Axelle/Bauer-Griffin/FilmMagic(LOS ANGELES) — Angelina Jolie says she’s a mother first and foremost, which is why she is focusing on “healing our family” after her public and, sometimes, contentious divorce from ex Brad Pitt.
Opening up to British Voguefor the magazine’s upcoming March issue, the 45-year-old actress admits, “The past few years have been pretty hard.”
Jolie and Pitt, who announced their divorce in 2016 and, in the following years, engaged in a public and difficult legal battle over custody of their six children: Maddox, 19, Pax, 16, Zahara, 15, Shiloh, 14, and 12-year-old twins Vivienne and Knox.
The former couple secretly wed in 2014 after dating for nearly a decade.
“I’ve been focusing on healing our family,” the Salt star continued. “It’s slowly coming back, like the ice melting and the blood returning to my body.”
Jolie revealed that she has since moved to be closer to Pitt.
The actress revealed that her new Los Angeles estate once belonged to the famed Cecil B. DeMille, telling Vogue, “I wanted it to be close to their dad, who is only five minutes away. I felt a little pressure moving in. Like I had snuck into where DeMille and Chaplin would hang out.”
Adds Jolie, “I feel very fortunate we have that at this time” — referencing the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic that has challenged her family in other ways.
“Pax going into his senior year, but not being able to enjoy all that it is to be a senior; Zahara finally getting her driving license, but she’s taking the test with the driver wrapped in the full outfit with the masks. It’s not how you imagine these moments,” she reflected. “But birthdays go on, and I think that for many people, it’s made us all feel very human together. There’s something beautiful about that.”
ABC(LOS ANGELES) — Ashley Tisdale is counting down the days until she welcomes her newborn daughter and, on Monday, reminded her fellow expecting moms to have pride in their bodies.
The High School Musical alum shared a tastefully nude maternity shot that fully shows her pregnant body. The actress said that she hopes to promote self-love and acceptance with her vulnerable post.
“So much of the time we give our love to others. Let’s start loving ourselves and our bodies in every shape and form,” captioned Tisdale, 35. “Our bodies do a lot for us every day and we neglect to acknowledge that.”
The Masked Dancer host closed out her inspirational post by telling her followers to “Thank your body and say I love you.”
Tisdale’s followers were quick to praise the message and received words of encouragement from famous friends like Vanessa Lachey who gushed, “Babe! This is so Beautiful!!!! So damn happy for YOUUUU!”
Fellow Disney Channel alum Hilary Duff, who is also expecting, told Tisdale that she’s “Lookin like a queen.”
Sarah Hyland and Vanessa Hudgens also left positive remarks, both telling the soon-to-be mom that she looked “gorgeous.”
Tisdale is expecting a daughter with husband Christopher French. The two wed in 2018 and announced they were expecting their first child in September.
Myriam Borzee/iStockBy MORGAN WINSOR, ERIN SCHUMAKER and IVAN PEREIRA, ABC News
(NEW YORK) — A pandemic of the novel coronavirus has now infected more than 103 million people worldwide and killed over 2.2 million of them, according to real-time data compiled by the Center for Systems Science and Engineering at Johns Hopkins University.
Here’s how the news is developing Tuesday. All times Eastern:
Feb 02, 9:29 am Russia’s vaccine found to be over 91% effective in peer-reviewed study
Feb 02, 8:27 am Japan extends state of emergency in greater Tokyo area
Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga has extended a state of emergency in Tokyo and nine surrounding prefectures for another month to further stem the spread of the novel coronavirus.
The declaration, however, was lifted in Tochigi prefecture, north of Tokyo, where the COVID-19 infection rate has eased.
“I regret that the declaration cannot be lifted across the nation at this time,” Suga said Tuesday night in a televised address from his office in Tokyo.
The prime minister used a chart to show that Japan’s daily number of newly diagnosed infections has declined from 7,721 on Jan. 7 to 1,783 on Feb. In Tokyo, that number has dropped from 2,447 on Jan. 7 to 393 on Feb. 1. According to the Japanese Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare, there were 556 new cases of COVID-19 confirmed in the capital city on Tuesday.
Suga said the state of emergency could be lifted earlier than March 7 if the situation continues to improve. He noted that his government is hoping to begin a mass COVID-19 vaccination program as early as mid-February.
“Thanks to the cooperation of the people of Japan, we have seen a marked outcome,” he said. “At this point in time, I need to ask the people to endure another round of the state of emergency so that positive outcomes can be solidified.”
The move comes less than six months before the pandemic-delayed 2020 Summer Olympics are scheduled to open in Tokyo.
A state of emergency declaration gives the governors of those respective regions the authority to ask residents for cooperation in efforts to curb the spread of the virus. There are currently no legal ramifications for non-compliance.
Suga first declared a state of emergency in Tokyo and three neighboring prefectures on Jan. 7, before expanding the order to include more virus-hit areas.
Under the state of emergency, Suga said governors will ask residents to refrain from dining out and to stay home after 8 p.m. unless for essential reasons. They will also ask companies to decrease the number of employees commuting to work by 70%.
Suga said bars and restaurants will be asked to stop serving alcohol by 7 p.m. and to close by 8 p.m. Governors may disclose the name of the businesses that don’t comply, while those that do will be given 1.8 million Japanese yen ($17,000) per month.
Spectator events will be limited to an audience of 5,000 people. Schools will not be asked to close, according to Suga.
Suga’s predecessor, Shinzo Abe, declared a nationwide state of emergency relatively early in the pandemic in April, which lasted for a month. At that time, residents were asked to reduce person-to-person contact by 80% and to practice “jishuku,” or “self-restraint,” by staying at home and closing non-essential businesses.
