• The LAPD has arrested four women in connection with break-ins at Lindsay Lohan and Audrina Patridge's homes.

One of the women, 19-year-old Rachel J. Lee, may also be involved in last year's jewelry heist at Paris Hilton's house, and her team may have also targeted Orlando Bloom. Teen cat burglars? I smell a screenplay! [People, TMZ, TMZ]

• Meanwhile, Lindsay says it's okay for her 15-year-old sister to party because "She's tougher than I am." And: "She has a good head on her shoulders. Maybe it was different for me because I didn't know what to expect and it just happened really fast. I didn't have a big sister." [E!]
• A club that had banned Lindsay Lohan has allowed her back in. [Page Six]
• Word is Rosie O'Donnell's marriage is over for good and Kelli Carpenter actually moved out months ago. [Radar Online]
• Someone dared David Cross to snort coke at the White House Correspondents' Dinner (which was not held in the White House) so he did. "Maybe 40 feet from the president of the United States!" [Newser]
• The United States has officially asked Switzerland to hand over Roman Polanski to authorities in California. [AP]
• Katherine Jackson has changed lawyers in the Michael Jackson estate case. [USA Today]
• Kenny Ortega, the choreographer working with Michael Jackson on the This Is It tour, says he wanted MJ healthy: "Michael had sleepless nights and we had to look after him. [I'd say to him], 'Stay hydrated, have a protein shake - Did you eat today before you came?'" But Ortega doesn't believe rehearsals were wearing MJ down: "Working on this show was invigorating, was nourishing." [AP]
• Alex Rodriguez dabbled in Kabbalah when he was dating Madonna and now he's getting into Buddhism, thanks to Kate Hudson. [Gatecrasher]
• A source close to Balloon Mom Mayumi Heene says she is "totally subservient to Richard and the boys. Whatever they want, they get" And that Mayumi will "go down with the ship." [NY Daily News]
• A pharmacist testified in the Anna Nicole Smith case, saying that when he received a request for drugs from her doctor, he said: "This is crazy. This is pharmaceutical suicide. The dosages are way out of whack." And: "I said I wouldn't fill it, and no pharmacy in California would." [NY Daily News]
• Awesome: Jay-Z and Will Smith are backing Fela!. [NY Post]
• Matt Damon is dealing with a "serious" family emergency. Stay tuned. [E!]
• Denis Leary and his wife Ann have a house in the country with three dogs and two horses; they're profiled in the Times today and also, Ann blogs about their picturesque rural life. [NY Times]
• Pamela Anderson is living in a trailer because construction on her house in Malibu is not going as planned. She says: "I am $3million over budget and I should have moved in over a year ago. I'm tiling the whole pool in platinum - that's expensive!" She also claims: "I'm going to sell [the house]. I hate it. People commit suicide over constructions. Relationships break down over constructions and I can see why. It rips your heart out." [Daily Mail]
• Oliver Stone is using "his uptown friends" as extras in Wall Street 2. Authentic! [Page Six]
• At the link, the amazing Mira Nair — who directed Mississippi Masala, Monsoon Wedding, The Namesake and Reese Witherspoon's VanityFair, talks about her latest, Amelia: "So much about Amelia [Earhart] is so undeniably modern. If she were to walk into a room today in her jodhpurs and her aviation jackets, [with] her ideas about marriage or men and women, she would still be considered an iconoclast." [NPR]
• Is there a backlash against Precious? And is Oprah to blame? [LA Times]
• Vanessa Redgrave is doing a one-night-only performance of The Year Of Magical Thinking — which is based loosely on the Joan Didion memoir and about dealing with unexpected death — mere months after Redgrave's daughter Natasha Richardson died. [WSJ]
• In this video, Tom Green and Tony Hawk have lunch and Tom talks shit about his ex-wife, Drew Barrymore: He has opinions about her photoshoot with Ellen Page and her behavior during their marriage. [Shred Or Die]
• "Magic Johnson blames former friend Isiah Thomas for spreading rumors that Johnson was gay after he announced he had HIV in 1991." [Newser]
• Bronson Pinchot made some… intense statements about Tom Cruise's homophobia and Denzel Washington's unpleasant character, and at the link, he clarifies. [WSJ]
• Earlier this year, Spike Lee slammed Tyler Perry's sitcoms, saying, "I think there's a lot of stuff out today that is coonery and buffoonery. I'm scratching my head. We've got a black president. Are we going back?" Now Perry say: "You know, that pisses me off. It really does. Because it's so insulting. It's attitudes like that that make Hollywood think that these people do not exist and that's why there's no material speaking to them. I would love to read that to my fan base." [CBS News]
• RIP Soupy Sales. [Reuters, CNN]
• "If you took the top five of my CDs and just put 'em away and then you have children, 10 years later, you break these out and put 'em on… you'll be laughing. And your kids will be laughing. ou put The Cosby Show on - there won't be any cellphones and people might be wearing funny sweaters - but that same human behavior will still connect with people." — Bill Cosby, who will received the Mark Twain Prize for American Humor on Monday, and believes good comedy has no shelf life. He also says he doesn't watch TV anymore: "I'm not thrilled with the deliberate onslaught of the public by the major networks in terms of the sitcoms. They still don't get it about race. They still don't get it about gender. Jokes are still about jerks and body parts and sex." [USA Today]
• "I think women really responded to that initially." — Patricia Arquette, on what this column calls her "more womanly, post-childbirth frame" on Medium. She also says: "They'll bring me new outfits, and I'm like, 'No, I need to repeat those pajamas again. And again.'" And! "I'm not one for spending a lot of money on this show, but these people need a new comforter!" [Variety]
• "I cook OK — I cook every night, so every night is not great. I am really not that adept a cook as [Julia Child] was, especially with that rapid-fire knife. If I did that in my kitchen everybody would run because there would be a lot of blood probably." — Meryl Streep. [Mirror]
• "It depends on the kid.  There are parts of it that are pretty intense. When I was 7 years old, I could not have seen this movie.  It would've scared me.  But my younger brother, who's now 7, could've seen this a year ago.  It depends on the kid." — Max Records, who plays Max in Where The Wild Things Are, on whether the film is too scary for young children. [LA Times]
• "Motherfucker took me out of the ghetto. That's my dude, man. He's been like a dad to me. I remember when I was on Saturday Night Live my first year and I wasn't getting much. I was down; I was ready to quit. It was three o'clock in the morning, man, I'll never forget. Makes me want to cry sometimes when I think about it. I love that man. I love that man. [long pause; starts to cry] I'm sorry, man. Excuse me. [another long pause] Son of a bitch… motherfucker's good. I remember one time Lorne took me to his office, and he said, 'Tracy, you are here not because you're black. You're here because you're fucking funny, man.' [bursts into tears again; wipes face with shirt] Changed my whole perspective.... They say every Jewish man is supposed to love one black motherfucker in this life. I'm glad Lorne Michaels chose me." — Tracy Morgan hearts Lorne Michaels. [Playboy via NY Mgaazine]

• Jennifer Lopez "threw a fit" when guests were late to her 40th birthday bash:

"An Evening With Lola" was supposed to be perfect — Lola is Marc Anthony's nickname for Lopez, and she entered the party to the song "Whatever Lola Wants." Bu there were empty seats when the dinner started and Jennifer was "fuming." [Gatecrasher]

