‘I needed to be locked up’: how Kavana went from 90s pop stardom to smoking crack in a skip – and bounced back

He was a teen singer with his dream career. But then his life fell apart. Anthony Kavanagh talks about sex work, addiction and the years he spent being forced to hide his sexuality

Nobody could say that Anthony Kavanagh does not know how to laugh at himself. The day he was fired from his record label, he trudged across London in the rain, walking and walking, as the realisation sank in that he was no longer a pop star. Soaked, he went into a pub and the woman behind the bar offered him a grubby tea towel to dry off. Washed-up indeed, he thought.

His memoir, Pop Scars, is sprinkled with darkly comic takes on what his life had become after 90s pop stardom. Known as Kavana, he had a Top 10 hit in 1997 with his cover of Shalamar’s I Can Make You Feel Good. “I’ve always somehow been able to find the humour, even at some of the darker times,” he says.

Published: July 15, 2025, 4:00 am

The shining: my trip to the G7 horror show with Emmanuel Macron | Emmanuel Carrère

Deeply unpopular in France, President Macron relishes the international stage, where he projects himself as the leader best placed to handle Trump. Seven years after our last encounter, I joined him as he prepared for battle

Nuuk, the capital of Greenland, is a small jumble of orange prefab buildings and low grey apartment blocks nestled on a stony outcrop on the edge of the ocean. There are no trees, but there’s a hill topped by the statue of Hans Egede, the Danish-Norwegian missionary who evangelised the world’s biggest island in the 18th century and which, as such, is threatened with removal by Inuit anti-colonialists. It was at his feet that I awaited the helicopters bringing back the Greenlandic prime minister, Jens-Frederik Nielsen, the Danish prime minister, Mette Frederiksen, and the French president, Emmanuel Macron – referred to throughout this trip as “PR”, short for président de la république – from their excursion on the ice.

Published: July 15, 2025, 4:00 am

In Gaza, we know why Israel wants to herd us all into one camp – our lives are bargaining chips | Nour Abo Aisha

We’ve fled the attacks again and again. Now Israel plans to force us into the ruins of Rafah in order to increase pressure on Hamas

After 21 months of war, the Israeli minister of defence, Israel Katz, has proposed a new initiative to force all Palestinians in Gaza into a camp on the ruins of Rafah.

I lived west of Gaza city, just five minutes away from the beach. I used to see the waves from the roof of our house. The area was marvellous, with luxury architecture, hotels and tourist resorts.

Nour Abo Aisha is a freelance writer based in Gaza

Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here.

Published: July 14, 2025, 6:15 pm

Gaming in their golden years: why millions of seniors are playing video games

Adults over the age of 50 represent nearly a third of US gamers and are becoming more visible in the mainstream

Michelle Statham’s preferred game is Call of Duty. It’s fast and frenetic, involving military and espionage campaigns inspired by real history. She typically spends six hours a day livestreaming to Twitch, chatting to her more than 110,000 followers from her home in Washington state. She boasts about how she’ll beat opponents, and says “bless your heart” while hurtling over rooftops to avoid clusterstrikes of enemy fire. When she’s hit, she “respawns” – or comes back to life at a checkpoint – and jumps right back into the fray.

The military shooter game has a predominantly young male user base, but Statham’s Twitch handle is TacticalGramma – a nod to the 60-year-old’s two grandkids. Her lifelong gaming hobby has become an income stream (she prefers to keep her earnings private, but says she has raised “thousands” for charity), as well as a way to have fun, stay sharp and connect socially.

Published: July 14, 2025, 4:00 pm

Superman: identity crises, fascist space holograms and a super furry animal – discuss with spoilers

Has director James Gunn reinvented the superhero film – or just lovingly detonated it? Let’s have a deep dive into the new Man of Steel movie

• This article contains spoilers for Superman

James Gunn’s Superman is a curious film: so earnest, so heartfelt, and so defiantly weird it sometimes feels less like a reboot of the world’s most iconic superhero and more like an elaborate fan project. Most of us will be relieved we’ve said goodbye to the heavy metal space Jesus of the Zack Snyder years, and that Gunn has avoided paying too much retro cosplay tribute to the Christopher Reeve era. This is undeniably a Superman we’ve never seen before on the big screen: a Kal-El who’s deeply human, flawed, and more likable for it.

The new Man of Steel, played with boyish charm and the right amount of golden retriever energy by David Corenswet, spends most of the movie juggling black holes, battling clone siblings, and dealing with the looming realisation that his space dad might have been one bad day away from full-blown genocide. And yet there’s always the sneaking suspicion he would break off from all this in a second if you asked him to fix your router and play Enya until your existential dread subsides.

Published: July 14, 2025, 5:06 pm

From awol to A-lister: how pop stars from Charli xcx to Addison Rae found the fun in fame again

Despite their predecessors stressing the horrors of pop success, a new cohort are hungry for it, reflecting the ambitions of spotlight-hungry gen Z and the shamelessness of Trump 2.0 life

On Lorde’s 2021 album Solar Power, the New Zealand pop star ditched fame. She threw her phone in the sea, sang “if you’re looking for a saviour, well, that’s not me” and advised looking to nature for answers instead. But her sun-bleached third album proved divisive, so much so that just a year later, she placated fans by promising she was making “bangers” again. This April, her comeback single What Was That returned to the incandescent synth-pop of her beloved 2017 album Melodrama; her new album Virgin opens: “It’s a beautiful life so why play truant? / I jerk tears and they pay me to do it.” Lorde was back roaming the streets, swapping Auckland fishing trips for New York Citi Bike rides, addicted to her phone again, playing Glastonbury at 11.30am and then disappearing to get high at Four Tet.

Where Solar Power was introverted, Virgin is hungry for experience and connection, sticky with sweat and other bodily fluids. But it’s also still preoccupied with the cost of finding fame at the age of 16 and how to carry it at age 28. The erratic album has divided critics again: is the sometimes spindly sound and lyrical status anxiety another attempt by Lorde to push listeners away? Or are the intermittent Melodrama 2.0 bangers her giving in to expectation? Ever alert to her own myth, she said recently: “I just am this person who’s meant to make these bangers that fuck us all up.”

Published: July 14, 2025, 3:07 pm

Ukrainians hail Melania Trump for challenging husband’s faith in Putin

US first lady celebrated as ‘Agent Melania Trumpenko’ for noting Russian leader’s duplicity

• Europe live – latest updates

Ukrainians are celebrating Melania Trump on social media in a series of memes, after Donald Trump suggested the first lady played a part in his apparent change of heart over Russia.

Speaking at a meeting in the White House on Monday with the Nato secretary general, Mark Rutte, Trump said his wife had played a key role in pointing out Vladimir Putin’s duplicity.

Published: July 15, 2025, 9:48 am

US supreme court allows Trump to resume gutting education department

Justices lift federal judge’s order that reinstated nearly 1,400 workers affected by mass firings in win for president

The US supreme court on Monday cleared the way for Donald Trump’s administration to resume dismantling the Department of Education as part of his bid to shrink the federal government’s role in education in favor of more control by the states.

In the latest high court win for the president, the justices lifted a federal judge’s order that had reinstated nearly 1,400 workers affected by mass firings at the department and blocked the administration from transferring key functions to other federal agencies. A legal challenge is continuing to play out in lower courts.

Published: July 14, 2025, 8:48 pm

UN’s Albanese hails 30-nation meeting aimed at ending Israeli occupation of Palestine

The Hague Group aims to agree political, economic and legal actions in ‘existential hour’ for Israel and Palestine

The UN rapporteur hit with sanctions by the US last week has vowed not to be silenced as she hailed a 30-nation conference aimed at ending Israel’s occupation of Palestine as “the most significant political development in the past 20 months”.

Francesca Albanese will say the two-day gathering in Bogotá, Colombia, starting on Tuesday and including China, Spain and Qatar, comes at “an existential hour” for Israel and the Palestinian people.

Published: July 15, 2025, 4:00 am

China’s economy beats expectations in face of Trump’s trade war

GDP grows 5.2% in second quarter as world’s second largest economy ‘front-loads’ shipments before tariffs kick in

• Business live – latest updates

China’s economy grew more strongly than expected in the second quarter as it proved resilient in the face of Donald Trump’s trade war.

China’s gross domestic product (GDP) grew 5.2% in April to June compared with a year earlier, slowing from 5.4% in the first quarter, but just ahead of analysts’ expectations for a rise of 5.1%.

