YCLOAK

Hollywood is gearing up for the 95th Academy Awards, where “Everything Everywhere All at Once” comes in the lead nominee and the film industry will hope to move past “the slap” of last year’s ceremony. Here’s everything you need to know about the 2023 Oscars, including when they are, where to watch the live show and this year’s controversies.

When are the Oscars?

The Oscars will be held Sunday, March 12, at the Dolby Theatre in Los Angeles. The ceremony is set to begin at 8 p.m. EDT and be broadcast live on ABC.

Can you stream the Oscars?

The broadcast can be streamed with a subscription to Hulu Live TV, YouTubeTV, AT&T TV and Fubo TV. Some of these services offer brief free trials. Here’s what you need to know about how to watch or stream the show live. 

Who is hosting?

Jimmy Kimmel will host for the third time and his first time since 2018. That was also the last Oscars to feature a solo host. The show went hostless for several years after Kimmel’s last outing. Last year, Regina Hall, Amy Schumer and Wanda Sykes hosted as a trio. In an ad for this year’s show styled after “Top Gun: Maverick,” Kimmel made his humble case for being the right person for the job while noting that he can’t get slapped because “I cry a lot.” 

What’s nominated for best picture at the 2023 Oscars?

The 10 movies competing for best picture are: “All Quiet on the Western Front,” “Avatar: The Way of Water,” “The Banshees of Inisherin,” “Elvis,” “Everything Everywhere All at Once,” “The Fabelmans,” “Tár,” “Top Gun: Maverick,” “Triangle of Sadness,” “Women Talking.” Here’s a guide to how you can watch them. 

Who is presenting?

Presenters include: Halle Bailey, Antonio Banderas, Elizabeth Banks, Jessica Chastain, John Cho, Andrew Garfield, Hugh Grant, Danai Gurira, Salma Hayek Pinault, Nicole Kidman, Florence Pugh and Sigourney Weaver. They join a previously announced group including: Riz Ahmed, Emily Blunt, Glenn Close, Jennifer Connelly, Ariana DeBose, Samuel L. Jackson, Dwayne Johnson, Michael B. Jordan, Troy Kotsur, Jonathan Majors, Melissa McCarthy, Janelle Monáe, Deepika Padukone, Questlove, Zoe Saldaña and Donnie Yen. A third wave was announced Thursday: Halle Berry, Paul Dano, Cara Delevingne, Harrison Ford, Kate Hudson, Mindy Kaling, Eva Longoria, Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Andie MacDowell, Elizabeth Olsen, Pedro Pascal and John Travolta. 

What else is in store for the shoe?

The Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences has said that winners to all categories will be announced live on the show. (Last year, some categories were taped in a pre-show, something that caused an uproar among academy members.) All signs point to a full slate of musical performances, with Rihanna performing “Lift Me Up” from “Black Panther: Wakanda Forever” and Rahul Sipligunj and Kaala Bhairava singing Chandrabose and M.M. Keeravaani’s “Naatu Naatu” from “RRR.” Nominee Lady Gaga, on the other hand, will not sing “Hold My Hand,” from “Top Gun: Maverick,” during the show. On Monday, show producers announced that Lenny Kravitz will deliver the “In Memoriam” performance. 

Who are the favorites?

Daniel Kwan and Daniel Scheinert’s indie sci-fi hit “Everything Everywhere All at Once” comes in with a leading 11 nominations. Close on its heels, though, is the Irish friends-falling-out dark comedy “The Banshees of Inisherin,” with nine nods, a total matched by Netflix’s WWI film “All Quiet on the Western Front.” Michelle Yeoh (“Everything Everywhere All at Once”) may have a slight edge on Cate Blanchett (“Tár”) for best actress. Best actor is harder to call, with Brendan Fraser (“The Whale”) and Austin Butler (“Elvis”) in the mix. In the supporting categories, Angela Bassett (“Black Panther: Wakanda Forever”) and Ke Huy Quan (“Everything Everywhere All at Once”) are the frontrunners, though Jamie Lee Curtis’ Screen Actors Guild Awards win may have thrown a wrench into the supporting actress category. Steven Spielberg (“The Fabelmans”) may win his third best director Oscar, though the Daniels may have emerged as the frontrunners. AP Film Writers Lindsey Bahr and Jake Coyle are predicting a big haul for “Everything Everywhere All at Once.” 

What’s been controversial this year?

Aside from the usual snubs and surprises, this year’s biggest to-do has been the debate surrounding Andrea Riseborough’s unexpected nomination for best actress. Riseborough was nominated for the little-seen, Texas-set drama “To Leslie” after many A-list stars rallied around her performance. When two other best-actress contenders — Danielle Deadwyler (“Till”) and Viola Davis (“Woman King”) — were snubbed, some saw that as a reflection of racial bias in the film industry. The academy launched an inquiry into the star-studded, grassroots campaign for Riseborough but found no reason to rescind her nomination. 

What else should you look for?

Just the reading of the title to one of this year’s short film nominees should prompt a wave of giggles. John Williams (“The Fabelmans”), up for best score, is the oldest nominee ever, at 90 years old. After historic back-to-back best-director wins by Chloé Zhao (“Nomadland”) and Jane Campion (“The Power of the Dog”), no women were nominated this year for best director. Also don’t expect to see Will Smith at the Oscars anytime soon. After striking Chris Rock at last year’s ceremony, Smith was banned by the film academy from attending for 10 years. In a live Netflix special on Saturday, Rock finally punched back at Smith with a blistering stand-up set about the incident. 
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Brent Sass, the defending Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race champion, withdrew from this year’s race on Saturday, citing concerns for his health.

Sass scratched at the Eagle Island checkpoint, a statement from the Iditarod said. Eagle Island is about 966 kilometers into the nearly 1,609-kilometer race.

“He didn’t feel he could care for his team due to current concerns with his periodontal health,” the statement said. The condition typically relates to gum disease.

A plane was being sent to Eagle Island to fly Sass off the trail, according to a video posted on the Iditarod Insider webpage.

“Yeah, I’m pretty sad, but it is what it is,” Sass’ father, Mark Sass, told Alaska Public Media. “I just want him to be OK.”

The Iditarod said all 11 dogs on Sass’ team were in good health.

Sass was in the lead when he arrived at the Eagle Island checkpoint late Friday night with an almost four-hour advantage over his nearest competitor, Jessie Holmes of Brushkana.

Holmes was the first musher to leave the Eagle Island checkpoint early Saturday morning. The 40-year-old Alabama native in 2004 moved to Alaska, where he is a carpenter and appears on the National Geographic reality TV show Life Below Zero, about people who live in rural Alaska.

The race started for 33 mushers on March 5 in Willow. It takes the sled dog teams over two mountain ranges, the frozen Yukon River and the treacherous Bering Sea ice en route to the finish line in Nome. Mushers had to contend with another issue during the first week of competition: Altering their race strategy because of high heat in interior Alaska.

The winner is expected to mush down Nome’s Front Street, a block off the Bering Sea, to the finish line either Tuesday or Wednesday.

Before the competitive start to the race, mushers greeted fans March 4 during a ceremonial start in downtown Anchorage and drove auction winners riding in their sleds for a 17.7-kilometer jaunt through the streets of the state’s largest city.

The 33 mushers represented the smallest field ever to start a race, one short of the first race run in 1973.

