|  |  |  | | | | | The Guardian World News | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | As her memoirs are published, the woman whose sense of style has shaped fashion for decades talks about race, weight, cats, and how to stand up to Anna Wintour
• Read an extract from Grace: A Memoir White walled, silent, with its quiet only broken by the crack of heels on floor, the US Vogue office feels like a building with PMT. A building just about to cry. Through a pair of heavy glass doors, down a narrow corridor, in an office that looks out over the migrainous lights of Times Square sits the world's second most influential person in fashion, Grace Coddington. She is having a bad day. "If [Anna] Wintour is the Pope," wrote Time Magazine, gushingly, "Coddington is Michelangelo, trying to paint a fresh version of the Sistine Chapel 12 times a year." They started on the same morning in 1988; Wintour as editor, Coddington as creative director. Karl Lagerfeld called her a genius. Wintour agrees. As the stylist responsible for Vogue's visual identity, instead of simply reflecting beauty, she creates it. Her work with the world's greatest photographers (including Helmut Newton, Mario Testino, Annie Leibovitz and Snowdon) long ago set the bar for the modern fashion story, but it was with RJ Cutler's 2009 documentary The September Issue that the wider world first saw her face. The film's framing of the power play between Wintour and Coddington transformed her into a fashion hero because, first, she appears to fight so hard against trends and commercialism in her pursuit of beauty. And secondly because she's the only person who answers back to Anna. She beckons me in with one unadorned hand. With the other she grips her desk phone. Apologising, she tells me this is the worst day to see her. The very worst. The room is rose-scented and busy with photos – a huge black-and-white portrait of a freckled model stares down from the far wall and delicate cat ornaments litter the shelves. She's on hold to a hospital where Didier Malige, her boyfriend of 30 years, is threatening to walk out of A&E. While she waits for him to come on the line, she calls his doctor on the other phone, asking him to make sure Malige doesn't leave before being seen. Coddington is project managing her partner's illness with the calm composure of someone used to wrestling alligators. When her attention does land on me, sitting below her on a small sofa, I feel it as something physical. At 71, Grace Coddington looks raw and striking, a cloud of nectarine hair against paper-white skin, and one sleepy eye, the result of an accident in her early 20s. In person she is reminiscent of her most famous work – ambitious and sprawling, with moments of odd beauty and the ability to scare. I didn't quite know what to expect, going to interview Grace Coddington. Some people describe her as ferociously intimidating, others as gentle, maternal, "nice". All agree she is incredibly intelligent. All say she is a force. So I settle, stiff-backed, on her sofa, and wait for the doctor to give in. "She's a storyteller," explains US Vogue's contributing editor Sarah Mower. "And I've concluded in looking through years of her work that the story is about Grace. She really cares what the clothes look like, but far more important to her is 'feeling the girl' in the picture, her character, her escapades, her sense of humour. Often Grace transcends fashion, quite literally – she has designers make special dresses to costume her fantasy shoots, rather than simply documenting the collections du jour." "I'm not an artist," Coddington says, twice. She's handed the phone to her assistant. "I'm a creative person, but I'm one of a team of people that helps the photographer. There's that difference between art and fashion photography. Sometimes that line blurs, but I think you always have to have in your head that the most important thing is the dress." Grazia's Susannah Frankel says: "Her aesthetic is recognisably British. It's very romantic for sure, indebted to [Cecil] Beaton and the idea of class, heritage and history." After decades in America, does Coddington still think of herself as British? "I am British," she says firmly. "I'm told of my British sensibility sometimes. That whole romanticism thing. But I don't think you can compartmentalise things any more. I think everything is global now. Before affordable flights – before it became so easy to be anywhere you like tomorrow – things like that mattered more." Coddington was born in Anglesey, Wales in 1941. "Although it was bleak," she recalls, "there was beauty in its bleakness." She grew up in her parents' long low hotel by the sea. They had a family crest, a dragon breathing flames, and a motto: "Never Despair". In her new book, Grace: a Memoir (for which she was paid a reported $1.2m), she writes about her childhood as if she's setting up a ghost story – the mists on the shoreline, the monochrome trees, her mother's growing clutter, Grace's continuing fear of the dark and anxiety in crowds – but with a move to modelling school in London, her tone lightens. Her life speeds up. In 1959 she won the Young Idea category of a Vogue modelling contest, despite the notorious agent Eileen Ford telling her she was too fat. For her, the 60s swung. "She was a huge celebrity in that world, an incredible beauty," said Wintour. "I was in awe of her." She hung around with Vidal Sassoon and David Bailey, and one boyfriend called James Gilbert who would fly her to France for lunch, "shouting: 'This is rather fun,' while I sat there staring at my terrified face, distorted by gravity, reflected back at me from the speedometer". Driving through London one rainy evening he went through a red light and rammed their car into a van. Her left eyelid was sliced off. "Luckily," she writes, "they found my eyelashes." She says firmly, and holding my gaze: "But I was never considered beautiful anyway. I was a character. Not a beautiful blonde with blue eyes. Beauty is not about perfection. I prefer imperfections – it's much more interesting." She pauses. "Perfect is boring." After five operations she started modelling again, albeit in sunglasses, commuting between Paris and London in Lycra and PVC, nightclubbing with the Beatles and Stones. "After one wild night," she writes, "I remember accepting a lift from Roman Polanski. He stopped short at his house and tried dragging me inside. I escaped, but had to walk the rest of the way back to my place." Her anecdotes are often tinged with a jolly kind of death, but occasionally she is frank. Driving home one afternoon, a crowd of Chelsea fans overturned her Mini. She was in her late 20s and seven months pregnant by her then-fiancé Albert Koski. She miscarried. "This turned out to be the only time in my life that I was able to conceive," she writes. The next story she tells is about discovering her fiancé was having an affair with Catherine Deneuve's sister. "Her car burst into flames on the way to Nice airport… I was in bed with Albert the morning the call came through telling him she had died. So he didn't just lose her at that moment. He lost me, too." There's a scene in The September Issue when Coddington offers advice to a colleague who has just come, cold and quivering, from Wintour's office. "Don't be too nice," she tells him, "because you'll lose. You have to beat your way through." Coddington's most effective weapon seems to be silence. One of the most memorable scenes in the documentary comes when Coddington and Wintour share a long, uncomfortable lift ride together on the way to visit Jean Paul