Tag: Paris

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Entertainment

A Mirrored Mecca for Okay-Pop Dancers in Paris

A Mirrored Mecca for K-Pop Dancers in Paris

PARIS — On a recent Saturday morning, Carla Kang, Audrey Kouamelan and Emma Letouche assembled in front of a squat glass building called CB3. It stands about 250 yards from the Grande Arche, the architectural marvel that is the signature structure of La Défense, a district of soaring office towers northwest of Paris.

Then the three women, aged 21 to 23, began spinning, jumping and swooping as they danced to “Fire Truck,” a song from NCT 127, a South Korean K-pop group. They stopped and started, often laughing, and paused from time to time to look at NCT’s original music video on their phones as they tried to duplicate the intricate dance steps.

They were rehearsing to make their own video in the coming weeks — a re-enactment of the NCT 127 original — that they will upload to a K-pop channel they run called Young Nation. Their top video, based on “Next Level” by the four-women K-pop group aespa, has more than 250,000 views.

As on every weekend, the three women of Young Nation were hardly alone.

Throughout the day, about 100 other dancers arrived at CB3 to practice their own routines. In the last few years, the pedestrian plaza around CB3 has become a mecca for dancers from all over Ile-de-France, the region that encompasses Paris and its surrounding suburbs, known as banlieues. Even on weekdays, even in the dead of winter, dancers are out at CB3, from early morning to well into the evening.

Most of the dancers are female, range in age from the mid-teens to late 20s and live in the banlieues. They are almost all part of K-pop fan groups that record song covers and dance re-enactments to post on YouTube channels. The videos, which are shot at locations around Paris — including at Trocadéro, the plaza overlooking the Eiffel Tower; in front of the Pantheon; and, of course, at La Défense — are labors of love because the groups cannot collect money from advertising: The songs, and even most of the dance moves, are copyrighted by K-pop artists.

K-pop has an urban appeal that crosses cultural and geographic borders. Scrolling through YouTube, it’s possible to find similar K-pop cover dance groups in Russia, Poland, Italy, Bulgaria, the United States and dozens of other countries.

Recent French tours by the most popular K-pop band, BTS, have sold out in minutes; in 2019, all the tickets for the 200,000-seat Stade de France arena went in two hours. Paris now has a K-pop Dance Academy where people can take classes, a couple of K-pop themed stores (Boutique Musica and Tai You), and a Korean K-pop restaurant called Kick Café.

Kouamelan, 23, said she had to commute about an hour to get to CB3 from her home in Drancy, near Charles de Gaulle Airport on the eastern side of Paris. She said she likes practicing at CB3 because “there is so much space and we can move around freely.”

The glass building has other amenities that make it attractive. It is vacant, and has been for five years, so there is no one for the dancers to disturb while they play their music, and vice versa.

The building’s ground floor is recessed on all four sides so that there is a large protected area under the higher floors when it rains. It is also surrounded by plate glass windows: perfect mirrors, just as in a professional dance studio.

The cost of using the space — nothing — is a huge draw, as many of the dancers are either students or work low-paying jobs. Professional studio time is not necessarily something their personal budgets can afford.

La Défense is also a major transportation hub: The subway, trains, trams and buses all stop or end at the Grande Arche. That last factor is particularly important, as many of the dancers travel long distances to get to CB3.

On this particular Saturday, members of the dance crew Stormy Shot had come to work on their latest project: a tribute video for the fifth anniversary of the founding of Blackpink, a female group which may be the second-most popular K-pop group.

Lucie Zellner, 23 — who organizes Stormy Shot, along with her sister, Elea, 21 — said that the group often practices between 9 and 17 hours per week. Stormy Shot has about 30 members, Zellner said, though not everyone appears in each video, and, not surprisingly, there is attrition. She added that the group had let a member go the previous week. Stormy Shot rehearsed for hours, pausing to eat lunch under the canopy of CB3 as the skies intermittently opened up. Eventually, a hand-held camera came out and one of the group’s members, Lahna Debiche, 17, filmed the others as they rehearsed.

