Diversity Showbiz and Celebrity Breaking News

A Manchester publishing house has been recognised as the best small press in the North at a prestigious book awards.

Meghan Markle has shared her daughter Lilibet's adorable nickname and praised her husband, Prince Harry, for being a 'hands-on dad'.The Duchess of Sussex revealed this during her speech at the South by Southwest Festival on Friday, March 8, where Harry was cheering her on from the front row. The Duchess made a powerful appearance at the festival in Austin, Texas as she participated in a keynote speech called Breaking Barriers, Shaping Narratives: How Women Lead On and Off the Screen.

Meghan Markle has opened up about her family life in a speech at the SXSW festival in Austin, Texas, as Prince Harry proudly watched on.The Duchess of Sussex donned a stylish cream pinstripe shirt and matching maxi skirt as she took to the stage. Meghan joined the panel on 'breaking barriers' and the 'representation fo women' alongside actress Brooke Shields, news anchor Katie Couric, and diversity, equity, and inclusion consultant at Peoplism, Nancy Wang Yue.

Meghan Markle has become "irritated" at Prince Harry after realising he's not the "charismatic figure" she thought he was, according to one Royal expert.

Nationwide banking customers have received a message from the company as it prepares to 'consider' making a big offer that could mean better deals and savings.

Travel blog by Travels of Adam (Hipster Blog) – Travels of Adam (Hipster Blog) - Travel & Lifestyle Hipster Blog From the moment I landed in Key West, I knew it was going to be a good week. Arriving to the small island airport was just like I remembered from my childhood visits decades before. A small plane, walking on the tarmac, an airport with local art on the walls, and a single waiting area for luggage, taxis, and snacks.

Diego Ramos Bechara editor When discussing the industry-wide changes needed for television to more authentically capture the lived experiences of disabled people, actor Eileen Grubba passionately implored the industry to end what she described as the tokenization of the community. “The industry has got to stop saying, ‘OK, let me go find some kid that’s cute that’s in a wheelchair and give them a series.’ That is soul-crushing to the people who’ve been fighting for decades to make a living,” said the “New Amsterdam” actor, who has faced disabilities since the age of 5.

Popular sportswear brand The North Face is offering shoppers a huge discount to spend online - but there’s a catch. The American outdoors company is giving a 20% off promotional code to those who take a course on “racial inclusion.”

Naman Ramachandran The South Asian House initiative is back at SXSW with the festival’s first-ever South Asian music showcase. Featured acts include Jay Dhami, Bodur, Simar, Avara, Meetu Chilana, The Tabla Queen, DJ Anupi, Bollyflow and The Diversity Band.

Christopher Vourlias As the Thessaloniki Documentary Festival embarks on its second quarter-century, with its 26th edition kicking off March 7, the event’s industry arm continues to look for ways to reinvent itself. “We are educating ourselves. We are asking the local and the regional industries and communities, ‘What do you need from us?’” says Angeliki Vergou, who heads the Agora industry program.

Naman Ramachandran Bollywood A-list star Rani Mukerji was in refreshingly candid form at Mumbai’s FICCI Frames media industry conference, proffering frank opinions on the Indian theatrical business. The usual Hindi-language domination of the all-India box office was reversed for a period in 2021-22, when films from the south of India, including “RRR,” “Kantara,” “Ponniyin Selvan” and “Vikram” dominated, and the northern counterparts from’ Bollywood’ struggled to become hits. Since then, the north-south competition has evolved again.

A lawsuit filed by a SEAL Team script coordinator and freelancer who claims he was denied a writing position because he’s a straight white guy has already struck a chord with fellow scribes.

Callum McLennan Featuring famed directors such as Argentina’s Ariel Rotter and Spain’s Benito Zambrano, who have not only played but won at Berlin and San Sebastian respectively, Malaga’s 19-pic out of competition strand is a testament to the buyer-driven pulling power of Malaga , thanks to its significant market. Multiple other name auteurs pack out the selection, which also includes a far stronger line is broad audience comedies than most festivals would risk.

