Jeff Kravitz/FilmMagic for HBOBrian Cox gave his take on the world’s most popular book this week in an interview on The Starting Line podcast with Rich Leigh, slamming the Bible as the “worst book ever.”The Succession star said he thinks religion “holds us back because its belief systems, which are outside ourselves, they’re not dealing with who we all are, they’re dealing with well, ‘if God says this and God does that.’”Cox has become known for his very strong, unfiltered public opinions. Most recently he stated that Joaquin Phoenix was “truly terrible” in Ridley Scott’s Napoleon and added that he could’ve “played it a lot better.” Now, he’s got some spicy words for the Bible and religion, which he ultimately calls “stupid”—mostly because of the “patriarchal” lens it puts on the world.Read more at The Daily Beast.

Caitlin Ochs/ReutersPro-Palestinian protesters stormed into a Columbia University building and barricaded themselves inside early Tuesday, the latest dramatic escalation in the ongoing demonstrations denouncing Israel’s war in Gaza currently blazing at campuses across the country.Dozens of protesters used tables and chairs to block the entrances to Hamilton Hall in the early hours, according to the Columbia Daily Spectator. Activists inside the building—which was once occupied during a 1968 civil rights and anti-Vietnam war protest—reportedly unfurled banners reading “Free Palestine” and “Hind’s Hall” in reference to Hind Rajab, the 6-year-old Palestinian girl who was found dead in February after making a desperate phone call for help.Columbia started suspending students on Monday if they broke a 2 p.m. deadline to vacate an encampment nearby. Such students won’t be able to graduate or return to university housing. It’s not year clear how many individuals have been hit by the suspensions. Read more at The Daily Beast.

Julieta CervantesAlicia Keys’ musical Hell’s Kitchen and David Adjmi’s critically adored play Stereophonic, about a 1970s band rehearsing and combusting in an atmospherically rendered recording studio, each picked up 13 nominations Tuesday, leading the contenders for theater-land’s Oscars which will be televised on CBS on June 16. The Outsiders musical, based on S.E. Hinton's classic 1967 novel, picked up 12 nominations.One notable snub was for movie star Steve Carell, locked out of the Best Actor Play category for his title role in Uncle Vanya—his co-star William Jackson Harper beat him to the nomination instead. (Danny DeVito was also snubbed for his role in the poorly received I Need That.) Also nominated were Leslie Odom Jr. for Purlie Victorious: A Non-Confederate Romp Through the Cotton Patch, Succession star Jeremy Strong for An Enemy of the People, Liev Schreiber for Doubt, and Michael Stuhlbarg for Patriots.The Best Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role in a Play category is a vibrant list of boldface names: Sarah Paulson for Appropriate, Rachel McAdams (Mary Jane), Jessica Lange (Mother Play), Betsy Aidem (Prayer for the French Republic), and Amy Ryan for Doubt: A Parable.Read more at The Daily Beast.

Seth Winnig/Getty The third week of Donald Trump’s criminal trial in New York got off to an aggressive start on Tuesday morning, when the former president was swiftly fined $9,000 by the judge for repeatedly making public comments about jurors and witnesses—ignoring the court’s gag order that sought to stymie an ongoing MAGA intimidation campaign.New York Supreme Court Justice Juan Merchan said prosecutors had clearly proven that Trump was violating his court order in nine out of 10 instances, fining him $1,000 for each violation.“The people met their burden of proof and demonstrated contempt,” Merchan said with little fanfare.Read more at The Daily Beast.

