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Milo Ventimiglia explains why he had to keep his Call of Duty role a secret
Celebrity News

Milo Ventimiglia explains why he had to keep his Call of Duty role a secret

by jummy84
written by jummy84

Milo Ventimiglia had to keep his Call of Duty: Black Ops 7 role a secret because he was forbidden from telling anyone he had been cast as the fan-favourite protagonist, David Mason.

Milo Ventimiglia was contractually forbidden from telling anyone he was playing David Mason in Call of Duty: Black Ops 7

The 48-year-old actor stars in the blockbuster video game as the beloved Lieutenant Commander – who first appeared in 2012’s Call of Duty: Black Ops II – and Ventimiglia has now revealed his contract with publisher Activision prevented him from telling anyone about the role, including his parents.

When the BBC asked the Girlmore Girls star what it was like to tell his friends and family about landing the part, he said: “I couldn’t tell them.

“That was actually the thing, like part of my contract [was] I could not say what I was working on.

“So I think like … I didn’t even tell my parents. A producer at the company we have together knew, and my wife knew.”

Ventimiglia added he thinks the secrecy around his role was something the fans would have wanted, so that the “excitement” around the game could be maintained.

He continued: “I think that’s what the fans want. They don’t want to be told too far ahead of time. They want that excitement.”

As well as Ventimigila, Call of Duty: Black Ops 7 stars Kiernan Shipka as Emma Kagan and Michael Rooker as Mike Harper, who had previously portrayed the character in Black Ops II.

Reflecting on joining the iconic shooter franchise, Ventimigila said working on Call of Duty: Black Ops 7 had been “intense, but also really fun”.

He said: “Honestly, when it comes to something like this – Call of Duty has such a legacy, such an iconic presence – you really want to get it right. And I feel like so many people on this team have been working on the franchise for years.

“It was lovely being in an environment where I could say, ‘This isn’t quite working’, and be surrounded by people who genuinely cared and helped figure it out. 

“It was a super collaborative space, and I’m naturally a collaborative actor, so it suited me perfectly. Everyone was so kind and fun – even though the story is intense, the vibe was always great. 

“That’s important to highlight: it was intense, but also really fun.”

On November 6, London hosted a pop-up event with Call of Duty’s Toshin Matcha Bar bringing the world of Black Ops into real life, offering an exclusive preview of Call of Duty: Black Ops 7.

High-profile guests, including Micky van de Ven and Hugo Chegwin, experienced a fusion of London’s matcha culture and high-energy gameplay, set to a live soundtrack by Nia Archives.

Inspired by the new Japanese-themed multiplayer map Toshin, the event opened with a serene, neon-lit Tokyo-style matcha bar serving limited-edition Layered Peach and Mango Uji Iced Matcha Lattes from Chinatown’s Tea Parlour.

From there, the experience intensified, as guests moved through a smoke-filled red tunnel into a disorienting mirror room, followed by a corridor encounter with the game’s villain, Menendez.

The journey continued through an interrogation room and an upside-down bar serving themed cocktails.

The main space featured a 1950s-style Nuketown airstream, gameplay stations, a surveillance-style face-capture installation displayed on a giant screen, and multiple photo moments.

Nia Archives and CLIPZ closed the night with high-energy DJ sets that completed the immersive Black Ops 7 world.




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Milo J Shows Off the Beauty of Argentine Folk » PopMatters
Music

Milo J Shows Off the Beauty of Argentine Folk » PopMatters

by jummy84
written by jummy84

Despite not fitting the tropical stereotype often attributed to (and intensely exploited by the Latin music industry, Argentina has always found ways to stand out. Historically known for tango and one of South America’s richest rock legacies (thanks to names like Fito Páez and Soda Stereo), the country is also an inexhaustible source of pop culture exports, from iconic telenovelas like Chiquititas and Rebelde Way to a new wave of global pop stars. Milo J stands in an interesting position regarding Argentina’s music scene.

When Latin music had a post-Despacito boom in the 2010s, Argentina’s most visionary artists carved a place in the Latin pop explosion with smart, self-assured moves. Singers like TINI, María Becerra, and Nicki Nicole emerged as A-listers of the movement, shaping their careers around the aesthetics and performance style of global pop stars.

Meanwhile, Argentine producers such as Bizarrap brought an electronic edge to reggaeton and urban pop, merging dance, house, and trap. Argentine music has never thrived only by “riding the wave” of rhythms born elsewhere, however. It has also built its own genres and styles (like RKT and turreo), and artists like Cazzu and Ca7riel & Paco Amoroso have experimented with pop and Latinidades in fresh, creative ways.