Meghan Markle is headed to the 2024 South By Southwest film festival, which is kicking off on March 8, 2024 in Austin, Texas!

Adam B. Vary Senior Entertainment Writer Meghan, The Duchess of Sussex is coming to SXSW.

“Tough choices and hard decisions” are to come at the BBC. That is the verdict of new Chair Samir Shah, who kicked off his tenure today by setting his stall out in an all-staff email that urged greater diversity of “class and thought” in the corporation’s news coverage.

Naman Ramachandran Giants of U.K. TV and streaming have combined for the fourth iteration of The TV Collective’s groundbreaking Breakthrough Leaders program. The program aims to identify and empower 50 exceptional individuals from Black, Asian and global majority (a collective term for people of Indigenous, African, Asian, Latin American descent, who constitute some 85% of the global population) backgrounds who are poised to become the future leaders of the U.K.

Drivers are being warned to expect disruption near Manchester city centre as part of a Salford road closes for almost two months. Irwell Street will be closed to traffic heading towards the city centre from Monday, March 4, until the end of April.

There are constantly cast shakeups happening at ABC’s General Hospital and we have the latest updates for you!

Diego Ramos Bechara editor The National Association of Latino Independent Producers and Netflix have announced the third cohort for their Women of Color Incubator — the finalists were chosen from a pool of over 100 applications. The 2023 class of filmmakers are Sonia Gonzalez (“Heartbreak in Another Tongue”), Michelle Salcedo (“Bye Bye Barbarito”), Jackie! Zhou (“Good Boy Banjo”), Lorena Duran (“Last Day Home”) and Fabiola Andrade (“Natural Selection”). Gonzalez is a Mexican-American writer and filmmaker based in Los Angeles.

Stewart Talent is expanding its literary footprint with the hires of A3 veterans Ron Gwiazda and Amy Wagner, who will launch the agency’s New York literary division.

Joe Otterson TV Reporter Kurt Sutter’s upcoming western drama series “The Abandons” at Netflix has added six new cast members, Variety has learned. Nick Robinson (“Maid,” “A Teacher”), Diana Silvers (“Booksmart,” “Space Force”), Lucas Till (“X-Men” film franchise, “MacGyver”), Lamar Johnson (“The Last of Us,” “Brother”), Aisling Franciosi (“The Nightingale,” “God’s Creatures”), and Natalia del Riego (“Hail Mary,” “Promised Land”) have all joined the series. They will star alongside previously announced star Lena Headey as well as Gillian Anderson.

Bella Hadid has been using her platform of 60 million followers on Instagram to promote controversial ideologues, like Louis Farrakhan.Fox News Digital reviewed the “highlights” section featured prominently on the top of Hadid’s Instagram page and discovered that over the years, the supermodel has shared videos on her social media of figures promoting anti-white ideology.Hadid’s reps and IMG Models – whose official website links out to Hadid’s Instagram – didn’t respond for comment.Hadid shared an old video from Nation of Islam leader and antisemite Louis Farrakhan where he admonished a white woman in the audience during “The Phil Donahue Show.” The white woman said she was afraid of violence, to which Farrakhan responded by saying the woman’s fear was a “deep guilt thing.”“Now Whites fear violence from us… And what you fear is a deep guilt thing… You are afraid that if we ever come to power we will do to you what you and your people have done to us. And I think you are judging us by the state of your own [White] mind and that is not necessarily the mind of Black people,” Farrakhan said.The Nation of Islam, which is “based on a somewhat bizarre and fundamentally anti-White theology,” according to the left-wing group the Southern Poverty Law Center.The Nation of Islam believes that “White people were not created by God but by the evil black scientist Yakub… Because of the process by which Yakub created the white race, white people are inherently deceitful and murderous.

The good news: the demographic diversity of the Television Academy’s membership has increased and women with historically marginalized racial/ethnic identities reported a 10% increase in “belonging.”