Since then, three mushers including Sass have withdrawn.
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When Richard McKinney was getting married last year, friends stepped in to help. Bibi Bahrami cooked Afghan dishes — from rice with carrots and raisins to chicken and beef — for the wedding guests. Her husband officiated the Islamic part of the ceremony. 

At first glance, nothing seems unusual about that off-camera wedding scene — until you know the on-camera story of how McKinney and the Bahramis met. The short version is this: Angry and filled with hate for Muslims, the broad-shouldered, tattooed veteran once wanted to bomb the Bahramis’ Islamic Center of Muncie in Indiana and inflict mass casualties on its congregation. 

The longer version of what followed, how the kindness he encountered from congregation members helped change not just his plans but his life’s course, is chronicled in “Stranger at the Gate.” The 30-minute movie is nominated for best documentary short film at the 95th Academy Awards, set for Sunday. 

“We have been friends for years,” Bahrami, a former Afghan refugee and a grandmother of seven (the eighth is on the way), said of McKinney in an interview. “He’s like family at this point.” 

McKinney acknowledged that their unlikely bond is probably “mind-boggling” to many. “This whole journey has been very surreal,” he said. 

His is a story of second chances and transformation. It’s also one of love conquering hate, said “Stranger at the Gate” director Joshua Seftel. 

“It’s easy to feel hopeless these days. When I saw this story, I thought, ‘Wow, maybe there is a reason to believe in humanity,'” Seftel said. “If these two people can be friends, then why can’t any of us?” 

Seftel came across McKinney’s story when he was working on a documentary series titled “Secret Life of Muslims,” featuring American Muslims of diverse backgrounds and seeking to shatter negative stereotypes. 

“It’s easy to hate someone that we don’t know,” Seftel said. “The power of film and storytelling is that you can get to know someone through a film, and it can change the way people think.” 

The inspiration for that series, he said, was rooted in his own memories of antisemitism that he’s encountered and being called names as a Jewish kid. 

“After 9/11, I saw that kind of hate toward Muslims, and I just thought, ‘Maybe I can do something with my film work to try to help,'” he said. 

Bias prevalent

A poll by The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research conducted ahead of the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks in 2021 found that 53% of Americans have unfavorable views toward Islam. 

McKinney was once one of those — fervently so. 

The end of a long military career left him angry, bitter, feeling worthless and drinking too much. His “destiny” to die in combat and return home in a flag-draped coffin a hero never panned out. He would look at himself and wonder who he was. 

He focused his hate on Muslims, some of whom, he said, had been his battlefield enemies when he was serving overseas. 

“My plan was to detonate an IED,” or improvised explosive device, outside the Islamic center on a Friday when worshippers would be gathered, he said in the film. “I was hoping for at least 200 or more, dead, injured.” 

He started going to the mosque in 2009, introducing himself as someone who wanted to learn about Islam. 

“I didn’t trust them. … I figured they would have me in the basement with a sword to my throat,” he recalled in the film. 

In reality, he said, he was welcomed and embraced by congregation members. 

Bahrami, who viewers learn is a fan of country music and whose husband dubbed her “the Mother Teresa of the Muslim community,” recounted comforting McKinney and giving him attention. Eventually, he found the sense of belonging he so craved. 

“I said I need to be Muslim,” McKinney said. 

Today, McKinney and Bahrami say they see the impact of the message behind their story in interactions with audiences after talks or screenings. 

“One of the best compliments I’ve ever received was when somebody told me after seeing the film that ‘you have given me a lot to think about,'” McKinney said. “I want people to think, because we live in a society where, unfortunately, there’s a lot of followers.” 

Someone told him how hearing his story saved him, as it made him think that everyone has a purpose to find. 

Bahrami, who Seftel said shows up at screenings with cookies for the audience, has had people hug her. Some have come up to her with tears, told her she gave them hope and courage or asked if they could “borrow” her for their own community. 

Others have posed a tough question: How did she forgive McKinney? 

She said that when she heard, in disbelief, of the plans McKinney once harbored, she invited him for dinner and asked him what he was thinking. 

“I’m a strong believer,” she said. “I think my faith is a big part of this forgiveness.” 

Another aspect, she added, was the vulnerability she saw in him and how apologetic he was. 

Bahrami recalled how when Seftel approached her to participate in the film, he found her in a coma. While recovering, she considered his request and had one thought: 

“God gave me a second life,” she said, “and if I die again, the story could live.” 
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In the 2022 Elvis film, Tom Hanks’ depiction of Elvis Presley’s real-life former manager, Colonel Tom Parker, is cruel, corrupt, and according to the 2023 Razzie award results, deserving of worst supporting actor and worst screen combo awards.

Before celebrating the best films of the season during the Oscar ceremony Sunday, the Razzie Awards called out the worst Saturday.

Despite the Forrest Gump actor’s legacy of Oscar-winning roles, many critics and fans condemned his performance in Elvis, particularly his accent.

The Razzies named Hanks worst supporting actor and worst screen combo for the actor and his “latex face” in the film.

Joining Hanks, biographical drama Blonde, starring Ana de Armas as Hollywood icon Marilyn Monroe “won” Razzies for both worst picture and screenplay. De Armas, however, is in the running for best actress for the role at Sunday’s Academy Awards.

Also taking home a Razzie is Jared Leto, who portrays Michael Morbius, and Adria Arjona, who portrays Dr. Martine Bancroft, in the Sony Marvel film Morbius. Both won for worst actor and worst supporting actress.

The Redeemer Award, which is granted to a previous Razzie contender who’s redeemed themselves following their unfavorable fall to Razzie status, goes to Colin Farrell for the Oscar-nominated film Banshees of Inisherin.

Farrell was nominated in 2004 in the Razzie worst actor category for Winter’s Tale, but as a now 2022 best actor front-runner for his leading role, he has escaped from Razzie prison, possibly rising to Oscar status Sunday.

Finally, the Razzies awarded itself the worst actress award after it nominated 12-year-old Firestarter actress Ryan Kiera Armstrong for a Razzie. After allegations of bullying, Armstrong was later removed from the Razzie ballot.

The Razzies, the self-described “ugly cousin to the Oscars,” started in 1980 as the Golden Raspberry Awards, created by UCLA film school graduates and film industry veterans John J.B. Wilson and Mo Murphy.

More than 1,100 Razzie members from across the United States and about two dozen other countries vote on the awards, according to the Razzie website.
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A film buff from Oklahoma City, Elyssa Mann has scant time to waste, needing to cross just four more movies off her Oscars binge list before Sunday’s Academy Awards broadcast: Two animated films, one for cinematography and another for costume design.

In the San Francisco Bay Area, Steve Tornello has just one left — the latest “Avatar” — before he can fairly judge all 10 of the Best Picture nominees.

In the perfect multiverse, time would bend to allow time-strained movie buffs to watch anything anywhere, all at once. But in the real world, not the googly eyed one, time keeps ticking and that makes things difficult for diehard film fans hoping to fill every bracket in their personal Oscars scoresheets.

“I have four Oscars movies left in my quest to watch all the ones nominated for picture/acting/craft etc.,” Mann wrote in a tweet, “and this somehow feels insurmountable.”

As it is, Sunday morning’s time change (don’t forget to spring forward) will mean an hour less to binge.

“I am a person who thrives under pressure, like I need the deadline. So, it’s good that it’s here,” Mann, a 31-year-old marketer, said during a phone call. “Now I have to watch them.”