At first, the young Milo J seemed to belong to that latter context. After achieving international recognition with “Bzrp Music Sessions, Vol. 57” (2023), many expected him to continue exploring the trendy genre-blending trap-pop that defined his early sound, as seen in Rara Vez (2023), which remains his most significant success to date. Instead, in La Vida Era Más Corta (2025), Milo J went all the way back into the parts of Argentine music that the world is less familiar with: its traditional, folk music.

Those who’ve been paying attention to Milo J may have spotted clues of his musical ambitions in tracks like “Carencias de Cordura” (2023) or “NI CARLOS NI JOSE” (2024). La Vida Era Más Corta, however, is the most straightforward demonstration of the lengths he is willing to go for his artistry, which is impressive for an 18-year-old. 

Perhaps the only unsurprising thing about his new album is his voice: a clean, direct, meslima-free, grounded baritone which sounds almost weightless. Here, Milo J’s timbre finally gets room to breathe. Divided into two discs, this project leaves no room for remixes or collages. Genres such as tango, chacarera, and Argentine folk are presented in their purest form. There’s no heritage-baiting or pop accessibility-chasing here. 

In a 2025 interview with Apple Music, Milo J cited his grandmother from Santiago del Estero (Argentina’s oldest city and its cradle of folklore) as one of the album’s guiding inspirations. Indeed, La Vida Era Más Corta sounds like a musical tapestry woven from the shared roots of the Andino-Platine world, the cultural continuum that connects the South American pampas to the Andes.

There are even a few samba beats in the closing seconds of “Llora Llora”. Perhaps this is meant to be a discreet hint at Brazil, which is also part of that geographic-cultural collective, although not through samba, but through the gaúcho culture of its southern region, instead.

The album’s palette of timbres is colored by instruments such as the Andean flutes of “Solfican12” and by voices including Argentine rap star Trueno, Chilean trap singer AKRILLA, Argentine chacarera icons Cuti y Roberto Carabajal, and Argentine folk singer Soledad Pastorutti, among others. The collaboration with Silvio Rodríguez is also a highlight: the Cuban icon was a longtime idol of Milo J’s grandmother.

Although not stemming from South America, Rodriguez has a long tradition of collaborating with exponents of Latin American cancionero, including Mercedes Sosa, the ultimate voice of Argentine folk across Latin America. Sosa is also present in La Vida Era Más Corta: Milo J’s posthumous duet with her is the album’s closing track. What could better evoke the country’s musical heritage than that?

Nevertheless, La Vida Era Más Corta is far from a cheerful celebration of South American kinship. It’s a melancholic, deeply introspective record, whose tone is set from the first lyrics: “I have some tattoos under my skin that haven’t healed, and others that are reincarnated” (“Bajo de la piel”). That ache, both nostalgic and existential, lingers through the end.

In a way, what Milo J does in La Vida Era Más Corta compares to what Rosalía did in El Mal Querer (the Spanish singer’s stunning flamenco album released in 2018): it’s a display of youth inserting itself in an ancient landscape with more pride in its history than anxiety to modernize it. Thus far, among the most well-shaped Spanish-language albums of 2025, La Vida Era Más Corta arrives at a moment when Latin pop stars with global exposure are embracing their roots with more pride than ever, and Milo J does that for Argentina gorgeously and sincerely. 

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THE RAINMAKER -- Episode 107 -- Pictured: (l-r) Robyn Cara as Kelly Riker, Milo Callaghan as Rudy Baylor -- (Photo by: Chistopher Barr/USA Network)
TV & Streaming

Milo Callaghan and Robyn Cara on Rudy and Kelly’s Relationship

by jummy84
written by jummy84

[Warning: The following post contains MAJOR spoilers for The Rainmaker Episode 7.]

Rudy Baylor (Milo Callaghan) had to go to court for a different reason than usual in Friday’s (September 26) new episode of The Rainmaker. Rather than heading in for another hearing to prosecute the Donny Ray Black civil case, Rudy came in as a defendant … in a criminal proceeding.

Cliff (Fionn Ó Loingsigh), the abusive husband of Kelly Riker (Robyn Cara), tracked her down to Dot’s (Karen Bryson) house and attacked her in the bathroom. After she ran out into the living room, Cliff was shot and killed, and Rudy took the blame for it to protect Kelly. Bruiser (Lana Parrilla) rushed to Rudy’s bond defense and even put up his bail money and, after discovering the truth of the encounter by visiting the scene, negotiated an end to the case, leaving Rudy free of charges and Kelly bound for a new life all her own.