• Rihanna and Chris Brown: In the same NYC hotel for about two days. "It was just a coincidence" and they never saw each other. [NY Post]
• Jon Gosselin: "I care about Kate Major, she resigned from her job for me. Right now, my focus is on my relationship with my kids. My personal relationship is private." [E!]
• But! Jon says: "At this point ... I'm single – per se. I'm just a regular guy who just wants to have friendship and good times. And I like meeting people." Uh, what? What about Hailey Glassman? "She's always a good friend of mine. Her family is so good. They took me in and I lived there for a while. I love them to death." Okay, so are you together? "We are going to chill out for a while and see where it takes us. I'm not looking for anyone." And what about Kate 2.0? We are just friends." [People]
• Jon shopped Madison Avenue and spent $950 on one pair of shoes. [Page Six]
• Kate Hudson! Alex Rodriguez! Kissing! At Yankee Stadium! [NY Daily News]
• Were Robert Pattinson and Kristen Stewart forced to be apart at Comic-Con, since the focus was supposed to be on Kristen and Taylor Lautner instead? [E!]
• It's official: Nadya Suleman has signed a reality show deal and each of her 14 kids will earn $250 a day. Taping begins September 1. [Us Magazine]
• Kate Moss has signed up to be a judge on Simon Cowell's new battle of the bands show, which attempts to discover an unsigned group. [Mirror]
• Carly Simon was a surprise guest (via speakerphone) at Simon Cowell's 50th birthday on Saturday and joked that "You're So Vain" was about him. [The Sun]
• Simon Cowell and Paula Abdul are still trying to wring more money out of American Idol. [LA Times]
• David Beckham had yet another confrontation with a fan during a Los Angeles Galaxy match; this time some dude allegedly dissed Victoria. "What he was saying about my wife was a disgrace," Bekcham says. [BBC News]
• Because he doesn't have more pressing things to worry about, Amy Winehouse's father Mitch has recorded an album with some Frank Sinatra covers and his own songs. [The Sun]
• Now that they're divorced, Blake Fielder-Civil is talking about the time Amy almost died in his arms from a drug overdose. [Daily Mail]
• LeAnn Rimes and husband Dean Sheremet are separated. This news comes right after last week's Midweek Madness revelation that LeAnn and Eddie Cibrian are still having an affair. Eddie's wife says she and her husband are "taking some time apart." So make of it what you will. [Us Magazine]
• Dean's Twitter reads: "Thanks to everyone for all the support through a very difficult time!" [People]
• If you want to read some "what went wrong?" speculation about LeAnn and Dean's relationship, go ahead. [People]
• Robert Plant was in a car crash but he's okay. [Telegraph
• Orlando Bloom has decided not to appear in the next Pirates of the Caribbean film; because everything "tied up nicely for his character Will Turner." [Daily Mail]
• Farrah Fawcett left her estate — a couple of million dollars — to her son, Redmond, but nothing to her "long-term lover" Ryan O'Neal. [Daily Mail]
• PETA hearts Hayden Panettiere. [Page Six]
• BREAKING: Adrian Grenier buys drinks for ladies. [Page Six]
• Candy Spelling is communicating with Tori Spelling via TMZ now. [TMZ]
• Leslie Mann says being married to Judd Apatow has its perks: "I haven't had to audition in a while. I'm the worst auditioner ever. And no, I didn't have to audition for [Funny People]." [USA Today]
• Michael Jackson's "secret Norwegian love child" claims his mom was employed at Neverland as a nanny; while his dad was a driver. Sing: The kid is not my son. [Daily Mail]
• "Michael Jackson's strenuous rehearsal schedule was causing him to lose 5-6 pounds a day, according to his nurse Cherilyn Lee." [MSNBC]
• Ugh: Seems like Dr. Conrad Murray gave Michael Jackson Propofol, left the room, and when he returned, Michael was dead. He did CPR, but it didn't work. Paramedics wanted to pronounce MJ dead at the house but Dr. Murray wanted him taken to the hospital, where even after doctors gave up, Dr. Murray continued CPR. Strange behavior for a doc. And if all this is true then OK! had a picture of a dead body on its cover. [TMZ, TMZ]
• Dr. Tohme Tohme has revealed that he has turned over "secret" money given to him by Michael Jackson for the purchase of a home in Las Vegas. [Mirror]
• Peter Jackson says he's about 3 or 4 weeks away from turning in a draft of a script for The Hobbit. [LA Times]
• Something about Katherine Heigl and her costar's penis, in that romcom that came in well below the guinea pig movie at the box office this weekend. [E!]
• True Blood season 3 teases at the link. [EW]
• Plus! True Blood video: Anna Paquin, Alexander Skarsgård, and Stephen Moyer speaking in their real accents. [EW]
• For next year, Lost is bringing back characters from season one. "Just trust us," executive producer Carlton Cuse asks. [Reuters]
• Meet the new Real Housewife Of Atlanta: Kandi Burruss. [CNN]
• Protect your ears: Carrie Prejean sings. [TMZ]
• Javier Bardem turned down the role in Oliver Stone's Wall Street sequel, and now Josh Brolin is being offered the part. [Deadline Hollywood]
• "Is John Travolta cracking up? It's not just grief - and guilt - over his dead son that are tearing the actor apart." [Daily Mail]
• Boy George was blocked from becoming a Hare Krishna because of his homosexuality… in the late '80s. [Daily Express]
• It's too early for a Joe Francis video about bribing and girls. [TMZ]
• "Rachel Hunter is leaving Los Angeles and returning home to New Zealand to get over being dumped just weeks before her wedding," [Daily Express]
• Billy Bob Thornton's estranged daughter: Free on bail. [UPI]
• An arrest has been made in connection to the death of American Idol contestant Alexis Cohen. [TMZ]
• Katie "Jordan" Price didn't get a role as a "naturally sexy" large-breasted Irish nanny in the Sex And The City movie sequel. [The Sun]
• Retro gossip: Bob Dylan wanted to make sure he got paid when he did a screen test for Andy Warhol. [Page Six]
• HBO scored highest among 15 networks for its representation of gay characters last season, according to a report released today. [AP]
• "I've hugged those breasts. There aren't many people who can say that." — Allison Janney on Dolly Parton. [Page Six]
• "It feels really good to be able to buy a place by myself. It is time for me to move. I have lived in a condo and it's just time. I've always wanted to buy a big house myself and it is so gratifying to be able to." — Kim Kardashian. [People]
• "Surgery was a success, now I just have to let it heal. I am totally jazzed that they found the problem, fixed it and in about four months my hand will feel like I am 18 again." — Eddie Van Halen. [UPI]
• "I didn't want to act. It wasn't like I was waiting in the wings, like All About Eve. It was a refuge, and I found to my surprise that I liked these people." — Hugh Dancy. [NY Times]
• "Years ago one of my mentors, Orson Welles, told me, 'A career is made not by what you do but by what you don't do.' But so much about these past few years has been about saying yes, and it's really paid off." — Cybill Shepherd, who will play a former witch on the new ABC series Eastwick, based on The Witches Of Eastwick. [NY Times]
• "I always look at a script and say, 'Can I do my thing? Can I pop?' If it's a small part, can I pop, can I make an impact with this part? . . . I don't want to be pegged as something definitive. I want to be chameleon-like." — Kyra Sedgwick. [LA Times]
• "She's so smart we wanted her to find a cure for AIDS or something. We were pretty firm about her finishing her education but when we saw how talented she was we finally said okay." — Blythe Danner on wanting daughter Gwyneth Paltrow to do something other than acting. [Daily Express]
• "I was student council president. I even had my own office. I was a cheerleader, too. I found out about cheerleader camp and heard that there were about six guys and 3,000 girls, so I signed up. It was a precursor for a rock-and-roll career." — what Chris Isaak was like in high school. [WaPo]
• "If we're going to do a Rescue Me movie, and I joked about this a couple of years ago when they brought it up … and I said, 'What if we do a Rescue Me movie, so it's the Rescue Me cast, but they're not firefighters and it's a zombie movie.' And they were like, 'What?' And I was like: 'How cool would that be? It's the Rescue Me cast, but it's a zombie movie.' And they were like, 'No.' And I was like, 'Well, that's the only way I'm doing it.' Like 'Shaun of the Dead, like a funny, real scary zombie movie. … They didn't go for it." — Denis Leary. [UPI]
• "No one in my family watches it. My wife, my mum, my sisters; they've never watched it. I don't think it even occurs to them." — Dominic West, on The Wire. [Telegraph]
• "The No. 1 demographic of high school dropouts are Latino women. I know there are economic factors for why young Latinos are so undereducated, but it also starts with what we place importance on as a culture. We have to empower the next generation to accept education as a way up, and I believe you have to start with the women so they can pass it on to their kids." — America Ferrara, at a commencement speech for Kaplan University. [UPI]
• "I kicked some major butt. It was many, many, hours, days, and months of stunt training and strength training, but it's fun because I had a goal. The goal was the Lycra catsuit." — Scarlett Johansson on preparing for her "unforgiving" Black Widow costume. [People]

• Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie have been checking out a gorgeous building on the Upper West Side of Manhattan. Will they move the brood to New York? [Rush & Molloy]

