Troubled Hollywood

I’m happy to say there is no snow in my future today. Of course, the reasoning for that is because I’m in sunny Florida, and even at 8:27, it’s already 64 degrees. I love nothing more than being on vacation, especially in a sunny climate such as this, but I have to admit I am jonesing a little bit to see a movie, my last having been Drillbit Taylor with Owen Wilson, but instead of getting a movie in this weekend as I usually do, we’ll be seeing the Beach Boys tonight … live on the beach. Until then, let’s dish a little.

The Los Angeles Times is sitting with egg on their face after publicizing documents they thought to be true. An inmate with a history of lying produced these documents that said associates of Sean “Diddy” Combs knew ahead of time about the assault on Tupac Shakur in 1994. The Times has made a public apology, but I’m thinking if I was Diddy, I’d be looking for something a little more. What kind of a crackpot newspaper doesn’t check that? It’s not like this is the Enquirer or anything. Apparently they had an ex-F.B.I. agent look it over, but … certain sections of it were blacked out, and he didn’t find this just a little odd?

A Hindu leader from Nevada is demanding that Paramount Pictures allow himself and other members of his community to screen Mike Myers new film, The Love Guru, before it hits theatres, believing that it “appears to be lampooning Hinduism and Hindus.” Myers has said in the past that Deepak Chopra, a longtime friend of his, is the inspiration for this new character. All I can think is it’s too bad the spies of the world never demanded the same of Myers’ film Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery. Imagine thinking all British spies didn’t have bad teeth and large libidos!

Not to be disrespectful of the dearly departed, but aol.com is making comparisons between Heath Ledger’s second to last film, The Dark Knight, a sequel to Batman Begins, and the last films of other stars, such as James Dean, Clark Gable, Carole Lombard, Spencer Tracy, Will Rogers, Bruce Lee, and his son Brandon. Ledger was a great actor, but does he really belong in that list? I don’t think he would have ever been put in that list had he still been alive and promoting his turn as The Joker. Just sayin’.

Lindsay Lohan has gone from Disney star to rehab to films of infamous killers. After starring in Chapter 27 about John Lennon’s killer, Mark David Chapman, she’s now been signed to star as one of Charles Manson’s followers in Manson Girls. As odd as a career path as this seems, I’ll be watching after not being allowed to watch Helter Skelter, the movie about the Manson killings, as my mom thought I was too young. I’ve felt like I’ve been missing something every since. Maybe Lindsay feels the same.

The good weather isn’t done here, but I am.

Photos Courtesy of canmag.com and batman-movie-buzz.com
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I’ve been tracking American Idol for years. “Tracking,” I guess, is an odd term, but I’ve been more than “following” it. I was a fan the first season, a little more than a fan the next few years, and by season four I was recapping and commentating on it. I follow the trends, and while there are always going to be surprises, I can usually tell how it’s all going to go down, save for a week here or week there. But these past three weeks, I have to admit, I have no clue where it’s going this year.

You have to understand that from January to May, I’m all about Idol. Not only am I writing about it, I’m talking about it … often. With my friends and family, as well as belonging to a few Yahoo groups dedicated to American Idol. So I know from those groups who is popular and who isn’t, who people can’t stand, etc. And the trend normally at this earlier point in the show is that the people that are forgotten about are the ones that land in the bottom three. It’s the people that don’t do badly, but don’t do great, and when it comes to voting, they’re just forgotten about.

We’ll usually have some surprise results to make people really sit up and take notice, and the show loves to have fun with that, drawing it out, shocking us, etc. Yet this year, that’s happening every week. Not only is the person staying that everyone seems to like the least (Kristy Lee Cook), but the people that are so middle of the pack and aren’t staking out a claim to who they are and why they belong on the show are sticking around. Read more »

Getting to the top 10 of American Idol, it seems like we’re finally beginning to separate the pack from those that can and those that can’t. It’s the personalities that seem to really be coming in to play here, as let’s face it … everyone there has a good voice, or they wouldn’t have even made it to Hollywood to begin with, let alone to the final 24. Those that we just couldn’t connect with for one reason or another are gone, so now it comes down to personality, and if they have a personality to keep us excited every week, they’ll stick around for awhile.

