Chelsea step up Mason Mount contract talks amid Liverpool interest

Chelsea are stepping up attempts to agree a new contract with Mason Mount in the face of the growing prospect of Liverpool trying to buy the midfielder this summer.

Mount has 18 months on his deal and Chelsea, who are weighing up whether to increase their offer for Brighton’s Moises Caicedo, are yet to meet his wage demands. The uncertainty has led to questions over whether negotiations will come to a successful conclusion and Liverpool, who are planning a rebuild of their midfield, are prepared to act on their interest in the England international if the situation drags on.

Chelsea would be reluctant to lose Mount, particularly to one of their closest rivals, and remain optimistic they will convince the 24-year-old to stay. Mount, who has been at Chelsea since the age of six, is popular with supporters and has been one of the team’s best performers since breaking into the squad in 2019.

However Mount, whose £75,000-a-week wage makes him one of the lower earners, wants Chelsea to prove they value him. There is a risk of the club making one of their most dedicated players feel underappreciated. Chelsea are willing to make Mount a sizeable offer, though terms would need to be pitched at a reasonable level. Talks are due to resume and Chelsea are ready to be as generous as possible.

It would not be in Chelsea’s interests for negotiations to move slowly. Liverpool are monitoring the situation closely and have been putting plans in place for a summer move. Mount has also attracted interest from Juventus.

Liverpool, who host Chelsea on Saturday, are keen to refresh their ageing midfield. Jürgen Klopp’s side have slipped to ninth – level on points with Chelsea – and are in danger of failing to qualify for the Champions League. Liverpool are also interested in Caicedo, Borussia Dortmund’s Jude Bellingham and Wolves’ Matheus Nunes.

Chelsea are also looking to strengthen their midfield and have had a £55m bid for Caicedo rejected. It is understood that Brighton, who want £75m, have started to look for potential replacements for the Ecuador international. But they are under little pressure to sell and Chelsea, who are considering signing a defensive midfielder on loan, could wait until the summer before trying again to buy the 21-year-old.

Chelsea also confirmed the signing of the England Under-21 forward Noni Madueke from PSV Eindhoven on Friday evening in a deal believed to be worth £35m.

 

Nick Jonas' wife Priyanka Chopra describes premature daughter's time in NICU

Priyanka Chopra is looking back on the first year of her baby daughter’s life, admitting she and her husband Nick Jonas didn’t know if Malti would "make it" while they kept vigil over her in the neonatal intensive care unit for three months. 

"I’ve been really protective of this chapter of my life with my daughter. Because it’s not about my life only. It’s hers too," Chopra told British Vogue for its February issue. The article was published just after her daughter’s first birthday. 

Chopra and Jonas’ daughter was born on Jan. 15 last year via a surrogate a full trimester prematurely. 

"I was in the OR [operating room] when she came out," the "Quantico" actress told Vogue during an interview at her house while playing with Malti. "She was so small, smaller than my hand. I saw what the intensive-care nurses do. They do God’s work. Nick and I were both standing there as they intubated her. I don’t know how they even found what they needed [in her tiny body] to intubate her."

She said for the next three months they spent every day with Malti on her or his chest before they were able to bring her home. 

"I didn’t know if she would make it or not," she explained. 

Malti is now "healthy and thriving," Chopra celebrated, but said as a "NICU mom" she still struggles to shed those worries about her daughter’s health. 

The first time she had a solid morsel [of food] she gagged and I thought I’d killed her," she said, adding that her mother and in-laws have been extremely supportive with the baby, explaining that things like that are normal in babies.

"But because I’m a NICU mommy, the stakes are so high," she said "And I have to shed that. I will."

Jonas, who joined the interview, called fatherhood "overwhelming" but said there’s "nothing better." 

A recent appearance on Kelly Clarkson’s show, Jonas said he and his wife had a party for Malti. 

 

Timothée Chalamet Dreams of Landing an Apple TV+ Role in Funny New Ad: 'Hey, Apple — Call Me'

Apple TV+ rolled out a similar campaign starring Jon Hamm last year, and the actor will be on season 3 of The Morning Show

Timothée Chalamet feels left out.