• Madonna and Guy Ritchie have been spending time together, and Jesus Luz is unhappy. [Daily Mail]
• GLAAD president Jarrett Barrios says of a scene in Brüno showing an infant and two naked men involved in a sex act "doesn't help America understand the hundreds of thousands of gay families who get up every day, do the carpool then rush home to make dinner and be with their children." [USA Today]
• Another lawsuit for Brüno: A woman who got into a physical altercation with Sacha Baron Cohen at a bingo game (in a scene that didn't make the film) first sued for getting injured; now she is suing for "emotional distress." [E!]
• Please take a moment to read this interview between Daniel Radcliffe and an 11-year-old reporter. It is so very intensely awesome. [NY Mag]
• By the by, Daniel Radcliffe is worth £30 million; Emma Watson is worth £12 million; and Rupert Grint is worth £7 million. Buys a lot of treats in Diagon Alley! [Mirror]
• Emma Watson on former Harry Potter costar Robert Pattinson: "We're just friends." [Gatecrasher]
• Oh, and Robert Pattinson's ex-girlfriend is spilling that the sparkle vamp was "always amazing in bed." [ONTD]
• Wha?? Jon Gosselin and new girlfriend Hailey Glassman are in St. Tropez? And Shes the daughter of the doctor who did his wife's tummy tuck? And they've been hanging out on on fashion designer Christian Audigier's yacht?!?! [NY Daily News]
• Members of Parliament have received an apology from Mia Farrow after a "rogue fan" spent weeks flooding their fax machines with human rights and save Darfur information from Farrow's website. [Guardian]
• Gwyneth Paltrow hearts Spain! She and husband Chris Martin may build a home there, and there's now a Spanish version of Goop. [Daily Mail]
• Victoria Beckham wants a Sex And The City sequel cameo? Party like it's 1999! [NY Daily News, Elle UK]
• Aw: Step Up's Channing Tatum and Jenna Dewan got married in Mailbu on Saturday! No doubt that the dancing at the reception was intense. [UPI]
• "At 38 (she turns 39 in September), [Padma] Lakshmi has a beauty that is not, perhaps, as bewitching as reports would have had me believe…" [Times of London]
• Ryan Reynolds is the first choice to play Green Lantern, beating out Bradley Cooper, Jared Leto and Justin Timberlake. [The Hollywood Reporter]
• Michael Jackson-related magazines are flying off the newsstands; experts are calling it the biggest newsstand push since the election. [Folio]
• A&E had commissioned a one-hour special, The Jackson Family, which followed Jackie, Tito, Jermaine, Marlon and Randy. They finished shooting before Michael died, and the question is: Now what? [Reuters]
• The LAPD and the coroner are both targeting Dr. Conrad Murray, finding evidence linking him to the drug that may have killed Michael Jackson. [TMZ]
• La Toya Jackson believes Michael was murdered. [NY Post]
• This report claims that Katherine Jackson will have custody of Michael Jackson's kids; Debbie Rowe will have regular access and Joe Jackson will be kept away from them. [Mirror]
• "Debbie Rowe frequently injected Michael Jackson with drugs while she worked for Jackson's dermatologist, Dr. Arnold Klein." [TMZ]
• More pill/drug allegations. [TMZ, TMZ, The Daily Beast]
• Here's a claim that Joe Jackson wants to take Michael's kids on a world tour as the Jackson 3. [The Sun]
• Debbie Rowe will attend a custody hearing on July 20. [UPI]
• Michael Jackson's former nanny Grace Rwaramba was obsessed with Michael Jackson in high school, with references to him in hew yearbook. [TMZ]
• "Michael Jackson had a way of picking doctors who became such close friends with him that the doctor-patient distinction became blurred." [TMZ]
• "Jackson Targeted Dentists to Fuel Addiction." [TMZ]
• Some guy named Jack Wishna, who was orchestrating a deal with Michael Jackson to set up a Las Vegas residency, says that MJ was "thin and weak" and could not have put on shows. Wishna also says MJ "never never, never" wanted to go back to Neverland. "My thought is if someone buries him in Neverland he will come up out of the ground like in Thriller and strangle them," Wishna says. [E!]
• At the link, Zooey Deschanel and Joseph Gordon-Levitt discuss love, relationships and their new flick, 500 Days Of Summer, which is getting great buzz. [USA Today]
• Is Amy Winehouse finally growing tired of St. Lucia? How can you get weary of living in paradise? Should we fly there and conduct an experiment? [Daily Express]
• Oh: Amy Winehouse arrived in London from St. Lucia and promptly burst into tears. [Daily Mail]
• CNN: You were involved in the season finale of [the NBC program] 30 Rock. Are you a fan?
  Moby: Yeah. I got a call asking if I wanted to be a part of the season finale. And I didn't have to think. ... If they had said, "Would you like to come and clean the toilets on set?" I would've said yes. [CNN]
• Barbra Streisand talks global warming and environmental urgency. [Politico]
• Kim Cattrall found out that her grandfather was a bigamist and feels "terribly sad" and can't forgive him. [Daily Mail]
• Bethenny Frankel on The Real Housewives Of New Jersey' s "Lost Footage" episode: "Just really enjoyable and fun to watch!" [E!]
• Michelle Williams from Destiny's Child: Playing Roxie Hart in Chicago in London. [Independent]
• Mad Men's Christina Hendricks has picked a dress for her October wedding: "I'm wearing Carolina Herrera. It was the first dress I tried on and it was magnificent." But don't expect the nuptials to be Mad Men-filled — t will be mostly friends and family. [People]
• Remember Anna Chlumsky from My Girl? After dabbling in politics, writing and editing, she's back to acting. [WWD]
• More drama for Whatshername and Whatshis name. [The Sun]
• Al Pacino, Susan Sarandon and John Goodman will star in HBO Films' biopic about Dr. Jack Kevorkian. [The Hollywood Reporter]
• Blind item! "Which lazy actor hired someone to do his college homework? Learning apparently does not do a body good." [Gatecrasher]
• "She's been public as well about her extensive plastic surgery-her breast implants, her Botox injections, and her liposuction-and wears wigs so luxurious they are more landscaped than styled. Her own past drug addiction has been some of the richest fodder for her books and radio show." — from a profile on Wendy Williams. [The Daily Beast]
• In this charming interview, Paul Giamatti describes what people's souls would look like: "I'd like to try Willie Nelson's soul for a day. It would be like an ear of roasted corn. And I go to Dolly Parton, for some reason-her soul would be light and airy, like a hummingbird. Yes, I like the idea of having a country singer's soul. But not Merle Haggard's-it'd be an engine block. Powerful, but kind of rusty, with lots of buildup." His own soul? "I'm seeing a hand-painted ceramic toad." [The New Yorker]
• "Everyone says, 'Oh, it's fake, it's fake. But I can tell you from personal experience that it's not. Some of the things, maybe they will produce it a certain way or whatever, but what actually goes down with all the people that I film with is real." — Brody Jenner's girlfriend, Jayde Nicole, on The Hills [E!]
• "When I got my breast cancer diagnosis [in 2004] and realized that my body was out of balance, I started to look at what it needed to be in balance: good food, whole food. I started looking at the environment around me - and I realized we need similar ingredients to make our earth bodies run. We have neglected what it takes to make the earth run. When I got involved in Al Gore's An Inconvenient Truth, I really began to educate myself. I realized I couldn't keep walking down the path of, 'I can put anything I want into my stomach, and I'm going to live forever.' That's not going to work, nor will it for the Earth." — Melissa Etheridge. [Politico]
• "The reason I joined [Twitter] is because Rob Thomas found my wife on Twitter and they started talking. I didn't really appreciate that so much. So I called Rob. I was like, 'Dude, I hear you're tweeting my wife. So now I'm joining just so I can monitor your conversations.' It was all in good fun." — Chris Daughtry. [newsweek]
• I'm thinking Season 6: "Rescue Me 3-D." Why not? What show is going to be better for 3-D? A show where you're running through a fire, you're up on a giant ladder, you're racing through a fire… You get the regular viewers plus people who are going, 'What? 3-D fires?' You feel like your own living room is on fire! I don't know if that's a good way to sell it." — Denis Leary. [LA Times]
• "It's unprofessional in my eyes. In every soccer player's eyes throughout the world it would be unprofessional to speak out about a teammate especially in the press and not to your face. But I'm going to turn it on a positive spin because that's what this needs. But in 17 years, I have played with the biggest teams in the world and the biggest players and not once have I been criticized for my professionalism. It's important to get this cleared up and I will be speaking to Landon either this evening or over the next couple of days." — David Beckham, who is miffed that his L.A. Galaxy teammate Landon Donovan who called him a bad captain and portrayed him as stingy in upcoming book The Beckham Experiment, written by Grant Wahl. [AP]
• "I trim, but I don't shave. I think it could get pretty gruesome after a while - I mean, my beard is pretty nasty. I happen to be one of those men - uh, I like to bring it in a little closer to the body." — Kelsey Grammer, on manscaping. [NY Mag]
• "Confessions of a Shopaholic was fun, but it was bloody hard work. In Adam, the script was solid; Confessions literally changed day by day, line by line. It was a Disney–Jerry Bruckheimer film, and there were a lot of cooks, which became incredibly frustrating… I had to do detailed and specific work about [my character in Adam] so he didn't end up being a series of quirks. When I initially read that first bit of script, I thought, Jesus, I hope this isn't one of those scripts where it turns out he's just a little off, but he's kind of wonderful and is going to teach us how to be better and more simple people. Because I kind of hate that." — Hugh Dancy, who plays a man with Asperger's in new movie Adam. [NY Mag]
• "I'm high and clean and tight, man. It's good to feel hungry. If you keep filling your tank when it's three-quarters empty, you're gonna run on old fuel. So you gotta drive it down to empty and let it work. I came here to press a little reset and then head back down the road." — Matthew McConaughey, on his 10-day fast. [Times of London]
• "'Was I terrified [of becoming stepmother to three children]? Not at all. Actors are the biggest babies on the planet, and I would rather be in a kindergarten than a room full of actors." — Sandra Bullock. [Daily Mail]

• Being on vacation with Amy Winehouse must be relentlessly entertaining:

She was apparently told she couldn't sunbathe au naturale, so she whipped off her bikini top and streaked through the resort in St. Lucia, waving her arms in the air. She told you she was trouble! [Daily Mail]

