Category: 5. Entertainment

A new part of the PHOTOS series. Today, we explore the now-discontinued products from the workshops of the Foreign Legion Institution for Disabled Veterans (IILE), which were prominently showcased in vibrant, regular color advertisements in Képi Blanc, the French Foreign Legion’s magazine, from the mid-1970s to the early 1990s.

Since its founding in 1947, Képi Blanc, the official magazine of the French Foreign Legion, has relied on advertisements to support its publication, primarily promoting local products or beer producers. A significant change came in early 1975 when the magazine featured its first black-and-white advertisement for products from the Institution for Disabled Veterans, a home for disabled and retired legionnaires established in Puyloubier, southern France, in 1954. These ads highlighted mainly ceramic products handcrafted by IILE veterans, which provided meaningful activity, a sense of purpose, and financial support for the institution while promoting the Legion’s identity and traditions.

For the record, the Legion’s involvement in ceramics predates the founding of the IILE. The first ceramic workshop was set up in 1950 in Sidi Bel Abbès, Algeria, the Legion’s then-headquarters. It operated alongside other craft workshops like bookbinding. After the creation of the IILE, these workshops were transferred there.

By the mid-1970s, the ceramic workshop in Puyloubier employed around 25 veterans, becoming the institution’s most important component. A second workshop was opened in 1975, confirming the popularity and success of the ceramics program. The same year the aforementioned first advertisement for IILE products was published in Képi Blanc. The ad featured irregularly inside the magazine for over a year.

In October 1976, the first color IILE advertisement appeared on the back of the magazine, still intended for the promotion of commercial products. This reflected the beginning of what we can call the “golden age” of the IILE workshops and the artisanal products of the Foreign Legion, lasting until the first half of the 1990s. These colorful ads ran continuously for over 15 years, drawing attention to the veterans’ craftsmanship.

However, the global market began to shift after the fall of the Eastern Bloc in 1991. Globalization and the influx of inexpensive goods from Asia made it hard for the IILE workshops to remain financially competitive. Thus, ads for handcrafted products disappeared from the magazine’s back cover in November 1992. Since that time, wine production has become the institution’s primary source of income.

The IILE’s workshops, however, were not originally intended just to generate profit. As Major Le Roch, the institution’s first director, said in 1958: “We are not here for the numbers. We are here for the pensioners. We have to give back morale to people who were broken by life, often before joining the Legion, and who were subsequently wounded and traumatized by the war.” His words reflected the IILE’s initial mission: to support former legionnaires who had served honorably but suffered lasting physical or psychological injuries, and to help them rebuild their spirit and sense of purpose through meaningful, creative work within a community, and thus reintegrate them into society.

Even so, the workshops never fully disappeared. They still exist today, producing custom pieces – though only on demand and with less visibility due to minimal promotion. After the end of the Algerian War in 1962, the IILE gradually shifted its focus from war-disabled veterans to aging legionnaires. But the importance of meaningful, creative work as a source of morale and renewed spirit has remained just as vital. The handcrafted ceramics from this “golden age,” showcased in Képi Blanc, stand as a testament to the skill and creativity of the veterans in Puyloubier. At the same time, it’s reasonable to believe that such high-quality, original artisanal products could still attract buyers nowadays if they were properly promoted.

Whatever the current situation is, here are examples from the golden era of IILE unique handcrafted items, proudly advertised on the back pages of Képi Blanc from the mid-1970s to the early 1990s. Enjoy.

 
Click on the images to enlarge them:

 

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Related posts:
2022 Foreign Legion Veterans’ Institution
PHOTOS: 100th Anniversary of the Battle of Camerone in Aubagne in 1963
PHOTOS: Algerian War 1954-1962
GRLE: 2025 Support Mission to IILE

Kylie Jenner is no stranger to one-of-a-kind pieces of fashion. She’s been known to wear custom dresses at runway shows in Paris, lean into a throwback accessory, or coordinate with her boyfriend Timothée Chalamet at the Golden Globes. So it was no surprise to see that she casually owns two rare Hermès purses.