She’ll watch two or three Saturday and save whatever’s left for Sunday before the ceremony. Since the New Year, she’s watched nearly 30 of the nominated films, escalating her project when the nominations were announced in late January. She acknowledged there isn’t enough time to view nominees in a handful of categories, including documentaries.

It would take days without sleep to watch every one of the more than 50 movies receiving at least one nomination in any of the roughly two dozen categories being awarded.

Theoretically, those voting on the nominated movies are supposed to watch every film. But even for the pros, that apparently doesn’t happen. After all, does anyone really have the time?

Tornello, a fledgling screenwriter and creative director for a tech company, is trying to make time this weekend to finally trudge out to the movie theater to watch “Avatar: The Way of Water,” the final movie on his Best Picture list.

“I have a lot on my plate right now,” he said. “That’s a movie I know I need to see in the theater to get the full experience.”

Most of the rest he’s watched at home through a streaming service.

Drawn by all the buzz, he saw “Everything Everywhere All at Once” shortly after it was released last spring. He watched “Women Talking” earlier this month.

“I try to see as many movies as I possibly can, the ones I think are going to be a nominee, before Oscar nominations come out,” Tornello said. “I just want to get them all in so I can really enjoy the show.”

Like Mann, James Bramble has already seen all the Best Picture nominees and more.

“So, I’ve seen every picture nominated for Best International film, Best Documentary, Best Animated and before Sunday night, I will finish,” he said, saying he has a few more in the short film categories which shouldn’t require much time to watch.

Every year, there are bound to be nominated films that he thinks were a waste of his time. Not this year, he said.  

“I really liked, so far, everything that I’ve seen. Yeah, it’s a good year,” said Bramble, an attorney from Salt Lake City.

Mann hopes to beat the clock.

On her watch list this weekend: The animated features “Puss in Boots: The Last Wish” and “Turning Red,” as well as “Mrs. Harris Goes to Paris” for costume design and “Bardo, False Chronicle of a Handful of Truths” for cinematography.

She should have started sooner, she confessed.

“It’s something that I’ve always kind of considered doing, but seemed like too big of a project,” she said. But with the deep winter doldrums, she needed an outlet. “I love movies. And so, I thought this would be a fun one.”
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From “Star Wars” to “Jaws” to “Schindler’s List,” John Williams has written many of the most instantly recognizable scores in cinema history.

The 91-year-old is already the oldest person to receive an Oscar nomination for a competitive award, which he earned thanks to his spare yet poignant compositions for Steven Spielberg’s “The Fabelmans.”

With 53 total nods, Williams has more Academy Award nominations than any other living person, and is second only to Walt Disney, who had 59.

And if he gets another statuette on Sunday, which would be his sixth, he will become the oldest person ever to triumph in any competitive category. The record is currently held by screenwriter James Ivory, who was 89 when he won.

It “seems unreal that anybody could be that old and working that long,” Williams recently told NBC News, adding: “It’s very exciting, even after 53 years.”

“I’m very pleased, I think it’s a human thing — the gratification of any kind of appreciation of one’s work,” he said.

Out of the dozens of nominations over the course of his extraordinary career, the composer won Academy Awards for the original “Star Wars,” “Fiddler on the Roof” and three films by Spielberg, with whom he is closely associated — “Jaws,” “E.T.: The Extra-Terrestrial” and “Schindler’s List.”

He’s even competed against himself multiple times for Oscars glory.

Williams is known for his grand neo-Romantic scores in the fashion of Wagner, a contrast to the more experimental fare prevalent among many modern composers outside Hollywood.

But his work is also steeped in mid-century influences including jazz and popular American standards.

Williams holds he’s not as Wagnerian as his music might indicate but admits the 19th century German giant’s influence on Hollywood’s early composers, and therefore his own, is palpable.

“Wagner lives with us here — you can’t escape it,” he told The New Yorker in 2020. “I have been in the big river swimming with all of them.”

‘Single greatest collaboration’

Williams was born on February 8, 1932, in New York’s Queens borough to a percussionist father, and was the eldest of four children.

The family moved to Los Angeles in 1948, where Williams later studied composition and took a semester of jazz band at Los Angeles City College.

While in the Air Force, he played both piano and brass while arranging music for the service’s band.

Afterwards, he moved to New York, where he enrolled at the prestigious Juilliard school to study piano.

Though he aspired to be a concert pianist, it became clear to Williams that composition was his forte.

He moved back to LA, where he worked on orchestrations at film — earning plaudits for his range — and as a session pianist, including for the film adaptation of Leonard Bernstein’s “West Side Story.”

Williams notched his first Oscar nod for the 1967 film “Valley of the Dolls,” and won his first in 1972 for “Fiddler on the Roof.”

His momentous partnership with Spielberg began in the early 1970s, when the soon to be household-name director approached him to score his debut, “The Sugarland Express.”

Spielberg approached him once more to work on his second film, “Jaws.”

The menacing two-note ostinato Williams composed for the film has practically become synonymous with fear itself: “John Williams actually is the teeth of Jaws,” Spielberg said last year at a concert for the composer’s 90th birthday.

The pair then worked on “Close Encounters of the Third Kind” and a decades-long creative partnership unfurled.

At the Williams birthday celebration in Washington, Spielberg dubbed their relationship “the single greatest collaboration of my career and one of the deepest friendships of my life.”

“Through the medium of movies, John has popularized motion picture scores more than any other composer in history,” he said.

‘Soundtrack of our lives’

Spielberg also introduced Williams to one George Lucas — it would become another iconic collaboration that spawned perhaps the most recognizable film score ever.

Several of Williams’ “Star Wars” compositions are prime examples of leitmotif, with musical cues tying together the vast, character-rich story.

“He has written the soundtrack of our lives,” conductor Gustavo Dudamel told The New York Times last year. “When we listen to a melody of John’s, we go back to a time, to a taste, to a smell.”

“All our senses go back to a moment,” Dudamel said.

Other credits from Williams’ more than 100 film scores include the music for 1978’s “Superman,” the first three “Harry Potter” films and a number of “Indiana Jones” films.’

“Harrison Ford made Indiana Jones into an iconic action hero, but John made us believe in adventure again, through that pulse-pounding march,” said Spielberg.

Off-screen, Williams is responsible for the “Olympic Fanfare and Theme” first composed for the 1984 Summer Games in Los Angeles and used ever since on U.S. broadcasts.

Williams recently indicated he might take a step back from film scoring, giving more energy to conducting and composing concert music; he was a longtime leader of the Boston Pops orchestra.

But speaking at a panel with Spielberg earlier this year, Williams seemed to walk back the notion of slowing down, vowing to work until he’s 100 or so.

“So I’ve got 10 more years to go. I’ll stick around for a while!” he told the crowd. “You can’t ‘retire’ from music. It’s like breathing.”
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An exhibition of Ukrainian traditional clothing and unique art pieces opened in Los Angeles to support Ukrainian artists. The goals are twofold, help the artists but also help children in Ukraine. Khrystyna Shvchenko has the story.
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Mushers and their dogs in the Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race face plenty of variables in the Alaska wilderness. An unexpected one this year has been heat that is taking a toll in a sport better suited for temperatures well below zero. 

Jason Mackey said a thermometer hanging from the back of his sled hit 26.67 degrees Celsius at one point this week as he camped alongside the trail while mushers neared the halfway mark of the race. Other racers threw their game plans for the 1,609-kilometer race across Alaska out the window to deal with the heat and messy trail conditions. 