Martin Mlaka / Sky UKThe Holocaust is the wound that never heals because the hate that fueled it is always here, and one need only look and listen today—with Jews persecuted and demonized at home and abroad, and with vehement calls for their expulsion and extermination as commonplace as they were in the 1930s and 1940s—to be reminded that antisemitism is the world’s eternal ugliness. Thus, Peacock’s six-part limited series The Tattooist of Auschwitz arrives at a particularly auspicious moment. Inspired by both Heather Morris’ best-selling 2018 book and the memories of its main character, it’s a stirring tribute to the perseverance of one man and, by extension, to all who survived the horrors of Hitler’s genocide, and who were rewarded for their triumph with a lifetime of pain, guilt, heartache, and ghosts that refuse to go quietly into the terrible night.Spearheaded by director Tali Shalom Ezer and writer Jacquelin Perske, The Tattooist of Auschwitz, which premieres May 2, is, in several ways, a familiar tale refracted through a novel lens, and at times, its framing device proves a tad clunky. Nonetheless, such intermittent gracelessness is overshadowed by the proceedings’ complexity, poignancy, and horror. In Melbourne, Australia circa 2003, hospital worker Heather (Melanie Lynskey) visits the apartment of Lale Sokolov (Harvey Keitel), a widower and Holocaust survivor to whom she’s been referred by a friend. Lale wants someone to pen his life story and Heather is an aspiring writer. Despite not being Jewish or having any first-hand relationship with the atrocities of WWII, she agrees to the task, sitting with Lale in his sunlit living room as he slowly recounts his unthinkable ordeal.That begins in 1942 Slovakia, where twentysomething Lale (Jonah Hauer-King) hears that one member of each Jewish household must report to the authorities for work duty. Lale volunteers and is promptly loaded into an overcrowded train and transported to Auschwitz II—Birkenau, the most infamous of the Third Reich’s numerous concentration camps. Upon arriving, he displays courage to the man tasked with giving him his forearm number, and following a nearly fatal illness from which he recovers thanks to his friend’s bravery, he lucks into a job as a tattooist. Through this assignment, he eventually meets Gita (Anna Próchniak), and it’s love at first sight. Amour doesn’t blossom easily in this environment, however, and their ensuing attempts to forge a bond, and to help keep each other alive, involves compromises and choices of a dreadful sort, many of them enabled by a sociopathic Nazi guard named Stefan Baretzki (Jonas Nay) who takes Lale under his wing.Read more at The Daily Beast.

Chip Somodevilla/GettyWith the nation still reeling from South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem’s literary boasts about shooting her puppy to death, Kimberly Guilfoyle has decided that now is the time to pull the trigger on promoting her new dog-themed children’s book.Guilfoyle, an adviser on Donald Trump’s 2020 campaign and now the fiancée of his son Don Jr., unveiled her forthcoming book The Princess & Her Pup on Monday. The work’s self-described “pro-God, pro-America” publisher says the book follows the story of “Princess Kimberly” who is “afraid of almost everything” until she “meets a little pup who’s scared too.”Guilfoyle also announced on X that 10 percent of the proceeds from the book will go to supporting Furry Friends, a nonprofit “which provides complete care for abused and abandoned dogs and cats.”Read more at The Daily Beast.

via X / Tucker Carlson Tucker Carlson has interviewed a Russian fascist philosopher whose ideas, he falsely brags, are “so dangerous” that “Amazon won’t sell his books.”“Aleksandr Dugin is the most famous political philosopher in Russia,” the ousted Fox News host wrote in teasing the 20-minute interview he shared on X late Monday with a man dubbed “Putin’s brain” by some and dismissed as a fringe crackpot by others.In hyping up Dugin, Carlson went on to stress that “the Ukrainian government murdered his daughter,” referring to Daria Dugina, who followed in her father’s footsteps and cheered on attacks on Ukraine until she was killed in a car bombing near Moscow in August 2022.Read more at The Daily Beast.

Caitlin Ochs/ReutersLast Thursday, Donald Trump stood in the hallway of a Manhattan courtroom, where he is on trial for falsifying his business records, and once again attempted to rewrite history. Comparing the antiwar protests now spreading across college campuses to the “Unite the Right” rally in 2017, Trump claimed Charlottesville was “nothing...[like] the kind of hate that you have here.” The night before, Trump had written on Truth Social, “Charlottesville is like a peanut compared to the riots and anti-Israel protests that are happening all over our country.”Meanwhile, Trump has been echoed by a chorus of politicians, including Democrats like Senator John Fetterman (D-PA), who tweeted, “Add some tiki torches and it’s Charlottesville for these Jewish students,” and Rep. Jared Moskowitz (D-FL), who opined that, “I know the people saying this aren't, you know, white Aryan males with tiki torches, but they have the same message.”From the standpoint of those who lived through these events, the comparison is not only unwarranted. It is not only unreasonable. It is, ultimately, unconscionable.Read more at The Daily Beast.

