McKellen turns the dangerously familiar opening speech (“Now is the winter of our discontent”) into a sinister manifesto, a mini-“Mein Kampf” that flaunts Richard’s physical deformity and proclaims his intent to get the crown at any cost. The modern military garb gives Richard’s useless left arm, limping gait and twisted back the look of battle traumas. He is a soldier–Satan, underscored by McKellen’s dazzling dexterity as he dons a glove onehanded, his fingers working into it like five sibling snakes slithering to their lair....

Fever Pitch The case consumes the national media, winding up on NEWSWEEK’S cover—but then it falls apart: the victim recants, and the D.A. becomes an icon of prosecutorial abuse. All charges are dropped. Present Day Disbarred after 28 years of practice, Nifong, 57, still lives in the Durham area, passing his time writing poetry and performing as a soloist in his church choir, according to an ex-colleague who didn’t want to be named discussing a friend....

Sure, McDonald’s is owed damages - in theory. Defendants Dave Morris and Helen Steel, who distributed a leaflet with a slew of charges against McDonald’s, were ordered to pay $98,000, though it’s unclear whether the company will try to collect. The judge ruled that the company wasn’t - as alleged - to blame for starvation in the Third World, the destruction of the Central American rain forest or serving up unhealthy food that might cause fatal disease....

The My Lai massacre, of course, would come to be known as one of the darkest moments in American military history. In just four hours, nearly 500 Vietnamese civilians were killed. If not for Thompson, the body count would have been far higher. Defying a senior officer, he evacuated 10 civilians to safety, then landed to pull a squirming baby out of a ditch stacked with bodies. The killing spree stopped only after Thompson got back to base and told his commander what was happening....

Nancy Retherford, a member of the rapid response team of the American Red Cross, is one of those relief workers. As a disaster-services public-affairs officer for the organization, her job includes facilitating communication for disaster victims. Retherford spoke to NEWSWEEK’s Arlene Getz about her experiences in Bhuj, the city worst hit by the quake. NEWSWEEK: What does Bhuj look like right now? Nancy Retherford: Bhuj is just totally devastated. As you drive through the streets, even on the very outskirts of town, all you see are piles of rocks and debris....

Given the evidence presented so far, Timmendequas will likely be locked away if he doesn’t get the death penalty. Banishing predators like him from parents’ nightmares, however, is proving more difficult. More than 40 legislatures have now passed their own versions of Megan’s Law; in the toughest states, parole officers may knock on doors or hold a town meeting to warn residents about their new neighbor. But Megan’s Law is also on trial; legal challenges persist, and an early study found that while chronic child molesters are less likely to get away with their crimes under the law, they’re no less liable to commit them....

Babbitt can expect to rack up the frequent-flier miles. About 75,000 big dams block American rivers, testaments to the conviction that any river flowing to sea unimpeded is a waste of water and power. But that attitude is under attack. Many of the aging dams kill millions of valuable salmon migrating to sea. As a result, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) is refusing to relicense dams where the environmental costs outweigh the value of the hydropower, or demanding that a dam be retrofitted with fish ladders....

While becoming the first MLB player to kneel during the anthem — following the lead of Colin Kaepernick and other athletes who’ve protested what they see as racial inequality — Maxwell also shattered the ridiculous narrative of the America-hating, ungrateful, disrespectful anthem protester. A day after President Donald Trump said team owners should fire “son of a b—” anthem protesters, Maxwell, the son of an Army officer and who was born on a military base, took a knee anyway and showed unequivocally that one can be both patriotic and perturbed, both grateful and grieved....

Canha, who hit .303/.384/.505 for Triple-A New Orleans in 2014, must either stay with the A’s (or a team that the A’s trade him to) all season or be offered back to the Marlins for $25,000. The positions that Canha can play already are pretty crowded — Stephen Vogt can play both spots, while Oakland has Sam Fuld and Craig Gentry part of the picture in left field, and a DH/first base mix that includes Billy Butler, Ike Davis, John Jaso, and Nate Freiman....