Although it’s warm, it wasn’t 26.67 degrees in interior Alaska, which would probably be a record high in July, said Brian Brettschneider, a climate scientist with the National Weather Service’s Alaska Region. Instead, when you leave a thermometer in the sun, it absorbs the solar energy, which is the reason official measurement thermometers are kept in the shade. 

But it’s still warm and sunny, and it’s having noticeable effects on people who are exposed to it, Brettschneider said. 

Last weekend, the same area was much cooler than normal, with what appeared to be ideal mushing conditions. The warmer conditions are being driven by an area of high pressure, he said.  

Many communities in the nation’s largest state hit record highs this week, from Kodiak off Alaska’s southern coast to Deadhorse, the supply town for oil companies operating on the state’s North Slope, about 2,012 kilometers away. 

Along the Iditarod race route, the community of McGrath didn’t set records but had a high Wednesday of 2.22 degree Celsius, -10 degree Celsius above normal. More telling was a low temperature of -2.78 degrees Celsius. 

“Normally it should be below zero (-17.78 degrees Celsius),” Brettschneider said. 

That warmth was evident all along the Iditarod trail Wednesday. “There’s almost no places that were below freezing along the route,” he said. 

That was not news to Mackey. “I wish the temperatures would cool down,” the musher told a television crew from the Iditarod Insider. 

It’s just not the heat that was bothersome. He said he looked down at his sled at one point and saw two mosquitoes. 

“Yeah, it’s spring,” Mackey said. 

The heat is taking its toll on Mackey’s dogs, which he called “big boys” at 36.29 kilograms. He said other teams were moving in the heat of the day, but he wasn’t willing to do that. “I mean, it zaps them,” he said of the dog team. 

Kelly Maixner, a pediatric dentist, said his dogs don’t like the heat, and he’d rather it be -28.89 degrees Celsius. 

During the race, mushers must take one 24-hour layover at a checkpoint to rest. Part of where to take that layover plays into the strategy of most every musher. 

Nic Petit took his mandatory rest early in the race, at the checkpoint in Nikolai, because the sun was out. “I like hot dogs, just not my dog as a hot dog,” said Petit, who was born in France and raised in New Mexico. 

The melting was causing issues and concerns for some mushers, especially as they made for the race’s halfway point, the ghost village of Iditarod. 

“It could be soft and punchy out there, and who knows how the hills are going into Iditarod,” Richie Diehl told the TV crew. “It could be big tussocks just like a couple of years ago, and it could be a brutal run, you know, with the rolling hills and possibly barren tundra.” Tussocks are clumps of grass. 

Rookie musher Bailey Vitello of New Hampshire was near last place Thursday, running his dogs in the rain during the day and having to deal with ice at night. 

He would rather not be behind and dealing with ripped-up trails. “The back-of-the-pack is the worst part of the trail,” he told the TV crew. 

Riley Dyche of Fairbanks took his 24-hour break before reaching Iditarod because he didn’t want to run his dogs in the heat of the day. That likely cost him either $3,000 in gold nuggets or a new smart phone, the prize given to the first musher at the halfway point. 

“I don’t think the little incentive prize — it would have been cool — but I don’t think it would have been a benefit to these guys for getting to the finish line,” he said, speaking of his dogs. 

Instead, that prize went to race leader Wade Marrs, who is originally from Alaska but now living in Wisconsin. He arrived in Iditarod about 1 a.m. Thursday. 

The good news for mushers is that as they continue west, temperatures will be more Alaska-like, highs around -12 degrees Celsius and lows below -17.78 degrees, Brettschneider said. 

The race started Sunday in Willow, just north of Anchorage. Mushers will take their dog teams over two mountain ranges, the frozen Yukon River and the Bering Sea ice to the finish line in Nome. The winner is expected sometime early next week. 

 
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Robert Blake, the Emmy award-winning performer who went from acclaim for his acting to notoriety when he was tried and acquitted in the killing of his wife, died Thursday at age 89.

A statement released on behalf of his niece, Noreen Austin, said Blake died from heart disease, surrounded by family at home in Los Angeles.

Blake, the star of the 1970s TV show “Baretta,” had once hoped for a comeback, but he never recovered from the ordeal that began with the shooting death of his wife, Bonny Lee Bakley, outside a Studio City restaurant on May 4, 2001. The story of their strange marriage, the child it produced, and its violent end was a Hollywood tragedy played out in court.

Once hailed as among the finest actors of his generation, Blake became better known as the center of a real-life murder trial, a story more bizarre than any in which he acted. Many remembered him not as the rugged, dark-haired star of “Baretta,” but as a spectral, white-haired murder defendant.

In a 2002 interview with The Associated Press, he was adamant that he had not killed his wife. A jury ultimately acquitted him, but a civil jury would find Blake liable for her death and order him to pay Bakley’s family $30 million, a judgment that sent him into bankruptcy. The daughter he and Bakley had together, Rose Lenore, was raised by other relatives and went for years without seeing Blake until they spoke in 2019. She would tell People magazine that she called him “Robert,” not “Dad.”

It was an ignominious finale for a life lived in the spotlight from childhood. As a youngster, he starred in the “Our Gang” comedies and acted in a movie classic, “The Treasure of the Sierra Madre.” As an adult, he was praised for his portrayal of real-life murderer Perry Smith in the movie of Truman Capote’s true crime best seller “In Cold Blood.”

Blake’s career peaked with the 1975-78 TV cop series, “Baretta.” He starred as a detective who carried a pet cockatoo on his shoulder and was fond of disguises. It was typical of his specialty, portraying tough guys with soft hearts, and its signature line, “Don’t do the crime if you can’t do the time,” was often quoted.

Blake won a 1975 Emmy for his portrayal of Tony Baretta, although behind the scenes the show was wracked by disputes involving the temperamental star. He gained a reputation as one of Hollywood’s finest actors, but one of the most difficult to work with. He later admitted to struggles with alcohol and drug addiction in his early life.

In 1993, Blake won another Emmy as the title character in “Judgment Day: The John List Story,” portraying a soft-spoken, churchgoing man who murdered his wife and three children.

Blake’s career had slowed down well before the trial. He made only a handful of screen appearances after the mid-1980s; his last project was in David Lynch’s “Lost Highway,” released in 1997. According to his niece, Blake had spent his recent years “enjoying jazz music, playing his guitar, reading poetry and watching many Hollywood classic films.”

Once a wealthy man, he wound up living on Social Security and a Screen Actor’s Guild pension.
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The security crisis in Burkina Faso has impacted every aspect of society, including its film industry. The 28th edition of the Pan-African Film & TV Festival of Ouagadougou, or FESPACO, which ended earlier this month [March 4], reflected this difficult situation both on and off screen. Reporters Yacouba Ouedraogo and Thierry Kaore have this story, narrated by Salem Solomon
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California’s desert is drawing artists from Bangladesh and from Mexico to the Coachella Valley for an unusual exhibition called Desert X. For VOA, Genia Dulot went to see.
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Wednesday is International Women’s Day with a theme this year focusing on the need for gender equity. 

The annual observance, which dates to 1911 and fights for women’s rights, is a day for people everywhere to celebrate the achievements of women across society. 

