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Jimmy Kimmel has ridiculed Donald Trump over his obsession with crowd sizes.

During his latest rally in Uniondale, Long Island, the former president boasted that he draws bigger crowds than Elvis Presley.

“So I call up my wife, and I’d say, ‘Baby, who can draw crowds like me’,” Trump told attendees. “Nobody, nobody can. I’m the greatest of all time, maybe greater even than Elivs. Elvis had a guitar. I don’t have the privilege of a guitar.”

Finishing Trump’s thought on the latest episode of Jimmy Kimmel Live!, the late-night host joked: “Thanks to my tiny baby hands, I am unable to play the guitar.”

Kimmel continued: “As ‘disgraceland’ was boasting about having bigger crowds than Elvis, people started getting bored and leaving the arena.”

Showing footage of a half-emptied arena, he noted: “This is how his big rally wrapped up in Uniondale. Elvis hadn’t left the building, but half the crowd had.”

Despite the footage, police estimated that 50,000 people showed up for the rally, which took place following the second attempt on his life last weekend, according to local New York news station PIX 11. It marked one of Trump’s largest rallies of his re-election campaign.

Trump has become increasingly consumed with the size of his campaign rally crowds.

Last month, he falsely declared that attendance at his rally on January 6, 2021 – prior to the attack on the Capitol – rivaled the size of the crowd that Martin Luther King Jr drew to watch his “I have a dream” speech in August 1963.

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Vice President Kamala Harris capitalized on Trump’s obsession during their first presidential debate, baiting him into responding to her claim that his supporters leave rallies early out of “exhaustion and boredom.”

“People don’t leave my rallies,” Trump fired back. “We have the biggest rallies, the most incredible rallies in the history of politics.”

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Kimmel also played a clip of Trump’s recent interview on Fox News, in which he complained that the ABC debate moderators fact-checked “everything I said.”

“And the audience, they went crazy,” Trump claimed, with Kimmel interrupting to state that “there was no audience.”

“The debate was held in an empty room. There was no audience. I mean, is he losing his mind, or does he lie so automatically he doesn’t even know it anymore,” the comedian added. “At least in the past, when he exaggerated the size of the crowd, there was a crowd.”

Watching Fox News these days is like being at open-mic night at a marginal comedy club.

Rightwing pundits, like a lineup of amateur comics, are trying out their new material and hoping it kills. So far, not so much.

Take Jesse Watters (please). The primetime successor to Tucker Carlson was grasping at straws – yes, literal straws – the other day as he looked for a way to put down Tim Walz. How best to mock the popular Minnesota governor who is Kamala Harris’s running mate?

“Women love masculinity and women do not like Tim Walz, so that should just tell you about how masculine Tim Walz is,” Watters said on the roundtable talk show he co-hosts, The Five.

With that setup, he tried to prove his point.

“The other day you saw him with a vanilla ice-cream shake. Had a straw in it. Again, that tells you everything.”

The joke, or whatever it was, didn’t really land. Most people know that Walz is the opposite of a wimp. He’s a famously regular guy – America’s dad – who will use his newfound power to demand that all Americans own jumper cables and know how to use them.

The straw-grasping is getting a little desperate these days as Harris and Walz spread their forward-looking message, and as their rivals – the felon and adjudicated sex offender Donald Trump and his running mate, JD Vance – prove themselves less appealing by the day.

“Fox is really feeling the loss of Tucker Carlson right now,” theorized Matt Gertz, a senior fellow at Media Matters, the progressive media-watchdog non-profit, who watches a lot of rightwing cable news as part of his job.

“He was very effective at lifting something from the rightwing fever swamp and making it into a coherent message” that could spread through the conservative ecosystem.

Failing Tucker’s contributions to the commonweal, Fox and its pundits are floundering. They keep trying new approaches to replace their well-honed attacks on Biden – his family’s supposed corruption (“Biden crime family”) and his age (“senile”).

Over the past week, Fox tried to gin up controversy over Harris’s “code-switching” – the use of a different accent or speaking style when speaking to Black audiences. Fox’s White House correspondent Peter Doocy pressed the question at an official press briefing.

“Since when does the vice-president have what sounds like a southern accent?” Doocy demanded. The press secretary, Karine Jean-Pierre, dismissed him and moved on after posing a query of her own: “Do you think Americans seriously think this is an important question?”

Maria Bartiromo focused on this “southern accent” scandal on her Fox Business show, using a clip of Harris speaking to an audience in Detroit about how unions have helped win benefits for all Americans, like paid sick leave and a five-day work week, by repeating the phrase: “You’d better thank a union member.”