Nolan’s parents, Jimmy and Donna, told the Journal News of White Plains, N.Y., they will wait at Jacobi Medical Center in the Bronx for his body to eventually give out. Jimmy Nolan said the family will donate his son’s organs. MORE: Notable sports deaths of 2015 “It’s the right thing to do: give people life. My son don’t have life,” Jimmy Nolan told the Journal News. “Whoever gets his heart, they’re going to run for … That kid used to run six, seven, eight miles a day....

This was no drill. The explosion killed four Port Authority workers: a locksmith, an engineer, an operations superintendant and a secretary who was pregnant. A dental-equipment salesman hauled from the shattered parking garage died of a heart attack. Elsewhere in the World Trade Center, a complex as populous as many American cities, more than 50,000 people were thrown into chaos. Lights flickered, then went dark. Elevators stuck between floors. As greasy wisps of smoke filtered upward, people waited for instructions but got none....

Why the soft spot for the hard charger? Part of the answer is simple access. Reporters can be bought cheap with a little cooperation when we need it. For years, McCain has reliably returned press calls with a candid line or two. And unlike most politicians, McCain readily, and a bit self-consciously, concedes error, pounding his head with his fist like the late Chris Farley (“I’m so stupid sometimes!”) when he lands in trouble....

Whitewater. Starr’s prosecutors have long believed the story first told five years ago by Little Rock businessman David Hale: that, in 1986, Clinton pressured Hale to make a fraudulent $300,000 loan to Clinton’s business partner Susan McDougal. Clinton flatly denied the charge when he testified at the 1996 trial of Susan and Jim McDougal, and Starr’s prosecutors considered accusing the president of perjury. But the idea of including Whitewater perjury in the Lewinsky report was rejected because there were no credible witnesses to finger the president....

In the past, anti-Americans saved their bile for two separate areas of U.S. misconduct. They were appalled, first, by America’s antics abroad. They were disgusted, second, by the way Americans behaved inside their own country. Intellectuals would inveigh against a society apparently riddled with crime, riven by race and obsessed with money. Now, thanks to globalization, the two older forms of hostility have converged: America’s external and internal conduct have become one and the same thing....

This kind of well-intentioned but ultimately empty virtue signaling seems to always end up substitute for genuine action to uncover and address real issues, and I warned at the time that these expressions of white “allyship” might lead the next generation of Americans to grow up believing that the entire destiny of one race—black Americans—is reliant upon the voluntary largesse of another—white Americans. But if this were the case, it would trap blacks and whites in the roles of oppressed and oppressor, robbing both of a sense of personal agency....

Chirac denied all the charges, denouncing the “abracadabra history” in which “a dead man is made to talk after a year, and holds forth about events from 14 years ago.” He suggested the affair was concocted by his political enemies. The pro-Gaullist newspaper Le Figaro called the accusations “the first stink bombs” in the campaign for presidential elections next year. In fact, the stench from this posthumous confession taints French politicians of every stripe....

Twenty-one years ago, an explosives-filled guitar case slung across the shoulder of a male in his 20s erupted with a ferocious roar and decapitated him. A photo of the head in the debris was snapped by someone but never, as far as I know, appeared on any news platform. The gruesome image was sent to me much later. By then, the impact of what happened that hot school-vacation afternoon in a bustling, child-filled Sbarro pizzeria in the center of Israel’s capital city had receded into the distance....

After a 20-year war following the Al-Qaeda-led attack on the World Trade Center, the Taliban will return to a level of power last seen during a period between 1996 and 2001 when it governed roughly three-quarters of the country under Sharia Law. Here, Newsweek charts the Taliban’s rise in power: February 2020 Former President Donald Trump initiated talks to remove U.S. troops from the nation, joining other NATO powers in arranging terms of agreement with the Taliban for a withdrawal....

There’s no telling what MLB commissioner Rob Manfred and President-elect Donald Trump discussed during their meeting Tuesday in New York, but the mind certainly wonders. Also present was Yankees president Randy Levine, a Trump supporter. MORE: Sports figures who support Donald Trump Here’s a transcript*. *-This is fake news. Manfred: Thank you for inviting us, Mr. President-elect. Trump: I want to throw out the first pitch for the Yankees on opening day....