The United Nations is putting the focus of its International Women’s Day programs on the importance of protecting the rights of women and girls in digital spaces and working to address gaps in access to vital technology. 

The U.N. says worldwide 259 million fewer women have access to the internet than men, and that without access and the ability to feel safe online, “they are unable to develop the necessary digital skills to engage in digital spaces.”

In Washington, the International Women of Courage award ceremony is taking place at the White House for the first time. The award, which has been given to 180 women from 80 countries since 2007, “recognizes women from around the globe who have demonstrated exceptional courage, strength, and leadership in advocating for peace, justice, human rights, gender equity and equality, often at great personal risk and sacrifice,” according to the U.S. State Department. 

This year’s event will feature 12 honorees, including an award for the women and girls in Iran who have led protests since the September death in police custody of Mahsa Amini. 

Some information for this report came from Reuters. 
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When entrepreneur Sana Bhatt decided to set up a studio, she hardly knew if people would appreciate her efforts to revive traditional music on the Indian side of Kashmir.

Prior to the launch of the studio, the 24-year-old approached many local artists to sing songs on a set that that appeared similar to that of the Pakistan-based musical show, “Coke Studio.”

“Kehwa Beats” is the name of the show streamed live on Bhatt’s YouTube channel, Kashmir Originals. It went on to become a big hit with just six tracks. Eight artists, including two women, set the stage on fire, singing songs written by local poets from the disputed Himalayan territory.

“I felt there was a need to bring out domestically produced songs so that people can consume our music,” Bhatt told VOA.

“Kashmir has a rich culture and has an outstanding heritage of producing wonderful music,” she said, adding that music helps people living in different parts of the world understand different cultures.

The task of setting up an appealing studio, according to Bhatt, was challenging in the face of what she says is a social mindset that places restrictions on women.

“I had expected a good response but had no idea that people from outside Kashmir, too, would fall in love with our music,” Bhatt told VOA. “One of our female artists was trolled because of her clothing during her performance, otherwise everything went smoothly.”

Shift to local music

For more than two decades, residents of Kashmir used to listen to music sung by well-known artists from India and Pakistan. Musicians such as Aatif Aslam, Rahat Fateh Ali Khan, Bohemia, Honey Singh, Neha Kakkar and Shreya Ghoshal used to reverberate in every household.

However, artists such as Mohammad Muneem and Noor Mohammad Shah, and a duo of Irfan and Bilal brought the attention of the local population back to domestically produced songs.

The revival of traditional Kashmiri music remained confined to men for several years until female singers such as Aabha Hanjura, Memet Syed, Vibha Saraf and others released their own tracks.

“There are many people who say ‘Why (do) females produce or sing songs?’ but at the same time appreciate men for doing the same,” Bhatt said. “People often relate women’s singing to religion. I ask them if it is related to the religion then both men as well as women should be targeted as religious restrictions are meant for both the genders.”

Difficult success

Nargis Khatoon, a young Kashmir-born New Delhi-based singer, believes women musicians don’t find good opportunities in the valley, unlike in other parts of India. As a result, it becomes difficult for singers like her to thrive in Kashmir.

“I live in New Delhi and find number of opportunities here, but if we speak about Kashmir we don’t have [a] commercial market to perform due to a large number of youth [who] hesitate in choosing music as a career,” Khatoon said.

Khatoon sees hope in people such as Bhatt coming forward and setting up a platform that allows musicians to present their talent in front of the world without any gender bias. But she said some broad-minded parents allow their daughters to choose their career in music only to have fears of an unstable future sometimes cause them to change their minds.

“I believe this is one of the reasons parents don’t allow girls to become singers, as they are worried about their future,” said Khatoon. “If more opportunities are provided in Kashmir, we might witness more and more female artists coming forward and joining the industry.”

‘More artists are welcome’

The Kashmir valley historically has produced many female singers who created a lasting impact on people of the region with their unique vocalization.

Years ago, the local population would be glued in front of radio and televisions for hours so that they could listen to their favorite female artists — household names such as Raj Begum, Naseema Akhther and Shameem Dev Azad.

Ishfaq Kawa, one of the popular singers in the valley, said that like men, women should work to promote traditional music because of their love for the Kashmiri language and culture.

“They [women] too love and do their bit to protect and promote our cultural music,” Kawa told VOA. “More and more artists are welcome to join this field, and everyone should respect them.”

However, Kawa disagrees with a popular notion that women singers are the only victims of abuse on social media.

“The thing is, an individual has to carry on without caring and thinking about such people,” said Kawa. “If we pay heed to what people say then we have to stop doing what we believe is good for our mother tongue.”

The show must go on

Bhatt, the entrepreneur, meanwhile is working on Season 2 of her show. Many popular as well as new faces will join Kashmir’s own “Coke Studio.”

“I and my team this year will focus folk songs of Kashmir,” Bhatt said. “Season 1 of ‘Kehwa Beats’ was the fusion of folk and hip-hop. In Season 2 we will try to give our folk music a contemporary touch which I believe would be popular among the masses, especially youth.”

Kashmir Originals, she said, not only provides a platform for singers but also for the instrumentalists, who she says add beauty to music.

“Both men and women instrumentalists are part of Kashmir Originals and ‘Kehwa Beats,'” Bhatt said. “Instrumentalists are as important as singers because they put life in the songs.”
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Young artists everywhere struggle to earn a living but that’s especially true in South Africa, where youth unemployment is more than 43 percent. The International Public Art Festival is trying to help bridge that gap by connecting young artists with companies seeking creative marketing. Vicky Stark reports from Cape Town, South Africa.
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Several hundred thousand Russian citizens are thought to have fled their home country since February of last year, when the Kremlin launched its invasion of Ukraine. While no official figures exist, some estimates put the figure at close to one million people.

The exodus includes Russian citizens seeking to avoid mandated military service, as well as political activists, journalists and artists. Critics of the war face imprisonment for “discrediting” the Russian military or spreading what the Kremlin calls “unreliable information.”

Those who fled Russia’s government crackdown include Pavel Otdelnov, an artist whose works often critique Soviet and Russian history and politics. The 43-year-old found sanctuary in London and just completed an exhibition for Pushkin House, a Russian cultural center in the British capital.

‘Acting out’

Otdelnov said the exhibition, “Acting Out,” was about the humanitarian catastrophe associated with the war in Ukraine, along with an attempt to find the signs hidden in history that led to the Kremlin’s invasion of Ukraine.

One of the first works, a painting titled “Money,” showed old Soviet banknotes stored inside an unused missile silo, something that actually happened with the collapse of communism. The work is embellished with fragments of real bank notes.

“In 1991, under [then-Prime Minister Valentin] Pavlov, monetary reform led to the impoverishment of the population,” Otdelnov explained.

“Many people lost their savings as they had to exchange the old-style bank notes for the new-style bank notes within only three days, and the amount to be exchanged was very limited. All the rest [of the cash] turned into worthless paper that was stored in warehouses and bank deposits in different parts of the Soviet Union and Russia, and later in missile silos,” Otdelnov said.

‘Humiliated’

Otdelnov grew up through the collapse of communism. His art works parody Russia’s feeling of injustice at the outcome of the Cold War, when the Soviet Union broke up.

