EVANGELINE LILLY from “Ant-Man and the Wasp” is absolutely, positively, defiantly refusing to self-quarantine. In an Instagram post she said, “Just dropped my kids off at gymnastics camp. They all washed their hands before going in. They are playing and laughing. #BusinessAsUsual”. When the Internet came after her, she said the coronavirus is just a “respiratory flu,” and she’s worried the government is going too far to curb the spread. Evangeline has two young kids AND she’s living with her dad, who has stage 4 leukemia. But none of that is going to keep her from doing what she wants to do. One of her old co-stars from the TV show “Lost” actually HAS the coronavirus. DANIEL DAE KIM, who you might also recognize from “Hawaii Five-0”, announced yesterday that he’s been diagnosed. Ironically, he was just in New York shooting a TV show where he plays a doctor at a hospital during a flu pandemic.
If you’re hoping to make it through quarantine with the help of a fine publication like “Playboy”, you’d better have some back-issues stocked up. “Playboy” is shutting down due to the pandemic. They’re stopping PRINT publication, and will instead be focusing on DAILY Digital GROWTH. The Spring 2020 issue arrives on newsstands this week, and it’ll be their FINAL printed magazine for the YEAR. Playboy could possibly return in 2021 or later, but there are no concrete plans for now.
“Tom and Rita are doing very well and continue to recover. Their recovery is very much on course for healthy adults with this virus. They are feeling better each day.” Tom’s sister gave a slightly less rosy update, “He’s not great, but still okay. [Am I] shocked? No. He’s an actor, not a god.”
New Orleans Saints Coach SEAN PAYTON is the NFL’s first confirmed case of coronavirus. He says he started feeling ill on Sunday, got tested on Monday, and got the results yesterday.
COLE SWINDELL hit up Instagram to announce that he’s practicing “social distancing” by postponing the remaining shows on his Down to Earth Tour. The new dates are posted on ColeSwindell.com.
If you circled April 5th on your calendar to watch the ACMs on CBS – don’t un-circle. They announced a replacement show called “ACM Presents: Our Country”. It’s a bigger version of what we’ve been seeing this week where performers go live from their home or garage, or whatever. There will also be “greatest hits” clips from past ACMs. Don’t know yet who will be performing but at this point they’re still planning to do the full ACMs with trophies and performances sometime in September.
Owen Wilson is finally addressing the elephant in the room: why is the person who has been impersonated by several Saturday Night Live members never been its host? “I get really nervous with public speaking,” Wilson said on SNL alum Kevin Nealon’s YouTube series Hiking with Kevin. “I’ve never done any of those commencement addresses or Saturday Night Live just because I get too nervous.” Wilson has only ever appeared on the NBC sketch show once, appearing as his Zoolander character Hansel alongside Ben Stiller in 2016 on Weekend Update. Wilson also noted on his hike with Nealon that he even gets nervous about dressing up for formal events.
It’s been hard to keep up with all the “intimate” live shows country artists have been doing from their various home locations. So if you missed a few, CMT has links that will get you to shows from people like Jake Owen, Luke Combs, Keith Urban, Tim McGraw, Brad Paisley, and Michael Ray.
Sara Evans is shining a light on her influences throughout her new covers project, Copy That, due out May 15. The 13-track album features collaborations with Old Crow Medicine Show and Little Big Town’s Phillip Sweet and was co-produced by Evans and Jarrad K (Ruston Kelly, Weezer, Goo Goo Dolls). Billboard premieres the infectious first track, a cover of the Bee Gees’ 1977 hit “If I Can’t Have You,” today (March 19).
The National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences has announced that the 47th Annual Daytime Emmy Awards has been postponed. NATAS chairman Terry O’Reilly said, “We have decided that we will not be staging the 47th Annual Daytime Emmy Awards this coming June. As there are so many unknowns right now… it would simply be irresponsible to move forward with our annual celebration of excellence in daytime television at this time.”
The “Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon” is the game people play to find the shortest connection between any given actor and Kevin Bacon. Now, the actor is using the premise of the game for social distancing and isolating. Bacon posted to Instagram, “I’m staying home because it saves lives and it is the only way we’re gonna slow down the spread of the coronavirus.” Fans are encouraged to tag six friends to share who they are staying home for and use the hashtag #IStayHomeFor.
