MEXICO CITY — BTS’s upcoming concerts in Mexico have escalated to a presidential level, with the demands of the ARMY fan base reaching Claudia Sheinbaum’s Monday news briefing and prompting a response from the president herself.

Following a lightning-fast sellout last week, Mexico’s president used her briefing to advocate for more BTS concert dates in May, saying she sent a letter to South Korea’s prime minister requesting more dates for the band.

“We have not yet received a response, but we hope it will be positive,” she said.

Sheinbaum also said she reached out to concert organizers to discuss the feasibility of adding dates; however, the promoter Ocesa has stated that it is currently not possible. BTS is scheduled to perform at Mexico City’s GNP Seguros Stadium on May 7, 9 and 10.

Sheinbaum had previously celebrated the confirmation of BTS’s visit, noting during her Jan. 19 news briefing that the group’s arrival fulfills a “historic request” from Mexican youth.

“It is a very famous Korean group that young people love,” she said, adding that their presence is a positive development for the country. These comments even gained international traction, appearing in several South Korean news outlets.

During the same briefing, Sheinbaum and officials from Mexico’s consumer protection agency outlined efforts with Ocesa and Ticketmaster Mexico to ensure transparency in pricing and purchase conditions, while simultaneously implementing measures to curb ticket scalping.

Mexico has emerged as a premier destination for global tours; in 2025 alone, artists including Lady Gaga, Shakira, Oasis and Bad Bunny delivered landmark performances across the country.

With a capacity of 65,000, the GNP Seguros Stadium was named the world’s top concert venue for 2025 by Pollstar magazine — a title it has now secured for two consecutive years.

After a nearly four-year musical hiatus, BTS, consisting of RM, Jin, Jimin, V, Suga, Jung Kook and J-Hope, is back with a world tour and will release a new album on March 20 titled “ARIRANG.”

The tour will kick off in South Korea in April, spanning over 70 dates across Asia, North and South America, Australia and Europe through March 2027. These are the group’s first performances since their 2021–2022 Permission to Dance on Stage tour.

In the years between the tours, all BTS members had to fulfill their mandatory military service in South Korea.

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“Orange Is the New Black” and “Poker Face” star Natasha Lyonne has revealed she suffered a relapse after what’s believed to be nearly 20 years of sobriety.

The 46-year-old Emmy nominee tweeted late Friday that she was taking her relapse “public,” and seemingly promised to share more details soon.

She reflected further in a follow-up post early Saturday morning, writing, “Recovery is a lifelong process. Anyone out there struggling, remember you’re not alone.”

Lyonne asked that anyone facing similar setbacks “stay honest,” because we’re only as “sick as our secrets” and we never know how our experiences may help others.

“Keep going, kiddos. Don’t quit before the miracle,” she wrote. “Wallpaper your mind with love. Rest is all noise and baloney.”

While Lyonne didn’t say when she relapsed or with what, she did respond to multiple fans sharing their messages of support.

“There but for the grace,” she replied to one user who reassured her that she’d make it back again.

“May become a pothead or a nun. TBD,” she added in her signature deadpan tone.

Lyonne’s battle with substance abuse received widespread media attention in the early 2000s after multiple run-ins with the law. In 2005, her heroin addiction landed her in the ICU with hepatitis C, a heart infection and a collapsed lung. She eventually got sober with the help of court-appointed rehab she completed in 2006.

“Spiraling into addiction is really, really scary,” she told Entertainment Weekly six years later. “I was definitely as good as dead, you know?”

Lyonne was “doing OK” when she spoke to the Daily News in 2017 about the “life-affirming” nature of playing addict Nicky Nichols on “OITNB,” for which she earned her first Emmy nomination.

“Having some usefulness in your day job makes you better, so much more capable to transmit or articulate something,” she said, adding that filming some scenes for the series proved “problematic … because I do know them so intimately, and yet I find myself a decade away from them.”

In 2023, while attempting to give up smoking, Lyonne told Variety she’s “naturally wired for self-destructive crutches. I (expletive) love a vice.”

Around that same time, comedian John Mulaney confirmed in his Netflix special, “Baby J,” that Lyonne was one of the attendees at his “star-studded intervention” to address his relapse, which resulted in him going to rehab in late 2020. Also at the intervention were Seth Meyers, Bill Hader, Nick Kroll and Lyonne’s ex Fred Armisen, among others.

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PARK CITY, Utah — The comedy streak at the Sundance Film Festival continued Saturday with the world premieres of the art world satire “The Gallerist,” with Natalie Portman, and Olivia Wilde’s “The Invite,” a sharp look a crumbling marriage.

“The Invite,” which debuted at the Eccles Theater, marks Wilde’s third time behind the camera and first since “Don’t Worry Darling.” It received an enthusiastic standing ovation.

Will McCormack and Rashida Jones wrote the script for “The Invite,” in which a couple on the edge (Wilde and Seth Rogen) have their upstairs neighbors (Penélope Cruz and Edward Norton) over for dinner. The evening starts with awkward small talk and becomes a raw and revealing encounter that's funny and devastating at times.

“Several of the greatest moments of this movie were written by the cast,” Wilde said after the premiere. “We shot in order, which was incredible. … It was such a luxury.”

There was also quite a bit of improv, Wilde and Rogen said.

“I think there's a seven-hour movie that you would have liked,” Wilde said.

Wilde has had a busy Sundance so far. On Friday night she helped debut the new Gregg Araki movie “I Want Your Sex,” in which she plays an eccentric artist and sexual provocateur.

Following “The Invite” was Cathy Yan’s “The Gallerist,” starring Portman as gallerist Polina Polinski attempting to make a name for herself at Art Basel in Miami, with the help of her assistant (Jenna Ortega), who gets involved in a plot to sell a dead body.

“It was such a great original concept that felt really juicy and perfect,” Yan said after the movie, with Portman, Ortega and Charli xcx by her side.

When an audience member asked if Portman took the role for personal reasons, she quipped, “I've never tried to sell a dead body before.”

Zach Galifianakis plays an influencer and Da’Vine Joy Randolph is an emerging artist in the starry cast, which also includes Catherine Zeta-Jones, Sterling K. Brown and Daniel Brühl.

The Eccles also hosted the premiere of “Wicker,” starring Olivia Colman as a sardonic fisherwoman who commissions a basket weaver to maker her a husband, played by Alexander Skarsgård, who co-stars in the Charli xcx movie “The Moment.”

All of the films are seeking distribution at the Sundance Film Festival, which runs through Feb. 1.

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From combined wire services