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Tag: Demi Lovato

  • Actress-singer Demi Lovato opens up about her emotional and physical abuse in entertainment industry

    By IANS

    LOS ANGELES: Actress-singer Demi Lovato recently opened up about the emotional and physical abuse she’s endured in the entertainment industry, from her days as a child star to incidents that led her to rehab, reports Variety.The 30-year-old singer sat down with the podcast ‘Call Her Daddy’ to reflect on her career, sharing some of the darker incidents she’s faced, like the time an unnamed member on her team told her she wasn’t “sick enough” to seek treatment after she explained that she was “throwing up blood”.”I think that was his way of saying, ‘No, you’re not going back to treatment because if you do, this will look bad on me,” Lovato recalled about the interaction back in 2017, quoted Variety. Less than a year later, she “ended up overdosing.”According to Variety, at the age of 13, Lovato started experimenting with drugs after being prescribed opiates for injuries she sustained in a car accident.”My mom didn’t think she’d have to lock up the opiates from her 13-year-old daughter, but I was already drinking at that point,” Lovato explained. “I had been bullied [and] was looking for an escape and when my mom saw how many of the pills had disappeared and how fast they did, she took them away [and] locked them up.”For the next few years, Lovato shared that she would still “get certain kinds of pills” when she was 15 or 16 years old, including stealing her mom’s Xanax.”It was off and on. Then at 17 is when it kind of was the first time, like, I tried coke and loved it too much,” she continued, recalling the period following the release of her Disney Channel original movie ‘Camp Rock’. “That kind of bled into me going to treatment right after I turned 18.”Variety adds that Lovato later discussed the return of her eating disorder between 2016 and 2018. “There was one time where I had binged and purged one night. I came clean to my team and said, ‘Hey, this happened’.”According to Lovato, she snuck out of her hotel room that night because her management would remove the phones so she couldn’t call room service.”I didn’t have food in my hotel room, like snacks in the mini bar, because they didn’t want me to eat the snacks,” Lovato said, sharing that her team later trapped her in her hotel room by barricading the door with furniture. “It was that level of control when it came to my food, which just made my eating disorder worse,” she added.

    LOS ANGELES: Actress-singer Demi Lovato recently opened up about the emotional and physical abuse she’s endured in the entertainment industry, from her days as a child star to incidents that led her to rehab, reports Variety.
    The 30-year-old singer sat down with the podcast ‘Call Her Daddy’ to reflect on her career, sharing some of the darker incidents she’s faced, like the time an unnamed member on her team told her she wasn’t “sick enough” to seek treatment after she explained that she was “throwing up blood”.
    “I think that was his way of saying, ‘No, you’re not going back to treatment because if you do, this will look bad on me,” Lovato recalled about the interaction back in 2017, quoted Variety. Less than a year later, she “ended up overdosing.”
    According to Variety, at the age of 13, Lovato started experimenting with drugs after being prescribed opiates for injuries she sustained in a car accident.
    “My mom didn’t think she’d have to lock up the opiates from her 13-year-old daughter, but I was already drinking at that point,” Lovato explained. “I had been bullied [and] was looking for an escape and when my mom saw how many of the pills had disappeared and how fast they did, she took them away [and] locked them up.”
    For the next few years, Lovato shared that she would still “get certain kinds of pills” when she was 15 or 16 years old, including stealing her mom’s Xanax.
    “It was off and on. Then at 17 is when it kind of was the first time, like, I tried coke and loved it too much,” she continued, recalling the period following the release of her Disney Channel original movie ‘Camp Rock’. “That kind of bled into me going to treatment right after I turned 18.”
    Variety adds that Lovato later discussed the return of her eating disorder between 2016 and 2018. “There was one time where I had binged and purged one night. I came clean to my team and said, ‘Hey, this happened’.”
    According to Lovato, she snuck out of her hotel room that night because her management would remove the phones so she couldn’t call room service.
    “I didn’t have food in my hotel room, like snacks in the mini bar, because they didn’t want me to eat the snacks,” Lovato said, sharing that her team later trapped her in her hotel room by barricading the door with furniture. “It was that level of control when it came to my food, which just made my eating disorder worse,” she added.

  • Ariel Winter to headline NBC comedy series ‘Hungry’

    By PTI

    LOS ANGELES: “Modern Family” star Ariel Winter has been tapped to replace singer-actor Demi Lovato as the lead of NBC’s comedy series “Hungry”.