Published: July 15, 2025, 9:55 am

Republicans complain to Canada over wildfire smoke despite supporting planet-heating bill

Lawmakers send letter railing against ‘suffocating’ smoke days after voting for Trump plan likely to boost pollution

A group of Republican lawmakers has complained that smoke from Canadian wildfires is ruining summer for Americans, just days after voting for a major bill that will cause more of the planet-heating pollution that is worsening wildfires.

In a letter sent to Canada’s ambassador to the US, six Republican members of Congress wrote that wildfire smoke from Canada has been an issue for several years and recently their voters “have had to deal with suffocating Canadian wildfire smoke filling the air to begin the summer”.

Published: July 15, 2025, 10:00 am

Boy in Minnesota survives fall that sent arrow through his brain: ‘It’s a miracle’

Gus, nine, fell face-first on arrow, which penetrated his head and came within less than an inch of exiting his skull

A hospital in Minnesota was left in disbelief after a nine-year-old boy survived an accidental fall that sent an arrow through his brain and nearly out the back of his skull.

Abby Deterding recently told the Minneapolis news station KARE “it’s a miracle” that the freak mishap did not kill her son, Gus. “We’re just thankful, so grateful,” she said.

Published: July 15, 2025, 10:00 am

Footage shows flood water gushing into New York subway station during heavy rain – video

Heavy rain swept across parts of the U.S. Northeast on Monday night, inundating sections of New York and New Jersey with flash flooding that stranded vehicles in roadways, closed subway lines and led to the declaration of a state of emergency. In New York City, some subway service was suspended while other lines were running with severe delays due to flooding, according to the Metropolitan Transportation Authority.

Published: July 15, 2025, 9:54 am

Trump administration dashes hopes of anti-pollution plan for JD Vance’s home town

The $1.6bn Biden-era plan for a gas-powered blast furnace at a steel mill in Middletown, Ohio, is indefinitely on hold

A Biden-era plan to implement a gas-powered blast furnace at a steel mill in Ohio, which would have eliminated tons of greenhouse gases from the local environment year over year and created more than a thousand jobs, has been put on hold indefinitely by the Trump administration.

Experts and locals say the setback could greatly affect the health and financial state of those living around the mill.

Published: July 15, 2025, 10:00 am

Trump says Club World Cup trophy will remain in Oval Office after tournament’s end

• US president was given trophy earlier this year

• Chelsea won newly expanded tournament on Sunday

US president Donald Trump has claimed that the Club World Cup trophy that has featured prominently in the Oval Office will stay there, and that Fifa made a copy of the trophy that was awarded to Chelsea after their win in the tournament’s final on Sunday.

Trump attended the final along with numerous members of his cabinet and Fifa president Gianni Infantino. The pair of presidents jointly presented the trophy to Chelsea captain Reece James, with Trump staying front-and-center despite the apparent confusion of Chelsea players and the pleading of Infantino.

Published: July 14, 2025, 7:45 pm

Who is Dan Bongino? FBI deputy at center of Maga fallout over Epstein files

Bongino appears to be on course to be the Trump administration’s first casualty of the Epstein files fallout

The future of the deputy FBI director, Dan Bongino, is unclear after he stormed out of a meeting with Pam Bondi, the attorney general, and told friends he was considering quitting over the controversy surrounding Jeffrey Epstein.

Bongino, a former New York police officer and Secret Service agent who helped protect George W Bush and Barack Obama, appears on course to be the Trump administration’s first casualty of the Epstein fallout, which is threatening to split the “Make America great again” (Maga) movement

Published: July 15, 2025, 1:04 am

Trump news at a glance: president threatens 100% tariff on Russia and says he is keeping Club World Cup trophy

Trump gives Putin a deadline to make peace; president claims trophy given to cup winners Chelsea is copy of Oval Office one. Key US politics stories from Monday 14 July at a glance

Donald Trump has said he sealed an agreement with Nato allies that will deliver Patriot missiles and other key arms to Ukraine – and warned Russia it would face severe sanctions if the war did not end within 50 days.

Unveiling the military assistance deal, the US president expressed increased frustration with Vladimir Putin, whom he accused of giving the impression of pursuing peace while intensifying attacks on Ukrainian cities. He gave the Russian president a new deadline of 50 days to make peace or face 100% tariffs on Russian goods, and more importantly, sweeping “secondary tariffs”, suggesting trade sanctions would be imposed on countries that continue to pay for Russian oil and other commodities.

Published: July 14, 2025, 11:48 pm

Pam Bondi fires US justice department’s top ethics adviser

Move is latest in series of dismissals as Trump and allies seek retribution against civil servants in the agency

The US attorney general, Pam Bondi, fired the justice department’s top ethics adviser on Friday, the latest in a series of dismissals that comes as Donald Trump and allies have sought retribution against civil servants in the agency.

Joseph Tirrell, who had served as the head of the justice department’s ethics office, since 2023, revealed he had been fired in a post on LinkedIn. He shared Bondi’s letter to him, which misspelled his name and did not give a reason for his termination.

Published: July 14, 2025, 9:56 pm

US dairy industry to remove synthetic dyes from ice-cream, RFK Jr says

Dairy officials tout ‘great day for “Maha”’ as Trump officials claim deal leads to healthier options, especially for children

In what Trump administration officials dubbed a “major announcement”, health and agriculture department leaders said the US dairy industry agreed to voluntarily remove synthetic dyes from ice-cream.

The announcement continues the Trump administration’s pattern of voluntary agreements with industry – from health insurers to snack food makers.

Published: July 14, 2025, 9:30 pm

Irish tourist jailed by Ice for months after overstaying US visit by three days: ‘Nobody is safe’

Exclusive: For roughly 100 days, Thomas says he faced harsh detention conditions, despite agreeing to deportation

Thomas, a 35-year-old tech worker and father of three from Ireland, came to West Virginia to visit his girlfriend last fall. It was one of many trips he had taken to the US, and he was authorized to travel under a visa waiver program that allows tourists to stay in the country for 90 days.

He had planned to return to Ireland in December, but was briefly unable to fly due to a health issue, his medical records show. He was only three days overdue to leave the US when an encounter with police landed him in Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) custody.

Published: July 15, 2025, 10:00 am

‘I have a huge case brewing’: US readers’ frustrations with cancelling various subscriptions

Readers share their experiences after a US appeals court vacated the FTC’s ‘click-to-cancel’ rule

Cancelling subscriptions could continue to be a grueling process after the US court of appeals for the eighth circuit vacated the Federal Trade Commission’s “click-to-cancel” rule, which would have required companies to allow consumers to cancel subscriptions using the same method they used to sign up.

The court’s decision came down due to the commission behind it failing to follow required procedures under the FTC Act. In response, the Guardian asked readers to share their experiences while trying to cancel their various subscriptions - from Hulu, to Roblox, to dating apps. These are their stories.

Published: July 15, 2025, 10:00 am

Diljit Dosanjh is one of the biggest Asian stars in the world. So why can’t Indian cinemagoers see his latest film?

Sardaar Ji 3 is breaking box office records despite not being released to its most famous actor’s home audience

He is number one in the UK list of top 50 Asian celebrities in the world, has headlined arenas in the UK, US and across Europe as part of his sold-out Dil-Luminati world tour, and recently strutted the Met Gala carpet in an ivory-toned turban.

But despite Diljit Dosanjh’s stellar status, the Punjabi actor-singer has been caught in a cultural and political row that has halted the Indian release of his latest movie, Sardaar Ji 3.

Published: July 15, 2025, 5:00 am

Could giving this pod of dolphins the same legal rights as humans help keep them safe?

With a bottlenose population threatened by fishing gear, boats and pollution, campaigners on South Korea’s Jeju island are lobbying to extend legal status to the vulnerable cetaceans

It is a beautiful sunny day on the island of Jeju in South Korea and as the boat cuts through the water all seems calm and clear. Then they start to appear – one telltale fin and then another. Soon, a pod of eight or nine dolphins can be seen moving through the sea, seemingly following the path of the boat.

But as they start to jump and dive, fins cutting through the air, it becomes apparent that one dolphin is missing the appendage, his body breaking the surface but without the telltale profile of his companions. His name, given to him by a local environmental group, is Orae, which literally translates as “long”, but in this context means “wishing him a long life”.

