Keith Olbermann Slams Bill Maher for ‘Prostituting Himself' Over Trump Dinner Praise: ‘This Is So He Can Keep His HBO Show'
Media firebrand Keith Olbermann has unleashed a scathing rebuke of comedian and HBO/Max host Bill Maher for Maher's praise for President Donald Trump following a dinner set up by Kid Rock.
Taking to X (formerly Twitter), Olbermann dismissed the dinner as a transactional move to preserve Maher's career, directly attacking Maher's character and motivations.
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'BTW don't overanalyze Maher prostituting himself to Trump,' Olbermann wrote in a post. 'Maher works for the same fascists at Warner who took over and corrupted CNN.'
Olbermann, who has had a long and often combative career in media, claimed personal knowledge of Maher stretching back nearly five decades.
'I've known Bill since 1978. He was a shameless opportunist with no real principles then and he remains so,' he added. 'This is so he can keep his HBO show.'
The outburst came in response to Maher's recent monologue on his late night show 'Real Time with Bill Maher,' in which the host attempted to downplay the dinner with Trump — arranged by musician Kid Rock — as anything more than a social encounter. Maher opened his segment by mocking the media and public for blowing the meeting out of proportion: 'Let me first say that to all the people who treated this like it was some sort of summit meeting, 'You're ridiculous,'' Maher said on his show.
The remarks signaled a softening or at least a personal re-evaluation of Trump from Maher, who's previously critical of the former president. It was only two weeks ago, on a March 28 episode, that he delivered a segment titled 'Trump Devotion Syndrome,' when the 69-year-old comedian mocked and skewered MAGA.
But that nuance was lost on Olbermann, who interpreted the meeting and Maher's remarks as little more than damage control to maintain his standing within the Warner Bros. Discovery media company, which oversees HBO and CNN —both of which Olbermann accuses of ideological drift.
Whether Maher's dinner with Trump will have long-term consequences for his credibility or ratings remains to be seen. But in the court of public opinion, the battle lines are already being drawn, and Olbermann has made it clear which side he's on.
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Forbes
13 minutes ago
- Forbes
Why Hollywood Stars Make Bank On Broadway—For Producers
George Clooney could not have asked for a much bigger or better Broadway debut. Good Night, and Good Luck—the show he cowrote, produced and stars in—is nominated for five Tony Awards at this Sunday's ceremony, including Clooney for Best Actor, and has broken weekly box office records as the highest-grossing non-musical play in history. Its penultimate performance on Saturday will be broadcast live on CNN and HBO Max, a first for a Broadway show. Through 12 weeks of its 13-week run, the stage adaptation of the showdown between journalist Edward R. Murrow and Senator Joseph McCarthy has grossed more on Broadway ($44 million) than its source material. The 2005 film of the same name cowritten and directed by Clooney, earned just $32 million at the domestic box office despite earning six Oscar nominations, including Best Picture and Director. But this much is clear—Clooney didn't come to Broadway for the money. Forbes estimates the 64-year-old Clooney will earn $6 million in salary and gross royalties for his numerous roles in the show, more than any other theater performer over that span, but a fraction of what Hollywood's highest-paid actors can expect to make on each movie project. For last year's Wolfs, for instance, Forbes estimates Apple paid Clooney and his co-star Brad Pitt $30 million each. Whether it's the purity or the prestige of acting on stage—"Movies will make you famous, television will make you rich, but theatre will make you good," the Broadway stalwart Terrence Mann famously quipped—A-list stars like Clooney have become a vital of the Broadway ecosystem. Denzel Washington and Jake Gyllenhaal currently headline Othello, while Kieren Culkin, Bob Odenkirk and Bill Burr lead Glengarry Glen Ross. In April, Gladiator II star Paul Mescal wrapped up a run in A Streetcar Named Desire. And the 2024 theater season included Robert Downey Jr., Rachel McAdams, Steve Carrell, Eddie Redmayne and Jeremy Strong, all leading non-musical plays that ran 10-16 weeks with a hard closing date to accommodate the actors' busy schedules. While Hollywood stars have made appearances on Broadway for decades, in recent years, producers and investors have been increasingly eager to stage these short-run, star-driven productions, which considerably lower their financial risk. A play typically requires a $6 to $9 million investment to get to opening night, compared to $20-25 million for new musicals, according to Forbes estimates. Weekly operating costs run in the $400,000-$600,000 range for plays versus $800,000-$900,000 for musicals. 