• The family of Mercy James, the Malawian child Madonna would like to adopt, are on Madonna's side. Mercy's uncle says the guy who claims to be Mercy's biological dad "didn't care about his girlfriend, Mercy's mother, when she needed him most. He didn't even come to see his baby." [The Sun]
• Madonna was overheard telling people: I can't believe I'm leaving my beautiful baby behind. It's not right. I love that baby girl. She's my little girl - she needs to be with me." A judge disagrees, your Madgesty! [MSNBC]
• Chris Brown was in court yesterday, and he pleaded not guilty to two felony counts. His next court date is a preliminary hearing on April 29. [Rolling Stone]
• Some are "surprised" that Chris Brown pleaded not guilty? Really? [MSNBC Scoop]
• Rihanna was not in court, but her lawyer was, and he said her feelings about the case are that she would be happy if "it were over quickly." [TMZ]
• The latest on Lindsay Lohan and Samantha Ronson, according to LL: "We are taking a brief break so I can focus on myself." But, uh, she banned you from her party and changed the locks, right? [E!]
• Sam Ronson's family is hoping that Sam will not get back together with Lindsay. Ouch! [People]
• Courtney Love is about to sue a whole mess of people: She finally realized that whomever had been handling Kurt Cobain's estate lost millions of dollars. It's not her fault she didn't look into this sooner, she was high, okay? [Page Six]
• Cops in Costa Rica are investigating the security team hired by Tom Brady and Gisele Bundchen since they, you know, open fired on photographers, which doesn't seem very legal. [NY Post]
• Gisele wore Galliano, by the by. [People]
• Howard K. Stern will not cut a deal with the D.A. in the Anna Nicole Smith drug case and is expected to plead not guilty. He'll be in court today. [TMZ]
• Do what you must to prepare yourself: Britney Spears might take her Circus tour to Australia. [E!]
• Of the items being moved out of Gwyneth Paltrow and Chris Martin's London home, the mattress is not surprising; the dinosaur, the large horse and surfboard are. Gwynnie's moving to NYC; Chris is going on tour. [Daily Mail]
• Speaking of Chris Martin, Coldplay is denying that it copied Joe Satriani's music for "Viva La Vida." [Breitbart]
• Oh dear: Scarlett Johansson has reportedly been working out with Gwyneth's trainer, Tracy Anderson. She's already lost 14 pounds and now she's off carbs. Is she prepping for Iron Man 2 or just joining the brigade of stick thin stars? [The Sun]
• Did a reporter set up a fake charity and trick Heather Mills into dishing dirt on Paul McCartney? [ABC News]
• Zac Efron's mom stuffed hi stocking with condoms last Christmas and his dad gave him some speech about protection at some point so maybe the point is you won't see Zac as a young baby daddy any day soon. [E!]
• The woman who was saved from committing suicide by Demi Moore and "the Twitter community" says "I'm eternally grateful to her for helping me." [RadarOnline]
• Why aren't people donating to Prince Harry's African charity? Donations have dropped a whopping 84%. [Telegraph]
• Jennifer Garner will star in Butter, a flick that's a political satire set in the small-town world of competitive butter-sculpting. Yeah. Butter. [The Hollywood Reporter]
• Ru-roh: Pamela Anderson's boyfriend was in a kite-surfing accident in Hawaii. Luckily, he escaped serious injury and didn't need C.J. to run into the water with a red floaty thing. [Daily Express]
• Kylie Minogue took her new man to meet her parents and they found him to be "charming and witty." Good sign. [Daily Express]
• Buddhist and friend of the Dalai Lama Richard Gere attended a "Mind and Life" conference in Dharamsala, India on Monday. [Hindustan Times]
• Dennis Rodman was thrown out of a West Hollywood hotel after "slapping and groping" female guests. He needs to learn how to ask nicely when he wants to borrow a dress. [TMZ]
• The Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation received a gift from the estate of the late Luther Vandross; the amount of the gift was not disclosed. [UPI]
• Blind item! "Which Grammy-winning rapper can't get enough weed? She orders from a NYC delivery service non-stop, then tries to sweet-talk the courier into giving her free bags of ganja." [Gatecrasher]
• "He's certainly not the buffoon he looks like. This is the most amazing thing I found out about him. I was once staying at a hotel, and I was in the room directly under his. He is an amazing fuck — and you can quote me on this. The screams coming from the woman were some of the purest sounds of pleasure I'd ever heard." — Rupert Everett on Vanity Fair editor Graydon Carter. [Page Six via The Daily Beast]
• "Casey grew up in one of the richest families in New York, and she grew up without any responsibilities or any boundaries. And so, for her, it was very important to do something where there were laws and where your morals counted. I was very much into the idea of doing something I hadn't done before. This is a show about cops. Our show is very grounded in the sense of the crappy things that happen to you are funny. That's how you deal with them and get through life." — Amber Tamblyn, on her character in new show The Unusuals. [USA Today]
• "I don't know Ethan Hawke. Ethan Hawke wanted to do some kind of superficial Rolling Stone article. And he did everything he could to make his story the greatest story ever in Rolling Stone. And it was a fictitious (expletive) lie. O.K? He didn't even call me by my name. ... He called Norah Jones, Ray Charles, everybody else by name. Willie (Nelson), Kris (Kristofferson). Why didn't he call my name? Why didn't he say Toby Keith walked through and said this (expletive)? Right? You know why. You know why. You know as good as anybody why. He didn't want to (expletive) deal with the aftermath." — Toby Keith. [Yahoo News via AP]
• "The pilot script showed up, and I stalked [producer Alan Ball] until he said yes. The morning I showed up for work after going blonde, everyone was very relieved." — Anna Paquin on playing Sookie Stackhouse in True Blood. [Vanity Fair]
• "We were on the set, and the two firefighters that work here, I overheard them talking about, 'Yeah, you know, if I'd known I could measure from the pubic bone… And they were talking about a cock-measuring contest.' And I go, 'That's going in the show.'" — Denis Leary on Rescue Me. [The Daily Beast]
• "I'm crying for two and a half hours straight. And then you leave the stage door and people are like, 'Can we take your picture?' And I'm thinking, 'I've never looked worse.' I need a lot of eye cream." — Lauren Ambrose, on her role in the play Exit The King. [WWD]
• "Combs have been on the scene ever since humans had hair on his head. which is quite sometime? The date perhaps goes beyond the time of the old stone age. Man being man and not a lion would
  not be content to let his mane run wild and free. So he had to find some ways to tame it. First on the list of combing operations must have been the use of fingers. So in a way the fingers are the first combs of history. Today, combs are universal and no corner of the globe is without it." — Your friend Kanye West. [Jossip]

• Good Morning, you have new president. His name is Barack Obama. No, he cannot start today. But soon. And he says: "If there is anyone out there who still doubts that America is a place where all things are possible; who still wonders if the dream of our founders is alive in our time; who still questions the power of our democracy… tonight is your answer." [People]
• Oprah on Barack Obama's win: "It's one of the greatest moments I could ever even imagine. That's how great it is." [ET]
• Courteney Cox and David Arquette hosted a Barack Obama victory party at their house in Beverly Hills. Jennifer Aniston, Sacha Baron Cohen and Isla Fisher were in attendance; champagne was had. Meanwhile, in Chicago, Brad Pitt and Oprah Winfrey watched Obama's speech live. Also psyched: George Clooney and Usher. [E!]
• George Clooney: "I congratulate President-elect Obama on his historic victory, and now it's time to begin unifying the country so we can take on the extraordinary challenges that this generation faces." [ET]
• Oprah again: "This is democracy at its finest." [ET]
• In other news, Jennifer Aniston is pregnant with twins. Supposedly. More in Midweek Madness. [Star]