On Friday, Apple TV+ released a new ad campaign starring the Oscar nominee, 27, as he watches a variety of the streaming service's most popular and award-winning releases in recent years — and ponders why he hasn't landed a role there yet.

"I was in two Best Picture nominees last year," the Dune actor says as he and a friend are shown watching Academy Award-winner CODA in a movie theater.

Later, Chalamet is shown scrolling through Jennifer Lawrence's movie Causeway and Selena Gomez's documentary Selena Gomez: My Mind & Me on an iPad as his car drives by adoring fans, forcing him to wonder why he does not have his own doc on the platform.

The ad also shows the actor considering a turn to television roles as he affirms he could star in Apple TV+'s recent hits Ted Lasso, Severance and Black Bird: "I guess I could do prison," he says.

Chalamet's Dune costar Jason Momoa later FaceTimes in for the new spot as he says he finished production on his own Apple TV+ series Chief of War, forcing Chalamet to realize seemingly every star in Hollywood has a role on the streaming service except him.

Wait, you have a new Apple show?" Chalamet asks Momoa, who replies, "At this point, who doesn't?"

Yeah, I mean, who doesn't at this point? Like you just said..." Chalamet replies.

Back in January 2022, the streaming service rolled out a similar ad campaign starring Jon Hamm as he, too, questions why Apple TV+ had not yet recruited him for a role. Hamm, 51, has since landed a role on the upcoming third season of The Morning Show, alongside Reese Witherspoon and Jennifer Aniston.

 

Lisa Marie Presley Memorial At Graceland Will Be Livestreamed: How To Watch

Lisa Marie Presley is being honored at Graceland, her father Elvis Presley's former home. ET will be streaming her memorial service Live this Sunday, Jan. 22 at 9 a.m. CT on etonline.com.

In a statement shared Monday, Lisa Marie's rep told ET that the service was arranged to take place on the front lawn of Graceland at 9 a.m. on Sunday, at the Presley family estate in Memphis, Tennessee. Following the service, there will be a procession to view Lisa Marie's final resting place in Meditation Garden. All guests on the north lawn will be able to join the procession following friends and family. Lisa Marie's public memorial service is also being livestreamed via Graceland's livestream page.

 Her rep shared the Presley family's gratitude over the support they've received in the wake of the 54-year-old's shocking death last week. Lisa Marie is survived by her mother, Priscilla Presley, as well as her daughters -- 33-year-old Riley Keough and 14-year-old twins Harper and Finley Lockwood. 

"Riley, Harper, Finley, and Priscilla are grateful for the support, well-wishes, and outpouring of love honoring their beloved Lisa Marie," the statement reads.

In lieu of flowers, her family is asking all who wish to send something to do so in the form of a donation to The Elvis Presley Charitable Foundation, which offers support to various charitable organizations, especially focusing on arts, education, and children's programs in the Memphis and Whitehaven area.

The announcement came after ET learned Friday that Lisa Marie will be laid to rest at Graceland alongside her father and other family members.

In addition to Elvis, his parents, Vernon and Gladys, and his grandmother, Minnie Mae, are all buried at Graceland, as is Lisa Marie's son, Benjamin Keough, who died in July 2020. There is also a smaller memorial stone for Elvis' twin brother, Jessie, who died at birth.

Lisa Marie was rushed to the hospital on Jan. 12 after going into full cardiac arrest at her home in Calabasas, California. Responders performed CPR before transporting her to the hospital. Shortly thereafter, Lisa Marie died.

"Priscilla Presley and the Presley family are shocked and devastated by the tragic death of their beloved Lisa Marie," a rep for the family confirmed to ET. "They are profoundly grateful for the support, love and prayers of everyone, and ask for privacy during this very difficult time."

