Drake battling to be dismissed from Astroworld crowd crush lawsuits –

On Mar 13, 2024

BANG Showbiz – Mar 13, 2024 / 7:58 am | Story: 476799

‘Star Wars’ actor Michael Culver has died aged 85.

The star, best known for his role as Captain Lorth Needa in the 1980 film ‘The Empire Strikes Back’, passed away last month after a long illness – his agent has revealed.

His character was strangled by Darth Vader in the sci-fi flick in one of the popular franchise’s most memorable death scenes.

Aside from ‘Star Wars’, Culver had a major part in the historical epic ‘A Passage to India’ as the bigoted police inspector Major McBryde.

He also had two uncredited roles in the James Bond films ‘From Russia With Love’ and ‘Thunderball’.

A statement from the actor’s agents read: “We are very sad to confirm the passing of our friend and client Michael Culver.

“A career spanning over 50 years with notable roles in ‘Sherlock Holmes’, ‘A Passage to India’, ‘Secret Army’ and of course one of the most memorable death scenes in the ‘Star Wars’ franchise.

“Michael largely gave up acting in the early 2000s to concentrate his efforts into political activism.

“It’s been an honour to have represented Michael for the last decade and to have taken him to some of the best ‘Star Wars’ events in the UK and Europe.

“A real highlight was taking Michael to Celebration in Chicago in 2019. He was lost for words when he saw his queue line with nearly 200 people waiting to see him.

“We worked with Michael just 3 weeks ago at his last home signing with our friends at Elite Signatures.

“Michael died on Tuesday 27th February at the age of 85. We miss him.”

Fan community The Star Wars Underworld also paid tribute to Culver, writing on the social media platform X: “We are saddened to report that actor Michael Culver has passed away at the age of 85.

“Culver was best known to ‘Star Wars’ fans for portraying Captain Lorth Needa in ‘The Empire Strikes Back’.

“He also had a variety of roles across many stage, screen and radio productions.”

BANG Showbiz – Mar 13, 2024 / 6:08 am | Story: 476788

Drake is fighting to be dismissed from the web of lawsuits linked to the fatal crowd crush horror at Travis Scott’s 2021 Astroworld festival.

The rapper, 37, was a surprise guest at the Houston festival was questioned for hours in a deposition tied to the hundreds of cases that have been filed in Harris County after the fan rush that caused the deaths of 10 people and left hundreds of others injured.

Drake was named in the lawsuits despite him stressing he had no involvement in the planning or the organisation and, according to Billboard, a new motion filed in Houston shows attorneys for the singer – born Aubrey Drake Graham – are arguing he should never have been involved in the cases.

The lawyers say Drake he had no involvement beyond being asking to join Travis, 32, on stage, and stated festival bosses had “confirmed under oath that Mr Graham was not involved in any planning”.

Attorneys also argued Drake was unaware of any safety problems before taking to the stage, stating: “Mr Graham did not receive any security briefings, was not informed of any crowd control issues, injuries or deaths in the crowd, or any stop show orders at any time either before or during his 14-minute performance.”

They added Drake instead “arrived at the venue at approximately 7.30pm and remained largely secluded backstage in a trailer until approximately 9.54pm”, before he was “informed to take the stage”.

Drake was then said to have “immediately” taken the stage “as requested”, performing for “approximately 14 minutes” before exiting the stage at 10.08pm.

Lawyers also said “hundreds of hours” of depositions and “hundreds of thousands of pages” had found no evidence Drake could be held liable for negligence.

They said: “Plaintiffs produce no evidence that Mr. Graham actually knew of any risk in the Festival site design and layout, competence or adequacy of Festival staffing and personnel, or emergency procedures such as show stop authority.”

The alleged victims will reportedly have a chance to respond to Drake’s motion in the weeks ahead.

Travis has said he was “absolutely devastated” by the festival tragedy, saying he will “always think about it”.

BANG Showbiz – Mar 13, 2024 / 6:06 am | Story: 476787

Smokey Robinson is being lined up for his first Glastonbury headline slot.

Big name acts are said to have dropped out of spots on the Pyramid Stage ahead of this summer’s festival on Worthy Farm, Somerset, and it’s now emerged organizer Emily Eavis has been in talks about having the 84-year-old soul icon perform.

Smokey told The Sun at Sir Elton John’s Oscars party in Los Angeles about being approached: “We’ve been talking about that for the past two weeks – probably soon.

“(Glastonbury is) one of the things we’ve been talking about.”

Smokey added he would…