Scarlett Johansson, Jonathan Bailey film earns $250 million worldwide
Gareth Edwards, director of Jurassic World Rebirth, has finally opened about the chances of another a sequel.
The 2025 film starring Scarlett Johansson and Jonathan Bailey is currently running successfully in theatres globally.
Even though, the latest film did present new possibilities for the franchise to go forward, but Edwards discussed that he always thought of this project as a standalone film with no other entry.
While speaking in an interview with ScreenRant’s Liam Crowley, he said, “Maybe there’s something in there. But no, we tried to make this movie like a single standalone.”
According to him sequels and trilogies leave makers to the point where they end up with one question in their heads and that is, “how do we now make the others?”
Gareth explained, “I’ve genuinely never talked about it with anybody. Not a single conversation with David Koepp or Frank Marshall or Universal about a sequel.”
“I think everyone’s like (knocks on wood), all they want is for people to really like this movie and make the best film we can, and that’s it. And then it’s in the lap of the gods, everything else, really”, he continued.
Jurassic World Rebirth grossed $250 million globally ever since its release.
Mo Chara, DJ Próvaí and Móglaí Bap of Kneecap during day four of Glastonbury festival.
Leon Neal/Getty Images/Getty Images Europe
hide caption
toggle caption
Leon Neal/Getty Images/Getty Images Europe
LONDON – When Kneecap performed at Glastonbury music festival this year — a performance that the British Prime Minister opposed before the band even took the stage — bandmember Mo Chara told the crowd, “us three have no right to be on this stage in front of this many people, rapping predominantly in a language that even people at home don’t even speak.”
Kneecap, three young men from Northern Ireland who rap in Irish, has risen to prominence in recent years, with controversy surrounding its shows and political statements.
The hip-hop trio was formed in 2017, composed of bandmembers Mo Chara, Móglaí Bap and DJ Próvaí, who come from Belfast. The band is part of the generation known as the “ceasefire babies,” who grew up in the aftermath of the 1998 Good Friday Agreement that formally ended the decades of violence in Northern Ireland known as the Troubles. The group’s lyrics span everything from working class youth culture in Belfast, to Irish language rights, to a desire for Northern Ireland to join the Republic of Ireland.
Why the trio raps in Irish
Kneecap says that rapping in Irish, long marginalized under British rule in Northern Ireland, is a political choice. When NPR met the band at an Irish-language cultural center in west Belfast in 2023, bandmember Mo Chara explained, “It’s impossible not to be political here [in Northern Ireland] if you’re going to speak Irish. It’s very hard not to be political growing up in Belfast.”
The Irish language — which the British banned from Northern Irish government and courts under a recently repealed 18th century law — is now seeing a revival, especially among young people. Northern Ireland has seen a steady rise in Irish speakers in recent years, and Irish was made an official language of the region in 2022, where about 12% of the population now speak it.
Kneecap has been credited for leading what some have called an “Irish language revolution.”
As well as being a political choice, the band says rapping in Irish is also a creative one. Kneecap has pushed the boundaries of the language in rap, with Mo Chara telling NPR that Irish isn’t “just about fiddles and shamrocks.”
“Our youth culture now involves a lot more paraphernalia and drugs,” says Móglaí Bap. “We had to create new words so that we could talk about these things. That was part of the band, creating this new vocabulary that didn’t really exist.”
The band’s debut song, “C.E.A.R.T.A,” means “rights” in Irish. Kneecap says it was born out of a night when Móglaí Bap and his friends were out spray-painting around Belfast during a protest in support of the Irish language. It’s about the right to speak Irish, Móglaí Bap says, but it’s also about “the right for us to get off our heads, to get high.”
The band’s influences are wide-ranging, from U.S. hip-hop to Irish rebel music. The members grew up listening to Irish rebel songs, says Mo Chara. “These were songs that were about the unification of Ireland,” he says. “They were very anti-British involvement in Ireland.”
Mo Chara cites songs like “Come Out Ye Black and Tans”, a 1920s Irish rebel song about standing up to a notoriously brutal British police force named for the color of their uniforms, who were infamous for killing Irish civilians during the Irish War of Independence in the early 1920s. Móglaí Bap says the song, “talks about this army that came from England that went out murdering people,” and says that “it would be seen today to have a hip-hop theme to it.”