The pro-Trump cable network didn’t help its own cause with that one. “The funny thing about Fox News being mad at Harris for code-switching,” one observer noted on X, “is they had to play the clip of her talking about how great unions are over and over again.” You can’t buy that kind of media exposure.

The well-circulated photograph of Tim Walz’s family members wearing pro-Trump T-shirts fizzled, too, though it got a good ride on Fox for a day or two. Soon enough, it became clear that these were mostly distant cousins, a Nebraska branch of the family. Walz’s sister told the Associated Press she didn’t even recognize them. Walz does have an older brother who favors Trump, but most Americans are familiar with family disputes over politics.

Gertz told me that Fox pundits were sent reeling by Harris’s ascension and are “very shook by the ‘weird’ narrative” that Tim Walz has popularized. That’s the idea that Trump, Vance and their ilk are deeply strange people – way out of the mainstream with their nasty putdowns of “childless cat ladies” and their outlandish conspiracy theories. It applies all too well to the Fox personalities as well as the politicians they promote.

There’s time, of course, for Fox to come up with an effective message. Until something hits, we’re going to see a lot of painful tryouts.

The alternative, of course, is obvious: just don’t turn it on.

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28 years after Lyle and Erik Menéndez were sentenced to life in prison for murdering their parents, Kitty and José, Netflix is revisiting their case with the new drama Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story.

From the mind of Ryan Murphy, the new Netflix series will take viewers through the notorious American murders with a star-studded cast including Chloe Sevigny, Javier Bardem, Ari Graynor, Dallas Roberts, and Nathan Lane. Lyle will be played by Hollywood newcomer Nicolas Alexander Chavez, while Cooper Koch will take on the role of Erik.

Sevigny and Bardem play the role of Kitty and José, respectively.

The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story is the second instalment in Murphy’s controversial Monsters saga. In 2022, he revisited the exploits of the “Milwaukee Cannibal” in Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story. The series was a tremendous hit, reaching 1 billion hours of views in its first 60 days and prompting widespread debate about the glamorisation of murderers.

In the new drama, Murphy will widen the scope of the case to include the harrowing sexual abuse Lyle and Erik alleged to have been perpetrated by their father.

Lyle and Erik were arrested for first-degree murder and conspiracy to commit murder outside their home in March of 1990. They were then sentenced to life in prison in 1996. In 2024, new evidence has the potential to set them free.

With the release of the fresh true crime rendition, here is a run-through of all the cast members and how they compare to their real-life counterparts.

Nicolas Alexander Chavez as Lyle Menéndez

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Chavez, 25, will be assuming the role of Lyle, the older Menéndez brother and a former Princeton University student. Lyle was suspended from Princeton for an entire year after he was accused of plagiarizing. After his parents’ murders, he spent $300,000 on a down payment for a chicken wing restaurant called Chuck’s Spring Street Cafe.

Viewers may recognize Chavez from General Hospital and Crushed.

Cooper Koch as Erik Menéndez

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The younger Menéndez brother will be played by Koch, the 28-year-old star from Less Than Zero, They/Them, Swallowed, and A New York Christmas Wedding. Erik Menéndez was bound for the University of California Los Angeles before he was arrested for the murder of his parents.

However, before his parents’ death, his father had told him he wasn’t allowed to move in to the dorms. José wanted him to continue living at home and commute to school from Beverly Hills.

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Chloe Sevigny as Kitty Menéndez

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Sevigny, the 49-year-old actress and model celebrated for her roles in American Psycho and The Act, will play Kitty Menéndez in the Netflix adaptation. Kitty, born Mary Louise Andersen, grew up in Wateseka, Illinois. During the Menéndez trial, Lyle testified that his mother had known about the abuse from his father and that she would also “beat and kick” him. According to crime investigator Rachel Pergament, Kitty’s father Charles abused her and her mother Mae Andersen.

Javier Bardem as José Menéndez

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Bardem, who is often known for playing characters with an unhinged verve, will be assuming the role of José Menéndez. The 55-year-old actor has starred in projects including No Country for Old Men, Skyfall, Eat, Pray, Love the new Dune franchise.

José, the patriarch of the Menéndez family, had fled from Cuba to a town in Pennsylvannia when he was a teenager. He attended Southern Illinois University where he met Kitty and lived in New York before eventually settling in Beverly Hills as an entertainment executive. In 1996, Erik said he thought his father was a part of the Mafia.

