Inducted by Long Island’s own Billy Joel, Bill Medley and the Righteous Brothers joined the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame as part of the Class of 2003. Now 82, Bill sat down to chat with WHLI’s Rob Rush before he plays a show in nearby New Jersey.
Photo by Matt Sayles/Invision for The Society of Singers/AP Images
WASHINGTON (AP) — Former heart surgeon and TV pitchman Dr. Mehmet Oz was confirmed Thursday to lead the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services.
Oz became the agency’s administrator in a party line 53-45 vote.
The 64-year-old will manage health insurance programs for roughly half the country, with oversight of Medicare, Medicaid or Affordable Care Act coverage. He steps into the new role as Congress is debating cuts to the Medicaid program, which provides coverage to millions of poor and disabled Americans.
LAS VEGAS (AP) — Hollywood studio executives are making their case for theatergoing with a little help from John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo Starr — along with the newly announced stars set to play them.
Sony Pictures kicked off the annual CinemaCon convention and trade show in Las Vegas on Monday by touting their four upcoming biopics told from the perspective of each member of The Beatles.
At their presentation on the main stage at Caesars Palace, the studio confirmed and brought out the long-rumored leads for each film — Paul Mescal as McCartney, Joseph Quinn as Harrison, Barry Keoghan as Starr and Harris Dickinson as Lennon.
Director Sam Mendes said all four films will premiere April 2028, calling it the “first binge-able theatrical experience.”
“I’ve been trying to make a story about The Beatles for years,” Mendes said.
The convention draws thousands of movie theater employees from around the world each year, as the major Hollywood studios make big presentations packed with film clips, trailers and stars to make the case that their upcoming slate will lure audiences to theaters.
Sony also brought out Oscar-winning filmmaker Danny Boyle to debut the new trailer for “28 Years Later,” his long-awaited zombie apocalypse sequel to “28 Days Later” hitting theaters in June, as well as the team behind “Spider-Man: Beyond the Spider-Verse” to tease their third film in the Spider-Verse trilogy.
Sony CEO Tom Rothman encouraged movie theater owners to get creative with weekday discounts, and Sony executive Adam Bergerman made the case for keeping films in cinemas for longer.
The convention comes fresh off an Oscars rallying cry for seeing movies in theaters.
Although a fuller release schedule is expected this year compared to 2024’s depleted calendar thanks to dual historic strikes, Hollywood marked the first quarter of 2025 with a sizable box office deficit. Sales are down 11% from the same point in 2024, and nearly 40% from 2019, according to media analytics company Comscore.
NEW YORK (AP) — Wall Street shuddered, and a level of shock unseen since COVID’s outbreak tore through financial markets worldwide Thursday on worries about the damage President Donald Trump’s newest set of tariffs could do to economies across continents, including his own.
The S&P 500 sank 4.8%, more than in major markets across Asia and Europe, for its worst day since the pandemic crashed the economy in 2020. The Dow Jones Industrial Average dropped 1,679 points, or 4%, and the Nasdaq composite tumbled 6%.
Little was spared in financial markets as fear flared about the potentially toxic mix of weakening economic growth and higher inflation that tariffs can create.
Everything from crude oil to Big Tech stocks to the value of the U.S. dollar against other currencies fell. Even gold, which hit records recently as investors sought something safer to own, pulled lower. Some of the worst hits walloped smaller U.S. companies, and the Russell 2000 index of smaller stocks dropped 6.6% to pull more than 20% below its record.
Investors worldwide knew Trump was going to announce a sweeping set of tariffs late Wednesday, and fears surrounding it had already pulled Wall Street’s main measure of health, the S&P 500 index, 10% below its all-time high. But Trump still managed to surprise them with “the worst case scenario for tariffs,” according to Mary Ann Bartels, chief investment officer at Sanctuary Wealth.
Trump announced a minimum tariff of 10% on imports, with the tax rate running much higher on products from certain countries like China and those from the European Union. It’s “plausible” the tariffs altogether, which would rival levels unseen in roughly a century, could knock down U.S. economic growth by 2 percentage points this year and raise inflation close to 5%, according to UBS.
Such a hit would be so big that it “makes one’s rational mind regard the possibility of them sticking as low,” according to Bhanu Baweja and other strategists at UBS.
Trump has previously said tariffs could cause “a little disturbance” in the economy and markets, and on Thursday he again downplayed the impact as he left the White House to fly to Florida.
“The markets are going to boom, the stock is going to boom and the country is going to boom,” Trump said.