'Your likelihood of losing all your money [as an investor] is near zero, because of the projections of sales based on that actor," says Jason Turchin, a Tony-winning producer and founder of the Broadway Investors Club. 'You may not make multiples back but you should get a healthy return.' Good Night, and Good Luck, for example, recouped its initial $9.5 million investment just seven and a half weeks into its run. Othello and Glengarry Glen Ross made their money back ($9 million and $7.5 million respectively) in nine weeks. Reputation, Reputation, Reputation: Stars such as Othello's Jake Gyllenhaal and Denzel Washington can sell out limited-edition runs on Broadway and then return to the more lucrative world of movies. While the upside of these shows is capped by the limited run, investors can expect to make 10-30% return on their capital, Turchin says. Considering only about a quarter of all Broadway shows fully pay back their investors, or less, it's the kind of safe bet he believes producers will lean into even more in future years. A-list stars meanwhile, some of whom are paid upwards of $20 million per movie, are typically given a minimum weekly salary—around $100,000 per week for the highest-level talent—as an advance against a percentage of the show's net gross, after expenses such as credit card fees and theater restoration charges are deducted from the raw receipts. An actor's gross royalty points are highly variable, but the top end can reach 10%. Other significant members of a show, such as the writers, producers, and directors, are either paid royalties from a small percentage of the gross or a larger percentage of a show's profits after recoupment. For ongoing shows, almost all have moved toward paying out of the profits to mitigate risk, but for sure-thing star vehicles—say, Hugh Jackman's year-long run in the 2022 revival of The Music Man—the standard is gross participation. Clooney's Good Night, and Good Luck deal would include net gross points for starring, cowriting, producing and owning the underlying IP, adding up to his impressive total. Until this year, a Broadway actor's gross percentage only modestly exceeded the weekly minimums. Most hits gross just over $1 million per week, and over the run of a show, a star performer could expect to earn between $1-3 million. But if you're the type of actor who has made a fortune playing a superhero (Jackman), selling a tequila company (Clooney) or being one of the most bankable box office draws of the last 30 years (Washington), the money matters less. What's changed in the 2025 season is that producers are realizing just how far they can push the ticket pricing with a bankable star, particularly for the most expensive seats. Average ticket prices for Good Night, and Good Luck, Othello and Glengarry Glen Ross hover between $250-$400, and premium seats have routinely sold in the $700-$900 range, more than double the cost of top tickets to last year's star-driven plays or long-running hits like Wicked and Hamilton. Of the shows that started their runs in March, they account for three of the top four highest-grossers on Broadway, with Good Night, and Good Luck and Othello averaging more than $3 million per week, and Clooney's show cracking the previously untouchable $4 million threshold for non-musicals on three occasions. For deep-pocketed theatergoers, the appeal of seeing a movie star perform live has proven immune to traditional hurdles for other shows, such as negative reviews. According to Broadway review aggregator Did They Like It?, Good Night, and Good Luck received eight positive reviews, 9 mixed reviews and four negative reviews from major critics. Othello logged two positive reviews, 15 mixed reviews and three negative, and was completely shut out at the Tony Awards. Yet ticket sales remain robust. Last year's Robert Downey Jr.-led McNeal—his Broadway debut—was one of the worst reviewed shows of the season (one positive, five mixed, eight negative) and grossed $14 million across its 12-week run. Compare that to a play like John Proctor Is The Villain—a revisionist telling of Arthur Miller's The Crucible starring Sadie Sink of Stranger Things—which received 17 positive reviews, three mixed and one negative, plus seven Tony nominations, but averages less than $500,000 in weekly grosses, and one can quickly see the disconnect. "It does seem that theatergoers want to see Hollywood celebrities, in the same space at the same time. They crave that experience,' says one major Broadway dealmaker. 'And for the star? A standing ovation from a thousand people every night doesn't hurt the ego.'