The reality TV star turned makeup mogul has been spending time in Europe this summer, from Venice for Jeff Bezos’ wedding, to the South of France with her girlfriends. Jenner recently shared photos from her friend trip in Saint Tropez, France — alongside sister Kendall Jenner, bestie Stas Karanikolaou, and more. While most people probably think of a cheap tote bag to bring to the beach, Kylie Jenner brings a Birkin.

In a carousel of photos shared to Instagram, Jenner showcased her two Hermès bags. The first, was the Kelly Doll Picto Bag. The teeny tiny handbag has the signature shape of any other Kelly bag, but this one features a pixelated face and what appear to be hands as the front straps. The original Kelly Doll bag was released in 2000, and the brand has since created many versions of the iconic bag — including the Picto bag in 2022. The bag initially retailed for $15,600 but has since been auctioned off for up to $74,000, according to Sotheby’s.

Jenner paired the little bag with a white cutout bathing suit, a short bubble skirt, and kitten heel flip flops.

Instagram/ Kylie Jenner

The second Hermès bag that Jenner brought on her French vacation (makes sense, as it’s a French designer) was a Faubourg Birkin. For those who have been around since the King Kylie days, you’d know that Jenner has a collection of Birkins and Kelly bags lining her closet. But this one is one of our favorites.

Enter the buzzing showfloor at this year’s Anime Expo, and you’ll be met with the towering exhibitor presences of MAPPA, SEGA, Netflix, TOHO Animation, HULU, Viz Media, Aniplex, and more major players in a rapidly popularizing (and globalizing) anime industry. But even among the industry’s recognizable players, Crunchyroll — and its series of showfloor experiences, merchandising, and photo-ops — calls back to the heyday of the convention circuit in a way few others do. 

The massive booth features a mass of large screens that deliver trailer takeovers and anime ambiance sequences that act as an environmental backdrop alongside an “Anime Forecast,” a series on interactive screens where fans can browse the company’s catalog of upcoming titles. There’s of course a merch store to pick up collectables, manga, vinyls, clothing, and more, but there’s also the “trash to treasure” dumpster dive experience that introduces you to the characters and story of its upcoming graffiti-infused anime Gachiakuta as well as the Demon Slayer – Infinity Castle activation setting up the film trilogy’s release.

Inside, attendees move through an immersive set deco recreation of the Infinity Castle before interacting with a motion sensor experience that soars through the alternate dimension via the Crow, and a 3D photo-op that uses swords to simulate the breathing techniques (Water, Flame, Wind, Stone and Thunder) of key characters. This immersive activation helps make Crunchyroll’s floor presence one of the Expo’s biggest and most technologically advanced booths, and it’s every bit a part of the company’s strategy, says president Rahul Purini. 

Like the day-long pop-up convention hub Crunchyroll Stage and the Crunchyroll Lounge where onsite deals are made, the booth is a must-have — even if some of Crunchyroll’s competitors have pulled back in certain corners of the convention circuit after launching their own events. “Fans love experiences, and this [booth], that’s what we are creating here. It’s not just some of our store. It is a small amusement park. You can go interact with the characters, or touch the stories and find yourself immersed in that. And we’re trying to do that in places where the fans are already gathered,” he explains. 

Crunchyroll’s ongoing lean into the fan space doesn’t stop at the showfloor. Across the July 4 holiday weekend, the media and entertainment company featured a number of panels and screenings, and on Saturday, shared a steady stream of acquisition and trailer announcements. Among them, exclusive footage of Studio KAI’s dark fantasy Sentenced to Be a Hero, which sees criminals sentenced to heroism/service in a penal military unit waging war against a demon king’s army, and the news that Studio Pierrot’s Black Clover will return for an all-new season only on Crunchyroll, alongside a teaser trailer, key visual, a message from the manga’s creator Yuki Tabata celebrating the anime’s return and manga’s 10th anniversary. 

Other news included a trailer for the newly announced anime adaptation of Daemons of the Shadow Realm based on a manga created by Hiromu Arakawa (Fullmetal Alchemist); confirmation of Re:ZERO – Starting Life in Another World season four streaming exclusively on Crunchyroll in 2026; and a two-minute first-look at the upcoming third season of Studio Bind’s Mushoku Tensei: Jobless Reincarnation; the October 2025 premiere of action comedy Tojima Wants to Be a Kamen Rider and January 2026 drop of romantic comedy You and I Are Polar Opposites. Classroom of the Elite fans will get a follow-up to season three, titled Classroom of the Elite 2nd Year, and the game Classroom of the Elite – Merge Puzzle Special Exam, playable for the first time outside of Japan via Crunchyroll’s Game Vault, with Hiroyuki SAWANO LIVE [nZk]008 set to join Crunchyroll’s library of over 100 full-length concerts later this summer.

