Names and faces

U2 frontman Bono and a long list of world leaders will attend next week’s Global Citizen Festival, which aims to fight poverty. United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, leaders from several countries and some U.S. congressional members will join Stevie Wonder, Kings of Leon, Alicia Keys and John Mayer at the free concert Sept. 28 in New York’s Central Park. The concert coincides with the U.N. General Assembly. Fans earn free tickets for helping spread the word or volunteering to help end world poverty. Bono will present Liberian President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf with a Global Citizen Movement Award for her work on women’s equality. Crown Princess Mary of Denmark, Malaysia Prime Minister Najib Razak and U.S. Reps. Earl Blumenauer, D-Ore., Charlie Dent, R-Pa., and Kay Granger, R-Texas, also are expected to attend.

Asked about the coming season of The Walking Dead, Danai Gurira goes silent. When prompted again, she breaks into laughter: “I’m thinking. How I’m going to answer without saying anything?” The actress, who will mark her second full season as the katana-wielding fan favorite Michonne when the AMC show returns Oct. 13, is still figuring out how to dodge questions about what will happen so she doesn’t reveal plotlines. Gurira wouldn’t let on much about the new season although she said many fans are asking whether romance will bloom for Michonne and Sheriff Rick Grimes (Andrew Lincoln). “We know from the comic books even that these two characters do develop a connection. How exactly that plays out - I don’t know - we’ll have to all see,” she says. Gurira also is starring in Mother of George. The film is the story of a woman from Nigeria’s Yoruba tribe who moves to Brooklyn, N.Y., to marry her intended and the hurdles she faces as part of the traditional Yoruba New York community when she doesn’t become pregnant. Gurira, who was born in Iowa to Zimbabwean parents and grew up in Zimbabwe, said she appreciates being able to tell a story from the African perspective. “I loved being able to explore such a story,” she says. “That woman you see on the streets of Brooklyn, on the streets of Manhattan, and walking in the same subway and wearing her outfits with pride and with an ease and knowing she doesn’t look like anybody else in the carriage and not minding at all.”