• Britney Spears is on the cover of Australian Cosmopolitan, and they used a photograph tat is five years old. She looks good, though. [TMZ]
• Nikki Blonsky will guest star on Ugly Betty as an assistant from a rival magazine. Will there be an airport-style kerfluffle? [E!]
• Perez Hilton got served! With legal papers: Liz Silver, who runs the Web site PerezRevenge.com, is accusing him of plagiarism and copyright infringement. She had a friend crash his Halloween party and hand him papers. [Page Six]
• Blind items! 1. "Which aggressive TV, stage and movie actor has a shady past? Rumor is he sexually assaulted a girl while in high school and his family had the situation 'swept under the rug.' 2. "Which screen god isn't as happy as he and his paramour would like the world to think? Whenever the couple and their children are in LA, he 'goes to a bar in a Beverly Hills hotel and drinks for hours before going home." 3. "Which oft-photographed socialite/designer is losing her grip on the fashion world? Luxury brands no longer send her clothing and accessories and don't want her in their ad campaigns." [Page Six]
• Holly Madison is "depressed" about calling it quits with Hugh Hefner, but basically, she claims, "I got too old for Hef." Yeah, that's right: She's 28 and too old for the original Playboy. She now sleeps in a guest room. "I still work for him. We're still best friends. I still call and check in on him almost everyday." [Newser via Extra]
• More from Holly: "It might be refreshing to date someone who is not high maintenance. Sorry, Hef, you know you're high maintenance. I love you but you know you're high maintenance." [Perez Hilton]
• The rest of Janet Jackson's tour: Officially canceled. They say scheduling conflicts. Could it also be vertigo? Or crappy ticket sales? [Perez Hilton]
• Amy Winehouse and Pete Doherty are both off of NME's "Cool List" this year. Drugs and jail are bad for your career, kids! [The Sun]
• CNN's Christiane Amanpour may finally get her own show. It's about time! [Page Six]
• A top Hollywood agent — who repped Brad Pitt, Angelina Jolie, Leonardo DiCaprio, Jennifer Aniston and Matthew McConaughey — insulted his clients, stole gifts sent to them, and discussed their private parts, a lawsuit alleges. [Page Six]
• Angelina Jolie explains War and Peace in her household: "We don't take war and violence lightly, but we don't hide it from anybody. Listen, my kids play video games. I let them play with toy soldiers. We say, 'Mommy and Daddy have movies where we play these characters, but there's real death and real violence in the world. There's a real responsibility there to create in their minds the difference between the two." Also, when Mommy visits Afghanistan, she wears a flak jacket. [People]
• Anne Hathaway's new man is an actor named Adam Shulman. He's cute. [Perez Hilton]
• The Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network (GLSEN) is not happy about when Nelson's use of "that's so gay" in a scene with Milhouse on The Simpsons. [TMZ, E!]
• 50 Cent's new TV show, 50 Cent: The Money and the Power, airs tomorrow on MTV. Fourteen "wannabe moguls" compete to earn a $100,000 investment from the rapper by doing challenges like walking through Brooklyn chained together. No, really. There's a clip. [People]
• Christina Aguilera's new TV commercial for Target has a comic-book feel, meaning she wears a red jumpsuit and a cape. At least she seems to know who Roy Lichtenstein is. (There's video of her talking about the spot.) [People]
• Don't tell anyone, but Keanu Reeves is a secret genius. He reads Proust and stuff. Shh! [Newser via Details]
• Cammy Diaz: Seen smoking like a fiend and being rude at Drew Barrymore's Halloween party. [Page Six]
• Charlie Sheen left his pregnant wife at home to go party at get lap dances in Las Vegas because he is Charlie Sheen. [Star]
• Guy Ritchie has hired a top family lawyer to handle his custody battle with Madonna. She's already got a top divorce lawyer. Ever heard the joke about he little girl at the cemetery? She asked, "Mommy, do they ever bury two people in the same grave?" Her mom said, "Of course not, Why would you think that?" And the girl answered: "The tombstone back there said 'Here lies a lawyer and an honest man.'" [Daily Mail]
• Guy Ritchie went out for drinks and now the Brit tabs are calling him "Tipsy Ritchie." [The Sun]
• Tina Fey's Emmys and SNL appearances may be translating into more 30 Rock viewers. She deserves it! [AP]
• Hindu leaders are not amused by Heidi Klum's Kali Halloween costume. [Best Week Ever]
• Katie Holmes and Rebecca Gayheart were friends 16 years ago, way before Katie met Tom Cruise. According to Roger Friedman, after Katie met Tom, "Gayheart, like most of Holmes’s friends, never saw her or heard from her again." But now Gayheart's in a Broadway play right around the corner from All My Sons. Will they reunite? [Fox 411]
• Have mercy: Janice Dickinson was on some afternoon court TV show, being sued by one of her former models. Judge Christina (???) listened to her crazy-ass defense are ruled in her favor. [ONTD]
• Sharon Osbourne on Simon Cowell's break-up: "He deserves it. He's a t****r, that's the truth." Hmm, what's that word there? Tosser? Anyone? [Mirror]
• Simon Cowell gave Terri Seymour $5 million cash and another $4.6 to buy a Beverly Hills home as a parting gift. Simon, break up with me next! [MSNBC]
• Oh, and Simon says: "Don't worry about me - I don't need a lonely hearts ad. I'm off women now." [Mirror]
• Daniel Craig in a Bollywood film? "I am open to offers from India… Till now I haven't been fortunate enough to get hold of an Indian movie. But yes, I will be very honoured and excited to work with an Indian actor or actress on any given chance. I also feel very obliged for the immense popularity which I enjoy in this part of the world." [ONTD]
• Katie "Jordan" Price was named Britain's Best-Loved Celebrity Mum because "she's not perfect." [Mirror]
• Liz Hurley's husband likes it when she dresses like a tart. "Like the vast majority of men, Arun likes short, tight, sexy dresses." Here's the good news: So does Liz. [The Sun]
• Expect to see a lot of Jennifer Hudson headlines like this (this isn't the first one): "Hudson Begged Mother To Move Out Of Neighborhood." [Daily Express]
• Denis Leary is the voice of Ford Trucks. Don't worry, he makes no mention of autism in the commercials. [Business Week]
• Singer Duffy accidentally set her hair on fire in her dressing room in Cleveland. Candles are soothing yet dangerous! [ONTD]
• Matthew Broderick quotes Ferris Bueller in this prObama video. [Newser via HuffPo]
• Carrie Underwood won't tell you who she voted for, so stop asking. [People]
• Cindy McCain "has this evil queen beauty about her," quoth Project Runway's Austin Scarlett, whilst seen voting in New York. [NY Observer]
• Apropos of nothing: "Mariah Carey's Top 10 Maddest Moments." [Mirror]
• Audrina of The Hills moved out but LC was cool with it blahblahblah JustinBobby blahblahblah. [People]
• Corrie Loftin of Paris Hilton's My New BFF was once ins a Girls Gone Wild video. And hanging out with Paris is different… how? [E!]
• "Sporty Spice," Mel C says: "I know there’s been a lot of things written recently saying I’m getting married and they’ve said the date and the church and that Victoria’s organizing it, but, no, we’ve got no plans." Seems she wants to have the baby first. [The Sun]
• Did Ivana Trump's young Italian husband cheat on her with a hot Italian model? "Nothing sexual happened. That I know for sure," she writes in Page Six Magazine. "I'm not going to make any other comment until I speak to him." Good idea! [Page Six]
• Selena Gomez, 16-year-old budding Disney star, was asked if she reads tabloids: "Recently, I have not. I'm actually very, very proud of myself. Honestly, the blog sites and everything — I'd be on them nonstop. I've gone four weeks total without looking at them and I'm very proud and very happy. I was addicted. It was bad." [LA Times]
• Courtenay Semel's dad, former Yahoo CEO Terry Semel, has cut her off. What's a girl to do? A reality show, obvs. [Page Six]
• For the last time: Joe The Plumber did not hook up with any SNL cast member. [Politico]
• Simply Red's Mick Hucknall, yes, that's right, Mick Hucknall, paid £29,000 for a pair of David Beckham's football cleats in 2002 and they seem to have lost about £25,000 in value since then. Surely he's wishing he really could be holding back the years. [Mirror]
• Reading about Bianca Jagger being in an argument over a €200,000 ring she lost in Salzburg earlier this year is like reading about a goblin surfing on Mars: Sounds interesting, but I just can't relate. [Yahoo News]
• Very cool, worth-your-while profile of Diahann Carroll. She says: "Dynasty was rather marvellous, you know. It was all about the clothes. The most important thing about the day was wardrobe, and of course I explained to Aaron [Spelling] I didn't want to be on the show unless I could be bitchy." She also says: "I lost two children [to miscarriage]. That's why when we talk about racism it will always take third, fourth, fifth place to some of the other things that have happened to me that are much more meaningful than being in a room with an idiot who is going to judge the color of my skin." [Guardian]
• "Having a love is a gigantic bonus in life, but I wasn't unhappy when I was single, either. (John)'s just fun, so much fun. I'm very happy now." Bo Derek, who's living with John Corbett, aka Aidan from Sex And The City. [The Sun]
• "I enjoyed being Mayor of Carmel, but you do see that it is very difficult to get things done. You just have to lose your soul. You have to bullshit people. You have to deal with people you don't care for and will never be friends with, so you kind of sell yourself out to be a politician. You have to kiss it up with the world. That ain't my style." — Clint Eastwood. [Daily Express]
• "I'd always fall for guys I wanted to save. For the first time, I fell in love with someone who saved me." — Jessica Simpson on Tony Romo. [People]
• "I would rather be sexy like Simone Signoret or Anna Magnani than like - oy, vey - Paris Hilton" - Erica Jong to More. [Page Six]
• "Barack Obama's treated like the Messiah in England. We don't have particularly inspirational politicians, certainly no one who can draw crowds in the thousands." — Daniel Radcliffe. [Page Six]
• "I think every black kid will tomorrow will be one inch taller when he goes to school. And I think everyone will be energized. And a lot of people who had given up hope in the last seven eight years are hopeful." — Richard Belzer. [Observer]