 

David Crosby: 20 Essential Songs by the Folk-Rock Legend

I’ve got to make the most of every minute I have,” David Crosby told Rolling Stone in 2018. “Wouldn’t you?” He was on his third or fourth life by then — the golden-voiced, long-haired, cantankerous, beatific American original who was there to invent folk-rock with the Byrds in the mid-Sixties, to redefine the supergroup with Crosby, Stills, and Nash a few years later, and to remain unquestionably himself through all the decades of gorgeous harmonies and outrageous opinions that followed. In his final years on this planet, Croz seemed renewed, making some of his best records ever and sounding humbled in interviews like that one in 2018. His death at age 81 leaves an irreplaceable space in music. Here are his greatest songs.

Turn, Turn, Turn” (1965)

Crosby didn’t write or take the lead vocal on the Byrds’ chart-topping cover of Pete Seeger’s Bible-derived folk classic, but he did arrange the unforgettable vocal harmonies, as he did throughout his tenure in the band. It’s impossible to imagine this song without Crosby’s high parts floating above McGuinn’s lead on the refrain — a sound that inspired countless harmony-rich folk and rock acts in the decades to come. — B.H

Renaissance Fair” (1967)

Of all the original Byrds, Crosby was always the hippest and hippie-est, from his capes to his increasingly long locks. His open tunings, ethereal melodies, and elliptical lyrics captured that vibe, too, as heard on this ode to a land of “cinnamon and spices” with a “kaleidoscope of colors” from Younger Than Yesterday. This was inspired by actual Renaissance fairs in L.A. at the time. “They were the first large gatherings of hippies,” he said in the notes to his box set Voyage, “even before the Be-Ins.” This song, he said, “gave you a taste of what it was like.” — D.B.

Everybody’s Been Burned” (1967)

Amid cycles of psychedelic chords, Crosby wrote lyrics about coming to terms with being hurt for this contemplative deep cut. “Everybody has been burned before,” opens the song. “Everybody knows the pain.” Crosby had written the tune, whose jazzy voicings allowed for an avant-garde guitar solo, a few years before he joined the group, and years later he still recognized it as a songwriting breakthrough, calling it “the first actually passable song that I wrote” in a 1995 interview. “‘Everybody’s Been Burned’ was most characteristic of what was to become my style,” he said in ’84, “pretty changes, an unusual feel and flavor — plus good words.” — K.G.

Crosby’s relentless drive to push the Byrds into new realms — so effective when he turned his bandmates on to Coltrane and raga for “Eight Miles High” in 1966 — met its limit two years later with this frank threesome proposition. “I love you too, and I don’t really see,” he crooned over the band’s smoky slow-burn, “why can’t we go on as three?” Those words were risqué enough to get him axed from the band in the fall of 1968, after Croz fought unsuccessfully for the song’s inclusion on The Notorious Byrd Brothers amid growing conflicts with bandmates Roger McGuinn and Chris Hillman. (Jefferson Airplane, always game for a provocative gesture, went on to cover it; the Byrds’ original studio recording of “Triad” wouldn’t be released til years later as a bonus track.) “At least one group of people was very uptight by that song,” Crosby told Rolling Stone’s Ben Fong-Torres in 1970, after he’d landed happily in CSN. “This band is not uptight behind that song at all, having been through similar experiences.” — S.V.L.

Guinnevere” (1969)

Imagine it’s 1969 and you just bought CSN’s debut album. It opens with the seven-minute “Suite: Judy Blue Eyes,” followed by the rollicking “Marrakesh Express.” But by the third track, it all slows down. It’s the ballad “Guinnevere,” and you’ve entered the mystic. Croz himself knew the song was a killer, as he describes the legendary English queen’s green eyes and golden hair over an almost haunting time signature. He eventually revealed to us that he wrote the song about three different real-life, non-mythical women. One was his partner Christine Gail Hinton, who would die later that year in a tragic crash; another was Joni Mitchell. “And the other one is somebody that I can’t tell,” he said. “It might be my best song.” — A.M.