Wall Street had long assumed Trump would use tariffs merely as a tool for negotiations with other countries, rather than as a long-term policy. But Wednesday’s announcement may suggest Trump sees tariffs more as helping to solve an ideological goal than as an opening bet in a poker game. Trump on Wednesday talked about wresting manufacturing jobs back to the United States, a process that could take years.
If Trump follows through on his tariffs, stock prices may need to fall much more than 10% from their all-time high in order to reflect the recession that could follow, along with the hit to profits that U.S. companies could take. The S&P 500 is now down 11.8% from its record set in February.
“Markets may actually be underreacting, especially if these rates turn out to be final, given the potential knock-on effects to global consumption and trade,” said Sean Sun, portfolio manager at Thornburg Investment Management, though he sees Trump’s announcement on Wednesday as more of an opening move than an endpoint for policy.
Trump offered an upbeat reaction after he was asked about the market’s drop as he left the White House to fly to his Florida golf club on Thursday.
“I think it’s going very well,” he said. “We have an operation, like when a patient gets operated on and it’s a big thing. I said this would exactly be the way it is.”
One wild card is that the Federal Reserve could cut interest rates in order to support the economy. That’s what it had been doing late last year before pausing in 2025. Lower interest rates help by making it easier for U.S. companies and households to borrow and spend.
Yields on Treasurys tumbled in part on rising expectations for coming cuts to rates, along with general fear about the health of the U.S. economy. The yield on the 10-year Treasury fell to 4.04% from 4.20% late Wednesday and from roughly 4.80% in January. That’s a huge move for the bond market.
The Fed may have less freedom to move than it would like, though. While lower rates can goose the economy, they can also push upward on inflation. And worries are already worsening about that because of tariffs, with U.S. households in particular bracing for sharp increases to their bills.
The U.S. economy at the moment is still growing, of course. A report on Thursday said fewer U.S. workers applied for unemployment benefits last week. Economist had been expecting to see an uptick in joblessness, and a relatively solid job market has been the linchpin keeping the economy out of recession.
A separate report said activity for U.S. transportation, finance and other businesses in the services industry grew last month. But the growth was weaker than expected, and businesses gave a mixed picture of how they see conditions.
Worries about a potentially stagnating economy and high inflation knocked down all kinds of stocks, leading to drops for four out of every five that make up the S&P 500.
Best Buy fell 17.8% because the electronics that it sells are made all over the world. United Airlines lost 15.6% because customers worried about the global economy may not fly as much for business or feel comfortable enough to take vacations. Target tumbled 10.9% amid worries that its customers, already squeezed by still-high inflation, may be under even more stress.
All told, the S&P 500 fell. 274.45 points to 5,396.52 The Dow Jones Industrial Average sank 1,679.39 to 40,545.93, and the Nasdaq composite tumbled 1,050.44 to 16,550.61.
In stock markets abroad, indexes fell sharply worldwide. France’s CAC 40 dropped 3.3%, and Germany’s DAX lost 3% in Europe.
Japan’s Nikkei 225 sank 2.8%, Hong Kong’s Hang Seng lost 1.5% and South Korea’s Kospi dropped 0.8%.
By ANTHONY IZAGUIRRE Associated Press
New York City Mayor Eric Adams withdrew from the city’s Democratic primary on Thursday and said he would instead run for reelection as an independent, a move intended to buy him time to save a campaign deeply wounded by a bribery scandal and liberal anger over his warm relationship with President Donald Trump.
In a video announcement, Adams said he will not run in the Democratic primary in June because his recently dismissed criminal case “dragged on too long” while the “false accusations were held over me,” preventing him from campaigning.
The decision came after intense speculation over whether Adams would remain in the Democratic primary, which has attracted several serious opponents, including former New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo.
In a practical sense, the move will allow Adams to skip directly to the general election in November, giving him more time to campaign unencumbered by the weight of his criminal charges. But it will also further distance Adams from the city’s heavily Democratic electorate and party organization, potentially weakening his chances of winning a second term.
The mayor, who had not formed much of a formal reelection apparatus, has struggled to raise money in recent months and suffered a blow when he was denied access to millions of dollars in public matching funds for his campaign because of questions about gaps in his recordkeeping.
At a Thursday afternoon forum held by the Rev. Al Sharpton’s National Action Network, Adams said the criminal case had “overshadowed” his achievements and politically sidelined him.
“I wanted to run in a Democratic primary but I have to be realistic,” he said. “I have to let New Yorkers know what I have done.”
A federal judge dismissed Adams’ corruption case on Wednesday, ending a legal saga that left the mayor severely damaged and raised questions about his political independence.
