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‘Haunted Mansion’ comedy can’t scare up any laughs

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 10:32:45 GMT

Last week, it was a film about a Mattel toy from 1959. This week, it is a film about a Disney theme park attraction from 1969. “Haunted Mansion,” not to be confused with the 2003 film “The Haunted Mansion” headed by Eddie Murphy or the 2021 TV special “Muppets Haunted Mansion” featuring Will Arnett and Taraji P. Henson, this “Haunted Mansion” has a cast including LaKeith Stanfield, Rosario Dawson, Tiffany Haddish, Owen Wilson, Jared Leto, Danny DeVito and Academy Award-winner Jamie Lee Curtis. The director is Justin Simien of the prophetic 2014 comedy “Dear White People.”In this installment, Stanfield is Ben Matthias, a New Orleans astrophysicist who meets, falls in love with Alyssa (Charity Jordan) and promptly becomes a grieving widower. Losing himself to drink, Ben becomes a tour guide, arguing with customers, including a reed-thin Marilu Henner, about the ghosts of New Orleans and insisting oddly that, “life is dirt.” At the same time, a single mother named Gabbie (the likable D...

Lucas: Why Kennedy kin are lining up against RFK Jr.

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 10:32:45 GMT

If you’re wondering why the Kennedy family is dumping all over maverick Robert F. Kennedy Jr. all you need to do is look at Joe Biden’s payroll.Half of the Kennedys are on it.And RFK is running against their employer.Not only are woke Democrats concerned about Kennedy’s challenge to Biden, but they are also upset that arch enemy Donald Trump has said good things about him.Even ordinarily mild-mannered former Congressman Joseph P. Kennedy III, 42, got into the act.Now Biden’s special envoy to Northern Ireland, Kennedy was tougher on his uncle Robert than he was on Sen. Eddie Markey.Kennedy hardly uttered a word when Markey attacked him and the Kennedy family during their 2020 debates prior to the Democratic U.S. Senate primary. Markey mopped the floor with him.Now, joining other Biden Democrats, Kennedy condemned his uncle for controversial remarks RFK Jr. made about the COVID virus being “ethnically targeted” to attack certain groups (whites and blacks) disproportionately while othe...

Solomon: Princeton suit puts artifact ownership in spotlight

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 10:32:45 GMT

Princeton University recently achieved a significant victory in its legal battle against officials from the Eastern Orthodox Church regarding the alleged looting of manuscripts from a Greek monastery during World War I. The recent ruling by a New Jersey federal judge allows Princeton to depose the monastery’s non-testifying expert, enabling the university to gather additional evidence supporting its statute of limitations defense.The initial lawsuit, filed in December 2018, alleged that Bulgarian guerrillas unlawfully took four Eastern Orthodox texts from a monastery in Northern Greece in 1917. These texts eventually ended up in the possession of the university – part of the university’s collection of Greek manuscripts, acquired by Princeton in the early 20th century. The Church argues that the university’s acquisition and possession of these manuscripts are illegal and demands their return.In the original legal filings, the University not only reaffirmed its...

Summer hats provide stylish sun protection

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 10:32:45 GMT

By this point in the summer, you and your favorite SPF have no doubt become fast friends again.But there’s another often-overlooked tool in your kit for enjoying the sun while fending off skin damage, and it’s one of the most fashionable out there: sun hats. Just think of everything they do — coordinate with outfits; make big style statements, and do a great job of covering your neck and face.There are so, so many styles to choose from. The fedoras! The wide-brimmed straw numbers! The bucket hats and cowboy hats, and refined safari hats! They add a certain je ne sais quoi flourish to almost any casual look — from bathing suits and sundresses to maxi dresses and denim — with minimum effort. Check out these numbers:The Wide-brim Packable Straw Hat ($69.50 on jcrew.com), woven from raffia fiber that springs back after you’ve rolled it up and tucked it into your beach bag. But its best feature is how good it looks once you put it on; it boasts a light weave and medium brim, with a dark ...

Orioles promoting left-hander Cade Povich, club’s No. 2 pitching prospect, to Triple-A

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 10:32:45 GMT

The best prospect the Orioles acquired at last year’s trade deadline is now one level away from the major leagues.The Orioles are promoting left-hander Cade Povich, ranked by Baseball America as the organization’s second-best pitching prospect, to Triple-A Norfolk, a source with direct knowledge of the move told The Baltimore Sun late Wednesday evening.Povich, Baltimore’s 10th-best prospect, was the biggest minor leaguer in the Jorge López trade last summer, with the Orioles shipping their closer to the Minnesota Twins for the young southpaw and three other pitchers. One of those arms, of course, is Yennier Cano, who over the past year has transformed from an inaccurate reliever into an All-Star.Coincidentally, López was also on the move Wednesday, as the Twins traded him to the Miami Marlins for reliever Dylan Floro. López had a 4.37 ERA over the final two months with Minnesota last year and has struggled this year with a 5.09 ERA.Povich, meanwhile,...