Sergey Smolentsev/ReutersAt least five people have died after a Russian missile attack hit an ornate mansion in Ukraine affectionately known to locals as the “Harry Potter Castle,” officials said Tuesday.Ukraine’s State Emergency Service shared a video showing the building in a seafront park in the southern city of Odesa engulfed in flames after the strike Monday. The agency initially said four people had been killed and another 32 injured, including two children.On Tuesday, regional governor Oleh Kiper said another man had died in the hospital. He added that eight people are still in serious condition and that four of those are in an “extremely serious condition, including a four-year-old girl.” He also said that a day of mourning had been declared throughout the Odesa region.Read more at The Daily Beast.

Suzanne Plunkett/ReutersKing Charles III looked cheerful and happy Tuesday, as he carried out his first official public engagement since being diagnosed with cancer.He was accompanied by his wife, Queen Camilla, as he visited a cancer treatment center in London, England.The royal couple arrived at University College Hospital Macmillan Cancer Centre shortly after 11 a.m. in the state Bentley, a ceremonial vehicle fitted with extra large windows that Charles has been using while traveling in London on state and personal business in recent months to make sure he can be easily seen and photographed.Read more at The Daily Beast.

Photo Illustration by Luis G. Rendon/The Daily Beast/Getty Images/InstagramFemale royal fighters have always been powerful totems in art and history.Be it the woad-stained Boadicea, the dragon-taming Daenerys Targaryen, or Elizabeth I donning armor to rally the troops when the Spanish Armada threatened the English coast in 1588, the combat-ready queen or princess is an icon redolent with powerful symbolism.Now, however, a new generation of “warrior princesses” are emerging in a European continent forced into a dramatic reappraisal of the importance of military service by Vladimir Putin’s war in Ukraine arriving on its doorstep.Read more at The Daily Beast.

Photo Illustration by Thomas Levinson/The Daily Beast/GettyWhile Donald Trump stands trial over his hush money payment to porn star Stormy Daniels, Fox News and other outlets are giving her disgraced former lawyer Michael Avenatti—incarcerated for stealing millions from his own clients—loads of free airtime.But victims of the fallen Newport Beach litigator aren’t happy he’s back in the spotlight.“He’s a crook, he’s a criminal, and he doesn’t deserve it,” said Greg Barela, a former client who testified against Avenatti in a federal fraud case in California.Read more at The Daily Beast.

Photo Illustration by Thomas Levinson/The Daily Beast/GettyIf you want to understand why Donald Trump could win in 2024, look no further than Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, former Attorney General Bill Barr, and New Hampshire Gov. Chris Sununu. These three top Republican voices who previously condemned Trump now say they plan to vote for him again this November.Let’s start with McConnell, who on Sunday (re)asserted that he would be voting for Trump for president. McConnell’s reason? “Because the voters of my party across the country have made a decision. As the Republican leader of the Senate, obviously, I’m gonna support the nominee of our party.”Keep in mind, following Trump’s second impeachment trial in 2021, McConnell said that “Trump’s actions preceding the [Capitol] riot were a disgraceful dereliction of duty,” and that “There is no question that President Trump is practically and morally responsible for provoking the events of that day.”Read more at The Daily Beast.

Photo Illustration by Thomas Levinson/The Daily Beast/GettyFrench actor Gérard Depardieu was ordered to stand trial for allegedly sexually assaulting two women on a film set three years ago, marking the latest legal escalation for the 75-year-old movie star who has become a central figure in France’s #MeToo movement.The announcement coincides with a years-long battle between Depardieu and more than a dozen women who have accused him of sexual assault throughout his career. The allegations span nearly two decades and 11 production sets. Some of the women, which include actors, make-up artists, and production staff, have reportedly alleged that Depardieu made lewd remarks and groped them.Paris prosecutors announced Depardieu will face trial in October on Monday, just hours after the actor waltzed out of a police station in Paris’s 14th district where he had reportedly answered questions about the allegations against him.Read more at The Daily Beast.

GettyWell, you can’t say Donald Trump doesn’t have a type.While he used to have a thing for blondes—Ivana, Marla Maples, and dare we say, Stormy—his orbit now includes head-turning brunettes of a certain stripe.The latest in the spotlight is Margo Martin, his deputy chief of communications, who accompanied him to his criminal trial in Manhattan earlier this month.Read more at The Daily Beast.

