Entertainment News Roundup: Netflix star Julia Haart visits Israel to show support; Musical film 'The Color Purple' dances from trauma to triumph and more

Following is a summary of current entertainment news briefs.

Actor Vin Diesel hit with sexual battery lawsuit by former assistant

A former assistant to the actor Vin Diesel filed a lawsuit against him on Thursday alleging that he sexually battered her in 2010 and that she was fired from her job just hours later. In the lawsuit, filed in a Los Angeles court, the former assistant Asta Jonasson alleges that Diesel assaulted her in an Atlanta hotel room while the pair were working on the movie "Fast Five."

Netflix star Julia Haart visits Israel to show support

Fashion designer and Netflix reality star Julia Haart toured Israeli communities this week, joining a growing roster of celebrities who have visited to show their support in the wake of the Oct. 7 attack by Hamas. Haart, star of the Netflix series "My Unorthodox Life", said it was important to offer a clear sign of solidarity with Israel as its war with Hamas continues into its third month and incidents of antisemitism have risen across the world.

Russians go crazy for street gang TV tragedy set amid Soviet collapse

A Russian television serial exploring the tragedy wrought by brutal teenage street gangs fighting for survival, money and love in the last years of the crumbling Soviet Union has become a sensation in Russia. The series - "A hoodlum's promise - blood on the asphalt" - shows the savagery of the gangs which carved up the Russian city of Kazan in 1989 as the reforms of Mikhail Gorbachev gyrated the Soviet Union towards its 1991 demise.

Musical film 'The Color Purple' dances from trauma to triumph

Following the fame of previous versions, Ghanaian filmmaker Blitz Bazawule was not sure the 2023 musical film adaptation of "The Color Purple" was a movie that he could make.

"It's been a brilliant Pulitzer Prize winning book by Alice Walker, it's been a multi-nominated film by Steven Spielberg, and of course, a Tony award-winning Broadway play," he said.

Mariah Carey and the Christmas songs that become hits – again and again

Mariah Carey's "All I Want for Christmas is You" has been the soundtrack of the holiday season for nearly 30 years. Why has this song become a rare modern Christmas hit and what else can we glean from a closer look at the U.S. Billboard Holiday 100?

ABBA's virtual show boosts London's economy to the tune of $225 million

Thank you for the music, London's authorities might say, after Swedish pop group ABBA's digital concert residency raked in 178 million pounds ($225 million) in terms of net economic benefit to the British capital in its first year. ABBA Voyage recreates Bjorn Ulvaeus, Benny Andersson, Agnetha Faltskog and Anni-Frid Lyngstad as high-tech, digital versions of themselves from their 1970s heyday, thanks to motion-capture technology.

God save the King's hands: Charles makes 'sausage fingers' joke in coronation film

Britain's King Charles poked fun at his "sausage fingers" - a topic that has drawn immense media attention and internet memes in recent years - in a behind the scenes documentary that charts the royal family's preparations for his coronation. When his son, Prince William, struggles to fasten one of the ceremonial robes, Charles tells him not to worry, as he does not have "sausage fingers" like himself, the BBC cited the then 74-year old monarch as saying on camera.

Martin Scorsese to receive Berlin Film Festival lifetime award

The Berlin Film Festival will recognise Martin Scorsese's outsized contributions to cinema with a lifetime achievement award at its 74th iteration this February, organizers said on Thursday. Festival organizers - who described the Oscar-winning director's latest film "Killers of the Flower Moon" as one of his greatest achievements - will award Scorsese, 81, an honorary Golden Bear on Feb. 20.

Lionsgate to spin off studio business in $4.6-billion SPAC deal

Lionsgate will spin off its studio unit in a blank-check deal that values the business behind the "Hunger Games" and "John Wick" movie franchises at about $4.6 billion including debt, the company said on Friday. The studio business will merge with Screaming Eagle Acquisition Corp, a special purpose-acquisition company (SPAC), to create a new public firm for Lionsgate's film and television assets that include about 18,000 titles.

(With inputs from agencies.)