“I’m not famous, I’m a crossing guard.” If you live in the area, you may have seen him refereeing a youth basketball game or working as a crossing guard at a local school or event, but Adrian Dantley, 68, is one of the most prolific scorers in NBA history. He maintains his jobs because he just loves being a part of the community, someone involved with the youth who’s making life better for everyone. Now, he can add the Maryland State Athletic Hall of Fame to his résumé.
ABC 7 News/WJLA anchor Alison Starling has announced that she will be stepping away from the anchor desk after 20 years at the station and 26 years as a broadcast journalist.
Nick News, with co-host/correspondent Kahlil Greene (a MoCo native known by many as the “Gen-Z Historian”), has been nominated for a Children’s and Family Emmy Award for Best Non-Fiction Program. He has been with the revamped version of the show since February of this year.
Greene, a Germantown native, was born at Holy Cross Hospital, attended Daly Elementary School and Fox Chapel Elementary School before moving on to Neelsville Middle School (all in Germantown) and then Poolesville High School before attending Yale University and becoming the school’s first Black student body President.
Montgomery County native and New Orleans Pelicans rookie Jordan Hawkins, making a start in place of CJ McCollum, scored a career-high 31 points on Monday night in a 116-134 loss to the defending World Champion Denver Nuggets. Hawkins’ coach Willie Green referred to him as fearless, saying, “When he’s open he’s going to shoot it. He’s aggressive and the beauty of it is Brandon, Z, all of his teammates are looking for him.”
The young man from Gaithersburg was drafted 14th overall by the New Orleans Pelicans in the 2023 NBA Draft. He is averaging 12.6 and 4.7 rebounds per game coming off of the bench, but earning significant minutes, for the Pelicans this year. Including the seven he hit on Monday night, Hawkins has made 20 three pointers in seven games this season. He has made 11 in his last two, showing that he is the outside-shooter he was drafted to be in the NBA.
Westfield Montgomery has announced details for this year’s ‘Home for the Holidays Celebration’ taking place on Saturday, November 18th. The event will be hosted by The Holderness Family (The Amazing Race, YouTube) and feature performances by the Gay Men’s Chorus of DC’s, the Maryland Youth Ballet, and Rockapella. Full details below courtesy of Westfield Montgomery:
“Westfield Montgomery Mall is getting into the seasonal spirit with their Home for the Holidays Tree Lighting Celebration in support of Children’s National Hospital on Saturday, November 18. Award-winning content creators and best-selling authors, Penn and Kim Holderness of The Holderness Family will host the free celebration that welcomes the winter holidays. With over one billion views across social media, The Holderness Family will bring their signature brand of family comedy and joy to Bethesda, Maryland for the day. The duo are best known for winning Season 33 of The Amazing Race and chronicling their marriage and family life through hilarious videos for their eight million followers.
Akon is bringing his “The SuperFan Tour” to the DMV, when he performs at The Fillmore in Silver Spring on Tuesday, November 7th. Akon recently promoted the show on his instagram, referring to Silver Spring as “Silver Springs“, a common mistake among those not familiar with the area. The video can be seen below.
The Senegalese-American singer, record producer, entrepreneur, and philanthropist has become an influential figure in modern world music after rising to prominence in 2004 following the release of “Locked Up”, the first single from his debut album Trouble (2004), followed by the second single “Lonely”, which was also a smash hit. Akon’s second album, Konvicted (2006), received three Grammy Award nominations for Best Contemporary R&B Album, and for Best Rap/Sung Collaboration for “Smack That” (featuring Eminem) and “I Wanna Love You” (featuring Snoop Dogg). Both singles became Billboard Hot 100 top ten hits, followed up by “Don’t Matter” and “Sorry, Blame It on Me”. His third studio album Freedom (2008) was led by the single “Right Now (Na Na Na)”.
Originally published in 2018: Montgomery County has strong ties to many celebrities, but we wanted to list a few that aren’t discussed as much as the usual suspects. Check out this list of just 10 of the thousands of celebrities with MoCo ties below:
Pamela Reed: You may recognize her from one of her many movie or television roles (Kindergarten Cop, Junior, Jericho, NCIS: Los Angeles, etc.), but before she went to Hollywood, Reed lived in Silver Spring and attended Springbrook High School.