Kneecap’s own music talks about a desire for Northern Ireland to be freed from British rule, too. One of the group’s biggest hits is titled “Get Your Brits Out.”
A semi-fictionalised film about the band’s origins — in which the members star as themselves — won critical acclaim and a string of awards, including a BAFTA earlier this year.
YouTube
How the band has attracted controversy
The band is also vocal in its criticism of Israel, and call Israel’s war in Gaza a genocide — statements that have drawn the ire of politicians and public figures in the UK and beyond.
At Coachella this year, Kneecap led the crowd in chants of “Free Palestine” and ended the set projecting pro-Palestinian and anti-Israel messages on the screen, including one that said “Israel is committing genocide against the Palestinian people,” and, “It is being enabled by the US government who arm and fund Israel despite their war crimes.” The set attracted criticism, with some, including Sharon Osbourne, calling for the band’s U.S. visas to be revoked.
Soon after the Coachella set, two older videos surfaced online from past concerts, which appeared to show band members shouting “up Hamas, up Hezbollah” and saying “the only good Tory is a dead Tory,” referring to lawmakers from Britain’s center-right Conservative party. British counter-terrorism police said they were investigating the band and Mo Chara was later charged with a terrorism offence, for allegedly holding up a flag in support of Hezbollah, which is a proscribed terrorist organization in the U.K.
In a statement on X, Kneecap said: “we do not, and have never, supported Hamas or Hezbollah. We condemn all attacks on civilians,” and “we reject any suggestion that we would seek to incite violence against any MP or individual.” The group said the videos had been “taken out of all context” and that there had been a “smear campaign” against the band following its Coachella performance.
The band saw some of its shows cancelled following the terror charge. Some politicians said Kneecap shouldn’t be allowed to perform at Glastonbury, including British Prime Minister Keir Starmer who said it would not be “appropriate.”
In the end, Glastonbury organizers said the Kneecap performance would go ahead. The BBC, which broadcasts the festival live every year, said it would not broadcast the Kneecap show live but later made it available to watch online. In a statement, the BBC said “whilst the BBC doesn’t ban artists, our plans ensure that our programming meets our editorial guidelines.”
The band drew a crowd of hundreds of thousands, and it used the set to reiterate its support for Palestinians in Gaza and to hit back at the band’s critics, beginning with a montage of the various condemnations Kneecap received from both sides of the Atlantic. At one point the band led the crowd in chants of “F*** Keir Starmer” and described the charge against Mo Chara as a “trumped up terrorism charge.”
Mo Chara drew parallels between the Irish struggle and the plight of Palestinians in Gaza, telling the crowd that, “the Irish suffered 800 years of colonialism under the British state,” adding, “we understand colonialism and we understand how important it is for solidarity internationally.”
British police have now opened a criminal investigation into Kneecap’s Glastonbury set “relating to hate crimes,” alongside another set by British punk band Bob Vylan, in which the lead singer, Bobby Vylan, led the crowds in chants of “death, death to the IDF,” referring to the Israeli military. The police have not said which part of either set would be subject to criminal investigation.
LONDON – When Kneecap performed at Glastonbury music festival this year — a performance that the British Prime Minister opposed before the band even took the stage — bandmember Mo Chara told the crowd, “us three have no right to be on this stage in front of this many people, rapping predominantly in a language that even people at home don’t even speak.”
Kneecap, three young men from Northern Ireland who rap in Irish, has risen to prominence in recent years, with controversy surrounding its shows and political statements.
The hip-hop trio was formed in 2017, composed of bandmembers Mo Chara, Móglaí Bap and DJ Próvaí, who come from Belfast. The band is part of the generation known as the “ceasefire babies,” who grew up in the aftermath of the 1998 Good Friday Agreement that formally ended the decades of violence in Northern Ireland known as the Troubles. The group’s lyrics span everything from working class youth culture in Belfast, to Irish language rights, to a desire for Northern Ireland to join the Republic of Ireland.