Ahead of Saturday’s panel, The Hollywood Reporter spoke to Purini about the company’s presence at the con and its current season, what he’s most excited about in this moment of anime expansion, what challenges remain for those bringing the medium to western audiences, and key growth areas for the company. 

You’ve brought so much to the convention this weekend. What are you most excited about in terms of your slate? 

Our July season is among one of the biggest seasons that we’ve ever had. The volume, the breadth and the depth of content that we are able to bring to fans around the world, and the diversity of the content, is one thing we’re really excited about. There are shows for every kind of anime fan. There’s a show that premiered over the weekend, Lord of Mysteries, which is a Chinese animation show — there’s not a lot of that. But the biggest anime show in Japan, Gachiakuta, which we are featuring here, is a show that I’m really excited about. It is from our partners at [Japanese publisher] Kodansha, and it is one of those shows where, if you watch the trailer, you’re hooked. This kind of breadth and depth of show not only makes this season really, really compelling, it also talks to where we Crunchyroll are as a company. We have the single largest library of anime content anywhere. We have something for every fan, every genre, and we are adding a ton every quarter. That speaks to the value proposition for the anime fan when they come to Crunchyroll.

You worked at Funimation before heading up Crunchyroll, so you understand what the lift of making anime accessible to U.S. audiences was in those early days before places like Hulu and Netflix were also doing it. What was the biggest challenge then and what’s the biggest challenge now in terms of bringing this content to audiences? 

Early on, the biggest challenge Crunchyroll and other companies that were serving this fan base solved was accessibility. There was anime fandom around the world, but it was hard to get your hands on it, even as your peers in Japan were watching and enjoying it [sooner]. That was the biggest thing that most companies, including Crunchyroll and Funimation, solved. When the shows are happening in Japan, bring them globally, subtitle them so it becomes accessible. In the case of Funimation, innovate to even dub it during the season. We call it the simuldub, where now dubs are available one episode at a time within two to four weeks. But those were the initial challenges: accessibility, getting the shows from Japan and making them available to fans so they weren’t waiting for 15 to 18 months for a DVD release or for some TV channel to pick up a show. 

The challenges now are somewhat similar, except it’s a global audience. The audience is growing, and when the audience is growing, you need a diverse slate of content to serve that audience. So making sure we have that diverse slate for the audience that’s global, and making it accessible to them — that we’re on all the devices that they want to watch, we have all the payments that they want to use to sign up for it, all the languages that they want to watch it in whether it’s subtitled or dubbed, and making it available when they want to watch it. The second part of that is, given the volume of content, how do we make sure that we find the right content for the right fan at the right time. That discovery piece is the biggest thing that we are trying to solve because there’s so much new content. How do we make fans aware of what’s available, and serve as that connection. 

Platforms and streamers who more recently entered the anime market have increasingly found ways to blend it with Western animation or use American audience influences a little more in the visuals and storytelling. Can you talk about how your approach to your content slate is different, and how you tap into this medium that is outside the realm of Western storytelling to deliver for audiences? 

There are a few things that are really core to us, what we call our guiding principles. We believe anime is intrinsically connected back to Japan. For anime to be authentically anime, it has to be conceived and created by Japan, and we take that to heart. There is other animation that might be anime-inspired, but it’s not anime unless it has the connection. Second is that anime is a medium. It’s not a genre. There is anime for various kinds of people — there’s action, romance, slice-of-life, sci-fi, fantasy. It’s an art form, and that’s important to understand. One of the ways that I think we have operated and we believe we can successfully serve the anime fan is being singularly focused on that. This is not one genre that we serve the fan. This is our entire existence. So that focus and that clarity of what is authentically anime, and that relationship with partners, that relationship with the fans, and understanding why fans connect with anime, all of those things allow us to be able to serve those creators and fans in the best way. 