    Lovato, who is executive producing the show along with her manager Scooter Braun, stepped down from acting duties last week citing scheduling conflict.

    According to Deadline, the show will get into production coming week.

    Written by Suzanne Martin, “Hungry” follows a group of friends who belong to a food-issues group helping one another as they look for love, success and the perfect thing in the fridge that’s going to make it all better.

    James Burrows is attached to direct the multi-camera comedy.

    Actors Valerie Bertinelli, Gabriel Fluffy Iglesias, Ryan McPartlin, Alex Brightman and Ashley D Kelley round out the cast.

    The show is produced by Sean Hayes and Todd Milliner’s Hazy Mills, SB Projects and Universal Television.

  • Demi Lovato says the term ‘aliens’ is ‘derogatory’ toward ETs

    By ANI

    WASHINGTON: American singer-songwriter Demi Lovato thinks that referring to extraterrestrial beings as ‘aliens’ is offensive, according to a new interview.

    The 29-year-old singer has recently expanded into the docuseries territory with not only the tell-all ‘Dancing with the Devil’ documentary but also with Peacock’s ‘Unidentified with Demi Lovato’.

    As per Fox News, the latter, which is a four-part series, follows Lovato’s exploration of what may live beyond Earth as well as their attempt to make contact with alien life.

    In a recent interview with a news outlet, the singer said that there are a few things about how people see extraterrestrials that they’d like to change, including the terminology. Demi said, “I think that we have to stop calling them aliens because aliens is a derogatory term for anything. That’s why I like to call them ETs.”

    The term “aliens” has been one of hot debate in recent years, as many have deemed it derogatory to use toward illegal immigrants. According to the Online Etymology Dictionary, ‘alien’ comes from the Old French word ‘alien’ and the Latin ‘alienus’, both meaning strange or foreign.

    It adds that the meaning “residing in a country, not of one’s birth” dates to the mid-15th century, while the meaning “wholly different in nature” is from the 1670s and the usage “not of this Earth” was first recorded in 1920.

    Furthermore, Lovato said that they’re particularly irked by misconceptions that extraterrestrials are “harmful or that they’ll come and take over the planet.”

    “I really think that if there was anything out there that would want to do that to us, it would have happened by now,” they suggested. During the discussion, Demi expanded on their idea that humans are likely safe from harm when it comes to aliens.

    “I think that if there were beings that could harm us, we would have been gone a long time ago. I also think that if there are civilizations that are of consciousness in other dimensions, which has given them the technology to be able to travel through space, I think that they are looking for nothing but peaceful encounters and interactions because like I said, if they wanted us gone, we would have been gone a long time ago,” they said.

    “What if they’re waiting for us?” Lovato later asked, adding, “What if that’s what they’re waiting on?”

    Lovato had recently described “a beautiful and incredible experience” with a possible alien sorry, extraterrestrial, in an interview with E! News’ ‘Daily Pop’.

    “We went out into the desert in Joshua Tree and I basically saw this blue orb that was about 50 feet away, maybe less, and it was kind of like floating above the ground, just like 10 or 15 feet, and it was kind of keeping its distance from me,” they said.

    As per Page Six, Demi added that they’d had a previous experience with a possible extraterrestrial in 2020 at their 28th birthday party, in which “something showed up directly above us in the sky” displaying “huge lights that made a question mark, almost.”

  • Demi Lovato hunts for UFO in ‘Unidentified With Demi Lovato’ trailer

    By ANI

    WASHINGTON: Peacock Television Network has unveiled the trailer for the UFO docuseries ‘Unidentified with Demi Lovato’ which is set to release on September 30.

    The nearly two-minute docu series’ trailer sees Lovato as a self-professed ‘UFO experiencer’.

    As the clip starts, Lovato recounts “I had this crazy experience that happened to me in Joshua Tree. My goal is to find out what really happened.”

    Without actually taking the name, Lovato hints at spotting the aliens. The trailer further sees Lovato taking their friend Matthew Scott Montgomery and sister Dallas Lovato out to the desert to meet with some UFO experts.

    As per Variety, the show is produced by GoodStory Entertainment in association with SB Projects. Executive producers are Lovato, Scooter Braun, Scott Manson, and Allison Kaye on behalf of SB Projects; JD Roth, Adam Greener, and Sara Hansemann on behalf of GoodStory; and Andrew Nock.

