Chita Rivera: ‘True broadway legend’ dies aged 91
Chita Rivera, the Broadway star whose career spanned seven decades and opened the door for Latina artists, has died aged 91.
A dynamic singer and dancer, Rivera was nominated for 10 Tony awards – winning twice – and bounced back from a near-fatal car accident.
She died in New York after a brief illness, her daughter Lisa Mordente said on Tuesday.
Chita Rivera performing in 2015. Pic: AP
Playwright Paul Rudnick said she was “a true Broadway legend”.
Rivera first hit the big time in 1957 as Anita in the original production of West Side Story – and more than half a century later, she was still dancing on Broadway in 2015’s The Visit.
She won Tonys for 1984’s The Rink and Kiss Of The Spider Woman in 1993, and was nominated as recently as 2014 for The Visit.
In 2018, as she won a Tony Award for Lifetime Achievement, and said she “wouldn’t trade my life in the theatre for anything, because theatre is life”.
In 2009, Rivera was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the highest honour the US can give a civilian.
Rivera put her hand over her heart and shook her head in wonderment as Barack Obama presented the medal.
Actress and singer Kristin Chenoweth called her a “kick butt woman… all the rest of us just wanna be you”.
Rivera rose from chorus girl to star, working with many of Broadway’s greatest talents, including Jerome Robbins, Leonard Bernstein and Bob Fosse.
In 1988, she came back from a car accident that crushed her right leg and needed months of physical therapy to recover her dancing skills.
She said at the time: “It never entered my mind that I wouldn’t dance again. Never. I can’t explain to you why. It’s hard work getting back but that’s what I’m doing.”
In 1975, she starred as Velma Kelly in the original Broadway production of Chicago and had a small role in the 2002 film version.
Dolores Conchita Figueroa del Rivero was born in Washington in January 1933.
She took dance classes and then entered the prestigious School of American Ballet in New York.
Her first theatre gig, at age 17, was in the touring company of Call Me Madam, and won parts in the chorus line in such shows as Guys and Dolls and Can-Can, as her career began to take off.
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Om Fahad: Iraqi social media influencer shot dead by gunman on motorbike who posed as food delivery rider – report
A well-known Iraqi social media influencer has reportedly been shot dead in her car by a gunman on a motorbike.
Om Fahad, whose real name is Ghufran Sawadi, was killed outside her home in Baghdad’s Zayouna district on Friday, according to the AFP news agency, citing security officials.
It appears the unidentified attacker pretended to be delivering food to the victim, one security source said.
Om Fahad, who has nearly half a million TikTok followers, became famous for posting light-hearted videos where she dances to Iraqi music.
Six days ago, she shared footage of herself driving in a car and also posing in front of a mirror. They have each been watched hundreds of thousands of times.
The influencer was sentenced to six months in prison in February last year for sharing videos that a court ruled contained “indecent speech that undermines modesty and public morality”.
A campaign was launched in 2023 by the Iraqi government to clamp down on social media content which broke the country’s “morals and traditions”.
The interior ministry set up a committee to look for “offensive” clips on platforms such as TikTok and YouTube, with several influencers being arrested.
“This type of content is no less dangerous than organised crime,” the ministry declared in a promotional video which asked the public to help by reporting such content.
“It is one of the causes of the destruction of the Iraqi family and society.”
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Speaking last year, interior ministry spokesman Saad Maan argued the morality campaign has “nothing to do with freedom of expression”.
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In 2018, gunmen in Baghdad shot dead Tara Fares, who was a model and influencer.
After years of war and sectarian conflict following the 2003 US invasion that overthrew dictator Saddam Hussein, Iraq has returned to some semblance of normality despite sporadic violence, political instability and corruption.
But civil liberties, particularly among women and sexual minorities, are still constrained in a conservative and male-dominated society.
R Kelly’s challenge against a 20-year sentence for child sex convictions has been quashed by an appeals court.
The singer was correctly sentenced to 20 years in prison, a Chicago court ruled on Friday.
He was convicted in 2022 on three charges of producing child sexual abuse images and three charges of enticement of minors for sex.
In his appeal, Kelly, 57, argued Illinois’ old statute of limitations – which required prosecution of child sex crime charges within 10 years – should have applied, rather than the current law permitting charges while an accuser is still alive.
The appeals court rejected this, labelling it an attempt by Kelly to elude the charges entirely after “employing a complex scheme to keep victims quiet”.
He also argued that charges involving one accuser should have been tried separately from the charges tied to three other accusers due to video evidence that became a focal point of the Chicago trial.
Prosecutors have said the video showed Kelly abusing a girl. The accuser, only identified as Jane, testified for the first time that she was 14 when the video was taken.
The three-judge panel from the appeals court noted jurors acquitted Kelly on seven of the 13 counts against him “even after viewing those abhorrent tapes”.
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In a written statement, Kelly’s attorney Jennifer Bonjean said they plan to seek a US Supreme Court review of the decision and “pursue all of his appellate remedies until we free R Kelly”.
“We are disappointed in the ruling, but our fight is far from over,” she said.
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