The charges, brought last year during President Joe Biden’s administration, accused Adams of accepting illegal campaign contributions and travel discounts from a Turkish official and others, in exchange for helping Turkey open a diplomatic building without passing fire inspections, among other things.
The mayor pleaded not guilty and was set for a trial in April, but the case was upended after Trump’s Justice Department moved to drop the charges so that Adams could assist with the president’s immigration agenda, while leaving open the possibility that the case could be revived.
The highly unusual move set off a firestorm of criticism and resignations and threw Adams’ mayoralty in doubt, with many people questioning whether he was beholden to the Trump administration.
In an order dismissing the case, federal Judge Dale E. Ho denied prosecutors the option to refile the charges and wrote that allowing the case to be revived “would create the unavoidable perception that the mayor’s freedom depends on his ability to carry out the immigration enforcement priorities of the administration.”
In his video announcement, Adams maintained his innocence but acknowledged that the case had “shaken” voters and said he put his trust in the wrong people.
“I know that the accusations leveled against me may have shaken your confidence in me, and that you may rightly have questions about my conduct. And let me be clear, although the charges against me were false, I trusted people I should not have, and I regret that,” he said.
Adams, a former police officer, has governed as a centrist Democrat and often done battle with the city’s progressives. He was a registered Republican in the 1990s but has spent his political career, which includes time as a state senator and Brooklyn borough president, as a Democrat.
The mayor’s political opponents swiftly criticized his decision to run as an independent. Zohran Mamdani, a Democratic state assemblyman running for mayor, said, “Regardless of what party Adams flees to, New Yorkers deserve better than a self-interested, disgraced mayor who has and always will put his needs before their own.”
Another candidate, Democratic state Sen. Zellnor Myrie, described the whole ordeal as “a circus.”
Jim Walden, a former prosecutor who is running as an independent, promptly challenged Adams to a debate, arguing that the mayor’s decision came “out of desperation, not principle.”
Adams’ announcement was first reported by Politico.
There were dueling protests outside William Floyd High School in Mastic Beach Wednesday with some parents saying a boy is on the girls track team.
The School District has not issued a public statement. However, a parent familiar with the situation clarified that the student who is transgender has only participated in team practices and has not yet competed in any events.
Officials from Suffolk County have stated that New York state law prohibits discrimination based on gender identity, making it illegal to exclude transgender athletes from participation.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Amazon has put in a bid to purchase TikTok, a Trump administration official said Wednesday, in an eleventh-hour pitch as a U.S. ban on the platform is set to go into effect Saturday.
The official, who was not authorized to comment publicly and spoke on the condition of anonymity, said the Amazon offer was made in a letter to Vice President JD Vance and Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick.
The New York Times first reported on the bid.
President Donald Trump on Inauguration Day gave the platform a reprieve, barreling past a law that had been upheld unanimously by the Supreme Court, which said the ban was necessary for national security.
Under the law, TikTok’s Chinese-owned parent company ByteDance is required to sell the platform to an approved buyer or take it offline in the United States. Trump has suggested he could further extend the pause on the ban, but he has also said he expects a deal to be forged by Saturday.
Amazon declined to comment. TikTok did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The existence of an Amazon bid surfaced as Trump was scheduled on Wednesday to meet with senior officials to discuss the coming deadline for a TikTok sale.
Although it’s unclear if ByteDance plans to sell TikTok, several possible bidders have come forward in the past few months. Among the possible investors are the software company Oracle and the investment firm Blackstone. Oracle announced in 2020 that it had a 12.5% stake in TikTok Global after securing its business as the app’s cloud technology provider.
In January, the artificial intelligence startup Perplexity AI presented ByteDance with a merger proposal that would combine Perplexity’s business with TikTok’s U.S. operation. Last month, the company outlined its approach to rebuilding TikTok in a blog post, arguing that it is “singularly positioned to rebuild the TikTok algorithm without creating a monopoly.”
“Any acquisition by a consortium of investors could in effect keep ByteDance in control of the algorithm, while any acquisition by a competitor would likely create a monopoly in the short form video and information space,” Perplexity said in its post.
The company said it would remake the TikTok algorithm and ensure that infrastructure would be developed and maintained in “American data centers with American oversight, ensuring alignment with domestic privacy standards and regulations.”
Other potential bidders include a consortium organized by billionaire businessman Frank McCourt, which recently recruited Reddit co-founder Alexis Ohanian as a strategic adviser. Investors in the consortium say they’ve offered ByteDance $20 billion in cash for TikTok’s U.S. platform. Jesse Tinsley, the founder of the payroll firm Employer.com, says he too has organized a consortium and is offering ByteDance more than $30 billion for the platform. Wyoming small business owner Reid Rasner has also announced that he offered ByteDance roughly $47.5 billion.