Later that afternoon, about 10 members of the Cloud Dance Crew showed up for a final rehearsal before a later performance of songs and dances by Blackpink. Dressed mostly in black and pink themselves, the group was led by Clyde Williams, 27, who is nearly six foot five and describes himself as a “fairy from outer space” on Instagram. As the group rehearsed, Williams, whose large frame is surprisingly supple, made small corrections and gave instructions to the other dancers.

Nothing is forever, and CB3 may not be available to the dancers for much longer. A spokeswoman for the building’s owner, A.E.W., said in an email that the company could not comment about CB3’s status until later this year. But there is a work order posted on the building and, according to the website of the design and engineering company Gesys Ingénierie, it has been hired to renovate CB3 by adding five stories and some trees out front.

If CB3 does end up being renovated and occupied, the dancers may have to find another spot. Though it could be difficult to find one that checks all the boxes in the same way as CB3.

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Entertainment

Taking part in the Function of New York? Toronto. That View of Paris? It’s Montreal.

Playing the Role of New York? Toronto. That View of Paris? It’s Montreal.

There are countless examples of this Canadian urban stunt doubling, often pieced together via tight shots and computer graphics. Toronto plays Tokyo in “Pacific Rim,” Chicago in the movie “Chicago,” Baltimore in “Hairspray” and Boston in much of “Good Will Hunting.”

Vancouver plays New York in the Jackie Chan movie “Rumble in the Bronx” (leading to an infamous oversight, in which the city has mountains lurking behind it), and it plays Seattle, Budapest and Mumbai in “Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol.” Montreal has played Marseille and Montrichard, France, in “Catch Me if You Can” and Paris in “X-Men: Days of Future Past”; Washington, D.C., in “White House Down”; and Brooklyn in the movie “Brooklyn.”

Particularly popular filming locations include the R.C. Harris Water Treatment Plant, a beloved Art Deco complex in Toronto that has played sinister locations in movies like “Undercover Brother” (portraying The Man’s headquarters) and “In the Mouth of Madness” (a mental hospital). The University of Toronto has played Harvard, M.I.T. and Princeton, among many other schools.

The reasons for Canada’s prime status as a film “impostor” are many, Mr. Theodore said: tax breaks, lower costs, diverse landscapes, high-quality shooting and editing facilities, friendliness and a general unfamiliarity with Canada among international movie audiences, allowing it to easily stand in without being recognized.

Another factor, according to the exhibition’s designer, Thomas Balaban, an architect and professor at the School of Architecture at the University of Montreal, is that Canada’s cities are more generic than those in many countries, particularly those in the United States, which Canada plays most often.

“Everything goes through a design review board,” said Mr. Balaban, whose architecture firm, TBA, is spearheading the exhibition’s design as well. “There’s this feeling that the cities are designed by committee.”

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Entertainment

Why Youthful Is Higher Than Emily in Paris

YOUNGER, from left: Molly Bernard, Sutton Foster, Hilary Duff, Debi Mazar,

The final season of Younger has landed on Paramount + and it’s hard not to compare it to creator Darren Star’s other current show. Emily in Paris. On the surface, both seem similar: shiny, stylish, fleeting comedies about professional women in beautiful, glamorous cities. In reality, however, they are very different shows, and in fact they are Younger is very much the show that Emily in Paris tried (and failed) to be.

The fundamental difference between Younger and Emily in Paris is his heart, plain and simple. Even in the early seasons, when Liza was deep in her escalating web of lies, there was, paradoxically, an emotional honesty for everything. Although Liza lied to everyone, the show tried hard to make it clear why she was doing it and to build sympathy for her situation. Their love for their friends and their love interests was real; The only thing that wasn’t real was her lie about her age. The heart of the show has always come before its humor (though there are plenty of both); Emily in Paris often seems too anxious to be really vulnerable, and the result is a show that feels emotionally flat, even – or especially – when it tries to be emotionally deep.

The other big difference? Younger seems to care about its characters primarily while it’s hard not to feel like it Emily in Paris it’s all about aesthetics. Youngerlike with Star Sex and the City before that, a love letter to the glamor of New York City and the women who live there. There’s no shortage of beautiful, Instagram-perfect locations as the impeccably dressed characters stroll through town, but it never overshadows the characters and their journeys. Emily in Paris I always feel like the “Paris” part is more interested in exploring than the “Emily” part, which leaves us with characters that are hard to like when their bad choices take over.