  • Demi Lovato ‘slid into the DM’ of Schitt’s Creek star Emily Hampshire

    By ANI

    WASHIGNTON: Seems like even celebrities can’t resist sliding into someone’s DMs every once in a while. Actor Emily Hampshire recently during singer-songwriter Demi Lovato’s podcast revealed how the ‘Cool for the Summer’ singer slid into her DM.

    According to US magazine, during the September 1 episode of ‘4D With Demi Lovato’ podcast, Hampshire revealed that she first met the 29-year-old singer, when Lovato messaged her on Instagram.

    To this, the former Disney star joked, “I did, I slid in those DMs.”

    However, the 40-year-old ‘Schitt’s Creek’ alum confessed that there was more to the story.

    The Canada native recalled, “You slid in my DMs and you said, ‘Hey, I like you on the show. We should kick it sometime. And then you said, below it, ‘And by kick it, I mean go on a date. I find you attractive.’ You made it clear it was a date. And I loved that because sometimes that’s confusing. I’m decades older than you, so ‘kick it,’ I was looking it up.”

    The musician then suggested that they could be like Hollywood couple Sarah Paulson and Holland Taylor, but quickly realized the comparison implied Hampshire would be Taylor, who is 78.

    Hampshire recalled, “I thought it was the funniest thing in the whole world because I was a Holland Taylor in that situation. Proud to be.”

    Lovato admitted that her Paulson/Taylor mention was “not my smoothest move,” but added they were happy the exchange led to a friendship.

    “A non-binary person can dream. And they, she — I was a ‘she’ at the time — she was dreaming big. I was like, ‘What’s the worst that could happen?’ And I made a really good friend. You’re a dope friend, and I’m happy we became friends,” the ‘Confident’ singer said.

    Lovato came out as non-binary, earlier this year “Today is a day I’m so happy to share more of my life with you all — I am proud to let you know that I identify as non-binary and will officially be changing my pronouns to they/them moving forward,” they wrote via Instagram in May.

    Lovato added, “This has come after a lot of healing and self-reflective work. I’m still learning and coming into myself, and I don’t claim to be an expert or a spokesperson.”

    In an earlier interview, the ‘Anyone’ singer revealed that their brief engagement to Max Ehrich in 2020 helped them better understand their identity.

    As per US magazine, in March, she said, “This past year I was engaged to a man, and when it didn’t work, I was like, ‘This is a huge sign. I thought I was going to spend my life with someone. Now that I wasn’t going to, I felt this sense of relief that I could live my truth.” (ANI)

  • BTS, The Weeknd, Billie Eilish hope to raise billions for Global Citizen fundraiser 

    By Associated Press
    NEW YORK: The Weeknd, BTS and Billie Eilish will take part in Global Citizen Live, a 24-hour event on Sept. 25 that’s intended to raise money and awareness to fight worldwide threats including COVID-19, climate change and extreme poverty.

    Hugh Evans, CEO of Global Citizen, is hoping the event, timed to the United Nations General Assembly, will encourage governments, corporations and philanthropists to fund a billion COVID-19 vaccine doses by September, especially in Africa. The international advocacy group also hopes to raise $6 billion for famine relief efforts for the 41 million people worldwide who are estimated to be on the brink of starvation, as well as enough money to plant a billion trees to help counter climate change.

    For anyone who questions whether these institutions will manage to generate more money to donate, Evans points to the current space race.

    “As billionaires are leaping into space, we need to remind people that we’ve really only got one planet and we need to make sure that we that we actually care for it and for those who are on it,” Evans told the Associated Press. 

    “This is something the ultra-high-net-worth community can solve the world’s problems right now. We’re literally talking about an investment which sounds big in comparison — $6 billion to address the famine relief efforts across Africa. Honestly, Jeff Bezos could write that check tomorrow and it would be a percentage point in his total net worth. I’m all for people daring to dream, and may they dream even bigger, but let’s also dream about a world where the absolutely stupid social ills that currently still exist in the world are addressed by those who have the means to do so.”

    Global Citizen Live — which will run the gamut from pop stars H.E.R., Lizzo, Lorde and Ed Sheeran to rockers Coldplay, Green Day, and Metallica and international artists from Andrea Bocelli and Lang Lang to Angelique Kidjo and Femi Kuti — will take place on six continents. Live events are planned for Central Park in New York City, the Champ de Mars in Paris, as well as venues in London and Los Angeles. Performances and hosted segments will come from Sydney; Rio de Janeiro; Seoul, South Korea; and Lagos, Nigeria.