Crunchryoll is now many things, but first it was largely a content library. Many streamers started that way as well, and then expanded. Where is Crunchyroll in that conversation? How much do you want original content? How do you want to do it?

First, we do not consider ourselves to be a streamer. We consider ourselves to be a media and entertainment company focused on serving the anime fan. The video content is a big part of that fandom but this is much bigger than that. It’s everything from the real-world experiences, the community, the connection, the games, the merchandise, the manga, the music. We’re not interested in being something for everyone. We want to be everything for someone. So that’s number one. In terms of how we think about content, I go back to the amazing storytellers and partners in Japan. We want to work with them all, we want all of their content to be available to consumers, and we will continue to do that. Having said that, the audience around the globe is expanding. To serve them, we need more funding and more diverse content. So we’re doing co-productions, where we go to Japanese partners and help them fund shows by investing in them. This is not distributing, not licensing. We’re actually part of the production committee that’s making these shows. 

In addition to that, when we find stories around the world that we think are going to be great, we’re now starting to take the stories back to the Japanese creators and are asking if they’re interested in making anime from this story. Ghost of Tsushima  [based on the Sony PlayStation game] is a great example. Solo Leveling is a great example. We took this Korean [title based on the web novel-turned-webtoon], and went back to Japan and said we would love to make an anime. And we got partners like Aniplex and A-1 Pictures excited about it. That’s the third piece. Licensed content will always be the majority of our content because there’s so many great Japanese viewers. We will co-produce content with our Japanese partners to invest and bring shows. But we will also commission shows because we have stories that we think will be great in anime, and we’re taking them back to Japan. 

Anime has done some interesting things as it relates to theatrical releases, an area Hollywood has really been having a conversation about the last few years. The recent Dan Da Dan: Evil Eye experience, which put the first three episodes of season two together and screened them like a movie, is one example. Is there anything you think Hollywood can learn about the theatrical space from the anime industry in this current moment?

I’m not sure we’re at a place where we can tell Hollywood what it can learn. They’ve been doing this for a long time. (Laughs) What we have found and learned is that fans like experiences. They want to be able to go sit in a dark theater with friends and family and experience their stories on a big screen and feel that sense of community. So for them, it doesn’t matter if it’s a 90-minute or 120-minute movie, or it’s three episodes put together. To them, it is great stories told in an amazing, creative way on a big screen. That is an interesting insight for us.

What are other growth areas you’re focusing on right now that are represented at AX? 

Games. About 18 months ago, we announced this initiative called Crunchyroll Game Vault. If you’re a subscriber of Crunchyroll’s higher tiers — mega or ultimate tier — you get access to games for free. We initially started with a handful of games, and now we’ve scaled that to over 60 that fans and subscribers have access to, to play for free. We’re seeing a lot of traction. Fans come in to play a game and then watch something, and we are seeing a lot of subscribers that have been members for years dive in and play games telling us that they want to upgrade to be able to get access to the games. That is an area where we are really excited because there’s a big overlap between gamers and anime fans. 

And we recently announced that we’re going to be bringing a digital manga app to our fans in the U.S. One of the things that fans ask us most is for access to manga, so we see a lot of opportunity to be able to serve fans through it. And obviously, merchandise. Fans are collectors. They want to show off their fandom, and we want to be able to bring these unique collector items — whether it is apparel, figures, home accessories — that they can buy. Another area that we see is theatrical. Demon Slayer is coming up, we are part of Sony Pictures and they’ve been bringing movies to the world for 100-plus years. So we’re really excited about being able to bring movies to fans who want to watch in theaters. We know fans love that. 

You mentioned experiences and the exhibitor booth is one giant experience. Why is this such an important corner for Crunchyrull to occupy and are you thinking about ways to go bigger? 

We’re very fan-centric, very fan-first in our thinking. The fan sits at the center of everything we do. So we are here to serve this fanbase, and the best way for us to do that is to understand what they want, talk to them, connect with them, build a relationship with them. We don’t know any other way to do this. Our teams put on 100-plus shows worldwide. This is not a few things a year that we do. We are constantly spending time with our fans. In terms of experiences, do we want to do something bigger? Yes, if the opportunity shows up the right way and we can create that authentic experience for fans, we will do that. We’re doing that with videos. We’re doing that with music festivals. At San Diego Comic-Con, we’re going to have an anime music festival. Do we have a ride at a theme park? No. But are we creating experiences that excite? Absolutely.