Photo Illustration by Thomas Levinson/The Daily Beast/GettyListen to this full episode of The New Abnormal on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon and Stitcher.Protests at dozens of college campuses across the U.S. against the war in Gaza have escalated dramatically in recent weeks, evoking memories of Vietnam War-era unrest and the civil rights movement.But what has made The New Abnormal co-host Danielle Moodie “honestly disturbed” this week is seeing “the militarized police and the presence” and administrators’ decisions “to violently arrest students, lock them out of their dorms, lock them out of dining halls.”Read more at The Daily Beast.

Shudder“You have to understand why you’re afraid of spiders,” director Sébastien Vaniček tells The Daily Beast’s Obsessed. “And as soon as you understand that, there is no reason to be afraid.”If we can boil humanity’s near-universal fear of spiders down to one thing, it would probably be the way they move. Blessed with eight legs and as many eyes dotted all around their bodies, spiders are directionally unpredictable: They can scuttle forwards, backwards, or side to side without warning or reason, running away from us, around us, or towards us as we valiantly leap atop the nearest chair, shrieking in fear.This is exactly the spider quality that was important for Vaniček to get right. His feature debut Infested premieres on Shudder this week after taking the 2023 Venice Film Festival by storm, and prompting frenzied headlines about the army of real spiders used to engineer the movie’s skin-crawling scares. It’s so scary it’s already landed Vaniček a gig directing an upcoming Evil Dead movie.Read more at The Daily Beast.

Kurt Iswarienko / FXThe Veil tells a story that audiences have heard numerous times before—and in infinitely better fashion. A spy saga that requires one absurd leap of faith after another, hinges on inconsistent and unbelievable characterizations, peddles ridiculous plot twists, and loves clichés more than the French adore baguettes, this six-part FX limited series (premiering April 30) from Peaky Blinders mastermind Steven Knight and star Elisabeth Moss is something of a unicorn, in that it boasts not a single original, convincing, or compelling element. To endure it is to risk baldness from all the outraged hair-pulling it inspires.In a refugee camp on the Turkey/Syria border, Adilah (Yumna Marwan) is fingered by others as a famed female ISIS commander who goes by many nicknames, including the “Djinn of Raqqa.” This attracts the attention of the globe’s intelligence agencies, and results in Imogen (Moss)—an MI6 operative working with France’s DGSE agency and, in particular, her former boyfriend Malik (Dali Benssalah)—being sent to the outpost to learn if Adilah is “the most wanted woman in the world.”Thanks to an attempt on Adilah’s life and some even more oh-so-convenient developments, Imogen gets Adilah out of the camp alive, and as they take to the road, they bond over their fondness for poetry and Shakespeare. Adilah additionally explains that she’s a single mother who once dreamed of becoming an engineer before circumstance led her into European modeling. While she won’t divulge how she subsequently landed in a refugee camp, she does confess that she covets a reunion with her adolescent daughter Yasmina (Keyla Bara).Read more at The Daily Beast.

Photo Illustration by Luis G. Rendon/The Daily Beast/Everett CollectionWelcome to modern rom-com week at The Daily Beast’s Obsessed! In honor of two big romance releases this week—The Fall Guy and The Idea of You—we’re celebrating everything we love about the last 15 years of romantic comedies.As a journalist who came of age during the early aughts, I have a bone to pick with rom-com screenwriters. When I think back on the movies that raised me—stories like How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days, The Devil Wears Prada, and 13 Going on 30 (which has personally victimized me by turning 20 this month)—almost all of them have one thing in common. They each told the story of a journalist, usually a magazine writer but sometimes a TV reporter or a tabloid photographer, who fell in love in the most improbable of ways. Now, as a reporter in her thirties who has seen the New York dating scene (and media) for herself, I have to ask: Why did you all lie to us like this?!I recognize that most rom-com writers are not interested in sharing the gritty reality of dating, or New York, or their protagonists’ careers. And humor aside, I’m not that mad at the glamorous sheen they’ve historically painted over journalism as a career choice. (Although I will say, I had extremely inflated expectations for my shoe budget.) Still, like the famous New York Star columnist Carrie Bradshaw (who made her debut in 1998 and certainly helped kick off this trend) I couldn’t help but wonder… What was it about the magazine girlie that got screenwriters so excited? After carefully studying all of the subgenre’s most famous entries, I’m ready to pitch my think piece. Let me just grab my tri-fold board and balloons and get out my pointer.Read more at The Daily Beast.