“This is a narrative that is very actively used in today’s propaganda — this conviction that we were humiliated, that we were put on our knees, and that we are now finally getting up from our knees and showing the whole world how powerful we are. Putin’s phrase that the collapse of the Soviet Union was the greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the 20th century is very characteristic of this,” Otdelnov told VOA, referring to Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Russian laws

Shortly after launching its invasion of Ukraine, Russia passed a law criminalizing dissent against the war, punishable with huge fines and imprisonment. Thousands of people have been arrested at anti-war demonstrations and for voicing their opposition.

Otdelnov has exhibited his provocative works across Russia for decades. But like hundreds of thousands of other Russians, he feared for his liberty and safety. He left Russia shortly after the invasion began last year and was given a visa to live in Britain under the country’s Global Talent program.

Another of his works in the Pushkin House exhibition showed forlorn human figures lost in a vast sea of fog, apparently mirroring his experience. Otdelnov said the exhibit, “A Generation,” was about “those people who left their country, who do not see any prospects, do not see an opportunity to continue to live and progress and work there.”

Invasion of Ukraine

The final works in the exhibition addressed Russia’s war in Ukraine. One of the most powerful, “Cargo 200,” showed a railway wagon standing in a flat, snowy field — the winter landscape of eastern Ukraine.

“This is the refrigerated railway wagon that transports the bodies of the dead,” Otdelnov said. “This is the last work for this exhibition, and I decided to paint it when Putin announced mobilization,” he said.

“I thought about the fate of those people who will go to war, who will take up arms and who will be killed.”
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All eyes will be on Hollywood Sunday when the Academy Awards, or Oscars, will honor the best in filmmaking. From Los Angeles, Mike O’Sullivan has a preview.
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Several hundred thousand Russian citizens are thought to have fled their home country since February 2022, when the Kremlin launched the invasion of Ukraine. Critics of the war face imprisonment for “discrediting” the Russian military. Henry Ridgwell spoke to a Russian artist who has found sanctuary in London, and whose latest work addresses the war in Ukraine.
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In 2012, UNESCO, the U.N. body tasked with promoting arts and culture, identified the traditional xylophone known as the balafon as an important part of humanity’s cultural heritage. Today, in Ivory Coast, informal workshops with students are underway to promote the instrument and highlight its African origins. Alain Amontchi looks at this unique instrument in this story narrated by Salem Solomon. Video editor: Betty Ayoub.
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The battle to find baseball’s global champions gets under way this week when the pandemic-delayed World Baseball Classic returns after a six-year absence with Shohei Ohtani hoping to inspire Japan to a record third title.    

Teams from 20 countries are participating in the fifth edition of the tournament, with the four first round groups hosted at venues in Taiwan, Tokyo, Arizona and Florida before the bulk of the knockout rounds get under way in the United States.    

The tournament was last staged in 2017, with the United States finally winning the title for the first time with victory over Puerto Rico at Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles.    

The onset of the COVID-19 pandemic forced the postponement of the tournament in 2021, meaning the United States are only now launching their title defense with a team bristling with stars from Major League Baseball.    

The American roster includes some of the biggest names in the MLB, with Los Angeles Angels slugger Mike Trout joining the likes of the Philadelphia Phillies’ Kyle Schwarber and Trea Turner, the Los Angeles Dodgers’ Mookie Betts and the Colorado Rockies’ Nolan Arenado.    

Team USA manager Mark DeRosa believes the American line-up is conceivably the “greatest USA team ever assembled” and is relishing the fact that the defending champions will head into the tournament as the team everyone wants to beat.    

“We’ll be the hunted,” DeRosa acknowledged in a recent interview, adding that he is hoping to build an atmosphere of excitement amongst the US squad as they get the rare opportunity to join forces in an international setting.      

“I want there to be a buzz,” DeRosa said. “This is an opportunity to grow, and be great, and to represent your country and get to meet some guys you may never be in a batting practice group with.”    

Ohtani leads Japan challenge   

The U.S. will face Mexico, Colombia, Canada and Great Britain in Pool C, with all games taking place at Chase Field in Phoenix, the home of the Arizona Diamondbacks.  

Yet the star-studded U.S. roster is by no means the only one in the tournament with box office appeal.    

Japan, who won the inaugural classic in 2006 and successfully defended the title three years later, will be chasing a record third world crown with all eyes on two-way star Ohtani.   

Los Angeles Angels ace Ohtani, the 2021 American League Most Valuable Player, leads a Japan team that will play all of its first-round games at the Tokyo Dome, which is hosting Pool B.   

Ohtani says playing in the classic for Japan had been a dream ever since watching the tournament as a fan in 2006.    

“Just watching the best players in Japan playing together as a team against the best in the world was so exciting,” he said earlier this year. “Now that I’m in that position, I want to show people what I can do.”    

Other teams in the group include South Korea, Australia, China and the Czech Republic.      

Ohtani, who is expected to command a record-breaking contract when he enters free agency after this season, will be playing in front of Japanese fans for the first time in more than five years.    

The 28-year-old was originally due to play in the 2017 World Baseball Classic but was ruled out with an ankle injury.    

The Dominican Republic, meanwhile, the 2013 champions, are also looming large as one of the favorites for the title.    

The Dominicans’ largely MLB-based squad boasts the likes of San Diego Padres duo Manny Machado and Juan Soto although Toronto Blue Jays slugger Vladimir Guerrero Jr. has withdrawn from the roster. Guerrero pulled out on Saturday citing knee soreness.      

The Dominican Republic head a stacked Pool D staged at Miami’s LoanDepot Park which includes a powerful Puerto Rico team, Venezuela, Israel and Nicaragua.      

The tournament opens on Wednesday with Pool A games in Taiwan. Pool A includes Taiwan, Netherlands, Cuba, Italy and Panama. 
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Oscar de la Renta, Calvin Klein, Alexandra Alonso Rojas and many others produce their collections with hand-knitted products made by Ukrainian women. It’s been a year since Russia invaded Ukraine, but despite the war, Ukrainian women continue to work. Nina Vishneva has the story, narrated by Anna Rice. VOA footage by Vladimir Badikov, Natalia Latukhina.
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“Creed III” punched above its weight at the domestic box office in its first weekend in theaters. The MGM release knocked “Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania” out of first place and far surpassed both industry expectations and the opening weekends of the first two movies in the franchise.

Playing in 4,007 locations in North America, “Creed III” earned an estimated $58.7 million in ticket sales, according to studio estimates Sunday. Going into the weekend, analysts expected the film to open in the $30 million range. The first “Creed” debuted at $29 million in 2015 and “Creed II” opened to $35 million in 2018.

Michael B. Jordan made his directorial debut with “Creed III,” which pits his character Adonis against a childhood friend, Dame, played by Jonathan Majors. It’s the first in the Rocky/Creed films to not feature Sylvester Stallone, who chose not to return because of creative differences.

“This is beyond all of our expectations. And we knew that we had something special — we tested the movie and it tested great, but the public responded so resoundingly to it,” said Erik Lomis, MGM’s head of distribution. “Everything went right here starting with the movie itself … It was just up to us not to break it when they gave it to us, and we didn’t.”

Strong reviews helped “Creed III,” which is currently sitting at an 87% on Rotten Tomatoes, while audiences gave it an A- CinemaScore. The audience was largely male (63%), diverse (36% Black, 28% Latino, 23% white and 13% Asian/other) and young (55% between 18 and 34) according to exit polls.

Over 80% of the general audience said the film was a “definite recommend.” With Black audiences, that number ballooned to 89%.

