Not since "Moonlight's" win in 2017 have I been more delighted or shocked by a Best Picture Oscar than when "Parasite" won last week. When the film's name was called, my social media lit up with excitement, joy and pride.

With only one person of color nominated in an acting category and no women nominated for best director, 2020 promised to be ...Read more

SAN JOSE, Calif. -- Jane Levy, the San Anselmo native who stars in "Zoey's Extraordinary Playlist," doesn't have a musical theater background. Nor is she a trained singer or dancer.

She's not even a big Broadway nerd.

No matter. Levy is the leading lady of NBC's offbeat new musical drama series and she's having an absolute blast.

"Sometimes ...Read more

"Zoey's Extraordinary Playlist" centers on an emotionally contained coder who's shaken up after an earthquake occurs during her MRI. Upon turning a street corner, she sees a middle-aged man in a disheveled suit, immovable among the bustling sidewalk traffic.

"Help, I need somebody," he seems to sing. "Help, not just anybody. Help, you know I ...Read more

PASADENA, Calif. -- Actor, writer and producer Josh Thomas was only 17 when he first tried doing stand-up comedy in his native Australia. He did it, he says, because he was a socially inept.

"You do crazy things when you're 17," he says. "You drive too fast, you do weird drugs or whatever. Instead I was doing stand-up ... I wanted the attention...Read more

"THE BOLD AND THE BEAUTIFUL": Thomas and everyone at Forrester Creations throw Zoe a surprise birthday party. Katie shares Sally's confidential medical diagnosis. Carter offers Zoe a special gift. Vinny calls Thomas out for how his plan is affecting Douglas. Katie makes Wyatt promise to keep the Sally's terminal illness to himself. Brooke finds ...Read more

As a teen, I was mesmerized by the show "Rat Patrol." Well, it wasn't so much the show as much an actor who portrayed the German commandant Hans Dietrich. Eric Braeden accumulated many TV and film credits during his first two decades in America, and he had 120 guest-starring roles. His earliest credits were all under his birth name, Hans ...Read more

SAN JOSE, Calif. -- Sting has recorded massive albums, mounted major tours and starred in big-budget movies.

And all of that was a piece of cake compared to the effort it took to create "The Last Ship," Sting's original musical that has its Northern California premiere, Feb. 20-March 22, at the Golden Gate Theatre in San Francisco.

"It's ...Read more

I tuned into the new CBS drama "Tommy" for one reason: Edie Falco.

My contempt for network drama as compared to premium cable and streamed productions reached the point in recent years where I would ask anyone defending the genre to name one series besides NBC's "This Is Us" that they regularly went out of their way to see. The answer was ...Read more

Between releasing a new live album, forming a Texas country supergroup and rehabbing a newly purchased house, forgive William Clark Green if he sounds a little busy these days.

It's because he is.

Speaking to this reporter in January, the 33-year-old Green was bound for the hardware store. (The dinging seat belt bell in his truck was a ...Read more

Early on in "Miss Americana," the new Taylor Swift documentary, the then-16-year-old singer takes a moment to celebrate "Tim McGraw," the 2006 hit that made her the youngest artist ever to write a No. 1 country song that she also performed.

"I give myself, like, five seconds a day to say, 'Yes, this is happening!'" the curly-haired, whip-smart ...Read more

SAN JOSE, Calif. -- Prince Harry and Meghan Markle secretly jetted into the Bay Area Tuesday to attend "a brainstorming session" with professors at Stanford University, apparently as part of their efforts to launch their new Sussex Royal charitable organization after stepping away from royal life.

Of course, their visit wasn't so secret because...Read more

The '90s and early aughts were a golden era for black cinema, in particular the black romantic drama.

With the release of films like "Brown Sugar" (2002), "How Stella Got Her Groove Back" (1998), "Deliver Us From Eva" (2003), "Two Can Play That Game" (2001) and "The Best Man" (1999), representation for varying shades of black love was at an all...Read more

CHICAGO -- Embattled singer R. Kelly has been hit with new federal charges in Chicago adding allegations that he sexually abused another minor victim for four years starting in 1997.

A superseding indictment made public Friday alleged that Kelly sexually abused a girl identified in the charges only as "Minor 6."

The charges also seek for the ...Read more

Songwriter, musician, speaker, poet. These are just a few of the roles Hollis Wong-Wear has taken on in her life and career. Recently, she added yet another -- solo artist.

Even as a self-proclaimed "compulsive collaborator," Wong-Wear always had it in the back of her mind that she wanted to release a solo project. She said she let herself walk...Read more

Sooner or later, everything old is new again. Especially when you're in Hollywood.

Across television and film, remakes, reboots and revivals have dominated popular culture over the last decade, most noticeably across the horror genre. The latest reimagining (but surely not the last) is Blumhouse's "Fantasy Island," a PG-13 thriller that ...Read more