Photo Illustration by Luis G. Rendon/The Daily Beast/YouTubeDuring my tenure at the Fashion Institute of Technology, I was required to take one fashion merchandising class, where my professor impressed upon me the matter of “trend forecasting” like someone trying to burn a pancake on a griddle. Despite my professor’s insistence, I couldn’t give you an exact definition of the phrase because, well, I wasn’t listening. But since I hold a degree from the school, I can technically call myself an expert, which is how I know that MILFs are going to be huge this summer.If you’re unfamiliar with the term “MILF,” congratulations on waking up from the coma you were in between 2004 and 2010. I hope your brain damage is minimal. While you were out, some of us were lying in wait, biding our time until the “Mother I’d Like to Fuck” fad returned. They say that trends recycle every few decades, but the MILFs are too strong, too powerful, and too busty to abide by this belief. They refuse to wait—hell, they simply don’t have the time! Being a MILF implies being older, after all. And while Fergie so generously tried to make MILFs cool again with her 2016 single, “M.I.L.F $,” it was not yet time for these magnificent mamas to return. They were gathering their strength and popping their progesterone, waiting for the perfect moment.The stars have aligned, and the moons are in their correct phases, because MILFs are officially back. This summer, we will not be able to round a corner without being knocked over by a beautiful buxom mother. They have raised kids, and now they’re ready to raise our temperatures. But you don’t have to take my word for it: The proof is readily available. Leading the charge for MILFdom is Vanessa Williams, whose new single, “Legs (Keep Dancing),” is not just a joyful ode to aging gracefully, but an anthem for leggy broads of a certain age who have no shame in showing off their gams. The video for the song is sexy, spirited, and even a little naughty, all things that a MILF should be. “Legs” is all about meeting society’s notions of aging and femininity and defying them outright, and it’s the perfect song to usher in the dawn of MILF 2.0.Read more at The Daily Beast.

Photo Illustration by Thomas Levinson/The Daily Beast/Getty/Magnolia PicturesThere are roughly 47,000—oh, wait, a new Netflix Original just dropped; make that 47,001—TV shows and movies coming out each week. At Obsessed, we consider it our social duty to help you see the best and skip the rest.We’ve already got a variety of in-depth, exclusive coverage on all of your streaming favorites and new releases, but sometimes what you’re looking for is a simple Do or Don’t. That’s why we created See/Skip, to tell you exactly what our writers think you should See and what you can Skip from the past week’s crowded entertainment landscape.See: The Feeling That the Time for Doing Something Has PassedRead more at The Daily Beast.

Scouted/The Daily Beast/Retailers.MOScouted selects products independently. If you purchase something from our posts, we may earn a small commission.New Kids on the Block helps you navigate all the latest and exciting launches from our favorite brands and retailers, all in one place.Somehow, April is already drawing to a close, which means that Gemini season (and summer, of course) is on the horizon. April brought forth many spring showers, a once-in-my-lifetime solar eclipse, and a slew of new product drops that have become new obsessions. Read more at The Daily Beast.

Wikimedia CommonsA Monday gathering of dozens of pro-Palestinian protesters on the campus of Virginia Commonwealth University was broken up by law enforcement officers in riot gear and gas masks, who witnesses said moved in on the “Liberated Zone” with tear gas and zip ties. The Richmond Times-Dispatch and ABC 8News reported that several arrests had been made, but it was not immediately clear on Monday night how many protesters had been detained or transported to jail. The protest began that morning on a grassy patch outside the school’s James Branch Cabell Library, with protesters waving signs, setting up tents, and chanting “Free Palestine.” Read more at The Daily Beast.