Editorial: City Council misdeeds now 3 for 3 – where’s the accountability?

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 10:32:45 GMT

There was a time not too long ago when politicians embroiled in scandals put constituents before career and resigned from their posts.They may have done so reluctantly, but they did it.  It was the right thing to do.Unfortunately, with a few exceptions, we live in the age of doubling down, and that’s especially true on the Boston City Council.Councilor Tania Fernandes Anderson is the latest in the sorry-not-sorry lineup. She admitted this week to violating the state’s conflict of interest law by hiring her sister and son to paid positions on her staff, and agreed to pay a $5,000 fine.As the Herald reported, the State Ethics Commission said Tuesday that Fernandes Anderson appointed her sister and son to full-time positions in 2022, her first year on the City Council.Fernandes Anderson set her sister’s salary at $65,000. She awarded her sister a raise in June 2022, increasing her salary to $70,000 and tacking on a $7,000 bonus, the Ethics Commission said.In June 2022, Fernandes ...

‘The Heiress and the Heist’ captures crimes of debutante-turned-IRA rebel

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 10:32:45 GMT

Why would a daughter of immense British privilege rebel as spectacularly as Rose Dugdale did in the 1970s, supporting the Irish Republican Army in its notorious fight against English rule by robbing her family paintings by Goya, Gainsborough and Vermeer worth millions?Dugdale’s mind-boggling crossover from a debutante presented to the Queen to a revolutionary engineering that multi-million dollar art heist from her father’s rural Ireland estate is the focus of the three-part Sundance Now/AMC+ documentary, “The Heiress and the Heist.”“It’s a very well-known story in Ireland because Rose Dugdale is an extraordinary person who left privilege as the daughter of a very wealthy British man,” director David Harvey began in a Zoom interview from Dublin. “She goes to Oxford,  becomes radicalized as a young person, then joins the IRA and is involved in some of the most high-profile criminal acts in Irish history. It is an extraordinary story.”Dugdale’s headline-making heist, then “the greates...

Dear Abby: Nightmare neighbor takes over couple’s lives

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 10:32:45 GMT

Dear Abby: My boyfriend, “Pete,” and I have been together four years. During the pandemic, he moved to my hometown, and we live together. Last year, he befriended a man who lives across the street. This neighbor had been a civil-service employee but took early retirement and is undergoing treatment for PTSD.Originally, I was happy for Pete’s new friendship in a new city, but the friendship has turned into a daily bromance. They spend two to six hours in Pete’s man cave, drinking, smoking and playing bar games. When I join in, the neighbor interrupts me and railroads the conversation. He insults me and is hypocritical about everything from my appearance to the meals I prepare.I defend myself to this man, but Pete remains silent despite my pleas for support. (Pete says he “hates confrontation.”) An example: When Pete didn’t quickly answer his texts or calls, the neighbor would come to our house, peer through our windows, yell and bang on the d...

Stock market today: Asian shares gain after the Federal Reserve raises interest rates

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 10:32:45 GMT

BANGKOK (AP) — Asian shares were higher Thursday after the Federal Reserve raised interest rates to their highest level in more than two decades, just as Wall Street expected. Regional attention has focused on whether Japan’s central bank might alter its longstanding ultra-lax monetary policy at a policy meeting that ends on Friday. Tokyo’s Nikkei 225 index gained 0.4% to 32806.18 and the Hang Seng in Hong Kong jumped 1.3% to 19,613.18. The Shanghai Composite index was up 0.8% at 3,237,13. In Australia, the S&P/ASX 200 added 0.8% to 7,460.60. South Korea’s Kospi climbed 0.5% to 2,603.08.Bangkok’s SET was down 0.1% and Taiwan’s benchmark gained 0.4%. Stocks on Wall Street held steady Wednesday. The S&P 500 slipped less than 0.1% to 4,566.75, remaining near a 15-month high. The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 0.2% to 35,520.12, and the Nasdaq composite slipped 0.1%, to 14,127.29.The bond market moved more sharply, and Treasury yields fell after Fed Ch...

Accused of bomb threats they say they didn’t make, family of Chinese dissident detained in Thailand

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 10:32:45 GMT

BANGKOK (AP) — When Gao Peng landed in Thailand on July 3, he was not expecting to be accused of making bomb threats, to be put on an EU travel blacklist, or to see his mother and 16-year-old sister detained and threatened with deportation back to China.But bomb threats made in his and his mother’s names against airports, luxury hotels and the Chinese embassy in Bangkok derailed the family’s plan to seek asylum in the Netherlands, where Gao Peng’s father moved three years ago. The threats appear to be part of Beijing’s increasingly sophisticated efforts to harass Chinese dissidents living overseas and their families.While parts of the story told by Gao Peng and his father, Gao Zhi, couldn’t be independently confirmed, their predicament echoes accounts by other Chinese dissidents abroad, who believe Chinese authorities are making bomb threats in their names to control their political activities.William Nee, research and advocacy coordinator at a coalition of rights organization...