https://news.avclub.com/r-i-p-scrubs-sam-lloyd-1843205501?rev=1588371795950



Sam Lloyd has died. Best known for his role as sad-sack lawyer/a capella enthusiast Ted Buckland on long-running NBC sitcom Scrubs, Lloyd was a veteran character actor with more than 60 credits to his name, across a 30-year career. Lloyd was diagnosed with cancer last year; numerous members of the Scrubs family organized a GoFundMe at the time to help pay his medical costs. Lloyd’s death was reported on social media today by co-star Robert Maschio. He was 56.

Although he came up as a stage actor, Lloyd got his first break on the screen during the 1988 TV season, when he was cast in two different episodes—as two different characters—on NBC’s Night Court. He followed that with his first regular TV role, on the short-lived Valerie Harper sitcom City, but didn’t get his first real, high-profile exposure until 1993, when he had a memorable two-episode stint as TV Guide/Elaine Benes obsessive Ricky on the fifth season of Seinfeld.

Here’s Lloyd talking to us for a Random Roles interview in 2011, describing how he got the part:

That was one of the easiest auditions I ever had. I had done this [play] a few years before called The Nerd, and I had played the title character. And that guy, I got to know very well, that character. I continued to do him over the years in a cabaret setting, and kind of a stand-up thing. So when I got that audition, I thought, “I could do this guy. He might fit.” And his name was even Ricky, and the character’s name [in the play] was Rick Steadman. So that was kind of a sign to me. Originally I had made this great set of teeth that I had used for the part, and it became married to the part. I couldn’t do the part without the teeth. But the teeth were, even though they were subtle, they weren’t that subtle. So I couldn’t bring it into an audition. That was the first time I was ever able to do the character without the teeth. But anyway, I went in for that and read. There were two scenes, and I read the first scene, and Jerry Seinfeld was there, and of course Larry David was there. And the reaction was fantastic. And then I read the second scene, and I think reality set in. They were like, “Do we really want to put this guy into the show?” And so after it was over, I’m like, “Mmm… this could go either way.” Sure enough, my agent was like, “Hang in there. They’re still going to see people, but you’re one of their choices.”

</snip>

https://abcnews.go.com/US/michael-cohens-early-prison-release-coronavirus-concerns-rescinded/story?id=70456164

He had been notified in mid-April that he would be released to home confinement.

By Victor Ordonez

May 1, 2020, 1:27 PM

resident Donald Trump's former attorney and fixer Michael Cohen will not be leaving prison to serve out the rest of his term in home confinement, according to sources familiar with the matter.

Two weeks ago, the Federal Bureau of Prisons (BOP) had notified Cohen that he would be released early from prison due to the COVID-19 outbreak, Cohen's attorney Roger Adler told ABC News at the time.

Cohen is serving a 3-year sentence at the federal prison camp in Otisville, New York, where several staff and inmates have tested positive for the novel coronavirus.

He is scheduled for release in November 2021. Cohen would have been allowed to serve the remainder of his sentence from home confinement.

It appears that other prisoners at Otisville who were granted home confinement have also lost those privileges, according to the sources. The BOP has not responded to requests for comment from ABC News.

</snip>

https://twitter.com/jessemckinley/status/1256262048721375235
Jesse McKinley ✔@jessemckinley

NOW: Anti shutdown protesters in front of State Capitol in #Albany



12:39 PM - May 1, 2020

https://www.cnn.com/us/live-news/us-coronavirus-update-05-01-20/h_a000cfdbefdac4c0fcb950fa6c63731a

From CNN's Adrienne Vogt

New York schools will remain closed for the remainder of the academic year, Gov. Andrew Cuomo announced.

The schools – kindergarten through high school as well as college facilities — will continue to provide distance learning.

Summer school programming plans will be announced by the end of the month, Cuomo said.

"In the meantime, meal programs will continue, the child care services for essential workers will continue," Cuomo said.

"And then we want schools to start now developing a plan to reopen, and the plan has to have protocols in place that incorporate everything that we are now doing in society and everything that we learned."