Published: July 15, 2025, 2:00 am

‘He didn’t think he was a good man’: new book reveals unseen portrait of JFK

In an exhaustively researched new book, J Randy Taraborrelli looks at the private, public and secret lives of the president

J Randy Taraborrelli has already written five books on the Kennedy family but his sixth, JFK: Public, Private, Secret, is his first that’s directly about John F Kennedy, 35th US president from 1961 until his assassination in Dallas two years later.

“I have been writing about the Kennedys from Jackie’s perspective for 25 years,” Taraborrelli said, referring to Jacqueline Kennedy, the first lady who lived for another 30 years after he was shot, a figure of worldwide fascination.

Published: July 15, 2025, 9:13 am

Toni at Random by Dana A Williams review – the editorial years of a literary great

This illuminating account of Toni Morrison’s time at Random House reveals her determination to relate the ideas and words of black America

While a great deal has been written about Toni Morrison’s fiction, her work as a senior editor at Random House is less well known. Dana A Williams, professor of African American Literature at Howard University, sets out to fill this gap, offering an impeccably researched account of Morrison’s stint at Random House between 1971 and 1983, against the backdrop of the Civil Rights and the Black Arts movements. Reflecting ideas generated by that convergence, Morrison’s novels – described by the Nobel committee, when they awarded her the prize in literature in 1993, as giving life to an essential aspect of American reality – were driven by an unwavering belief in the possibility of African American empowerment through self-regard. Williams’s interest lies in showing how Morrison’s editorial career was informed by the same invigoratingly insular ethos. Whether writing or editing, her work was aimed at producing “explorations of interior Black life with minimal interest in talking to or being consumed by an imagined white reader”.

Morrison saw early on how that kind of insularity could be wielded as both a weapon and a shield. Addressing the Second National Conference of Afro-American Writers at Howard in 1976, she urged the audience to recognise that “the survival of Black publishing, which […] is a sort of way of saying the survival of Black writing, will depend on the same things that the survival of Black anything depends on, which is the energies of Black people – sheer energy, inventiveness and innovation, tenacity, the ability to hang on, and a contempt for those huge, monolithic institutions and agencies which do obstruct us”. These words could well have been repurposed as a mission statement for her editorial career, which, as Williams points out, consisted of “[making] a revolution, one book at a time”. Change was coming in America. Morrison’s contribution would be to work towards change in the overwhelmingly white world of publishing: “I thought it was important for people to be in the streets,” she said during an interview for the documentary Toni Morrison: The Pieces I Am, released in 2019. “But that couldn’t last. You needed a record. It would be my job to publish the voices, the books, the ideas of African Americans. And that would last.”

Published: July 15, 2025, 6:00 am

‘Don’t ever assume there’s anything to eat!’ 29 tips for perfect vegan holidays, from where to go to how to order

Nowhere should be out of bounds just because you have a plant-based diet. Seasoned travellers explain how to stay happy and hunger-free, whether you’re trekking in Thailand or on a mini-break in Berlin

This spring, I spent five weeks travelling around Mexico – my longest time away from home since becoming a vegan two and a half years ago. It was a learning experience: lots of incredible vegan food, gallons of fall-back guacamole and the odd cheese-related disaster. This is what I found out about being a vegan on holiday, and the advice I received from more seasoned vegan travellers.

Published: July 15, 2025, 9:00 am

‘I would go-go dance in a shower then work on sonnets!’ Ncuti Gatwa’s sexy new Shakespearean drama

After surviving the whirlwind of Doctor Who, the actor returns to the stage in ‘horny Elizabethan drama’ Born With Teeth. He and co-star Edward Bluemel discuss bust lips, hot pants and queering the Bard’s story

‘I think of it as a very sexy, dangerous game of Elizabethan cat and mouse.” Ncuti Gatwa is describing his new project with the Royal Shakespeare Company, a two-hander about William Shakespeare and fellow playwright Christopher “Kit” Marlowe. In Born With Teeth, Will and Kit collaborate on a play about Henry VI – for “collaborate”, read flirt, fight and ruminate betrayal.

Gatwa plays Marlowe and Shakespeare is Edward Bluemel; the pair last worked together on TV’s Sex Education. Bluemel followed that series about horny teens with playing a vampire (A Discovery of Witches), an MI6 agent (Killing Eve) and a brooding lord (My Lady Jane), while Gatwa was cast as one of the Kens in the Barbie movie and starred in a little thing called Doctor Who.

Published: July 15, 2025, 4:00 am

‘A rarefied world of privilege’: lives of the New England upper class – in pictures

Tina Barney’s decades-long exploration of the bourgeois set her family belonged to reveals the strange rituals and claustrophobic banality of rich people’s every day lives

Published: July 15, 2025, 6:00 am

I was on New York’s rent board. Zohran Mamdani’s ideas aren’t pie in the sky | Leah Goodridge

The Democratic mayoral candidate has faced controversy over his calls for a rent freeze. But the plan has plenty of precedent

During the New York City mayoral primary campaign, Zohran Mamdani’s proposal for a citywide rent freeze became a contentious topic. The Democratic nominee says to achieve a cap on annual rent increases for the city’s 1m rent-stabilized apartments, he would appoint members to the city’s rent guidelines board who support it. Critics decry a rent freeze as a pie-in-the-sky, unrealistic proposal.

I served as a rent guidelines board member for nearly four years, appointed by then mayor Bill de Blasio in 2018. And it’s clear this controversy isn’t just about rent freezes – there’s a larger agenda to deregulate rent-stabilized housing, under which rent ceilings prevent landlords from raising the rent too high and tenants must be offered renewal leases (unless the landlord shows legal reason not to).

Published: July 14, 2025, 12:00 pm

Women born in East Germany have lived between two worlds. That’s why we’re shaking up art and politics | Carolin Würfel

The stories of curator Kathleen Reinhardt and provenance expert Lynn Rother show how exclusion can be turned to powerful insight

In February 1990, the German news magazine Der Spiegel ran the headline “Why are they still coming?”, adding: “In West Germany, hatred for immigrants from the GDR could soon reach boiling point.” That year, resentment towards so-called newcomers from the east erupted without restraint. East Germans were insulted in the streets, shelters were attacked and children from the former GDR were bullied at school. There was a widespread fear that the weekly influx of thousands of people would overwhelm the welfare system and crash the housing and job markets. The public consensus? It needed to stop.

That same year, Kathleen Reinhardt and her parents moved from Thuringia in the former GDR to Bavaria. She was in primary school, and her new classmates greeted her with lines such as: “You people come here and take our jobs. You don’t even know how to work properly.”

Published: July 15, 2025, 4:00 am

Measles cases are surging in Europe and the US. This is what the anti-vax conspiracy theory has brought us

Nearly 30 years after Andrew Wakefield’s discredited study linking the MMR vaccine and autism, we badly need an injection of rationality

It’s easy to say in hindsight, but also true, that even when the anti-vax movement was in its infancy in the late 90s before I had kids, let alone knew what you were supposed to vaccinate them against, I could smell absolute garbage. After all, Andrew Wakefield, a doctor until he was struck off in 2010, was not the first crank to dispute the safety and effectiveness of childhood vaccines. There was a movement against the diphtheria-tetanus-whooping cough vaccine in the 1970s in the UK, and a similar one in the US in the early 1980s. The discovery of vaccination in the first place was not without its critics, and enough people to form a league opposed the smallpox rollout in the early 1800s on the basis that it was unchristian to share tissue with an animal.

So Wakefield’s infamous Lancet study, in which he claimed a link between the MMR (measles, mumps and rubella) vaccine and autism, going as far as to pin down the exact mechanism by which one led to the other, was new only in so far as it had all the branding of reputable research, when in fact it was maleficent woo-woo, a phenomenon as old as knowledge. It was noticeable, though, that it fell on parched ground – a lot of people were very keen for it to be true. That was partly simple news appetite: vaccines are inherently boring. Devised by humans co-operating with one another, motivated by nothing more complicated than a desire to help the species – and indiscriminately, no one baby more worthy of protection than any other – there is no animating conflict here, nothing hidden, no complexity. Is there anything more tedious than humanity at its finest? So wouldn’t it be at least piquant if it turned out to be a giant mistake?

Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here.