“I’ve been doing this a long time and that’s rarefied air,” Lomis said. “People love the movie.”

It’s also the most expensive “Creed” film, with a reported production budget of $75 million, compared to the others which cost $35 million and $50 million. Internationally, “Creed III” earned $41.8 million from 75 markets, making its global debut $100.4 million.

It’s a big moment for Amazon, who acquired MGM for $8.5 billion last year, and could have simply released “Creed III” on its streaming service with a limited theatrical run. But they chose theatrical, and it paid off.

“Amazon threw their weight behind this movie like only they can do,” Lomis said. “They supercharged the campaign with marketing support across all their verticals on the platform and beyond the platform. That shows a commitment to the theatrical business model from Amazon and MGM, which I think should be exciting to everybody.”

The company’s next major theatrical release is the Ben Affleck-directed “Air,” starring Matt Damon, out next month.

“Ant-Man 3″ slipped to a distant second in its third weekend in theaters with $12.5 million from North America and $22 million internationally. The Marvel and Disney film’s global cume now stands at $419.5 million.

Third place went to Universal’s ” Cocaine Bear,” which added $11 million in its second weekend in theaters to bring its domestic total to $41.3 million.

Crunchyroll’s “Demon Slayer: Kimetsu No Yaiba – To The Swordsmith Village” placed fourth with $10.1 million. The series is based on Koyoharu Gotouge’s manga about a boy avenging his family.

Lionsgate and Kingdom Story Company’s “Jesus Revolution” rounded out the top five with $8.7 million. The film starring Kelsey Grammer as a pastor in the 1970s has made $30.5 million in two weekends in theaters against a $15 million production budget.

Opening outside of the top five was Guy Ritchie’s “Operation Fortune: Ruse de Guerre,” a spy caper with Jason Statham, Hugh Grant and Aubrey Plaza that made $3.2 million from 2,168 locations this weekend. The film, originally an STX release, was in distribution limbo for some time. Lionsgate recently stepped in to oversee the domestic rollout.

The success of “Creed III” bodes well for other releases coming in March, including “John Wick Chapter 4” and “Shazam! Fury of the Gods.”

“We’re going to have an incredible March,” said Paul Dergarabedian, the senior media analyst for Comscore. “It’s going to feel more like summer than spring with hits coming one after the next that will create incredible momentum for the summer movie season.”

Estimated ticket sales for Friday through Sunday at U.S. and Canadian theaters, according to Comscore, with Wednesday through Sunday in parentheses. Final domestic figures will be released Monday.

1. “Creed III,” $58.7 million.  

2. “Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania,” $12.5 million.  

3. “Cocaine Bear,” $11 million.  

4. “Demon Slayer: Kimetsu No Yaiba – To The Swordsmith Village,” $10.1 million. 5. “Jesus Revolution,” $8.7 million.  

5. “Avatar: The Way of Water,” $3.6 million.  

6. “Operation Fortune: Ruse de Guerre,” $3.2 million.  

7. “Puss in Boots: The Last Wish,” $2.7 million.  

8. “Magic Mike’s Last Dance,” $1.2 million.  

9. “80 for Brady,” $845,000.
   …

Ukrainian diver Stanislav Oliferchyk proudly bears the name of his late grandfather, who died in brutalized Mariupol. Russia’s troops turned the Ukrainian port city into a killing zone in the process of capturing it. The elder Stanislav could no longer get the cancer treatment he needed in the ruins, his grandson says. He was 74 when he died last October.

Another victim of the months-long Russian siege of Mariupol was its gleaming aquatic center. Oliferchyk had planned to use the refurbished sports complex as his training base for the 2024 Paris Olympics. But it was bombed the same day last March as the city’s drama theater. The theater airstrike was the single deadliest known attack against civilians to date in the year-old Russian invasion. An Associated Press investigation determined that close to 600 people died.

So it takes no leap of the imagination to understand why Mariupol-born Oliferchyk is horrified by the idea that he and other war-traumatized Ukrainian athletes might have to put their anger and consciences aside and compete against counterparts from Russia and ally Belarus at next year’s Olympics.

“I’m angry most of the time. I just can’t stand it anymore when shelling happens,” said the 26-year-old Oliferchyk, a European champion in 3-meter mixed synchronized diving in 2019. “I want Russia to let us live in peace and stay away from us.”

Defying fury from Ukraine and misgivings from other nations, the International Olympic Committee is exploring whether to allow Russians and Belarusians back into international sports and the Paris Games. The IOC says it is mission-bound to promote unity and peace — particularly when war is raging. It also cites United Nations human rights experts who argue, on non-discrimination grounds, that athletes and sports judges from Russia and Belarus shouldn’t be banned simply for the passports they hold.

For Ukrainian athletes setting their sights on Paris, the possibility of sharing Olympic pools, fields and arenas with Russian and Belarusian competitors is so repellent that some say they’d not go if it happens.

Sisters Maryna and Vladyslava Aleksiiva — who won Olympic bronze in artistic swimming’s team competition at the Tokyo Olympics in 2021 — are among those who say they’d have to boycott.

“We must,” Maryna said during an Associated Press interview at their training pool in the Ukrainian capital, Kyiv.

Russia is the giant of their sport, previously called synchronized swimming, having won all the gold medals at the past six Olympics.

Completing each other’s sentences, the Ukrainian twins added: “Our moral feelings don’t allow us to stand near … these people.”

Oliferchyk worries that enmity could spill over if Ukrainians encounter Russians and Belarusians in Paris — a likely scenario given that Olympians will be housed and dine together in accommodation overlooking the River Seine in the city’s northern suburbs.

“Anything can happen, even a fight,” Oliferchyk said. “There simply cannot be any handshakes between us.”

Having to train in the midst of war also puts Ukraine’s Olympic hopefuls at a disadvantage. Russian strikes have destroyed training venues. Air raids disrupt training sessions. Athletes have lost family members and friends, or are consumed by worries that they will. Because Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has also closed the country’s airspace, traveling to international competitions has become an arduous odyssey — often of long train rides to neighboring Poland, for onward flights from there.

“Our athletes train while cruise missiles are flying, bombs are flying,” Ukrainian Sports Minister Vadym Guttsait said in an AP interview.

He recalled a meeting he took part in between IOC president Thomas Bach and Ukrainian cyclists given refuge in Swizterland.

“Bach asked one of the cyclists how she was doing,” the minister recounted. “She started crying. He asked why. She said that day they (Russian forces) attacked her city, where her parents were, and she was very nervous.”

“This is how every athlete feels about what is happening in Ukraine,” the minister said.

Ukraine’s artistic swim team, including the Aleksiiva sisters, used to train in the Lokomotiv sports center in Kharkiv, the country’s second-largest city. A Russian strike with powerful S-300 missiles wrecked the complex in September, the region’s governor, Oleh Syniehubov, said at the time. He posted photos showing a giant crater and severe damage to the exterior.

Maryna Aleksiiva said they used to think of the sports center as “our second home.” Their substitute pool in Kyiv doesn’t have the same broad depth of water, making it less suitable for practicing their underwater acrobatics, the sisters said. On a recent morning when they spoke to the AP, air raid sirens interrupted their training and they had to get out of the pool and take refuge in a bomb shelter until the all-clear sounded.

The power also flickered briefly off at times. Russia has been systematically bombarding Ukraine’s electricity infrastructure for months. When attacks shut off the pool’s heating, the water gets so cold that the sisters train in full-body wetsuits — far from ideal for their elegant sport.