Cuomo said those plans for schools and colleges will be approved by the state.

The New York City school system is the largest in the country. According to Cuomo, there are 4.2 million students in the entire state — including those at 4,800 public schools, 1,800 private schools, 89 SUNY and CUNY college campuses and additional private colleges.

</snip>

https://thelaughbutton.com/matty-simmons-co-founder-of-the-national-lampoon-has-passed-away-at-93



Matty Simmons, co-founder of “National Lampoon” has passed away at 93

April 30, 2020 The Laugh Button Staff

Today, the world of comedy has been dealt a pretty sad blow with the news that Matty Simmons, who co-founded the National Lampoon magazine and produced National Lampoon film’s such as Animal House and Vacation, has passed away at 93.

<snip>

In April 1970, comedy was in for a rude awakening and was bound to never be the same when the very first issue of National Lampoon hit the newsstands. Behind it was Harvard Lampoon alumni Doug Kenney and Henry Beard. To help oversee the magazine, they enlisted the help of Matty Simmons, best known at that time for the Weight Watchers magazine. Together, they changed the landscape of comedy and usher in a changing of the guards.

National Lampoon helped introduce us to some of the sharpest minds of comedy, with a long roster that includes John Belushi, Gilda Radner, Chevy Chase, Bill Murray, Christopher Guest, Richard Belzer, and Michael O’Donoghue. In addition to the magazine, they were responsible for a popular stage show, Lemmings, a radio show dubbed The National Lampoon Radio Hour, and countless records.

In 1978, the National Lampoon brand brought us Animal House, starring John Belushi and produced by Simmons. A runaway hit at the box office, it helped mold every raucous college and teen film that would come. And to follow that up with the Vacation series of films just goes to show what a lasting impact both National Lampoon as well as Simmons has had on us all.

</snip>

https://twitter.com/NatashaBertrand/status/1256215485806452747
Natasha Bertrand ✔@NatashaBertrand

Omg. He literally emailed one of the prosecutors just tasked with investigating coronavirus-related crimes.

Josh Dawsey ✔@jdawsey1

Jerome Corsi, the commentator who narrowly escaped charges in Mueller probe, meant to email Zev Zelenko, a White House-allied doctor, about a hydroxychloroquine project. He instead emailed Aaron Zelinsky, the Mueller prosecutor. A new probe has begun...

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/vladimir-zev-zelenko-fox-news-trump-hydroxychloroquine-jerome-corsi/2020/04/30/82622456-8af2-11ea-ac8a-fe9b8088e101_story.html …

9:34 AM - May 1, 2020

Justice Dept. scrutinizes White House-connected doctor linked to disputed coronavirus treatment

By Rosalind S. Helderman and Matt Zapotosky

April 30, 2020 at 11:06 p.m. EDT

Federal prosecutors are examining the communications of a New York family doctor who appears frequently on Fox News and has been in touch with the White House to tout an anti-malarial as a treatment for the novel coronavirus, according to people contacted as part of the inquiry.

The examination of Vladimir “Zev” Zelenko’s records began when an associate, conservative commentator Jerome Corsi, accidentally sent an email intended for Zelenko to another “Z” name in his address book — federal prosecutor Aaron Zelinsky, who as a member of special counsel Robert S. Mueller III’s team had spent months scrutinizing Corsi’s activities during the 2016 presidential election.

During episodes of his daily podcast this week and in a YouTube video he posted late Thursday in response to questions from The Washington Post, Corsi said that Zelinsky responded to the unexpected email by reaching out to Corsi’s lawyer and requesting all of Corsi’s communications with Zelenko.

Corsi said he and Zelenko are collaborating on a website designed to connect people with doctors. They have acted lawfully, Corsi added, but he plans to cooperate with the request and has handed over his communications.

</snip>

https://www.thedailybeast.com/photo-of-andrew-d-cleckley-funeral-home-shows-how-horribly-theyre-treating-the-dead-in-brooklyn



Before police found decomposing bodies in trucks outside a Brooklyn funeral home, a mourner saw a horrifying sign it was overwhelmed by the coronavirus pandemic.

