Tag: Paul

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Entertainment

Paul W.S. Anderson and Milla Jovovich: A Marriage Constructed on Monsters

Paul W.S. Anderson and Milla Jovovich: A Marriage Built on Monsters

Filmmaker Paul WS Anderson has directed Milla Jovovich in no fewer than four films in the apocalyptic Resident Evil franchise and has written two more in which she starred. He also directed Monster Hunter (2020) and a 2011 version of The Three Musketeers.

But what sounds like a series of genre nightmares is actually a dream arrangement: Anderson and Jovovich are married and have three children. A shared love of visual storytelling — often in the form of Jovovich’s slaying of monsters in Anderson’s post-industrial wasteland — has fueled them throughout a roughly 20-year collaboration that began with Resident Evil (2002), a video game adaptation they both had played. (A separate Resident Evil series is now available on Netflix.)

On a recent video call, I spoke to the happy couple about their partnership: Jovovich, 46, from Los Angeles, who recently completed Breathe, a dystopian thriller; Anderson, 57, from Kraków, Poland, where he is in pre-production on her next project, In the Lost Lands, based on a short story by George RR Martin. The family business continues with their daughter Ever Anderson appearing as Wendy in David Lowery’s upcoming Peter Pan & Wendy. This interview has been abridged and edited.

How did you meet each other?

PAUL WS ANDERSON We went to Pinewood Studios [outside London] to start production on Event Horizon and they ripped off these really cool looking sets for The Fifth Element. [starring Jovovich] that had just finished shooting. Our paths almost crossed there. And then we were at a premiere together, apart.

JOVOVICH MILE A premiere?

ANDERSON Yes! A Drew Barrymore film. “Unkissed.”

JOVOVICH I can’t imagine you watching a rom-com like this! This is hilarious.

ANDERSON It obviously attracted me for another reason, because you were there. Then I officially met Milla for the first time in 2000, just before we made Resident Evil. She was sitting on the steps in front of my office. I thought she was the coolest woman in the world. And I had just seen this really cool truck parked on the street outside – and it was her truck.

What was it like making notes on your first film together?

JOVOVICH Oh my god it was a disaster. I had read for a specific version of the film and I got the new rewrite the night before I had to go to Berlin [to shoot]. Paul pretty much wrote me out of the movie. I was the damsel in distress who kept saving Michelle Rodriguez—the “Look out! Behind you!” Girl. So when I got to the hotel, Paul’s very sweet producing partner was there with flowers, and I took the flowers and said, “I want to see Paul in my room within an hour. There are no script readings in the mornings!” Then I quickly got changed, put on my makeup, put on a really low-cut top and got together for some script editing. [Laughs] He said, “What’s the problem?” I said, “Okay, let’s get started: Page 1!”

Do you even work together now to write the stories?

JOVOVICH Paul is the writer, I’m just asking questions and trying to understand where my character fits. He does the heavy lifting and I come in and occasionally bring a kink to the work.

ANDERSON But it’s a hugely important part of the process, and Milla is really good at the script. I remember “Resident Evil: Afterlife” [2010], I had written the screenplay and Milla said: “There’s just something missing. It needs a characteristic action scene where I’m doing something, some kind of dogfight. And I had a dream last night: I jumped down an elevator shaft.” And I was like, oh my god, that’s a great idea. I went away and wrote a big rewrite. And Resident Evil: Afterlife starts off with this needle diving sequence, where it’s set in this underground skyscraper. She was right!

What do you think are each other’s strengths when it comes to filming action?

JOVOVICH Paul is the Action Master. It made a lot of sense when I found out he was the jailer [as a kid] because it takes that imagination to guide five nerds playing Dungeons & Dragons for 18 hours. And he still does it with our kids. It is so much fun. I’ve always been fascinated by the way Paul’s mind works because you’re the nicest guy but you have these horrific, disgusting visions and fantasies in your head.

ANDERSON Monsters from the ID!

JOVOVICH Who knows what would have happened if you couldn’t take it out in your films? You would have this conversation from prison.

Milla, your mother was an actress. Was that an influence for you?

JOVOVICH My mother was a movie star in the former Soviet Union. We defected to America in 1981 or so, my parents literally started from scratch. My mother tried to teach me what she knew to help us settle into a new country. So acting wasn’t really a choice for me. It was more of a necessity. I feel like maybe part of the reason I’m having such a hard time seeing myself on screen is because I never really believed in myself that I could be as good as her. But I don’t blame my mother; now i’m really thankful for that, because with my own daughter [Ever Anderson]I feel like I really nurtured her talent.

Paul, were there any filmmakers that inspired you?

ANDERSON The Scott brothers were a huge inspiration as Ridley and Tony were also from the north of England. It used to be shipbuilding and coal mining, and when I was a kid it was all industrial decay and unemployment.