YoungerOn the other hand, it has managed to create a range of characters whose flaws are not annoying but deeply human. In the final season, these themes are explored in more depth, with the “themes” and themes being closely linked to the characters’ journeys and not just put in for reasons of relevance or nervousness. When two characters hit a dead end because of the concept of marriage, it’s understandable where both of them are from, and it’s heartbreaking that they can’t see eye to eye. The flaws in all of these characters – Charles’ stubbornness, Kelsey’s trust in the wrong people, Maggie’s negligence – all come home to sleep, but it never makes them unlikely. Why? Because the show is careful to make them three-dimensional characters and really fight. They don’t giggle and wipe criticism off with a self-deprecating joke, like the heroine of Emily in Paris tends to do. Instead, they screw up and hit and get called and find out their stuff, all with the help of the people they love. That’s why it’s so satisfying when these characters are able towards the end of the season to prepare for the happier future we’ve been choosing all along.

YOUNGER, from left: Peter Hermann, Sutton Foster,

That real feeling of love may matter YoungerThe brand of escapism is so special. Younger is a show about love: love for the true self, love for friends and yes, romance too. It’s the true love between characters that really hurts the series’ betrayal, rather than just feeling like twists and turns that the writers thought would make for a good “OMG!” Moments. We are shown that they love each other instead of just being told. More than ever, the last season is about, because friends support each other through personal and professional exams without worrying. Gone are the days of secrecy and lingering pain; This is a group of people who really love each other.

The show’s Gal-Pal-Comedy-meets-Rom-Com vibe features some of the best moments of last season – it’s tropical, but in a playful, heartfelt way rather than trying too hard to tick off “relevant” topics (and condescending) without detailing any of them – see Emily’s “Surprise Influencer” story in Emily in Paris). This is what great escape means: home cooking, something fun, warm and stylish, but also something that represents the kind of life one can dream of. Sure, I would love to live in Emily’s Paris, but I would much rather live in the world of Youngerand have a loyal, loving support system like her.

Let’s be fair too: Younger has some of the same cracks in his escapist glamor as Emily in Paris. Here’s definitely something to say about how this particular brand of glamorous, glitzy escapist dishes mostly focuses on almost entirely white performers, and that can and should change. But when it comes down to it, escapism shouldn’t just be about aesthetics – it should be about the warmth and joy of the characters and the stories, and right here Younger Shines and other potential escapist shows should be noted.

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Business

Gustavo Dudamel, Celebrity Conductor, Is to Lead Paris Opera

Gustavo Dudamel, Superstar Conductor, Is to Lead Paris Opera

Neef pointed out that Yannick Nézet-Séguin, 46, music director of the Met since 2018, did not start with an enormous repertoire there either. “The question isn’t about the crowd,” Neef said. “And these things are a bit deceiving: if you look at the list of operas that Gustavo has conducted, then from Mozart to John Adams. He conducts opera as long as he conducts symphonic music. “

When asked which works he was looking forward to the most, Dudamel replied: “Everything.” In Paris this autumn he is to conduct Puccini’s “Turandot” and Mozart’s “Le Nozze di Figaro”. In addition to the mainstream repertoire, he hoped to work with living composers from Europe and North and South America, including Adams, Thomas Adès and Gabriela Ortiz.

He added that he would like to direct the Paris Opera Ballet, the company’s in-house dance company. Dudamel said his mentor, José Antonio Abreu, the founder of El Sistema, often took him to ballet to learn about conducting.

“It was part of my training,” he said. “Also for my way of seeing the music.”

His appointment will include significant travel between Paris and Los Angeles, but his engagement with the Philharmonic is one that Dudamel said he has no intention of limiting. “I will share my time between the two families,” he said. What he will be limiting is guest conducting, a process he started a few years ago to shift his focus to longer-term projects.

“We’ll organize it the way he works in LA,” said Neef. “Long periods that stick together instead of traveling a lot.”

Neef added that Dudamel would provide a charismatic and visible link between the company’s main productions and its educational endeavors. In Los Angeles, Dudamel has contributed to the solid educational offering of the Philharmonic, particularly the Youth Orchestra Los Angeles, a program inspired by El Sistema and founded in 2007.

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Entertainment

A Paris Opera Ballet Étoile on Being Younger, Gifted and Profitable

A Paris Opera Ballet Étoile on Being Young, Gifted and Successful

Hugo Marchand, probably the most famous of the stars of the Paris Opera Ballet, or étoiles, stares bare-chested and muscled from the cover of his new memoir “Danser” (Arthaud), released last month in France.

Marchand, 27, seems a little young to have written an autobiography. Although he climbed to the top quickly – at 23 he was an étoile, the highest rank in the company – he still has a whole career ahead of him. And from the outside, his life looks like a lighthearted string of accomplishments, confirmed by critics and audiences who love his poetry, virtuosity, acting skills and leading man looks.

Then why a book now? Marchand asked the same question when an editor approached him three years ago. “I had a lot of doubts, but the editor told me she wanted to hear the voice of a young person talking about following your passion and what the cost of doing it,” he said in a video interview from his Paris apartment.

As it turned out, he had a lot to talk about. In “Danser” (“to dance”) Marchand (with the help of a journalist, Caroline de Bodinat) describes the strenuous, competitive world of the Parisian opera ballet school and company, often with poetic intensity, and lets the reader into his claustrophobic boundaries.

He also writes movingly about his own struggles with self-acceptance. At 6 feet 3 and a naturally muscular build, he felt too tall and too tall for the fine-boned Paris Opera ideal, and his career was marked by self-doubt and visits by stage fright. And he goes, albeit frivolously, on the tricky politics of the past few years at the Paris Opera Ballet: Benjamin Millepied’s brief tenure as director, Aurélie Dupont’s current reign, an internal report from 2018 on the dissatisfaction of the dancers.

Marchand and other opera dancers have been able to give daily lessons and rehearsals since June, although performances have been restricted. Marchand also worked on a project, a pas de deux with Hannah O’Neill (an opera ballet colleague) for Gagosian Premieres – a series of filmed collaborations between visual artists and artists from other disciplines. The film, which will be released online on March 23, plays in a series of giant Anselm Kiefer paintings now on view in the Le Bourget grounds of the gallery in Paris.

Kiefer, who was present during the filming, described the relationship between the dancers and the arts as “a happy and wonderful interface”. In a video interview, he said, “It was as if the dancers came out of the paintings and wrote fleeting lines in the air,” adding that the images “are fleeting too; They are never finished, nor in action, and the dancers make it so clear. “

Marchand spoke about the Gagosian Project, the Paris Opera’s latest report on diversity and the ambition to dance in New York. Here are edited excerpts from that conversation.

What attracted you to the Gagosian piece?

I’ve always wanted to work with other artists and bring other artistic disciplines into play. Hannah and I asked Florent Melac, a friend of ours in the Corps de Ballet, how we liked his choreography. He chose the music, Steve Reich’s “Duet”. I like the way it repeats and brings together Kiefer’s work that uses recycled and repetitive materials. We were lucky enough to meet Anselm Kiefer and I was very touched and moved by the paintings.

Are there any other projects or ambitions you would like to pursue?

I’ve always wanted to explore another house, dance with other companies. I would love to come to New York and perform with the New York City Ballet or the American Ballet Theater. I’m very interested in the American style of ballet, how fast and efficient it is, how well people move. But we cannot even cross the borders in Europe at the moment. Maybe one day!

Benjamin Millepied encouraged and promoted you during his tenure. After he left, Aurélie Dupont came in and there seemed to be a lot of dissatisfaction in the company. How did you feel back then?

When Benjamin arrived it was a breath of fresh air. What was crazy was that these rules, which hadn’t moved in years, suddenly changed. We could dream of having roles even if we weren’t of the “right” age or rank. He paid me so much attention; As an artist, I would have done anything for him. I switched from understudy to soloist in the two years he was there, and when Aurélie arrived I was concerned.

Why? And how is your relationship now

Ballet is a matter of taste; It is not because one director liked you that the next will. But Aurélie made me an étoile six months later, which changed my life.

She has ideas for a long term career, and that can be frustrating when you have specific roles to dance to. Sometimes she’ll think it’s too early. But she has the experience of a long career; At the Paris Opera you have to be a long-term solo dancer because you usually stay there until you retire at 42.

