Entertainment
Jamie Foxx reveals he had a stroke in Netflix stand-up special: 'I don't remember 20 days'
Jamie Foxx is finally telling the whole story about his hospitalization last year in the language he knows best: comedy.
In his new comedy special released Tuesday, the Oscar winner revealed that he suffered a stroke last April. At that time, Foxx’s family had released a since-deleted statement that he was receiving care for an undisclosed “medical complication.”
While Foxx continued to share updates on his recovery, he declined in March to tell the full story until he could do so “in a funny way,” Variety reported.
He made good on that promise with arrival of his Netflix stand-up special “What Had Happened Was.”
During the 68-minute show, Foxx recounts his months-long health journey — beginning with the April evening when a “bad headache” turned much graver.
“I asked my boy for a aspirin,” he recalled, “and I realized quickly that when you in a medical emergency, your boys don’t know what the f— to do.
“Before I could get the aspirin,” he continued, pausing to snap his fingers, “I went out. I don’t remember 20 days.”
With the help of friends and family, Foxx said he pieced together an account of what happened immediately after. The first doctor to see him administered a cortisone shot and sent him off with “half-star service,” he quipped.
But his younger sister Deidra Dixon, who he called “4 foot of nothing but pure love,” wasn’t satisfied. So she drove until she came upon Atlanta’s Piedmont Hospital. She had never heard of the facility before, Foxx said, “but she had a hunch that some angels is in there.”
That doctor said Foxx had a brain bleed that had led to a stroke, the comedian said, and his sister continually prayed during his entire operation.
“They put me back together again,” Foxx said. “Atlanta saved my life.”
When he finally woke up one morning in May 2023, “The Jamie Foxx Show” star said he was startled to find himself in a wheelchair and stubbornly insisted on attempting to walk. Dramatically reenacting the scene in the special, Foxx’s legs tremble, his eyes wide. In the end, he said he admitted defeat.
Throughout the special, the “Just Mercy” actor also joked about his daughter Corinne’s fears that he would be “memed” for his condition, adding that being bathed by his nurse was more scarring than the stroke itself.
“You have no idea how good this feels,” Foxx told the Atlanta crowd as he opened his set. “If I dance all night, don’t mind me. I’m happy to be alive.”
Corinne Foxx first announced in April 2023 that Foxx was being treated for a medical emergency. In response to her since-deleted announcement, speculation arose about the details of the emergency. Corinne later slammed such rumors, lamenting “how the media runs wild” and adding that her dad had “been out of the hospital for weeks, recuperating.”
The revelation about Foxx’s stroke did not come until “What Had Happened Was.” Before Tuesday, the actor had spoken publicly about the medical emergency without details. He has also regularly updated fans on social media about his health and well-being.
Meanwhile, “Back in Action,” Foxx’s action movie with Cameron Diaz, releases in theaters Jan. 17.
Filming for the movie was delayed upon Foxx’s April 2023 hospitalization. In January, Page Six published photos of the co-stars seemingly on set, though it is unclear if Foxx still had scenes to shoot.
Times staffers Nardine Saad and Alexandra Del Rosario contributed to this report.
Entertainment
House committee report questions distribution of FireAid’s $100 million for L.A. wildfire relief
The House Judiciary Committee on Tuesday released a report after its own investigation into FireAid, the charity founded by Clippers executives that raised $100 million for wildfire relief efforts in Los Angeles last January.
The investigation — led by Rep. Kevin Kiley (R-Rocklin) under committee chair Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) — began in August when Kiley “sent a letter to FireAid requesting a detailed breakdown of all non-profits that received money from FireAid.” Kiley expressed concern that the money had gone toward local nonprofits rather than as more direct aid to affected residents.
FireAid promptly released a comprehensive document detailing its fundraising and grant dispersals. After reaching out to every named nonprofit in the document, The Times reported that the groups who successfully applied for grants were quickly given money to spend in their areas of expertise, as outlined in FireAid’s public mission statements. A review conducted by an outside law firm confirmed the same.
The new Republican-led committee report is skeptical of the nonprofit work done under FireAid’s auspices — but cites relatively few examples of groups deviating from FireAid’s stated goals.
Representatives for FireAid did not immediately respond to request for comment on the report.
Out of hundreds of nonprofits given millions in FireAid funds, “In total, the Committee found six organizations that allocated FireAid grants towards labor, salaries, or other related costs,” the report said.
The committee singled out several local nonprofits, focused on relief and development for minorities and marginalized groups, for criticism. It named several long-established organizations like the NAACP Pasadena, My Tribe Rise, Black Music Action Coalition, CA Native Vote Project and Community Organized Relief Efforts (CORE), whose activities related to fire relief they found “unclear,” without providing specific claims of misusing FireAid funds.
The report — while heavily citing Fox News, Breitbart and New York Post stories — claims that “FireAid prioritized and awarded grants to illegal aliens.” Yet its lone example for this is a grant that went to CORE, citing its mission for aiding crisis response within “underserved communities,” one of which is “undocumented migrants” facing “high risk of housing instability, economic hardship, exploitation, and homelessness.”
