Saks Unveils The Angelina Jolie $5 Million Star Sapphire
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- Published on Monday, 09 October 2017 06:28
- Written by Forbes
Gem expert, private jeweler and jewelry designer, Robert Procop, will debut a giant black sapphire that he says is the world’s largest star sapphire certified by the Gemological Institute of America. The 888.88-carat stone will appear at Saks Fifth Avenue at South Coast Plaza until the end of October.The gem is named the “Star of Jolie,” after Angelina Jolie, the internationally known actress, filmmaker and humanitarian. It is the featured pendant on a necklace comprised of 70 black star sapphires, totaling an additional 104.42 carats. The entire piece is set in 18k rose gold and has a retail price of $5 million.The pear-shaped, double-cabochon star sapphire has not been treated by heat or other methods, according to the GIA report. Its transparency is semi-translucent to opaque. There is no indication on the report about it being the largest star sapphire graded by the organization. Its geographic origins are unknown.In addition to her film work, Jolie and Procop have been long-time collaborators in a collection of jewels called “The Style of Jolie” in which proceeds are used to promote education and establish schools in conflict-affected countries through the Education Partnership for Children of Conflict, which builds schools for children around the world. The first of the schools opened for girls in April 2013 in Afghanistan outside Kabul. It educates from 200 to 300 girls.In addition to the unveiling of the Star of Jolie, Procop will also debut new pieces from his collection with Jolie, as well as pieces from his Exceptional Jewels collection. A portion of the sales from this event will be donated to charity.After Southern California, the piece will travel to Saks Fifth Avenue stores in both Bal Harbour, Fla., and Palm Desert, Calif., in November. The tour will conclude at the Smithsonian in Washington, D.C., in December.The world’s largest known star sapphire is the “Star of Adam,” an oval-shaped blue star sapphire, currently the largest star sapphire in the world. It weighs 1,404.49 carats and its estimated cost is at least $100 million. It was discovered in Ratnapura in southern Sri Lanka, in August 2015.
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Angelina Jolie reportedly involved in plot to bust warlord Joseph Kony
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- Published on Sunday, 08 October 2017 14:15
- Written by Page Six
The former chief prosecutor for the International Criminal Court had a thing for celebrities — once asking activist actress Angelina Jolie to play the role of a “honey trap’’ in a real-life attempt to arrest a notorious African warlord, a published report said Saturday.The Sunday Times of London said loopy lawman Luis Moreno Ocampo also tried to recruit film stars George Clooney and Sean Penn in his international crusades.The startling information was leaked by the court to the French Web Site Mediapart and made available to the British newspaper.Moreno Ocampo approached Jolie about five years ago — and even tried to cast her husband, Brad Pitt, as a co-star — in a stranger-than-fiction plot to take Ugandan Joseph Kony into custody in the Central African Republic, where he was based.“Forget other celebrities, she is the one,” Moreno Ocampo wrote in an e-mail. “She loves to arrest Kony. She is ready. Probably Brad will go also.”Moreno Ocampo wanted to embed Jolie, and hopefully Pitt, with US Special Forces close to Kony’s stronghold, according to the report.Jolie wrote Moreno Ocampo at one point. “Brad is being supportive. Let’s discuss logistics. Much love Xxx.”Moreno Ocampo claimed Jolie had suggested she could lure Kony to dinner as a ruse to arrest him, the report said.American troops, he told her, “are eager to get Kony . . . [and] after meeting you, they will do it.”Moreno Ocampo had his own fixation on Jolie. The prosecutor, who won only one case in his nine-years on the court, was ultimately even less successful with Jolie.At one point he sent her an e-mail: “Dear Angie, I hope you are well. I miss you.” It went unanswered.When he heard she was ill, he sent an e-mail to her assistant confessing: “I realize how much I love her.” The assistant replied Jolie had changed her e-mail address.Moreno Ocampo made still less headway with Clooney and Penn.He asked Clooney for help flying spy satellites over Libya “to put pressure on Khadafy’s generals.’’ Moreno Ocampo also invited Penn to a New York hotel, and tried to involve the star in a potential investigation into the Palestinian conflict. The ever-flip Penn responded, “While you make the decision on Palestine, I’m embroiled in a decision weather [sic] or not to get a steam in the hotel spa.’’
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Courteney Cox ‘Trash-Talking’ Angelina Jolie Over ‘Unfair’ Movie Financing
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- Published on Friday, 06 October 2017 06:14
- Written by Radar Online
Plus, how the 'Friends' star's directing career has put a wrench in her love life.Aspiring director Courteney Cox is up in arms over Angelina Jolie’s booming career, RadarOnline.com has learned exclusively.A behind-the-scenes snitch spills to Radar that Cox, 53, has been “trash-talking” Jolie, 42, far and wide, saying how “unfair” it is that she’s struggling for movie financing whereas the mother-of-six has had zero problems getting movies made even though she has had some huge failures in recent years,” like By The Sea.What’s more — Cox’s constant efforts to make it into the directing world has put a wrench in her romance with Johnny McDaid. An insider says, “Courteney is fighting a real uphill battle to make good on her plan to become a full time film and TV director, to the point that she’s skipping meetings for acting jobs, camping out at her computer all weekend working on scripts and generally ignoring Johnny unless it’s a matter of their direct collaboration of him doing the music for one of her projects.” “He’s a patient guy but there’s only so much he can take,” claims the pal. “They rarely have date nights anymore and it’s as though Courteney has nothing else to talk about but her work. Johnny’s feeling really neglected and openly wondering if they’re better off pressing the pause button or just being friends.”