Is industrial decay a key to all the post-apocalyptic landscapes in these movies?

JOVOVICH Paul is the king of industrial decay. My mother always complains. [Russian accent] “Why don’t you put an evening dress on her and do beautiful, glamorous hair. Always dirty. Always dirty. Always blood. Always terrible places. Disgusting.” [Anderson laughs]

ANDERSON I remember walking into the makeup trailer of Resident Evil: Extinction in the desert in Mexico [on a visit to the set of the 2007 film directed by Russell Mulcahy]. Milla is in there and the makeup artist has put on so much dirt. I think that’s enough dirt! And you could see that Milla was a little upset. A minute later I see her outside, chasing a truck around because it’s kicking up so much dust. And she’s just trying to get extra dirty!

JOVOVICH I’m telling you, nothing suits me better than blood and dust.

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Politics

Lawmaker to Name for Renewed Push to Free Paul Whelan, U.S. Marine Jailed in Russia

Lawmaker to Call for Renewed Push to Free Paul Whelan, U.S. Marine Jailed in Russia

Paul N. Whelan, the former US Marine who was sentenced to 16 years in prison in Russia on espionage charges, has been unable to contact his family or the US embassy since July 4, and relatives and members of Congress are increasingly concerned about his welfare. His.

“No one has heard from him,” said Haley Stevens, a Michigan Democrat who represents Mr. Whelan, in an interview. “We haven’t heard from him or really been able to speak to him since the beginning of July.”

Ms. Stevens and the family members of Mr. Whelan and Trevor Reed, another former Marine who has been sentenced to prison terms in Russia, will hold a press conference to discuss detention conditions and press for new Congressional resolutions calling for their release.

Speaking to the Capitol on Thursday, Ms. Stevens said Mr. Whelan had to work in a prison clothing factory six days a week, injuring his arm and being held by Russia for 944 days.

“That’s 944 days he’s been away from his friends and family,” Ms. Stevens said at the press conference. “It’s 944 days too long.”

In early June, Mr Whelan interviewed CNN, after which the Russian authorities restricted his access to cell phones, although he was still allowed to call his family. President Biden raised the cases of Mr Whelan, 51, and Mr Reed, 30, during his June summit with Russian President Vladimir V. Putin.

Mr. Whelan called his parents in early July and then a second on July 4th.

“At that time he said, ‘If you don’t hear from me tomorrow, there will be trouble,'” said Elizabeth Whelan, his sister, in an interview.

Since then, neither the US embassy in Moscow nor Mr. Whelan’s parents have been able to contact him, Ms. Whelan said.

Joey Reed, Mr Reed’s father, said Thursday that his son had Covid and that he hadn’t heard from him in more than two weeks. “We are very concerned about his health,” he said. “Both of our families are concerned that Paul and Trevor might die in a Russian prison because of the poor conditions and lack of medical care.”

Evidence against Mr Whelan is thin, and nothing Russian prosecutors have produced has convinced American officials that he was spying on Russia.

Mr Whelan was arrested in late 2018 and, following his conviction last year, was detained in the IK-17 labor camp in Mordovia, about eight hours from Moscow.

Ms. Whelan said she believed her brother was returned to camp after being taken to hospital for treatment for an arm injury. But Mrs. Stevens said it was not clear where the Russians were holding him now. She also said that he was in solitary confinement.

Ms. Stevens, the Congresswoman, said, “The reality is that there has been no contact with him. This reaches another crucial moment. ”

Congress passed a resolution on Mr Whelan in 2019, but new action is in order, Ms Stevens said. She added that a vote would hardly force Mr Whelan’s release, but would demonstrate bipartisan opposition to Moscow’s tactics and “get under the skin of Russia.”

Rep. August Pfluger, the Texas Republican who represents the district Mr. Reed is from, urged Mr. Biden to step up pressure on Russia.

“We won’t compromise until we get Trevor and Paul home,” he said. “We will not tolerate American citizens being illegally detained by the Putin regime.”

Ms. Stevens said Moscow was trying to use Mr. Whelan and Mr. Reed to its own advantage.

“Americans absolutely cannot be used as political pawns for other countries, period, end of story, unacceptable,” she said. “These are the Russians who engage in the dark arts of political interference. I think this is part of an attempt to play with the inner psychology of our political structure. “

Categories
Health

Dr. Paul Auerbach, Father of Wilderness Drugs, Dies at 70

Dr. Paul Auerbach, Father of Wilderness Medicine, Dies at 70

Dr. Auerbach said it was imperative never to get too comfortable when dealing with the whims of nature. “You have to be afraid when you go into work,” he said. “You have to stay humble.”