Gaultier. Angry, neither says a word. Her reaction to Wintour's announcement that they were to be filmed was famously one of horror. "My feeling has always been that people should concentrate on their jobs," she explains, "and not all this fashionable 'I want to be a celebrity' shit." But the more time that passed, and the longer she refused to work with him, the more director RJ Cutler (whose previous work includes The War Room, which follows Bill Clinton's presidential campaign) realised how much he needed her. "Observing the dynamic between Anna and Grace, it was evident that their relationship, their interaction, was seminal," he tells me. After six months avoiding her, he eventually gained Coddington's trust, "And it was the most extraordinary a collaboration I've ever had." He describes watching her as she watches a catwalk, sketching furiously as the clothes stalk past. Her eye, she says, was trained by Norman Parkinson, who told her never to fall asleep in the car because she'd miss potentially inspiring views from the window. "She is totally in the moment," Cutler enthuses. "Something is happening. She sees things in a way others don't." Since the film's release Coddington has, inadvertently, become one of the celebrities she so despises. At screenings, roomfuls of people fawn over her. "I grew to quite like that," she admits. The subject of "niceness", of being liked, is one that comes up often when discussing Coddington. She is seen as the sweet to Wintour's sour. An island of calm in a choppy sea. Is it important to her that people like her? "Yes," she says, leaning back in her seat, looking at her hands. She's embarrassed to say this out loud. "Yes. I get quite upset if I think someone doesn't, even if it's the milkman. Of course I want people to like me – I'm human." Does that mean that Wintour, who famously doesn't have time to bother with niceties is… less than human? "I wouldn't go so far as to say Anna Wintour doesn't give a shit if people like her," she says sternly, looking me in the eye now. "But she doesn't let it influence her decisions." Does the desire to be liked influence Coddington's decisions? "Would my work be stronger if I didn't care about being liked?" She thinks about it for a long second, and hmms. "Possibly. I still have ways of getting what I want, though. Ask Anna." There's a cartoon-baddie-ness to her laugh. So what's the secret to softening Anna? A song? A little cuddle? "I bore her to death. I don't cuddle her, no. She wouldn't respond to that. You have to present to her in a strong way – eventually if it's right you'll convince her." The Anna and Grace story is a compelling one – the stone-hearted executive battling the romantic artist, a couture catfight over the colour black. While Wintour is painted as a terrifying ice queen, allegedly rising at 5am for a blow-dry and game of tennis before work, Coddington never wears make-up, is friends with her assistants and has been heard to laugh, loudly. Is it true? Is she the anti-Anna? Coddington scoffs. "That depiction is a bit stupid. I'm not the 'anti-Anna'. The smarter people can see it's not a question of fighting. It's how we work together. She can't just say yes to everything. I certainly don't. I just have a different way of saying no." I understand that scoff. The anti-Anna story promotes competitive individualism rather than collaborative success, and reinforces the idea that professional women thrive on manipulation and bitchiness. But talking to her, it seems that rather than smack up against each other, the two are successful because their differences are complementary. Coddington stresses the importance of collaboration in her work. "Hierarchy is absolutely unimportant to me. Everyone is equal, from Anna, to me, to my assistant Stella." Stella, who shares her office, grins at her sunnily. Coddington is loath to take credit for her work, even the most groundbreaking stories, like the 1987 trip to Russia – the first time a magazine was allowed to shoot there – where she re-imagined Jerry Hall as a Soviet monument. "When I first started as a fashion editor at British Vogue I got into my own pictures sometimes for budget reasons, or just because... like one time with Helmut Newton, when I was walking around in a bikini during our shoot in the south of France, and I guess, graphically, it made sense." She looks out the window, uptown, as she remembers. "Me with my red hair in a bikini among all these really bad clothes, evening dresses, you know. That made the picture. You know you're helping to make a great picture when you're working with someone of his calibre, so it's very exciting." She has nothing but respect for photographers, including Newton, who, she says, often made models cry. Newton hassled her for 20 years to pose nude for him, but she refused. Eventually, meanly, he hissed at her that she had missed her chance – she had got too old. Coddington herself is famously gentle with the models she works with, having stood in their too-tight shoes herself. But how deep does that duty of care go? Does she think her contribution to fashion has been political? "Political? No. It's been long." Has her experience of modelling affected who she casts – is she more aware of the health of the girls than the average editor? She bristles slightly. "I'm not here to teach people anything. I photograph what I think is right, and if a girl is anorexic I'm not going to feel right about it, so I wouldn't book her. But I wouldn't book one that is too fat either." Wintour is frequently attacked by Peta for her love of fur. Where does Coddington stand on the issue? "I'm not happy photographing fur because I love my cats, and I cannot really separate animals and say: 'It's OK to kill those but not these.' I don't conscientiously object to fur, but if I can get around it I will. I don't seek it out." She is tiring of these questions, but I have one more. I wonder how she feels about the industry's preference for white skin. She sighs a sigh that is 10 miles deep. "There are black girls I find very beautiful and there are black girls I don't find very beautiful; same with white girls, some of whom I find hideous. It's not about colour for me; it's about beauty. And fun, and character." She's talking very fast, and then she slows down. "There are people who are very guilty of working with girls who are too thin, just because the camera always makes people look that little bit fatter than real life. Some 16-year-olds go too far – they can't see what's right in front of their eyes, and it's dangerous. But some young girls have no shape whatsoever – they're like little boys, and I hate to say it, but the clothes hang well on them." I'm disappointed she doesn't want to engage – as the whistle in Wintour's ear, if she were to insist on a more diverse spectrum of beauty in the magazine, then perhaps, slowly, some women's body-image issues would begin to melt. But Coddington has a very specific idea of what is beautiful, and seeing her work with models such as the British redhead Karen Elson, and remembering her stepping into Newton's picture, it's a beauty that could be seen as somewhat narcissistic. "I've always thought it's no accident that so many of Grace's favourite models have been redheads," says Sarah Mower. "Maggie Rizer, Lily Cole and Karen Elson – especially Karen – are girls she loves photographing. Maybe it is putting herself in the picture. Because I think Grace has the essential quality that will keep a woman caring about fashion all her life – inside she's never been any older than about 25." Discussing the politics of fashion she is