Both the FBI and the Federal Communications Commission have warned that ByteDance could share user data — such as browsing history, location and biometric identifiers — with China’s authoritarian government. TikTok said it has never done that and would not do so if asked. The U.S. government has not provided evidence of that happening.
Trump has millions of followers on TikTok and has credited the trendsetting platform with helping him gain traction among young voters.
During his first term, he took a more skeptical view of TikTok and issued executive orders banning dealings with ByteDance as well as the owners of the Chinese messaging app WeChat.
—
NEW YORK (AP) — A federal judge dismissed New York City Mayor Eric Adams’ corruption case on Wednesday, agreeing it was the only practical outcome while blasting the Justice Department’s “troubling” rationale for wanting the charges thrown out — namely so the Democrat could help President Donald Trump’s immigration crackdown.
The judge, though, denied prosecutors the option to refile the charges after the mayoral election. Judge Dale E. Ho’s order to dismiss the case “with prejudice” spares Adams from having to govern in a way that pleases Trump or potentially risk having the Republican’s Justice Department revive the charges.
The judge said he wasn’t opining on the merits of the case, but that courts can’t force prosecutors to move forward. Still, he expressed qualms about the government’s move, saying “there are many reasons to be troubled” by its reasoning.
“Everything here smacks of a bargain: dismissal of the indictment in exchange for immigration policy concessions,” Ho wrote. He said he found it “disturbing” that public officials might get special treatment from prosecutors by complying with policy goals.
He rejected an alternative the Justice Department had sought — dismissing the case “without prejudice,” which would have left room for the charges to be refiled.
“Dismissing the case without prejudice would create the unavoidable perception that the mayor’s freedom depends on his ability to carry out the immigration enforcement priorities of the administration, and that he might be more beholden to the demands of the federal government than to the wishes of his own constituents,” the judge wrote.
The mayor claims victory
Adams lauded the judge’s decision during brief remarks outside the mayoral residence.
“As I said all along, this case never should have been brought, and I did nothing wrong,” he said.
“I have always been solely beholden to the people of this city,” the mayor added. “No special interests, no political opponents, but just everyday New Yorkers, just you.”
Asked about his chances for reelection, Adams said: “I’m gonna win.”
He closed by holding up a copy and encouraging people to read FBI Director Kash Patel’s 2023 book “Government Gangsters,” which alleged a “sinister cabal” at the heart of government.
The Justice Department said in a statement that Adams’ case had been “an example of political weaponization and a waste of resources.”
Ho’s decision follows a legal drama that roiled the Justice Department, created turmoil in City Hall and left Adams’ mayoralty hanging by a thread amid questions about his political independence and ability to govern.
Several prosecutors in New York and Washington quit rather than carry out the Justice Department’s directive to drop the case against Adams.
After four of Adams’ top deputies decided to resign, Gov. Kathy Hochul pondered taking the unprecedented step of ousting a New York City mayor. The governor, a fellow Democrat, ultimately concluded it would be undemocratic and disruptive to do so and instead proposed new oversight for city government.
At a Feb. 19 hearing, Adams told Ho: “I have not committed a crime.”
The basis for the case
Adams pleaded not guilty to bribery and other charges after a 2024 indictment accused him of accepting illegal campaign contributions and travel discounts from a Turkish official and others — and returning the favors by, among other things, helping Turkey open a diplomatic building without passing fire inspections.
The case, brought during President Joe Biden’s administration, was on track for an April trial until Trump’s Justice Department moved to drop it. Ho delayed the trial while considering what to do, seeking advice from former U.S. Solicitor General Paul Clement.
Ho’s decision comes about three months before a Democratic primary that will likely choose the New York’s next mayor.
Adams faces a large field of challengers, including former Gov. Andrew Cuomo and several Democrats who say he’s now too indebted to Trump for New Yorkers to be sure he’ll prioritize their interests. Adams has said he’s “solely beholden to the 8.3 million New Yorkers that I represent, and I will always put this city first.”
As recently as Jan. 6, Manhattan federal prosecutors wrote in court papers that they continued to “uncover additional criminal conduct by Adams.” But a month later, their new Washington superiors decided to abandon the case.
In court filings and a hearing, then-acting Deputy Attorney General Emil Bove said he was “particularly concerned about the impact of the prosecution on Mayor Adams’ ability to support” Trump’s immigration objectives. Bove also questioned the prior administration’s motives in pursuing Adams, who had criticized Biden’s handling of immigration.