Paul Stuart Auerbach was born on Jan. 4, 1951, in Plainfield, N.J. His father, Victor, was a patents manager for Union Carbide. His mother, Leona (Fishkin) Auerbach, was a teacher. Paul was on his high school wrestling team and grew up spending summers on the Jersey Shore.

He graduated from Duke in 1973 with a bachelor’s degree in religion and then enrolled in Duke’s medical school. He met Sherry Steindorf at U.C.L.A., and they were married in 1982. (In the 1980s he worked part-time as a sportswear model.) Dr. Auerbach studied at Stanford’s business school shortly before joining the university’s medical faculty in 1991.

In addition to his wife, he is survived by two sons, Brian and Daniel; a daughter, Lauren Auerbach Dixon; his mother; a brother, Burt; and a sister, Jan Sherman.

As he grew older, Dr. Auerbach became increasingly devoted to expanding the field of wilderness medicine to account for the uncertainties of a new world. In revising his textbook, he added sections about handling environmental disasters, and, with Jay Lemery, he wrote “Enviromedics: The Impact of Climate Change on Human Health,” published in 2017.

Last year, shortly before he received his cancer diagnosis, the coronavirus pandemic began to take hold, and Dr. Auerbach decided to act.

“The minute it all first happened, he started working on disaster response,” his wife said. “Hospitals were running out of PPE. He was calling this person and that person to learn as much as he could. He wanted to find out how to design better masks and better ventilators. He never stopped.”

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Entertainment

Paul Huntley, Hair Grasp of Broadway and Hollywood, Is Lifeless at 88

Paul Huntley, Hair Master of Broadway and Hollywood, Is Dead at 88

For the show “Diana” – a version shot without an audience during the pandemic and due to premiere on Netflix on October 1st – he created four wigs for actress Jeanna de Waal to portray the style of the Princess of Wales has changed over time, from lousy naivete to windswept sophistication.

Paul Huntley was born on July 2, 1933 in Greater London, one of five children of a military man and a housewife. From an early age he was fascinated by his mother’s film magazines. After school, he tried to find an apprenticeship in the film industry, but the flooded job market after World War II did not offer a place for him, so he enrolled at an acting school in London.

He eventually helped design hair for school productions and in the 1950s, after two years of military service, became an apprentice at Wig Creations, a major London theater company. He became the main designer and worked with Vivien Leigh, Marlene Dietrich and Laurence Olivier.

Mr. Huntley helped construct the signature braids that Elizabeth Taylor wore in the 1963 film “Cleopatra”. Ms. Taylor introduced him to director Mike Nichols, who a decade later hired Mr. Huntley to do hair for his Broadway production of “Uncle Vanya” in Circle in the Square. He eventually became a designer for plays and musicals, including “The Real Thing”, “The Heidi Chronicles” and “Crazy for You”.

Join The Times theater reporter Michael Paulson in conversation with Lin-Manuel Miranda, see a performance of Shakespeare in the Park, and more as we explore the signs of hope in a transformed city. For a year now, the “Offstage” series has accompanied the theater through a shutdown. Now let’s look at his recovery.

Mr. Huntley returned to a show on a regular basis to make sure standards were being met. He referred to himself as “the hair police”.

Tony Awards are not given for hair design, but Mr. Huntley was given a special Tony in 2003.

“Everyone says, ‘I want Paul Huntley,'” Broadway producer Emanuel Azenberg once told the Times. “He does the hair organically for the show. It’s not about him. “

Mr. Huntley saw hair not just as a decorative element, but as an expression of an era or a change in society and an integral part of character development. For “Thoroughly Modern Millie” he tried to remember New York City in 1922, his pony, his spit curls and finger waves were marked by a feeling of liberation after the First World War.

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Entertainment

Donald York, Musical Director of Paul Taylor Firm, Dies at 73

Donald York, Musical Director of Paul Taylor Company, Dies at 73

In her review for The Times, Anna Kisselgoff described the score as “contains panting sounds, pop songs and the occasional mean beating of a drumstick that breaks through the classical structures and struggles to stay intact at the bottom of the pit”.

Once, Mr. York waved his baton and conducted an absolutely silent orchestra.

Donald Griffith York was born on June 19, 1947 in Watertown, NY. His mother Magdalene (Murphy) York was an organist and choir director; his father, Orel York, was a history teacher who later worked as an instructor for the FBI

Donald grew up in Delmar, a suburb of Albany. He had perfect hearing and was already composing piano music at the age of 7. As a teenager, he attended a summer program at the Juilliard School in Manhattan. In 1969 he earned a bachelor’s degree in composition from Juilliard.