Yahoo
an hour ago
- Yahoo
The Trump administration revives an old intimidation tactic: the polygraph machine
A version of this story appeared in CNN's What Matters newsletter. To get it in your inbox, sign up for free here. When President Ronald Reagan's White House threatened thousands of government officials with polygraph exams, supposedly to protect classified data (but probably also to control press leaks), his Secretary of State George Shultz threatened to resign. Reagan's White House backed down and agreed to impose the tests only for those suspected of espionage, according to a 1985 New York Times report. In terms of catching spies, polygraph tests failed spectacularly in key moments. More on that in a moment. First, consider the second Trump administration, which is leaning in on polygraphs, presumably to ferret out leakers, but also as an apparent method of intimidation. 'The polygraph has been weaponized and is being used against individuals who have never had a polygraph requirement, whether pre-employment or security, in their entire federal careers,' said Mark Zaid, an attorney who specializes in representing people who work in national security, after a slew of published reports about polygraph threats throughout the Trump administration. The tests are frequently being used to identify not leaks of classified information but rather 'unclassified conversations regarding policy or embarrassing decisions that have made their way through the rumor mill or directly to the media,' said Zaid, who has previously testified before Congress about the use of polygraphs and sued federal agencies for their practices. ► At the FBI, the New York Times reports, an increased use of polygraphs has 'intensified a culture of intimidation' for agents. ► At the Pentagon, officials publicly threatened to conduct polygraph tests as part of an effort to figure out how the press learned that Elon Musk was scheduled to get a classified briefing about China, which a billionaire with business interests in China probably should not get. It's not clear if polygraph tests were ultimately administered as part of the probe, according to CNN's report. ► At the Department of Homeland Security, according to CNN, polygraph tests have been used on FEMA and FAA officials in addition to those in more traditional national security roles. Administration officials have defended the practice as a way to protect government information. DHS Secretary Kristi Noem defended the use of polygraph tests during an interview on CBS in March. 'The authorities that I have under the Department of Homeland Security are broad and extensive,' she said. Previously, per Zaid, polygraphs have been used as a sort of 'weeding device,' not unlike a physical fitness test for large pools of applicants to national security and law enforcement roles. After that, some employees — particularly in the intelligence community — may be given exams every five or 10 years, sort of like a random drug test. What's happening now is something different. Polygraph tests are 'being used against individuals who have never had a polygraph requirement, whether for pre-employment or security, in their entire federal careers,' Zaid said. Most Americans have never been subjected to a polygraph, and that's in large part because Congress acted to largely outlaw them from use in the public sector in 1988, a time when millions of Americans were being polygraphed each year and companies were using them to bar people from jobs and conduct coercive internal investigations. For an example of why polygraphs were problematic, look back at an old '60 Minutes' segment in which Diane Sawyer submits to an exam and hidden cameras are used to show how the bias of the examiner affects results. 'If you're trying to find one leaker in an organization of 100 people, you could end up falsely accusing dozens of people,' according to Amit Katwala, author of the polygraph history Tremors in the Blood: Murder, Obsession and the Birth of the Lie Detector. 'And you might not even catch the culprit — there's no evidence to suggest that an actual lie detector is even scientifically possible,' he told me in an email. The Employee Polygraph Protection Act was signed into law in 1988 by Reagan, years after his showdown with Shultz. But the law kept polygraphs for the public sector, particularly for national security and law enforcement. In the national security world, the principle of protecting the innocent is 'flipped on its head,' according to Zaid. 