A hugely popular right-wing Croatian singer and hundreds of thousands of his fans performed a pro-Nazi World War II salute at a massive concert in Zagreb, drawing criticism.

One of Marko Perkovic’s most popular songs, played in the late Saturday concert, starts with the dreaded “For the homeland — Ready!” salute, used by Croatia’s Nazi-era puppet Ustasha regime that ran concentration camps at the time.

Perkovic, whose stage name is Thompson after a U.S.-made machine gun, had previously said both the song and the salute focus on the 1991-95 ethnic war in Croatia, in which he fought using the American firearm, after the country declared independence from the former Yugoslavia. He says his controversial song is “a witness of an era.”

The 1990s conflict erupted when rebel minority Serbs, backed by neighboring Serbia, took up guns, intending to split from Croatia and unite with Serbia.

Perkovic’s immense popularity in Croatia reflects prevailing nationalist sentiments in the country 30 years after the war ended.

The WWII Ustasha troops in Croatia brutally killed tens of thousands of Serbs, Jews, Roma and antifascist Croats in a string of concentration camps in the country. Despite documented atrocities, some nationalists still view the Ustasha regime leaders as founders of the independent Croatian state.

Organizers said that half a million people attended Perkovic’s concert in the Croatian capital. Video footage aired by Croatian media showed many fans displaying pro-Nazi salutes earlier in the day.

The salute is punishable by law in Croatia, but courts have ruled Perkovic can use it as part of his song, the Croatian state television HRT said.

Perkovic has been banned from performing in some European cities over frequent pro-Nazi references and displays at his gigs.

Croatia’s Vecernji List daily wrote that the concert’s “supreme organization” has been overshadowed by the use of the salute of a regime that signed off on “mass executions of people.”

Regional N1 television noted that whatever the modern interpretations of the salute may be its roots are “undoubtedly” in the Ustasha regime era.

N1 said that while “Germans have made a clear cut” from anything Nazi-related “to prevent crooked interpretations and the return to a dark past … Croatia is nowhere near that in 2025.”

In neighboring Serbia, populist President Aleksandar Vucic criticized Perkovic’s concerts as a display “of support for pro-Nazi values.” Former Serbian liberal leader Boris Tadic said it was a “great shame for Croatia” and “the European Union” because the concert “glorifies the killing of members of one nation, in this case Serbian.”

Croatia joined the EU in 2013.

Croatian police said Perkovic’s concert was the biggest ever in the country and an unseen security challenge, deploying thousands of officers.

No major incidents were reported.

David Corenswet recently revealed who he approached for a piece of advice on playing the role of Superman in the forthcoming film.

While giving an interview to Heart at the red-carpet premiere of James Gunn’s Superman in London, the 32-year-old American actor reflected on reaching out to Henry Cavill and Tyler Hoechlin for guidance, as they both have played the DC icon in Man of Steel and Superman & Lois, respectively.

Notably, Cavill and Hoechlin were “encouraging” but refrained from influencing Corenswet’s performance by sharing their words of wisdom.

He said, “Both of them, interestingly, sort of said in their own words, ‘I’m not gonna try and give you any tips.’ And I think that’s a very Superman thing. Superman’s not so much for giving advice or dictating how other people should be.”

The Twisters star added, “They really just conveyed to me an encouragement and a sense of ‘have fun with it’, which I think is Superman’s way of doing it too.”

Corenswet remarked, “They were very encouraging and we had a lovely experience. I’m excited to meet them one day. It’ll be great when we can all get in a room together.”

Before concluding, it is noteworthy to mention that the upcoming Superman movie is scheduled to hit theatres on July 11, 2025.

A woman who livestreamed Kneecap’s Glastonbury festival set to 2 million people on TikTok has described the “obscene” abuse she says has received in the aftermath, including people calling her a Nazi.

Helen Wilson, a Swansea-based yoga teacher who also runs the Ground Plant Based Coffee cafe, said she had been sent a lot of personal insults, but that she had received “hundreds and hundreds times more support than negativity”.