Recognition…York family

After graduating, he played in several contemporary bands, including a synthesizer group called The First Moog Quartet, and for the pop duo Hall and Oates, before joining Paul Taylor in the mid-1970s. He has also conducted for the New York City Ballet and Broadway musicals, including “Clams on the Half Shell Revue”, Bette Midler’s mockery of Broadway show tunes. And he composed choral works and song poems.

In the early 1990s, Mr. York moved to Southern California. He is survived by his companion Debbie Prutsman, a performer and educator; his wife Anne York, a graphic artist he was separated from; three stepchildren, Nick, Tasha, and Andrew Bogdanski; and a brother, Richard. In 1985 he divorced his first wife.

Mr. York was a nocturnal composer. It was his habit to go to bed at 7 p.m., wake up between 1 and 2 a.m., make a pot of coffee, and go to work. He called these hours his “crazy time,” Ms. Prutsman said, adding that he would normally be ready by dawn.

Mr. York retired on November 17, 2019 and bowed at the final performance of the Paul Taylor Company season at Lincoln Center. His last concert composition for the American Brass Quintet will be performed in July at the Aspen Music Festival and School, where he studied as a teenager. On his death, Mr. York wrote an operatic musical about a child prodigy named “Gifted”.

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Health

Paul J. Hanly Jr., Prime Litigator in Opioid Instances, Dies at 70

Paul J. Hanly Jr., Top Litigator in Opioid Cases, Dies at 70

Paul J. Hanly Jr., a top litigation attorney who has been the focus of the current statewide litigation against drug companies and others in the supply chain for his role in the deadly opioid epidemic, died Saturday at his Miami Beach home. He was 70 years old.

The cause was anaplastic thyroid cancer, an extremely rare and aggressive disease, said Jayne Conroy, his longtime legal partner.

During his four decades-long career, Mr. Hanly, a class plaintiff attorney, has tried and administered numerous complex legal cases, including terrorist funding for the 9/11 2001 attacks and allegations of the sexual abuse of dozens of boys by a man, who ran an orphanage and school in Haiti.

But nothing compares to the national opioid cases pending in federal court in Cleveland on behalf of thousands of communities and tribes against manufacturers and distributors of prescription opioid pain relievers. The federal opioid litigation is considered by many to be perhaps the most complex in American legal history – even more intricate and far-reaching than the epic tobacco industry litigation.

The defendants – including everyone in the opioid manufacturing, distribution and dispensing chain – are charged with aggressively marketing pain relievers while downplaying the risk of addiction and overdose. Their actions, Hanly said, contributed to the opioid epidemic that has raged across the country for two decades, killing hundreds of thousands of people who have started abusing pain relievers like OxyContin and switched to street drugs like heroin and fentanyl.

“This was probably the most complicated set of lawsuits ever to come to court in my tenure,” said Ohio District Judge Dan A. Polster, who oversees the sprawling case, in a telephone interview on Saturday. “I was fortunate to have the best lawyers in the country on all sides, and Paul was one of them.”

“He was an excellent lawyer, an accomplished professional,” added the judge. “He fought hard. He fought fair. And that’s exactly what you want from a lawyer, from a lawyer. “He said that Mr. Hanly was leading” in helping organize and hold the plaintiffs’ side together “.

Mr. Hanly of Simmons Hanly Conroy in New York played a leading role in the litigation as one of three plaintiffs’ attorneys appointed by Judge Polster to handle important aspects of the cases, including negotiations. The others were Joe Rice of Motley Rice, South Carolina and Paul T. Farrell Jr. of Farrell Law, West Virginia.

At the same time, there are several cases of opioid occurring at the state level. Mr. Hanly had also prepared for a lawsuit against manufacturers and dealers due to go on trial next month in Suffolk County, NY

He had long been at the forefront of efforts to hold drug companies accountable. He filed one of the first major lawsuits against Purdue Pharma in 2003 for warning no more than 5,000 patients about the addictive properties of OxyContin. His clients eventually settled for $ 75 million in Purdue. It was one of the few cases where a drug company agreed to pay individual patients who accused them of gently pedaling the risk of addiction.

Mr. Hanly had taken up complex cases with a large number of plaintiffs in the past. Shortly after the 2001 terrorist attacks, he represented some of the families who had lost loved ones on the planes and in the World Trade Center. He also filed a lawsuit to stop the sale of tanzanite, a rough stone used as a cash alternative to fund terrorist activities. This lawsuit was extended to foreign governments, banks, and others who supported al-Qaeda. Parts of it are still pending.

Another major case was a landmark US $ 12 million settlement in 2013 on behalf of 24 Haitian boys who said they were sexually abused by Douglas Perlitz, who ran programs for underprivileged boys, and was subsequently sentenced to 19 years in prison . Mr Hanly said the defendants, including the Society of Jesus of New England, Fairfield University and others, did not properly supervise Mr Perliitz. Mr. Hanly filed additional charges in 2015, bringing the total number of juveniles abused to over 100 between the late 1990s and 2010.

