عربي English Türkçe اردو فارسى
Logo
Latest News
Entertainment

Usher, Longtime Partner Jenn Goicoechea Married after Super Bowl

11 February 2024, US, Las Vegas: American singer Usher (C) performs during the Apple Music Halftime Show at Super Bowl LVIII, Allegiant Stadium, Las Vegas, Nevada. Photo: -/PA Wire/dpa
11 February 2024, US, Las Vegas: American singer Usher (C) performs during the Apple Music Halftime Show at Super Bowl LVIII, Allegiant Stadium, Las Vegas, Nevada. Photo: -/PA Wire/dpa
TT
TT

Usher, Longtime Partner Jenn Goicoechea Married after Super Bowl

11 February 2024, US, Las Vegas: American singer Usher (C) performs during the Apple Music Halftime Show at Super Bowl LVIII, Allegiant Stadium, Las Vegas, Nevada. Photo: -/PA Wire/dpa
11 February 2024, US, Las Vegas: American singer Usher (C) performs during the Apple Music Halftime Show at Super Bowl LVIII, Allegiant Stadium, Las Vegas, Nevada. Photo: -/PA Wire/dpa

Usher and longtime partner Jenn Goicoechea married in Las Vegas just hours after the R&B superstar's headline appearance at the Super Bowl halftime show, according to officials and documents. The officiant who wed the pair is known to dress as an Elvis Presley impersonator, The Associated Press reported.
The couple married Sunday at Vegas Weddings, according to a marriage certificate made public Monday. The ceremony was officiated by the Rev. Ronald Joseph Polrywka, better known locally as Ron DeCar. Witnesses included Jonnetta Patton, Usher's mother.
“Congratulations to the Newlyweds!" chapel owner Melody Willis-Williams said in a statement. “We were beyond thrilled to host in this epic day for Usher and his new wife.”
“As much as we love, love,” the statement adds, "this is the couple’s news to share any further details on. We’ll always be fans of Usher! Yeah!”
Usher, 45, and Goicoechea, 40, have been together since 2019 and have two young daughters. A representative for Usher, Lydia Kanuga, did not immediately respond to questions from The Associated Press, including whether the service was conducted in the chapel, on a balcony or in the drive-thru lane.
DeCar did not respond to an email from The Associated Press seeking additional information. A publicist said DeCar declined to comment.
Clark County Clerk Lynn Marie Goya, the head of the county's marriage license bureau, confirmed that her office issued a license to Usher and Goicoechea last week.
“Naturally they got married in Las Vegas," Goya said. "What better place than the ‘Wedding Capital of the World?’”
The document, issued Thursday, lists the couple's full names — Usher Raymond IV and Jennifer Jean Goicoechea — and shows they paid a $102 filing fee. It notes that Usher had been married before and Goicoechea had not. It also listed their business address at a commercial building in the Encino neighborhood of Los Angeles.
Usher divorced his first wife, Tameka Foster, in 2009 after two years together, and he won custody of their two sons. In December 2018, the singer filed for divorce after three years together with his second wife and former manager, Grace Miguel.
Usher's Super Bowl halftime performance Sunday at Allegiant Stadium drew acclaim and included guest appearances by such stars as Alicia Keys, H.E.R., Jermaine Dupri, Lil Jon and Ludacris. The Kansas City Chiefs won the NFL championship game in overtime, 25-22, over the San Francisco 49ers.
Usher recently ended a two-year Las Vegas Strip residency where he performed “Usher: My Way” at the Park MGM. He just released his first solo album in eight years, and in August is scheduled to kick off a 24-city US tour titled “Past Present Future.”

Most Viewed

 
 
Entertainment

Video Game Performers Will Go on Strike Over Artificial Intelligence Concerns 

SAG-AFTRA signage is seen on the side of the headquarters in Los Angeles on Friday, Nov. 10, 2023. (AP)
SAG-AFTRA signage is seen on the side of the headquarters in Los Angeles on Friday, Nov. 10, 2023. (AP)
TT
TT

Video Game Performers Will Go on Strike Over Artificial Intelligence Concerns 

SAG-AFTRA signage is seen on the side of the headquarters in Los Angeles on Friday, Nov. 10, 2023. (AP)
SAG-AFTRA signage is seen on the side of the headquarters in Los Angeles on Friday, Nov. 10, 2023. (AP)

Hollywood's video game performers announced they would go on strike Thursday, throwing part of the entertainment industry into another work stoppage after talks for a new contract with major game studios broke down over artificial intelligence protections.

The strike — the second for video game voice actors and motion capture performers under the Screen Actors Guild-American Federation of Television and Radio Artists — will begin at 12:01 a.m. Friday. The move comes after nearly two years of negotiations with gaming giants, including divisions of Activision, Warner Bros. and Walt Disney Co., over a new interactive media agreement.

SAG-AFTRA negotiators say gains have been made over wages and job safety in the video game contract, but that the two sides remained split over the regulation of generative AI. A spokesperson for the video game producers, Audrey Cooling, said the studios offered AI protections, but SAG-AFTRA’s negotiating committee said that the studios’ definition of who constitutes a "performer" is key to understanding the issue of who would be protected.

"The industry has told us point blank that they do not necessarily consider everyone who is rendering movement performance to be a performer that is covered by the collective bargaining agreement," SAG-AFTRA Chief Contracts Officer Ray Rodriguez said at a news conference Thursday afternoon. He said some physical performances are being treated as "data."

Without guardrails, game companies could train AI to replicate an actor’s voice, or create a digital replica of their likeness without consent or fair compensation, the union said.

"We strike as a matter of last resort. We have given this process absolutely as much time as we responsibly can," Rodriguez told reporters. "We have exhausted the other possibilities, and that is why we’re doing it now."

Cooling said the companies' offer "extends meaningful AI protections."

"We are disappointed the union has chosen to walk away when we are so close to a deal, and we remain prepared to resume negotiations," she said.

Andi Norris, an actor and member of the union's negotiating committee, said that those who do stunt work or creature performances would still be at risk under the game companies' offer.

"The performers who bring their body of work to these games create a whole variety of characters, and all of that work must be covered. Their proposal would carve out anything that doesn’t look and sound identical to me as I sit here, when, in truth, on any given week I am a zombie, I am a soldier, I am a zombie soldier," Norris said. "We cannot and will not accept that a stunt or movement performer giving a full performance on stage next to a voice actor isn’t a performer."

The global video game industry generates well over $100 billion dollars in profit annually, according to game market forecaster Newzoo. The people who design and bring those games to life are the driving force behind that success, SAG-AFTRA said.

Members voted overwhelmingly last year to give leadership the authority to strike. Concerns about how movie studios will use AI helped fuel last year’s film and television strikes by the union, which lasted four months.

The last interactive contract, which expired in November 2022, did not provide protections around AI but secured a bonus compensation structure for voice actors and performance capture artists after an 11-month strike that began in October 2016. That work stoppage marked the first major labor action from SAG-AFTRA following the merger of Hollywood’s two largest actors unions in 2012.

The video game agreement covers more than 2,500 "off-camera (voiceover) performers, on-camera (motion capture, stunt) performers, stunt coordinators, singers, dancers, puppeteers, and background performers," according to the union.

Amid the tense interactive negotiations, SAG-AFTRA created a separate contract in February that covered independent and lower-budget video game projects. The tiered-budget independent interactive media agreement contains some of the protections on AI that video game industry titans have rejected. Games signed to an interim interactive media agreement, tiered-budget independent interactive agreement or interim interactive localization agreement are not part of the strike, the union said.