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Angelina Jolie Addresses United Nations to Praise Nigerian Lawyer Who Has Helped Educate and Feed Orphans
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- Published on Thursday, 05 October 2017 05:24
- Written by People
Just weeks after the New York City premiere of her Netflix war movie First They Killed My Father, Angelina Jolie donned her humanitarian hat to send a taped message to Nigerian mediator Zannah Mustapha, who she praised as an “inspiration.” Appearing on camera Monday to address the United Nation’s prestigious Nansen Refugee Award in Geneva, Switzerland, Jolie added that Mustupha – who has provided free schools for children in an area blighted by Islamic fundamentalists, Boko Haram – possessed “extraordinary” courage.“Zannah Mustapha runs his school in the midst of the Boko Harem insurgency in Nigeria,” said Jolie in the video. “In the teeth of brutal conflict in which schools and school children are deliberately targeted, the courage it takes to defend children’s rights to education in the face of Boko Haram is extraordinary.“Mustapha has brought light to a region that has been terrorized for years. He has made his community stronger. Girls and boys, who might otherwise have been lost, now feel that they have a future.”Earlier in her speech, Jolie, 42, provided a glimpse of the sights she has seen through her own eyes while working as a Special Rapporteur for the UN High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR), which has seen the Oscar winner highlight the causes of refugees in Africa, Europe, the Middle East and Southeast Asia.“There is nothing more important in the life of any person than the chance to have an education, yet millions of children have their education disrupted by war,” added Jolie. “I have seen the impact this has on young refugees: denying them a safe place to study and play; taking their dreams away from them; limiting their possibilities to work and making them even more vulnerable.” In Zannah Mustapha’s case this has seen him create two school in Maiduguri, Nigeria – the heartland of a Boko Haram insurgency that has killed 20,000 and displaced millions more. Along with free education, free meals, uniforms and health care, Mustapha welcomes orphaned children from both sides of the conflict into his classrooms in the hope that it will encourage the warring parties to reconcile.Mustapha also previously brokered a deal between Boko Haram and the Nigerian government that resulted in the release of more than 100 kidnapped Chibok girls. Most recently, he rehoused 800 displaced families on his own land, providing them a water source to grow crops and become self-sustainable.“This school promotes peace. It is a place where every child matters,” Mustapha said upon receiving the award on Monday. “These children shall be empowered, empowered in such a way that they can stand on their own.” Jolie, added, “Mr. Mustapha, you are an inspiration. I hope this award will encourage you and others to continue this vital work.”
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Why Angelina Jolie needs to step down from Cleopatra
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- Published on Thursday, 05 October 2017 05:21
- Written by Yahoo ! Movies
This year, British actor Ed Skrein set a new precedent in the film industry by quitting a role in the ‘Hellboy’ reboot because his character, Ben Daimio, is Japanese-American in the source comics. His replacement, ‘Lost’ star Daniel Dae Kim, applauded the move for “championing the notion that Asian characters should be played by Asian or Asian American actors”.Now, with the news that Denis Villeneuve is in talks to direct Sony’s new ‘Cleopatra’ movie, it’s time for Angelina Jolie to follow Ed Skrein’s example by doing the right thing and recusing herself from the role.The actress has long been linked to Sony’s biopic, based on Stacy Schiff’s bestselling biography ‘Cleopatra: Queen of the Nile’, and while there’s no denying she is a great actress and would do a good job in bringing the infamous Egyptian queen to life, she’d be playing a far bigger role in continuing the terrible trend of whitewashing in Hollywood.Cleopatra’s ethnicity has long been debated by scholars. She was part of the Ptolemaic dynasty, a Greek Macedonian family that ruled Ancient Egypt for 275 years, between 305 to 30 BC, but because of the intermingling with the Persian aristocracy at the time, she was considered to have both Greek and Persian heritage.However, historians don’t know for certain who her mother or paternal grandmother were. It’s assumed that Cleopatra’s mother was the sister or cousin of Ptolemy XII Auletes, Cleopatra V, because of the family’s trend of marrying relatives to maintain the bloodline, but the Pharaoh was known for having several wives and some have suggested he took an Egyptian noblewoman as one.It’s because Cleopatra could speak Egyptian that historians have suggested her mother was native to the North African country because no other ruler in her family could speak their tongue, and, as the historian Duane W. Roller points out, her own daughter “honoured the Egyptian religious elite” in Mauretania (Algeria) – after becoming their queen – which suggests they were her ancestors too.
So, it seems more than likely that Cleopatra was not as white as the women who have brought her to life on screen. She was probably mixed race, of Greek Macedonian, Persian and Egyptian descent, with an olive to light brown skin tone not unlike my own. I am a mix of Caucasian and North African heritage and one thing’s for sure, my skin colour is nothing like Angelina Jolie’s.But, it doesn’t surprise me that the actress has been in talks for the role. Back in 2007 she donned a curly wig and fake tan in ‘A Mighty Heart’ to play Mariane Pearl, a woman of Afro-Cuban and Dutch heritage. She got away with it then but nowadays that sort of whitewashing won’t be accepted. Just look at the backlash over ‘The Great Wall’, ‘Ghost in the Shell’, and ‘Aloha’ which all arguably suffered at the box office in the wake of their negative press.One would think that Jolie would want to be a part of changing this aspect of the industry as the mother of children of varying ethnic backgrounds. Wouldn’t she like to have her kids see more faces that looked like them on screen and telling their stories? It certainly seemed the case with her latest film, ‘First They Killed My Father’, which she was inspired to make because of her Cambodian-born son.It tells the true story of a child soldier serving under the Khmer Rouge during the Cambodian genocide and the entire cast, as well as some 3,500 background performers and 500 crew members, were made up of Cambodian natives. Surely she can understand that as a pale-skinned white woman, the idea of her getting to play the role of a mixed race Egyptian queen is pretty frustrating for both ethnic actresses and audiences alike.
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