The culmination of Rudy’s relationship with Kelly hits quite differently in this version, since, unlike the book and movie iterations, there’s not a romantic element for the two — a decision that came at the very last minute.

Series creator Michael Seitzman remembered, “It was a big discussion on set and on the page about what that moment was going to be like when they lay down in bed together… I had a thought overnight, the night before we shot, that it felt wrong to me, that it felt like the reward for all of this shouldn’t be sexual, and it shouldn’t be. It shouldn’t be.”

“It was originally going to be a love scene, that scene when she says, ‘Can you hold me?’ and then they lay down in bed together,” Seitzman continued. “Then I killed it the night before we were shooting, and thought it just didn’t feel right. It didn’t feel like the right emotion coming out of this episode… I didn’t want the audience to be turned on by the moment or to be confused by the moment.” Another reason it was changed? “I really wanted Rudy to be somebody who really meant it when he said, ‘Of course, I’ll hold you.’ … Anything more would have felt it just would have felt wrong to me.”

The stars involved in the scene completely agreed. For Milo Callaghan, it was also a character issue for Rudy. “It was a conversation we had with Robyn Cara, who plays Kelly, is fantastic and so beautifully vulnerable and sweet in the show. And I think in our version of this, in our take on this story, there’s a curiosity that he feels — that you see in the book and in the film — but something curbs the follow-through on that because this is, again, somebody who’s really vulnerable in an abusive relationship, and he has a value system that doesn’t allow him to take advantage of that, which I think is one of the things that drives the plot, in lots of ways, is that Rudy Baylor refuses to take advantage of the vulnerable.”

Robyn Cara also thought it was the right move for her character’s mindset, explaining, “I like the way it kind of played out in this version because she’s just been through such a horrible thing… She killed her husband, so her brain must just be everywhere. She’s just gone through a huge amount of trauma. So I think going through for a more platonic ending with the characters with them, it feels like the right way to go for us in this version.”

Christopher Barr / USA Network

As for the changes to the criminal proceeding itself — in the book and film, it’s Kelly who’s arrested after Rudy killed Cliff in self-defense — Seitzman said those tweaks were meant to keep fans on their toes.

“I really liked the storyline a lot because it lives outside of the spine of the story, but it’s still a part of Rudy’s growth arc, his maturation and matriculation throughout the season,” he explained. “I wanted to upend the audience’s expectations a little bit about what was going to happen. If they were familiar with the book or they were familiar with the movie, they kind of knew how this played out in those original versions. I wanted a different version, and I wanted one that allowed Bruiser to be a very smart investigator and a smart litigator and to figure it out. I also felt that we should play on Rudy’s sometimes view of the truth as something that might be malleable… This is another example of Rudy being dishonest because he thinks he’s doing the right thing.”

The Rainmaker, Fridays, 10/9c, USA Network

If you or someone you know is the victim of domestic abuse, contact the National Domestic Violence Hotline at 1−800−799−7233. 

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THE RAINMAKER -- Episode 104 -- Pictured: Milo Callaghan as Rudy Baylor -- (Photo by: Christopher Barr/USA Network)
TV & Streaming

Milo Callaghan Defends Rudy’s Decision to Seize on Sarah’s Slip

by jummy84
written by jummy84

[Warning: The following post contains MAJOR spoilers for The Rainmaker Episode 4.]

Are Rudy Baylor (Milo Callaghan) and Sarah Plankmore (Madison Iseman) finally, fully through? It sure seems that way.

Ever since the two found themselves on opposite sides of the lawsuit between the family of Donny Ray Black and the hospital he died in, they’ve been sniping at one another in small but significant ways. There was the fancy business suit that served as a major metaphor, plus Sarah’s decision to tell her boss about Rudy’s dead brother so they could form emotional leverage against him. This time, it might’ve been the final straw … or tissue, as the case may be.

At the bar where Rudy was still part-timing, he and Sarah broke their no-work-talk rule and started arguing over the missing nurse Jackie Lemanczyk (Gemma-Leah Devereux). That’s when Sarah let it slip that Jackie was a part of the “tissue committee,” whatever that was. (In an earlier flashback, she took her concerns about Melvin Pritcher (Dan Fogler) to a company executive, but she wasn’t happy with the outcome.) That was information Sarah wasn’t supposed to share with anyone, let alone opposing counsel, and she worried it might negatively impact her career if Rudy seized on it. Rudy was torn up about whether to follow that lead, considering Sarah’s pleas for him not to, and consulted with Deck (P.J. Byrne) and Bruiser (Lana Parrilla). Ultimately, he came to the conclusion that this was substantial evidence that deserved to be subject to discovery and went after it, even if it cost him his relationship with Sarah.