unapologetic, dismissive, and for the first time I see the formidable aggressor RJ Cutler first met. So, an eternal coward, I talk about cats. Grace Coddington loves cats. She has illustrated a book about them, published by Karl Lagerfeld; she has designed an accessories collection for Balenciaga decorated with scratchy portraits of them, and she dedicates a chapter of her memoirs to them. Cutler is in talks with her about directing an animated film about them. Cats. She dreams about them. "I love cats," she says. "I love their vulnerability and I love the way they look. They're very independent, which I like." A love of cats is traditionally seen as an arrow towards loneliness, inversion, and an inability to maintain relationships with people. But with Coddington, it's accepted as being a part of her thirst for untameable beauty. Until, um, she discusses her cat psychic. When I came to this chapter in her memoir, I thought: "Ah." The same sort of "Ah" that you release when a first date leads you into their Victorian doll room. "I was told to take the cat psychic stuff out of the book because everybody would think I was a kook," she chuckles. "But it's just that sometimes when the thing you love is ill, you reach out for a little more knowledge of what's going on." I ask whether she would like to be a cat psychic. The look she gives me is withering. "No," she says in a voice that suggests she is not angry with me, but instead disappointed. After a pause she admits that she does dream of retirement. "I talk about it every day," she says, and I think she means it. What will fashion look like when she leaves? If she leaves. Suddenly she's talking about her dreams for future shoots, unexplored locations – "The moon, maybe? Could we do Virgin Galactic?" I hear an assistant in the corridor whisper a litany of apologies as she stumbles against another editor's clothes rail. Coddington's office, a haven of pink roses lit by a red cat lamp, seems to exist at a slightly different altitude, where there's more oxygen than in the rest of the building. "The fact that someone who seems so normal, for want of a better word, so dry, funny and nurturing has a head filled with such extraordinary imagery is pretty amazing," says Susannah Frankel. Despite the cats, she is a rare point of sanity in a sometimes-mad world. "There are a lot of crazies in this industry," Coddington admits, "but there are sane people, too – you just have to weed them out." Perhaps it's more accurate then, to credit at least a part of her success to being simply likeable. A beacon of kindness in a world that makes people cry.
  | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Joe Luis Saenz, detained by authorities in Mexico, faces charges in the US of murder, kidnapping and rape One of the FBI's Ten Most Wanted Fugitives has been arrested in Mexico and returned to Los Angeles to face charges of murder, kidnapping and rape, US officials said on Saturday. Joe Luis Saenz, a reputed gang member, was taken into custody Thursday in Guadalajara following a joint operation with the Mexican government, said Bill Lewis, assistant director in charge of the FBI's Los Angeles office. Mexican officials expect extradition proceedings to begin in the coming days. Saenz returned to Los Angeles on Friday evening. Investigators said Saenz shot and killed two rival gang members in July 1998, in retaliation for an assault on one of his associates. Saenz then suspected Sigrieta Hernandez, his girlfriend and the mother of his daughter, was going to tell police about the slayings, investigators said. He is accused of kidnapping, raping and killing her less than two weeks later. Saenz also is believed to have killed Oscar Torres at his home in October 2008, because he failed to repay $600,000 in drug money after police seized the cash during a traffic stop. Authorities said they have videotape from a surveillance camera at Torres' house that shows Saenz killing Torres and wounding another person. Saenz, who is about 37 years old, was believed to be hiding in Mexico, working as an enforcer and hit man for a Mexican drug cartel. He has been on the FBI's most-wanted list since 2009, alongside Osama bin Laden and other notorious criminals. A reward of up to $100,000 was offered for information leading to his arrest.
  | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Nine protesters detained in California as protest group co-ordinates action across US on busiest shopping day Police arrested nine people outside a California Walmart late on Friday, at a protest that was part of a nationwide series of walk-outs and demonstrations against labour conditions at the retail giant. The protests were held to mark Black Friday, the busiest shopping day in the American calendar. Organisers claimed that at least 1,000 actions took place across 46 states. The biggest protest seemed to be in Paramount, California, where more than 1,500 people gathered in the streets to chant protest songs in opposition to what they say are low wages that keep Walmart workers in poverty. Organisers have also complained of retaliation by the company against people who speak out. The nine people arrested refused to leave the street and were peacefully detained, said Captain Mike Parker of the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department. Three of those arrested were striking Walmart workers, said OUR Walmart, which is organising the protests and is backed by the United Food and Commercial Workers' Union. The others were local community supporters. Protests were staged all over the country and attracted some high-profile supporters. In Florida, congressman Alan Grayson joined a picket line, as did congressman George Miller in California. Demonstrations hit Walmart outlets in major cities across America. In recent months the company has also been hit by strikes and protests in its US-based supply chain in Southern California and Illinois, where much work is outsourced to third parties which are accused of paying low wages and operating in unsafe conditions. Despite the unrest, Walmart said it had experienced its best Black Friday ever and that the majority of protesters were not Walmart workers. Certainly the protests did not disrupt trade at the nation's Walmart stores when they controversially opened late on the Thanksgiving holiday itself, or in the early hours of Friday morning. There were the usual scenes of long lines, crowded checkouts and shoving and pushing as shoppers battled to snap up bargain buys. "We had very safe and successful Black Friday events at our stores across the country and heard overwhelmingly positive feedback from our customers," said Bill Simon, Walmart's US president and chief executive officer. Protesters vowed to keep the protests going into the holiday season. Dan Schlademan, director at lobby group Making Change at Walmart, said: "This has been an amazing moment but we are just at the starting point of what we are doing." Mary Pat Tifft, an OUR Walmart member and 24-year associate who led a protest on Thursday evening in Kenosha, Wisconsin, said: "For Walmart associates this has been the best Black Friday ever. We stood together for respect across the country." Others agreed. "Our voices are being heard," said Colby Harris, an OUR Walmart member and three-year associate who walked off the job in Lancaster, Texas, on Thursday evening. "And thousands of people in our cities and towns and all across the country are joining our calls for change at Walmart. We are overwhelmed by the support and proud of what we've achieved so quickly and about where we are headed."
  | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | The Texan who shot to fame as an astronaut and to fortune as the scheming JR Ewing in Dallas was a larger-than-life character who used to turn up drunk to film the soap opera Tributes poured in on Saturday to mark the death of Larry Hagman, the actor best known as JR Ewing, perhaps the most notorious villain in the history of TV soaps. Hagman's portrayal of JR in Dallas earned him worldwide fame and catapulted the character of the scheming oilman with the terrifying grin to the pinnacle of pop culture. It was a role that Hagman was still playing at the age of 81, when the once immensely popular soap opera was revived on American television this year. Hagman died on Friday in a Dallas hospital after a long battle with cancer, surrounded by family and friends who had just celebrated the Thanksgiving holiday. "Larry was back in his beloved hometown of Dallas, re-enacting the iconic role he loved the most. Larry's family and closest friends had joined him in Dallas for the Thanksgiving holiday," said a statement from Warner Bros, who are behind the current Dallas revival. Linda Gray, who played his on-screen wife and later ex-wife Sue Ellen, was among those with him in his last moments. "He brought joy to everyone he knew. He was creative, generous, funny, loving and talented, and I will miss him enormously. He was an original and lived life to the fullest," she said. "He is unforgettable, and irreplaceable to millions of fans around the world, and in the hearts of each of us," said Victoria Principal, who played Pam, JR's sister-in-law, in the original series. It is unclear exactly what impact Hagman's death will have on the new show. Channel 5 said it will be incorporated into the storyline, as production is midway through a second series. There is certainly little doubt that the loss of JR will leave a Texas-sized hole. "JR Ewing will endure as one of the most indelible [characters] in entertainment history," said Dallas executive producers Cynthia Cidre and Michael Robin. Hagman "truly loved portraying this globally recognised character and he leaves a legacy of entertainment, generosity and grace". JR Ewing is one of the greatest "bad guys" of the modern entertainment era. He wheeled and dealed against family, friends and enemies alike. When Hagman's character was shot in 1980 the CBS drama drew audience records and the mystery over who shot JR kept viewers glued to their seats. But Hagman, of course, was not JR. Nor was it his only role. Before landing the gig of a cigar-chomping and whiskey-drinking oilman Hagman had found fame playing the astronaut husband of a genie on the sitcom I Dream of Jeannie. The actress in the show, Barbara Eden, also paid her respects to Hagman's career. "We've lost not just a great actor, not just a television icon, but an element of pure Americana. Goodbye, Larry. There was no one like you before and there will never be anyone like you again," she said. Hagman was a native of Dallas's twin city Fort Worth. He was born the son of Broadway star Mary Martin and attorney Ben Hagman. He gained a reputation for mischief as a boy – something he retained as an adult – and jumped from school to school before landing in the Air Force in the 1950s. While serving in Britain he met and married a young Swedish designer, Maj Axelsson, with whom he had two children, Preston and Heidi. The family moved to Malibu in California and Hagman drifted into the family trade of acting in theatre and TV before he got his big break with Jeannie.He was seen as the unofficial "mayor of Malibu" as he led impromptu parades, sometimes in outlandish costumes, down the beach outside his oceanfront home. While many actors often shun their famous roles, fearing stereotype, Hagman appeared to embrace his. "I know what I want on JR's tombstone," Hagman once said. "It should say: 'Here lies upright citizen JR Ewing. This is the only deal he ever lost.'" But that jollity did disguise a serious battle with heavy drinking. He confessed to being drunk through many shoots of Dallas, including once pouring bourbon on his breakfast cornflakes. In 1992 he was diagnosed with cirrhosis and three years later had a liver transplant after cancer was found. That experience made him a prominent spokesman and campaigner for organ donation. But even there his essential good humour shone through. "I'm often asked how my liver transplant operation changed my life. Aside from saving it, nothing changed," he wrote in his autobiography. "It confirmed what I've always tried to do; live my life as fully as possible before the clock runs out."
 | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Films featuring weapon-wielding teenage girls are dominating Hollywood's fantasy output. But in the real world men still hold power in the industry It was a hard fight, but in the end there was only ever going to be one winner. As Americans flocked to the cinema last week over the Thanksgiving holiday, early figures showed the latest and last Twilight vampire movie knocking the James Bond blockbuster Skyfall from its perch atop the US movie charts. In the end Bond, in the macho incarnation of the brooding, highly masculine Daniel Craig, was no match for a teen action heroine called Bella. But maybe Bond, and other male heroes of the silver screen, are going to have to get used to being beaten by a much younger girl. For Twilight's Bella is far from alone when it comes to young, active heroines invading cinematic territory usually occupied by male characters. In fact, many people see the Twilight series – whose five movies about teen vampires have been smash hits since 2008 – as paving the way for a wave of new, aggressive and tougher feminine stars. "Twilight has done so much to change the culture of Hollywood and it does not get the acknowledgement it deserves because it is about a girl," said Melissa Silverstein, editor of the blog Women and Hollywood. "It is gigantic. It has shown women can fuel box office. But it still is something that Hollywood does not know what to do with." One thing, however, that Hollywood is doing with it is trying to replicate the Twilight films' success: telling stories of young, powerful female characters in settings not usually associated with them. The most obvious example of that desire has been the movie Hunger Games, set in a brutal, futuristic dystopia where the bow-wielding heroine is a ferocious young girl called Katniss Everdeen. The movie – which, like Twilight was based on a bestselling young adult book series – was an enormous hit, taking in more than $680m and making a global star out of actress Jennifer Lawrence. More Lawrence-led Hunger Games films are in the works, but there are others too as film executives pore over the literary world in a hunt for other teenaged heroines ready to lead the way. In 2013, another supernatural series, Beautiful Creatures, will get its turn in America's cinemas. The main character of Lena – a "caster" whose magic powers can be claimed for good or evil on her 16th birthday – is to be played by young actress Alice Englert. Next year will also see the first Mortal Instruments movie featuring Lily Collins as Clary Fray, a young girl battling demons who have kidnapped her mother. Meanwhile, top director Sam Raimi has been signed up for Angelfall, the first movie in another adaptation from a young adult book with a female protagonist and which takes place in a post-apocalyptic Earth. The trend has even reached the world of animation. This year Pixar released Brave, its first ever film with a female lead, a Scottish princess called Merida who is far more skilled with a bow and arrow than any of the male characters in the film. One thing that has struck many observers of the trend is that the young female characters emerging in post-Twilight Hollywood are not overly sexualised. Instead they wield weapons, lead other characters and exist in film genres – such as horror, dystopian science fiction and post-apocalyptic settings – where strong male characters have usually dominated. Again The Hunger Games is a classic example. The character of Everdeen is dominant and strong, including over her putative love interests. "These girls are not all wearing bikinis. It is not just about showing skin," said Noah Levy, senior news editor at celebrity magazine In Touch Weekly. But, just as Hollywood seems to be getting something right, many experts would argue that the trend is still unlikely to reverse deep-rooted sexism in the world of movie-making. Silverstein pointed out that, while Hollywood now seems content to make action movies with strong, young, female leads, it is still risk averse when it comes to strong adult women's roles. With a few exceptions, it seems Hollywood studios are still not comfortable in taking the progress made with teen movies and turning that into the more grown-up spectrum of entertainment. "Girls can be powerful and strong. Women can't. We are comfortable with girls kicking ass, but not a woman who is in their 20s or 30s, unless she happens to be Angelina Jolie. But she is an anomaly," Silverstein said. Nor is it any coincidence that the hits are all based on already highly successful young adult books. That means much of the marketing and branding for the movie is already built in, greatly reducing the risks and cost of selling the film. That will allow historically timid movie studios to take a risk on having a strong, young, girl protagonist. "Hollywood could never make these movies by itself. You could not pitch these movies without the books behind them. They had to have already proven themselves in another milieu," said Gayl Murphy, an author and long-standing Hollywood correspondent. It is unlikely then, many observers believe, that the success of Twilight and the movies that it has paved the way for will do much to change the balance of power in favour of women elsewhere in the industry. Women will still struggle for good roles and high wages compared to their male co-stars, they will still find sitting in the director's chair a rare experience and they will still be troubled by the industry's pervasive ageism. A recent study of family-oriented films – likely to be friendlier to female roles than elsewhere – showed that only 11% featured girls and women in roughly half of their speaking parts. It also showed that, while women make up 47% of the labour force in the US, they occupy only one in five jobs featured in family films. In Hollywood itself, the statistics are just as bad. The Boxed In survey of women in the industry in 2012 found that just 11% of directors are women and just 13% of editors. Overall, 26% of people working in movies are women, a figure that has moved up a mere five percentage points over the last 15 years. "Hollywood plays catchup with the rest of society. In big movies they are often behind where the rest of us in the culture already are," said Murphy. So while Bella Swan, the teen vampire of Twilight, might have bested James Bond this weekend on the big screen, there is a long fight still ahead of her and her kind for a wider levelling of the playing field in the real world.
 | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Authorities thankful for "miracle" after Friday-night explosion that damaged several buildings does not lead to any fatalities A natural gas explosion in one of New England's biggest cities leveled a strip club and heavily damaged a daycare center on Friday. Authorities said it was a "miracle" that no-one died in the blast. At least 18 people were injured in the explosion in Springfield, Massachusetts, many of them firefighters, police officers and gas company workers responding to reports of an gas leak. A suspicious odor at the site had led to emergency services evacuating the strip club. "This is a miracle... that no one was killed," Massachusetts lieutenant governor Tim Murray said at a press conference. The explosion blew out all windows in a three-block radius, leaving three more buildings beyond repair and prompting emergency workers to evacuate a six-story apartment building that was buckling. According to a police sergeant, John Delaney, the scene looked as though it had been hit by "a missile strike". The blast victims were taken to two hospitals in the city. None of their injuries was considered life-threatening, officials said. Firefighters were investigating a gas leak when the blast happened, shortly after 5pm. "It really is a miracle and it's an example of our public safety officials, each and every day, putting themselves in harm's way, taking what could have been considered a very routine call of an odor of gas, but they took the proper precautions," said Stephen Coan, a state fire marshal. "And thanks to God that they did." Officials also marveled how the blast occurred when a daycare center next door was closed. The center's building was heavily damaged. Many Springfield officials, including mayor Domenic Sarno, were attending a tree-lighting ceremony when the explosion occurred. Sarno said some people had thought the boom was part of the holiday event. Springfield, which is 90 miles west of Boston and has about 150,000 residents, is the largest city in western Massachusetts. On Friday night, residents milled around the neighborhood where the explosion occurred, stunned by the destruction and confused by the cordoned-off area, which grew as crews continued to search for gas leaks. The mayor warned against looting, saying police would be out in force. Wayne Davis, who lives about a block away from the destroyed building, said he had felt his apartment shake. "I was laying down in bed, and I started feeling the building shaking and creaking," he said. The Navy veteran added that the explosion was louder than anything he had ever heard, including the sound of a jet landing on an aircraft carrier. The blast was heard in several neighboring communities. Video from WWLP-TV showed the moment of the explosion, with smoke billowing into the air.
  | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Texan actor who became irreplaceable as macchiavellian oil man JR Ewing in the US soap Dallas On 21 November 1980, 83 million people in the US and 24 million in the UK watched the TV show Dallas to see who shot the villainous JR Ewing. The head of Ewing Oil was working late at the office, when suddenly he was fired on by an unseen assailant. Who shot JR, and will he survive? Those were the questions put around the global village. Any character who had ever come into contact with the oleaginous Texas oilman had good reason to do away with him, but there was no way he could really have been killed off. If JR had died, then the series would have died, because JR was Dallas – and Larry Hagman, who has died in a Dallas hospital of complications related to throat cancer, aged 81, was JR. Other actors were at times replaced in their roles, but Hagman was irreplaceable. Nevertheless, just in case, Hagman quickly renegotiated his contract with Lorimar Studios just after the episode where he was shot, securing an annual salary of around $1m (£620,000). JR thus survived the attempt on his life, and continued his scheming ways for another 10 seasons. One should not underestimate Hagman's achievement in becoming the man the whole world loved to hate, the focal character of this progressively preposterous soap opera. With his bug eyes, smarmy grin and dicey hairpiece, Hagman generated a certain lethal charm as he went about betraying trusts and manipulating innocent people. He was Machiavelli in a Stetson, the evil face of capitalism – though, according to Hagman, "JR has lost Ewing Oil more than $16m". Hagman, nominated twice for an Emmy award (though he never won), was the only member of the cast to be in all 357 episodes of Dallas from 1978 to 1991. Ironically, nothing in his previous acting career indicated that Hagman was other than a competent light-comedy actor whose fame would be strictly limited, despite being the son of Mary Martin, known as the "First Lady of the Broadway musical". Born in Fort Worth, Texas, he was brought up for a while by his grandmother after his parents divorced when he was five; he was then shunted between his mother and his district attorney father, Benjamin Hagman, and was moved around various private schools and psychotherapists. At the age of 20, Hagman moved to London as a member of the chorus of Rodgers and Hammerstein's South Pacific, which starred his mother as Nellie Forbush, the role she created on Broadway. Hagman and Sean Connery, a year older, were among the shirtless sailors who sang There Is Nothing Like a Dame. After a year at Drury Lane, Hagman joined the US air force. After serving for four years, he resumed his acting career in earnest, getting roles on television and films. Hagman made little impression in his first Hollywood movies: as servicemen in Joshua Logan's Ensign Pulver (1964) and in Otto Preminger's In Harm's Way (1965), although he was very good playing weak men in two Sidney Lumet films: as the US president's nervous Russian interpreter in the nuclear scare story Fail-Safe (1964), and as Joanna Pettet's playwright husband with a penchant for wine and women in The Group (1966). In Harry and Tonto (1974), he was the selfish, whining son of retired teacher Art Carney, and hammed it up as an incompetent, gung-ho American colonel in The Eagle Has Landed (1976) and as a caricatured Hollywood studio executive in Blake Edwards's S.O.B. (1981). But it was television that was the foundation of his career. Hagman had scores of TV appearances. His first real success came in I Dream of Jeannie (1965-70), in which he played a befuddled bachelor astronaut who finds himself master of a glamorous, 2,000-year-old genie (Barbara Eden). Continuing to display a deft light touch, Hagman went on to appear in other mildly amusing sitcoms (Here We Go Again, The Good Life). Then came the long-running Dallas (1978-90), which Variety initially called "a limited series with a limited future". Robert Foxworth was originally cast as JR, but he wanted the role softened too much for the producer's taste, and Hagman was the perspicacious second choice. Hagman differed from JR in most aspects, being amiable and modest, though his liking for practical jokes and dressing up in different guises, such as an English bobby or French foreign legionnaire, gained him the nickname "Wacky Larry" and "The Mad Monk of Malibu". He was, like JR, a heavy drinker, which led to his contracting cirrhosis of the liver; he had a transplant that saved his life. Thereafter, Hagman was active in several organisations that advocated organ donation and transplantation. A passionate non-smoker, he also served as the chairperson of the American Cancer Society's Great American Smokeout, from 1981 to 1992. In 1996, Hagman reprised his infamous alter ego in a TV special called JR Returns, in which the dysfunctional Ewing family is reunited. Then, acting against type, he showed his range as a benevolent judge in Orleans (1997). Among Hagman's few feature films was Mike Nichols's Primary Colors (1998), in which Hagman was convincing as a populist, plain-speaking Florida governor. Hagman himself, a member of the Peace and Freedom party, once described fellow Texan George Bush as "a sad figure, not too well educated, who doesn't get out of America much. He's leading the country towards fascism". In recent years, Hagman became a prominent campaigner for alternative energy, transforming his California home into one of the world's biggest solar-powered estates. He revelled in the irony of TV's most famous oil man driving an electric car, and after disgust with the Deepwater Horizon oil spill agreed to star as JR in a SolarWorld TV advert, in which he parodied vice-presidential candidate Sarah Palin's statement "Drill, baby, drill" with the pro-solar slogan "Shine, baby, shine". In 2010, his Swedish-born wife, Maj Axelsson, whom he married in 1954, was diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease, and had to be moved into a care home. In June 2011, Hagman revealed that he was suffering from throat cancer. Despite his illness and retirement from acting, he appeared earlier this year in a new 10-episode season of Dallas alongside co-stars Linda Gray and Patrick Duffy. His wife, a son and a daughter survive him. • Larry Martin Hagman, actor, born 21 September 1931; died 23 November 2012
  | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Supreme judicial council suspends all court offices and says president made 'unprecedented assault' on its independence Egypt's most senior judges have condemned President Mohamed Morsi for granting himself sweeping new powers which they say amount to an "unprecedented assault" on the independence of the judiciary. The supreme judicial council said work would be suspended in all courts and prosecution offices until the decree passed by the president earlier this week was reversed. The announcement by the top judges, most of whom were appointed by former President Hosni Mubarak, came after tens of thousands of Egyptians took to the streets on Friday to protest against Morsi's decree. The judicial body had previously urged the president on Thursday to "distance this decree from everything that violates the judicial authority". The new edicts give the president near-absolute power and immunity from appeals in courts for any decisions or laws he declares until a new constitution and parliament is in place. Opponents of the decree have called for a large-scale demonstration on Tuesday. In a second day of protests on the streets of Cairo on Saturday, activists threw rocks at riot police, while a few dozen people manned makeshift barricades to keep traffic out of Tahrir Square. The decree has polarised opinion between the newly empowered Islamists, represented by Morsi's Muslim Brotherhood, and their opponents. Leftwing and liberal parties have called for an open-ended sit-in aimed at "toppling" the decree. "We are facing a historic moment in which we either complete our revolution or we abandon it to become prey for a group that has put its narrow party interests above the national interest," the liberal Constitution party said in a statement. Anti-Morsi demonstrators, who accuse the president of having launched a "constitutional coup" on Thursday, were reported to have set fire to the offices of the Muslim Brotherhood's Freedom and Justice party, to which Morsi belongs, in the Suez Canal cities of Suez and Port Said on Friday. Clashes also erupted on Friday between the two sides in the Mediterranean city of Alexandria, the southern city of Assiut and Giza, prompting Essam el-Erian, a leading figure in the FJP, to condemn the attacks as "acts of thuggery hiding behind political forces". While in Cairo, the two opposing camps gathered in large rival rallies. In a packed Tahrir Square, youths opposed to the decree fought intermittent battles with police firing volleys of teargas outside the French Lycée and American University. Morsi's Muslim Brotherhood meanwhile bussed in supporters from across the country to hear him address a rally outside the presidential palace in Heliopolis. Morsi's decree orders the retrial of former president Hosni Mubarak, officials and security force members accused of killings during the country's revolution. Controversially, it also exempts all of Morsi's decisions from legal challenge until a new parliament is elected, as well as offering the same protection to the Islamist-dominated constituent assembly, which is drawing up the country's new constitution. Morsi's aides said the presidential decree was to speed up a protracted democratic transition that has been hindered by legal obstacles. Morsi's rivals, however, were quick to condemn him as a new autocratic pharaoh who wanted to impose his Islamist vision on Egypt. Morsi made the move in a week in which he had been buoyed by accolades from around the world for mediating a truce between Hamas and Israel. "I am for all Egyptians. I will not be biased against any son of Egypt," Morsi said on a stage outside the presidential palace, adding that he was working for social and economic stability and the rotation of power. "Opposition in Egypt does not worry me, but it has to be real and strong," he said in response to his critics.
 | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Pontiff's move follows criticisms that 114-strong body, which will elect his successor, is dominated by European cardinals Pope Benedict XVI has appointed six priests from non-European countries to be cardinals in an apparent bid to increase the global diversity of the senior ranks of the Catholic church. The move follows criticism that the Vatican's college of cardinals, which elects the new pope, is too dominated by cardinals from Europe. The appointment of six new cardinals, from Colombia, India, Lebanon, Nigeria, the Philippines and the United States, is seemingly a reaction by the pope to accusations that priests from the developing world have been under-represented in the church's upper echelons. Speaking at the consistory, or cardinal-making ceremony, in St Peter's Basilica on Saturday, the pope described the cardinals as representing the "unique, universal and all-inclusive identity" of the Catholic church. "In this consistory, I want to highlight in particular the fact that the church is the church of all peoples, and so she speaks in the various cultures of the different continents," he said. By adding six non-Europeans to the 114-strong Vatican college, the pope has slightly shifted the international makeup of the body, although Europeans still make up the majority of members (51%). In February, the pope created 22 new cardinals, including 16 Europeans, seven of whom were Italian. The new cardinals are Archbishop Rubén Salazar Gómez of Bogota, Archbishop James Michael Harvey from the US, His Eminence Bechara Boutros Rai, patriarch of Lebanon's Maronitechurch, Archbishop John Olorunfemi Onaiyekan of Abuja, Archbishop Luis Antonio Tagle of Manila and His Eminence Baselios Cleemis Thottunkal, a major archbishop of the Syro-Malankara rite in India.
 | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Thousands of demonstrators accuse government of corruption and call for prime minister Yingluck Shinawatra to step down Police in Bangkok have fired teargas at thousands of anti-government protestors calling for the overthrow of the Thai government. At least 9,000 people attended the rally, organised by activists who believe the current prime minister, Yingluck Shinawatra, is the puppet of her brother, the deposed former PM Thaksin Shinawatra. Around 17,000 riot police were deployed to contain the protest, with officers firing tear gas at demonstrators who tried to climb over concrete and barbed wire barriers blocking entry to the rally site, Bangkok's Royal Plaza, near the parliament. The rally was organised by the royalist Pitak Siam group, led by retired military general Boonlert Kaewprasit, which accuses Yingluck's government of corruption. The group is supported by the 'yellow shirts' of the People's Alliance for Democracy, who have been involved in destabilising or ousting governments led or backed by Thaksin in 2006 and 2008. Boonlert told supporters: "The world will see this corrupted and cruel government. The world can see the government under a puppet." A police spokesman said five officers had been injured in the skirmishes, two of them seriously, and that 130 demonstrators had been detained, some of them carrying knives and bullets. At clashes near the UN Asia-Pacific headquarters, near the site of the main rally, least seven police were wounded and up to 132 protesters arrested. Yingluck's government has invoked the Internal Security Act, which gives police powers to detain protesters, to carry out security checks, and to set up roadblocks. The demonstration reflects the tensions that have destabilised the country since the army ousted Thaksin Shinawatra in military coup in 2006. Thaksin fled the country in 2008, shortly before being found guilty of abuse of power. Thitinan Pongsudhirak, a political analyst at Chulalongkorn University in Bangkok, said the government's action against the protesters was heavy-handed and could prove counter-productive. He said: "At this stage, the government is more a threat to itself. If it overreacts using an army of policemen that's going to enrage demonstrators and things could get out of control." But he added: "I think it's a serious concern more than a serious threat." Yingluck was elected after a landslide victory in August 2011. She was initially criticised for her lack of political experience but has won praise for leading the country through one of its longest peaceful periods in recent years.
  | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Three children among dead and 30 injured from roadside bomb near Shia Muslim processsion in Sunni area of Dera Ismail Khan At least seven people, including three children, have been killed by a roadside bomb near a Shia Muslim procession in north-western Pakistan. The blast, which also wounded 30 people, happened in the city of Dera Ismail Khan, a stronghold of Sunni Muslim militant groups, according to local police. More attacks are feared in the coming days as the minority Shia Muslims prepare to observe the holy day of Ashura on Sunday, the climax of the holy month of Muharram. No one claimed responsibility, but the suspicion fell on Pakistani Taliban, who have carried out such attacks previously. Ashura commemorates the death of Imam Hussein, the Prophet Muhammad's grandson, in the 7th century. The Sunni-Shia schism over Muhammad's rightful heir dates back to that time. President Asif Ali Zardari condemned the bombing, which took place near the South Waziristan tribal region. "Such nefarious acts cannot deter the people and the government in their fight against the scourge of militancy," he said in a statement. Sunni extremists frequently attack Shia Muslims, who they consider heretics, and the Ashura ceremonies are a prime target. On Wednesday night, a Taliban suicide bomber struck a Shia Muslim procession in Rawalpindi, a garrison city near Islamabad, killing 17 people. The same day, the Taliban set off two bombs outside a Shia mosque in the southern city of Karachi, killing one person and wounding 15 others. Qamar Abbas Zaidi, the spokesman for main Shia political party, Tehrik-e-Jafariya, vowed this week to go ahead with Ashura processions across the country despite threats of attacks. Pakistani authorities have deployed thousands of additional police across the country to heighten security for such processions. Authorities have also suspended mobile phone service in all the major cities for two days to prevent such bombings, which officials say are often remotely detonated by mobile phones.
  | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Palestinian officials want former leader's remains to be examined after traces of polonium-210 were discovered on his clothing The remains of the former Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat are to be exhumed to examine whether he was poisoned. Arafat died in November 2004 in a military hospital in Paris, a month after suddenly falling ill. His medical records put the cause of death as a stroke resulting from a blood disorder. But Palestinian officials have long claimed he was poisoned by Israel and French authorities began a murder inquiry in August following the detection of traces of the lethal radioactive substance polonium-210 on Arafat's clothing. Those tests were inconclusive, and experts said they need to check his remains to learn more. Swiss, French and Russian experts will take samples from Arafat's bones on Tuesday, said Tawfik Tirawi, who heads the Palestinian team investigating the death. Arafat will be reburied the same day with military honours, but the ceremony will be closed to the public, Tirawi said. The new inquiry into Arafat's death began after his widow Soha gave the Palestianian leader's clothes to TV station Al-Jazeera, which then passed them to a Swiss lab for testing. The widow also asked the French government to investigate, while the Palestinian Authority called in Russian experts. Arafat's death has remained a mystery for many. While the immediate cause of death was a stroke, the underlying source of an illness he suffered in his final weeks has never been clear, leading to persistent conspiracy theories that he had cancer, Aids or was poisoned. Many in the Arab world believe Arafat, the face of the Palestinian independence struggle for four decades, was killed by Israel. Israel, which saw Arafat as an obstacle to peace, vehemently denies the charge. There is no guarantee the exhumation will solve the mystery. Polonium-210 is known to rapidly decompose, and experts are divided over whether any remaining samples will be sufficient for testing.
  | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Actor who found fame as the machiavellian Texan oilman in US soap dies in Dallas hospital after battle against throat cancer Larry Hagman, who played one of television's most infamous villains – the amoral oil tycoon JR Ewing – in the longrunning soap Dallas, has died at the age of 81. The actor's family confirmed his death after the Dallas Morning News reported Hagman had died of complications from throat cancer in hospital in the city on Friday. He had suffered from liver cancer and cirrhosis of the liver in the 1990s after decades of drinking. Hagman first found fame in 1965 staring in I Dream of Jeannie, a popular television sitcom in which he played Major Anthony Nelson, an astronaut who discovers a beautiful genie in a bottle. But it was his role as the machiavellian oilman JR Ewing in Dallas that made Hagman an international star. The soap, which ran for 13 seasons from 1978 to 1991, broke viewing records with more than 350m people worldwide tuning in to the cliffhanger 1980 episode to find out "Who shot JR?". Hagman's character became the villain TV viewers loved to hate, grinning wickedly in his Stetson cowboy hat and boots, plotting how to undermine his business rivals, his brother Bobby, and cheat on his long-suffering wife Sue Ellen. His Dallas co-stars joined with his family to pay tribute to the star, who had recently returned to the role of JR in the 2012 revival of the series. "Larry was back in his beloved Dallas re-enacting the iconic role he loved most," his family said in a statement carried by the Morning News. "Larry's family and close friends had joined him in Dallas for the Thanksgiving holiday. When he passed, he was surrounded by loved ones. It was a peaceful passing, just as he had wished for. The family requests privacy at this time." Linda Gray, who plays Sue Ellen, called Hagman her "best friend for 35 years" and was at his bedside when he died, her agent told the BBC. In a statement, she said: "He was the Pied Piper of life and brought joy to everyone he knew. He was creative, generous, funny, loving and talented and I will miss him enormously. He was an original and lived life to the full." Ken Kercheval, who played JR's business rival Cliff Barnes, wrote on Twitter: "A friend and long time partner... the other half … RIP Larry Hagman … your spirit will live long." Hagman, who also appeared in films including Nixon and Primary Colors, was born in Fort Worth, Texas on 21 September 1931, the son of actress Mary Martin and lawyer Ben Hagman, a biography on his official website said. While in England with the US Air Force he met and married his wife of almost 60 years, Swedish designer Maj Axelsson. The couple later had two children. Hagman was diagnosed with cirrhosis of the liver in 1992 and three years later he had a liver transplant. In October last year he discovered a tumour on his tongue and was diagnosed with cancer, and underwent six weeks of chemotherapy and radiation before it went into remission in March. Earlier this year he appeared in a new 10-episode series of Dallas, with a second series in production and due to run next year. Other celebrities took to Twitter and Facebook to express their sadness at his death. Veteran American broadcaster Larry King wrote: "I'm shocked. Larry Hagman was a dear man who had an incredible career. He helped me to stop smoking. He really was a very special person." Barbara Eden, who starred with Hagman in I Dream of Jeannie, published a statement on her Facebook page which read: "I can honestly say that we've lost not just a great actor, not just a television icon, but an element of pure Americana. "Goodbye Larry, there was no one like you before and there will never be anyone like you again."
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