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Amy Adams (born August 20, 1974) is an American actress. She made her feature film debut with a supporting part in the 1999 satire Drop Dead Gorgeous, and her first major role was in Steven Spielberg's 2002 biopic Catch Me If You Can. After a breakthrough role as a loquacious pregnant woman in Junebug (2005), her first major success as a leading lady was in the 2007 musical Enchanted, in which she played a cheerful Disney Princess. She went on to play naive, optimistic women in a series of films. She played stronger female parts to positive reviews in The Fighter (2010) and The Master (2012), and in 2013 she began portraying Lois Lane in superhero films set in the DC Extended Universe. She won two consecutive Golden Globe Awards for playing a seductive con artist in American Hustle (2013) and Margaret Keane in Big Eyes (2014). Further acclaim came for playing a linguist in the science fiction film Arrival (2016) and a self-harming reporter in the miniseries Sharp Objects (2018). (Full article...)

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Did you know...

Romani flag

... that the flag of the Romani people (pictured) was a triband, before the red stripe was removed over suspicions that it stood for communism?
... that Sir Cusack Patrick Roney was knighted for his role as secretary to the Great Industrial Exhibition of 1853?
... that penis worms very similar to Priapulus caudatus created trace fossils in the early Cambrian period?
... that minutes after a world record was set for Super Mario World, SethBling completed a faster run, validating a technique used previously only on an emulator?
... that Narmakosh, compiled by Narmad, is the first monolingual dictionary of the Gujarati language?
... that video artist Joan Braderman superimposed herself onto scenes from the television series Dynasty to critique the characters, plots, and themes?
... that if the Green Bay Packers football team, with an estimated value of $2.55 billion, was ever sold, all the profits would go to its charitable foundation rather than its shareholders?
... that opera singer Catherine-Nicole Lemaure was imprisoned overnight for refusing to perform?

In the news

Kofi Annan

Former UN Secretary-General and Nobel Peace Prize winner Kofi Annan (pictured) dies at the age of 80.
The Asian Games open in Jakarta and Palembang, Indonesia.
Former Prime Minister of India Atal Bihari Vajpayee dies at the age of 93.
American soul singer and songwriter Aretha Franklin dies at the age of 76.
In Afghanistan, hundreds are killed as the Taliban seize most of the strategic city of Ghazni for four days.
A portion of the Ponte Morandi motorway bridge in Genoa, Italy, collapses, killing at least 41 people.

On this day

August 20: Day of Arafah (Islam, 2018); Day of Restoration of Independence in Estonia (1991); St. Stephen's Day in Hungary

Yellowstone fires

636 – Rashidun forces led by Khalid ibn al-Walid took control of Syria and Palestine in the Battle of Yarmouk, marking the first great wave of Muslim conquests after the death of Muhammad.
1710 – War of the Spanish Succession: The Spanish-Bourbon army commanded by the Marquis de Bay was soundly defeated by a multinational army led by the Austrian commander Guido Starhemberg.
1909 – Pluto was photographed for the first time at the Yerkes Observatory in Williams Bay, Wisconsin, U.S., 15 years before it was officially discovered by Clyde Tombaugh.
1950 – Korean War: United Nations forces repelled an attempt by North Korea to capture the city of Taegu.
1988 – Fires (pictured) in the United States' Yellowstone National Park destroyed more than 150,000 acres (610 km²), the single-worst day of the conflagration.

Jeremi Wiśniowiecki (d. 1651) · Rudolf Bultmann (b. 1884) · Mika Yamamoto (d. 2012)

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Adams in 2015

Amy Adams is an American actress who has appeared in several films and television shows. She made her film debut in the 1999 black comedy Drop Dead Gorgeous and had her first major role in Steven Spielberg's biographical crime drama Catch Me If You Can (2002). However, the film did not launch her career as Spielberg had hoped. She had her breakthrough in 2005 by playing a joyful pregnant woman in Junebug (2005) and in 2007, Adams starred in the Disney romantic comedy Enchanted. Adams played a naive nun in Doubt (2008) and expanded into dramatic roles by playing a tough barmaid in David O. Russell's sports drama The Fighter (2010). She subsequently starred in Paul Thomas Anderson's drama The Master (2011) and Russell's crime comedy American Hustle (2013), for which she received her fifth Academy Award nomination. In 2016, Adams played intellectual women troubled by their memories in the science fiction film Arrival and the psychological thriller Nocturnal Animals. She went on to gain acclaim for playing a self-harming reporter in the HBO thriller miniseries Sharp Objects (2018). (Full list...)

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Benjamin Harrison (1833–1901) was a politician and lawyer who served as the 23rd President of the United States from 1889 to 1893. Before ascending to the presidency, Harrison established himself as a prominent local attorney, church leader, and politician in Indianapolis, Indiana, and as a Union Army soldier in the American Civil War. After a term in the U.S. Senate (1881–1887), the Republican Harrison was elected to the presidency in 1888. Hallmarks of his administration included unprecedented economic legislation, including the McKinley Tariff and Sherman Antitrust Act, as well as modernizing the U.S. Navy and admitting six new western states to the Union.

Engraving: Bureau of Engraving and Printing; restoration: Andrew Shiva

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