While Ramiele Malubay has a pretty voice that she finally showed she can belt with, there’s no connection from her to us. Despite the show telling us before the season started that this time there would be more focus placed on getting to know the performers, I don’t really feel I know her. Trying to figure out songs for each to sing, I can’t begin to tell you what I think she should sing, as I don’t know really who she is. She sang Heart’s Alone, and while she was finally belting a song out to prove the voice she had, it still had me wondering what else she was going to do with it. Not to mention the fact that outfit with the shorts was horrible. It made her look even more short, as well as stumpy.

I kind of feel the same way with Syesha Mercado. Vocally, tonight, she was the best she has ever sounded, and I’m sure this is the performer the judges put through to the final 12 … finally. However, I’m wondering who the hell she really is as well. We need to find out some fun things about her, as without the personality, she’s just another good voice, and frankly, we’ve had too many females to have done well on the show with pretty voices. She needs to show us something along with that. Read more »

I still shudder looking out the window at six inches of snow that fell on the first day of spring. It’s only supposed to reach a high of 37 today, but there’s not much hope of that snow melting with no sun and more supposedly on the way. I’m on vacation in a few days, and right now I can’t get out of Dodge quick enough. Until then, let’s dish a little.

I’m struggling to figure out how you commit “fraud” in a marriage both ways. Originally when Pamela Anderson filed for annulment after two months of marriage to Rick Salomon,
she cited the reason as “fraud.” Now, he’s countering with his own claims for fraud. Surely, he knew those weren’t real. But how else do you commit fraud in your marriage. False claims to … what?

US reports that Ryan Phillippe was on the radio with Howard Stern and denies that he ever hooked up with Britney Spears last year. He also denied getting together with the other starlets he was rumored to be with, such as Ashlee Simpson, Jennifer Love Hewitt, or Angelina Jolie. Yet, he thinks Lindsay Lohan “wanted” him. Well, she wanted a lot of things last year, so I wouldn’t be bragging about that. However, he thinks his ex, Reese Witherspoon, is happy with her new flame, Jake Gyllenhaal, and he sees him as a “good dude.” I’m sure Jake is relieved.

Apparently there are already words being exchanged within this season’s Dancing With the Stars cast. Penn Jillette joked after the Tuesday night performances, saying he was done being the happy one, after seeing the performance of Broadway star Marissa Jaret Winokur, and later he told Access Hollywood that skater Kristi Yamaguchi is a cheater, as he thinks she’s been dancing for thirty years professionally, albeit on ice. She responded that she thought he was saying this all in fun, and her professional partner Mark Ballas confirmed that. Reportedly Penn apologized right after the comment, but the thought of huge Penn going against tiny Kristi really tickles me.

The National Enquirer, if you choose to believe such a source, is reporting that Winona Ryder was shoplifting again. Reportedly, she went into the local CVS and when leaving, there was some makeup that wasn’t paid for, mixed in with the merchandise that had been paid for. It could have been an honest mistake, but if you’d already been in that much trouble, wouldn’t you be more careful? I’m just sayin’ …

Slow day on gossip here. Maybe everyone is taking time off from being bad for Easter holiday. It’s done, and so am I.

Photos Courtesy of exposay.com and abc.go.com.

It’s a lovely first day of spring out there. Believe it or not, that was just a few hours ago, not a few months. I’m beginning to think we’re entering the new Ice Age or something. Can you just imagine the poor little robins outside checking their calendars? I’m trying really hard to ignore the blizzard outside, so let’s dish a little.

Oprah Winfrey’s production company has been slapped with a lawsuit. A woman alleges that back in December of 2006, the audience members were told to sit wherever they wanted, causing a press for the better seats. With “severe and permanent injuries,” this woman is suing for $50,000 because of a failure to control the audience. I wish she would have mentioned in the lawsuit who the guest was that day. I’m trying to figure out the reason for the mad dash for seats. It can’t be because Dr. Phil was the guest.

