Latest news with #Parker
The Guardian
5 hours ago
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
Sarah Jessica Parker in possible conflict of interest over Booker longlisted author
An apparent conflict of interest has emerged over the Sex and the City star Sarah Jessica Parker's judging of this year's Booker prize. A production company run by the actor is reportedly in the process of developing a book written by Claire Adam, whose second novel, Love Forms, appears on this year's longlist, announced on Tuesday. Adam's debut novel, Golden Child, was published in the US in 2019 by SJP for Hogarth, the Penguin imprint for which Parker served as editorial director. It is being developed as a film by Parker's company Pretty Matches Productions and MA Productions. 'It is not uncommon for judges to have a connection to authors whose work has been submitted, so all judges have to declare any conflicts of interest at the outset,' said Gaby Wood, chief executive of the Booker Prize Foundation. 'As Sarah Jessica Parker published Claire Adam's first novel, Golden Child, under her US imprint SJP for Hogarth, she declared the potential conflict to ensure transparency and only gave her view on the book after the other judges had shared theirs. No book can go through if it is supported by one judge alone, and Love Forms has earned its place on the Booker prize 2025 longlist through the active support of other judges on the panel.' In an interview with the the Irish Times published in June, Adam said that the film option 'was bought by a small production company in LA (MA Productions), and we're all so thrilled that SJP's Pretty Matches Productions is on board as well. Film stuff moves slowly, there are a zillion obstacles, and her supporting the project is fantastic.' Pretty Matches Productions, founded in 2005, is also behind the Sex and the City sequel And Just Like That … and the HBO series Divorce, which Parker executive produced and starred in. In an interview with the Times in June, Adam said that Parker 'reads loads and so it was really fun to hang out with her. She's so lovely and sincere. She read the book cover to cover and got up at 5am to travel to meet me.' Golden Child is published in the UK by Faber, and in 2019 won the Desmond Elliott prize. In June 2023, Parker launched SJP Lit, in partnership with the independent publisher Zando, which has published titles including These Days by Lucy Caldwell and The Story of the Forest by Linda Grant. Parker also shares book recommendations on her Instagram account. Parker was announced as a judge of this year's Booker prize in December, with Wood saying at the time that she had 'enjoyed sharing book recommendations with Sarah Jessica, who has passionately supported contemporary fiction for many years'. The 2025 judging panel is chaired by Roddy Doyle, and Parker's co-judges are Ayọ̀bámi Adébáyọ̀, Kiley Reid and Chris Power. Adam was named as one of 13 longlisted authors, which include the former winner Kiran Desai, Tash Aw and David Szalay. The shortlist will be revealed on 23 September, with the winner announced on 10 November.
The Guardian
6 hours ago
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
Sarah Jessica Parker in possible conflict of interest over Booker longlisted author
An apparent conflict of interest has emerged over the Sex and the City star Sarah Jessica Parker's judging of this year's Booker prize. A production company run by the actor is reportedly in the process of developing a book written by Claire Adam, whose second novel, Love Forms, appears on this year's longlist, announced on Tuesday. Adam's debut novel, Golden Child, was published in the US in 2019 by SJP for Hogarth, the Penguin imprint for which Parker served as editorial director. It is being developed as a film by Parker's company Pretty Matches Productions and MA Productions. 'It is not uncommon for judges to have a connection to authors whose work has been submitted, so all judges have to declare any conflicts of interest at the outset,' said Gaby Wood, chief executive of the Booker Prize Foundation. 