 

Milo Callaghan told TV Insider of the decision, “I think part of him knows [it will cause them to break]. I think he makes a half-hearted attempt to cover for her at one point with Bruiser, and I think that’s his last-ditch effort to really sort of save his relationship. But I don’t know if he’s so much as betraying Sarah as fighting for what he believes to be right and true.”

Elsewhere in the episode, we got to see what happened to Jackie after she was kidnapped by Melvin. She woke up in an empty summer camp that he attended as a child and learned her neighbor was a victim of his, too. (An independent autopsy confirmed she died of an overdose.) Jackie was later kept captive in a trunk with an oxygen tank that very nearly ran out while Melvin was in court for his first hearing. Later, as Jackie tried to flee into the woods, she also found the private investigator, Jane Allen (Laura Campbell), tied to a tree and injured from a stab wound, but still alive.

Christopher Barr / USA Network

Also, Rudy decided to inform Kelly Riker (Robyn Cara) that her husband, Cliff (Fionn Ó Loingsigh), was at his house and threatened him, but she didn’t want Rudy to alert the authorities. She’d been squirreling away money as her own exit strategy, but in the final moments of the episode, she discovered he’d taken her hidden stash of cash. Now what?

The Rainmaker, Fridays, 10/9c, USA Network

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Madison Iseman and Milo Callaghan in The Rainmaker
TV & Streaming

Milo Callaghan and Madison Iseman on Episode 3 Betrayal

by jummy84
written by jummy84

[Warning: The following post contains MAJOR spoilers for The Rainmaker Episode 3.]

When Rudy Baylor (Milo Callaghan) and Sarah Plankmore (Madison Iseman) first found themselves on opposing sides of the central case of The Rainmaker, they agreed not to let their professional lives mix with the personal relationship they had. Best laid plans being what they tend to be, though, that quickly went to the wayside … with some devastating consequences in this week’s new episode.

The segment finds Sarah starting to reap some of the rewards of working for the high-profile Tinley Britt headed by Leo Drummond (John Slattery), including a swanky new apartment fully furnished by the firm. She efforts to share the spoils with Rudy by buying him an expensive power suit, but that goes over like a lead balloon.

For actor Milo Callaghan, the gesture hits Rudy hardest because it’s not something he could do for himself. “A lot of the things that he struggles to speak about are things like money, influence, wealth, and power by birth. And there’s a great commentary on class throughout the show, I think,” he told TV Insider. “So when she buys him the suit, it’s another blow. He has to say out loud that he can’t afford it, and that’s a terrible thing for a guy, I think, to be saying to his girlfriend.”

Madison Iseman added that she didn’t think Sarah meant to offend him with that purchase, explaining, “There’s a world where if they weren’t put in the position that they’re put into, things could look very different. And so I do think by her giving him this suit, that’s all she knows. All she knows is how to be at the top of her game, how to look a certain way, how to present herself, how to speak. And she loves him, and she cares about him, so her giving him this suit, it’s encouragement. It’s, ‘I know your potential.’ Just meet me there.’”

The new suit is just the start of their problems, of course. It’s the old one that really causes them anguish.

During a deposition of a doctor in the Donny Ray case, Rudy reveals that he knows of the doctor’s experience with alcoholism, and Leo comments that he wonders if the man in his suit would approve of his tactic. That signals to Rudy that Sarah has told her bosses about Rudy’s late brother, which is, according to Callaghan, “a big blow” like no other. “His brother is one of the biggest driving forces of all of his decision-making, and so for her to step on that and reveal it for personal gain is, I think, unimaginable for him. It’s crushing,” the actor said.

Christopher Barr / USA Network

From there, Sarah’s confronted by Rudy’s mother — who does not appreciate it when she lies to her about Rudy being fired — and her boss. The latter questions whether Sarah really sees herself having a successful future with Rudy.

Later, the two find themselves in the same company studying for the bar exam, and the tension is palpable. When Sarah decides to celebrate after the test is done, Rudy goes home early. Things are bleak between them, and with everything that’s happened now, is there any hope?

For now, Rudy has bigger things to worry about. He gives a ride home to his battered neighbor Kelly Riker (Robyn Cara) and then finds her husband waiting for him in his apartment. Plus, his negligence lawsuit might’ve just turned into a murder case thanks to one unhinged former nurse.

The Rainmaker, Fridays, 10/9c, USA Network

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