    Like nearly all of the group’s events, Global Citizen Live will encourage millions of fans urge their governments or individual corporations to donate or take actions to advance the group’s goal of ending extreme poverty by 2030. Evans said that goal has suffered setbacks because of COVID-19 and the economic stagnation that resulted from it, forcing 150 million people back into extreme poverty. 

    “It is very important to me to be a part of this historic event to spread awareness and encourage action toward helping the people of Ethiopia during this devastating humanitarian crisis they are faced with,” The Weeknd said in a statement. “It’ll be an honor to perform and help bring support to these citizens who are suffering so severely.”

    Also set to participate are Adam Lambert, Burna Boy, Camila Cabello, Christine and the Queens, Davido, Demi Lovato, DJ Snake, Doja Cat, Duran Duran, Hugh Jackman & Deborra-lee Furness, Keith Urban, Shawn Mendes, The Lumineers, Tiwa Savage and Usher. Ticketing details and performances for the individual cities, as well as additional artists, will be announced in August.

    “The artist community is very selective about what they all rally around, and the sense that I’ve had is that there is this amazing appetite to be part of it,” Evans said. 

    The event has support from leaders around the world, including French President Emmanuel Macron, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, and Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi.

    Evans said education issues will also be in the spotlight at the event, which hopes to get 4.5 million kids back to school learning by raising $400 million. Only one in three children globally can access remote learning. And the number of children who have had their educations interrupted has grown by 50% since 2020.

    “I always say that people care either about planetary concern or about social issues,” Evans said. “For September, we’re targeting both.”

    It’s an ambitious agenda. Evans said he is hopeful because of Global Citizen’s previous successes this year.In May, the organization sponsored VAX Live, which generated more than 26 million COVID-19 vaccine doses and $302 million for the Access to COVID-19 Tools Accelerator initiative, which includes the World Health Organization’s COVAX program for more equitable distribution of vaccines. The event, which included appearances by President Joe Biden as well as the Duke of Sussex, helped raise the issue of vaccine sharing globally.

    “I believe that VAX Live changed the dialogue and tangibly resulted in vaccines that will be shared,” Evans said. “Yes, $302 million is still a small amount of money compared to what we need to achieve. Our ambitions are much bigger for September. And that’s why we’re uniting the whole world for this.”

  • Valerie Bertinelli to co-star with Demi Lovato in NBC comedy ‘Hungry’

    By PTI
    LOS ANGELES: Actor and TV host Valerie Bertinelli will feature alongside singer Demi Lovato in NBC’s upcoming comedy “Hungry”.

    The single-camera comedy show is being written and executive produced by “Will & Grace” scribe Suzanne Martin, according to The Hollywood Reporter.

    The series received a put pilot commitment from the network, meaning NBC will pay a penalty if it doesn’t air.

    It follows a group of friends who belong to a food issues group help each other as they look for love, success and the perfect thing in the fridge that’s going to make it all better.

    Bertinelli, who previously featured in series “Hot in Cleveland”, will essay the role of Lisa, the mother of Lovato’s character Teddy.

    Lisa is always quick to point out that they’re also best friends.

    Warm and loving, she’s also “a self-critical and emotional mess who has lost and gained the same 30 pounds for 30 years”, as per the description of the character.

    Lisa owns a restaurant and is constantly thinking about — and serving people — food.

    Lovato, who got her break with Disney Channel’s “Camp Rock” franchise, will also serve as an executive producer on the series.

    Sean Hayes and Todd Milliner of Hazy Mills, and Scooter Braun, James Shin and Scott Manson of SB Projects are the other executive producers.

  • Singer Demi Lovato says complimenting someone on weight loss might be ‘harmful’

    By ANI
    WASHINGTON: American singer-songwriter Demi Lovato, who last week came out as non-binary and will henceforth be using they/them pronouns, recently said that complimenting someone on their weight loss can be just as harmful as complimenting somebody on weight gain.

    Lovato took to her Instagram story and wrote, “If you don’t know someone’s history with food, please don’t comment on their body. Because even if your intention is pure, it might leave that person awake at 2 am overthinking that statement.”

    Lovato said that body compliments could sometimes feel great, but they could also leave the recipient lying “awake at 2 am overthinking that statement.”

    The 28-year-old singer wrote, “Does it feel great? Yeah, sometimes. But only to the loud ass eating disorder voice inside my head that says ‘See, people like a thinner you’ or ‘If you eat less you’ll lose even more weight,’. But it can also sometimes suck because then I start thinking ‘Well, damn. What’d they think of my body before?’”

