"Straight Outta Compton," a biopic about the pioneering rap group N.W.A., wowed Hollywood by taking first place in the North American box office in its debut weekend.

Racing past its rivals, and past even the most optimistic of expectations, the film took in an impressive $60.2 million, box office tracker Exhibitor Relations reported Monday.

Actor Emile Hirsch is due back in a Utah court Monday for a hearing on assault charges stemming from a nightclub incident during the Sundance Film Festival.

The "Into the Wild" star is accused of putting a female studio executive in a chokehold Jan. 25 at Tao Nightclub in Park City while in Utah for the Sundance Film Festival. He is charged with felony aggravated assault and intoxication.

Politically charged rapper Talib Kweli on Saturday released a musical indictment of capitalism and, true to his principles, he gave it away for free.

The New York rapper, known for his left-wing activism, put out with no prior warning a new album entitled "Fuck the Money," which listeners can download for free from his website.

She is black and trendy, and young South African girls are learning to love her.

Meet Momppy Mpoppy, who is a step ahead of other black dolls across Africa who are often dressed in traditional ethnic clothes.

Oscar-winning actor Morgan Freeman's step-granddaughter was stabbed to death by her boyfriend in New York, US media reported Sunday.

E'Dena Hines, 33, was found on a Manhattan street early Sunday morning with multiple stab wounds, officials said. She was pronounced dead in a hospital shortly after.

A gaming console that was the forerunner of today's PlayStation and Xbox has been brought back to life more than 30 years later after an online fundraising campaign by nostalgic fans.

The ZX Spectrum became a classic after its release in Britain in 1982 and its success helped introduce a generation to computing and simple but addictive games.

R2-D2 will be rolling into Mickey Mouse's neighborhood, Disney announced Saturday, unveiling plans for two huge "Star Wars" theme parks adjacent to existing U.S. venues in Florida and California.

With star Harrison Ford on hand, Disney CEO Bob Iger said that after Disney's $4 billion purchase of Lucasfilm three years ago, "we wanted to bring 'Star Wars' to every corner of our company... Not only on screens but in real life."

Disney and its subsidiary Pixar on Friday announced a slew of new animated movies coming down the pipe, including a love story in the "Toy Story" series and a modern take on Jack and the Beanstalk. 

John Lasseter, the chief creative officer of Walt Disney and Pixar Animation Studios, introduced clips from several of the new films at Disney's D23 Expo in California, in front of an audience of nearly 8,000 people.

Investigators opened a criminal probe on Thursday after Russian-born supermodel Natalia Vodianova described how a cafe kicked out her autistic sister because of her disability.

Vodianova, who has been the face of Calvin Klein campaigns and modeled for Givenchy and Stella McCartney, grew up in poverty in the industrial city of Nizhny Novgorod, where her sister and mother still live.

After 45 years on U.S. public television, "Sesame Street" is relocating to HBO in a move its creators say will result in more new episodes of the beloved children's program.

Starting this fall, "Sesame Street" will run for five seasons on the pay TV channel and its Internet streaming options, its producer, the non-profit Sesame Workshop, said in a statement Thursday.