PALM SPRINGS, Calif. (AP) — Udo Kier, the German actor whose icy gaze and strange, scene-stealing screen presence made him a favorite of filmmakers including Andy Warhol, Gus Van Sant and Lars von Trier, has died at 81.

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His partner, artist Delbert McBride, told Variety that Kier died on Sunday in Palm Springs, California.

A longtime arthouse favorite, Kier also had an unlikely run as a character actor in Hollywood blockbusters including “Ace Ventura: Pet Detective” with Jim Carrey.

The most recent of Kier’s more than 200 credits in a nearly 60-year career was this year’s Brazilian political thriller “The Secret Agent,” which could vie for Oscars and other major awards in the coming season.

Kier had his breakout as the star of two films produced by Warhol and directed by Paul Morrissey: 1973’s “Flesh for Frankenstein” and 1974’s “Blood for Dracula.”

German director Rainer Werner Fassbinder put Kier in several films later in the decade, including “The Stationmaster’s Wife” and “The Third Generation.”

Kier was introduced to many American moviegoers through Van Sant’s 1991 film “My Own Private Idaho,” starring River Phoenix and Keanu Reeves. Madonna, a fan of that film, invited Kier to appear in photos for her 1992 culture-shaking book “Sex,” and in the video for her song “Deeper and Deeper.”

Kier credited Van Sant with getting him a U.S. work permit and a Screen Actors Guild card.

Those documents allowed him to bring his arresting presence to several Hollywood films of the 1990s, including “Armageddon,” “Blade,” “Barb Wire” and “Johnny Mnemonic.”

He was a constant collaborator with von Trier, starring in the Danish director’s television series “The Kingdom” and appearing in the films “Dancer in the Dark,” “Dogville” and “Melancholia.”

Kier was born Udo Kierspe in Cologne, Germany, in 1944, as Allied forces bombed the city during World War II.

He moved at age 18 to London, where he was discovered at a coffee bar by singer and future filmmaker Michael Sarne.

“I liked the attention, so I became an actor,” Kier told Variety last year.

People noticing him for his striking presence and approaching him became a lifelong pattern.

“I have never asked a director, ‘I would like to work with you,’” he said.

Kier had lived in the Palm Springs area since the early 1990s, and was a regular and frequent party host at its annual film festival.

By JULIE CARR SMYTH

COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) — Vice President JD Vance’s memoir, “Hillbilly Elegy,” has a storied history as a New York Times bestseller, as the then-31-year-old’s introduction to the nation as a “Trump whisperer,” as a divisive subject among Appalachian scholars, and, eventually, as a Ron Howard-directed movie.

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Its latest role? Secretly transporting drugs into an Ohio prison.

The book was one of three items whose pages 30-year-old Austin Siebert, of Maumee southwest of Toledo, has been convicted of spraying with narcotics and then shipping to Grafton Correctional Institution disguised as Amazon orders. The others were a 2019 GRE Handbook and a separate piece of paper, according to court documents.

On Nov. 18, U.S. District Judge Donald C. Nugent sentenced Siebert to more than a decade in prison for his role in the drug trafficking scheme.

Siebert and an inmate at the prison were caught in a recorded conversation discussing the shipment. He either didn’t know or didn’t care that a central theme of “Hillbilly Elegy” is the impacts of narcotics addiction on Vance’s family and the broader culture.

“Is it Hillbilly?” the inmate asks.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Siebert replies, momentarily confused. Then, suddenly remembering, he says, “Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. That’s the book, the book I’m reading. (Expletive) romance novel.”

The latest version of ’80s rock band Guns N’ Roses will play the new Mystic Lake Amphitheater in Shakopee on Aug. 8.

Tickets go on sale at 10 a.m. Dec. 5 through Ticketmaster. Fans who register at signup.ticketmaster.com/gunsnroses by the end of the day Monday have access to a presale that runs on Dec. 3.