Published: July 14, 2025, 2:12 pm

Rage against the machines: ignore the fury at Wimbledon, AI in sport works | Sean Ingle

In the fevered environments within sporting arenas, anything that can help an official has to be a good thing

We are all suckers for a good story. And there was certainly a cracking two‑parter at Wimbledon this year. First came the news that 300 line judges had been replaced by artificial intelligence robots. Then, a few days later, it turned out there were some embarrassing gremlins in the machine. Not since Roger Federer hung up his Wilson racket has there been a sweeter spot hit during the Wimbledon fortnight.

First the new electronic line-judging system failed to spot that Sonay Kartal had whacked a ball long during her match against Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova – which led to the Russian losing a game she otherwise would have won. Although, ironically, it happened only because an official had accidentally switched the system off.

Published: July 15, 2025, 7:00 am

I’m not keen on the Clooneys’ ‘no phones’ rule for guests | Emma Beddington

Amal Clooney says the policy allows for ‘safe and frank’ conversation. But what if you want to show George a cool meme of an anteater posing?

Would you willingly surrender your phone if you were invited to the Clooneys’? Because that’s the deal, apparently. “I now have a phone basket that I use to take everyone’s phones away!” Amal Clooney recently told Glamour magazine in a rather stilted “conversation” with the cosmetics diva Charlotte Tilbury. “It’s important to get that balance where you have time alone with your family and with your friends where people feel like you can have a safe and frank exchange,” she explained.

Hmm. I’m fine with shoes-off households (although you reap what you sow when it comes to the state of my socks or my toes). But the phone basket is reminiscent of those aggressively jocular pub signs that say: “No wifi – talk to each other.” What if you’re dealing with a family or work situation, need to hide in the loo and stroke your shiny pocket rectangle to recharge your social batteries, or want to show George a cool meme of an anteater posing? Yes, the Clooneys are the A-est of A-list, with attendant privacy concerns and young children. But if you can’t trust people to behave properly, what are they doing in your home?

Published: July 14, 2025, 10:00 am

Our Médecins Sans Frontières staff are being killed in Gaza. Why are UK ministers enabling that? | Natalie Roberts

We have warned the government repeatedly: the response has been pathetic. Britain has a duty to act morally, and stop supporting this genocide

• Dr Natalie Roberts is the executive director of Médecins Sans Frontières UK

Our colleague Abdullah Hammad was killed last week by Israeli forces as he waited to collect flour from an aid truck in Khan Younis. He is the 12th Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) colleague to have been killed in Gaza since October 2023. The Israeli-US food distribution scheme forces people in Gaza to choose between starvation and risking their life for minimal supplies. With more than 500 people killed and nearly 4,000 wounded while seeking food, this scheme has had the effect of luring desperate people in with aid, only for them to be slaughtered by the Israeli armed forces.

This is part of the genocide that is being committed in Gaza. And the UK government is complicit.

Dr Natalie Roberts is the executive director of Médecins Sans Frontières UK

Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here.

Published: July 14, 2025, 7:00 am

The Guardian view on Europe’s Trump challenge: Brussels must hold its nerve and think big | Editorial

A renewed threat of punitive tariffs from the White House is a reminder that the EU must invest in its own values in a volatile and transforming world

As the world has grown used to Donald Trump delivering aggressive ultimatums that are then revised or watered down, the shock-and-awe effect of a presidential edict on Truth Social has somewhat diminished. On Saturday, Mr Trump unexpectedly announced that the United States would hit the European Union with swingeing tariffs on goods of 30% from 1 August. That certainly prompted urgent weekend discussions in Brussels, Paris and Berlin. But for now, the European Commission president, Ursula von der Leyen, is placing all countermeasures on hold, in the hope that what the German chancellor, Friedrich Merz, described as “reasonable solutions” can be found.

Given the stakes, betting on the success of a softly, softly approach to trade negotiations remains sensible. Mr Trump’s previous imposition of 25% tariffs on European carmakers (on top of the pre-existing 2.5% rate) has already panicked German manufacturers in particular. But the president’s attempts to further batter Europe into economic submission, risking a trade war with an ally and threatening an annual €1.7tn worth of commercial activity, would be likely to trigger another market backlash if taken to the brink.

Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here.

Published: July 14, 2025, 5:58 pm

The Guardian view on a climate reckoning: an annual address could set a new standard for political accountability | Editorial

The energy secretary framed environmental action as practical and patriotic, not in terms of wordy ideological pieties. But holding the line won’t be easy

Ed Miliband is a target for the political right; not because he’s irrelevant, but because he’s effective. The bacon sandwich gags and “Red Ed” jokes mask a deeper unease: that Mr Miliband, with his dogged insistence on science, public investment and long-term thinking, is right. Now, as energy secretary, he has delivered what he calls an exercise in “radical truth-telling” and a stark warning to MPs that rejecting climate action is a betrayal of future generations. The language, for once, isn’t overblown. It’s belated.

By highlighting the Met Office’s annual State of the UK Climate report, Mr Miliband shows that the hotter, wetter and more arduous future we feared has already arrived. Extremes are becoming the norm: the number of very hot days has quadrupled; in the last 250 years, six of the 10 wettest winter half-years have occurred in the 21st century. Britons experience this in cancelled hospital appointments, flooded homes and hosepipe bans.

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Published: July 14, 2025, 5:59 pm

Bigger, better, more often? Infantino won’t let up on his ambition for Club World Cup

With claims of 2bn TV views, $2.1bn revenues and a push for it to go every two years, Infantino’s pet project is here to stay

All that can be said with certainty about the future of the Club World Cup is that it is not going away. The 24-carat gold Tiffany trophy presented to Reece James by Donald Trump in New Jersey, in one of the most surreal scenes seen in a sports stadium, will be up for grabs again in four years. The event could well be bigger, Fifa intends it to be better and the presentation will surely not be as brash.

Gianni Infantino was widely criticised for imposing the Club World Cup on an indifferent sporting public, against a backdrop of hostility from players’ unions and domestic leagues, but his belief that top clubs would back his vision has been vindicated, albeit largely because of the $1bn (£740m) prize fund. With Chelsea banking £85m for winning seven matches, others are keen for a slice of the pie.

Published: July 15, 2025, 7:00 am

Former NFL QB Bridgewater suspended from high school coaching job

The former Lions QB has been suspended while under investigation for allegedly providing impermissible benefits

Former NFL quarterback Teddy Bridgewater has been suspended from his position as a high school football coach in Miami while under investigation for allegedly providing impermissible benefits.

Bridgewater, 32, confirmed his suspension by Miami Northwestern in a Facebook post on Sunday but said he remains committed to his alma mater.

Published: July 14, 2025, 9:53 pm

Tour de France 2025: Ben Healy rides into yellow as Simon Yates storms to stage 10 win

• Healy becomes first Irishman in 38 years in maillot jaune

• Giro winner Yates takes his third career Tour stage win

The Bastille Day stage of the 2025 Tour de France ended with an Englishman winning in the Auvergne, an Irishman in yellow, and a French hope falling by the wayside, as Tadej Pogacar and Jonas Vingegaard called a truce on the eve of the first rest day.

Simon Yates took a third career stage win in the Tour, only a few weeks after his unexpected success in the Giro d’Italia, dropping the last of his breakaway companions on the uphill finish to Puy de Sancy, while Ireland’s Ben Healy claimed the first yellow jersey of his career.

Published: July 14, 2025, 4:27 pm

Cole Palmer’s Chelsea finally believe they are Premier League contenders | Jacob Steinberg

Aggressive, motivated, extremely talented and now champions of the world, Enzo Maresca’s squad have the confidence and real depth

When Chelsea won the Conference League in May, a victory secured by the standard ice‑cold Cole Palmer performance in a final, the reaction was restrained and there was no internal talk of an impending title challenge. Now the vibe is different. It is hard not to dream when Chelsea perform as they did against Paris Saint‑Germain in the final of the Club World Cup.

Nobody is getting carried away. Chelsea know what the rest of us know, which is that they are not the best team in the world. They are not the finished article. They are young and still have much to learn. Yet there is a gold badge on the shirt for the next four years and if Chelsea woke up feeling $100m on Monday morning it will not only have been because of the prize money made during their month in the US.

Published: July 14, 2025, 4:46 pm

Sinner’s Wimbledon focus was unblinking on every point – Alcaraz is playing catch-up | Tumaini Carayol

Italian overcame heartbreak in French Open final and now moves on to his favoured hard courts for US Open buildup

With his hopes of a third consecutive Wimbledon title fading desperately with every point, Carlos Alcaraz sat in his chair on Centre Court after conceding the third set of his final with Jannik Sinner and unloaded his thoughts on his team: “From the back of the court, he is much better than me. Much better than me! Much [better]! It’s like this,” Alcaraz said, gesturing with his hands to demonstrate the vast gap between his greatest rival and himself.