Before he was LA Knight, one of the hottest superstars in professional wrestling today, Shaun Ricker was a kid growing up in Hagerstown, Maryland. He graduated from North Hagerstown High School (class of 2000), where he was in the band and ran track, but always dreamed of becoming a professional wrestler. On Saturday, he has his biggest match ever– taking on WWE Universal Champion, Roman Reigns, at WWE Crown Jewel in Saudi Arabia.
Though he appears to be outspoken now, as his LA Knight persona has been compared to a modern-day version of Stone Cold Steve Austin or The Rock, Ricker remembers how different he was when he was growing up in Hagerstown. “I was a very shy kid, but I always wanted to be a performer. I was that kid that was so shy when I was at my grandma’s house, I would whisper in my mom or dad’s ear, ‘Could you ask her for a cookie?’ Those hand mixers, when I was a kid, I thought the metal mixer part looked like a microphone so I would take those, stand behind a door and I would sing and dance. I figured if I was behind a door, nobody would see me, nobody could hear me. It was like I was invisible.” he said in a since-archived interview with the Ottawa Citizen.
Actor Sean Whalen who credits his 1993 “Got Milk?” Commercial for changing the course of his life, shared the story behind it on its 30 year anniversary. The actor, who is a Montgomery County, Maryland native and 1982 graduate of Sherwood High School also starred in various television shows including Shannon’s Deal and Grace Under Fire, as well as movies, including The People Under the Stairs and Twister. The story he shared regarding the milk commercial (as well as the commercial itself) can be seen below:
“30 YEAR ANNIVERSARY: On this day in 1993 a regional milk commercial came out that changed the course of my life. I went into an audition just a few weeks before where they gave me peanut butter and told me to try to answer the question of “Who shot Alexander Hamilton?” With my mouth full. Then they told me to improvise an ending. They said I got the job because everyone else screamed, yelled, got angry, and threw the phone! I was the only one who looked at the phone and essentially said, “My whole life led to this moment, and I failed… “ When I got to the set, they just said… “Do what you did in the audition” and Michael Bay shot it over and over for 12 hours. This job killed my commercial career, branded me as “the milk guy” for years, but was loved by Spielberg which got me the gig in Twister, which gave my theatrical career a huge boost. Less and less people know what I’m talking about when I mentioned it so it is fading out of the zeitgeist. But that’s OK. I really haven’t been able to eat peanut butter since but it was a good trade off.”
John Astin, 93, who is perhaps best known for starring in the 1960s version of The Addams Family as patriarch Gomez Addams, is a Maryland native who was born in Baltimore and raised in Bethesda. Astin was born in Baltimore to Margaret Linnie (née Mackenzie) and Dr. Allen Varley Astin, who was the director of the National Bureau of Standards, now the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST). At that time, Astin and his family resided on Battery Lane in Bethesda. Astin graduated from Johns Hopkins University (also in Maryland) in 1952. He studied drama while at Johns Hopkins and was a member of the Phi Kappa Psi fraternity at Johns Hopkins.
Astin got his start in theater, appearing on Broadway in the 50s. His first big film break came with a small role in West Side Story in 1961. Actor Tony Randall, famous for his role as Felix Unger in The Odd Couple, spotted Astin’s knack for comedic roles, which led to guest starring roles on the sitcoms Dennis the Menace, The Donna Reed Show, and more. During the 1962–63 television season, Astin had his first lead in a television series, the ABC sitcom I’m Dickens, He’s Fenster, co-starring with Marty Ingels. By the time I’m Dickens, He’s Fenster gained a following and started winning its time slot, ABC had already canceled the show after a total of 32 episodes were produced.
Popular Fox 5 traffic anchor Erin Como has announced she will be stepping away from traffic anchoring in November in a social media post made last week. She will be remaining with fox 5, co-hosting LION Lunch Hour, appearing on Good Day DC & DMV Zone, and adding more feature content. The full statement and more about Como can be seen below:
“It’s been a great ride covering your morning commute around the DMV for the past 8 years. A huge thank you to everyone for the support & love. The time has come for me to ditch the early alarm clock and shift my career focus.