Why the trio raps in Irish
Kneecap says that rapping in Irish, long marginalized under British rule in Northern Ireland, is a political choice. When NPR met the band at an Irish-language cultural center in west Belfast in 2023, bandmember Mo Chara explained, “It’s impossible not to be political here [in Northern Ireland] if you’re going to speak Irish. It’s very hard not to be political growing up in Belfast.”
The Irish language — which the British banned from Northern Irish government and courts under a recently repealed 18th century law — is now seeing a revival, especially among young people. Northern Ireland has seen a steady rise in Irish speakers in recent years, and Irish was made an official language of the region in 2022, where about 12% of the population now speak it.
Kneecap has been credited for leading what some have called an “Irish language revolution.”
As well as being a political choice, the band says rapping in Irish is also a creative one. Kneecap has pushed the boundaries of the language in rap, with Mo Chara telling NPR that Irish isn’t “just about fiddles and shamrocks.”
“Our youth culture now involves a lot more paraphernalia and drugs,” says Móglaí Bap. “We had to create new words so that we could talk about these things. That was part of the band, creating this new vocabulary that didn’t really exist.”
The band’s debut song, “C.E.A.R.T.A,” means “rights” in Irish. Kneecap says it was born out of a night when Móglaí Bap and his friends were out spray-painting around Belfast during a protest in support of the Irish language. It’s about the right to speak Irish, Móglaí Bap says, but it’s also about “the right for us to get off our heads, to get high.”
The band’s influences are wide-ranging, from U.S. hip-hop to Irish rebel music. The members grew up listening to Irish rebel songs, says Mo Chara. “These were songs that were about the unification of Ireland,” he says. “They were very anti-British involvement in Ireland.”
Mo Chara cites songs like “Come Out Ye Black and Tans”, a 1920s Irish rebel song about standing up to a notoriously brutal British police force named for the color of their uniforms, who were infamous for killing Irish civilians during the Irish War of Independence in the early 1920s. Móglaí Bap says the song, “talks about this army that came from England that went out murdering people,” and says that “it would be seen today to have a hip-hop theme to it.”
Kneecap’s own music talks about a desire for Northern Ireland to be freed from British rule, too. One of the group’s biggest hits is titled “Get Your Brits Out.”
A semi-fictionalised film about the band’s origins — in which the members star as themselves — won critical acclaim and a string of awards, including a BAFTA earlier this year.
How the band has attracted controversy
The band is also vocal in its criticism of Israel, and call Israel’s war in Gaza a genocide — statements that have drawn the ire of politicians and public figures in the UK and beyond.
At Coachella this year, Kneecap led the crowd in chants of “Free Palestine” and ended the set projecting pro-Palestinian and anti-Israel messages on the screen, including one that said “Israel is committing genocide against the Palestinian people,” and, “It is being enabled by the US government who arm and fund Israel despite their war crimes.” The set attracted criticism, with some, including Sharon Osbourne, calling for the band’s U.S. visas to be revoked.
Soon after the Coachella set, two older videos surfaced online from past concerts, which appeared to show band members shouting “up Hamas, up Hezbollah” and saying “the only good Tory is a dead Tory,” referring to lawmakers from Britain’s center-right Conservative party. British counter-terrorism police said they were investigating the band and Mo Chara was later charged with a terrorism offence, for allegedly holding up a flag in support of Hezbollah, which is a proscribed terrorist organization in the U.K.
In a statement on X, Kneecap said: “we do not, and have never, supported Hamas or Hezbollah. We condemn all attacks on civilians,” and “we reject any suggestion that we would seek to incite violence against any MP or individual.” The group said the videos had been “taken out of all context” and that there had been a “smear campaign” against the band following its Coachella performance.
The band saw some of its shows cancelled following the terror charge. Some politicians said Kneecap shouldn’t be allowed to perform at Glastonbury, including British Prime Minister Keir Starmer who said it would not be “appropriate.”
In the end, Glastonbury organizers said the Kneecap performance would go ahead. The BBC, which broadcasts the festival live every year, said it would not broadcast the Kneecap show live but later made it available to watch online. In a statement, the BBC said “whilst the BBC doesn’t ban artists, our plans ensure that our programming meets our editorial guidelines.”