His assessment was not wrong. From a set down, Sinner put together a supreme performance to overturn five consecutive defeats against Alcaraz and win his first Wimbledon title, avenging the most difficult loss in his career – his French Open final defeat by Alcaraz in June – at the earliest opportunity.

Published: July 14, 2025, 3:46 pm

Premier League fans in Asia want to feel valued – and not just as a source of revenue

Pre-season trips to Asia may not be new for English clubs, but they remain a huge global engagement opportunity

Fifty years ago, Arsenal lost 2-0 to Malaysia in Kuala Lumpur, with jet-lagged players struggling to deal with frogs bouncing around the Merdeka Stadium pitch as well as the legendary local striker Mokhtar Dahari.

Since then, however, many aspects of Asian tours by English clubs have changed. They have become, mostly, slick affairs. This summer, Arsenal will visit neighbouring Singapore for games against Newcastle and Milan. Then to Hong Kong for an unusual north London derby against a Tottenham team that will also travel to South Korea to face Newcastle. Liverpool visit Japan and Hong Kong just weeks after Manchester United were in action there on a post-season tour, which they finished in Malaysia.

Published: July 15, 2025, 7:00 am

US men to host friendlies against Australia and Ecuador in October international window

• The US will play Australia in Colorado on 14 October

• Game v Ecuador in Austin, Texas set for 10 October

The US men’s national team will play friendlies against Ecuador and Australia in the October Fifa international window, the federation announced on Monday. The games will pit the US against two teams that have already sealed their spots in the 2026 World Cup in one of the team’s last gatherings before the start of the tournament next summer.

The US will host Ecuador first on 10 October at Q2 Stadium in Austin, Texas, with kickoff set for 8.30pm ET. This will be the US men’s 16th all-time meeting against Ecuador, with the last meeting coming in 2019. In that match, Gyasi Zardes scored a late winner in a 1-0 victory for the US.

Published: July 14, 2025, 8:28 pm

Jake Paul is boxing’s newest power broker. Taylor v Serrano was his proof of concept

Katie Taylor’s decisive victory over Amanda Serrano at MSG on Friday capped a watershed night for Most Valuable Promotions, who are betting big on women’s boxing

On Friday night, 11 July, Katie Taylor earned the clear-cut win that had eluded her in two previous victories by controversial decision over Amanda Serrano. Fighting before a sold-out crowd of 19,721 on the first all-women’s boxing card ever at Madison Square Garden, Taylor outboxed her longtime rival and solidified her status as one of the greatest women boxers of all time.

The evening was a celebration of women’s boxing and also marked a significant step forward for Most Valuable Promotions (Jake Paul’s promotional company), which orchestrated, produced and marketed the event.

Published: July 14, 2025, 8:00 am

Meet the Estonian amateur who started golf by accident and qualified for the Open

Richard Teder secured a major debut at Royal Portrush after a playoff hole-out and only took up the sport after his aunt won a prize

All we know already about Richard Teder suggests his Open Championship debut may provide essential viewing when he becomes the first golfer from Estonia to tee it up in the oldest major.

He qualified by holing out from 90 yards in a sudden‑death playoff, a euphoric scene which preceded the eating of half a doner kebab for dinner.

Published: July 14, 2025, 2:00 pm

Texas camp leader waited over an hour after flood warning to evacuate

Camp Mystic leader, who died trying to save small children, waited over an hour after alert before starting evacuation

• The Texas way: why the most disaster-prone US state is so allergic to preparing for disasters

The adult leader of Camp Mystic, the Texas summer camp where 27 children and counselors died in the Hill Country floods, waited more than an hour after receiving a severe flood warning before initiating an evacuation, it was disclosed on Monday.

Richard “Dick” Eastland, who had run the popular all-girls, Christian-values sleepaway camp on the banks of the Guadalupe River with his family since the 1980s, was among the fatalities after a wall of water rushed through the camp early on 4 July.

Published: July 14, 2025, 8:30 pm

Andrew Cuomo announces run for New York City mayor as an independent

Former governor lost the Democratic primary to Zohran Mamdani by more than 12 points last month

Andrew Cuomo, the former New York governor, said on Monday that he will run as an independent in New York City’s mayoral race, after losing in the Democratic primary to Zohran Mamdani.

Many saw Cuomo as the favorite in the primary, but he ultimately lost to Mamdani, a current member of the New York state assembly, by more than 12 points.

Published: July 14, 2025, 10:06 pm

xAI announces $200m US military deal after Grok chatbot had Nazi meltdown

Defense department also inked contracts with other leading AI firms including Google, Anthropic and OpenAI

The week after its Grok chatbot identified itself as “MechaHitler” and generated antisemitic posts, Elon Musk’s xAI firm announced a contract with the US Department of Defense worth nearly $200m. The deal is for developing and implementing artificial intelligence tools for the agency.

The DoD on Monday also announced similar contracts with $200m ceilings with several other major US-based artificial intelligence developers, including Google, Anthropic and OpenAI. The agency is partnering with the General Services Administration to make these companies’ AI tools available for use throughout the federal government.

Published: July 14, 2025, 8:24 pm

Starbucks tells corporate staff in US and Canada to work in office at least four days a week

Seattle-based coffee chain offers payment to those who opt to quit instead as it seeks to ‘re-establish in-office culture’

• Business live – latest updates

Starbucks has ordered its corporate staff to work from the office at least four days a week from late September and is offering cash payments to those who choose to quit instead.

Brian Niccol, the chief executive of the Seattle-headquartered coffee chain, said many of its employees would be required to work in the office for a minimum of four days a week, up from three, from Monday to Thursday. This will apply to its Seattle and Toronto support centres and regional offices in North America.

Published: July 15, 2025, 9:31 am

US court blocks Trump administration from revoking Afghans’ protected status

More than 82,000 Afghans had been evacuated after Taliban’s takeover and were allowed a temporary ‘parole’

A US appeals court has for now blocked the Trump administration from removing the temporary protective status of thousands of Afghans in the United States, court documents showed on Monday.

An administrative stay on the termination of temporary protected status for Afghans will remain until 21 July, the US court of appeals for the fourth circuit said in an order granting a request from immigration advocacy organization Casa.

Published: July 15, 2025, 1:49 am

Four astronauts depart international space station in return flight home

Crew Dragon capsule will parachute into the Pacific Ocean off the coast of California on Tuesday

Nasa retiree turned private astronaut Peggy Whitson and three crew mates from India, Poland and Hungary departed the International Space Station early on Monday and embarked on their return flight to Earth.

A Crew Dragon capsule carrying the quartet undocked from the orbital laboratory at 7.15am ET, ending the latest ISS visit organized by Texas-based startup Axiom Space in partnership with Elon Musk’s California-headquartered rocket venture SpaceX.

Published: July 15, 2025, 2:11 am

Hollywood agent’s son accused of murdering wife and in-laws kills himself

Samuel Bond Haskell, whose father represented major stars, was charged with dismembering his wife and killing her parents

A California man who was charged with murdering and dismembering his wife and her parents in the home they shared in the Los Angeles suburbs, then dumping his wife’s remains into a garbage bag, has died by suicide in jail, the Los Angeles county district attorney confirmed on Monday.

Samuel Bond Haskell IV, 37, was arrested in November 2023 and charged with the murders of his wife, Mei Haskell, her mother, Yanxiang Wang, and her stepfather, Gaoshan Li. Haskell pleaded not guilty to the three murder counts in January 2024 and was being held without bail pending trial. He was facing a sentence of life in prison with no parole.

Published: July 14, 2025, 9:45 pm

FTSE 100 share index hits 9,000 points for the first time; UK government considers reforms to ISAs and savings – business live

London stock market hits new peak, Thames Water reports £1.6bn loss, and Rachel Reeves outlines ‘Leeds reforms’ for financial services

The FTSE 100 has also benefitted from the TACO trade this year – the bet that Trump always chickens out when his policies cause mayhem in the markets.

As this chart shows, shares in London slumped in early April after the US president announced high new tariffs on US trading partners.