At the end of the turbulent Sixties, Crosby was still making sense of the decade. The gentle, elegiac “Long Time Gone,” from the first CSN album, reflects his frame of mind. “I wrote [‘Long Time Gone’] right after they assassinated Bobby Kennedy,” he told Rolling Stone in 2008. “It was a result of losing him, of losing John Kennedy and Martin Luther King. I started to feel overwhelmed. It seemed as if it was ballot by bullet. It seemed as if it didn’t matter how good a person we could find to put up as an inspiration and a leader for the good, that somehow the other side would triumph by simply gunning them down.” But Crosby didn’t feel totally helpless. In the song’s third verse, he urges, “Speak out, you got to speak out against the madness/You got to speak your mind, if you dare.” — K.G.

“Deja Vu” (1970)

More than 50 years ago — long before Olivia Rodrigo or Beyoncé felt any kind of eerie familiarity in the back of their minds — there was this dazzling CSNY title track. When the band began amassing material for the album, Croz was grappling with Hinton’s death and was too devastated to write anything new. So he handed his bandmates this gem, which he wrote after a strange ride on a friend’s sailboat. “It’s as if I had done it before,” he told CSNY biographer David Browne. “I knew way more about it than I should have. I knew how to sail a boat right away. Not an instinctive thing. It doesn’t make sense …I felt then and now that I have been here before. I don’t believe in God but I think the Buddhists got it right — we do recycle.” — A.M.

Almost Cut My Hair” (1970)

One of the bleeding-heart fan favorites from Deja Vu might never have been on the album had David Crosby not fought for its inclusion. “Stephen [Stills]…didn’t want me to leave it in ’cause he thought that it was a bad vocal,” Crosby told Rolling Stone in 1970. “But I felt like what I meant when I sang it.” What Crosby felt when he wrote the song was a mix of late-Sixties disillusionment in the wake of RFK’s assassination and heightened alienation as the body count in Vietnam rose. 53 years later, Crosby’s righteous anger still resonates. — J.B. 

“The Lee Shore” (1971)

The first time fans ever heard Crosby’s ballad that he wrote “about a 20-year love affair with an Alden schooner” was on Four Way Street, CSNY’s multi-platinum 1971 live album. “Sailing is a mystical experience for me,” Crosby said of the acoustic lullaby. “It gets me out of the whole scene.” Although it never was one of the band’s biggest hits, the song became an integral part of Crosby’s sets in decades to come, a touching moment of natural impressionism, two-part harmony (when performed with Graham Nash) and future rendezvous: “Perhaps I’ll see you,” Crosby sang. “The next quiet place.” — J.B.

“Cowboy Movie” (1971)

Backed by three members of the Grateful Dead — Jerry Garcia, Phil Lesh, and Mickey Hart — this standout from Crosby’s classic solo debut, If I Could Only Remember My Name…, is one of his rawest, hardest-grooving recorded moments. “It is the story of CSNY, but it’s told as a cowboy movie,” he told Rolling Stone‘s Andy Greene. “The recording on the album kind of naturally fell out. We played it a number of times. That time you hear on the record is pretty spectacular. It was really good chemistry between me and Garcia and Lesh… We just had a good chemistry. It was loose and funky and it felt right.” — B.H.

Tamalpais High (At About 3)” (1971)

Crosby couldn’t find the right words to fit the mood for “Tamalpais High (at About 3)” — whose title refers to a Bay Area high school that let out around 3 p.m. — so he sang jazzy stacks of “doo doo doo” over bluesy guitar and splashing cymbals. “I just did it the way I wanted to, using my voice like a horn section,” he told Rolling Stone in 2021. “As far as I’m concerned, there’s no rules, so you can do stuff like that. I don’t know if anybody else would have done that. But I loved it.” At one point he had a girlfriend who attended the school, which explains the track’s upbeat vibe. “‘Tamalpais High’ is not about getting high and it’s not about the mountain,” he said, meaning Marin County’s Mount Tamalpais. “But it is pretty.” —  K.G.