“Paul was an attorney’s attorney,” said Ms. Conroy, his legal partner. She said he was known for his extensive preparation for the process, his creative strategies for the process, and his almost photographic memory of the contents of documents.

He was also known for moving away from the muted grays and blacks of most lawyers to brisk dresses in bright yellows, blues, and pinks. He preferred bespoke styles that were eye-catching yet sophisticated. His two-tone shoes were all handmade.

In a recently published book on the opioid industry, Empire of Pain, Patrick Radden Keefe described Mr. Hanly as “like a lawyer in a Dick Tracy cartoon” with his bold colors and tailored shirts with stiff, contrasting collars. But none of this, Mr. Keefe made clear, diminished his competitive advantage.

“Paul was a man of few words and a tremendous presence,” said David Nachman, who recently retired from the New York attorney general where he was the state’s chief counsel for the state’s opioid case and worked with Mr. Hanly on it to bring case to court in Suffolk County.

“When he walked into a room everyone noticed,” Nachman said via email. “When he spoke, everyone listened and when he smiled, you knew everything would be fine.”

Paul James Hanly Jr. was born on April 18, 1951 in Jersey City, New Jersey. His father held a variety of government posts including assistant director of Hudson County Penitentiary and hospital administrator. His mother, Catherine (Kenny) Hanly, was a housewife.

His family was notorious in New Jersey; Some members had been charged with corruption and spent time in prison. These included his maternal grandfather, John V. Kenny, a former Jersey City mayor and a powerful Democratic chief of Hudson County known as the “Pope of Jersey City” who was jailed in the 1970s after pleading guilty of tax evasion would have.

Mr. Hanly went a different way. He went to Cornell, where his roommate was Ed Marinaro, who later played professional football and later became an actor (best known for “Hill Street Blues”). Mr. Hanly, who played soccer with him, graduated with a major in philosophy in 1972 and received a sports scientist award as Cornell Varsity Football Senior, which combined the highest academic average with outstanding ability.

He earned a Masters in Philosophy from Cambridge University in 1976 and a law degree from Georgetown in 1979. He then worked as a clerk for Lawrence A. Whipple, a judge at the US District Court in New Jersey.

Mr. Hanly’s marriage to Joyce Roquemore in the mid-1980s ended in divorce. He is survived by two sons, Paul J. Hanly III and Burton J. Hanly; one daughter, Edith D. Hanly; a brother, John K. Hanly; and a sister, Margo Mullady.

He began his legal career as a national litigation and settlement advisor with Turner & Newall, a UK asbestos company, one of the world’s largest in its product liability cases. The company was bought by an American company, Federal-Mogul, in 1998. After that, it was overwhelmed with asbestos claims and filed for bankruptcy in 2001.

Mr. Hanly and Ms. Conroy spent much of their time negotiating with the plaintiffs’ attorneys. They soon switched to representing the plaintiffs themselves.

“We have come to realize over time that this is more important to us,” said Ms. Conroy, “to ensure that the victims are compensated for what happened.”

Jan Hoffman contributed to the coverage.

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Business

$100 million New Jersey deli firm fires CEO Paul Morina

$100 million New Jersey deli company fires CEO Paul Morina

Paulsboro coach Paul Morina cheers on George Worthy as he takes on Bergen Catholic s Wade Unger in the 152-pound bout during a wrestling match at The Palestra in Philadelphia,

Joe Warner | USAToday

The shareholders of the mystery $100 million New Jersey deli company Hometown International fired CEO Paul Morina — a high school principal and renowned wrestling coach — after weeks of questions about the firm and his role there, a financial filing revealed late Friday.

Hometown International’s majority shareholders also voted to remove the company’s only other executive, vice president and secretary Christine Lindenmuth, who works with Morina as an administrator at nearby Paulsboro High School. The deli, located just across the Delaware River from Philadelphia, is Hometown’s only operating business asset.

Their ousters came a week after a previously unreported resignation of the president of a shell company, E-Waste, which has multiple connections to to Hometown International

Securities and Exchange Commission filings show that the shareholders voting to remove Morina and Lindenmuth almost certainly included all or some members of two different groups of investment entities, one based in Hong Kong, the other based in Macao, a special administrative region in Hong Kong.

Morina, 62, held a slew of other titles at Hometown International before he was removed. According to financial filings, he owns 1.5 million common shares of the deli owner, making him, on paper at least, worth more than $18 million.

Morina was replaced as chief executive officer by Peter Coker Jr., who is Hometown International’s chairman.

