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Jennifer Nettles is one of the biggest names in country music. As the frontwoman of Sugarland, she’s been a radio favorite for years and years. She also moonlights as an actress from time to time (as fans of The Righteous Gemstones will know from her quirky role as Aimee-Leigh). Her latest TV role is in Prime Video’s horror-comedy series The Bondsman, which releases in full on Thursday (April 3), and she picked that part for a very particular reason. In the series, she stars as Maryanne Dice, a longtime nightclub singer with hopes of finally making it into the recording scene in Nashville … until her ex-husband Hub (played by Kevin Bacon) is murdered and resurrected as a demon-hunter who inadvertently ropes her into his dangerous new career. “I’ve been approached numerous times before with offers to come into TV and film projects that were about a musician, and...

Steven Spielberg’s movies have been regarded as the epitome of filmmaking. Having multiple Oscar nominations and wins under his belt, his films are some of the most critically acclaimed projects in all of Hollywood. He has been in the business for five decades and his films have become ingrained in the very fabric of cinema. Setting many standards and norms, his impact cannot be measured.

Knowing just how iconic and significant he has been, it is not surprising that he has also been an inspiration to many. His films have made many want to follow a similar path and it would seem that Robert Zemeckis was one such person.

Hollywood filmmaker Steven Spielberg (image credit: Gage Skidmore/Wikimedia Commons)

During an interview, the filmmaker revealed just how important Spielberg was in shaping the kind of movies he ended up making in his career.

Steven Spielberg Changed Robert Zemeckis’ Life...

Apple, or at least its technology, was worried about the health and well-being of Hollywood’s greatest director.

In the middle of Steven Spielberg’s Tribeca Festival talk on Saturday, where the filmmaker was celebrating the 50th anniversary of his debut feature, “The Sugarland Express,” he was interrupted by his Apple watch with a message that read “It looks like you’ve taken a hard fall.” Spielberg jokingly said “I’m not going to press the Sos [button]” before throwing it on the ground. “I’ll pick it up later,” he said, only to retrieve it a few minutes later when it started issuing some sort of distress signal.

Before the Q&a began, a taped message from “The Sugarland Express” star Goldie Hawn appeared on the screen, thanking Spielberg and reminiscing about the pivotal moment in her career—and his. The film was released in 1974, just one year before “Jaws,...

Most of the action in Steven Spielberg’s 1974 directorial debut, Sugarland Express, unfolds over the course of an extended car chase as Goldie Hawn and William Atherton’s characters try to evade a long convoy of police vehicles in an effort to regain custody of their young son from foster care.

While the film predated high-speed freeway car chases, modern audiences might be reminded of such events, including O.J. Simpson’s infamous white Bronco chase, which unfolded roughly 30 years ago, on June 17, 1994.

And sure enough, Spielberg himself admitted he thought of his own film when he saw the Bronco chase, which riveted audiences as it took over TV.

Speaking after a 50th-anniversary screening of Sugarland at the 2024 Tribeca Festival, Spielberg jokingly said he thought, “Shit, they’re stealing my thunder,” when he saw the Simpson chase.

Elsewhere during the post-screening Q&a, Spielberg reflected on making the film, including casting lead...

For the group’s 25th anniversary, Little Big Town is pouring some sugar on it. Some Sugarland, actually, as the two country groups will be spending some quality time together later this year, in the wake of their joint performance Sunday night on the CMT Music Awards, where they hooked up to sing their newly arranged cover of Phil Collins’ 1985 smash “Take Me Home.”

The day after the meeting of the vocal-group titans on the CBS awards telecast, Lbt and Sugarland have released a studio version of the Collins tune they performed live, along with announcing a joint tour in the fall that will see them hit the road together for 18 dates. The tour starts Oct. 24 in Greenville, Sc and wraps Dec. 13 with a hometown show at Nashville’s Bridgestone Arena.

The tour is produced by Live Nation and Sandbox Entertainment, and is billed as Little Big Town with special guest Sugarland,...

Kelsea Ballerini has been the hostess with the mostest, as far as the CMT Music Awards, but it will soon be time to slap an “emeritus” on that. She hosts the awards show, now seen on CBS, tonight for a fourth and last time. Ballerini is revealing she will be relinquishing the role after handling emcee duties since 2021; Kane Brown was her partner in co-hosting previous telecasts, leading up to her solo reign over the ceremony this time.

Sitting in her dressing room backstage at Austin’s Moody Center the day before the telecast, she was anything but moody in discussing why she’s enjoyed the CMTs ride so far, but why she’ll also enjoy delving further into other opportunities she’s hoping to focus on more in the time to come.

“It’s my final year, yeah,” Ballerini confirms. “I’ve hosted or co-hosted this show for four years now,...

Tonight’s CMT Music Awards show will endeavor to emphasize what’s currently flameworthy, to borrow a word that has long since been retired from the telecast’s original name. Prime performance slots have been given to country music figures who are still on the ascent, from still-fairly-freshly-minted superstars Jelly Roll and Lainey Wilson to up-and-comers who really seem fresh out of the oven, like Megan Moroney and TikTok sensation Dasha.

To a less emphatic extent, “we also know that we have to pay homage to the artists that got us here,” says executive producer John Hamlin, which for the 2024 show means paying tribute to two icons of ’90s country. “So we’re thrilled to be honoring Trisha Yearwood this year, something that Margaret Comeaux and Leslie Fram [his fellow producer] spent a lot of time orchestrating to make happen for the show. So having Trisha and then having Brooks and Dunn do...

Toby Keith, whose history with the CMT Music Awards goes back to having co-hosted the earliest incarnation of the show, will get his due in the wake of his recent death, as an all-star salute is planned for Keith on Sunday night’s three-hour CBS telecast.

The tribute will feature performances by one of the hottest figures in country music, Lainey Wilson, along with his fellow industry veterans Brooks & Dunn, whose Ronnie Dunn is a fellow Okie. Rocker Sammy Hagar, who featured Keith on an episode of his TV series “Rock & Roll Road Trip” in 2022, will join the lineup paying homage.

Set for what’s being billed as special appearances saluting the late singer are Lukas Nelson and Roger Clemens. Nelson’s father, Willie, had a smash duet with Keith, “Beer for My Horses.” Baseball legend Roger Clemens’ friendship with Keith included the singer inducting the ballplayer into the Houston Sports Hall of Fame.

If you’ve attended a mainstream country concert in the past decade, you’re probably familiar with the part of the set where the headliner sprinkles in a non-obvious cover from an adjacent genre like pop, R&b, or classic rock. It’s a move with any number of purposes: to show an artist’s range of influences, to reel in a drifting crowd with a massive hit, to appeal to a wider audience, or to highlight how fluid and arbitrary genre borders really are when you strip a song back to its essentials.

Just how big a deal is Jon Stewart’s return to The Daily Show desk? John Oliver, the former Daily Show correspondent turned HBO Last Week Tonight host, compared it to NBA legend Michael Jordan’s return to the Chicago Bulls in 1995 after retiring from the game.

“Jordan’s back!” Oliver quipped in an interview with NBC’s Willie Geist.

Oliver was caught as off guard as everyone else with the news, which broke in the middle of the interview with Geist.

“I mean, that’s, that is a surprise,” Oliver said. “That’s a show that needs a host. He certainly is a very, very good one. So yeah, it’ll be exciting to see what he does.”

But he also added that the show “should appoint a permanent host” after Stewart’s run, naming former Peacock host Amber Ruffin and former Daily Show correspondent Roy Wood Jr. as strong contenders.

Kenny Chesney, Alan Jackson, Zac Brown Band, and Mac MacAnally all took the stage at the 2023 CMA Awards to celebrate the music of Jimmy Buffett, who died earlier this year.

Chesney and MacAnally, a longtime member of Buffett’s Coral Reefer Band, kicked things off with a faithful acoustic rendition of the seafaring ballad “A Pirate Looks at Forty,” which Chesney also sang in a video tribute to Buffett that he posted shortly after the songwriter’s death in September. Then Jackson joined Brown (performing barefoot and in shorts, in...

Today’s country artists love to namecheck icons like Hank Williams, Johnny Cash, and Waylon Jennings in their songs and during interviews. But sonically, they owe their greatest debt to Jimmy Buffett, whose tropical vibes, beachy imagery, and ocean escapism has shaped the last two decades of mainstream country. Buffett died Friday at 76, leaving an undeniable legacy that is still heard in the songs of country radio and warrants future induction into the Country Music Hall of Fame.

While artists like Garth Brooks were mining bits of the tiki-bar sound...

Jennifer Nettles has joined the cast of “The Exorcist,” the first film in the new horror trilogy.

Details of her part haven’t been revealed, but it’s described as a “primary role.” She joins a cast that includes Leslie Odom Jr., Ann Dowd, Lidya Jewett and Ellen Burstyn, who is reprising her role as Chris MacNeil from the 1973 original.

The new take on the possession story is being produced by Blumhouse and Morgan Creek for Universal and Peacock. The first film in the trilogy will be released theatrically on Oct. 13, 2023.

Nettles is known for both her acting and her music. She most recently played Jenna Hunterson in the Broadway musical “Waitress.” Nettles also appears on HBO’s “The Righteous Gemstones” and had a supporting role in the Oscar-nominated Harriet Tubman biopic, “Harriet.” She is a judge on TBS’ competition series “Go-Big Show” and will host Fox’s “The Farmer Wants a Wife.

The Masked Singer shared Mustang's performance ahead of the season 9 premiere, and fans think they know who she might be. Mustang is a sleek black horse decorated with red flames. She has red eyes, a glowing mane, and black high-heeled boots. Mustang will compete against Gnome and Medusa in the season premiere. Other The Masked Singer season 9 characters who have been introduced so far include Axolotl, California Roll, Dandelion, Doll, Fairy, French Hen, Gargoyle, Jackalope, Macaw, Mantis, Moose, Night Owl, Polar Bear, and Rock Lobster.

In an Instagram post, Mustang's The Masked Singer season 9 performance was revealed. She sang a rousing rendition of Whitesnake's song "Here I Go Again."

View this post on Instagram A post shared by The Masked Singer (@maskedsingerfox)

During the performance, shared on The Masked Singer Instagram page, Nicole raves, "Beautiful voice," She and Jenny later said that they were getting chills from the song.