The band drew a crowd of hundreds of thousands, and it used the set to reiterate its support for Palestinians in Gaza and to hit back at the band’s critics, beginning with a montage of the various condemnations Kneecap received from both sides of the Atlantic. At one point the band led the crowd in chants of “F*** Keir Starmer” and described the charge against Mo Chara as a “trumped up terrorism charge.”
Mo Chara drew parallels between the Irish struggle and the plight of Palestinians in Gaza, telling the crowd that, “the Irish suffered 800 years of colonialism under the British state,” adding, “we understand colonialism and we understand how important it is for solidarity internationally.”
British police have now opened a criminal investigation into Kneecap’s Glastonbury set “relating to hate crimes,” alongside another set by British punk band Bob Vylan, in which the lead singer, Bobby Vylan, led the crowds in chants of “death, death to the IDF,” referring to the Israeli military. The police have not said which part of either set would be subject to criminal investigation.
Susan Choi’s sixth novel takes a little-known and appalling aspect of Japanese-Korean history and fashions it into a rich generational saga that teems with intelligence, curiosity and, in terms of reading, sheer pleasure. Like the flashlight of its title it casts an evasive, variably illuminating beam, focusing on the hidden lives of characters, their careless and destructive lies, random yet weighted connections to each other, vulnerability and extraordinary ability to survive.
Choi’s previous work, Trust Exercise (2019) won the National Book Award in her native US. Of that novel, Choi has said that it “takes up the question of national identity, and the extent to which it coincides or does not coincide with ethnic and with cultural identity”.
Flashlight, which began as a New Yorker short story, has not dissimilar concerns as it takes in a sweep of places and periods from the 1950s to the early 2000s: suburban Indiana, downtown Los Angeles, the Japan of both city and shore, late 1980s Paris and London and, in its grave and beautiful conclusion, the border with North Korea.
It opens in the “dog days of August” 1977 in an unremarkable coastal town in Japan. On its beach one night, a nine-year-old girl is discovered suffering from hypothermia and half-drowned. Her father, with whom she had been taking an evening walk, has vanished.
Despite prolonged searches no trace of him is found, and the pair’s sandals remain side by side where they were placed at the end of the jetty. They become the objects of a temporary shrine of rice bowls, flowers, fruit and trinkets donated by local people, until they are washed away.
Identity, names and statelessness — their arbitrary bestowing and removal — are central themes in this questioning novel
What is left following this catastrophe is a traumatised family — American mother Anne, and daughter, Louisa. The latter is angry, hitting out, eternally furious with her mother and, as time passes, barely remembering her father, Serk, who was presumed washed out to sea.
Of what happened that evening, despite a psychiatrist’s delving, she has no memory: that will come much later, when “her body is leaden as if she has swum all that distance again, through the muscling, relentless, gelatinous cold force of the waves”.
Serk’s alleged drowning remains in the background until two-thirds of the way through the novel as the sea — helped by a large dose of the fatalism that readers of fiction rely on — gives up its secrets. Before his disappearance, Serk is a lecturer in engineering who emigrated from Japan to the US on a visa, although as an ethnic Korean his Japanese citizenship had been cancelled in 1952.
Identity, names and statelessness — their arbitrary bestowing and removal — are central themes in this questioning novel. Serk is known variously throughout as Hiroshi (his Japanese name), Seok (Korean), and lastly, the Crab, by which time he has been almost subsumed into mythological status.
His parents, originally from Korea, were forced through poverty to move to Japan; several years after the second world war, which ended when Serk was six, they begin to make plans to return — to a now divided country, communist North Korea, the DRPK. By this time, Serk (the Americanisation of Seok) is about to graduate from college; his next sibling, a sister, Soonja, hastily marries to avoid leaving Japan.
Their parents, seduced by the promised paradise that awaits them and their three youngest children, make the journey “home”. After their return, their letters are scarce, stating only their great happiness, which sits oddly alongside urgent requests for basic food and clothing, for medicine and blankets. The letters gradually cease.
Choi’s narrative winds back and forth over some 50 years. The viewpoints of its principal characters alternate — from Louisa as a child, then a college student, then a married woman with children of her own; to Anne, her mother; to Serk, and to Tobias, Anne’s son by another man. Aged 19, she had been forced to give him up for adoption directly after giving birth. Anne’s and Serk’s marriage foundered from the start, blighted by his arrogance, silences and their bitter arguments.