'As Sarah Jessica Parker published Claire Adam's first novel, Golden Child, under her US imprint SJP for Hogarth, she declared the potential conflict to ensure transparency and only gave her view on the book after the other judges had shared theirs. No book can go through if it is supported by one judge alone, and Love Forms has earned its place on the Booker prize 2025 longlist through the active support of other judges on the panel.' In an interview with the the Irish Times published in June, Adam said that the film option 'was bought by a small production company in LA (MA Productions), and we're all so thrilled that SJP's Pretty Matches Productions is on board as well. Film stuff moves slowly, there are a zillion obstacles, and her supporting the project is fantastic.' Pretty Matches Productions, founded in 2005, is also behind the Sex and the City sequel And Just Like That … and the HBO series Divorce, which Parker executive produced and starred in. In an interview with the Times in June, Adam said that Parker 'reads loads and so it was really fun to hang out with her. She's so lovely and sincere. She read the book cover to cover and got up at 5am to travel to meet me.' Golden Child is published in the UK by Faber, and in 2019 won the Desmond Elliott prize. In June 2023, Parker launched SJP Lit, in partnership with the independent publisher Zando, which has published titles including These Days by Lucy Caldwell and The Story of the Forest by Linda Grant. Parker also shares book recommendations on her Instagram account. Parker was announced as a judge of this year's Booker prize in December, with Wood saying at the time that she had 'enjoyed sharing book recommendations with Sarah Jessica, who has passionately supported contemporary fiction for many years'. The 2025 judging panel is chaired by Roddy Doyle, and Parker's co-judges are Ayọ̀bámi Adébáyọ̀, Kiley Reid and Chris Power. Adam was named as one of 13 longlisted authors, which include the former winner Kiran Desai, Tash Aw and David Szalay. The shortlist will be revealed on 23 September, with the winner announced on 10 November.
BBC News
9 hours ago
- Climate
- BBC News
Land's End to John O'Groats rowers 'won't stop' despite bad weather
A rowing team attempting a 900-mile (1,448km) journey from Land's End to John O'Groats to raise £57m for motor neurone disease (MND) research, say bad weather which forced them to change their route will not defeat four-strong team from Row 4 MND set off from Newlyn but were hampered by challenging weather 20 miles (32.1km) off the coast of member, Matt Parker, said the wind "was against us" and they had taken the decision on Sunday to change course to Milford Haven, off the Pembrokeshire coast in said they changed plans as "we're here to do something special" and were inspired by people with MND whose "big thing is doing everything with a smile on your face". Mr Parker said the message from the MND community had been "don't stop what you're doing".The crew's weather router and safety team came up with a couple of options to continue up the west coast "neither of which were low tariff or low risk", he could have rowed another 50 miles (80.4km) back to Ireland or waited another week for the weather to calm down."It was going to be another tough row and if we didn't make it, it was going to be very difficult to find a way of exiting. We wanted to carry on," Mr Parker said. Mr Parker swam ashore to the Welsh coast and travelled by taxi, train and car back home to pick up a trailer so the boat could be brought back to crew plan to now turn left and go anti-clockwise around the south coast of England, beginning at 22:00 BST on Tuesday, instead of heading up the west coast. They expect to reach The Lizard at 05:00 BST on Wednesday and aim to be at the south-east corner of England to row up the east coast late Friday or Saturday morning. He said the experienced team had more than 270 days of ocean experience between them and were resilient."Twenty four hours ago we thought we weren't going anywhere. If that means changing plans and asking people to help us, we're not shy of doing that," said Mr added the team had been motivated by messages from MND charities who told them: "The amount of money that you're trying to raise has the potential to fundamentally change what's going on."