Apparently the Beach Boys were feuding with each other recently, or ex-Beach Boys at least. Mike Love was suing Al Jardine over the use of the name of the band. Love has exclusive use of the name, while Jardine was denied use because he refused to abide by the terms. As Jardine used a form of the name anyway, Love was suing him for court costs and the money he collected from using the name. The suit was settled after a two-day conference in Superior Court, but the terms are unpublished. This all makes me wonder which group I’ll be hearing when I see them in concert next weekend. I’m sure hoping it’s the “real” one.

Just in case there weren’t enough people sticking their noses in Britney Spears business, 93-year-old fitness guru Jack LaLanne is telling her she needs to shape up. He would like here to “develop pride and discipline in herself.” He wants her to forget the suckers (the candy kind, not her exes) and eater better “fuel” for her “machine.” He likens her problems to the rest of the country and doesn’t appreciate that physical fitness takes such a low priority. Jamie Lee Curtis should be her mentor, as she’s appearing topless on the cover of AARP next to show how good healthy living at 50 can be.

If Britney isn’t more careful, she’ll one day have her children writing tell-alls about what they’ve gone through because of her. Steve-O of Jackass fame, currently hospitalized on a psychiatric hold, has been writing on MySpace about the things he experienced because of his mother’s alcoholism. He reports he’d be given alcohol before a flight so that he wouldn’t embarrass her, and also recalls her lying about having lymph node cancer to excuse the fact she was doing nothing but staying in bed drunk. Steve-O can’t believe after witnessing all that that he got into heavy drug use himself, even inhaling nitrous oxide, leaving him with brain damage. Britney, he should not not be your mentor.

The snow appears to be done for now, and so am I.

Photos Courtesy of myself and people.com.

This second week of Beatles seems to have hurt the wrong people. Throwing this at them at the last minute, forcing the Idols to choose yet another song from the same genre after they’d already done the one they felt the best for them, or their favorite, or their huge risk just didn’t pay off and placed one of the best singers in the competition in the bottom three.

Don’t get me wrong, as much as I loved Amanda Overmyer, and despite the fact she wasn’t one of my favorites, I knew she wouldn’t win, but I figured she’d be in the top 10 at least, and figured she’d at least make it to eighth place. For this rocker chick, two Beatles nights exposed her as just that. How does a rocker chick take Beatles and do two different weeks? Of course she was going to sound the same. And let’s be honest here. As much as we’re saying she always sounds the same, had she sung something like Here Comes the Sun or Blackbird, she would have been slammed for choosing the wrong song for herself.

Kristy Lee Cook was helped out simply by the fact she had nowhere to go but up with this genre. She had chosen so incredibly wrong the first week, and amazingly stayed, so to have another week with this genre, it was only going to help her. She simply couldn’t do any worse than she already had. She didn’t mess too much with the song, and even though she was off-key through some of it, it sounded better than the country bumpkin thing. Read more »

It really doesn’t need to be said any more at this point, that the Beatles were pioneers in their time. They were geniuses in rock, and managed to stay on top for several years, changing their sound here and there with the times. That said, they’ve never been my favorite music to listen to, as I’ll hear a few Beatles songs here and there and think, okay, I’m good. So twenty-three of their songs in the past two weeks are more than enough for me. The first twelve were plenty. And since American Idol switched to this second week of Beatles at the last moment, no one seemed to have as much time to prepare, and everyone had already sung their favorite, or what they felt would help them the most, or had taken a huge risk already with this music. So to choose another, it seemed to throw off the whole balance of the show.

Even Brooke White said as much in her comments to the judges. She came out and sang Here Comes the Sun, which was way too fluffy of a song after listening to her put everything she had into Let It Be last week. She seemed uncomfortable with it, trying to throw in some dancing to lighten it up, which only looked ridiculous! She ended up telling the judges she knew she couldn’t match the magic of Let It Be and even asked if she could repeat it, but was denied. She’d already reached her pinnacle with Beatles music, so she was never going to be able to beat that. Brooke would have been screwed no matter what she sang, sickeningly sweet performance or not.