By the time of Serk’s disappearance Louisa’s relationship with her parents resembles that of “a Venn diagram” with the child as the only common factor.
In the US her father is overprotective, to the point of obsessiveness. But when they relocate to Japan for what is meant to be his year-long secondment, Louisa is expected to be independent, like a Japanese child.
Having felt that she wasn’t white enough for the US, she is too tall for Japan, and initially she struggles. (Later, as a student travelling in France, she will be subject to a horrible instance of racist violation that prefigures the darker revelations that Choi has in store).
In Japan, Anne is the outsider, just as Serk always seemed in the US; confined to their damp flat with a mysterious wasting illness (eventually diagnosed as MS), while Serk takes Louisa on visits to meet a stranger, a woman from his past.
At this point Anne is reunited with Tobias, whose role in this complex familial structure — a spiky, snarly one that resists affection — is to be the savant, annoyingly compassionate older brother whom Louisa ridicules until she finally sees the point of him.
Culturally the late 1970s were a showcase for the blockbuster sci-fi film — on one of their last outings together Serk and Lousia attend a screening of Close Encounters of the Third Kind. It is tempting to believe more in fantastical alien abduction than in the human shadow puppets of a totalitarian regime that, for Serk and others, will prove all too real as Choi delivers the book’s shocking last third: “Time is not a river moving ceaselessly into the future but a stagnated pool. Breathing at its surface, drowning in its depths, are the same.”
Here the personal graphically collides with the geopolitical. Yet it has been lying quietly in abeyance all along, like Louisa’s abandoned childhood backpack or Anne’s cassettes casually taped from Japanese radio. They are all clues hiding in plain sight in a restless, leisurely and capacious work of such emotional force and controlled style that it surely cannot be overlooked by this year’s Booker judges.
Flashlight by Susan Choi Jonathan Cape £20/Farrar, Straus and Giroux $30, 464 pages
Join our online book group on Facebook at FT Books Café and follow FT Weekend on Instagram, Bluesky and X
Text description provided by the architects. After a devastating fire in 2021, aluminium manufacturer Aluned faced a critical question: how do you rebuild a workplace that is not only functional but also sustainable, inspiring, and in dialogue with its surroundings? HA-HA Design & Development, a Rotterdam-based architecture firm, saw an opportunity in the crisis. By retaining the existing foundations and steel structure, they designed a contemporary work environment that honours the site’s industrial heritage while embracing the landscape. “We saw the loss of the old building as a chance to show what circular and adaptive building can truly mean.” — Nima Morkoç, Architect at HA-HA. “It’s remarkable how a limitation, the existing steel structure, became the basis for a light and open design.” — Aluned BV, Client. In 2021, a fire destroyed the Aluned headquarters. Instead of demolishing and starting from scratch, the project team chose radical reuse: the original foundation and steel structure were preserved. The Zwijndrecht site consists of three industrial halls arranged around a central green courtyard with a pond — a rare oasis of green in an otherwise paved industrial zone.
Meghan Markle accused of orchestrating a ‘wine robbery’: ‘Its as bitter as her’
Meghan Markle’s new product sold at three bottles minimum has sparked major distaste among people like chef Jameson Stocks.
In light of this “great wine robbery” as he calls it, the culinary dabbler slammed the Duchess, and even sounded the alarm over her decision to put the minimum order requirement on her newest product Napa Valley rosé.
According to a report by Express UK he started by pointing out the fact that “nobody knows what it tastes like,” yet but may end up getting something that “tastes like vinegar and be as bitter as her.”
For those unversed, the three bottle minimum puts the price of the wine at “high” £22 a pop.
“It’s similar to her other products, it’s not meant to be affordable for the general public but rather caters to a more exclusive market.”
At one point he also revealed his own experience making an alcoholic product and rubbished her pricing.
“Having worked extensively in South Africa, a region known for producing some of the world’s finest wines, I’m confident that you can create top-quality wine at a fraction of the price she’s charging and still make a decent enough mark up per bottle,” he said.
Especially since the chef himself is collaborating “regularly with vineyards and growers there, for his own wine in South Africa which is slated for next year.