“Laughing” (1971)

On “Laughing,” Crosby sings about false prophets who claim they talk to God. “I thought I met a man who said he knew a man who knew what was going on,” he sings. “I was mistaken/Only another stranger that I knew.” The idea for the song came to him while thinking about his friend George Harrison, whom Crosby worried had been taken in by Maharishi Mahesh Yogi. “I wanted to say to him, ‘Be skeptical. …  Anytime someone tells you they talked to God right after breakfast this morning, they are probably bullshitting you,'” he reflected in Rolling Stone in 2021. “That’s what I wanted to say. But I was chicken because it was George.” The song’s final line, “I was mistaken/Only a child laughing in the sun” had a poetic significance to Crosby: “A child laughing in the sun knows more about God than I do.” — K.G.

The Wall Song” (1972)

As he would proudly explain, no one specialized in songs about grappling with life, mistakes, and groping around in the darkness as much as Crosby — or, as he puts it in this track from Graham Nash/David Crosby, “Stumbling half-blinded/And dry as the wind/That strafes you and leaves you/To lie in the sand.” Featuring backup from members of the Dead as well as Nash, “The Wall Song” featured a more aggressive groove than some of his other songs of the time, even as it clearly hinted at the turmoil he felt after the death of Christine Gail Hinton. — D.B.

“Page 43” (1972)

Crosby’s reminder to seize the day, “Page 43” has all the makings of a gospel song — a Biblical message of practicing kindness, curious metaphors about looking for silver and gold in a rainbow, plenty of wine in the third verse — except it’s all secular. When Crosby sang, “It says right here on page 43 that you should grab a hold of it/Else you’ll find it’s passed you by,” he was speaking generally, joking that the page could have come just as easily from the Old Testament or Zap Comix. But he had no problem praising one holy inspiration for the track: “I wrote it in the main cabin of my boat in Sausalito,” he recalled in the book Songwriters on Songwriting, “and it was under the influence, musically, of James Taylor.” — K.G.

“Carry Me” (1975)

On “Carry Me,” a track off Crosby and Nash’s 1975 album, Wind on the Water, Crosby reflects on his mother’s death. “She was lying in white sheets there, and she was waiting to die,” he sings. “She said if you’d just reach underneath this bed/And untie these weights, I could surely fly.” But for all the grief in his voice, there’s never despair, and his and Nash’s voices become ascendant in their harmony. In the chorus, she calls for him to carry her. The song became a live staple for Crosby and his bandmates. “It doesn’t matter how many times we sing those songs, at some point our emotions take over, and brother, let me tell you that it generates something sacred,” Graham Nash wrote of “Carry Me” in his memoir, Wild Tales. “Whatever that might be, Croz and I have it with each other, whether it’s intuition, tone of voice, or something much deeper and indefinable.” — K.G.

Homeward Through the Haze” (1975)

Depending when you asked him, this song was either about the deterioration of L.A. or CSNY’s first brush with haters back in the day (“first rain of winter/first fall from grace”). But with Crosby playing a rare piano part, it was, either way, one of his most introspective songs, with a hymn-like melody that felt burdened and beautiful at the same time. CSNY tried cutting it first, during their failed ‘74 sessions, but then he and Nash, with guest Carole King, recorded the definitive version for their Wind on the Water. — D.B.

“Shadow Captain” (1978) 

The opening track from 1978’s CSN — Crosby, Stills, and Nash’s first album as a trio since their 1969 debut — combines a sleek arrangement and sophisticated chords that hinted at Crosby’s love for the then-ascendant jazz-rock of Steely Dan with harmonies as rich as anything the band has recorded. He wrote the metaphorical lyrics in a single burst on a sailing trip, and the song was strong enough overall to almost entice Neil Young back into the band. — B.H.

“Tracks in the Dust” (1989)

After spending time in prison for drugs in the mid-Eighties, Crosby slowly began reuniting with his muse, as this largely forgotten track from his Oh Yes I Can album attests. What sounds like a dinner party conversation between people who are optimistic or grumpy, it turns out to be his own internal dialogue. With guitarist Michael Hedges prettying up the melody with his acoustic shimmer, “Tracks in the Dust” was one of the first signs that Crosby was capable of a post-meltdown, post-addiction comeback — which would continue, startlingly, for several more decades. — D.B.