David Artchuleta had actually done Beatles to perfection a few weeks ago as well, and knew he was never going to top Imagine. I don’t know if anyone this season will top that. Then last week, trying to move away from that, he did terrible, forgetting his lyrics. He could only go up from that, but knew he’d never top Imagine. He sang Long and Winding Road, and it was the perfect thing for the long drawn out ballads he seems to prefer, but he still needs to figure out how to master the up tempo songs and not screw up the words. Read more »

A glass window pane proved to be Ola Brunkert’s Waterloo on Monday. While his name isn’t immediately recognizable to us, his music is. Brunkert was the former drummer for the Swedish group ABBA.

The 61-year-old Brunkert once belonged to the groups Slim’s Blues Gang and Science Poption in the 60s. He joined ABBA just before the 1972 single broke, People Need Love, and he is one of only two musicians to have performed on all the group’s albums.

Ola was found dead in his home in Mallorca, having bled to death. Found near him was a shattered window glass pane, although the Civil Guard police have said an autopsy will be conducted.

From ABBA’s hit Waterloo

Waterloo - Couldn’t escape if I wanted to

Waterloo - Knowing my fate is to be with you

Waterloo - Finally facing my Waterloo

Photo Courtesy of dailymail.co.uk.

Alright, so it’s been a few days since I updated the gossip here. I was just sitting around feeling sorry for myself, wishing for some caffeine. Since the Great Caffeine Fairy didn’t show up, I decided it was just time to get my ass in gear anyway, still sans caffeine. So let’s get back into it, and dish a little.

Do you think it would be possible just to let Anna Nicole Smith and her son, Daniel, rest in peace? It’s a year since she was found dead and a year and a half since he was found dead, yet, after fighting and fighting and fighting over her daughter and with whom she and her inherited fortune should reside, we’re now back to trying to figure out how Daniel died. Ex-boyfriend to Anna, Larry Birkhead, told a jury he knows she once gave Daniel an Ecstasy pill, despite having concerns about his drinking and drugs and consequent weight loss. It’s time for everyone to realize nothing that has anything to do with Anna, her boyfriends, old husbands, or children are ever going to make sense. Leave them all alone, and let’s move on.

Moving on with less money than she wanted is Heather Mills. While the divorce settlement of $48.6 million seems like an amount that would set us all up with easy living for the rest of our lives, it’s not even close to what she wanted. She wanted $250 million of McCartney’s total wealth of $800 million, so not quite a third. The judge in the case felt the amount she was asking for was “unreasonable” and “exorbitant.” He also referred to her as “less than candid.” After this ruling, Mills sought to keep the resolution blocked from publication, as she thought it would potentially harm her 4-year-old daughter. Was she afraid Beatrice would find her mum to be a golddigger? Read more »

Since these people are all in the public eye, we knew how a couple of them were doing, but we wanted to know the whole story of all of them, how they were doing six months after completing Celebrity Rehab. Dr. Drew called it. There was something about this show that allowed us to see what an addict really goes through in rehab, and it put a face on not only the disease, but celebrity addicts as well. And we needed to know how they were doing and if they made it or not.

All of the celebrities came together on the stage, save for Jessica Sierra and Daniel Baldwin. We know where Jessica is, but what’s with Baldwin? It was really odd, as Dr. Drew didn’t really address the absence. Well, he did, but not to stay why he wasn’t there. But the really interesting thing is while he was saying they all send their love to him, the other celebrities were countering that saying no. He let them down. And the best was them comparing him to the molesting uncle. Dr. Drew didn’t seem to appreciate it, saying they needed to remember how good Daniel was before he left, and remember he was an addict just like them, but it didn’t matter. He let them down, and that’s all they could see.

As for Jessica, we knew she was arrested for intoxication and assault and that she was pregnant, but we didn’t know what went wrong in between sober living and the arrest for her to end up back in this place. She was called back to Florida for a previous arrest, and Dr. Drew fought for her not to have to go back, knowing how detrimental that would be for her sobriety. His efforts were all for naught, as she was sent back anyway, and while there, became hooked in again by old friends, going out that night. Dr. Drew flew to FL to fight again for her, as she could have been sentenced to ten years in jail, and he felt that would be the end of Jessica. With his urging, she was sentenced to one year back at the Pasadena Recovery Center. Read more »