One aspect of Meghan’s decisions the chef did agree with was her decision to source from Napa Valley which is often called the “wine capital of America”.
Reason being “the quality of the wine is evident, which explains why she chose to align herself with Napa Valley’s reputation.”
However, despite that he pointed out “producing large quantities of wine, prices tend to drop significantly compared to what she charges” and because of this he also accused the former-royal of trying to “overcharge her loyal fan base” full of people who “might not be able to afford it.”
In his concluding words he also highlighted the current situation of the world and added, “in the current global cost of living crisis, I find it unacceptable that the price of the wine is so high.”
The social media accounts of several Pakistani celebrities were geo-blocked again on Thursday (July 3, 2025), hours after they became briefly accessible to users in India — a development that had triggered sharp reactions across social media platforms.
Some of the previously restricted profiles became visible on Wednesday (July 2, 2025), reportedly due to a technical glitch. However, following the issue being brought to the attention of the authorities, the content was once again geo-restricted and is no longer accessible in India.
In the wake of the recent terrorist attack in Pahalgam, the Union Ministry of Home Affairs had recommended the blocking of 16 YouTube channels based in Pakistan. These were accused of disseminating provocative and communally sensitive content, false narratives, and misinformation targeting India, its armed forces, and security agencies.
The list of banned YouTube channels includes prominent media outlets such as Dawn News, ARY News, Samaa TV, Bol News, and Geo News, along with other channels such as Irshad Bhatti, Raftar, The Pakistan Reference, Samaa Sports, GNN, Uzair Cricket, Umar Cheema Exclusive, Asma Shirazi, Muneeb Farooq, Suno News, and Raazi Naama.
In addition, the social media profiles of Pakistani public figures — including actors Mahira Khan, Saba Qamar, Ahad Raza Mir, Danish Taimoor, Yumna Zaidi, Fawad Khan, Mawra Hocane, and Hania Aamir — as well as cricketers such as Shahid Afridi, Babar Azam, Mohammad Rizwan, Wasim Akram, Shan Masood, Hasan Ali, Naseem Shah, Imam-ul-Haq, Shadab Khan, and Shoaib Akhtar — remain geo-blocked in India.
Further, the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting had issued an advisory to over-the-top (OTT) platforms, media streaming services, and digital intermediaries in India, instructing them to discontinue web series, films, songs, podcasts, and other forms of media content originating from Pakistan.
The advisory cited national security considerations, stating, “Several terrorist attacks in India have been established to have cross-border linkages with Pakistan-based state and non-state actors… On April 22, the terrorist attack in Pahalgam led to the killing of several Indians, one Nepali citizen, and injuries to a number of others…”.
Quoting Part III of the Information Technology (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code) Rules, 2021, the Ministry underscored the responsibilities of content publishers on OTT platforms. It also referenced Rule 3(1)(b) of Part II of the IT Rules, 2021, which stipulates that intermediaries must ensure that users do not upload or share content that “threatens the unity, integrity, defence, security or sovereignty of India, friendly relations with foreign States, or public order”.
The entertainment industry is still grappling with the sudden loss of actor and dancer Shefali Jariwala, who passed away on June 27 following a cardiac arrest. Her untimely death sent shockwaves across the nation, leaving fans and colleagues heartbroken. Now, her husband, actor Parag Tyagi, has shared a moving tribute on Instagram, remembering her as a radiant soul who lived life with purpose and unconditional love.‘So much more than Kaanta Laga’: Parag Tyagi’s heartfelt noteParag posted a serene photo of Shefali, smiling as she took in the natural beauty around her. In the caption, he began by acknowledging the legacy she leaves behind: “Shefali — the ever-eternal Kaanta Laga — was so much more than what met the eye. She was fire wrapped in grace — sharp, focused, and fiercely driven.”