Dream for Him” (1999)

On “Dream for Him,” Crosby reconciles bringing new life into a cruel world, questioning how to explain death and hardship to his son, Django, without lying or sugarcoating. “I want a world where I can tell him the truth about everything from Jesus to John Wilkes Booth,” he sing-speaks over jazzy guitar. “How they lie in the House and the Senate, too/Only get close to the truth when it suits them to.” In the background, his CSNY bandmates sing the title of the song, which appeared on their Looking Forward album. “Nobody I know that has children hasn’t asked themselves those questions: How do I explain the insanity of human behavior around the world to my kid? … How do you explain that one day you’re going to be gone?” he once said. “This is tough stuff.” — K.G.

Things We Do for Love” (2016)

Crosby wrote “Things We Do for Love” for his wife, Jan Dance, whom he married in 1987 and who’d stay by his side till his death. It’s a tender, subtly gorgeous ballad that focuses on the little moments of a relationship, more meditative tone-poem than gushing valentine. “At first it’s just fun/But love is long,” Croz sings. “A little each day/You build it that way.” For Croz, the song came as part of a fruitful period of late-career songwriting. “I can’t explain why that would happen except that I’m happy,” he told the Wall Street Journal at the time. “I’m a very happy guy. That may be the key to the whole deal.”

 

Alec Baldwin Will Be Charged With Involuntary Manslaughter in ‘Rust’ Killing

A gun that Mr. Baldwin was rehearsing with went off, killing the film’s cinematographer. The armorer responsible for weapons on set also faces manslaughter charges.

For more than a year, the actor Alec Baldwin has tried to defend himself against the suggestion that he bore responsibility for the fatal shooting of a cinematographer on the set of “Rust,” a low-budget Western he was filming on the outskirts of Santa Fe, N.M.

He gave his account to detectives, telling them he had been told the gun he was rehearsing with that day did not contain live ammunition. He stopped to talk to the paparazzi that followed his family to Vermont, sat down for an extensive television interview, sought indemnification from financial liability in the case and then sued crew members on the film, claiming that they were responsible for handing him a loaded gun.

But on Thursday prosecutors said that they would charge him with two counts of involuntary manslaughter in the killing of the cinematographer, Halyna Hutchins, 42, saying they believed he had a duty to ensure the revolver was safe to handle.

“We’re trying to definitely make it clear that everybody’s equal under the law, including A-list actors like Alec Baldwin,” Andrea Reeb, a special prosecutor appointed by Santa Fe County’s district attorney to help handle the case, said in an interview. “And we also want to make sure that the safety of the film industry is addressed and things like this don’t happen again.”The film’s armorer, Hannah Gutierrez-Reed, who loaded the gun that day and was responsible for guns on the set, will also be charged with two counts of involuntary manslaughter. The film’s first assistant director, Dave Halls, who handed Mr. Baldwin the gun, agreed to a plea deal on a charge of negligent use of a deadly weapon.The criminal charges Mr. Baldwin now faces came as a surprise to many in the film industry and were strongly disputed by his legal team. A lawyer for Mr. Baldwin, Luke Nikas, said the prosecutors’ decision “distorts Halyna Hutchins’s tragic death and represents a terrible miscarriage of justice.”

“Mr. Baldwin had no reason to believe there was a live bullet in the gun — or anywhere on the movie set,” Mr. Nikas said in a statement on Thursday. “He relied on the professionals with whom he worked, who assured him the gun did not have live rounds. We will fight these charges, and we will win.”Mr. Baldwin, 64, has been a household name for decades as a Hollywood leading man, a TV star who played Jack Donaghy in “30 Rock” and former President Donald J. Trump on “Saturday Night Live,” a co-host of the Oscars and the voice of the New York Philharmonic’s radio broadcasts.