An internal survey in 2018 that was released to the press revealed a high level of dissatisfaction with the company. In your book you speak about it very neutrally. Did you identify yourself with some of the issues you encountered?

I was shocked and sad when the internal survey came out. Aurélie hadn’t been there long and it was unfair to burden her with long-term issues like harassment or bullying. The survey should have helped the institution grow and improve, but it had the opposite effect.

What do you think of the opera’s latest commission of inquiry into racism and its conclusions?

The report indicated that changes must be made from the start. that we need to send the message, you are black, asian, mixed race, whatever and you should come to the paris opera ballet school if you have the ability. This message has not yet been delivered, but the report means they will be working on it. The company must look like French society, and in a few years it will be.

In your book you vividly describe the training of the Paris Opera Ballet School – the ranking, the competitiveness, the desperate desire to join the company. Are you critical of the system at all?

Being a good ballet dancer isn’t about being good in the studio. It’s about being able to do your best at the right moment in the performance. The system is violent, but it helps you understand this very early on. Of course, it is very stressful to face competitions and exams at a very young age. But it gives you the guns for the moment you need them.

Once in the company, is the annual advertising contest a continuation of that idea?

When you join the company, annual competition plays an important role because for the first year or so you don’t dance at all, you’ll be in luck if you ever get on stage. The competition gives you a specific goal and reason to work and improve every day. There is some luck and chance; Two minutes on stage determine your fate for the next year. But here, too, it’s about doing your best at the right moment.

And I believe that ultimately people get where they need to. Ballet is about talent, a lot of work, the right body type – but also about dying to appear on stage. This is my best talent: I love ballet so much that I could die for it.

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Entertainment

‘Un Movie Dramatique’ Overview: College students Report the Paris Suburbs

‘Un Film Dramatique’ Review: Students Record the Paris Suburbs

In the documentary “Un Film Dramatique”, the artist Éric Baudelaire fulfills the task of creating a special work of art for Dora Maar, a newly built secondary school in the Paris suburb of Saint-Denis. For the project, Baudelaire filmed 21 students over four years and encouraged them to take the camera themselves. The finished film shows the liveliness and generosity that can emerge from bourgeois art.

The film passes in informal episodes. The filmmakers organized games and debates, and encouraged their classmates to discuss what they think the film will be about. Students consider what it means to be the subject and creator of a documentary and, in turn, calculate how their school fits into the world around them.

These youths are workers, often the children of immigrants, and they mock the bad reputation Saint-Denis has in Paris. With cameras in hand, they make their own record of what life is like in the suburbs. They dance, they sing, they offer house tours. Every child is confident, curious and cooperative.

The film has a patchwork quality that results from getting in and out from the perspective of different people. Some scenes are exciting when the Franco-Romanian student Gabriel-David debates through his Franco-Ivorian classmate Guy-Yanis what it means to have a country of origin if you have never lived there. But just as many sequences are banal – children film themselves watching TV as if they were streaming live on Instagram.

It is the cumulative effect of seeing the world through the eyes of these children that makes this film so profoundly joyful. This is an encouraging project, a philosophical excavation of a school marked by playful optimism.

A dramatic film
Not rated. In French with subtitles. Running time: Running time: 1 hour 54 minutes. Watch virtual cinemas.

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World News

U.S. formally rejoins the Paris local weather accord.

U.S. formally rejoins the Paris climate accord.

The United States officially joined the Paris Agreement on Friday, the international treaty to avert catastrophic global warming.

President Biden said tackling the climate crisis was one of his top priorities and he signed an executive order re-committing the United States to the deal just hours after he took office last month.

“We can no longer delay the fight against climate change or do what is absolutely necessary,” said Biden on Friday. “This is a global existential crisis. And we will all face the consequences if we fail. “

It was a sharp rejection of the Trump administration, which had pulled the country out of the pact and appeared to be eager to undercut regulations to protect the environment.

“The Paris Agreement is an unprecedented framework for global action,” Foreign Minister Antony J. Blinken said in a statement on Friday. “We know because we helped design it and make it a reality.”

With around 189 countries joining the pact in 2016, it had broad international support, and Mr Biden’s move to rejoin the effort was welcomed by foreign leaders.

“Welcome back to the Paris Agreement!” Emmanuel Macron, the President of France, said in a Twitter message at the time.