The Trump administration’s acting U.S. attorney in New York, Danielle Sassoon, resisted Bove’s order, saying she couldn’t defend a dismissal linked to political considerations.
Sassoon and several other career prosecutors quit in protest.
Adams, a retired police captain and former state lawmaker and Brooklyn official, was elected in 2021 as a centrist Democrat in a liberal stronghold. Since his indictment, Adams has cultivated a warmer relationship with Trump, telling mayoral staffers not to criticize the president publicly.
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump on Wednesday announced far-reaching new tariffs on nearly all U.S. trading partners — a 34% tax on imports from China and 20% on the European Union, among others — that threaten to dismantle much of the architecture of the global economy and trigger broader trade wars.
Trump, in a Rose Garden announcement, said he was placing elevated tariff rates on dozens of nations that run meaningful trade surpluses with the United States, while imposing a 10% baseline tax on imports from all countries in response to what he called an economic emergency.
The president, who said the tariffs were designed to boost domestic manufacturing, used aggressive rhetoric to describe a global trade system that the United States helped to build after World War II, saying “our country has been looted, pillaged, raped and plundered” by other nations.
The action amounts to a historic tax hike that could push the global order to a breaking point. It kickstarts what could be a painful transition for many Americans as middle-class essentials such as housing, autos and clothing are expected to become more costly, while disrupting the alliances built to ensure peace and economic stability.
Trump said he was acting to bring in hundreds of billions in new revenue to the U.S. government and restore fairness to global trade.
“Taxpayers have been ripped off for more than 50 years,” he said. “But it is not going to happen anymore.”
Trump declared a national economic emergency to levy the tariffs. He has promised that factory jobs will return to the United States as a result of the taxes, but his policies risk a sudden economic slowdown as consumers and businesses could face sharp price hikes.
Trump was fulfilling a key campaign promise as he imposed what he called “reciprocal” tariffs on trade partners, acting without Congress under the 1977 International Emergency Powers Act. But his action Wednesday could jeopardize Trump’s voter mandate in last year’s election to combat inflation. Several Republican senators, particularly from farm and border states, have questioned the wisdom of the tariffs. U.S. stock market futures sold off sharply overnight in anticipation of the economy weakening, after having already dropped since the start of this year.
“With today’s announcement, U.S. tariffs will approach levels not seen since the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act of 1930, which incited a global trade war and deepened the Great Depression,” said Scott Lincicome and Colin Grabow of the Cato Institute, a libertarian think tank.
The president’s higher rates would hit foreign entities that sell more goods to the United States than they buy, meaning the tariffs could stay in place for some time as the administration expects other nations to lower their tariffs and other barriers to trade that it says led to a $1.2 trillion trade imbalance last year.
The new tariffs will come on top of recent announcements of 25% taxes on auto imports; levies against China, Canada and Mexico; and expanded trade penalties on steel and aluminum. Trump has also imposed tariffs on countries that import oil from Venezuela and he plans separate import taxes on pharmaceutical drugs, lumber, copper and computer chips.
Canada and Mexico would not face higher rates on what they’re already being charged by Trump in what he says is an effort to stop illegal immigration and drug smuggling. As of now, goods that comply with the USMCA North American trade pact would be excluded from those tariffs.
But the 20% charged on imports from China due its role in fentanyl production would largely be added to the 34% announced by Trump. The specific products that Trump is tariffing, such as autos, would be exempt from the tariffs unveiled Wednesday, as would products such as pharmaceutical drugs that he plans to tariff at a later date.
Threats of backlash
None of the warning signs about a falling stock market or consumer sentiment turning morose have caused the administration to publicly second-guess its strategy, despite the risk of political backlash.
Senior administration officials, who insisted on anonymity to preview the new tariffs with reporters ahead of Trump’s speech, said the taxes would raise hundreds of billions of dollars annually in revenues. They said the 10% baseline rate existed to help ensure compliance, while the higher rates were based on the trade deficits run with other nations and then halved to reach the numbers that Trump presented in the Rose Garden.
The 10% rate would be collected starting Saturday and the higher rates would be collected beginning April 9.
Trump removed the tariff exemptions on imports from China worth $800 or less. He plans to remove the exemptions other nations have on imports worth $800 or less once the federal government certifies that is has the staffing and resources in place.
Based on the possibility of broad tariffs that have been floated by some White House aides, most outside analyses by banks and think tanks see an economy tarnished by higher prices and stagnating growth.
Trump would be applying these tariffs on his own; he has ways of doing so without congressional approval. That makes it easy for Democratic lawmakers and policymakers to criticize the administration if the uncertainty expressed by businesses and declining consumer sentiment are signs of trouble to come.
