by Kimberly C. Roberts Special to the NNPA from The Philadelphia Tribune Comedian J. Anthony Brown co-stars on “The Rickey Smiley Show,” which airs Tuesdays at 9 p.m. on TV One.— “The Rickey Smiley Show,” which premiered on Sept. 18, had an auspicious beginning, giving TV One its “biggest debut in its history.” Airing Tuesdays at 9 p.m., the sitcom, “loosely based on his own life,” stars radio host Rickey S ...

by Gregory Dale Special to the NNPA from the Afro-American Newspaper Actor Mike Epps is set to portray legendary comedian Richard Pryor in an upcoming film about jazz singer Nina Simone. According to The Hollywood Reporter, Cynthia Mort wrote the script for the biopic, and the title character will be played by actress Zoe Saldana. In the film, Epps will play Pryor, who opened for Simone during their rise to ...

By Charlene Crowell NNPA Columnist Among the 10.9 million homes that went into foreclosure between 2007 and 2011, more than half of the “spillover” cost to nearby homes have led to a $1 trillion loss in home equity for African-American and Latino families., according to a new report by the Center for Responsible Lending titled, “Collateral Damage: The Spillover Costs of Foreclosures.” The report said, “Fami ...

By Dwight Brown NNPA Film Critic Grass. Booze. Cocaine. Veteran pilot Whip Whitaker (Denzel Washington) hits the drug-abuse trifecta.  And that’s just hours before he straps himself into the cockpit of a 50-ton jet, with 96 passengers and six flight crew members aboard. On the plane’s ascent from the Orlando, Fla. airport, he battles treacherous weather with blinding storm clouds and hurricane-like winds; h ...

By Marian Wright Edelman NNPA Columnist When Sybrina Fulton, Trayvon Martin’s mother, spoke at the Children’s Defense Fund’s recent national conference, she shared some details about her son that reminded the audience both how special Trayvon was to his family and at the same time how much the happy, social high school student was like any mother’s child. “He was very affectionate. He loved to hug and kiss ...

By Benjamin F. Chavis, Jr. NNPA Columnist There is abundant evidence that this will be a close contest between President Barack Obama and former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney.  Of course, the election is not really about race, religion or about a random celebrity or publicity quotient.  This election is actually about the future of the nation politically and economically as well as the global leadership of ...