And he has long drawn scrutiny for his offscreen behavior, which have included run-ins with paparazzi, an arrest for riding his bicycle the wrong way on Fifth Avenue, a 2018 arrest over a parking space dispute and feuds waged on social media.

But he has never faced a crisis like the one he faces now.

Ever since the shooting Mr. Baldwin had sought to strike a delicate balance: publicly maintaining his innocence in an effort to preserve his reputation and career while trying to stay out of legal jeopardy.

He appeared on national television, where he said that he had been told the gun he was using that day did not have live rounds in it, and added that he was only following directions when he pointed it at the cinematographer. “Someone is ​responsible for what happened, and I can’t say who that is, but I know it’s not me,” he said in the interview.Privately, a police report said, he had lamented to a detective who was investigating the case that fall that “if your name becomes associated with something, nobody wants to work with you anymore — nobody.”

If a jury found Mr. Baldwin or Ms. Gutierrez-Reed guilty, it would choose between the two manslaughter charges. The more serious one includes a firearm enhancement and a mandatory five-year sentence; the other charge carries a sentence of up to 18 months.

The criminal charges against Mr. Baldwin are sure to reopen questions about safety on film sets, and who bears responsibility. The district attorney for Santa Fe County, Mary Carmack-Altwies, said in an interview that Mr. Baldwin had a duty to ensure the gun and the ammunition were properly checked and that he should never have pointed it at anyone. “You should not point a gun at someone that you’re not willing to shoot,” she said in an interview. “That goes to basic safety standards.”

Ms. Gutierrez-Reed, the armorer who was responsible for the weapons on set and loaded the gun that day, told investigators after the shooting that she had checked the gun and all six cartridges she loaded in Mr. Baldwin’s gun that day, but she also remarked to investigators, “I wish I would’ve checked it more.”

One of her lawyers, Jason Bowles, said his client was not responsible for involuntary manslaughter, calling the investigation into the case “flawed.”

The shooting on Oct. 21, 2021, which also wounded the film’s director, Joel Souza, took place in a small set meant to look like a church.

The film’s first assistant director, Mr. Halls, 63, who had taken the revolver from a gray, two-tiered tray set up outside the church by Ms. Gutierrez-Reed, and handed it to Mr. Baldwin, calling out, “cold gun,” indicating that it did not contain live ammunition, according to court papers. He agreed to a plea deal, admitting there was sufficient evidence to convict him of negligent use of a deadly weapon.

A lawyer for Mr. Halls, Lisa Torraco, said in a statement that “he can now put this matter behind him and allow the focus of this tragedy to be on the shooting victims, their family and changing the industry so this type of accident will never happen again.”

The prosecutors said they had determined it was part of film industry standards for actors to ensure that the guns they used on set were safe for them to handle, saying they had interviewed several actors who spoke to the importance of those protocols. Mr. Baldwin has pushed back on that idea in the past, saying that in his experience on film sets it was not the practice for actors to check their own guns.

Ms. Reeb, the special prosecutor, said Ms. Gutierrez-Reed was also responsible for ensuring that the guns on the set did not contain live rounds, saying in an interview that she should have taken each round out of the gun and shaken them in front of the actor — a practice that helps confirm the rounds are dummies, inert cartridges used to resemble real ammunition in a film.

In the aftermath of the shooting, the authorities found five additional live rounds on the set, including on top of the cart where props were kept and in a belt that Mr. Baldwin was wearing as a costume piece. The investigation by the Santa Fe County Sheriff’s Office did not answer a key question of the case: how live ammunition ended up on a movie set.Ms. Reeb, the special prosecutor, said that aspect of the case was still unclear. “We may never answer that question,” she said.

The tragedy has resulted in several lawsuits, including from crew members who have accused the production of not properly adhering to safety protocols.

During interviews with the sheriff’s office, some crew members described a lack of consistent meetings devoted to on-set safety. The night before the shooting, most of the camera crew had quit over complaints about overnight lodging and other concerns; in an email to other people on set informing them he was leaving, Lane Luper, the head of the camera department, wrote that the filming of gunfight scenes was played “very fast and loose,” citing two accidental weapons discharges.