The galvanizing idea of ​​the Paris Climate Agreement is that only global solidarity and collective action can prevent the ravages of climate change: hotter temperatures, rising sea levels, stronger storms or droughts that lead to food shortages.

President Biden has announced a plan to spend $ 2 trillion over four years to increase the use of clean energy in transportation, electricity and buildings while rapidly moving away from coal, oil and gas. His goal is to eliminate fossil fuel emissions from power generation by 2035 and has vowed to put the entire U.S. economy on the right track to become carbon neutral by mid-century.

Former President Trump announced in 2017 that the United States would withdraw from the Paris Agreement, but the withdrawal could not be made official until November 4th last year.

The United States was officially excluded from the agreement for 107 days.

On Friday, Blinken said the fight against climate change would once again be at the center of the US domestic and foreign policy priorities.

“Climate change and science diplomacy can never again be” add-ons “in our foreign policy discussions,” said Blinken.

But he added: “As significant as our accession to the agreement in 2016 was – and as significant as our re-entry is today – what we do in the weeks, months and years to come is even more important.”

Since the industrial age began, the United States has emitted more greenhouse gases than any other country. The way the United States uses its money and power has both a symbolic and a real impact on whether the world’s 7.6 billion people, and the poorest in particular, will be able to avert climate disasters.

There are two immediate signals to watch out for. First, how ambitious will the Biden government be with its emissions reduction targets? Stakeholders are under pressure to cut emissions by 50 percent by 2030 compared to 2005.

Second, how much money will the United States spend to help poor countries adapt to global warming disasters and turn their economies away from fossil fuels?

The answers to both questions are expected in the next few weeks, just in time for the virtual climate summit on April 22nd, which President Biden has announced.

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Entertainment

Paris Opera to Act on Racist Stereotypes in Ballet

Paris Opera to Act on Racist Stereotypes in Ballet

The announcements may seem straightforward, but the conversation about the Paris Opera and diversity has already caused a stir in France this year.

In December, an article in Le Monde magazine, the daily newspaper, caused a stir when it suggested Neef was considering banning problematic works. At one point the article discussed the “aesthetic choices” of Rudolf Nureyev, the star Russian ballet dancer who directed the Paris Opera Ballet for much of the 1980s. Some of its productions, which the company still performs, originally featured dancers in black and yellow, and although they are no longer presented that way, some sequences, like the “Chinese Dance” in its “Nutcracker,” still seem to viewers to be regarded as insensitive.

“Some works will undoubtedly disappear from the repertoire,” Neef was quoted as saying.

This comment, which Neef later said was taken out of context, was picked up by Marine Le Pen, leader of the far-right National Rally Party, who wrote on Twitter that it was an example of “insane anti-racism.” It also sparked a debate in the media and online about whether the focus on diversity was a sign of creeping Americanization.

Neef said he wasn’t concerned about a similar reaction to the new report. “We are not here to promote a climate of censorship or dictatorial leadership,” he said. “The whole point of this initiative is that we want to perform opera and ballet by artists of the 21st century for the audience of the 21st century.”

It was clear, however, that the excitement had an impact on how the report was drafted. “I expect protest from the far-right and the most conservative politicians and intellectuals, and say it is once again about the Americanization of French culture,” said Ndiaye. He wrote it carefully to ward off these reactions, he added.

The Paris Opera isn’t the only ballet company in Europe involved in racial debates. Last year Chloé Lopes Gomes, the only black dancer at the Berlin State Ballet, made global headlines when she complained about racism in the company. In 2019, Misty Copeland, an African-American director at the American Ballet Theater, complained about the use of blackface at the Bolshoi in Moscow, although many in Russia defended its use, arguing that it wasn’t racist because it was the way it was classic Ballets have always been performed in the country.

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Entertainment

Paris Hilton Has a Podcast, With a Twist

Paris Hilton Has a Podcast, With a Twist

Podcasting is a major draw for potential media distraughters and visionaries. In the medium that is still developing, they see moist clay that can be formed into an ideal vessel for long-form narrative journalism or fiction or game shows or musicals or memoirs.