Shefali Jariwala Dies At 42, Devastated Husband Parag Tyagi Breaks Down Outside Hospital
He described her as a woman who lived with intention, nurturing every part of her being. “A woman who lived with intention, nurturing her career, her mind, her body, and her soul with quiet strength and unwavering determination,” he wrote.‘She was sab ki maa’ — A pillar of love and careBeyond her public persona, Parag painted a portrait of Shefali as someone who embodied selfless love. “She was sab ki maa — always putting others first, offering comfort and warmth simply through her presence,” he shared.He also remembered her as a devoted wife, a loving mom to their pet Simba, and a caring sister and maasi. “A fiercely loyal friend who stood by those she loved with courage and compassion,” he added.Calling for a space of healing and remembranceIn the final part of the tribute, Parag urged people to remember Shefali not for the noise or speculation that followed her passing, but for the light she brought into people’s lives. “Let that be her legacy — a soul so radiant, she will never, ever be forgotten. Love you till eternity,” he wrote.A prayer meet in Shefali’s memory was held on July 2 in Mumbai, attended by her close friends and family. On the day of her death, June 27, she was rushed to Bellevue Multispeciality Hospital by Parag after reportedly suffering a cardiac arrest. She was declared dead on arrival.Shefali Jariwala rose to fame with the iconic 2002 music video Kaanta Laga and went on to become the pop culture sensation overnight. She also reprised her song in Mujhse Shaadi Karogi starring Salman Khan, Akshay Kumar and Priyanka Chopra. She also participated in Bigg Boss 13 and other reality shows, earning a loyal fanbase over the years.
Musical icon Angélique Kidjo has become the first black African performer to be selected for a star on the prestigious Hollywood Walk of Fame.
Kidjo, who comes from the West African country of Benin and has won five Grammy awards, was among the 35 names announced as part of the Walk of Fame’s class of 2026 list.
The 64-year-old was hailed as Africa’s “premier diva” during a press conference announcing the list on Wednesday.
Singer Miley Cyrus, actor Timothée Chalamet, actress Demi Moore and former basketball player Shaquille O’Neal are also among those set to be honoured with a star on Los Angeles’ famous walk.
Kidjo receives the honour after making music for more than four decades and releasing 16 albums.
The songstress has won fans across the world with her commanding voice and ability to fuse West African styles with the likes of funk, jazz and R&B.
Her long list of collaborators includes forces such as Burna Boy, Philip Glass, Sting and Alicia Keys.
Kidjo joins Charlize Theron, a white South African actress, in representing Africa on the Walk of Fame. Theron received her star in 2005.
The date on which Kidjo will see her star unveiled on the Walk of Fame has not yet been announced.
After recipients have been selected for a star, they have two years to schedule induction ceremonies.
Kidjo grew up in Benin, but left for Paris in 1983, citing oppression from the country’s then communist government.
“From the moment the communist regime arrived in Benin, I became aware that the freedom we enjoy can be snatched away in a second,” she told the BBC in 2023.
She said she has been driven by curiosity since childhood, adding: “my nickname was ‘when, why, how?’. I want to understand things, to understand my place in this world.”
Kidjo worked as a backing singer in France before striking out as a solo artist in 1990, with the album Parakou.
She is a Unicef and Oxfam goodwill ambassador, and has her own charity, Batonga, which is dedicated to supporting the education of young girls in Africa.
Growing up in rural Wangaratta in north-eastern Victoria, Damien Saunder spent many a wintry day listening to music on the family’s record player. Just beneath the stereo was a Reader’s Digest atlas. “Anytime we put on a record, I’d get out the atlas,” Saunder recalls. “It was like a gateway to the world – a way to dream, explore and let your mind wander.”
Decades later, music and maps have come together again, this time in a coffee table book: Maps on Vinyl, a world-first survey of the cartographic influence on album sleeve design; an atlas of album cover maps. It’s the book most music fans – and map-makers – never knew they needed.
More than 415 records are featured in Maps on Vinyl: An Atlas of Album Cover Maps. Illustration: Damien Saunder
Saunder is a cartographer by trade. Formerly director of cartography at National Geographic and head of cartography at Apple (“I can’t talk about what we do there,” he says), he also helped develop a system for “mapping” tennis matches using ball-tracking technology, which in turn led to him working with Grand Slammers including Roger Federer.
But music and album cover design have always been passions. While he was studying typography at the ArtCenter College of Design in the US, a lecturer recommended looking at album covers for inspiration. “That’s when I wondered: have maps influenced album cover design? Turns out, they have – though strangely, it hasn’t been studied in cartographic academia. So, I dove in.”