• Ladies! Get your issue of Entertainment Weekly and hold on to it tightly. Daniel Craig looks mighty fine. [Just Jared]
• Daniel Craig showed up at the London premiere of Quantum of Solace with a black sling. He is still injured! (We've seen him in a sling before.) [Guardian]
• When Courtenay Semel — whose dad used to run Yahoo, who was once Lindsay Lohan's roommate and Tila Tequila's girlfriend — was arrested in Vegas in August, she allegedly said to the security guard who was trying to prevent her from entering a club: "Do you even know who I am, fucking idiot? Google me, you dumb fuck." Then she hit him in the face. [TMZ]
• Lily Allen's PR Machine calls her "the Wordsworth of the MySpace generation." Apparently, her new album, It's Not Me, It's You, contains the following couplet: "Now I lie here in the wet patch in the middle of the bed/I'm feeling pretty damn hard done by, I've spent ages giving head." HAHAHA. [Guardian]

• A gun thought to be the murder weapon in the Jennifer Hudson family tragedy has been found. [TMZ]
• William Balfour, the main suspect in the Hudson murders, has refused a polygraph test. [Yahoo News]
• There was a drug raid at the Hudson house in 2002: Jennifer's brother, Jason, allegedly sold crack to a registered informant. [TMZ]
• Nancy Grace spoke with the mother of William Balfour, the man who is being held in the triple murder of Jennifer Hudson's family. His mom says Jennifer Hudson's brother was selling drugs out of the house and her son was with a girlfriend at the time of the crime. [TMZ via CNN]
• Melissa Etheridge blogged about being gay and truing to adopt kids over at the Daily Beast. "I know my preference of lifemate freaks some people out," she writes. "Maybe it is just their fear of sex or intimacy. I know that they hold up the Bible and say that it's wrong… I will never forget the day earlier this year when the news came down the wire that the Supreme Court of California had declared same sex marriage legal," Etheridge recalls. "We told our children about it and all danced around the room in family glee." [Yahoo News, via E!]
• You guys, this country is going to get less beautiful if Obama doesn't get elected: Seal says he and Heidi Klum will leave the U.S. if McCain wins! Seal told this month's Vanity Fair: "If McCain is elected and America staggers on further towards the abyss, then we will leave the country. That is not a problem for us.” It's a problem for us, dude. [LA Times]
• Did you get invited to Heidi Klum's big Halloween bash? Neither did we. Seal, Debra Messing and Christian Siriano will be there. [Page Six]
• Yesterday, Matilda Ledger turned three. It was her first birthday without her dad. She celebrated at home with mom MIchelle Williams and a small group of family and friends. [News.com.au]
• Angelina Jolie was in Afghanistan last week, meeting with refugees who have returned to their post-Taliban homeland. She says: "After seeing real suffering, you never complain anymore." [People]
• Nicole Kidman keeps crying when she thinks of her baby daughter, Sunday Rose. But! "They are tears of joy." Hey, lady: You do have other kids, you know. [The Sun]
• David and Victoria Beckham: Superheroes? Stan Lee thinks so! "They're great looking, talented and colorful. Now, here's the exciting part, just imagine how cool they'd be in a humorous, good-natured show that depicts them as, you guessed it—superheroes," he says. Would they have capes? Skin-tight outfits? Would Posh be able to render you immobile with a mere glare? [Yahoo News via E!]
• This is hard to imagine, but Victoria Beckham has been training for the New York Marathon in secret. She may not run this weekend if she doesn't feel ready, but she's planning to do the one in L.A. in February. As if wearing all those heels did not punish her feet enough? [Perez Hilton]
• Denis Leary is sorry about his autism remarks, you guys. He says: "I apologize for any pain the out-of-context quotes from my book may have caused." [Daily Express]
• After Julianne Hough admitted that she had endometriosis, Lacey Schwimmer from Dancing With The Stars has announced that she, too has endometriosis. And that she never would have gotten it checked out if it wasn't for Julianne. [ET]
• The Keanu Reeves trial continues! His lawyer caused the paparazzo who filed suit to "buckle under questioning." Sorta wish it was televised. [AP]
• Madonna made an "emotional late-night call" to Guy Ritchie and "pleaded" with him to settle their divorce amicably. And by that she means having a mediation with Kabbalah rabbis instead of going to court. [Daily Mail]
• Here's a "rocky" interview in which Guy Ritchie discusses RocknRolla and, um, a Kabbalah documentary he's working on. Bet that's off! [News.com.au]
• Rosario Dawson wants to clear up the rumors that she is engaged. She's not. "Oh my God, I'd be getting calls from my grandmother being like, 'Mija! How come I had to read this first?'" Grandma's reading trashy gossip! [People]
• Jennifer Lopez is an evil genius: She keeps making crappy pilots, which TV networks don't pick up, but she still gets money for them, because they've signed a contract with her. It's twisted. [Jossip]
• Peaches Geldof made a wasted spectacle of herself at her husband's band's gig and there's "trouble in paradise." No one saw this coming. No one. [Mirror]
• Celine Dion has rescheduled a concert in Minneapolis/St. Paul due to "respiratory illness." Wasn't she just on Oprah? And what do you say to taking chances??? [Star-Tribune]
• Is Celine going to try and get knocked up again? [Daily Express]
• Natalie Cole says: "I feel sturdy and strong," despite undergoing dialysis three times a day week. AMAZING. [People]
• Derek Jeter will not admit that he is dating Minka Kelly, and when asked about A-Rod, replied: "Don't start with me about Kabbalah. I went to Catholic school." Dude, so did Madonna. [People]
• Bruce Springsteen is a party pooper! He's not having his elaborate Halloween decorations this year because his cool set-up attracts too many visitors. Boo. No, really. Boo. [AP]
• Bill Pullman's 19-year-old son was arrested in North Carolina for alleged underage drinking and possession of moonshine. No word on whether he was driving a car with doors welded shut called the General Lee. [UPI]
• Courteney Cox will be in a new ABC half-hour comedy called — uh — Cougar Town. Cox stars as a newly single 40-year-old mom. Lemme guess: She goes on dates, sometimes with younger dudes. [Variety]
• This young lady — Andrew Sachs' granddaughter — claims that Russell Brand was a "disappointment" in bed. [The Sun]
• After resigning from his radio show for saying he'd "fucked" Andrew Sachs' granddaughter, Russell Brand says "I hope to go to America now and make quite a lot of films." What kind of films, hmm? [The Sun]
• Now that the FBI has raided the home of hacker Josh Holly, who hacked Miley Cyrus' e-mail account, Miley is reportedly a "nervous wreck," worrying that more personal pictures and info will be made public, despite the government's involvement. [ONTD]
• Zac Efron talked about his hair with Ellen DeGeneres: "I actually modeled it [after] Ellen season 2," he said. "Smart," Ellen replied. "So you're copying me?" Zac confirmed, "I am in fact." [People]
• Nicolas Cage is selling his "haunted" New Orleans mansion, if you have $3.8 million. You could live near Brad and Angie! [Daily Express]
• Whoa. An apology from The Sun: "On 19 June 2007, we reported that David Hasselhoff had celebrated winning custody of his two daughters by getting drunk and making a nuisance of himself in a Hollywood bar. We now accept that David did not drink any alcohol that evening and nor did he irritate other customers. We apologise to David for any embarrassment caused." [The Sun]
• Janet Jackson tamed down part of her concert for Michigan, where state law prohibits simulated sex acts in a public space. Usually, she pulls a male fan from the crowd, ties him down and "molests" him while her dancers mime various sexual acts, including masturbation. *cough* [Yahoo News]
• Speaking of Jacksons, here are Michael and his kids. They are wearing masks, maybe because it's Halloween, maybe because it's Wednesday night. Who knows. [The Life Files]
• Hey! The Jackson 5 are reuniting! For a tour, which would include Michael and Janet! Let's pretend they're gonna look like this, okay? [NY Times]
• Paris Hilton has parted ways with Jason Moore, who has been her manager for more than 10 years. He was the one who walked away. [Daily Express]
• Josiah Leming, a homeless singer whose mother is dying of cancer, might be blocked from releasing the album he recorded because he was a contestant last season on American Idol. Shit, when you sign a reality show contract, you generally screw yourself, huh? [Page Six]
• Peter Andre is NOT leaving Katie "Jordan" Price, so you can all just relax and get a good night's sleep, okay? [The Sun]
• Ice T's wife Coco says of Halloween: "It's my day! I get to get naked! Finally!!!" Ahem. Pardon? Ice T explains: You know, a lot of people comment, but some chicks like to be wild. You come home and they're standing on the couch and they want to jump at you and tackle you. Coco's one of them girls." [NY Mag]
• Melissa Auf der Maur has an "elaborate new project" coming out: OOOM (Out of Our Minds), a "3-D concept album" that includes a CD, a half-hour film, a comic book and website. Oh! And she has a persona in the project: MAdM. Expect a "conceptual fantasy world, spawned from sound." [ONTD]
• E! has ordered a second season of Denise Richards: It's Complicated. Oh, it's simple: Vom. [AP]
• Corey Haim: Getting married. Think Feldman will attend? [ONTD]
• Beatles songs on the Rock Band video game? Yeah, yeah, yeah. [WSJ]
• The Phil Spector retrial has begun; yesterday the prosector told jurors Spector murdered actress Lana Clarkson in a "petulant fit of rage." [Yahoo News]
• Kato Kaelin might be back, on a reality show called 16th Minute. Bascially, it would feature "stars" whose 15 minutes of fame are up — and give them one extra minute. Do you weep for humanity? [mediabistro]
• "I hadn't eaten all day, and I was starving. They were coming around with this bowl of brownies, and I grabbed three of them and just started scarfing them down. After that, every lyric sounded like it was the Cookie Monster yelling in my ear, and I started feeling really shitty, but I had to play through the set. I couldn't just go up to Puffy and say, 'Sorry, I ate a shit-load of hash brownies, I can't do your White Party.'" — Mark Ronson, on the refreshments at Diddy's soirée. [Page Six]
• "If I get married again, then it will be the last time." — Jessica Simpson. [Page Six]
• "My mom's like 'Honey, don't get married.' It comes from a good place, but I'm such a romantic, I'd like to get married one day. It's fulfilling to live with a person you love." — Alexa Ray Joel, whose Mother, Christie Brinkley, went through a nasty divorce with Peter Cook. [Daily Express]
• "I spent most of the year I was 27 toxic, just completely over-medicated. I was stoked to make it past 27. Everyone was really worried. My management company were panicked, because I was out of the office, and 'pharmaceutically engaged.'" — Pete Wentz. [Daily Express]
• "I got into an argument with him. I don’t believe him as much as he believes him. He said something along the lines of, 'I only shag really stupid women.' And I said, 'I guess they would have to be.' I don’t get him at all." — Pink on John Mayer. [The Sun]
• "I can't stand Sarah Palin. I bet a woman like that has no sense of humor." — Grace Jones. [Yahoo News]