Add Paris Hilton to their ranks. Hilton, master of an earlier era of mass communication in the early years of the tabloid, is stepping into a form with a new company, her own show, and an unusual spin that seeks to create an audio that matches social media.

“This Is Paris” will debut on February 22nd, in partnership with iHeartMedia, the radio giant that has grown to become one of the largest podcast distributors, with more than 750 shows that collect more than 250 million downloads per month. The new show is aimed at Hilton’s 40 million+ followers on social media platforms and features a mix of personal content and conversations with their family, friends and other celebrities. It will be the flagship of a planned list of seven shows produced by Hilton’s London Audio and iHeartPodcast Network. The other programs with different hosts will be released over the next three years.

“I’ve always been an innovator and a trailblazer when it comes to reality TV, social media and DJing, and now I really believe that language and audio are the next frontier,” she said in an interview.

A key feature of their podcast will be their use of a format that Hilton calls “podposts”: short (between one and three minutes), slimmed-down shows designed to mimic the cadence and tone of social media posts. The “This Is Paris” podcast feed will feature longer (around 45 minutes), more traditional episodes each week, with intermittent podposts filling the void several times a week.

“I really think it’s like another form of social media,” said Hilton. “I do so many things – as a DJ, businesswoman, designer, and writer – that I can talk about them a lot.”

Pre-planned categories of podposts are inspired by Hilton’s famous buzzwords, including “That’s Hot” for product recommendations, “Loves It” for cultural recommendations, and “This Is my Hotline,” in which Hilton responds to voicemail messages sent by listeners. Conal Byrne, president of the iHeartPodcast network, said the company is currently looking to partner with brands for sponsorship at various levels.

“Her ability to recommend products she believes in to her fans is almost unrivaled,” said Byrne.

Since the end of “The Simple Life,” her reality television series starring Nicole Richie, in 2007, Hilton, who turns 40 this month, has branched into a variety of industries through her company Paris Hilton Entertainment. The assets include 45 retail stores and 19 product lines in various categories such as fragrance, fashion and accessories. Prior to the coronavirus pandemic, Hilton was a sought-after DJ around the world, paying her $ 1 million per gig.

With this new deal, iHeartMedia will fully fund the list of shows produced in association with London Audio on a multi-million dollar budget. The two companies will be joint partners at every trade fair and will share all sources of income. After “This Is Paris,” the rest of the list is said to be focused on topics such as beauty, wellness, dating, philanthropy and technology, with Hilton and Bruce Gersh, President of London Audio serving as executive producers.

“This is a medium that has so many dimensions and it really allows you to connect with an audience in unique ways,” said Gersh. “Paris wanted to step in with all of its heart.”

Hilton, who named “Bill Gates and Rashida Jones Ask Big Questions,” and Kate and Oliver Hudson’s “Sibling Revelry” as their favorite shows, immersed themselves in the medium during the pandemic at home in Los Angeles.

“I usually travel 250 days a year and work all the time,” she said. “During the whole year in quarantine, I had more free time than ever before in my career. I’ve listened to a lot of podcasts and I was really interested in them. When I cook or work or do my art, I always have it in the background. “

Podcasts have become a preferred medium for celebrities looking to delve deeper into fans than a typical post on Instagram or Twitter, while avoiding the control and vulnerability associated with speaking to the press. Name recognition is a huge perk on the platform – shows from celebrity podcasters like Dax Shepard, Jason Bateman, Anna Faris and Bill Burr regularly appear in the top 50 Apple Podcasts charts. (In addition to the Hilton deal, iHeartMedia has partnered with Will Ferrell and Shonda Rhimes to watch shows.) And podcast audiences tend to be relatively friendly: there are no comment areas highlighting uncomfortable behavior and podcasts The Nature requires a level of active engagement that will deter passing critics.

“I think once people understand that this is a platform where they can interact directly with their fans without any sort of middle person, it will be a very attractive proposition,” said Tom Webster, senior vice president from Edison Research, a media research company.

Webster added that Hilton’s podposts concept reminded him of the proto-podcast field of audio blogging, where writers published short audio diaries for sites like The Quiet American and The Greasy Skillet. “It enables them to engage with their personal interests in ways that they cannot achieve in their day-to-day work,” he said.

