Cormac Roth, musician and youngest son of actor Tim Roth, has died from cancer, his family have announced.
It was confirmed that he passed away surrounded by his family, on Sunday 16 October, following a year’s battle with the disease.
A talented guitarist, composer and producer, Cormac revealed on Instagram that he had been diagnosed with stage 3 germ cell cancer in November 2021.
A family statement in tribute to Cormac described him as “an exceptionally gifted and extraordinary musician whose passion and love for making music stretched back to when his guitar was bigger than he was”.
A graduate of Bennington College, in Vermont, USA, Cormac’s music career was just beginning to take off.
The family statement went on: “He was a wild and electric ball of energy, and his spirit was filled with light and goodness.
“As wild as he was, Cormac was also the embodiment of kindness. A gentle soul who brought so much happiness and hope to those around him.
“The grief comes in waves, as do the tears and laughter, when we think of that beautiful boy across the 25 years and 10 months that we knew him.
“An irrepressible and joyful and wild and wonderful child. Only recently a man. We love him. We will carry him with us wherever we go.”
The statement ended with a quote from Cormac, which said: “Make sure you do the things you love.”
Sharing the news of his illness back in November, Cormac said he had been “fighting it daily”, undergoing “chemo, high dose chemo, medication, transplants, transfusions, surgeries etc”.
He explained that he was suffering from choriocarcinoma, a rare type of cancer.
Cormac said the disease had “taken away half of my hearing, 60 pounds of weight, my confidence, and will continue its murderous path until I can manage to stop it somehow and kill it”.
He went on: “But it hasn’t taken away my will to survive, or my love of making music. It hasn’t taken me down yet.
“If you or someone you love is affected by cancer, please feel free to reach out for it is an emotional rollercoaster unlike anything else.”
He concluded: “Love to you all please make sure to do the things that you love. Life is short. It is chaos. And you never know when it’s going to be you.”
Cormac is survived by his parents, Tim and Nikki, his elder brother, Hunter, and half-brother, Jack.
Adele has bid a tearful farewell to her Las Vegas residency show, as the Someone Like You star admitted she doesn’t know when she’ll perform again next.
The British singer-songwriter, 36, launched Weekends with Adele at Caesars Palace in November 2022 and performed her 100th show there on Saturday.
Her mammoth run of sell-out shows at the venue, which seats around 4,000 people, has been a success but has taken its toll.
John David Washington says he felt like he had to conceal his desire to act because of the external expectations of him being the child of Denzel and Pauletta Washington.
He tells Sky News it took some time for him to pursue an acting career, choosing football instead to assert his “independence” and create his own “identity” separate from his famous family.
“I’ve been wanting to do this my whole life… but I was hiding it,” he said.
“I had to conceal that passion based on my relationship to the world and more specifically, my folks being in the industry, so I chose ball.
“I loved ball, but I was sort of hiding my love for the arts under a helmet – literally an American football helmet – and so when I wanted to become an actor, when I decided to pursue it, that was a big shock to some people.”
The 40-year-old actor says when he decided to pursue an acting career, he kept the decision quiet.
“Some people didn’t know I was even pursuing it professionally until I got a job,” he said.
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Since switching to acting, John David has starred in a number of notable roles including the protagonist in Christopher Nolan’s Tenet, Ron Stallworth in BlacKkKlansman and Joshua in The Creator.
He also led the stage revival of the 2022 Tony-nominated play The Piano Lesson on Broadway alongside Samuel L Jackson.
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“He [Jackson] originated the role [I play] in 1987 at Yale with Lloyd Richards and August Wilson,” John David said.
“So it was of great importance for us to learn from both he and Michael Potts about August Wilson. It was a great blessing for me, I think, for all of us to have him present on set.”
The Piano Lesson is the third August Wilson play to be adapted for the screen by Denzel Washington’s production company Mundy Lane Entertainment.
It is part of a pledge made by the Gladiator II actor to make all 10 of the playwright’s works into films.
The Netflixproject is directed by another Washington family member, Malcolm, and stars most of the cast from the Broadway revival.
Set in 1936 Pittsburgh in the aftermath of the Great Depression, the film centres on a family heirloom, a piano, that is etched with the carvings of their family history made by their enslaved ancestor.
Malcolm says he started reading the play for the first time during the pandemic and immediately wanted to be involved in the film adaptation.
“I think with this movie, reclamation of story and identity is so central to the theme and it’s something that’s central to my life where I both acknowledge the fertile ground that I was raised on and who I am today.
“That’s what Wining Boy [played by Michael Potts] really is trying to do, he’s trying to build on that legacy, so that’s a story that really resonated with me.”
The filmmaker added: “I take all the gifts that my ancestors laid in front of me, and I’m trying to build something for the next generation to pass down – all of their gifts, plus mine to the next generation and let them build on it.”
Malcolm says his goal was to put family at the forefront of the production. By dedicating his feature debut to “Mama”, he is acknowledging the dedication and sacrifices that mothers make for the growth of their families.
“There’s so much pointing to my mother in particular, who inspired this adaptation so much. I see so much of her life in Berniece’s character [played by Danielle Deadwyler] – and that became a guiding light for me in this adaptation,” he said.
“As we made this thing and started reconnecting with our ancestors, my mum became like a kind of representative of them.
“She’s the matriarch of our family. She tells me about my grandparents and great-grandparents and the line that I come from, and I see them in her.
“And when the movie ends, I want people to kind of have that moment of reflection for their own lives. So in dedicating it to her, I was trying to dedicate it to all mums everywhere.”
Blockbuster Wicked has landed the largest opening weekend of 2024 at Vue International.
The film, starring Oscar-nominated actress Cynthia Erivo and Grammy-winning pop star Ariana Grande as Elphaba and Glinda, surpassed both Gladiator II and Paddington In Peru.
It has also had the largest opening weekend for a stage musical adaptation in the cinema chain’s history.
A boss for Vue International said it had seen a “sea of pink and green” over the weekend.
Released on Friday, Wicked is up 60% on Les Miserables’ opening weekend in 2012 and three times larger than the 2022 film adaptation of Matilda.
Founder and chief executive of Vue International Tim Richards said: “Vue has seen a sea of pink and green over the opening weekend of Wicked, which has shown continued high demand for the big screen experience.
“We saw record-breaking pre-sales for Wicked, followed by a chart-topping opening weekend – the biggest for 2024.”
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The film is the first of two parts, with the second expected in November next year.
Wicked and Gladiator II – known together as Glicked – have reportedly failed to beat out Barbenheimer, Barbie and Oppenheimer, in its own opening weekend last summer.