• You've heard it before, you'll hear it again: Madonna and Guy: DIVORCE! They want it over by Christmas, says a source. [The Sun]
• Madonna actually wanted to wait until the end of her tour to announce the split. [Mirror]
• And! The divorce settlement could leave Guy Ritchie pocketing up to £150 million. There was no pre-nup! [Daily Mail]
• Here's a chronological "diary" of the events leading up to the divorce. [Mirror]
• Oh, but Madonna's cast was impressed with her dedication on the set of Filth And Wisdom. Lead actress Holly Weston says: "Everything had to be perfect. I think she was even there before us in the morning." [Daily Express]
• Mothers Against Murder and Aggression (MAMA) are "horrified" that Madonna wore Karl Lagerfeld shoes with gun-shaped heels to her film premiere. [Daily Express]

• Hayden Panettiere's dad has been temporarily ordered not to "harass, strike or threaten" his wife. Temporarily??? [People]
• By the by, Hayden Panettiere wants you to smoke cigarettes and vote for John McCain. [Funny Or Die]
• Blake Lively, Penn Badgley and some other kids are backing Barack Obama in a pretty funny MoveOn video. [StarPulse]
• Speaking of Blake Lively, her father was critically injured in a car wreck late Tuesday night. Blake flew to L.A. yesterday to be by his side: actor Ernie Lively has a broken back, arm and nose. "It was pretty bad — he's lucky to be alive," says a source. [Star]
• Blake's dad is expected to make a full recovery. [Us Magazine]
• What's this? Even John McCain thinks Sarah Palin is gonna be on SNL. [MSNBC]
• Jennifer Aniston and John "The Player" Mayer had dinner Saturday night New York. Is it back on? Are they just friends? [People]
• Jen and John had dinner Sunday night in New York as well. Reunited, and it feels so good! [Page Six]
• Holy crap: Britney's going on tour next spring? It would be her first time since 2004. Well, touring is where the cash is. The lady has kids to feed. [Reuters]
• Christina Aguilera says she's having more kids. Definitely. And: "I'm in love with my life." And: "I think it's important to share what I love – what makes me me – with my son. So. I change diapers and I breastfeed him and I play with him and then I work. I want to show Max everything about me." [People]
• Liz Taylor has become a regular at The Abbey, the hottest gay bar in West Hollywood. A source says: "She talks to everyone and everybody just loves her. She particularly likes watermelon martinis and tequila shots." [Daily Express]
• Between building homes for people displaced by Katrina, dabbling in photography and donating $100,000 to support gay marriage in California, Brad Pitt doesn't seem very interested in Hollywood. [ABC News]
• Holly Madison wanted to have kids with Hugh Hefner, so she did everything she could. Yeah, she slept with him. And! She tried fertility treatments. [Extra]
• Demi Moore will make her directorial debut, and the flick will star her daughter, Rumer. It's a 20-minute short film for Glamour's Reel Moments project. [ONTD]
• Someone actually paid $20,000 to box with Michael Lohan. Well, it is for charity. The dude is Robert Venero, president and CEO of Future Tech Enterprise in Holbrook, Long Island. He also bought 50 seats at $150 each so his friends can watch the fight. It all goes down November 24th at the Hilton Long Island in Melville. The rumble is a bungle! [Perez Hilton]
• DJ AM will appear on tour with Jay-Z tonight at the Hollywood Palladium in a big comeback move. [Perez Hilton]
• Colin Farrell has opened up about his stint in rehab on the BBC's Friday Night With Jonathan Ross: "I began to come out of the haze that I was in and had burrowed myself into so deeply...Basically, I'd been fairly drunk or high since I was 14. I was very drunk and high for 16 years, so it was a tough life change, and I was dying. I'm one of the lucky ones." The video is worth watching for his fascinating eyebrows alone. [E!]
• Meredith Vieira stubbed her big toe pretty badly and the financial crisis is to blame. [NY Observer]
• The lawyer who reps Anne Hathaway's ex, Raffaello Follieri, is trying to get him less jail time. She wants to speed up his deportation back to Italy and reduce his prison sentence from 5 to 3 years. She also calls him "deeply religious" and mentions his sick mother in Italy. He picked a good one. [Reuters]
• Ashlee Simpson's mom is moving in for a few days — or weeks — to help out after Ash gives birth. Pete Wentz is "cool with it." [Just Jared]
• Victoria "Posh Spice" Beckham will be on Gordon Ramsay's new show. Just. Can't> Picture. Her. Cooking. [The Sun]
• The son of the Beckhams' housekeepers has been arrested on suspicion of theft of items from their some that were later offered for sale on eBay. [Daily Mail]
• Reese Witherspoon and Ben Stiller will star in a "wacky disaster comedy" about a Hawaiian volcano that needs a virgin sacrifice? Well, Cameron Crowe is involved… [Perez Hilton]
• Simon Cowell sits on cushions to look taller on TV. [Perez Hilton]
• Kim Kardashian: Calls Reggie Bush her "hubby" but he's not even her fiancé. Someone said they saw that she was hitched on Facebook. "I'm not engaged," she says. "I'm not even on Facebook!" [E!]
• Avril Lavigne and Deryck Whibley are putting on a "united front" by going out to dinner amid split rumors, which could mean the rumors are just rumors. [Daily Express]
• Leonardo DiCaprio and Bar Refaeli: Spotted together in Cancun, then West Hollywood, then Beverly Hills. It's definitely on. [Perez Hilton]
• Sacha Baron Cohen bumped into a waiter and sent a tray of food flying all over his white suit at his birthday dinner in West Hollywood. It might have actually been real and not a joke. [Mirror]
• It seems that Nikki Ziering was pregnant when she was on Hulk Hogan Celebrity Championship Wrestling. Probably not a good idea to wrestle with a bun in the oven, no? [TMZ]
• Vanessa Redgrave and Natasha Richardson, mother and daughter, will play mother and daughter in a one-night concert version of A Little Night Music, the Stephen Sondheim-Hugh Wheeler musical. [AP]
• Gary Coleman pleaded not guilty to charges of disorderly conduct and reckless driving yesterday regarding that September incident at a bowling alley where he allegedly hit a dude with his truck who was trying to take a cell phone picture. Coleman's lawyer says: "He simply acted accordingly with what normal human beings would do." LOL. [AP]
• John Travolta was gonna film in one of Paris's toughest housing projects, but 10 cars to be used in the movie were burned. [Yahoo News]
• A photographer for UK tabloid paper The Sun spills: "Working with Madonna was fantastic… I also got to see Pink in a thong when shooting the video for one of her in a shower. I tried to avert my eyes but it was strange..." Mariah Carey is the biggest diva who "doesn’t like downward shadows on her face." [The Sun]
• Christie Brinkley is suing ex-husband Peter Cook for taking her kids out of town by single-engine plane. [NY Post]
• Tim McGraw apologizes for his greatest hits album. Not for the music, but for not releasing new tracks. Although he blames his label. [People]
• "I had just lost my virginity the year before. So to go from doing that to shooting a love scene... I remember I talked to Sean Connery about it and told him I was nervous before going in there and he just said, 'Well, all I can tell you boy is breathe, remember to breathe.'" — Christian Slater, on his first love scene, in The Name Of The Rose.
• "It's coming to a point where I love this show so much, but I'm ready to kind of walk away. I've been doing it for five years now. Five years on TV is a really, really long time. It's more difficult when not only everyone knows about your problems, but they make them worse because things escalate and things get twisted. It's hard to have an actual friendship be torn apart in the media." — Lauren Conrad, on The Hills. [Perez Hilton]
• "There is a huge boom in autism right now because inattentive mothers and competitive dads want an explanation for why their dumb-ass kids can't compete academically, so they throw money into the happy laps of shrinks…to get back diagnoses that help explain away the deficiencies of their junior morons. I don't give a [bleep] what these crackerjack whack jobs tell you - yer kid is NOT autistic. He's just stupid. Or lazy. Or both." — Denis Leary. [Page Six]

