National Entertainment

NEW YORK (AP) — The assignment was daunting: Write a song for an onstage moment of transcendence. Make it kind of funny and exciting and for a five-piece band.

VATICAN CITY (AP) — Before flying to Italy's southern Puglia region to meet world leaders at the Group of Seven summit, Pope Francis hosted a very different audience at the Vatican on Friday celebrating the importance of humor.

LOS ANGELES (AP) — To rising comic Hannah Einbinder , her bits are for more than just laughs. She says her jokes are a coping mechanism she uses to process the tough topics she tackles in her material.

Tejano singer and longtime television music show host Johnny Canales has died. He was 77. Canales' family confirmed his death in a statement posted Thursday on the Johnny and Nora Canales Show Facebook page. The post did not provide a cause of death.

NEW YORK (AP) — Ron Simons, an actor who turned into a formidable screen and stage producer, winning four Tony Awards and having several films selected at the Sundance Film Festival, has died. He was 63.

HAVANA (AP) — He was the poetic voice of the Cuban Revolution, an inspiration for millions of Latin Americans living under dictatorships throughout the 1960s and 1970s who dreamt of the ideal Cuba that he — and his guitar — helped to evoke.

BARCELONA, Spain (AP) — Hugging his knees and clad in a bright orange life vest, the giant “Inflatable Refugee” looks vulnerable as he sits alone in a sea of empty red velvet chairs.

COPENHAGEN, Denmark (AP) — Swedish accident investigators on Friday said the country's oldest amusement park didn't properly test new parts for a roller coaster that derailed last year and sent some passengers plunging to the ground, killing one and

NEW YORK (AP) — A comet must have landed at the 2024 Songwriters Hall of Fame induction ceremony. The members of R.E.M. had joked only hours before it would take “a comet” to get the band to perform together one last time.

NEW YORK (AP) — Tony Bennett's two daughters are suing their brother, alleging he mishandled and failed to disclose some of their father's assets in his role as trustee of the late singer 's estate.