
Watch: 'Weird Al' Yankovic leads star-studded Coldplay kiss cam spoof
July 22 (UPI) -- "Weird Al" Yankovic and Lin-Manuel Miranda led a star-studded Coldplay kiss cam spoof on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert Monday.
The duo performed the Coldplay song "Viva la Vida," and then spotlighted several "couples" in the audience.
The parody was a nod to the recent controversy surrounding Astronomer's former CEO Andy Byron, who was spotted with the company's HR head, Kristin Cabot, at a Coldplay concert last week.
When the "kiss cam" zoomed in on Byron and Cabot, who are married to other people, Byron ducked and Cabot covered her face.
"Either they're having an affair or they're just very shy," said the band's frontman Chris Martin.
The moment has circulated widely online and inspired countless spoofs since. Byron subsequently resigned from Astronomer.
As Yankovic and Miranda sang, the camera zoomed in on several "couples," portrayed by Anderson Cooper and Andy Cohen, Jimmy Fallon and Seth Meyers, and Adam Sandler and Christopher McDonald.
Colbert said the song was an effort to cheer up his fans after the news that The Late Show, which has been on the air since 1993, has been canceled.

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USA Today
14 minutes ago
- USA Today
Book alleges Gwyneth Paltrow's 'cult' of Goop hid 'difficult,' 'toxic' workplace
Gwyneth Paltrow may be running defense as a temporary spokesperson for Astronomer after its now-former CEO's Coldplay concert drama, but a new biography is more interested in how she runs her own empire. 'Gwyneth' by culture and fashion journalist Amy Odell maps Paltrow from Hollywood nepo baby to household name to controversial wellness figure. The biography is based on interviews with over 220 sources, but Paltrow declined to speak for it. 'Gwyneth' (out now from Simon & Schuster) spans the star's life and includes a behind-the-scenes look at her relationship to Brad Pitt, her marriage and 'conscious uncoupling' to Coldplay's Chris Martin and her journey to Oscar-winning fame. Perhaps the most fascinating peek behind the curtain, however, comes at her career transition to Goop guru. How Gwyneth Paltrow's out-of-touch lifestyle led to Goop If there is one central theme in this deep dive of all things Paltrow, it's the actress' unrelatability extends much farther back than her jade egg shenanigans. When promoting 'Emma' in 1997, Paltrow requested a private plane for herself and 10 friends, a penthouse suite at the Ritz where only her friends would be allowed and Mercedes vehicles to chauffeur her and her friends around, the book says. The plane ride alone cost Miramax $200,000 in today's dollars, Odell writes. And when she filmed 'Shallow Hal' alongside Jack Black, her team requested her lodgings be distant from the rest of the cast and crew. But what kickstarted Paltrow's slide into the luxury wellness sphere was her father's throat cancer. While Bruce Paltrow was in denial about his health, Odell writes, Gwyneth took charge of hers – 'I felt I could heal him by proxy,' Gwyneth wrote in The Guardian. It was around this time that she was promoting 'Shallow Hal' (a poorly aged comedy in and of itself) and began sharing often unfounded comments about her health, like that her liver 'wouldn't drop down' during yoga because of her diet, Odell writes. Around the mid-2000s, she became disillusioned with the film industry and asked her 'Spain… on the Road Again' producer Charlie Pinsky what her next move should be. Her ideas of food and home improvement projects seemed something like 'the next Martha Stewart' to Pinsky, but he insisted she focus on motherhood as her brand, Odell writes. She didn't take his advice. Branding expert Peter Arnell helped her come up with the name and fine-tune the vision for Goop. Biography alleges Goop as a 'sometimes-toxic environment' Behind the scenes of the clean marketing and health promises, employees Odell spoke with described Goop as 'one of the most difficult working environments they had ever encountered.' Odell says the employee said they 'never felt less well in my life than during my time there.' Paltrow had a 'capricious, indirect leadership style' that led to anger and resentment. Her close relationships with some employees 'blurred the lines between professional and personal,' Odell