Published: July 15, 2025, 10:05 am

Farm worker who died after California Ice raid was ‘hardworking and innocent’, family says

Jaime Alanís, 57, died a day after falling off a greenhouse roof during an immigration raid of a cannabis farm

The farm worker who died from injuries he sustained after falling from a greenhouse roof during an Ice raid of a California cannabis farm was a “hard-working, innocent farmer” and the sole provider for his wife and daughter, his family says.

Jaime Alanís died a day after a frenzied immigration raid of Glass House Farms in Ventura county where authorities arrested at least 200 workers. The 57-year-old, who was from the town of Huajúmbaro in Michoacán, Mexico, is the first known person to die during the Trump administration’s enhanced immigration enforcement operations in southern California.

Published: July 14, 2025, 8:16 pm

Trump officials address ‘chemtrails’ conspiracy theories while spreading misinformation, experts say

EPA’s move comes as it slashes climate research funding and cuts weather forecasting and scientific agencies’ staff

Trump officials’ recent attempt to dispel concerns about “chemtrails” has perplexed and angered some experts who say the administration has itself promoted the conspiracy theory while also spreading climate misinformation.

“This is an intriguing strategy … in an administration that, depending on agency, is actively promulgating conspiracy theories or at least conspiratorial thinking,” said Timothy Tangherlini, a professor at the Berkeley School of Information who studies the circulation of folklore and conspiracy theories.

Published: July 14, 2025, 5:07 pm

Wildfire that destroyed Grand Canyon lodge spread after being left to burn for days

Arizona’s governor calls for federal investigation into National Park Service’s handling of the fire, which was sparked in early July

A wildfire raging along the Grand Canyon’s North Rim that leveled a historic lodge erupted over the weekend after burning for more than a week, raising scrutiny over the National Park Service’s decision not to aggressively attack the fire right away.

Katie Hobbs, Arizona’s governor, called for a federal investigation into the park service’s handling of the fire, which was sparked by lightning on 4 July.

Published: July 14, 2025, 5:10 pm

Trump promised to lower energy costs – his tax bill will raise them for people in red states the most

Household energy bills in some Republican-leaning states could rise by more than $600 every year, analysis of the so-called ‘big, beautiful bill’ finds

The cost of electricity is poised to surge across the US in the wake of Republican legislation that takes an axe to cheap renewable energy, with people in states who voted for Donald Trump last year to be hardest hit by the increase in bills.

As air conditioners crank up across the US during another sweltering summer amid an unfolding climate crisis, rising energy costs will become even more severe for households due to the reconciliation spending bill passed by Republicans in Congress and signed by Trump, who called it the “big, beautiful bill”, on 4 July.

Published: July 14, 2025, 2:00 pm

Homelessness in Los Angeles county declines for second straight year

LA reports 72,308 people as unhoused, a 4% decrease from last year, as California pushes to break up encampments

Homelessness in Los Angeles county declined by 4% to an estimated 72,308 people in 2025, the Los Angeles homeless services authority (Lahsa) announced on Monday.

The southern California metropolitan area previously reported its highest unhoused population in 2023, when it counted 75,518 people experiencing homelessness. That count decreased slightly to 75,312 people in 2024.

Published: July 14, 2025, 11:05 pm

Unreleased Beyoncé music stolen in Atlanta during Cowboy Carter tour

Star’s team members reported music, concert visuals and future setlists taken from vehicle ahead of Atlanta shows

Beyoncé’s choreographer and one of her dancers for the Cowboy Carter tour told police that thieves broke into their vehicle and stole numerous items, including jump drives full of unreleased music, footage for her upcoming shows and past and future setlists.

The alleged robbery, first reported by Channel 2 in Atlanta, occurred less than 48 hours before the singer kicked off a four-show residence at the city’s Mercedes-Benz Stadium.

Published: July 14, 2025, 9:14 pm

Musk’s giant Tesla factory casts shadow on lives in a quiet corner of Germany

Politics of carmaker’s owner has soured sentiments in Grünheide, south-east of Berlin, where the factory promised jobs and revitalisation

When Elon Musk advised Germans to vote for the far-right Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) in elections last year, Manu Hoyer – who lives in the small town where the billionaire had built Tesla’s European production hub – wrote to the state premier to complain.

“How can you do business with someone who supports rightwing extremism?” she asked Dietmar Woidke, the Social Democrat leader of the eastern state of Brandenburg, who had backed the setting up of the Tesla Giga factory in Grünheide.

Published: July 14, 2025, 12:14 pm

Arizona Democratic race for House seat highlights party’s internal debate – and previews the midterms

An old-versus-new, established-versus-insurgent dynamic is being played out among the candidates

A gen Z influencer, a former state lawmaker and the daughter of a former representative are facing off in a special Democratic primary in Arizona on Tuesday that showcases the party’s internal debate in the run-up to the midterm elections.

Longtime Arizona representative and progressive stalwart Raúl Grijalva died in office from complications of lung cancer treatment in March at age 77, leaving open a seat representing southern Arizona and its borderlands.

Published: July 14, 2025, 2:00 pm

Sudan’s paramilitary RSF accused of killing almost 300 people in village raids

Rights group says Rapid Support Forces accused of targeting villages ‘completely empty of any military objectives’ in North Kordofan state

Sudan’s paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) killed nearly 300 people in attacks in North Kordofan state that began on Saturday, according to Sudanese activists.

The RSF has been fighting the Sudanese army in that area, one of the key frontlines of a civil war in Sudan that has raged since April 2023.

Published: July 15, 2025, 12:39 am

UK worst in G7 for MMR jab rates, as 30m children worldwide not fully immunised

More than 14m children globally have not had single routine jab as figures show less than 90% of those eligible in UK had first MMR last year

Millions of children worldwide are at growing risk of serious illness and death due to declining infant vaccination rates, experts have warned, while the UK ranks worst of major western economies for MMR immunisation.

Figures released by the World Health Organization and Unicef show that more than 30 million children worldwide are not fully immunised against measles, mumps and rubella and 14.3 million children have not received a single routine infant vaccination.

Published: July 15, 2025, 12:01 am

France signals willingness to discuss reparations for colonial massacres in Niger

Exclusive: French government says it is open to dialogue but does not acknowledge responsibility in letter seen by the Guardian

More than a century after its troops burned villages and looted cultural artefacts in the quest to include Niger in its west African colonial portfolio, France has signalled willingness over possible restitution, but is yet to acknowledge responsibility.

“France remains open to bilateral dialogue with the Nigerien authorities, as well as to any collaboration concerning provenance research or patrimonial cooperation,” the office of France’s permanent representative to the UN wrote in a document seen by the Guardian.

Published: July 15, 2025, 4:00 am

Indian regulator orders airlines to check Boeing fuel switches after plane crash report

Air India cautions investigation into Boeing 787 Dreamliner crash is in early stages as speculation about cause grows

India’s aviation regulator has ordered the country’s airlines to examine fuel switches on Boeing aircraft, after a preliminary report on the Air India flight 171 crash in June showed the fuel supply had been cut seconds after takeoff.

The Directorate General of Civil Aviation said it had issued the order after several domestic and international airlines began making their own inspections of the locking mechanisms attached to the switches.

Published: July 14, 2025, 3:03 pm

‘They digest externally’: the artist who creates paintings with live flies

For over a decade, John Knuth has created art using the regurgitation of flies and after he lost his home in the California wildfires, his work has a new perspective

One morning in Denver as artist John Knuth was getting his exhibition ready at the David B Smith Gallery, the police knocked on the door to check he wasn’t housing a dead body. “They said, ‘We’ve got a report of a lot of flies in here. Is there a dead body or anything rotting?’” Knuth recalls to the Guardian over Zoom.

The hundreds of flies emerging from Knuth’s gallery were actually his collaborators. For over a decade, Knuth has been creating paintings using the regurgitation of tens of thousands of flies. “When flies eat they digest externally,” explains Knuth. “They’re in a constant state of regurgitation. They land on a surface, puke up, suck it back in. Puke up, suck it back in.” After feeding the insects a mixture of acrylic colored paint and sugar water, the flies spend several weeks expelling the mixtures on to his canvases. “From that I get these really transcendent color connections.”

Published: July 14, 2025, 5:12 pm

‘Spirited and sumptuous’: why Big Night is my feelgood movie

The latest in our series of writers recommending comfort watches is a tribute to 1996’s charming restaurant-set comedy drama

“Life is meals,” observed the novelist James Salter. Big Night, Stanley Tucci’s spirited and sumptuous indie from 1996, is a film about one big meal that asks a few big questions about life, including: What is the cost of the American dream? What does food allow us to say to each other that words can’t? And what right does Marc Anthony, of all people, have to deliver one of the most charming non-speaking performances in any movie since the silent era?