The report said that $500,000 was used by the California Charter Schools Assn., Neighborhood Legal Services of Los Angeles County, Los Angeles Regional Food Bank, LA Disaster Relief Navigator, Community Clinic Assn. of Los Angeles County and LA Conservation Corps “towards labor, salaries, or other related costs,” which the committee said went against FireAid’s stated goals.
Yet the examples they cite as suspicious include NLSLA using its FireAid grant to pay salaries to attorneys providing free legal aid to fire victims, the Community Clinic of Los Angeles “expanding training in mental health and trauma care” through grants to smaller local health centers, and the L.A. Regional Food bank allocating its funds to “mobilize resources to fight hunger.”
The report singled out one group, Altadena Talks Foundation, from Team Rubicon relief worker Toni Raines. Altadena Talks Foundation received a $100,00 grant from FireAid, yet the report said Altadena Talks’ work on a local news podcast, among other efforts, “remains unclear” as it relates to fire relief.
The report’s claims that “instead of helping fire victims, donations made to FireAid helped to fund causes and projects completely unrelated to fire recovery, including voter participation for Native Americans, illegal aliens, podcast shows, and fungus planting” sound incendiary. Yet the evidence it cites generally shows a range of established local nonprofits addressing community-specific concerns in a fast-moving disaster, with some small amounts of money possibly going toward salaries or overhead, or groups whose missions the committee viewed skeptically.
FireAid still plans to distribute an additional round of $25 million in grants this year.
Movie Reviews
Movie Review: A Home Invasion turns into a “Relentless” Grudge Match
I’d call the title “Relentless” truth in advertising, althought “Pitiless,” “Endless” and “Senseless” work just as well.
This new thriller from the sarcastically surnamed writer-director Tom Botchii (real name Tom Botchii Skowronski of “Artik” fame) begins in uninteresting mystery, strains to become a revenge thriller “about something” and never gets out of its own way.
So bloody that everything else — logic, reason, rationale and “Who do we root for?” quandary is throughly botched — its 93 minutes pass by like bleeding out from screwdriver puncture wounds — excruciatingly.
But hey, they shot it in Lewiston, Idaho, so good on them for not filming overfilmed Greater LA, even if the locations are as generically North American as one could imagine.

Career bit player and Lewiston native Jeffrey Decker stars as a homeless man we meet in his car, bearded, shivering and listening over and over again to a voice mail from his significant other.
He has no enthusiasm for the sign-spinning work he does to feed himself and gas up his ’80s Chevy. But if woman, man or child among us ever relishes anything as much as this character loves his cigarettes — long, theatrical, stair-at-the-stars drags of ecstacy — we can count ourselves blessed.
There’s this Asian techie (Shuhei Kinoshita) pounding away at his laptop, doing something we assume is sketchy just by the “ACCESS DENIED” screens he keeps bumping into and the frantic calls he takes suggesting urgency of some sort or other.
That man-bunned stranger, seen in smoky silhoutte through the opaque window on his door, ringing the bell of his designer McMansion makes him wary. And not just because the guy’s smoking and seems to be making up his “How we can help cut your energy bill” pitch on the fly.
Next thing our techie knows, shotgun blasts are knocking out the lock (Not the, uh GLASS) and a crazed, dirty beardo homeless guy has stormed in, firing away at him as he flees and cries “STOP! Why are you doing this?”
Jun, as the credits name him, fights for his PC and his life. He wins one and loses the other. But tracking his laptop and homeless thug “Teddy” with his phone turns out to be a mistake.
He’s caught, beaten and bloodied some more. And that’s how Jun learns the beef this crazed, wronged man has with him — identity theft, financial fraud, etc.
Threats and torture over access to that laptop ensue, along with one man listing the wrongs he’s been done as he puts his hostage through all this.
Wait’ll you get a load of what the writer-director thinks is the card our hostage would play.
The dialogue isn’t much, and the logic — fleeing a fight you’ve just won with a killer rather than finishing him off or calling the cops, etc. — doesn’t stand up to any scrutiny.
The set-piece fights, which involve Kinoshita screaming and charging his tormentor and the tormentor played by Decker stalking him with wounded, bloody-minded resolve are visceral enough to come off. Decker and Kinoshita are better than the screenplay.
A throw-down at a gas-station climaxes with a brutal brawl on the hood of a bystander’s car going through an automatic car wash. Amusingly, the car-wash owners feel the need to do an Idaho do-si-do video (“Roggers (sic) Car Wash”) that plays in front of the car being washed and behind all the mayhem the antagonists and the bystander/car owner go through. Not bad.
The rest? Not good.
Perhaps the good folks at Rogers Motors and Car Wash read the script and opted to get their name misspelled. Smart move.