    Lovato concluded the post by adding, “Moral of the story: I am more than the shell for my soul that is my body and every day I fight to remind myself of that, so I’m asking you to please remind me that that is all people see of me sometimes.”

    The post came four days after Lovato announced that they identify as nonbinary and will be changing their pronouns, telling fans that the decision came after “self-reflective work.”

    Lovato said they picked gender-neutral pronouns as “this best represents the fluidity I feel in my gender expression,” and further added, “I’m doing this for those out there that haven’t been able to share who they truly are with their loved ones.”

    The singer behind hits such as ‘Sorry Not Sorry’, ‘Heart Attack’ and ‘Stone Cold’ recently shared their personal struggles with mental health and addiction in a YouTube documentary, which followed their journey prior to and following a near-fatal overdose in 2018.

  • Demi Lovato’s eating disorder comedy pilot gets NBC order

    By ANI
    WASHINGTON: American singer-actor Demi Lovato’s comedy series about a group of people with eating disorders is getting a pilot order at NBC.

    According to The Hollywood Reporter, the 28-year-old actor is set to star and executive produce the project, titled ‘Hungry’, which follows “friends who belong to a food issues group and help each other as they look for love, success and the perfect thing in the fridge that’s going to make it all better.”

    Other executive producers on the single-camera comedy include Sean Hayes, Todd Milliner, Scooter Braun, Scott Manson and James Shin.

    The ‘Stone Cold’ songstress has been open about having an eating disorder herself in the past.

    Lovato told ABC News in 2011, “I was compulsively overeating when I was 8 years old.So, I guess, for the past 10 years I’ve had a really unhealthy relationship with food.”

    The ‘Sonny With A Chance’ star has also said that when she was working on ‘Camp Rock’ as a teenage Disney Channel star, she was bullied about her weight by her classmates, which in turn led to bulimia.

    “I was performing concerts on an empty stomach,” “I was losing my voice from purging,” she said.

    If the project is greenlit to the series, it will mark Lovato’s first regular TV role since she starred in Disney Channel’s 2009 series ‘Sonny With a Chance.’

  • Demi Lovato says engagement to Max Ehrich made her realise ‘how queer’ she is

    By ANI
    WASHINGTON: Singer-actor Demi Lovato recently revealed that she used her engagement to show that she was doing well following her 2018 drug overdose. She also shared that the engagement gave her a “false sense of security.”

    As per E! News, last July, the singer announced that she and actor Max Ehrich were engaged after mere months of dating. Then, just two months later, following reports that Lovato’s family and friends didn’t approve of the relationship, the couple split up.

    Speaking to Entertainment Weekly in a recent interview, Lovato opened up about her brief engagement and said, “I really had myself fooled, because it was the safe and expected thing.”

    She added, “Obviously I cared deeply about the person, but there was something inside of me that was like, ‘I have to prove to the world that I’m okay.’ Now that I’m not engaged or married and I’m okay, I’m like, ‘Wow. Isn’t that so much more empowering?’ It’s not this false sense of security.”

    She added that her massive engagement ring, which was reportedly worth about USD 1 million, “made it really real.”

    ALSO READ | Demi Lovato opens up about being sexually assaulted as a teen in new documentary

    “The second it was off, I was like, ‘You know what? I’m good. I don’t need that,’” the 28-year-old star continued.

    Lovato said, “I just don’t need an object on my finger to make me feel like I’ve got my s–t together. It looks like stability, but it doesn’t mean that it is.”

    Earlier this month, the singer told Glamour that ending her engagement with Ehrich helped her realise how queer she really is.

    The Grammy-nominated singer previously opened up about dating women, as well as men, in her 2017 YouTube documentary ‘Demi Lovato: Simply Complicated’.

    “When I started getting older, I started realizing how queer I really am,” the Disney Channel alum explained.

    “This past year, I was engaged to a man, and when it didn’t work, I was like, ‘This is a huge sign.’ I thought I was going to spend my life with someone. Now that I wasn’t going to, I felt this sense of relief that I could live my truth,” she added.

    In September, People magazine confirmed that Lovato and Ehrich, who began dating in March, called off their engagement two months after he proposed to her in Malibu, California, on July 22.

    In July 2018, Lovato was hospitalised after overdosing on drugs at her Hollywood Hills home, which came months after relapsing. Lovato, who battled substance addiction in years past, spent almost two weeks in a hospital before undergoing treatment at a rehab centre and sober living facility.