Coker Jr., who is based in Hong Kong, is aligned with investment entities there that have major stakes in the deli owner.

Coker Jr.’s father, North Carolina businessman Peter Coker Sr., himself is a major investor in the company.

The related shell company E-Waste also has replaced its president, John Rollo, 66, after similar questions were raised by CNBC about him, that company and its similarly preposterous sky-high market capitalization despite a total lack of ongoing business.

Rollo, a Grammy-winning recording engineer, until recently was working as patient transporter at a New Jersey hospital.

Rollo, also a New Jersey resident, was replaced as E-Waste’s president by 31-year-old Elliot Mermel, a California resident who is getting paid $8,000 per month in that role.

Mermel’s colorful business background includes founding a company that raised crickets as human food, and a partnership in a cannabis-related business with Paul Pierce, the former Boston Celtics superstar basketball player.

Pierce, who won an NBA title with the Celtics, last month was fired as an analyst by ESPN for a racy Instagram Live poss that showed him in a room with exotic dancers.

On Saturday, the Boston Globe reported that Pierce will be inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame as part of its 2021 class.

Mermel also founded a biotech company and an artificial intelligence company, and was a business development consultant to a fertilizer company, according to a financial filing.

Mermel, a Colby University graduate, has another company, Benzions LLC, that had been collecting $4,000 each month since December under a consulting agreement with E-Waste.

That agreement was terminated as part of his taking over management of E-Waste, according to a Securities and Exchange Commission filing on Thursday.

Boston Celtics forward Paul Pierce waves to the crowd after reaching No. 2 on the all-time Celtics scoring list, surpassing Larry Bird, during the second half of an NBA basketball game against the Charlotte Bobcats in Boston on Tuesday, Feb. 7, 2012. (AP Photo/Elise Amendola)

Elise Amendola

SEC filings show that Benzions in March signed another consulting agreement with a second shell company, Med Spa Vacations, connected to Peter Coker Sr., which likewise pays Mermel’s firm $4,000 per month.

CNBC has reached out for comment from Morina, Lindenmuth, Rollo, Mermel, Hometown International’s lawyer and a spokesman for the Hong Kong investors.

The current president of Med Spa Vacations is former E-Waste president Rollo, who took that job in February, according to filings.

The changes in executive leadership at both Hometown International and E-Waste were disclosed in 8-K filings with the SEC.

The deli owner’s filing gave no reason why shareholders who control 6 million shares of common stock — which represents about 77% of the company’s voting power — voted out Morina and the 46-year-old Lindenmuth. At least 5.5 million of Hometown International’s common shares are controlled by the Hong Kong and Macao investors.

Both Morina and Lindenmuth remain principals in the deli itself, according to the SEC filing.

Morina also is involved in an entity that leases the deli space to Hometown International.

E-Waste’s filing said that Rollo resigned as president on May 7, a day after CNBC reported on the opaque nature of the Macao group of investors.

Your Hometown Deli in Paulsboro, N.J.

Google Earth

The moves appear — like other recent ones by each of the money-losing companies — to be an attempt to eliminate controversial issues that could harm their joint goal of merging with other firms in a transaction that would exploit their status as publicly traded companies on U.S. markets.

Hometown International first drew widespread attention last month when hedge fund manager David Einhorn, in a letter to clients, pointed out the company’s market capitalization, which had topped $100 million despite owning only a single small Italian deli.

That eatery had sales of less than $37,000 in sales for the past two years combined and was closed for nearly half of 2020 due to the coronavirus pandemic.

Einhorn noted the incongruity of Morina being Hometown International’s CEO while working his day jobs as high school principal and wrestling coach.

Hometown Deli in Paulsboro, N.J.

CNBC

Morina’s team at Paulsboro high school is a perennial contender for state titles, and he is among the most successful coaches in New Jersey wrestling history.

But he has no apparent history of operating either a publicly traded company or food service business before the Hometown Deli opened in his own hometown.

However, Morina, whose brother is a New Jersey county sheriff, wrestled in the 1970s at Paulsboro High School with a man named James Patten, who works at Coker Sr.’s firm Tryon Capital.

Patten was barred by FINRA, the broker-dealer regulator, from acting as a stockbroker or associating with broker-dealers, according to the regulator’s database.

Before that sanction, Patten was the subject of repeated disciplinary actions by FINRA, which included not complying with an arbitration award of more than $753,000 for violating securities laws, unauthorized trading and churning a client’s account.

Since Einhorn’s letter, CNBC has reported other eyebrow-raising details about Hometown International and E-Waste, whose stocks, traded on the low-tier Pink over-the-counter market, in the past year have risen to stunning levels as ties have been formed between them.

Among those questions was why some investors would pay so much to buy shares in either thinly traded company, given their lack of meaningful revenue in the deli owner’s case, or, in E-Waste’s case, a lack of any revenue at all.