'We would rather ruin 99 innocent people's careers than let the one new Ed Snowden, Aldrich Ames or Robert Hanssen get through,' he said. If polygraphs have a spotty record in detecting lies, they have a horrible record in detecting spies. A Senate Intelligence Committee report from 1994 explores how the CIA officer Aldrich Ames, who spied for the KGB, evaded detection for years in part because he passed multiple polygraph exams. At the same time, the same report describes how another CIA employee who aided the KGB, Edward Lee Howard, did so in part because he felt jilted by the CIA after he was fired for failing a polygraph exam. Then there was the shocking trial of FBI official and Russian spy Robert Hanssen, who had never been given a polygraph in his career, there was an uptick in their use at some agencies, including the FBI and the Department of Energy. At the turn of the 21st century, the US government commissioned a large-scale report on the efficacy of the polygraph undertaken by a special committee at the National Research Council. They found the scientific evidence on polygraphs to be more than lacking. 'As a nation, we should not allow ourselves to continue to be blinded by the aura of the polygraph,' Stephen Feinberg, the Carnegie Mellon professor who led the study, testified before Congress. Ames offered his assessment of the polygraph machine in a letter from prison published in 2000, calling the polygraph 'junk science that just won't die' and saying it is most useful as an instrument of coercion. 'It depends upon the overall coerciveness of the setting — you'll be fired, you won't get the job, you'll be prosecuted, you'll go to prison — and the credulous fear the device inspires,' he wrote. Polygraphs are frequently used in criminal investigations, but rarely used in court. The idea behind the polygraph, which was first developed in the '20s, is that lying causes stress. The examiner hooks a person up to monitors that gauge things like blood pressure and fingertip sweat. A pre-interview helps formulate common questions that create a baseline and reactions to more probing questions are compared to that baseline. But it's not a scientific process, and it can be beaten, or misled, since at its core the machine is simply measuring physiological responses. Frequently, incriminating information is offered by nervous exam-takers who don't understand exactly how the process works. Pop culture often suggests that when a person is hooked up to a polygraph machine, their lies will be detected. But that is not exactly true. 'The polygraph works because we think it works. It's a tool of psychological coercion in an already intimidating environment—particularly when it has the weight of the federal government behind it,' Katwala told me. But the intimidation is probably the point. 'Using the polygraph may not help you catch the leakers, but the idea of it could well scare any potential future leakers into keeping their mouths shut,' Katwala said. The man credited with fully developing the polygraph, a Berkeley police officer named John Larson, who also had a PhD in psychology, would later turn on his invention as unreliable, according to Katwala. Larson was inspired by the truth-telling machine of William Marston, himself a psychologist, but one with an active imagination and a flair for the theatrical. Zaid described him as the PT Barnum of polygraphy. Here's a video of Marston using a polygraph-like machine and claiming to identify the varying emotions of blonde, brunette and redheaded women. His conclusion was that redheads like to gamble, brunettes are looking for love and blondes are easiest to scare. Okay. Marston also invented the comic book hero Wonder Woman, with her Lasso of Truth. Katwala warns that there are new technologies being developed with the help of AI or revolving around brain waves, but he argues they should be viewed just with the same skepticism as the polygraph machine. 'None of them get past the Pinocchio's nose problem — everyone's different, and something that works for one person might not work for everyone,' he said. But they could all be used in the same coercive way as the polygraph machine.
New York Post
2 hours ago
- New York Post
The best revelations from the ‘Billy Joel: And So It Goes' documentary premiere at Tribeca Film Festival
It was a Billy Joel state of mind at the opening night of the Tribeca Film Festival. The world premiere of the Piano Man's documentary 'Billy Joel: And So It Goes' kicked off the 24th edition of the festival at the Beacon Theatre on Wednesday night. Although the 76-year-old music legend was absent from his big night after revealing his shocking brain disorder diagnosis two weeks ago, Joel's presence was still very much felt as the audience watched the first half of the two-part doc that will premiere on HBO and HBO Max later this summer. 9 'Billy Joel: And So It Goes' will premiere on HBO and HBO Max later this summer. Getty Images for Tribeca Festival 9 Tribeca Festival co-founders Robert De Niro and Jane Rosenthal introduced 'Billy Joel: And So It Goes.' Getty Images for Tribeca Festival Here, we break down some of the biggest revelations of Part 1: He wanted to be a heavy-metal rocker While we always think of Joel as the ultimate piano balladeer, he actually wanted to get his Led Zeppelin on with an early band. The young Piano Man broke away from his early band The Hassles with Jon Small to form the heavy-metal duo Attila (as in Attila the Hun) in 1969 that set out to 'destroy the world with amplification.' 