Rep. Suzan DelBene, D-Wash., said the tariffs are “part of the chaos and dysfunction” being generated across the Trump administration. The chair of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee stressed that Trump should not have the sole authority to raise taxes as he intends without getting lawmakers’ approval, saying that Republicans so far have been “blindly loyal.”
“The president shouldn’t be able to do that,” DelBene said. “This is a massive tax increase on American families, and it’s without a vote in Congress. … President Trump promised on the campaign trail that he would lower costs on day one. Now he says he doesn’t care if prices go up — he’s broken his promise.”
Even Republicans who trust Trump’s instincts have acknowledged that the tariffs could disrupt an economy with an otherwise healthy 4.1 % unemployment rate.
“We’ll see how it all develops,” said House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La. “It may be rocky in the beginning. But I think that this will make sense for Americans and help all Americans.”
Allies brace themselves
Longtime trading partners are preparing their own countermeasures. Canada has imposed some in response to the tariffs that Trump tied to the trafficking of fentanyl. The European Union, in response to the steel and aluminum tariffs, put taxes on 26 billion euros ($28 billion) worth of U.S. goods, including on bourbon, which prompted Trump to threaten a 200% tariff on European alcohol.
Many allies feel they have been reluctantly drawn into a confrontation by Trump, who routinely says America’s friends and foes have essentially ripped off the United States with a mix of tariffs and other trade barriers.
The flip side is that Americans also have the incomes to choose to buy designer gowns by French fashion houses and autos from German manufacturers, whereas World Bank data show the EU has lower incomes per capita than the U.S.
The Chinese government delivered a measured response to the new tariffs, saying in a statement: “China believes that protectionism leads nowhere, and trade and tariff wars have no winners. This has been widely recognized in the international community.”
Italy’s conservative Premier Giorgia Meloni said Trump’s new tariffs against the EU were “wrong” and Italy would work toward an agreement with the United States to avoid a trade war that would weaken all involved.
Basic Fun CEO Jay Foreman, whose company is behind such classic toys as Tonka trucks, Lincoln Logs and Care Bears, has been working hard to come up with new ways to cut tariff-related costs like reduce packaging and eliminate batteries with the products.
But Trump’s announcement that he plans a 34% increase in tariffs on Chinese imports has solidified his decision to hike prices. Most of the company’s toys are made in China. He said the Tonka Mighty Dump Truck will go from $29.99 to $39.99 this holiday season, possibly even $45.
“There is no other way,” he said.
NEW YORK (AP) — Nintendo has announced a June 5 launch date and $449.99 price tag for its latest gaming console, the Switch 2, which will introduce interactive chat and screenshare functions to connect gamers.
In its 60-minute Nintendo Direct presentation on Wednesday, the company revealed a more vibrant display on the Switch 2, a larger screen and several games that will launch with the console.
Central to its updated system is a new “C” button on its Joy-Con controller, which will launch a new “GameChat” feature that requires a subscription to Nintendo’s Switch online service. It allows players to “communicate with friends and family while playing a game,” and lets them share their game screen with others. A built-in microphone will also allow chatting with other gamers.
“When you think about some of the biggest titles on (the Nintendo Switch), it’s like Mario Kart, Super Mario Jamboree, even though that’s quite a new title, has cracked the top ten of most played games on the console. So, it does make a lot of sense that the sort of headline feature is geared primarily towards that sort of use,” said Hannah Cowton-Barnes, a London-based video game industry expert for Tech Advisor.
Perhaps the most contemporary function yet for the Switch 2 is the ability to use the Joy-Con controllers like a computer mouse. The developer displayed multiple ways to use the new function, such as angling a club in a golf game.
The new portable console features a 7.9 inch LCD screen that displays in 1080p. Nintendo also revealed in the live stream that, when docked, the system will be able to support 4K resolution for compatible games.
The presentation started with an extended look at Mario Kart World — the console’s launch bundle game — which adds a bit of flair to the series with in-game characters doing tailwhips, flips, rail grinds and other tricks.
The developer also unveiled a new James Bond game, dubbed Project 007, revisiting a classic Nintendo 64 console hit revered by many first-person shooter fans.
Nintendo also announced two more Switch 2 exclusives featuring its marquee characters. Donkey Kong Bananza, a 3D adventure with the big ape punching his way through a huge underground world, arrives July 17. Kirby Air Riders, a racing game from the director of the Super Smash Bros. series, is due later in the year.
Third-party exclusives likely to create some buzz include Koei-Tecmo’s Hyrule Warriors: Age of Imprisonment, a hack-and-slash prequel to The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom, coming this winter. From Software’s The Duskbloods, a baroque multiplayer title from the creators of Elden Ring, is scheduled for 2026.