Big Night follows two Italian immigrants who run a failing restaurant in 1950s New Jersey. Ambitious, high-strung Secondo (Tucci, practically hirsute) is the manager, while his brother Primo (Tony Shalhoub) is the madman in the kitchen, a purist who derides the local clientele as philistines and has begun to doubt the wisdom of coming to the US in the first place.

Published: July 14, 2025, 9:00 am

Futra Days review – esoteric sci-fi romance offers lovers time-jump ‘happiness heists’ to save relationships

A man gets catapulted into the future to help him understand the future of his crush, but the sloppy chronology and gratuitous stylistic touches leave this film a little too infatuated with itself

With studio projects abandoning Los Angeles as a shooting location, it’s the low-budget crowd that are still holdouts, presumably out of necessity. Futra Days is another in the line of esoteric films about overheated Angeleno creative minds that the pandemic seemed to encourage; the likes of the hermeneutic sci-fi Something in the Dirt or family found-footage He’s Watching. But running time-travel rings around a dysfunctional relationship, Ryan David’s sophomore effort is just a bit too infatuated with itself.

Jaded record producer Sean (Brandon Sklenar, looking like Chris Evans and Glen Powell spliced) is wondering whether a new crush on thrift-shop worker and aspiring singer Nichole (Tania Raymonde) will go the distance. So he signs up to a “happiness heist”: being catapulted into the future by an experimental time-travel clinic run by Dr Felicia Walter (Rosanna Arquette) whose medical qualifications seem, well, questionable. After replacing his future self, who is in the process of walking out on an exasperated future Nichole, he decides to try to reboot their relationship.

Published: July 14, 2025, 12:00 pm

DJ Nick León on Rosalía, regional Latin club sounds and rejecting success: ‘I was losing my edge’

Early success left the Miami producer feeling risk-averse. He quit touring to discover his muggy, magical sound – and accidentally scored another hit with Erika de Casier

A few years ago, Nick León made a hit. Not a hit hit, like a Drake/Sabrina/Taylor hit, but a hit in certain circles. His single Xtasis, made with the Venezuelan producer DJ Babatr, was one of the defining club tracks of 2022. Named track of the year by Resident Advisor and a staple at parties throughout the summer and autumn, it launched León from his status as one of Miami’s most interesting underground DJs into the international club circuit.

“It was like, we’re hitting the ground running – we’re gonna be touring and DJing all the time, and there was this mission of spreading the music that so many people have been playing already, from Latin America and the US,” León recalls of this period, sweating through his tie-dye T-shirt in an east London cafe in June.

Published: July 14, 2025, 11:07 am

Flesh and Code is an utterly jaw-dropping listen: best podcasts of the week

Brace yourself for the staggering tale of Travis, who has both real and bot wives. Plus, the wickedly gossipy duo of Graham Norton and Maria McErlane are back

This staggering tale of people falling in love with AI chatbots is baffling, tragic and terrifying. It’s full of jaw-dropping moments, as hosts Hannah Maguire and Suruthi Bala speak to Travis who “married” a bot despite already having a real-life spouse. There’s also the vulnerable teenager whose “companion” spurs him on to an attempt to assassinate Queen Elizabeth II (which ends with him being charged with treason). Alexi Duggins
Wondery+, episodes weekly

Published: July 14, 2025, 6:00 am

Brooklyn and beyond: Colm Tóibín’s best books – ranked!

As the Irish author turns 70, we rate his best works of fiction – from his latest, Long Island, to his emotionally wrenching ‘masterpiece’

This dispatch from what we might call the extended Colm Tóibín universe is set near the same time and in the same place as his earlier novel Brooklyn (one character appears in both books). It’s the story of a widowed woman who struggles to cope with life after love. If it lacks the drama of some of Tóibín’s other novels, the style is impeccable as ever, with irresistibly clean prose that reports emotional turmoil masked by restraint. There is no ornate showing off. “People used to tease me for it, saying: ‘Could you write a longer sentence?’” Tóibín has said. “But there’s nothing I can do about it.”

Published: July 14, 2025, 11:01 am

Poem of the week: Poem in which I’m a transnational drug smuggler by Bethany Handley

A sharp and witty look at the treatment of people with disabilities conveys its anger with arresting artistry

Poem in which I’m a transnational drug smuggler

Published: July 14, 2025, 11:12 am

A Year With the Seals review – what to know about the elusive sea creature

A science journalist delves deep into our sometimes fraught relationship with these intelligent animals

‘There is no creature born, even among the greater apes, which more resembles a human baby in its ways and its cries than a baby grey seal,” wrote the ecologist Frank Fraser Darling in 1939. Seals’ large eyes, the five digits of their flippers, their lanugo – the soft down with which they (and sometimes we) are born – all erode the mental barriers we erect between ourselves and our marine cousins. According to Faroese legend, there are even seals, known as selkies, that can shed their skins, assume human form and live undetected among us.

The selkie myth is just one that appears in the Maine-based science writer Alix Morris’s compelling book, which explores seals’ fraught relationship with culture, the economy and our imaginations. She charts the varied and conflicting ways in which we conceive of these creatures: as reviled competitors for fish, magnets for great white sharks, or defenceless human children who “weep” when distressed.

Published: July 14, 2025, 8:01 am

‘The way a child plays is the way they live’: how therapists are using video games to help vulnerable children

Minecraft and other creative games are becoming recognised as powerful means of self-expression and mental health support, including for traumatised Ukrainian refugees

Oleksii Sukhorukov’s son was 12 when the Russian invasion of Ukraine began. For months, the family existed in a state of trauma and disarray: Sukhorukov was forced to give up his work in the entertainment industry, which had included virtual reality and video games; they became isolated from friends and relatives. But amid the chaos, his boy had one outlet: Minecraft. Whatever was happening outside, he’d boot up Mojang’s block-building video game and escape.

“After 24 February 2022, I began to see the game in a completely different light,” says Sukhorukov. I discovered that Ukrainian children were playing together online; some living under Russian occupation, others in government-controlled areas of the country that were the targets of regular missile attacks; some had already become refugees. And yet they were still able to play together, support one another, and build their own world. Isn’t that amazing? I wanted to learn more about how video games can be used for good.”

Published: July 14, 2025, 9:00 am

First look at HBO’s Harry Potter TV series released

HBO releases first glimpse of new Boy Who Lived as cameras roll on small screen adaptation of JK Rowling’s books

HBO has provided a first glimpse at the new world of Harry Potter, as filming begins on its hotly anticipated television adaptation of JK Rowling’s beloved book series.

A photo provided by the broadcaster shows Dominic McLaughlin in character as the young wizard for the first time. The 11-year-old was selected alongside Alastair Stout as Ron Weasley and Arabella Stanton as Hermione Granger after an extensive casting search among British children aged 9-11. As with Daniel Radcliffe before him, McLaughlin sports Potter’s trademark round glasses and Gryffindor uniform.

Published: July 14, 2025, 3:59 pm

‘People here are as strong as concrete’: the stunning architecture of war-torn Kharkiv

A new architectural guidebook was written as a love letter to the Ukrainian city – then Russia started bombing it. How will this home to Tetris-like offices and daring curved cinemas be rebuilt?

When the Derzhprom building erupted on to the Kharkiv skyline in the 1920s, it must have seemed like an impossibly futuristic vision. Standing like a gleaming white concrete castle, it curves around the circular plaza of Freedom Square in the city’s centre.

Built as the state industry headquarters of what was then the capital of the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic, it looks like a three-dimensional game of Tetris, a mighty nest of chunky oblong forms stacked, rotated and interlocked to form a colossal administrative pile. Striding across three city blocks, and towering almost 60m high, it was the tallest office building in Europe for several years, its humungous floor plates connected high up in the air by thrilling sci-fi skybridges. It was far ahead of its time, prefiguring the brawny brutalist complexes that emerged in western Europe and the US half a century later.