'I didn't know one person that liked what we were doing,' says Joel, who can be seen as the hair apparent to Robert Plant in the doc. 'But I did.' Joel broke his bandmate's heart by stealing his best friend's wife 9 Billy Joel married Elizabeth Weber in 1973, and she went on to become his manager. Getty Images for Tribeca Festival The Piano Man fell in love with Elizabeth Weber, who was Small's wife at the time. 'I was just in love with a woman,' he says. 'And I got punched in the nose, which I deserved.' But Small took the high road after Weber inspired Joel's 1971 debut, 'Cold Spring Harbor.' 'You could tell from the lyrics that he was really in love with Elizabeth,' Small says of songs such as 'She's Got a Way.' He attempted suicide after falling into depression over the affair 9 Elizabeth Weber and son Sean Weber-Small attended the Tribeca Festival premiere of 'Billy Joel: And So It Goes.' Getty Images for Tribeca Festival 'I was just in a lot of pain .. so I just thought I'd end it all,' he says of trying to take his own life by overdosing on sleeping pills. But after surviving the attempt, he cracked 'You can't even do yourself in,' while revealing the compassion he was shown by his betrayed best friend through the ordeal: 'Jon saved my life.' Joel was performing as Billy Martin when he was inspired to write 'Piano Man' 9 Billy Joel was unable to attend the Tribeca Festival premiere of his new doc because of his brain disorder diagnosis. Getty Images for Tribeca Festival After he moved cross-country to Los Angeles with Weber to make more music, Joel became the resident lounge lizard at the Executive Room in LA. But he didn't want to perform under his recording moniker, so the artist born William Martin Joel performed as 'Bill Martin at the keyboards' after his first and middle names. 'This was a real-life experience,' he says. 'And I thought, 'I gotta get a song outta this!' … And that's where the 'Piano Man' song came from.' The Plano Man didn't like being compared to the Rocket Man 9 Billy Joel resisted attempts to make him work with Elton John's band in the '70s. Getty Images When it was suggested that Joel use Elton John's band, he thought that it was 'a terrible idea.' 'Why would I wanna work with another well-known piano player's band?' he says. 'The lack of imagination was staggering. And I was already having critical issue with them comparing me to Elton.' Beatles producer be damned, he stayed loyal to his band 9 'Billy Joel: And So It Goes' directors Susan Lacy and Jessica Levin attended the Tribeca Festival premiere of their doc. Getty Images After Joel said goodbye to Hollywood and returned to New York with his now wife and soon-to-be manager Weber, he sought out famed Beatles producer George Martin to work on what would be 1977's 'The Stranger.' Martin agreed, but he wanted Joel to use studio musicians instead of the New York crew he had formed on 1976's 'Turnstiles' — a dealbreaker for him. 'And I passed on working with George Martin,' he says. 'Love me, love my band.' Joel thought 'Just the Way You Are' was 'too mushy' 9 Billy Joel's first wife Elizabeth Weber was the inspiration behind his first Top 10 hit, 'Just the Way You Are.' Getty Images 'Just the Way You Are' — the second single from 'The Stranger,' which would become a US Top 10 hit — was inspired by his wife and then manager Weber. 'It just didn't feel right, it was too mushy,' says Joel. But after being pushed to be a single by Weber — not to mention Linda Ronstadt and Phoebe Snow — his breakthrough ballad won Grammys for Record and Song of the Year and took Joel to a whole new level of stardom. He was an arena headliner now. He faced backlash from Catholics for 'Only the Good Die Young' The 'Only the Good Die Young' lyric, 'You Catholic girls start much too late,' drew the ire of the church. 'It ended up being banned by the Catholic church,' he says. 'And then, as soon as they banned the sale of it, kids went out in droves [to buy it].' 9 Billy Joel wrote 'You May Be Right' after his ex-wife confronted him about riding his motorcyle while drunk. Getty Images Joel's drinking problem led to 'You May Be Right' — and the end of his marriage As Joel's drinking problem worsened, he took to riding his motorcycle while intoxicated. And when he drunkenly rode his bike to Weber one night, it inspired his 1980 hit 'You May Be Right' with the lyrics 'You may be right/I may be crazy/But it just may be a lunatic you're looking for.' But after Joel had an accident while riding his Harley-Davidson in 1978, it crashed their marriage. 'I was amazed that I was still alive,' he says. 'I should've died in that accident.'