“This Is Paris” takes its name from Hilton’s YouTube documentary that was released last fall. In this film, which has nearly 20 million views, she distances herself from the carefree, ditsy person she has been identified with since she appeared in the glitz of paparazzi onions two decades ago. Hilton also says she was molested by administrators of a private boarding school she attended as a teenager, an experience that leaves her traumatized.

The podcast is supposed to follow in the same open direction. Hilton records it in a home studio (built for her music projects) and uses her much discussed natural voice (which to my ear is deeper than her girly trill, but no dramatic departure).

“She speaks in a way that is very relaxed and approachable, unlike someone doing a performance,” said Byrne. “Right away she felt like a one-on-one conversation and not a one-to-many media object.”

It was initially uncomfortable for Hilton to include the pilot for the show – unlike on social media, there were no glamorous photos or videos to hide behind. “It’s all about the knowledge you bring and what you say with your voice,” she said.

But soon she fell into a groove. After being the subject of interviews for a lifetime, she has enjoyed turning the tables when asking questions. Compared to their old jobs, the commute isn’t bad either.

“I love being a homebody,” she said, thinking about her new chapter. “I’ve worked so incredibly hard to build my empire – now I can finally enjoy it.”

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U.S. rejoins Paris local weather settlement

U.S. rejoins Paris climate agreement

President Joe Biden signs Executive Orders in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington upon his inauguration as the 46th President of the United States on January 20, 2021.

Tom Brenner | Reuters

President Joe Biden signed an executive order on Wednesday to reintroduce the US to the Paris Agreement. This is his first major global warming move as it brings in the largest team of climate change experts to ever come to the White House.

The Biden administration also plans to revoke approval for the construction of the Keystone XL pipeline from Canada to the United States and to sign additional contracts in the coming days to reverse several measures taken by former President Donald Trump to weaken the environment.

Biden pledges to act swiftly on climate change, and his inclusion of scientists across the government marks the beginning of a major political reversal after four years of the Trump administration weakening climate rules in favor of fossil fuel producers.

Almost every country in the world is part of the Paris Agreement, the non-binding agreement between nations to reduce their CO2 emissions. Trump withdrew the US from the deal in 2017.

Mitchell Bernard, President of the Defense Council for Natural Resources, said Biden’s order to re-join the deal makes the US part of the global solution to climate change rather than part of the problem.

“This is a quick and determined action,” Bernard said in a statement. “It creates the conditions for comprehensive measures to deal with the climate crisis, as long as there is still time to act.”

With a slim Democratic majority in the Senate, Biden could potentially achieve large chunks of his ambitious climate change agenda, including a $ 2 trillion economic plan to drive a clean energy transition, cut electricity sector carbon emissions by 2035, and achieve net zero emissions by 2050.

During his first few months in office, Biden is expected to sign a wave of executive orders to combat climate change, including preserving 30% of American land and waters by 2030, protecting the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge from drilling, and restoring and enhancing the role of science in government decisions.

Some legal actions related to the climate will take longer, including the government’s plan to undo a number of Trump environmental setbacks related to clean air and water rules and emissions to warm the planet. The Trump administration reversed more than 100 environmental regulations in four years, according to research by Columbia Law School.

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“From Paris to Keystone to protecting gray wolves, these great first steps by President Biden show that he is serious about stopping the climate and extinction crises,” said Kieran Suckling, executive director of the Center for Biodiversity, in a statement. “These strong steps must be the start of a furious race to avert disaster.”

The next major UN climate summit will take place in Glasgow, Scotland, in November. The countries in the agreement will set updated emissions targets for the next decade.

The aim of the agreement is to keep the global temperature increase well below 2 degrees Celsius or 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit compared to pre-industrial values. The earth will warm by 1.5 ° C in the next two decades.

Robert Schuwerk, executive director for North America at Carbon Tracker, said the resumption of the deal signals to global markets that the US will give priority to tackling climate change, but added that this is only part of what the government is doing must to reduce their emissions.

The USA is the second largest greenhouse gas emitter in the world after China. It is expected that an updated climate target and a concrete plan for reducing emissions from the electricity and energy sectors will be available.

“Re-entry is just a table,” said John Morton, President Barack Obama’s director of energy and climate on the National Security Council. “The hard work to get the country on track to net zero emissions by the middle of the century begins now.”