Even if both companies achieve their goal of engaging in reverse mergers or similar transactions with private firms looking to become publicly traded, current investors will not receive payments that reflect — in any way — the trading price of the stocks.

On Friday, just 205 shares of Hometown International were traded, closing at $12.40 per share. Given the company’s nearly 8 million shares of common stock outstanding, that gives it a market capitalization of $96.68 million.

E-Waste closed Friday at $9 per share, after no shares traded hands. With 12.5 million shares outstanding, E-Waste has a market cap of $112.5 million.

In recent weeks, both the deli owner and E-Waste disavowed their stock prices, saying in extraordinary SEC filings that there was no financial justification for their market capitalizations.

The moves followed the demotion of Hometown International from a more prestigious OTCQB over-the-counter market platform for what OTC Markets Group called “irregularities” in their public disclosures, and OTC Markets telling CNBC that it would be eyeing E-Waste as well.

A trio of Hong Kong investment entities led by Maso Capital, which last year became some of the largest investors in Hometown International’s biggest investors, are understood to be involved in likewise positioning E-Waste as a reverse merger candidate.

The Hong Kong investors include entities that are investment arms of Duke and Vanderbilt universities.

E-Waste’s biggest single investor, Macao-based Global Equity Limited, is also the largest investor in the deli owner, and in Med Spa Vacations, another shell company linked to Coker Sr..

The office building on Avenida Da Praia Grande in Macao, China, the address for multiple entities listed as investors in Hometown International, the owner of a single New Jersey deli.

Catarina Domingues | CNBC

Rollo remains the president of Med Spa Vacations, a shell company with no business operations whose office address is that of a business operated by Coker Sr.

Hometown International loaned Med Spa Vacations $150,000 in February, records show.

That loan came after E-Waste was loaned an identical amount by Hometown International in November, according to an SEC filing.

Records show that Coker Sr. loaned E-Waste $255,000 last September, most of which was used to pay the prior owners of E-Waste before they sold their shares to Global Equity Lmiited.

CNBC’s articles have detailed how Coker Sr., a former college basketball star who has refused to comment when contacted by a reporter, has been sued for allegedly hiding assets from a creditor to whom he owed nearly $900,000 and for business-related fraud. He denied wrongdoing in those cases.

He also has been arrested for soliciting a prostitute, according to a Raleigh, North Carolina, police report, and for exposing himself to and trying to proposition three underage girls, according to a 1992 newspaper article.

Peter Lee Coker mugshot from the Raleigh/Wake City-County Bureau of Identification (CCBI).

Source: Raleigh/Wake City-County Bureau of Identification

A firm controlled by Coker Sr., Tryon Capital, had until recently been collecting $15,000 a month from Hometown International under a consulting agreement. E-Waste was paying Tryon Capital $2,500 per month for its own consulting agreement.

Those agreements were terminated last month after CNBC articles described those deals and Coker’s tangled legal history.

SEC filings show that Med Spa Vacations is paying Tryon Capital $2,500 per month for its own consulting agreement.

Coker Sr.’s partner in Tryon Capital, Peter Reichard, in 2011 was convicted in a North Carolina court of his role in a scheme that facilitated the illegal contributions of thousands of dollars to the successful 2008 campaign for governor by Bev Perdue, a Democrat.

The scheme involved the use of bogus consulting contracts with Tryon Capital. Coker Sr. was not charged in that case.

Peter Reichard, a top Perdue aide, takes the oath before his apearance in Wake County Court, Wednesday, December 14, 2011 in Raleigh, N.C.

John Rottet | The News & Observer | AP

Reichard is also a managing member, with Coker Sr., of an entity called Europa Capital Investments, which owns 90,400 common shares of Hometown International, and has warrants for another 1.9 million shares.

Reichard is the son of Ram Dass, the late spiritual and LSD guru who gained renown in the 1960s and 1970s.

CNBC earlier this week detailed how Coker Sr. and Reichard in 2010 created eight shell companies that were later sold off to other owners.

Most of those shell companies, after they were sold, ended up having their registrations revoked by the SEC for failing to keep current in their disclosure filings, records show.

One of the companies ended up being owned by a real estate tax lawyer in New York named Allan Schwartz, who did work for former President Donald Trump decades ago in connection with Trump’s real estate holdings. Schwartz told CNBC he knew nothing about Reichard and Coker Sr., or the deli owner.

Hometown Deli, Paulsboro, N.J.

Mike Calia | CNBC

Records show that a securities lawyer named Gregg Jaclin was involved in the creation of those shell companies. Jaclin also was involved three years later in the creation of Hometown International.