Feb 02, 7:15 am Tokyo Olympics will take place ‘no matter how the COVID situation will be’
The Tokyo Olympics will take place this year “no matter how the COVID situation will be,” organizers said Tuesday.
“We will make sure the Games will be held no matter how the COVID situation will be,” Yoshiro Mori, president of the Tokyo 2020 organizing committee, said during remarks at a meeting on preparations for the event. “We go beyond the discussion of whether we hold (the Games) or not hold. We are to come up with ‘new’ Olympics.”
The 2020 Summer Olympics were supposed to kick off in the Japanese capital last year on July 24. But in late March, amid mounting calls to delay or cancel the upcoming Games, the International Olympic Committee and Japan’s prime minister announced that the event would be held a year later due to the coronavirus pandemic.
The Games are now scheduled to open in Tokyo this summer on July 23, but doubt has surfaced as Japan — and much of the world — grapples with a resurgence of COVID-19 infections. Moreover, Japan is not expected to begin administering its first round of COVID-19 vaccinations until the end of February.
Last week, organizers said COVID-19 vaccines will not be a requirement to compete in the Tokyo Olympics and that they are still considering holding the Games without spectators.
Feb 02, 6:49 am US reports over 134,000 new cases
There were 134,339 new cases of COVID-19 confirmed in the United States on Monday, according to a real-time count kept by Johns Hopkins University.
Monday’s case count is far less than the country’s all-time high of 300,282 newly confirmed infections on Jan. 2, Johns Hopkins data shows.
An additional 2,031 fatalities from COVID-19 were registered nationwide on Monday, down from a peak of 4,466 new deaths on Jan. 12, according to Johns Hopkins data.
COVID-19 data may be skewed due to possible lags in reporting over the Martin Luther King Jr. Day holiday weekend.
A total of 26,321,457 people in the U.S. have been diagnosed with COVID-19 since the pandemic began, and at least 443,365 have died, according to Johns Hopkins data. The cases include people from all 50 U.S. states, Washington, D.C., and other U.S. territories as well as repatriated citizens.
Much of the country was under lockdown by the end of March as the first wave of the pandemic hit. By May 20, all U.S. states had begun lifting stay-at-home orders and other restrictions put in place to curb the spread of the novel coronavirus. The day-to-day increase in the country’s cases then hovered around 20,000 for a couple of weeks before shooting back up over the summer.
The numbers lingered around 40,000 to 50,000 from mid-August through early October before surging again to record levels, crossing 100,000 for the first time on Nov. 4, then reaching 200,000 on Nov. 27 before topping 300,000 on Jan. 2.
So far, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration has authorized two COVID-19 vaccines for emergency use — one developed by U.S. pharmaceutical giant Pfizer and its German partner BioNTech, and another developed by American biotechnology company Moderna and the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. More than 32 million vaccine doses have been administered nationwide, according to the latest data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Craig Barritt/Getty Images for Audible(LOS ANGELES) — As allegations of abuse against Marilyn Manson pour out, his ex, Rose McGowan, is making it known where she stands — with the victims.
McGowan, who dated and was engaged to the rockstar until their split in 2001, took to Instagram on Monday threw her full support behind Manson’s accusers.
“I am profoundly sorry to those who have suffered the abuse & mental torture of Marilyn Manson. When I say Hollywood is a cult, I mean the Entertainment industry including the music industry is a cult. Cult’s protect the rot at the top. Theirs is a sickness that must be stopped,” the 47-year-old actress wrote in a statement.
“The industrial fame complex chooses who they protect & who they’ll let be their victims. For profit. I stand with Evan Rachel Wood and all of those who have or will come forward,” she continued. “And please don’t pull out the ‘why did they take so much time to come forward?’ question that shames victims/survivors, it’s what stops others from coming forward. And to all of those who have covered for monsters, shame on you. Rise and say no more.”
McGowan’s statement comes hours after Wood openly accused Manson of alleged abuse, claiming he “started grooming me when I was a teenager and horrifically abused me for years. I was brainwashed and manipulated into submission.”
The “Sweet Dreams” singer has since responded to the allegations with an Instagram post of his own.
“Obviously, my art and my life have long been magnets for controversy, but these recent claims about me are horrible distortions of reality,” Manson wrote. “My intimate relationships have always been entirely consensual with like-minded partners. Regardless of how — and why — others are now choosing to misrepresent the past, that is the truth.”
Paul Archuleta/FilmMagic(LOS ANGELES) — Hal Holbrook, the four-time Emmy Award-winning actor best known for channelling the iconic Mark Twain, died on January 23 at his Beverly Hills, California home, his assistant confirmed to the New York Times on Monday.
He was 95.
Holbrook channeled the legendary writer on his one-man show Mark Twain Tonight!, which ran for six decades. He was also known for starring as Deep Throat, the government informant in All the President’s Men, and as Lou Mannheim in Wall Street, who tries to be the conscience that Charle Sheen’s Bud Foxx loses for love of money.
In his later years, the actor was nominated for an Oscar for his 2008 work Into the Wild, becoming the oldest actor at 82 to be nominated for best supporting actor. He is survived by three children and was pre-deceased by wife, Dixie Carter.
Axelle/Bauer-Griffin/FilmMagic(LOS ANGELES) — Angelina Jolie says she’s a mother first and foremost, which is why she is focusing on “healing our family” after her public and, sometimes, contentious divorce from ex Brad Pitt.