Miss the GameCube? Nintendo said Switch Online subscribers will be able to access a limited selection of GameCube titles such as The Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker and F-Zero GX.
The new console will be backwards compatible — able to play physical and digital Switch games — but users will need to purchase a microSD express memory card for the Switch 2. The presentation revealed that normal microSD cards will not be compatible with the system. However, data from the original Switch can be transferred to the new console.
The Switch 2’s launch price is significantly higher than the original Switch’s $299 price tag. A separate bundle that includes the new Mario Kart game will also be available for $499.99.
The Trump administration’s tariffs have hit the video game console industry at a fragile moment, said Joost van Dreunen, author of “One Up: Creativity, Competition, and the Global Business of Video Games.”
“At the beginning of a new hardware cycle, all of a sudden we’re looking at this price hike,” said van Dreunen, a games industry researcher. “I had originally predicted that the Switch 2 would be $400. Now it’s announced that it’s $450. That $50 difference is a Trump tax.”
The tariffs, he said, impact games hardware because console devices are manufactured and shipped from China and that region at large.
The early stages of a hardware life cycle are already very low margin, or usually a loss for hardware manufacturers, van Dreunen said. Those manufacturers typically eat the margin in order to get the devices out to stores.
“But with an increased tariff, that means that margin is probably even worse than it historically is. But their hands are kind of tied. They can’t not progress. They can’t not launch a new hardware generation. So for the consumer base, people are just going to pay more.”
Nintendo plans to host “Switch 2 Experience” events in several countries, where gamers can get a hands-on experience with the new system. Those events are planned for cities such as Los Angeles, New York, London and Paris beginning this month.
LOS ANGELES (AP) — Val Kilmer, the brooding, versatile actor who played fan favorite Iceman in “Top Gun,” donned a voluminous cape as Batman in “Batman Forever” and portrayed Jim Morrison in “The Doors,” has died. He was 65.
Kilmer died Tuesday night in Los Angeles, surrounded by family and friends, his daughter, Mercedes Kilmer, said in an email to The Associated Press.
Val Kilmer died from pneumonia. He had recovered after a 2014 throat cancer diagnosis that required two tracheotomies.
“I have behaved poorly. I have behaved bravely. I have behaved bizarrely to some. I deny none of this and have no regrets because I have lost and found parts of myself that I never knew existed,” he says toward the end of “Val,” the 2021 documentary on his career. “And I am blessed.”
Kilmer, the youngest actor ever accepted to the prestigious Juilliard School at the time he attended, experienced the ups and downs of fame more dramatically than most. His break came in 1984’s spy spoof “Top Secret!” followed by the comedy “Real Genius” in 1985. Kilmer would later show his comedy chops again in films including “MacGruber” and “Kiss Kiss Bang Bang.”
His movie career hit its zenith in the early 1990s as he made a name for himself as a dashing leading man, starring alongside Kurt Russell and Bill Paxton in 1993’s “Tombstone,” as Elvis’ ghost in “True Romance” and as a bank-robbing demolition expert in Michael Mann’s 1995 film “Heat” with Al Pacino and Robert De Niro.
“While working with Val on ‘Heat’ I always marvelled at the range, the brilliant variability within the powerful current of Val’s possessing and expressing character,” director Michael Mann said in a statement Tuesday night.
Actor Josh Brolin, a friend of Kilmer, was among others paying tribute.
“You were a smart, challenging, brave, uber-creative firecracker,” Brolin wrote on Instagram. “There’s not a lot left of those.”
Kilmer — who took part in the Method branch of Suzuki arts training — threw himself into parts. When he played Doc Holliday in “Tombstone,” he filled his bed with ice for the final scene to mimic the feeling of dying from tuberculosis. To play Morrison, he wore leather pants all the time, asked castmates and crew to only refer to him as Jim Morrison and blasted The Doors for a year.
That intensity also gave Kilmer a reputation that he was difficult to work with, something he grudgingly agreed with later in life, but always defending himself by emphasizing art over commerce.
“In an unflinching attempt to empower directors, actors and other collaborators to honor the truth and essence of each project, an attempt to breathe Suzukian life into a myriad of Hollywood moments, I had been deemed difficult and alienated the head of every major studio,” he wrote in his memoir, “I’m Your Huckleberry.”