• So you know how Gerard Butler kicked a paparazzi's ass yesterday? He was definitely provoked. After Gerard allegedly got out of the limo and punched the dude in the face, the photog continued following Butler for more than an hour before going to the hospital. Plus, he called a lawyer before calling the cops. [TMZ]
• Oooh! Anna Wintour has a crush on Gerard Butler! Get in line, lady. Or put him on the cover of Vogue! [Page Six]
• Did you notice how Brad and Angelina stopped in New Orleans before heading back to France? Totally on purpose! An insider says: "Brad wanted to check on the progress of the houses being built in the Ninth Ward." And someone else says: "With just a handful of weeks before the presidential election, they wanted to subtly remind everyone that New Orleans is still in recovery mode." [E!]
• Um, Angelina is in a new glossy version of The Bible. [Drudge Retort]

• Britney's lawyer would not take a plea deal for her driving-without-a-license case. He wants a $10 fine. "We don't want a misdemeanor," he says. "This should be an infraction. No probation." So! There will be a trial on October 15. [E!]
• As for Jamie Lynn, as previously reported, even though the Enquirer says she is knocked up again, other sources say she is not pregnant. Phew. [Perez Hilton, TMZ]
• Oh yeah, and what's up with OK! saying that Jamie Lynn's baby daddy Casey never cheated on JLS, when In Touch had an exclusive interview with the other woman? Both mags stand by their stories. [MSNBC]
• Zac Efron was attacked by a a middle-aged man thought to be a deranged fan in London. The dude ran up to Zac and girlfriend Vanessa Hudgens and tried to grab Zac's hair. Apparently he wouldn't let go of the teen heartthrob and had to be tackled by a bodyguard. [Mirror
• Michael Phelps went to a party where ladies surrounded him and screamed, "Fish man! Fish man!" [Page Six]
• Wait, what's this? Michael Phelps has a girlfriend? Miss California runner-up Nicole Johnson? [Rush & Molloy]
• Nicole Richie and little Harlow are on the cover of People this week! [People]
• Diddy is pissed that John McCain called Barack Obama "that one." [Radar]
• On October 14, there will be a benefit concert thrown by DJ AM's friends — with performances from celebrity DJs, including Mark Ronson, Steve Aoki, Danny Masterson and Mixmaster Mike. Proceeds will go to the memorial funds established for crash victims. [People]
• Former America's Next Top Model competitors will now be on Modelville, a reality show within Tyra's talk show. Very meta. [E!]
• Joe Jonas and Taylor Swift have broken up. You know who they are, right? [Us Magazine]
• Hugh Hefner talks about his split with Holly Madison: "If Holly says it's over, I guess it's over. She's still here in the house. Until a few days ago, we were still sharing the same bed." He also says: "It's now apparent there will be some new faces in my personal life and on the show. There's been moments that I've been down in the dumps about all this… [But] there are girls lined up outside the front gate. At my age, that's hard to believe, but it seems to be true." He added: "It's a big house. And I'm not going to live alone. I'm definitely not going to live alone." [AP]
• Nikki Blonsky says that airport brawl with ANTM's Bianca left her "completely destroyed" and she lives "every day in pain." She and her father face assault charges. [People]
• Audrina was on Ellen's show and talked all about LC and Justin Bobby! Lauren and Justin flirted in the past; Audrina has tried to call LC but LC hangs up on her; and Audrina hasn't spoken to Justin Bobby. So basically nothing was confirmed. [Perez Hilton]
• Courteney Cox looks like a dazed zombie on the cover of the new Marie Claire. [ONTD]
• Michael Jackson took his kids to a comic book store in L.A. and they wore masks, prompting this paper to print the headline: "It's ALWAYS Halloween In Michael Jackson's Family." But the unmasked pix are cute! Blanket is getting so big. Here's a question: Do you really think MJ is the father of those kids? [The Sun]
• Oprah is leading an Obama fund-raising weekend in Chicago. [Chicago Sun-Times]
• Jason Priestley returning to 90210? Ah, to direct. Hmm. [People]
• Ricky Gervais has built a gym at his New York apartment — because he is too embarrassed to work out in public. [The Sun
• Katy Perry's mom dated Jimi Hendrix? And her dad was an LSD dealer, good friends with Timothy Leary? [The Sun]
• Hannah Montana is hazardous to your health: Some jewelry with the Disney star on it was found to have high levels of lead. [Perez Hilton]
• Lil' Kim is being sued for $2.5 million by a recording company, which says the rapper hasn't delivered all the recordings their contract requires. [USA Today]
• Rachael Ray wants to open a burger joint in New York. "I'm going for a '60s back-in-the-day Rat Pack-y kind of hangout, and I want the bar to be really central [and] the burgers to become a very social thing. I want people to come to the bar to see beautiful proper martinis being made and to enjoy some sliders." So. Hungry. [Gothamist]
• TV chef Jamie Oliver didn't want to kiss girls at his book signings for fear of communicable disease: I said, 'Look, you know, I'm very loyal to my wife and if I have to keep kissing these birds, right, it's only a numbers game before I get herpes. And once you've got it ... it never goes. And I'll be growing flapjack on me lip.'" [Daily Star]
• Paul McCartney is calling on his fans to boycott McDonald's after finding out his picture is in a Mickey Ds in Liverpool. He's been a vegetarian for decades. [Nikki Sixx, who is dating Kat Von D, says, in the beginning, when they first started seeing each other, "When I tried to kiss her she karate chopped me. She's a fiery one." [People]
• American Idolcontestant Kelli Pickler battled a year-long depression and anti-depressants made her "crazy." [People]
• LOL: Boogie Nights, the musical. [The Star]
• Do what you must to prepare yourself: Katie Price, the "glamour model" known as Jordan, and her husband Peter Andre are moving to Hollywood in January. They have three kids: Harvey, 6, who is blind; Junior Savva Andreas Andre, 3, and one year old Princess Tiáamii Crystal Esther Andre. [Perez Hilton]
• Ozzy Osbourne's show on Fox will be "half scripted," so the Writers Guild of America is issuing a warning to writers about that. [NY Times]
• Following Peter Cook's interview with Barbara Walters, Christie Brinkley says: "It is a measure of [his] character that he has breached the confidentiality agreement that is in the divorce settlement and has sought to present this distorted one-side view of his marriage." Word. [ABC News]
• Here's a picture from Howard Stern's wedding, if you care. [People]
• Who shot the sheriff? Eric Clapton is auctioning 13 of his shotguns. [The Sun]
• Anna Deveare Smith will premiere a new solo piece in November, inspired by Arizona State University's law school, named for retired Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor - the first U.S. law school to be named for a woman. [Yahoo News]
• "All men have thought about her at least once in their lives. The great thing about Judi Dench is that she's the matriarch of British film. She has an innate power about her ... Bond needs a woman like M to contain his nonsense and say, 'Look, 007, you've been an idiot!' But they won't sleep together. Not unless the cupboard gets very bare in terms of storylines." — Daniel Craig. [Sydney Morning Herald]
• "[The Beatles] were young capitalists who, far from developing a youth culture, were exploiting youth culture by promoting fan worship, mindless screaming and nothing more than a passive teenage consumer." — Historian David Fowler. [Guardian]
• "Last night i went to see Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist and it was so cute! I think the entire cast is so much fun to watch, and the storyline is great. I'm a big fan of Kat Dennings and Michael Cera. It would be nice to give them some support! Seeing movies like this is such a good feeling. It also shows you how important movies are in life – you can be in a horrible mood, and most of the time a movie that makes you laugh and enjoy life can change your mood by the time you walk out of the theatre." — Lindsay Lohan. [People]
• "Most heterosexual men do not find Renée Zellweger attractive. It’s true. Nice girl, and I have met Renée. She is the kind of girl who bakes really good muffins, you go out to dinner with her, but that’s it." — Denis Leary. [Vanity Fair]
• "What Jay and I have is real. It's not about interviews or getting the right photo op. It's real." — Beyoncé, sorta talking about her wedding in Essence. [ People]
• "But if you, out of nowhere, are going to grab a woman out of the woods and make her your vice presidential candidate, what can I do? [Sarah Palin] is like Jodie Foster in the movie Nell. They just found her, and she was speaking her own special language. Have you noticed how [Palin's] rallies have begun to take on the characteristics of the last days of the Weimar Republic? In Florida, she asked 'Who is Barack Obama?' Hey, lady, we just met YOU five fucking weeks ago." — Jon Stewart. [Rush & Molloy]