Jaclin was disbarred as an attorney last year after pleading guilty to federal criminal charges related to his creation of shell companies to sell to individuals “who used those shell companies as publicly traded vehicles for market manipulation schemes,” court records show.

None of the shells in that scheme were one of the ones created by Coker Sr. and Reichard, or to Hometown International.

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Entertainment

Paul Oscher, Blues Musician in Muddy Waters’s Band, Dies at 74

Paul Oscher, Blues Musician in Muddy Waters’s Band, Dies at 74

An uncle gave Paul a harmonica when he was 12, but he didn’t learn how to make the most of it until one day when he was delivering groceries after school. A customer who happened to be a blues musician overheard him trying to play “Red River Valley” and taught him the ropes.

Updated

April 26, 2021, 11:15 p.m. ET

By the age of 15 he was playing in black clubs in Brooklyn and had become part of a network of musicians in that scene. He was 17 when he was introduced to Mr. Waters one night after a Waters show at the Apollo Theater in Harlem. Three years later, when Mr. Waters returned to perform in New York City and did not have a harmonica player, he invited Mr. Oscher to sit down. At the end of the show, Mr. Waters offered him a job.

For a while, Mr. Oscher lived in the basement of Mr. Waters ‘house in Chicago and shared the room with Otis Spann, the well-known Chicago blues pianist and member of Mr. Waters’ band. Mr. Oscher later said that he learned his blues timing from Mr. Spann.

He toured Europe and the United States with the band, often dressed like his bandmates in a red brocade Nehru jacket. (Mr. Waters was wearing a black suit.) When they reached the segregated south, he was usually not allowed to stay in the same hotel as his bandmates, and he remembered one day the group fell silent on the street when they saw a sign stopped by explaining, “You are entering Klan County.”

Mr. Oscher left the band in the early 1970s to pursue a solo career in New York City. Over the years he has performed with Eric Clapton, Levon Helm, T-Bone Walker, John Lee Hooker and many others.

In addition to the harmonica, he often played the piano and guitar at the same time – his harmonica in a neck stand, his guitar on his lap and one hand on the keyboard. He also played the accordion and vibraphone.

In the late 1990s, Mr. Oscher was playing in Frank’s Cocktail Lounge in Brooklyn when he met Suzan-Lori Parks, the playwright and author, and she asked him to teach her to play the harmonica. They married in 2001 and separated amicably in 2008. They later divorced but remained friends. Mr. Oscher had no immediate survivors.

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Politics

Trump marketing campaign chief Paul Manafort worker Kilimnik gave Russia election knowledge

Trump campaign chief Paul Manafort employee Kilimnik gave Russia election data

Konstantin Kilimnik as he appears on an FBI poster.

Source: FBI

A long-time employee of former President Donald Trump’s 2016 campaign manager, Paul Manafort, gave Russian intelligence services “sensitive information about election and campaign strategy” during this year’s elections, the US Treasury said on Thursday.

Manafort staffer Konstantin Kilimnik “also tried to further the narrative that Ukraine, not Russia, interfered in the 2016 US presidential election,” the Treasury Department said as the Biden government launched new sanctions against Russia, Kilimnik and others announced.

These sanctions relate in part to alleged efforts by Russia to influence the outcome of the 2020 US presidential election.

Former Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort arrives in the U.S. District Court in Washington on June 15, 2018 to be indicted on a third superseded indictment against him by special adviser Robert Mueller for witness manipulation.

Jonathan Ernst | Reuters

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Business

Sports activities agent Wealthy Paul joins former Nike execs to start out Undertake

Sports agent Rich Paul joins former Nike execs to start Adopt

Sports agent Rich Paul oversees the game between the Miami Heat and the Charlotte Hornets at American Airlines Arena on March 11, 2020 in Miami, Florida.

Michael Reaves | Getty Images

Rich Paul, the sports agent best known for representing NBA star LeBron James, has joined former Nike executives to start a marketing and creative agency owned by a minority group called Adopt.

The company aims to support sports and wellness companies in expanding their audiences through brand marketing. Nike alumni working with Paul include David Creech, who led product and branding for the shoe seller and Michael Jordan’s company.

According to Creech, CNBC Adopt will focus on brand building so companies can better relate to athletes and consumers. Adopt charges an agency marketing fee for their services.

“We believe there is this opportunity in sports and wellness where we can identify and uncover market opportunities,” Creech told CNBC in an interview.

Creech has worked on branding for athletes like Tiger Woods, James, and Kobe Bryant. He will lead the design, branding and product departments at Adopt. Nicole Graham, who served as Nike’s vice president of global brand marketing, will lead strategy and branding, and Josh Moore, another Nike veteran, will oversee digital and design.

David Creech, co-founder of the marketing agency Adopt.

Source: Adopt