One of his more iconic roles — hotshot pilot Tom “Iceman” Kazansky opposite Tom Cruise — almost didn’t happen. Kilmer was courted by director Tony Scott for “Top Gun” but initially balked. “I didn’t want the part. I didn’t care about the film. The story didn’t interest me,” he wrote in his memoir. He agreed after being promised that his role would improve from the initial script. He would reprise the role in the film’s 2022 sequel, “Top Gun: Maverick.”
One career nadir was playing Batman in Joel Schumacher’s goofy, garish “Batman Forever” with Nicole Kidman and opposite Chris O’Donnell’s Robin — before George Clooney took up the mantle for 1997’s “Batman & Robin” and after Michael Keaton played the Dark Knight in 1989’s “Batman” and 1992’s “Batman Returns.”
Janet Maslin in The New York Times said Kilmer was “hamstrung by the straight-man aspects of the role,” while Roger Ebert deadpanned that he was a “completely acceptable” substitute for Keaton. Kilmer, who was one and done as Batman, blamed much of his performance on the suit.
The Times was the first to report his death on Tuesday.
“When you’re in it, you can barely move and people have to help you stand up and sit down,” Kilmer said in “Val,” in lines spoken by his son Jack, who voiced the part of his father in the film because of his inability to speak. “You also can’t hear anything and after a while people stop talking to you, it’s very isolating. It was a struggle for me to get a performance past the suit, and it was frustrating until I realised that my role in the film was just to show up and stand where I was told to.”
His next projects were the film version of the 1960s TV series “The Saint” — fussily putting on wigs, accents and glasses — and “The Island of Dr. Moreau” with Marlon Brando, which became one of the decade’s most infamously cursed productions.
David Gregory’s 2014 documentary “Lost Soul: The Doomed Journey of Richard Stanley’s Island of Dr. Moreau,” described a cursed set that included a hurricane, Kilmer bullying director Richard Stanley, the firing of Stanley via fax (who sneaked back on set as an extra with a mask on) and extensive rewrites by Kilmer and Brando. The older actor told the younger at one point: “‘It’s a job now, Val. A lark. We’ll get through it.’ I was as sad as I’ve ever been on a set,” Kilmer wrote in his memoir.
In 1996, Entertainment Weekly ran a cover story about Kilmer titled “The Man Hollywood Loves to Hate.” The directors Schumacher and John Frankenheimer, who finished “The Island of Dr. Moreau,” said he was difficult. Frankenheimer said there were two things he would never do: “Climb Mount Everest and work with Val Kilmer again.”
Other artists came to his defense, like D. J. Caruso, who directed Kilmer in “The Salton Sea” and said the actor simply liked to talk out scenes and enjoyed having a director’s attention.
“Val needs to immerse himself in a character. I think what happened with directors like Frankenheimer and Schumacher is that Val would ask a lot of questions, and a guy like Schumacher would say, ‘You’re Batman! Just go do it,'” Caruso told The New York Times in 2002.
After “The Island of Dr. Moreau,” the movies were smaller, like David Mamet human-trafficking thriller “Spartan”; “Joe the King” in 1999, in which he played a paunchy, abusive alcoholic; and playing the doomed ’70s porn star John Holmes in 2003’s “Wonderland.” He also threw himself into his one-man stage show “Citizen Twain,” in which he played Mark Twain.
“I enjoy the depth and soul the piece has that Twain had for his fellow man and America,” he told Variety in 2018. “And the comedy that’s always so close to the surface, and how valuable his genius is for us today.”
Kilmer spent his formative years in the Chatsworth neighborhood of Los Angeles. He attended Chatsworth High School alongside future Oscar winner Kevin Spacey and future Emmy winner Mare Winningham. At 17, he was the youngest drama student ever admitted at the Juilliard School in 1981.
Shortly after he left for Juilliard, his younger brother, 15-year-old Wesley, suffered an epileptic seizure in the family’s Jacuzzi and died on the way to the hospital. Wesley was an aspiring filmmaker when he died.
“I miss him and miss his things. I have his art up. I like to think about what he would have created. I’m still inspired by him,” Kilmer told the Times.
While still at Juilliard, Kilmer co-wrote and appeared in the play “How It All Began” and later turned down a role in Francis Ford Coppola’s “The Outsiders” for the Broadway play, “Slab Boys,” alongside Kevin Bacon and Sean Penn.
Kilmer published two books of poetry (including “My Edens After Burns”) and was nominated for a Grammy in 2012 for spoken word album for “The Mark of Zorro.” He was also a visual artist and a lifelong Christian Scientist.
He dated Cher, married and divorced actor Joanne Whalley. He is survived by their two children, Mercedes and Jack.
“I have no regrets,” Kilmer told the AP in 2021. “I’ve witness and experienced miracles.”