writes – she had her food editor double as a personal chef, making her lunch and even sometimes dinner for her and husband Brad Falchuk. Some employees described the office culture as "noxious and chaotic," Odell writes. She describes writers as overworked and underpaid, expected to be on call at all times, with some employees pulling over on the side of the road while driving to answer work messages. Paltrow offered employees a two-week 'Goopcation' but still expected employees to respond to her messages during that time. Gwyneth Paltrow ruffled feathers at Condé Nast over Goop fact-checking As Goop's influence ballooned, it treaded further and further into debunked wellness fads like vaginal steaming, bone broth diets and vaginal jade eggs (for which Goop was fined $145,000 in 2018 for unsubstantiated medical claims). Paltrow has seen herself as a crusader for little-known women's health topics, though medical experts abhor her 'vigilante health journalism,' Odell writes. According to Odell's reporting, "neither Gwyneth nor Goop's board nor its investors were concerned about these controversies." When Condé Nast and Anna Wintour tapped Goop for a magazine partnership in 2017, the deal fell apart after only two issues because Paltrow and Goop wouldn't comply with Condé Nast's fact-checking standards. There was also a power struggle over whether Paltrow or Wintour had true control over the magazine. Paltrow wanted complete control to promote Goop's merchandise in the magazine, but Condé Nast feared it would alienate advertisers or compromise integrity. Odell reports that Wintour and Paltrow's relationship was a 'lovefest in the early days,' with the media mogul calling Paltrow 'baby' in meetings. But Wintour wanted the stories to be rigorously fact-checked, and Odell writes that Paltrow dismissed any criticism as 'patriarchal,' saying that she was 'finally illuminating truths that other outlets would not' about women's health, even if they weren't backed by science. Experts Odell spoke with for 'Gwyneth' liken Goop to a cult because of the way its foundational wellness beliefs tie into consumers' identities. 'Proponents of wellness have positioned it as necessary opposition to Big Ag and Big Pharma, conveniently ignoring (what) they've created: Big Wellness,' Odell writes. New celeb memoirs: Read tell-alls on aging, marriage and Beyoncé Clare Mulroy is USA TODAY's Books Reporter, where she covers buzzy releases, chats with authors and dives into the culture of reading. Find her on Instagram, subscribe to our weekly Books newsletter or tell her what you're reading at cmulroy@


UPI
15 minutes ago
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WWE 'Raw': Roman Reigns, Jey Uso fall to Bron Breakker, Bronson Reed
July 29 (UPI) -- Roman Reigns and Jey Uso were decimated during a wild brawl with Bron Breakker and Bronson Reed on WWE Raw. Chaos erupted as Uso faced off against Reed in a one-on-one match in the main event of Raw on Monday. Breakker made his way to the ring after Uso had gained the upper hand following a Suicide Dive from the ring. Breakker wasted no time in delivering a Spear to Uso on the entrance ramp, which ended the match in a disqualification. Breakker and Reed started to beat down Uso until his cousin, Reigns, ran down to the ring to even the odds. Reigns successfully cleared the ring despite not being able to lift up the over 300-pound Reed. The tables were turned, however, when Reigns and Uso decided to continue the fight outside the ring where their rivals were waiting. Breakker and Reed proceeded to quickly lay waste to the cousin duo. Reed performed a Tsunami on both men from the top rope, while Breakker ended things with a Spear that sent Reigns and Uso crashing through the side ring barrier. Breakker and Reed are a part of Seth Rollins' new cabal alongside manager Paul Heyman. Rollins, who holds the Money in the Bank briefcase, is currently out with an injury. Reigns and Uso will be teaming up to take on Breakker and Reed in a Tag Team match at SummerSlam this weekend, which takes place Aug. 2 and 3 at MetLife Stadium in East Rutherford, N.J. Rapper Cardi B serves as the host. SummerSlam will also feature Undisputed WWE Champion John Cena defending his title against Cody Rhodes and World Heavyweight Champion Gunther defending his title against CM Punk.