The project became a four-year labour of love: 32,000 words and a collection of more than 415 vinyl records – some of them deeply obscure, some celebrated.
Artists with sleeves in the collection include Oasis, Coldplay, Talking Heads, Devo, Bob Marley, XTC, MC5, Queen, New Order, James Brown and Weezer. Others you will not have heard of unless you’re into Belgian speedcore.
Little Creatures by Talking Heads features cover art by Howard Finster and design by Tibor Kalman. Photograph: Damien Saunder
Some major names in the design and graphics world are there, too: Peter Saville (New Order etc), Curtis McNair (Motown’s in-house designer), Neville Garrick (Bob Marley’s art director), Roger Dean (maker of fantasy worlds for the covers of Yes and Asia LPs) and Pedro Bell (Funkadelic, etc).
Saunder collected physical copies of each record and photographed all the sleeves himself. That was one job he grossly underestimated, he says. “I set up a light room in our lounge, photographed each one, made sure the white and black colours appeared as they should, cleaned them, colour-corrected them – three to four tasks per cover … times 415 covers. I pushed through, but I definitely had some moments of doubt.”
Then there was the research. Where possible, Saunder tracked down the designer responsible for each sleeve design to ask them how their concept came about and what it means.
The Equatorial Stars by Fripp & Eno, with sleeve design by Brian Eno and Hugh O’Donnell. Photograph: Damien Saunder
The selection criteria for the book was strict: no landscape paintings; no satellite photography. “A map had to be an abstraction of a geographic form – real or fictitious – and show spatial relationships. That distinction helped narrow the collection.”
While maps are often celebrated for their beauty, they can also contain layers of meaning, says Saunder. “Even the most basic shapes of countries can draw out a lot of feelings – positive and negative.”
The reasons for using maps on album sleeves vary. Some reflect origins – the country or city a band or artist comes from – while others are more aspirational. Peter Barrett’s sleeve design for the UK pressing of Madonna’s 1983 album Borderline, featuring conjoined maps of New York and London, speaks of a star about to make it in the UK. (“Did Madonna sign off on it? I don’t know,” says Saunder. “Is she into maps? I don’t know, but that would likely be the story behind that particular one.”)
skip past newsletter promotion
after newsletter promotion
Saunder collected physical copies of each record. Photograph: Steve Womersley/The Guardian
Some designs address global social or environmental issues. Others map the mind, imaginary places, feelings, worldviews – or, in the case of Robert Fripp and Brian Eno’s The Equatorial Stars, deep space.
Among Saunder’s personal favourites is a sleeve from the long-gone Iowa alt rock band House of Large Sizes, showing a cake whose icing is decorated with a map, with a chunk missing. “It’s a commentary on how we’re consuming the world piece by piece, almost without noticing,” says Saunder.
Another favourite cover comes from Belgian punk band Hetze: an illustration of a globe dangling by a thread from the forefinger of an elegant, long-nailed hand, by tattoo artist Florence Roman.
California, with sleeve design by Mary Scholz and Zachary Ross. Photograph: Damien Saunder
Then there’s the minimalist cover of Mary Scholz’s album California, a collaboration between the singer and guitarist Zachary Ross, showing a wide brush stroke in the shape of the golden state, the paint fading out towards the coast. “It’s like a never-ending horizon of opportunities being swept off into the ocean,” says Saunder. “Having gone off to work and live in California myself, that means something to me.”
During the writing process, Saunder spoke to influential graphic designers such as Peter Saville, creator of sleeves for Joy Division, New Order, OMD and Ultravox. He has three covers in the book – one of them created for Canada’s Martha and the Muffins based on a 1:150,000-scaled map from the National Topographic System of Canada.
Metro Music by Martha and the Muffins, featuring sleeve design by Peter Saville. Photograph: Damien Saunder
“I fired off an email thinking he [Saville] would be too busy or whatever, but … we ended up having a great chat. He has a genuine passion for the language of maps and cartography,” says Saunder.
All proceeds from the sale of the book are going to Support Act, an organisation helping musicians deal with the emotional, physical and financial challenges rife in the industry. “Without music, there are no album sleeves or books like this,” Saunder says. “It didn’t feel right to profit from others’ artwork, so this was my way of giving back.”