Published: July 14, 2025, 5:00 am

Wireless festival review – Drake’s disjointed three-night headline run smacks of desperation

Finsbury Park, London
An all-star lineup of supporting turns – including, astonishingly, Lauryn Hill – show up to bolster the beleaguered megastar, but this is a very scrappy affair

The announcement of Drake’s three-day headline set for Wireless’s 20th anniversary met with a mixed response. Having been eviscerated in a rap beef with Kendrick Lamar, he had seemingly lost all street credibility. Plus, three consecutive sets from one artist could be overkill. On the other hand, what better way could there be to mark the occasion? No artist is more emblematic of the interface between British and American music that is so central to Wireless (despite Drake being Canadian). And the triptych curation around his various artistic personae seemed like genius: the swoon-worthy Casanova, the menacing rapper, the Black diaspora-surfing chameleon (or “culture vulture”, if you’re a Drake-sceptic).

Friday at the festival has an R&B focus, revealing rising star Kwn and the delightfully bluesy Leon Thomas. Summer Walker is somewhat garbled and listless. And then, after collaborator PartyNextDoor bores us to death for 20 minutes, Drake arrives, throwing it back with the 2011 heartbreak classic Marvin’s Room. The surprise army of R&B all-stars he brings on is incredible: Mario, Bobby Valentino, Giveon, Bryson Tiller; Lauryn Hill’s appearance is astonishing, despite the glaring audio issues that occur in the transition from Nice for What into Ex-Factor. It is a clear statement of Drake’s standing among the greats, an assembling of allies.

Published: July 14, 2025, 10:17 am

The valleys of the Dolomites: exploring Italy’s new network of wild trails

The Via delle Valli is a series of 50 trails aiming to tempt mountain-lovers away from the region’s hotspots and towards lesser-charted country

Thick white cloud hangs outside the windows of Rifugio Segantini, a mountain hut 2,373 metres up in the Italian Alps. But it is shifting, revealing glimpses of the majestic Brenta Dolomites before us: a patch of snow here, a craggy peak there. The view is tantalising, and a couple of times I have run outside in a kind of peekaboo farce to see the full display, only for it to pass behind clouds again.

The refuge – cosy, wooden-clad and packed with hikers – is named after the Italian landscape painter Giovanni Segantini, who was inspired by these mountains. His portrait hangs on the walls and his name is embroidered on the lace curtains. A simple stone building with blue and white shutters in Val d’Amola, the refuge is dwarfed by its rugged surrounds, with Trentino’s highest peak, the snow-capped 3,556-metre Presanella, as a backdrop. The entries in the guestbook are entirely by locals.

Published: July 15, 2025, 6:00 am

Terrible night’s sleep? Here’s how to make it through the day – and maybe even enjoy it – one step at a time

Coffee or no coffee? Almond croissant or exercise snack? Early night or bedtime as usual? You’ll be grateful you made the right choices

Ah, sleep – “nature’s soft nurse” to Shakespeare, “the foundation of our mental and physical health” to the less poetically minded neuroscientist and podcaster Andrew Huberman. By now, you hopefully know that getting a consistent seven to eight hours of shuteye is crucial for everything from your short-term decision-making to your long-term health, and you’re familiar with all the usual advice on getting it (have a consistent bedtime, make your bedroom really dark, no double espressos at 9pm). But one question that’s considered less is: what if you have one restless night? How do you best get through the day – and what can you do to avoid a single interrupted slumber snowballing into several? Let’s take it one hour at a time.

When you first drag yourself out of bed, it’s tempting to click the kettle straight on – but should you hold off your first hot drink of the day until you’re a bit less bleary-eyed? Increasingly, influencers advise delaying your first hit of tea or coffee for anywhere between 30 and 90 minutes after you wake up – the rationale being that caffeine mostly works by blocking the brain’s receptors for a molecule called adenosine, which ordinarily promotes relaxation by slowing down neural activity. Adenosine levels are at their lowest when you wake up, and so in theory, you might be “wasting” your first brew of the day by glugging it when there’s nothing for the caffeine to block. This seems plausible, but it’s also worth noting that caffeine’s effects take about 10 minutes to kick in, and it’s about 45 minutes before levels peak in the bloodstream. Caffeine’s also not just good for getting you going: if you’re planning a workout or a morning walk, it can help things along by producing feelgood endorphins and increasing the amount of fat you’re able to burn. Some people suggest that waiting a while before your first cup helps to avoid afternoon drowsiness, but according to an evaluation of the scientific literature published last year, “There is no evidence that caffeine ingestion upon waking is somehow responsible for an afternoon ‘crash’.”

Published: July 14, 2025, 4:00 am

Women in the US: if you’re single, tell us why

We’re keen to hear from women in the US why they are single, what they are looking for in a partner and whether they’ve given up dating

Based on Census Bureau historical data and Morgan Stanley forecasts, 45% of prime working age women (ages 25-44) will be single by 2030 – the largest share in history and up from 41% in 2018.

We’d like to hear from single women in the US why they are single, how they’re feeling about not having a partner and whether they are still looking for one.

Published: July 14, 2025, 11:23 am

Georgina Hayden’s recipe for red curry chicken and courgette burgers

This might just be summer’s winning recipe – ridiculously easy and delicious flavours for barbecue season

I present to you my new favourite summer burger, which has been on our menu at home ever since its arrival in my kitchen. It’s one of those recipes where the ease is almost embarrassing. How can something so delicious be so straightforward? The burgers themselves are a simple food processor job; if you don’t have one, use chicken mince and make sure you really mix in the curry paste and courgette by hand. The accompaniments are also key: the lime-pickled shallots, the abundance of herbs and the creaminess of the mayo all work so well together. Turn up to a barbecue with a tray of these and I guarantee you’ll be dishing out the recipe in no time.

Published: July 15, 2025, 5:00 am

Alice Zaslavsky’s buttery brussels sprouts with apple and smoked pork belly – recipe

Salt, sweetness and speed are key to bringing out brussels’ best, says the cookbook author. Here she adds apple and smoked pork for a show-stealing side dish

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Have you heard of the five monkeys experiment? It’s an apocryphal demonstration of how behaviours and beliefs can be adopted and perpetuated, long after the OG reasons for them fade. I’m pretty sure they could’ve just used humans and brussels sprouts as a metaphor instead.

Like most veg of medieval origin, brassicas, of which sprouts are a baby-cabbage-y-version, were grown for hardiness and weather-resistance. As a result, the flavour skewed bitter, and the texture, tough and oftentimes woody.

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Published: July 14, 2025, 3:00 pm

Five beef patties, four cheese slices, bacon, lettuce, tomato … Burger King’s sumo of a burger enters the ring

Japan’s limited-edition Baby Body Burger packs in 1,876 calories and tips the scales at nearly 680g. Will it defeat our reporter?

Japan can legitimately claim to be home to some of the best food on the planet. But it usually has little appetite for supersizing it.

That changed on Friday with Burger King’s gargantuan but curiously named Baby Body Burger, tipping the scales at nearly 680g (1.5lb). As part of a collaboration with the Japan Sumo Association, whose July wrestling tournament has just started, the burger checks in at 1,876 calories. Sumo wrestlers would only need about four of these to get their average daily caloric needs; a mere mortal would need just one to one-and-a-half. And, at ¥2,590 (£13.05), it’s nearly twice the price of a one-patty Whopper with cheese.

Published: July 14, 2025, 12:05 pm

Rukmini Iyer’s quick and easy recipe for cashew rice bowls with stir-fried tofu, broccoli and kimchi | Quick and easy

A great speedy bowl meal that is wholesome, tasty and a success with all the family

These were an absolute hit with my children, albeit minus the cashews, and as any parent with toddlers who refuse to let their food touch other food will know, that’s a breakthrough. It’s well worth making the whole quantity here, because any leftovers are perfect for fried rice the next day – just make sure you cool the rice after making it, then refrigerate immediately and reheat until piping hot the next day.

Published: July 14, 2025, 12:00 pm

‘I couldn’t watch the forests vanish’: the man restoring Solomon Islands’ vital mangroves

Crucial for coastal communities, mangroves are threatened by land clearing, development and rising seas

As the morning light hits Oibola village in Solomon Islands, the receding tide drains water through a maze of tangled mangrove roots.

Dressed in muddy jeans and a worn T-shirt, Ben Waleilia moves carefully through the thick mangrove forest, searching for seedlings. Rows of young mangrove shoots stand high as Waleilia gently drops seedlings into a small plastic bucket.

Published: July 15, 2025, 1:13 am

Bastille Day and a swan census: photos of the day – Monday

The Guardian’s picture editors select photographs from around the world

Published: July 14, 2025, 1:26 pm