UPI
an hour ago
- UPI
Dusty Slay gets creative with clean comedy in 'Wet Heat'
July 29 (UPI) -- Dusty Slay's second full-length Netflix special, Wet Heat, is streaming Tuesday, and the stand-up comedian says it wasn't always clear to him that comedy was the right path. Slay, 43, told UPI in a recent phone interview that he was a fan of comedy from a young age, but his own aptitude for it came later. "I was always trying to make people laugh," he said. "But I moved to Charleston, South Carolina, from Alabama when I was 21. And about 2003, I moved with a friend and then we had some problems. So I moved out and got my own place and I didn't have any friends, so I took an improv class. And that's how I got into stand-up -- I took improv, and I did improv for a long time." He said the idea of doing stand-up professionally didn't enter the equation until around 2011. "I won a stand-up comedy competition," he recalled. "And I thought, 'Maybe I could do something with this.' So I started to take things a little more serious, and then in early 2012, I quit drinking, and things became very clear to me, and I got very good at comedy -- Well, I got good at comedy much faster. I wouldn't say I got very good right away, but I got much faster." Sober and clean Slay said giving up drinking didn't just make him better at comedy, it changed his entire approach. "Quitting drinking changed my whole life in a positive way. I never think of myself as an alcoholic, but I was most certainly a binge drinker that once I started drinking, it usually ended in some sort of a disaster. Not a tragedy, but I would black out and lose my friends and things like that," he said. Slay said he was "a bit of a maniac" when he was under the influence. "So much of my jokes were all about drinking. I would label myself an 'alcoholic' and I thought it was funny. I thought it was funny to drink too much and make bad decisions. But I was really living that lifestyle, so while I was making jokes about it, I was also falling apart in a lot of ways -- while still having fun. It just changed my life, and once I quit drinking, I no longer could make drinking jokes." Slay said quitting drinking was the first step toward becoming a clean comic -- but it wasn't the last. "I've always been on the cleaner side, but I had jokes here and there along the way that I would do that I wouldn't do now. ... I did a couple of shows where people asked me to be completely clean, and then when I would go through my set, I would be like, 'Oh, I'm losing some of my best jokes. I'm losing some of my best punchlines,'" he said. Slay said the final straw was when he got a write-up about a joke he told at a show. "I was the cleanest person on the lineup, yet I got the worst write-up because of this one joke. So I just said, 'You know what, I'll just be completely clean, but I still want to talk about the things I want to talk about, but I'll just find a new creative way to say that.'" He said being a clean comic forced him to get more inventive. "I had to find other words. I couldn't rely on shock," he said. On the road Slay said his favorite part of stand-up comedy is taking his act to different cities, but he has to strike a balance between going on the road and being around for his wife and kids. "I don't like to be gone for longer than a week, because I want to be home with my kids. But that's what comedy is to me. Now, if you live in New York, you live in LA, or maybe even Chicago ... you can get locked into a circuit where you're still getting to do a lot of comedy every night. But if you're not living in those cities, touring is what you have to do, and it is the most fun thing to me." The comedian, who lives with his family in Nashville, said two of his favorite venues are close to home: Zane's Comedy Club and the Grand Ole Opry. "I don't think it was until I did the Grand Old Opry that my dad actually took it serious, and by that point I had already done two late night [shows]," he said. Slay said he was surprised at the reception he received when he first started venturing out of the Southeast. "I remember the first time I went to Phoenix, I drove from Nashville to Phoenix to do comedy at Stand Up Live. And I thought, 'Man, this is too far out.' They're going to be like, 'Go back to the South.' And it was one of my most fun weekends. I just remember being so excited about how well it went," he said. Slay said he was shocked to find a similar reception in cities as far away as Portland, Ore., and Seattle. "I think a lot of it is because Charleston, although it's a very southern city, it is an artistic city and it's a bit of a snobby city with its art. So I had to learn to make artistic people laugh. Then when I started working the road, it was a different thing. I had to learn to make people on the road laugh, which a lot of these cities are not very artistic cities," he said. "I think I often get labeled as a 'Southern comic' when really a lot of times I do better in more artsy cities," Slay said. Comedy as music Wet Heat finds Slay talking quite a bit about one of his favorite subjects: music. He also frequently discusses his favorite artists on his podcast, We're Having a Good Time. Slay said he finds a lot of common ground between music and stand-up comedy. "I think that, in a way, our comedy bits are like our own little songs. They're our own little poems. When I do a full comedy special, I almost think about it like how someone would put out an album -- at least the older albums, where an album would be complete. You might have some themes from an earlier song that come back in a later song, and it ties the whole thing together," he said. He said his approach to putting together a special is inspired, in part, by the ways he analyzed Pink Floyd albums as a teenager. "We're very much in a phase of comedy where everybody wants clips, we all want our likes and we all want to go viral with a clip. But when I think about a special, I like to have a full-on, complete special that feels like I'm going in and out of little songs," he said. Dusty Slay: Wet Heat is streaming now on Netflix.