A lawyer for Ms. Gutierrez-Reed, 25, who trained on film sets with her father, a veteran Hollywood armorer named Thell Reed, had previously said she filled two roles on the “Rust” set — as armorer and props assistant — which made it difficult for her to focus fully on her job as armorer.

Mr. Baldwin has maintained that he is not responsible for the shooting, saying that Ms. Hutchins had been directing him where to point the gun and that he did not pull the trigger before the gun discharged. He told investigators he had pulled the hammer back and let it go in an action that might have set it off.

I know 1,000 percent I’m not responsible for what happened to her,” Mr. Baldwin told an investigator, Detective Alexandria Hancock, in a phone call following the shooting.

Ms. Carmack-Altwies said an F.B.I. analysis of the gun showed “conclusively” that the trigger had been pulled.

The prosecutors said the people they intended to charge this month would not be arrested but would be expected to appear for a virtual court appearance. A judge in New Mexico will then oversee a preliminary hearing on the charges and determine whether there is probable cause to move forward.

Ms. Gutierrez-Reed has also accused Seth Kenney, the primary supplier of guns and ammunition for the film, of being responsible for the shooting, alleging in a lawsuit against him and his company that the supply he sent to the set had mixed live ammunition in with dummy rounds.

Mr. Kenney has said he checked all of the ammunition he provided to the production to ensure they were not live, saying in a statement that handling the guns and ammunition on set was Ms. Gutierrez-Reed’s responsibility.

Last year, Matthew Hutchins, the widower of Ms. Hutchins, agreed to settle his wrongful death lawsuit against the “Rust” production. Under the agreement, Mr. Hutchins would become an executive producer of “Rust,” which had been set to resume filming this month. It was not immediately clear how the planned charges would affect those plans.

A lawyer for Mr. Hutchins, Brian J. Panish, said in a statement that he agreed with the decision to bring criminal charges.

“It is a comfort to the family that, in New Mexico, no one is above the law,” Mr. Panish said. “We support the charges, will fully cooperate with this prosecution, and fervently hope the justice system works to protect the public and hold accountable those who break the law.”

Britney Spears Makes Rare Comment About Ex Justin Timberlake

 

Britney Spears recently reflected on a memory with ex Justin Timberlake in a since-deleted social media post. See what the pop star had to say about the throwback photo.

Britney Spears Makes RARE Comment About Ex Justin Timberlake

Britney Spears is stepping back in time and we're in the zone.The pop star shared a throwback photo of herself and ex Justin Timberlake, whom she dated from 1999 until 2002, clad in matching basketball uniforms to Instagram Jan. 17. In the since-deleted post, Britney wrote, "When we used to shoot hoops TOGETHER … that's when miracles happened!!!"The Grammy winner, who tied the knot with Sam Asghari in June 2022, added, "I came out of my mom's stomach just like we all did!!! Psss … why always cast me out ??? I'm equal as all!!!"

The "Sometimes" singer's reference to their relationship comes nearly two years after Justin issued to a public apology to his ex following the debut of Framing Britney Spears.

The documentary, which premiered in February 2021, prompted criticism from fans about comments Justin made about his ex after their split, including his seemingly close depiction of Britney in his 2002 video for "Cry Me a River."

In his statement, Justin also simultaneously apologized to Janet Jackson for their 2004 Halftime Show incident, sharing that he "cared for" and "respected" both women.

"I specifically want to apologize to Britney Spears and Janet Jackson both individually, because I care for and respect these women and I know I failed," he wrote in a February 2021 statement. "I also feel compelled to respond, in part, because everyone involved deserves better and most importantly, because this is a larger conversation that I whole heartedly want to be part of and grow from."The 'N Sync alum, who married Jessica Biel in 2012, went on to note that he did "not want to ever benefit from others being pulled down again."

He continued, "I know this apology is a first step and doesn't absolve the past. I want to take accountability for my own missteps in all of this as well as be part of a world that uplifts and supports