“It’s hard to move,” Vladyslava said.

The terrors of war also take a mental toll.

“Every day we read the news — explosion, explosion, air alert,” Maryna said. “We feel so nervous about our relatives.”

Oliferchyk said he cannot imagine a handshake between Ukrainian and Russian athletes for “the next 50, 100 years.”

The Neptune arena in Mariupol where he wanted to train for Paris was wrecked by a Russian strike last March 16. As with Mariupol’s drama theater also destroyed that day, civilians were sheltering at the sports complex from bombardments. They included pregnant women who moved there after a Russian strike the previous week devastated a city maternity hospital. Video posted on Facebook by the region’s governor showed the Neptune’s shattered front and a gaping hole in its roof.

The IOC’s possible pathway out of sports exile for Russians and Belarusians would see them compete as “neutral athletes,” without national flags, colors or anthems.

That idea is a non-starter for Ukraine’s sports minister and athletes who resent that would-be Olympians from Russia and Belarus aren’t taking a stand against the invasion.

“They just do nothing and say nothing. And precisely because of their silence and inaction, all this horror is happening,” Oliferchyk said. “A neutral flag is not an option. It is not possible.”
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An international archeological mission has uncovered the remnants of what is believed to be a 5,000-year-old restaurant or tavern in the ancient city of Lagash in southern Iraq.

The discovery of the ancient dining hall — complete with a rudimentary refrigeration system, hundreds of roughly made clay bowls and the fossilized remains of an overcooked fish — announced in late January by a University of Pennsylvania-led team, generated some buzz beyond Iraq’s borders.

It came against the backdrop of a resurgence of archeology in a country often referred to as the “cradle of civilization,” but where archeological exploration has been stunted by decades of conflict before and after the U.S. invasion of 2003. Those events exposed the country’s rich sites and collections to the looting of tens of thousands of artifacts.

“The impacts of looting on the field of archeology were very severe,” Laith Majid Hussein, director of the State Board of Antiquities and Heritage of Iraq, told The Associated Press. “Unfortunately, the wars and periods of instability have greatly affected the situation in the country in general.”

With relative calm prevailing over the past few years, the digs have returned. At the same time, thousands of stolen artifacts have been repatriated, offering hope of an archeological renaissance.

“‘Improving’ is a good term to describe it, or ‘healing’ or ‘recovering,'” said Jaafar Jotheri, a professor of archeology at University of Al-Qadisiyah, describing the current state of the field in his country.

Iraq is home to six UNESCO-listed World Heritage Sites, among them the ancient city of Babylon, the site of several ancient empires under rulers like Hammurabi and Nebuchadnezzar.

In the years before the 2003 U.S. invasion, a limited number of international teams came to dig at sites in Iraq. During Saddam Hussein’s rule, Jotheri said, the foreign archeologists who did come were under strict monitoring by a suspicious government in Baghdad, limiting their contacts with locals. There was little opportunity to transfer skills or technology to local archeologists, he said, meaning that the international presence brought “no benefit for Iraq.”

The country’s ancient sites faced “two waves of destruction,” Jotheri said, the first after harsh international sanctions were imposed following Iraq’s 1990 invasion of Kuwait and desperate Iraqis “found artifacts and looting as a form of income” and the second in 2003 following the U.S. invasion, when “everything collapsed.”

Amid the ensuing security vacuum and rise of the Islamic State militant group, excavations all but shut down for nearly a decade in southern Iraq, while continuing in the more stable northern Kurdish-controlled area. Ancient sites were looted and artifacts smuggled abroad.

The first international teams to return to southern Iraq came in 2014 but their numbers grew haltingly after that.

The digs at Lagash, which was first excavated in 1968, had shut down after 1990, and the site remained dormant until 2019.

Unlike many others, the site was not plundered in the interim, largely due to the efforts of tribes living in the area, said Zaid Alrawi, an Iraqi archeologist who is the project manager at the site.

Would-be looters who came to the area were run off by “local villagers who consider these sites basically their own property,” he said.

A temple complex and the remains of institutional buildings had been uncovered in earlier digs, so when archeologists returned in 2019, Alrawi said, they focused on areas that would give clues to the lives of ordinary people. They began with what turned out to be a pottery workshop containing several kilns, complete with throwaway figurines apparently made by bored workers and date pits from their on-shift snacking.

Further digging in the area surrounding the workshop found a large room containing a fireplace used for cooking. The area also held seating benches and a refrigeration system made with layers of clay jars thrust into the earth with clay shards in between.

The site is believed to date to around 2,700 BC. Given that beer drinking was widespread among the ancient Sumerians inhabiting Lagash at the time, many envisioned the space as a sort of ancient gastropub.

But Alrawi said he believes it was more likely a cafeteria to feed workers from the pottery workshop next door.

“I think it was a place to serve whoever was working at the big pottery production next door, right next to the place where people work hard, and they had to eat lunch,” he said.

Alrawi, whose father was also an archeologist, grew up visiting sites around the country. Today, he is happy to see “a full throttle of excavations” returning to Iraq.

“It’s very good for the country and for the archeologists, for the international universities and academia,” he said.

As archeological exploration has expanded, international dollars have flowed into restoring damaged heritage sites like the al-Nouri mosque in Mosul, and Iraqi authorities have pushed to repatriate stolen artifacts from countries as near as Lebanon and as far as the United States.

Last month, Iraq’s national museum began opening its doors to the public for free on Fridays — a first in recent history. Families wandered through halls lined with Assyrian tablets and got an up-close look at the crown jewel of Iraq’s repatriated artifacts: a small clay tablet dating back 3,500 years and bearing a portion of the Epic of Gilgamesh that was looted from an Iraqi museum 30 years ago and returned from the U.S. two years ago. The tablet is among 17,000 looted artifacts returned to Iraq from the U.S.

Ebtisam Khalaf, a history teacher who was one of the visitors to the museum on its first free day, said, “This is a beautiful initiative because, we can see the things that we only used to hear about.”

Before, she said, her students could “only see these antiquities in books. But now we can see these beautiful artifacts for real.”
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Archaeologists say they have uncovered a “unique” cache of well-preserved spices, from strands of saffron to peppercorns and ginger, on the wreck of a royal ship that sank off Sweden’s Baltic coast more than 500 years ago.

The wreck of the Gribshund, owned by King Hans of Denmark and Norway, has lain off the coast off Ronneby since 1495, when it is thought to have caught fire and sank as the monarch attended a political meeting ashore in Sweden.

Rediscovered by sports divers in the 1960s, sporadic excavations of the ship have taken place in recent years. Previous dives recovered large items such as figureheads and timber. Now an excavation led by Brendan Foley, an archaeological scientist at Lund University, has found the spices buried in the silt of the boat.

“The Baltic is strange – it’s low oxygen, low temperature, low salinity, so many organic things are well preserved in the Baltic where they wouldn’t be well preserved elsewhere in the world ocean system,” said Foley. “But to find spices like this is quite extraordinary.”

The spices would have been a symbol of high status, as only the wealthy could afford goods such as saffron or cloves that were imported from outside Europe. They would have been travelling with King Hans as he attended the meeting in Sweden.

Lund University researcher Mikael Larsson, who has been studying the finds, said: “This is the only archaeological context where we’ve found saffron. So, it’s very unique and it’s very special.”
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