Ari Graynor as Leslie Abramson

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Graynor, the star of Bad Teacher and The Sopranos, will play Leslie Abramson, Erik’s defense attorney in both trials. At the time, Abramson was a respected defense attorney in California with a proven track record of persuading juries against the death row penalty. Abramson remained close to Erik and Lyle even after the six-year turn of their two trials,

Dallas Roberts as Jerome Oziel

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Roberts, celebrated for his roles in Glass Onion (2022) and The Walking Dead, will be transformed into Dr Jerome Oziel. Oziel was Erik’s psychiatrist. In 1989, Erik confessed to killing his parents during a recorded session with Oziel. The therapist later turned in the tapes as evidence, leading to the brothers’ arrest.

Leslie Grossman as Judalon Smyth

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American Horror Story regular Grossman is taking on the role of Judalon Smyth, Oziel’s mistress. Smyth was listening behind Oziel’s door when Erik confessed to killing his parents. She was Oziel’s former client who became his secret lover. After the two split up, Smyth told the police Oziel had evidence that proved the two brothers were murderers.

Jason Butler Harner as Les Zoeller

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Harner, the 53-year-old actor of Ozark and Edge of Everything, will play Beverly Hills detective Les Zoeller. In addition to the Menéndez case, Zoeller worked on the Billionaire Boys Club Ponzi scheme. He passed away in 2021 after working in the BHPD for 30 years.

Nathan Lane as Dominick Dunne

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Lane, 68, will assume the role of Dominick Dunne, a writer and producer who wrote about the Menéndez trial. Lane is known for his roles in The Gilded Age, Only Murders in the Building, The Good Wife, Modern Family, and The Lion King.

Television coverage of the Paris 2024 Paralympics has reached hundreds of thousands more viewers than the Tokyo Games, with billions more minutes watched across terrestrial and streaming.

Going into the final weekend, Channel 4 said coverage of the Paralympics had reached 18.5 million individuals, equating to 30.4% of the TV population. The broadcaster has described its coverage as “the most accessible Games to date”, with improved British Sign Language and audio offering and audio descriptions.

At the halfway point of the Games, the number of viewers was 4% higher than at the same stage of Tokyo 2020, while streaming views were double. Viewers have spent more time with this year’s Paralympics too, watching 4.3 billion minutes across TV and streaming, up from 2.9 billion by the same stage of Tokyo 2020.

Team GB’s Tully Kearney winning gold in the Women’s 200m Freestyle S5 was among the most-watched moments, bringing in 1.6 million viewers.

Milly Pickles made her TV presenting debut at the games, covering badminton, archery, and conducting interviews with GB medallists for C4. When Pickles had her right leg amputated after an accident seven years ago, she found hope in the idea that she could one day compete in the Paralympics, and trained for a couple of years in the 100m, before focusing on her media career.

“For two years, I said to myself every day: I’ll be in the 2024 Paris Paralympics,” she told the Observer. “Even though it’s not doing a sport, I get to meet so many of the athletes and really understand what motivates them. I feel honoured to be in this position. I’ve loved it.”

Pickles is part of an expanded lineup of disabled presenters, reporters and commentators, from veterans like Ade Adepitan, Baroness Tanni Grey-Thompson and The Last Leg’s Adam Hills to fellow newcomers Rose Ayling-Ellis, comedian Fats Timbo, and actor Lenny Rush.

Disabled people are still vastly underrepresented in the UK TV industry. In 2022, only 8.2% of on-screen and 6.5% of off-screen contributions were made by disabled people. Yet 18% of the UK population is disabled.

“For people who are struggling, they might be newly disabled or haven’t had much exposure to people like them, it’s just so reassuring to know you’re not alone,” Pickles said. “When you can see something that you relate to, it helps you have more self-belief that you’re capable too. That is priceless.”

C4’s coverage of previous Paralympics has incorporated BSL and audio description into repeats of daily highlights and comedy show The Last Leg. This year, the daily highlights had live audio description available during live broadcasts, with BSL versions of both programmes broadcast simultaneously on 4Seven. Live sports coverage, presented by Clare Balding and Ayling-Ellis, has featured BSL every afternoon, while live audio description has been part of evening coverage.

Pickles praised efforts to make Paralympics coverage more accessible, and said measures have extended behind the scenes too. “Channel 4 and the Paralympics are showcasing and paving the way for how TV should be done,” she said. “They really are practising what they preach behind the scenes … but it’s going to be a crazy reality when we go back to normal and things are not accessible any more.”

Pickles said witnessing the athletes in action has been “eye-opening” and rekindled her own interest in competing: “I admire them so much. It takes so much skill and mental strength.”

GB athlete Hannah Moore was one of the first disabled people that Pickles met after losing her leg. Moore took home a bronze medal in the triathlon and Pickles had the chance to interview her. “It was a really nice full circle moment to be sat there with her,” Pickles said. “I get to showcase these incredible athletes to the world. No words can describe how that feels.”