It came after she held up her phone in the crowd to stream the set by the Irish rap trio last Saturday, which the BBC refused to show live, over what it said were efforts to ensure it “meets our editorial guidelines”.

The BBC later made an edited version available on iPlayer, though the broadcaster did not respond to the Guardian when asked what had been cut out.

Wilson said: “I just thought, I’m just going to livestream it because the BBC aren’t showing it. And I really disagreed with that. I did not think for a moment that over 2 million people would see it.”

It was only her second TikTok live stream on her handle HelenWilsonWales – her first, about her weight loss, had no viewers at all – and initially she had not realised how many people were watching because the sun was shining on her phone screen.

“But I could see that when you’re doing a live stream, loads of messages pop up and people can talk to you. So the screen was going mental. People were just like ping, ping, ping, ping, ping, ping, ping, ping.

“And I was like: ‘Oh, my god, something’s happening here,’ and so I just knew I had to carry on. People were saying to me: ‘Please keep going, do what you can, please keep going.’ And then that was it,” said Wilson, who grew up in Somerset and was working at the festival.

The stream was spreading through word of mouth, as viewers sent it to their friends and family, and Wilson found out later that at one point it was playing on a big screen in a pub in the band’s home town.

She told the Guardian: “I have had a lot of trolling. When you rang, I was just in the middle of deleting some obscene comments off my business Facebook page.”

“There was somebody on Instagram just saying he sent me a message saying: ‘You’re just a wrinkled old woman looking for attention.’”

“[In a tabloid newspaper] I’ve been referred to as a middle-aged woman. Like, what has that got to do with anything?” said the 44-year-old.

She said: “This is about the genocide in Palestine, and this is about the failure of our government to act, to do anything about it.”

Wilson added: “More people need to know what is going on in Palestine. And we shouldn’t be censoring bands under freedom of speech, full stop. We shouldn’t be censoring anybody who is trying to raise awareness of the atrocities that are taking place.”

Afterwards, Kneecap called her a “legend” and offered her free tickets to any of their shows.

On Saturday, while supporting Fontaines DC in Finsbury Park, the band once again led 45,000 people in chants of “fuck Keir Starmer”.

The band were far from alone in their sentiments at Glastonbury – dozens of acts and figures at the festival spoke out in support of Palestine, including CMAT, the Libertines, Gary Lineker, Joy Crookes, TV on the Radio, Sorry and Paloma Faith.

Kneecap were also backed by Emily and Michael Eavis, the festival’s organisers, with Emily telling the BBC that “everyone is welcome”, before their set.

Couture Comings and Goings

What’s Happening: This Paris couture week will be defined by designer comings and goings. Gucci-bound Demna is slated to stage his final show for Kering stablemate Balenciaga on Wednesday afternoon, followed by Glenn Martens’ debut at OTB’s Margiela that evening.

Up First: The week will get its unofficial start on Sunday when Michael Rider makes his ready-to-wear debut for Celine. Dior and Chanel are taking a backseat this season (Dior is skipping couture, while Chanel will show another studio-signed collection) and Celine’s decision to seize the moment was probably the right call. That said, succeeding Hedi Slimane, who more than doubled annual sales, was never going to be easy. Expect evolution, not revolution.

Last Act: Demna’s final show for Balenciaga is sure to be emotional. His decade-long tenure was nothing short of transformational: the designer turned Balenciaga into a global fashion sensation, more than quadrupling sales, with an unholy collision of goth-inflected streetwear and Balenciaga’s couture codes, wrapped in post-internet marketing provocations.

A couture finale is fitting: back in 2021, Demna’s skilful revival of the house’s couture line proved a masterstroke that rebalanced the brand after heavy marketing of sneakers and hoodies threatened to dilute its image. Does Balenciaga need another reset? With Demna headed to Gucci, ex-Valentino designer Pierpaolo Piccoli is waiting in the wings.

Fashion Drama: The bar is high for Glenn Martens’ debut at Margiela, where he succeeded star couturier John Galliano in January. Galliano produced some of the industry’s most artistic, and viral, couture outings (even if there was little link between his shows and the brand’s best-selling products). But Martens is no stranger to drama and provocation himself, and OTB is doubling down on the creative director to design Margiela as well as its flagship Diesel brand, while it shakes up the top creative ranks at its Jil Sander and Marni labels.