Reuters
13 hours ago
- Business
- Reuters
Rating firms say US tariffs alone will not trigger EU sovereign downgrades
LONDON, July 29 (Reuters) - The sharp increase in U.S. trade tariffs on the European Union will not trigger immediate sovereign rating cuts, but could compound existing pressures, Fitch and other agencies said on Tuesday, while Moody's warned of the effect on exporting firms. One of Fitch's top sovereign analysts, Ed Parker, said the United States' baseline tariff of 15% on imports from the EU was in line with assumptions the rating agency has had since March and therefore did not materially shift its economic forecasts. Nevertheless, the 15% rate is a huge increase relative to the 1.2% rate of last year, he said. "We don't expect the increase in the tariff rate to directly drive EU rating changes on its own, but it could compound existing credit pressures," Parker told Reuters. Smaller European-based agency Scope Ratings and Morningstar DBRS echoed the view, with Scope's head of sovereign ratings, Alvise Lennkh-Yunus, saying the tariffs arrived "against a backdrop of accumulating economic shocks". At a sector level, Moody's warned that "the credit effects will be significant" for companies that export a lot to the United States, depend on complex global supply chains and have limited pricing power in their markets. That includes carmakers like Stellantis ( opens new tab and Volkswagen ( opens new tab, whose ratings Moody's recently downgraded. Large diversified European manufacturing companies like Siemens and ABB generate about 25% of their revenue in the United States. But they tend to follow local-for-local strategies, sourcing at least 80% of their procurement within the U.S. and should be able to pass at least some of the tariff increases on to customers. Uncertainty still remains about key goods such as semiconductors and pharmaceuticals. The pharmaceutical sector amounts to 25% of all EU exports to the U.S., analysts estimate. The exemption of aircraft components meanwhile eases expected tariff-related pressures for Airbus ( opens new tab and MTU Aero Engines ( opens new tab, "which reinforces our already positive outlook for the global aerospace and defence sector," Moody's said. It also said the 15% rate had been broadly in line with expectations it laid out when it cut its euro zone economic growth forecast for the year to below 1% in May. It did not give an EU-wide sovereign view, although it said Ireland, which it rates at Aa3 and has a 'positive' outlook on, was most exposed with total value-added exports to the U.S. accounting for around 8% of its GDP back in 2020.
Free Malaysia Today
13 hours ago
- Business
- Free Malaysia Today
Rating firms say US tariffs alone will not trigger EU sovereign downgrades
At a sector level, Moody's warned that 'the credit effects will be significant' for companies that export a lot to the US. (EPA Images pic) LONDON : The sharp increase in US trade tariffs on the EU will not trigger immediate sovereign rating cuts, but could compound existing pressures, Fitch and other agencies said today, while Moody's warned of the effect on exporting firms. One of Fitch's top sovereign analysts, Ed Parker, said the US' baseline tariff of 15% on imports from the EU was in line with assumptions the rating agency has had since March and therefore did not materially shift its economic forecasts. 'Nevertheless, the 15% rate is a huge increase relative to the 1.2% rate of last year,' he said. 'We don't expect the increase in the tariff rate to directly drive EU rating changes on its own, but it could compound existing credit pressures,' Parker told Reuters. Smaller European-based agency Scope Ratings and Morningstar DBRS echoed the view, with Scope's head of sovereign ratings, Alvise Lennkh-Yunus, saying the tariffs arrived 'against a backdrop of accumulating economic shocks'. At a sector level, Moody's warned that 'the credit effects will be significant' for companies that export a lot to the US, depend on complex global supply chains and have limited pricing power in their markets. That includes carmakers like Stellantis and Volkswagen, whose ratings Moody's recently downgraded. Large diversified European manufacturing companies like Siemens and ABB generate about 25% of their revenue in the US. However, they tend to follow local-for-local strategies, sourcing at least 80% of their procurement within the US and should be able to pass at least some of the tariff increases on to customers. Uncertainty still remains about key goods such as semiconductors and pharmaceuticals. The pharmaceutical sector amounts to 25% of all EU exports to the US, analysts estimate. The exemption of aircraft components meanwhile eases expected tariff-related pressures for Airbus and MTU Aero Engines, 'which reinforces our already positive outlook for the global aerospace and defence sector,' Moody's said. It also said the 15% rate had been broadly in line with expectations it laid out when it cut its euro zone economic growth forecast for the year to below 1% in May. It did not give an EU-wide sovereign view, although it said Ireland, which it rates at Aa3 and has a 'positive' outlook on, was most exposed with total value-added exports to the US accounting for around 8% of its GDP back in 2020.