Naman Ramachandran Netflix has revealed its upcoming 2024 Indian slate and Monika Shergill, VP, content has outlined the streamer’s commissioning philosophy and strategy for the country. New titles on the slate include: Luv Ranjan comedy film “Wild Wild Punjab”; Neeraj Pandey heist film “Sikandar Ka Muqaddar”; scripted Anubhav Sinha thriller series “IC 814: The Kandahar Hijack”; Kapil Sharma’s unscripted comedy series “The Great Indian Kapil Show”; and cricket themed docu-series “The Greatest Rivalry – India vs Pakistan,” featuring top Indian and Pakistani cricketers.

EXCLUSIVE: The Black List is opening submissions for six diversity lists in partnership with GLAAD, CAPE, the MPAC Hollywood Bureau, The Salon, the Latin Tracking Board, NALIP, 1IN4 Coalition, and the WGA Disabled Writers Committee, in addition to establishing the Desi List-–a new, curated list that will shine a light on the most promising feature scripts and pilots from South Asian writers.

A team of volunteer divers who found Scots fisherman Greig Stoddart have been gifted an expert search device.

The X-Files creator Chris Carter is addressing the reboot series coming from Black Panther director Ryan Coogler.

Full Swing is back.

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer The Writers Guild of America East has tapped Sam Wheeler as the union’s new executive director. Chosen by the WGA East council as successor to longtime WGA East leader Lowell Peterson, who exited his post last October after the conclusion of the writers strike, Wheeler enters the role after serving as the national executive director of the American Guild of Musical Artists (AGMA) since 2022.

Naman Ramachandran Fresh off the Sundance-winning “Girls Will Be Girls,” Indian actor-producers Richa Chadha and Ali Fazal have unveiled a further slate from their Pushing Buttons Studios. Directed by Shuchi Talati, “Girls Will Be Girls” is the debut production from Pushing Buttons Studios, in collaboration with Crawling Angels, Blink Digital and Dolce Vita Films.

Travel blog by Travels of Adam (Hipster Blog) – Travels of Adam (Hipster Blog) - Travel & Lifestyle Hipster Blog Sydney is the heaven of Australia, with lively and friendly people. Sydney is on the unique lands of the Gadigal people from the Eora nation. If you plan a trip here, aim for at least four days or more.

Todd Spangler NY Digital Editor Whoopi Goldberg, famed EGOT and business mogul, is adding another entry to her résumé: streaming entrepreneur. Goldberg is an equity investor in Blkfam, billed as the first and only Black-owned and Black-focused family streaming platform. The free, ad-supported service launches Feb.

Jasroop Singh once hated the way she looks, but the 21-year-old is now making a name for herself in the modelling world.The star of Channel 4’s new docuseries New Model Agency has featured in Vogue, modelled for brands including Burberry, and now considers her skin condition vitiligo to be a superpower. However, it has been a long and painful journey to self-acceptance for Jas, who reveals she was cruelly bullied at school and forced to drink cow’s urine in a bid to cure her condition, which causes white patches to develop on the face and body. “There were times where I just thought, ‘What even is the point any more?’” Jas tells OK!.

Angelique Jackson A new cohort of emerging content creators have been selected for the second edition of Hoorae and Walmart’s “Black and Unlimited” digital development program. The program aims to provide content creators from diverse backgrounds with the necessary resources, membership and exposure to “unlock their full potential and pave their way to success.” The new class will receive a $10,000 stipend to help them focus on limitless discovery and creation.

Todd Spangler NY Digital Editor After critics slammed Google‘s “woke” generative AI system, the company halted the ability of its Gemini tool to create images of people to fix what it acknowledged were “inaccuracies in some historical image generation depictions.” Google’s Gemini, formerly known as Bard, began offering text-to-image generative features this month. The problem appeared to be that, in trying to compensate for gender- and racial-representation bias in AI, the system was creating ahistorical images of people.