Liberation Day 2: The Tariffing

What’s Happening: In April, President Donald Trump delayed “reciprocal” tariffs on many countries for 90 days. On July 9, time’s up.

Art of the Deal: The Trump administration is simultaneously negotiating numerous bilateral agreements with nations targeted by his tariffs, including most of fashion’s biggest manufacturing hubs. So far, just two deals have been signed: one with the UK in May, and a second with Vietnam last week. The latter came as a particular relief to the fashion industry, as Vietnam is behind only China in the amount of clothes, footwear and accessories it ships to the US. Vietnamese importers will pay a 20 percent duty, not the 46 percent threatened on April 2.

Down to the Wire: That still leaves agreements to be reached with other countries that are central to fashion’s global supply chain, including Cambodia (which faces a 49 percent tariff) and Bangladesh (37 percent). China has a temporary agreement to avoid tariffs as high as 145 percent, which expires in August. In other cases, it’s slow going, particularly with large trading partners such as Japan that have greater negotiating power.

Exploring Alternatives: The fashion industry isn’t waiting to find out which countries sign more agreements, with brands using bonded warehouses to sidestep customs enforcement, altering designs to lower costs and, where necessary, raising prices (Rhode was the latest brand to break the news to customers last week that its popular lip tints would soon cost $2 more). The Trump administration has gotten wise to one common method used to evade duties; Vietnam agreed to a 40 percent duty on goods from other countries passing through its ports en route to the US.

The Week Ahead wants to hear from you! Send tips, suggestions, complaints and compliments to brian.baskin@businessoffashion.com.

Superman actress Rachel Brosnahan has finally responded to the negative perspective people have about her character in the film.

The 34-year-old is all set to play “Lois Lane” in the upcoming James Gunn movie.

Many perceive her character being a “damsel in distress”, who the hero must save constantly.

Rachel has finally addressed the matter debunking the misconception about Lois Lane.

According to her, Lane is so dedicated and hungry to find out the truth that she ends up getting in trouble ever single time.

In conversation with Collider, The Blacklist star added, “You know, in my experience, she’s never been a damsel in distress. She’s always been so hungry and so relentless in her pursuit of the truth that she gets herself in trouble.”

Brosnahan further explained that “Lois not always the most graceful in her pursuit of what’s right and just and true.”

This is why the viewers “see her get herself into some piles, and that’ll continue in this world, as well.”

The upcoming action sci-fi features David Corenswet as the cape crusader and Nicholas Hoult as Lex Luthor. 

The Oscar-winning Miloš Forman-directed movie One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, starring Jack Nicholson, could get the television treatment.

Producer Paul Zaentz, the nephew of the Hollywood classic’s original producer Saul Zaentz, mentioned plans for a series during a press conference at the 59th edition of the Karlovy Vary International Film Festival (KVIFF), in which he appeared with Cuckoo’s Nest producer and Hollywood legend Michael Douglas. The two traveled to the Czech spa town to present a newly restored version of the 1975 classic as it celebrates its 50th anniversary this year.

The movie is based on the 1962 novel of the same name by Ken Kesey about a new patient at a mental institution. Louise Fletcher portrays the domineering head nurse Ratched. 

“Over the last 50 years, there have been hundreds of calls from studios, directors, and producers who want to remake the movie, and we would never allow it to be remade if they were just going to do it as Miloš made it,” Zaentz shared. “It would be a dishonor.”

But he also had some exciting news to share. “We just made an arrangement with Ken Kesey’s family to possibly do a television series, but it’s based on the book, and the book was told through the eyes of Chief Bromden,” the tall, deaf-mute Native American portrayed in the movie by Will Sampson, Zaentz told reporters. “So the television series would be through his eyes.”

He signaled how he envisions the story arc. “At the end of the first [season], the R.P. McMurphy, the Jack Nicholson, character would die. And then the second year would be what happens to the Chief after he escapes.”

Danny DeVito, Sydney Lassick, William Redfield, Christopher Lloyd and Brad Dourif played supporting roles in the movie.

Zaentz didn’t mention a possible writer or studio partner or a potential network or streamer that the series could be made for.