Rating: R, graphic violence, smoking, profanity
Cast: Jeffrey Decker, Shuhei Kinoshita
Credits:Scripted and directed by Tom Botchii.. A Saban Entertainment release.
Running time: 1:34
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Entertainment
Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas breaks out in ‘Sentimental Value.’ But she isn’t interested in fame
One of the most moving scenes in Joachim Trier’s “Sentimental Value” happens near the end. During an intense moment between sisters Nora (Renate Reinsve) and Agnes (Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas), who have both had to reckon with the unexpected return of their estranged father, Gustav (Stellan Skarsgård), Agnes suddenly tells Nora, “I love you.” In a family in which such direct, vulnerable declarations are rare, Agnes’ comment is both a shock and a catharsis.
The line wasn’t scripted or even discussed. Lilleaas was nervous about spontaneously saying it while filming. But it just came out.
“[In] Norwegian culture, we don’t talk so much about what we’re feeling,” explains Lilleaas, who lives in Oslo but is sitting in the Chateau Marmont lounge on a rainy afternoon in mid-November. If the script had contained that “I love you” line, she says, “It would’ve been like, ‘What? I would never say that. That’s too much.’ But because it came out of a genuine feeling in the moment — I don’t know how to describe it, but it was what I felt like I would want to say, and what I would want my own sister to know.”
Since its Cannes premiere, “Sentimental Value” has been lauded for such scenes, which underline the subtle force of this intelligent tearjerker about a frayed family trying to repair itself. And the film’s breakthrough performance belongs to the 36-year-old Lilleaas, who has worked steadily in Norway but not often garnered international attention.
Touted as a possible supporting actress Oscar nominee, Lilleaas in person is reserved but thoughtful, someone who prefers observing the people around her rather than being in the spotlight. Fitting, then, that in “Sentimental Value” she plays the quiet, levelheaded sister serving as the mediator between impulsive Nora and egotistical Gustav. Lilleaas has become quite adept at doing a lot while seemingly doing very little.
“In acting school, some of the best characters I did were mute,” she notes. “They couldn’t express language, but they were very expressive. It was freeing to not have a voice. Agnes, she’s present a lot of the time but doesn’t necessarily have that many lines. To me, that’s freedom — the [dialogue] very often comes in the way of that.”
Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas in “Sentimental Value.”
(Kasper Tuxen)
Lilleaas hadn’t met Trier before her audition, but they instantly bonded over the challenges of raising young kids. And she sparked to the script’s examination of parents and children. Unlike restless Nora, Agnes is married with a son, able to view her deeply flawed dad from the vantage point of both a daughter and mother. Lilleaas shares her character’s sympathy for the inability of different generations to connect.
“A lot of parents and children’s relationships stop at a point,” she says. “It doesn’t evolve like a romantic relationship, [where] the mindset is to grow together. With families, it’s ‘You’re the child, I’m the parent.’ But you have to grow together and accept each other. And that’s difficult.”
Spend time with Lilleaas and you’ll notice she discusses acting in terms of human behavior rather than technique. In fact, she initially studied psychology. “I’ve always been interested in the [experience] of being alive,” she says. “Tremendous grief is very painful, but you can only experience that if you have great love. I’ve tried the more psychological approach of studying people, but it wasn’t what I wanted. Acting is the perfect medium for me to explore life.”
Other out-of-towners might be disappointed to arrive in sunny Southern California only to be greeted by storm clouds, but Lilleaas is sanguine about the situation. “I could have been at the beach, but it’s fine,” she says, amused, looking out the nearby windows. “I can go to the movies — it’s perfect movie weather.”
Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas. (Evelyn Freja / For The Times)
Her measured response to both her Hollywood ascension and a rainy forecast speak to her generally unfussed demeanor. During our conversation, Lilleaas’ candor and lack of vanity are striking. How often does a rising star talk about being happy when a filmmaker gives her fewer lines? Or fantasize about a life after acting?
“Some days I’ll be like, ‘I want to give it up. I want to have a small farm,’” she admits. “We lived on a farm and had horses and chickens when I grew up. I miss that. But at the same time, I need to be in an urban environment.”
She gives the matter more thought, sussing out her conflicted feelings. “Maybe as I grow older and have children, I feel this need to go back to something that’s familiar and safe,” she suggests. “I think that’s why I’m searching for small farms [online] — that’s, like, a dream thing. I need some dreams that they’re not reality — it’s a way to escape.”
Lilleaas may have decided against becoming a psychologist, but she’s always interrogating her motivations. This desire for a farm is her latest self-exploration, clarifying for her that she loves her profession but not the superficial trappings that accompany it.
“Ten years ago, this would maybe have been a dream, what’s happening now,” she says, gesturing at her swanky surroundings. “But you realize what you want to focus on and give value. I don’t necessarily want to give this that much value. I appreciate it and everything, but I don’t want to put my heart in it, because I know that it goes up and down and it’s not constant. I put my heart in this movie. Everything that comes after that? My heart can’t be in that.”
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