NewsmaxPresident Joe Biden’s eating habits are no longer just the subject of Fox News host Jesse Watters’ invaluable scrutiny, after Newsmax host Eric Bolling grew increasingly angry Monday with the president eating salad at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner over the weekend.Bolling, channeling his inner Sean Hannity, concluded his opening monologue by saying that Biden isn’t fit enough for the job he holds.“Here is the president of the United States, the man with the nuclear codes at his fingertips, grappling with a bowl of lettuce. He can barely feed himself,” Bolling insisted, instructing his audience to watch a clip of Biden eating.Read more at The Daily Beast.

NBCGiven the speed at which the news cycle is moving these days, it would be impossible for a late-night host to take a two-week vacation and not miss some pretty major stories; like a former president dozing off during a certain, historic criminal hush-money trial—and more than once.It’s a lesson Seth Meyers learned the hard way this month, but he was back with a vengeance on Monday and ready to recap all the wildest news stories he missed. While Donald Trump’s courtroom siestas were an obvious topic of conversation for the Late Night host to catch up on, he was much more interested—and outraged—in Kristi Noem’s bizarre decision to write about the time she murdered her puppy.In a new memoir, aptly titled No Going Back (which likely sums up her chances of being named Trump’s running mate), the South Dakota governor described the 14-month-old wirehaired pointer named Cricket as “untrainable,” “less than worthless… as a hunting dog,” and “dangerous to anyone she came into contact with.”Read more at The Daily Beast.

Justin Sullivan/Getty ImagesOne of the three winners of the record-breaking $1.3 billion Powerball jackpot is a 46-year-old immigrant from Laos who has been battling cancer for the last eight years.Speaking to the press at the Oregon Lottery headquarters in Salem on Monday, Cheng “Charlie” Saephan said he and his friend, Laiza Chao, 55, went in together on a batch of tickets that contained the winning numbers. Saephan and Chao will split the money, with Saephan sharing his half with his wife, Duanpen, 37.They are taking a lump sum payment of $422 million after taxes, according to the Associated Press.Read more at The Daily Beast.

Hulton Archive/GettyThe war is in Gaza, not Vietnam, as it was when Mark Rudd became the iconic leader of the protests that rocked Columbia University more than a half century ago.But 76-year-old Rudd says the anti-war protesters who are now encamped on a lawn in the heart of the Columbia campus share an essential motivation with those of his time.“They're pretty much the same as we were,” Rudd told The Daily Beast. “The basic impetus of the students, I think it's not that complicated. It's that they see a moral tragedy and moral crime going on, and they want to try to do something to stop it.”Read more at The Daily Beast.

MSNBCRep. Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) appeared to criticize MSNBC anchor Katy Tur during a discussion Monday about job losses during the Trump administration by suggesting she was an “apologist” for the former president for mentioning the COVID-19 pandemic—a charge which Tur promptly denied.On Katy Tur Reports, the former House Speaker began by stating that Trump hasn’t shown that he “ever valued or did anything to support a democracy.”“I have sympathy and respect for everybody who votes. I’m just glad people vote. I know some of them will always reject those of us who might look different to them in leadership or the rest, and that’s that,” Pelosi then said.Read more at The Daily Beast.

Khadejeh Nikouyeh/The Charlotte Observer/Tribune News Service via Getty ImagesThree members of a U.S. Marshals fugitive task force were shot and killed in Charlotte, North Carolina on Monday when gunfire erupted as they were trying to serve a warrant, authorities said. Five other law enforcement officers were wounded, with one in critical condition on Monday evening.The suspect the officers were pursuing was also killed in the shootout. That person was not immediately identified.During a news conference at which Johnny Jennings, the chief of police for the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Department, laid out the timeline of events, he said that four of the officers shot had been task force members. Three died. The other four officers shot were members of Jennings’ police department, he said.Read more at The Daily Beast.

Photo Illustration by Luis G. Rendon/The Daily Beast/Getty ImagesSouth Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem’s gruesome recounting of how she killed her dog may have also killed something else: her hopes to be Donald Trump’s running mate.In Trump’s orbit, Noem’s decision to disclose in her forthcoming memoir that she once shot and killed a family dog is being seen as pure political self-immolation—part of a series of “lapses in judgment” and a sign of “desperation that President Trump especially doesn’t like,” according to a over a half-dozen GOP sources who spoke to The Daily Beast on condition of anonymity to detail confidential conversations.“Everyone around Trump is talking about this,” said a MAGA operative.Read more at The Daily Beast.