BBR Music Group In a year when many are seeking comfort in Christmas cheer, Runaway June‘s Jennifer Wayne got a head start by writing a Christmas song in the middle of a scorching hot Tennessee summer.
Jennifer co-wrote “When I Think About Christmas” alongside Tiffany Goss and Josh Matheny, which describes the joy of having someone to celebrate the season with. The jazzy song ultimately became the title track to Runaway June’s Christmas EP.
“It’s funny, we weren’t even trying to write a Christmas song. It was like in the middle of August and we were so hot. It was two of my friends and they were over at my house and we were drinking wine and we were like ‘gosh, I wish it was Christmas,’ so we just started writing it,” she explains to ABC Audio about the writing process.
“We were like, ‘When I think about Christmas, I think about all these things,’ and that’s kind of what inspired it,” Jennifer adds. “So we wrote a Christmas song in the middle of August.”
When I Think About Christmas features another original song, “Christmas on the Radio,” along with covers of holiday classics including “O Holy Night” and “Let it Snow.”
narvikk/iStockBy MINA KAJI and AMANDA MAILE, ABC News
(NEW ORLEANS) — A 69-year-old man who died shortly after collapsing on a United flight last week had COVID-19, a coroner’s report released Tuesday said. The Jefferson Parish Coroner listed acute respiratory failure and COVID-19 as cause of death.
The United flight from Orlando, Florida, to Los Angeles declared an emergency and was forced to divert to New Orleans on Dec. 14 after the man became ill. Paramedics transported him to a local hospital where he was pronounced deceased, the carrier said.
In order to fly on major U.S. airlines passengers must confirm they haven’t tested positive for the coronavirus or experienced COVID-like symptoms within the past 14 days. The passenger did fill out that form and said no to both, sources tell ABC News.
According to witnesses, the passenger’s wife told an emergency medical technician that her husband was experiencing COVID-related symptoms, including loss of smell and difficulty breathing.
Cameron Roberts was a passenger on the flight. He described a chaotic scene in which fellow passengers rushed to help the man in distress.
“They had him on the ground in the center of the aisle,” Roberts said. “They were still giving him CPR while we were touching down.”
Roberts and his fiancé said passengers gave the man chest compressions and mouth-to-mouth, believing he was suffering from cardiac arrest.
Roberts said he is currently quarantining and took a COVID test.
“It’s sad to see that, you know, they lost a family member,” Roberts said, “but at the same time, it was irresponsible on their part to have come on the plane.”
United Airlines said it has turned over all passenger information and seating assignments to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The airline said it does not reach out to individual passengers as it cannot offer medical advice, but adds the CDC will reach out to any passenger who might have been exposed.
On Sunday, the CDC said it “is in the process of collecting information and proceeding according to our standard operating procedures to determine if further public health action is appropriate. To protect the privacy of the individual, we aren’t providing this information to the public.”
Several passengers on flight 591 told ABC News they now have symptoms and have not been contacted by the CDC. The CDC did not respond to specific questions from ABC News regarding flight 591 on Tuesday.
The agency said it continues to recommend that postponing travel and staying home is the best way to protect oneself and others from COVID-19.
ABC News’ Sam Sweeney, Darren Reynolds, Alex Stone, and Stephanie Ebbs contributed to this report.
ABC/Rick Rowell(LOS ANGELES) — The words “Barbie” and “thought provoking” might not always fit together like the blonde bombshell did into her pink Corvette, but that’s exactly what Margot Robbie is going for with her live-action Barbie movie.
The Oscar-nominated actress is an obvious choice to play the flesh-and-blood incarnation of the popular Mattel toy, but as a producer she deliberately chose less obvious choices to, respectively, write and direct it: Lady Bird‘s Greta Gerwig and Marriage Story’s Noah Baumbach.
“Something like Barbie where the [intellectual property or IP], the name itself, people immediately have an idea of, ‘Oh, Margot is playing Barbie, I know what that is,'” Robbie tells The Hollywood Reporter, “but our goal is to be like, ‘Whatever you’re thinking, we’re going to give you something totally different — the thing you didn’t know you wanted.'”
She says of her production company LuckyChap, “We like the things that feel a little left of center.”
Robbie says, “Now, can we truly honor the IP and the fan base and also surprise people? Because if we can do all that and provoke a thoughtful conversation, then we’re really firing on all cylinders.”
The film, in which Barbie enters the real world, is still in development.
Phylicia J.L. MunnFor Mickey Guyton, her Grammy nomination is bigger than herself.
Joining Hoda Kotb for a recent interview on the Todayshow, Mickey says she’s “still trying to process” her historic nomination for “Black Like Me” for Best Country Solo Performance, making her the first solo Black woman to be nominated in a country category.
“This award is just so much bigger than just the Grammy nomination for me. This award is for Black women, for every single woman that has felt unseen and unheard and put in a corner and not acknowledged,” she proclaims. “It’s just been so overwhelming, I’m just so blessed.”
Mickey adds that she views the nomination through the lens of Booker T. Washington‘s famous quote: “If you want to lift yourself up, lift up someone else.”
“That is what this is all about. It’s about opening that door for other women of color no matter what you are,” she continues. “This is such a huge monumental moment for women of color.”
Mickey and her husband Grant Savoy are expecting their first child, a boy, early next year. They plan to name their son Grayson Clark, combining her husband’s name with that of his best friend, Tyson, who passed away in 2019.
“I just want to lift him up in whatever it is that he decides he wants to do with his life,” Mickey says of how she’s approaching parenthood. “I just want to be that beacon for him.”
The Grammy Awards air on January 31 on CBS at 8 p.m. ET.
We spoke with country singer @MickeyGuyton after she received her first Grammy nomination! She tells us about that special moment and how she got to this historical moment. pic.twitter.com/Z9RHdm447w
ABC(LOS ANGELES) — “Part of me left here when Alex left, really.” That’s the word from longtime Jeopardy! announcer Johnny Gilbert, on the passing of his “friend and colleague” Alex Trebek.
The affable, Emmy-winning quiz show host died at the age of 80 on November 8 following a lengthy battle against pancreatic cancer, which he was first diagnosed with in March 2019.
“Everybody’s walking around in a little bit of a fog, shaken from the whole thing,” the 96-year-old Gilbert tells People.
The announcer expressed, “Jeopardy! has always been my life. I got married [to wife Sharee] right after the show went on the air, so our life together and the show’s life are all bundled into one.”
Gilbert met Trebek in 1984, and recalled, “he wasn’t the usual big-smiley-face emcee” and was someone who, “was quiet and listening to everybody and everything.”
He explained, “Alex has always been the same person. He was very introspective, he read a tremendous amount and traveled a lot. He was always doing crossword puzzles to keep his mind active.”
Gilbert also remembered how Trebek would answer their audience’s questions during commercial breaks — no matter how serious or silly they were.
“One gal asked him, ‘Boxers or briefs?’ Alex said, ‘Thongs!'” he laughed. “I told him a long time ago, ‘If this show goes away, you could be a stand-up comedian.'”
As for whoever carries the torch of Trebek’s legacy forward as Jeopardy! host, Gilbert has just one piece of advice.
“Jeopardy! is a very special game,” he said. “If the person lets the show be the show, it will be fine.”
Trebek’s final Jeopardy! will air on Christmas Day. Guest hosts like all-time champ Ken Jennings have been filling in before a successor is named.
BBR Music Group In a year when many are seeking comfort in Christmas cheer, Runaway June‘s Jennifer Wayne got a head start by writing a Christmas song in the middle of a scorching hot Tennessee summer. 