Michael Daly
Special Correspondent
Updated May. 01, 2020 8:19AM ET / Published May. 01, 2020 4:40AM ET

Zeqway Clarke was in the back pew in the upstairs chapel at the Andrew D. Cleckley Funeral Home in Brooklyn when he chanced to gaze under the coffin and see what looked like a bare foot.

“You could see it,” he later told The Daily Beast. “You could actually look under the casket and see it. I asked somebody else, ‘Is that a foot?’”

Clarke was there on April 9 with his wife and daughters and a small number of relatives in masks and gloves, bidding farewell to her grandfather, 88 year-old Francois Jules. The pastor continued conducting the service as Clarke gazed at what was indeed a bare foot visible beneath the hem of the cloth backdrop closing off the front of the room.

At the end of the service, Clarke went up for a final parting moment with Jules, a military veteran and retired graveyard security guard, who was recovering from a stroke in Kings County Hospital when he was fatally struck by COVID-19. Clarke used the moment by the coffin to raise his cellphone above the cord on which the backdrop hung.

“I stuck the phone up and took a picture,” the 39-year-old entrepreneur recalled.

He did not see the result until he returned to his seat and checked his phone.

“It was just bodies, bodies on the floor, people on top of each other,” he said.
</snip>

https://www.axios.com/georgia-brian-kemp-coronavirus-stay-home-5100a6df-acb9-425d-91b1-570287733a11.html

Marisa Fernandez

Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp (R) announced that he will lift the state's shelter-in-place order for most residents on Thursday at 11:59 pm, though it will remain in place for the elderly and “medically fragile” through June 12.

Why it matters: Kemp has come under fire for his aggressive moves to roll back coronavirus restrictions earlier than most governors. Even President Trump said he "strongly disagrees" with Kemp's decision last week to reopen non-essential businesses like gyms, bowling alleys and tattoo parlors.

https://twitter.com/GovKemp/status/1255927918888394752

</snip>

https://www.thedailybeast.com/georgia-gov-brian-kemps-aggro-reopening-plan-spooks-georgia-coroners

“I think it’s a real possibility that we could be seeing under-reporting by anywhere from 10 to 20 percent,” one coroner said. Meanwhile, businesses are opening.

Justin Glawe

Published Apr. 29, 2020 4:46AM ET

Gene Proctor remembers one of the first times he told the family of a recently deceased Georgian that he couldn’t test their loved one for COVID-19.

It was early April, and a 58-year-old woman had passed away at home after years of battling multiple illnesses. The family wanted to know if the coronavirus had ultimately caused her death, but Proctor, the Floyd County Coroner, didn’t have a test.

“At first they were upset because I couldn’t test her and I said, ‘Look, the few tests that we do have, have to go to the people that are still alive,” Proctor told The Daily Beast. “I told the daughter, in fact, ‘You take care of your mother most of the time, so it would be more important to know that you had it then if she did.’”

Since then, testing has increased substantially in the state, according to Dr. Jose Vazquez, chief of infectious disease at the Medical College of Georgia - Augusta University. Meanwhile, Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp has invited a slew of non-essential businesses, from hair salons to restaurants, to reopen in recent days.

But even as that scheme proceeded this week, coroners across the state told The Daily Beast the actual number of deaths caused by the coronavirus was higher than the official count published each day by the Department of Public Health. That number stood at just more than 1,000 on Tuesday afternoon.

That the United States has previously undercounted coronavirus deaths, and coroners have often lacked tests to pick up the virus, has been well established.

</snip>

https://twitter.com/Kevinliptakcnn/status/1255201111813873664
Kevin Liptak ✔@Kevinliptakcnn

Pence wasn't wearing a mask at Mayo Clinic today. Reporters said everyone else inside the building was because of their policy. Mayo says they told Pence their policy. He's still there.

Mayo Clinic ✔@MayoClinic

Mayo Clinic had informed @VP of the masking policy prior to his arrival today.

2:24 PM - Apr 28, 2020