Guns N’ Roses formed in 1985 from the ashes of several other Los Angeles rock bands. After turning heads on the Hollywood club scene, GNR signed a deal with Geffen Records the following year and released their debut “Appetite for Destruction” in the summer of 1987. It spawned five hit singles, including the ballad “Sweet Child o’ Mine,” and went on to top 18 million in sales.

The mini-album “G N’ R Lies” and ambitious 1991 records “Use Your Illusion I” and “Use Your Illusion II” followed and helped establish Guns N’ Roses as one of the biggest rock bands in the world. But the first cracks in the group started to show in 1990, when they fired original drummer Steven Adler. Rhythm guitarist Izzy Stradlin quit the following year, and the rest of the band soon followed, leaving Rose the sole remaining member.

For the next two decades, about a dozen people cycled in and out of GNR, with Minneapolis’ own Tommy Stinson playing bass in the band from 1998 through 2014. Rose’s version of Guns N’ Roses resumed touring in 2001. They played the Target Center three times – in 2002, 2006 and 2011 – and drew about 8,000 fans each show.

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Following years of rumors that GNR’s classic lineup would reunite, news finally broke in early 2016 that guitarist Slash and bassist Duff McKagan would hit the road with lead singer Axl Rose for the first time since 1993. The tour kicked off that April and grossed more than $584 million. In July 2017, GNR headlined U.S. Bank Stadium in front of a sold-out crowd of more than 48,000. The band returned to the metro in September 2021 to headline the former Xcel Energy Center in St. Paul.

The upcoming tour will be GNR’s fourth since the reunion outing. It’ll be the first time locals see the group’s new drummer Isaac Carpenter, the replacement for Frank Ferrer, who amicably left the lineup last year.

Two new Guns N’ Roses songs, “Nothin” and “Atlas,” will be released Tuesday.

By JACK BROOK

A copy of the first Superman issue, unearthed by three brothers cleaning out their late mother’s attic, netted $9.12 million this month at a Texas auction house which says it is the most expensive comic book ever sold.

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The brothers discovered the comic book in a cardboard box beneath layers of brittle newspapers, dust and cobwebs in their deceased mother’s San Francisco home last year, alongside a handful of other rare comics that she and her sibling had collected on the cusp of World War II.

She had told her children she had a valuable comic book collection hidden away, but they had never seen it until they put her house up for sale and decided to comb through the basement for heirlooms, said Lon Allen, vice president of comics at Heritage Auctions. The brothers uncovered the box of comics and sent a message to the auction company, leading Allen to fly out to San Francisco earlier this year to inspect their copy of “Superman No. 1” and show it to other experts for appraisal.

“It was just in an attic, sitting in a box, could have easily been thrown away, could’ve easily been destroyed in a thousand different ways,” Allen said. “A lot of people got excited because it’s just every factor in collecting that you could possibly want all rolled into one.”

The “Superman No. 1” comic, released in 1939 by Detective Comics Inc., is one of a small number of copies known to be in existence and is in excellent condition. The Man of Steel was the first superhero to enter pop culture, helping boost the copy’s value among collectors, alongside its improbable backstory, Allen said.

The previous record for the world’s most expensive comic book had been set last year, when an “Action Comics No. 1” — which first introduced Superman to the world as part of an anthology — sold for $6 million. In 2022, another Superman No. 1 sold for $5.3 million.

A small, in-house advertisement in the comic book helped experts identify it as originating from the first edition of 500,000 Superman No. 1 copies ever printed. Allen estimates there are fewer than 500 in existence today.

The copy was not given any special protection, but the cool Northern California climate helped preserve it, leaving it with a firm spine, vibrant colors and crisp corners, according to a statement from Dallas-based Heritage Auctions. The copy was rated a 9.0 out of 10 by comics grading company CGC, meaning it had only the slightest signs of wear and aging.

The three brothers, in their 50s and 60s, did not wish to be identified due to the windfall involved nor did the buyer of the comic book, according to the auction house.

“This isn’t simply a story about old paper and ink,” one brother said in a statement released by the auction house. “This was never just about a collectible. This is a testament to memory, family and the unexpected ways the past finds its way back to us.”

Brook is a corps member for The Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues.