• Lindsay Lohan has returned from India!

While there, she visited the Sanlaap women's and children's shelter outside Calcutta. She spent about 3 hours with people there, and watched dance performances by the children. With her was a four-person camera crew from the BBC, and, at one point, Lindsay wore a bindi. Of course. [People]

• If you have $300, you can buy a "Marc Jacob" bag from LohanHouse.com, where Lindsay and her family are selling gently used clothes, shoes, hats, bags, and "collectables." [Page Six, Lohan House]
• Chris Brown is pissed that stores are not carrying his new CD, Graffiti. He wrote on his Twitter: "im tired of this shit. major stores r blackballing my cd. not stockin the shelves and lying to costumers. what the fuck do i gotta do... WTF... yeah i said it and i aint retracting shit. im not biting my tongue about shit else... the industry can kiss my ass." He said of a Walmart in Connecticut: "They didn't even have my album in the back… not on shelves, saw for myself. the manager told me that when there are new releases its mandatory to put em on the shelves.. BUT NO SIGN OF GRAFFITI." [MSNBC Scoop, Twitter, Page Six, Gatecrasher]
• Lily Allen may have smoked a cigarette during a concert last week; and if the Liverpool City Council can prove she was smoking, she and the venue could be fined. The council is asking "witnesse" to rat Lily out. [BBC News]
• Jude Law and Sienna Miller: "In love" and moving in together in the new year. As you may recall, their romance began on the set of Alfie; then Jude cheated on her with his children's nanny. Forgive but not forget? [The Sun]
• Playgirl has turned down alleged nude photos of Tiger Woods — apparently taken by Tiger himself. The magazine's spokesperson Daniel Nardicio says: "They were impossible to 100 percent verify, hence the unwillingness to go there." [People]
• Tiger Woods' wife, Elin Nordegren, is not in Sweden, despite some reports. She is in the guest house, which, while large, is not another country. [TMZ]
• Consulting firm Accenture is the first corporate sponsor to officially drop Tiger Woods. [NY Post]
• Tiger Woods' wife will reportedly dump him after Christmas and is talking to a divorce lawyer. As for Tiger, he is seeing a therapist. Allegedly. [Radar Online]
• This report claims that Elin Nordegren wants a trial separation. but that Tiger Woods wants to take a cruise on his yacht with her and convince her to stay with him and have another baby. (?1?!) [NY Post]
• Here, Cori Rist, who hooked up with Tiger Woods, is called a "spectacular escort." [Rush & Molloy]
• According to this report: Tiger Woods and Rachel Uchitel are both in Palm Beach, Florida. But he's on his yacht; she's with her family. [TMZ]
• "Tiger Woods Cheated As Dad Died. Star Bedded Jamie Jungers As Father Lay Dying In Hospital." [Radar Online]
• Gerald Posner reports that Tiger Woods had a "separate team handle his trysts," and that Rachel Uchitel could be getting $5 million to stay quiet. [The Daily Beast]
• A source says Uma Thurman's ex-fiancé was too controlling: "It seemed like he always wanted to run the show… He wanted to bring in his own chef and his own security. He'd talk about redesigning her house in the city and knocking down buildings at her place upstate." [Rush & Molloy]
• Russell Brand was seen spotted shopping for diamonds at Cartier, fueling speculation he's going to ask Katy Perry to marry him. [Daily Mail]
• Is Prince William a "shadow King"? [NY Daily News]
• Jay-Z is well-loved by his Rocawear employees, whose Christmas gift to him was a video spoof of his hit single, "Empire State of Mind." [Page Six]
• Behold: Lady Gaga and Cyndi Lauper in the 2010 MAC Viva Glam ad campaign, shot by Ellen von Unwerth. [The Life Files]
• Susan Boyle says he life hasn't changed that much: "I have everything I had before – it's just a little more interesting now." She hasn't really splurged on too much: She bought "a red couch and some cushions." And, she says: "To anyone who has a dream I say follow that dream. You are never too old. It is never too late. And dreams can become a reality." [People]
• What do we think of Carey Hart's Day-of-the-Dead-style tattoo of Pink? [The Life Files]
• Guy Ritchie is thinking of opening a branch of his London pub, the Punch Bowl, in New York. [Daily Express]
• Sad face: Grizz from 30 Rock is suffering from severe hypertension and has to be on a dialysis machine three times a week. He's on the waiting list for a kidney transplant, but need to lose 75 pounds before he's considered a viable candidate. And the wait is 5 years. He talks about all this on Dr. Oz's show on Tuesday. [NY Daily News]
• The Los Angeles Film Critics Association and the Boston Society of Film Critics agree: Mo'Nique's performance in Precious and Kathryn Bigelow's The Hurt Locker were some of the best moments in film this year. [People]
• Lots of Kerry Washington's favorite places in New York are food-related. [NY Post]
• Candy Spelling, a panelist on E!'s new series, Bank of Hollywood — produced by Ryan Seacrest — says: "I don't have to work. I'm not putting up my own money! We all contributed our salaries, but I wasn't going to pay [the contestants] to be on TV… I love giving of my time and money — I'm very charitable and sit on three nonprofit boards and two city boards as commissioner — but… then I would just be donating money and leaving it up to the contestants as to how it's spent. We all felt a strong responsibility about how they would spend the money." Yeah, I don't know either, but it sounds snotty. [NY Post]
• Sarah Ferguson, ex-Duchess Of York, says she's going to start a historical novel, starring an aristocratic redhead and set in the eighteenth century, "sort of like Pride and Prejudice meets 24. It's actually me putting myself in the eighteenth century… I can just imagine how it would be, and I have such fun!" [New York Magazine]
• Groan: Spencer Pratt now owns a music company, King Spencer Music. Be afraid. [TMZ]
• Entourage's Kevin Connolly says he thinks Rex Lee didn't really mean it when he said he was made fun of on the set because of his ethnicity and sexuality. Pardon? [TMZ]
• At the link, an obituary for Natasha Richardson by Ralph Fiennes. [Guardian]
• Add Kid Rock and Dave Grohl to the list of musicians suing bars for playing unlicensed music. [TMZ]
• LOL: 21-year-old Ekaterina Ivanova is calling ex-boyfriend, 65-year-old Rolling Stone Ronnie Wood, an "evil goblin." [Telegraph]
• CSI Miami's Jonathan Togo was arrested Friday for allegedly getting violent in a fight with his girlfriend; he was booked for felony domestic violence. [TMZ]
• A year after being rejected on TV, Bachelor contestant Melissa Rycroft got married. But not to a guy from TV. [Us Magazine]
• "Garth Brooks & Trisha Yearwood Celebrate Anniversary at McDonald's." [People]
• The Princess And The Frog was number one at the box office with a modest $25 million. [MSNBC Scoop]
• Bentley Meeker is a celebrity lighting guru and you are not. [Page Six]
• "I don't want to talk about him, except that I like him… I think everyone needs an adventure buddy." — Holly Madison on Benji Madden. [People]
• "Whenever anybody say they are going to give me some kind of award, I'm always a little stupefied by the notion. The first thing I say is 'why?' I just go to work like anyone else, except my job happens to be a little stranger." — Johnny Depp, when receiving a career achievement award at the Bahamas International Film Festival. [AP]
• "It makes certain cities impossible to live in. Like Sydney, it makes it impossible for us to live there… We certainly don't get that treatment in Tennessee. But it goes with the territory. It's just, we have to be careful, just to maintain some sort of semblance of a normal life for our child." — Nicole Kidman says attention from photographers is the reason she won't live in Sydney. [News.com.au]
• "I don't have a personal vendetta against Nicole Kidman… These are Machiavellian games that are being played and they are just not right. If she doesn't want to be photographed she should change her profession and become a butcher." — Paparazzo Jamie Fawcett, whom Nicole Kidman has requested a restraining order against and also took to court for placing a listening bug outside her home and following her in his car. [News.com.au]
• "Breaking up the band was a mistake because I think it broke trust with the audience. You had an audience that was very invested in that idea - whether they were invested in the people or the idea or the songs, I don't know. Like a relationship that you break off from and then try to pick back up, it's never quite the same. It doesn't mean it can't be as good, but it has to be different. That beautiful original feeling got lost in the interim of being away. If we had said, 'We just went away for seven years,' it would have been similar, but somehow breaking up, there's a violence to it." — Billy Corgan, on the Smashing Pumpkins. [WENN via Spinner]
• "If I didn't act, I'd be a nutcase. Some people have to do it. They have a lot of emotion they have to get out." — Rachel Weisz, who's in The Lovely Bones. [News.com.au]
• "My body is falling apart. The only way that I could do it is if I played a character who gets shot in the left leg and the right shoulder in the opening scene." — Kenny Rogers says he is too "decrepit" to be in Christmas In Canaan, the movie based on the book he wrote. [Daily Express]
• "Sometimes when I watch the show back I think we've gone too far because I see the pre-story beforehand, I can then see the audition from their perspective and there are times where I think I could have handled that better or I was in a bad mood and I was too rude. At the same time... no-one is sort of dragged kicking and screaming onto the audition set." — Simon Cowell. [BBC News]
• "A journalist went up to my  husband once and said 'did you know that dating anyone more than three years younger than you is considered pedophilia?' [Peter shot back] 'Really? My wife is seven years younger.'" — Maggie Gyllenhaal. [Gatecrasher]
• "Angry African-American women, you know, thought that it would be the image that people would associate with them. Virginiaca is definitely art imitating life, but I understand where they're coming from, and I don't have to project that onto mainstream America. What's funny is funny. This place is well known for getting angry letters — Lorne keeps 50 of them outside his office. It keeps you grounded in the fact that in late-night comedy, you're going to have to burn somebody." — Kenan Thompson. [New York Magazine]
• "I say 'Be Italian' many times in the song, but it was important to me that every time I say it, it have a different meaning, because there are so many different things about being Italian. There's love of life and food and sex and drink. There's love of dancing, love of singing. So it was putting all that into it." — Fergie, on her song in Nine. [NY Post]
• "The negative stuff is crazy and the positive stuff is crazy… I actually see all the discussion and controversy and, you know, 'Is it Smurfs and Dances With Wolves in space?' and all this crap, as good. It fuels interest. All those people that go online and repeatedly dismiss the movie day after day, I know they're going to be there watching it." — James Cameron on Avatar. [NY Post]
• "I think every little girl should be able to feel themselves the princess. I think every little girl is worthy of having a princely young man, and vice versa. It's really thrilling that Zahara will never have a moment where she didn't see herself in that light. She's Ethiopian. She comes from kings and queens. She should certainly know herself as a princess." — The Princess And The Frog's Anika Noni Rose, responding to Angelina Jolie's claim that she's ecstatic that daughter Zahara has a role model. [Ok!]
• "I'm working out again. I'm going to make the sequel to 300. My pecs will be glistening. I'll have a codpiece. I'm going to blow your mind." — Alec Baldwin. [Rush & Molloy]

The Lovely Bones is the story of Susie Salmon (Saoirse Ronan), who is murdered in 1973 by her neighbor George Harvey (Stanley Tucci), after he lures her into his underground den. After her death, Susie, stuck in "the InBetween," watches as her father (Mark Wahlberg), mother (Rachel Weisz), grandmother (Susan Sarandon), sister (Rose McIver), brother (Christian Thomas Ashdale), and a detective (Michael Imperioli), cope with her death and try to solve her murder.

Reviewers say director Peter Jackson, who wrote the film adaptation along with Lord of the Rings screenwriters Fran Walsh (also Jackson's wife) and Philippa Boyens, doesn't do the book justice. While the novel allows readers to create their own image of the afterlife Susie creates for herself, critics dislike Jackson's tacky, overly-saturated CGI vision of heaven. Most of the performances are strong, especially Ronan's, but frequent interruptions by Jackson's fantasy world and a preachy, "Oprah-esque tone" undermine the emotional story of how each family member deals with their grief.

Though the film tones down the more disturbing aspects of the book by having Susie murdered off screen and only hinting at her rape, critics are still offended by how Susie's story is handled. While Jackson's early horror films and Lord of the Rings' work demonstrated that he's fascinated by gory details and Heavenly Creatures revealed an ability to tell a more delicate story, in The Lovely Bones critics say there is too much fantasy and horror, and Jackson shies away from the heart of his source material. Below, the reviews:

NPR

Sitting through Peter Jackson's film of Alice Sebold's The Lovely Bones is an ordeal. I'm not talking about the subject. The book opens with the rape and murder of a 14-year-old girl, so even a good adaptation would be an ordeal. But Jackson's adolescent New Age computer-generated fantasyland is an excruciating fusion of the novel's primal trauma and his own sensibility, which is more at home with juvenile, male-dominated Lord of the Rings epics. There isn't a second that rings true - on any level.

Rolling Stone

The novel never flinched, the movie does. But Jackson, who builds jolting suspense when Susie's sister enters the killer's lair, is drawn to a spiritual dimension. He may oversaturate the Claritin-ad colors in Susie's in-between place, but he infuses the film with a sense that what lies beyond may have the power to heal. All this is conveyed in the remarkable performance of Ronan, an Oscar nominee for Atonement. She and Tucci - magnificent as a man of uncontrollable impulses - help Jackson cut a path to a humanity that supersedes life and death.

Time

Tucci plays the killer not with a madman's sneers and cackles but with a quiet malevolence; he's never more ice-shivery than when he's pretending to be normal. Such a performance could have upset the movie's balance if Wahlberg hadn't provided the solid foundation of parental devotion. The center, of course, is Ronan, the Irish teen best remembered as the girl whose lie set lives tumbling in Atonement. As the dead girl hovering over her family like a guardian angel, Ronan makes Susie seem an ordinary child whom catastrophe has made otherworldly-wise. Through Jackson's art and Ronan's magic, the obscenity of child murder has been invested with immense gravity and grace. Like the story of Susie's life after death, that's a miracle.

The Los Angeles Times

Other elements, including The Lovely Bones' imaginative notion of what Susie's afterlife looks like, are strong, but everything that's good is undermined by an overemphasis on one part of the story that is essential but has been allowed to overflow its boundaries. That would be the film's decision to foreground its weirdest, creepiest, most shocking elements, starting with the decision to give a much more prominent role to murderer George Harvey. Expertly played by Stanley Tucci, so transformed by makeup as to be almost unrecognizable, Harvey is such an unsettling, toxic individual that the actor says he came close to turning down the role. It's not only Harvey that we see in sometimes grotesque detail, it's the bizarre decorations of the underground murder site that we watch him ever so carefully plan and build, as well as the realistic bodies of his previous victims. And there is of course the chilling time the family spends trying to solve Susie's murder.

Entertainment Weekly

Jackson reduces his Lovely Bones, in the end, to the dramatic contrast between the menace of a hateful killer (will he be caught?) and the grief of a loving father (can he avenge his daughter's death?). Sebold's Lovely Bones, on the other hand, is fleshed out with the perilous, irresistible power of sex - the author acknowledges a real world of extramarital sex and sex between young lovers in addition to the heinous rape from which moviegoers are shielded. The filmmaker handled the sexual power of girls beautifully in 1994's Heavenly Creatures. But here he shies from the challenge, shortchanging a story that isn't only about the lightness of souls in heaven but also about the urges of bodies on earth. Jackson forfeits depth for safe, surface loveliness.

The A.V. Club

The Lovely Bones is often moving, almost in spite of itself. Jackson draws excruciating tension out of scenes where the audience knows exactly what's coming but the characters don't, and his dreamlike, allusive handling of Ronan's murder is stunning. The afterlife scenes are gorgeous, even though they often seem to be ultra-glossy updates of sequences he managed with more heart back in 1994 with Heavenly Creatures. And Ronan remains a tender, touching performer, though Wahlberg edges perilously close to his bug-eyed sincerity mode from The Happening. But for all its successes, Bones remains more crafted than sincere, more meant to look achingly pretty on the screen than to resonate in the heart.

The New Yorker

The book was brought off with considerable delicacy-it's really an affectionately detailed portrait of a suburban girl's life. Literalized in the movie, the material is closer to a high-toned ghost story. Jackson intermingles family goings on with Susie's gossamer interventions, and some of the brushed-with-ether imagery verges on the uncanny. Yet Jackson has become an undisciplined fabulist: the movie is redundant and undramatic. Heaven is notoriously harder to make interesting than Hell, but Jackson has outdone other artists in cotton candy-there are luscious hills and dales, and gleaming lakes and fields of waving grain, and sugarplum fairies with music by Brian Eno rather than by Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky. The Lovely Bones has been fashioned as a holiday family movie about murder and grief; it's a thoroughly queasy experience. The lesson that Susie has to learn is that she must "let go" of her past life. Meanwhile, skilled, opportunistic artificers like Alice Sebold and Peter Jackson won't let go of a chance to mingle life and death.

Newsweek

Onscreen, however, The Lovely Bones is a hybrid of unmatching parts-shuffling between thriller, police procedural, family melodrama, and mystical fantasy. There's even a section-when Susie's madcap grandmother (Susan Sarandon) shows up to help the grieving family-during which the movie verges on becoming Auntie Mame. How do you literalize heaven? It's a problem moviemakers have struggled with forever, and Jackson hasn't solved it. Sebold's notion was that everyone creates a heaven to fit her fantasies and wishes. Jackson creates the afterlife of a 14-year-old raised on '70s teen life and pop culture-a kitsch universe of greeting-card imagery and Renaissance Faire clothes. The tackiness, intentional or not, is jarring. Even worse is the vision of Susie and the other murdered girls as a happy, gamboling clan of free spirits. At such moments, the story's willful wish fulfillment seems downright cuckoo.

The New York Times

We all like children, and - at least in our capacity as moviegoers, book-club members and consumers of true-life melodrama - we seem to like them best when they're abused, endangered or dead. Nothing else is quite so potent a symbol of violated innocence, a spur to pious sentiment or a goad to revenge as a child in peril.

[Susie] is, in any case, obsessed with the lives that go on without her, in particular with the ways her siblings and friends and father (Mark Wahlberg, agonized) and mother (Rachel Weisz, narcotized) deal with losing her, something the audience never has to endure. We are always in Susie's company, soothed by her voice-over narration and tickled by her coltish high spirits. This puts a curious distance between us and most of the characters in the film - it makes us, in effect, Susie's fellow ghosts - a detachment that Mr. Jackson's stylish, busy technique makes more acute. His young heroine, played with unnerving self-assurance and winning vivacity by Saoirse Ronan, cares desperately about the poor living souls left in her wake, but it is not clear that Mr. Jackson shares her concern.... the problem with this Lovely Bones is that it dithers over hard choices, unsure of which aspects of Ms. Sebold's densely populated, intricately themed novel should be emphasized and which might be winnowed or condensed.

Slate

The Lovely Bones also exists in the in-between, located somewhere in the interstices between thriller, fantasy, crime procedural (Michael Imperioli, The Sopranos' Christopher, plays the detective who tries to catch Susie's killer), and family-in-dissolution drama. Mark Wahlberg and Rachel Weisz play Susie's grief-addled parents (they also have two younger children, played by Rose McIver and Christian Thomas Ashdale). There are moments that remind you what a master craftsman Jackson can be, like a pulse-pounding suspense scene in which Susie's sister ransacks the killer's house for evidence. But as Susie learns that avenging her death may matter less than giving her family a chance to heal, the movie takes on a weirdly Oprah-esque tone, as if determined to turn child murder into an occasion for personal growth. Scene by scene, the movie alternates between prurient violence and sentimental uplift. If it weren't for the luminous performance of Saoirse Ronan (who, I've said it before and I'll say it again, is going to be a huge star), this would be the kind of movie you'd give up on halfway through.

Variety

With reddish hair, brilliantly alive eyes and a seemingly irrepressible impulse for movement and activity, Ronan represents a heavenly creature indeed, a figure of surging, eager, anticipatory life cut off just as it is budding. Less quicksilver and more solidly built, McIver's Lindsey properly begins in her live-wire sister's shadow only to grow gradually into an impressive figure. Chain-smoking and depleting the liquor cabinet, Sarandon camps it up for a few welcome laughs, while Ritchie seems a likely candidate for teen idolhood. Mainly, it's Wahlberg and Weisz who are shortchanged by the film's divided attention between earthly agony and astral accommodation. Both thesps are OK as far as things go, but that's not nearly far enough.

The Wall Street Journal

And at this point in his working life he can use the prodigious digital resources of Weta, his production facility, to conjure up infinite worlds of special effects. Which, heaven help us, is exactly what he's done to visualize the Inbetween. The result is dumbfounding and ludicrous in equal measure, a too-muchness that makes the excesses of What Dreams May Come seem downright spartan. If Reader's Digest did music videos they might look like this. The screen pulses with bathos and swirls with surreal images, some of them shamelessly intercut with the life of Susie's bereaved family on earth-giant ships in giant bottles, fields of daisies, butterflies, cute dogs, cherry blossoms, baobab trees out of The Little Prince, a hot-air balloon, ice sculptures, snow-covered mountains, a gazebo in a lake, the same gazebo in a corn field, the same field lighted by a lighthouse. By the time Susie finally ascended to the highest realm, I was not only aghast but so exhausted by her surfeit of experience that I heard, as if touched by magic myself, those deathless lyrics from Talking Heads: "Heaven is a place where nothing ever happens...."

The Village Voice

In Jackson's hands, The Lovely Bones is doubly appalling. Part Disney's Alice in Wonderland, part Fritz Lang's M, the movie is horrific yet cloying, alternately distended and abrupt, sometimes poignant and often ridiculous... As the novel suggests a form of talk therapy, Jackson's adaptation is a misguided tribute to the magic of the movies-which have always specialized in reanimating the dead. But there is something to be said for representing the actual world and there are some things that can only be visualized in the mind's eye. What heaven could have been more radiant than a child's view of her suburban neighborhood-what spectacle more divine than Susan Sarandon's wig?

Salon

The Lovely Bones is a fiercely delicate and often funny piece of writing, a work of fantasy with a solid footing in reality, and it wouldn't be an easy book for any filmmaker to adapt. Jackson (aided and abetted by frequent collaborators Fran Walsh and Philippa Boyens, who co-wrote the screenplay with him) has reinvented Sebold's story in the most facile and heedless way imaginable: He's turned it into a supernatural thriller.

The Lovely Bones is a perfect storm of a movie disaster: You've got good actors fighting a poorly conceived script, under the guidance of a director who can no longer make the distinction between imaginativeness and computer-generated effects. The result is an expensive-looking mess that fails to capture the mood, and the poetry, of its source material. David Byrne once sang, "Heaven is a place where nothing ever happens." There's way too much going on in Peter Jackson's heaven — and yet it isn't nearly enough.

Let's face it: Susan Sarandon has earned the right to wear flats if she feels like it.


Ariana Grande is in the brief window where it's acceptable to wear shrink-wrapped velvet.


I'm over the 90s-floral, as modeled by Courtney Ford, but I guess given the film's subject matter, it's kind of apropos.


Speaking of current retro-trends: the early-90s/late 80s mini (on Rose McIver) has the virtue of (when worn with tights) being relatively warm.


Oh noes! Olivia Munn forgot her shoes!


Nikki Soohoo is so ready for Radio City!


Saoirse Ronan makes her official debut as the one of the chicest, awesome young actresses on the planet.


I think what AJ Michalka was going for...


...was done better by Stefania Owen!


Lea Thompson, you see, believes in Love.


Kat Kramer believes in being on every red carpet anywhere, in a houndstooth marching-band hat.


And Rachel Weisz? Subscribes the the school of gently daring pretty!

[Images via Getty]

• A source claims that Taylor Lautner has proposed to Taylor Swift. The source was last spotted running down the street screaming, "It's true! Now stay away from Bella! You're ruining everything! Team Edwaarrrrddd!" Not really. But maybe? [ShowbizSpy]

• "It's crazy to me that in my head, that being 32 and dating women is going to get me in trouble. I can't even explain to you how terrible that feels, that I equate dating a woman with punishment, shame, guilt, disappointment, reproach, reprimand, persecution. It's a nightmare."John Mayer [NYTimes]
• Kristen Scott Thomas will also be co-starring in the upcoming Bel Ami, alongside Uma Thurman and Robert Pattinson, as "one of Pattinson's conquests." [DailyExpress]
• Brad Pitt, meanwhile, will be fighting off aliens in the Bermuda Triangle for an upcoming adaptation of the video game Dark Void. [DailyExpress.]
• Heidi Klum hit the runway just five weeks after the birth of her daughter, Lou, for the Victoria's Secret fashion show in New York City. "I embrace that I have more curves right now," she says. [DailyMail]
• Klum also legally changed her name to Heidi Samuel yesterday, taking her husband, Seal's surname. It's not clear yet if she'll go by Heidi Samuel professionally. [People]
• "We are engaged, and Darren and I are completely committed to ‘until death do us part,' although we haven't made it official with the paperwork yet. It's not for any political reason or that we're waiting for this or for that, but maybe one day we will have an official ceremony."-Rachel Weisz on her relationship with Darren Aronofsky. [JustJared]
• Kristen Stewart and Robert Pattinson snuck out of the official New Moon afterparty in order to spend time at another club with Joan Jett. Pattinson was spotted singing along to Pulp's "Common People," which means I'm obligated to like him now. [USWeekly]
• Amy Winehouse smokes cigarettes after she leaves the gym. [TheSun]
• "I like to wear crazy stuff. I mean, if I'm hanging out at home watching TV… But I like expressing myself, I like stuff that's not typical. I like being different. Being different and being eccentric feels normal to me." -Adam Lambert [JustJared]
• Nicole Richie is back home after spending time in the hospital in order to battle pneumonia. "But don't worry," her boyfriend Joel Madden notes, "all is well and we are home with no problems." [People]
• "Oprah Winfrey is first and foremost one of my dearest friends and obviously the person who taught me everything I know about television. Her show was home for me for five of the most exciting years of my life. The Oprah Winfrey Show is the gold standard and I know that she will succeed at whatever she chooses to do next."-Dr. Phil. [E!]
• 50 Cent says he may settle down someday: "I think it could happen. You know, it has to be at the right time. I mean, you see Em make a decision to go home. He didn't want to wake up one morning and Hailie be grown. You know, your life in general, you gotta make choices at different points." [MTV]
• The famous glove that Michael Jackson wore during his first public performance of the moonwalk is being auctioned off today; pre-auction estimates place the glove's value at $40,000-60,000. [Yahoo]
• Project Runway winner Irena Shabayeva attempts to explain why she had "the bitch edit" on this season's show. [EW]
• Nick Lachey is set to host an a cappella singing contest for NBC. You know what that means! It's time to Do It, Rockapella! [People]
• Kim Kardashian is striking back at Star magazine for insinuating that she's had plastic surgery, writing on her blog: "It's no secret I contour my nose now to make the bump go away! I guess it's a compliment to my makeup artist that he does such a good job contouring my nose that it appears smaller. But hey, Star mag thinks it looks smaller... yay! My dream come true, hahaha! Stories like this are so funny! I love that there's a Dr who I've never even met giving his 'professional' opinion on my face!" [KimKardashian]
• Hugh Hefner says that his favorite book is The Great Gatsby, the love of his life is his current girlfriend, Crystal Harris, and that Robert Downey Jr. is being talked about as a potential Hefner in an upcoming film based on his life. [Guardian]
• James Roppo a senior VP of sales at Island/Def Jam records, was arrested yesterday after a mall event he organized featuring tween sensation Justin Bieber got out of control, with "10,000 screaming fans" showing up to get autographs from the singer. [NYDN]
• "And then there are the paparazzi, who always want you to fail. Last night when I arrived they were all going, ‘Smile, smile'. I was smiling but they were shouting, ‘You're so f***ing boring'. Then one fell into a flower pot. That made me laugh a lot. I hate them. There are actors who want that attention, but I don't care about any of that." -Robert Pattinson [TimesOnline]
• "I've been blessed to be able to be eclectic, and I am thankful for that. As I got older, with my work, I became aware of the responsibility of film, and I feel one of the best ways I can apply myself as an actor is to go beyond movie stardom and celebrity. These movies, these so-called "popcorn movies," or "family movies," actually provide something quite beautiful and something quite necessary — which is a family bonding experience. So God bless the popcorn film. Especially movies where you can take the kids, because I remember looking forward to seeing these movies with my parents, and if I can give that back, I'm going to do it. I don't care if people have criticism for it or not, I think it's a good thing."-Nicolas Cage [Film.com]

[New York, October 21. Image via Bauer-Griffin]

• Lindsay Lohan is on the cover of Elle UK — the shoot where jewelry went missing! — and here's what Editor-in-Chief Lorraine Candy writes in her Editor's letter:

"Lindsay Lohan wrote me a note during this month's cover shoot. It read, 'Let's do it again some time.' I've put it on my office wall because, in all honesty, I don't know if I could. This was the most unpredictable, and confusing cover shoot in my magazine career. First, Lindsay was about to arrive. Then she was in Paris. She was almost on set, then she disappeared into her hotel room. She was ready for her interview, then she had to have a fake tan! But we got there. And what we got was amazing. This shoot is truly original, just like Ms Lohan herself. In the end, she did her job brilliantly and, I hope you'll agree, so did we." Here's video from behind-the-scenes at the shoot [Elle TV]

• Chris Brown will be sentenced on Wednesday and appear on Larry King Live afterward: He'll apologize for assaulting Rihanna on TV. [Radar Online]
• Was Chris Brown forcibly removed from an upscale bowling alley in NYC last week for "partying too much"? [Fox 411]
• Take note: Tom Cruise is David and Victoria Beckham's "relationship guru." [Daily Express]
• "David Beckham is to star alongside Arnold Schwarzenegger in TV ads promoting California to tourists." [The Sun]
• Ryan O'Neal says of Farrah Fawcett's funeral: "I had just put the casket in the hearse and I was watching it drive away when a beautiful blonde woman comes up and embraces me. I said to her, 'You have a drink on you? You have a car?' She replied, 'Daddy, it's me - Tatum!' I was just trying to be funny with a strange Swedish woman, and it's my daughter. It's so sick." Tatum O'Neal says: "That's our relationship in a nutshell. You make of it what you will." [The Sun]
• Vanity Fair produced two different covers for its September issue: Michael Jackson and Farrah Fawcett. These deaths bumped a scheduled Mad Men cover, so now the actors from the show will be inside. Boo. [WWD]
• This paper spoke with the grandmother of the Samantha Burke, woman that Jude Law got pregnant. Delores Burke, 80, says: "What I want to know is how a girl gets pregnant in this day and age? Yes, it takes two people but he is the older and wiser man and he should have made sure nothing like this happened. I'm mad at him, we all are. He has other children. Didn't he think about how his actions would affect them?" [Daily Mail]
• "Samantha, her mom, and her family can affirm that Jude has been responsive and supportive throughout the relationship and pregnancy, and know that he will remain so as a father once Baby Sophia is born." [People]
• Video of Samantha Burke talking to the media at the link. TMZ]
• Apparently Samantha barely had any boyfriends, hence the headline: Prude Until Jude. [The Sun]
• A source says: "Jude sleeps with so many different women. A lot of names were going around as to who the mother of his baby could be." [Page Six]
• Jude's ex, Sadie Frost, is the oldest of 10 half brothers and sisters and mother of four kids from two marriages, so she's "understanding" and wants her kids with Jude to meet the new child. [Mirror]
• Jude Law allegedly told Sadie Frost that he only slept with Samantha Burke once, after a drunken party. [Daily Mail]
• Jessica Biel sings! She's playing Sarah Brown in Guys and Dolls at the Hollywood Bowl, and says she would love to to go Broadway: "That is one of my eight-year-old dreams. That's like my little eight-year-old inside me is cartwheeling around, thinking about that idea." [AP]
• Mariah Carey's new CD will have ads. Actually, the CD booklet will be a 34-page mini magazine in co-production with Elle… with ads from Elizabeth Arden, Angel Champagne, Carmen Steffens, Le Métier de Beauté and the Bahamas Board of Tourism. [BrandWeek]
• Paris Hilton's estranged manager Jason Moore is hopping a book about how he molded this blond piece of clay into a global icon." [Rush & Molloy]
• Dr. Conrad Murray was getting $150,000 a month to be Michael Jackson's personal physician. But many of his previous patients were low-income. "There are many, many patients that thank God this man was here for them," says one. One patient said Murray performed angioplasty on him three years ago without ever being guaranteed he would be paid. [CNN]
• If you have $30 million or so, you can big on the Andy Warhol portrait of Michael Jackson, going up for auction soon. [BBC News]
• Jon & Kate Plus 8 will not become Jon & Kate Plus Dates. [MSNBC Scoop]
• Leslie Mann says her husband Judd Apatow gives her anecdotes to tell while she's promoting new film Funny People: "He has trained me to be ultra-prepared, to have five stories ready to go. He gives what I say a beginning, a middle, and an end. Whereas I'd just barf it out," she says. "It's really lazy of me to depend on him to make me sound sensible, but so what? I'm lazy." [The New Yorker]
• Milla Jovovich: Getting hitched for the third time; filmmaker Paul W.S. Anderson is her fiancé. [Daily Mail]
• Tilda Swinton and 40 other people are pulling a film screen through the Scottish Highlands "on an eight and a half day odyssey through the mountains, camping each night in a different village." [Guardian]
• In this interview, Diane Kruger says she is a "country girl" and "definitely not sophisticated." The reporter writes: "What utter hogwash! Kruger spent most of her childhood summers on a scholarship to the Royal Ballet School in London, then five years as a top-drawer international model, based in Paris, before becoming a film actress." [Times of London]
• Liev Schreiber says kids make you youthful: "I'm older physically, but spiritually much younger." [People]
• Kate Middleton, aka Prince William's girlfriend, has had a series of meetings with Sir Richard Branson, in an effort to "sharpen her business acumen." [Daily Mail]
• Editors at British magazine Pride are apologizing for manipulating comments made by Nia Long, which made it seem like she was ranting about Beyoncé's acting skills. [Daily Express]
• Liza Minnelli will not be on Ugly Betty, but she will be on Drop Dead Diva. [AP]
• Whoops! Emile Hirsch and an Emile Hirsch impostor both attended the same party. [Page Six]
• Eric Bana is hot and talking about his attraction to cars. [Daily Mail]
• Sienna Miller on GI Joe: "If these films are well done I can find them quite entertaining. But…I prefer indie, arty films really. It's not the kind of film I'd normally go and see." [Guardian]
• In addition, Sienna's GI Joe wig cost cost £4,800. [Telegraph]
• Carey Hart says he and Pink are going to have a baby… Eventually. "She still has another 18 months of touring, and I'm pretty heavy in competing again in all my businesses, so it's definitely going to happen, but just not anytime soon." [E!]
• Q: A character with special needs or a prostitute-those are usually the two paths to Oscar. Had you considered that? Hugh Dancy: "I genuinely didn't. But now that you've said that, if it doesn't work out for me with Adam, I'll play a hooker next. There was the worry that if we didn't pull this off, I would look doubly exposed. Like, 'Really? You thought that was going to work? Better luck next time! There's this great prostitute movie coming out-maybe you should give that a shot.'" [BlackBook]
• Kevin Costner and his band were set to perform in Canada when suddenly the stage collapsed. One person died and at least 60 people were injured, including 2 members of Costner's band. [TMZ]
• Funny interview with Michael Ian Black and Michael Showalter, at the link. [BlackBook]
• Sheree from The Real Housewives Of Atlanta seems psyched that she was the number one trending topic on Twitter last week after her "Who's gonna check me, boo?" argument. She says: "You don't want to be on the wrong side of Sheree. You really don't. I tell them all the time, 'Don't let the cute face fool you!'" [E!]
• He's done Ali G, Borat and Brüno.What will Sacha Baron Cohen do next? How about a Eurovision music mockumentary? [The Sun]
• Kathleen Turner spills about living the last 17 years with the pain of rheumatoid arthritis, taking steroids which made her puffy and bloated and then turning to vodka to kill the pain — and becoming a drunk. [Daily Mail]
• Omarosa will be on TV One in a new series called Life After. [WaPo]
• "In Cold Souls, opening Friday in limited release, the actor Paul Giamatti plays an actor named…Paul Giamatti." [LA Times]
  
• Billy Joel is "distraught" over his breakup with Katie Lee Joel and "obsessed" with getting her back. [Page Six]
• People you may or may not have hear of had a kid: "Survivor & Amazing Race's Rob and Amber Become Parents." [People]
• Hollywood is out of ideas, part MCDXLIV: Steven Spielberg will direct a remake of Harvey, about a man and his friendship with an invisible six-foot tall rabbit. The original flick was released in 1950 and starred James Stewart. [Hollywood Reporter]
• Will Ferrell has left the film project Neighborhood Watch. [Variety]
• Dustin "Screech"Diamond: purposely excluded from the Saved By The Bell reunion by his castmates. [NY Daily News]
• Whatshername will celebrate her divorce with a televised "party extravaganza." [The Sun]
• Whatshername is on "yet another" holiday, and her cagefighter boyfriend is with her. [Daily Mail]
• Whatshisname has been crying himself to sleep and wishes he were stronger. [Mirror]
• "They did try to submit in the comedy category in the '90s and suffered from doing it in an era of juggernaut comedies like Friends and Seinfeld and Cheers and whatnot. And The Simpsons was as well written, if not more so, as any of those — but suffered from the prejudice against the medium. So I think perhaps in reparation for that, they should give them an honorary achievement Emmy." — Seth MacFarlane. [LA Times]
• "At 21 I married Luc Besson and we bought a beautiful 13-room chateau in Normandy. I was totally happy, drinking wine, walking in the forests and riding horses in the beautiful farmland. It didn't work because he was so much older. I was young and staying up late, playing the guitar and hanging out with my friends. He was the early riser who went to sleep early. He expected me to be the perfect wife, which was natural - the hostess entertaining his friends. But I was like, 'Aaaargh! I don't even like those people.' It's too bad it didn't work because he was an incredible person and I was an incredible girl, but the timing wasn't right." — Milla Jovovich. [Daily Mail]
• "I think Hillary Clinton is one of the most amazing women of this time. I don't know her and I don't know — should I call her? I'm sure she's busy. But I know they know this movie's being made. And I just want to call and say: Do you have any thoughts or feelings I should be aware of? Of course I can't make that call. I feel like saying, 'I'm going to play you in this movie and I have a lot of respect for you and is there anything you want me to say?'" — Hope Davis. [LA Times]
• "Whatever I say, I get myself into trouble." — Sienna Miller. [Guardian]
• "When I'm not working, I feel like a Ferrari in the garage. You have all this potential and you just want to break out." — Glenn Close. [LA Times]
• "I would talk my wacky language to him and he'd interpret it to the drummer. I'd say, 'I want it to sound like Zeus woke up from a nap and he's pissed and there's an opening in the clouds and he starts handing out lightning bolts,' which is crazy, but that's how I hear the rhythm. And Omar, he whispers some things to the drummer, and that's exactly what it sounds like. It really encouraged the songwriter within me." — Juliette Lewis, on recording her band's new album, produced by The Mars Volta's Omar Rodriguez-Lopez. [Reuters]
• "I have a theory that people feel as attractive as they did as a child. I was a really hideous child. People who were attractive as children have a sense of entitlement. I have a sense of awkwardness." — Kate Beckinsale. [Times of London]
• "Troy launched me but it launched me as the face that launched a thousand ships and not as an actress. I want roles where I have to expose my soul." — Diane Kruger. [Sydney Morning Herald]
• "I have never come across a female character that is written with Blanche's level of complexity, in that she's vulnerable, she's pathetic, she's a monster, she's nasty, she's tender, she's kind – she's so many things that you never know quite what she's going to do next. I've never come across so rich a character before." — Rachel Weisz on being in A Streetcar Named Desire in London. [Telegraph]
• "My life has gotten more surreal in stair steps. from the blog to the book to the movie to 'Oh my God, Nora Ephron's directing it! Oh my God, Meryl Streep's in it!' So right now I'm at this sort of surreal-is-the-new-normal phase. I'm cool with it." — Julie Powell, whose blog became the movie Julie & Julia. [NY Daily News]
• "I'm so not the relationship go-to girl. But I'm much clearer about what a relationship is, which is why I will never marry again. Gabriel and I have a great partnership and a lovely daughter. But I once was stupid enough to say, in a previous relationship, 'I'm going to be with this person for ever,' and realized, as I grew, that I don't know if for ever is possible. Gabriel and I don't look at our relationship in terms of for ever, we look at it as right here today. And today means being the best people we can be, the best parents we can be. It's wonderful, but neither one of us feels the need to attach ourselves to each other for life – because it may not be that." — Halle Berry. [Daily Mail]
• "I hate alcoholics and AA. If you can't drink responsibly, don't drink at all. Don't go to meetings, whine about your character flaws and blame the fact that you are a sociopath on booze" — Roseanne Barr to Heeb. [Page Six]

• A car lost control this weekend and hit Bret Michaels' tour bus on a highway in Canada, causing a five car pile up. No one was injured. [People]

• Michael Jackson's doctor, Conrad Murray, was not licensed to prescribe medication in California. A federal law enforcement official said, "Dr. Murray has DEA registration numbers in Nevada and Texas, but he does not have one in California. You absolutely have to have a registration number to prescribe controlled substances, and there was nothing in California." It has been reported that Murray gave MJ Demerol or Oxycontin. He released a statement today through his lawyer saying, "Dr. Murray didn't prescribe or administer anything that should have killed Michael Jackson." [Fox News]
• A California judge ruled that attorney John Branca and music executive John McClain, who were both named in Michael Jackson's will should oversee his estate instead of his mother Katherine Jackson. [NY Post]
• A family source says Michael Jackson's kids have been mostly isolated from media reports of their father's death. "They've been with their grandmother ever since and she's doing everything she can to protect them from all the media focus," the friend said. "They aren't even close to processing all of this. They are probably years away from that, really. But they're doing OK." [MSNBC]
• Mariah Carey will perform "I'll Be There" at Michael Jackson's memorial service tomorrow. [TMZ]
• Debbie Rowe won't attend Michael Jackson's memorial service tomorrow. Her lawyer released this statement: "The onslaught of media attention has made it clear her attendance would be an unnecessary distraction to an event that should focus exclusively on Michael's legacy. Debbie will continue to celebrate Michael's memory privately." [TMZ]
• When paparazzi swarming around Debbie Rowe got too close yesterday she yelled, "Are you ready to have your butt kicked? Don't fucking touch me!" [TMZ]
• Elizabeth Taylor will be hospitalized soon but it has nothing to do with Michael Jackson. She Tweeted: "Although my grief over Michael could not be any deeper, I am not on suicide watch as some of the cheaper 'rags' would have you believe... I will always love Michael from the depth of my being and nothing can separate us" and that she's going to the hospital to complete a test I was in the middle of." [Perez Hilton]
• Reports that Tom Green is in critical condition following a car accident are untrue. Apparently it was just an internet hoax. Once again, celebrity death hoaxes = not hilarious. [BuzzFeed]
• Joyce DeWitt of Three's Company was arrested for DUI on July 4th in El Segundo, California. She allegedly drove past a barricade and failed a sobriety test. She's out on bail. [TMZ]
• You can check out Joyce DeWitt's mug shot here: [TMZ]
• Sharon Stone got into a fight with a flight attendant on a plane headed to Salt Lake City. A witness says, "The flight attendant in Kalispell asked her to gate check her bag and Sharon refused and got into a huge fight with her. They eventually took the bag from her and she screamed at her assistant with her and made a scene during the entire flight." Though her rep denies it, the source says she was met by the police when she got off the plane. [Stylelist]
• Casey Kasem retired this week with little notice, saying on his American Top 20 radio show over the weekend, "We began the weekend of July 4, 1970, and after 39 years this will be our final countdown." [ABC News]
• Rachel Weisz wants her fellow stars to stop using Botox. She says, "It should be banned for actors, as steroids are for sportsmen. Acting is all about expression; why would you want to iron out a frown?" [The Mirror]
• Natalie Imbruglia spoke before the United Nations today urging support for women who have fistulas, a hole in their vagina that results from childbirth without assistance or with complications. The classiest part of this article: the reference to her song "Torn" in the first line. [The Associated Press]
• Aerosmith has postponed three shows because Steven Tyler has an undisclosed injury. Joe Perry Tweeted: "Sincere apologies out 2 all Aero Fans regarding the canceled shows. It really bums me out too- you have no idea. Pray 4 Stevens speedy return." [Rolling Stone]
• Shanna Moakler says, "Travis [Barker] is leaving for tour, my babies are going with him, so I'm getting all prepared. We're lucky that Blink [182] tours are very lavish. We each have our own buses. At the venues, we set up kid rooms so the kids can kind of get out of the buses and start running around. We have a runner to take [them] 'round. They're going to be going to Canada, to see the different parts of the States … so it's pretty exciting." [People]
• Anna Paquin says that dating Stephen Moyer makes their onscreen sex scenes on True Blood easier. "Obviously, if you're already with that person then you're not having to sort of get over the 'Wow, I'm naked with someone that I don't even know the middle name of!'" she says. "I think that regardless of what kind of scene you're doing, the better you know the person ... the more open and real your performance can be," she adds. "And that goes for stunt scenes and heavy emotional scenes and sex scenes. OK, so I have a little bit of a leg up in that particular area with my on-screen [partner]." [People]
• Dane Cook's half brother has been indicted in Massachusetts on 20 counts of larceny for allegedly stealing more than $11 million from Cook over a five-year period. [TMZ]
• Kelly Osbourne on Lady GaGa: "She's a Butter Face. She has everything But the face. She reminds me of Peaches Geldof. I love Lady GaGa's tracks but I just wish she'd keep her mouth shut. She talks way too much and has too much attitude. It's starting to make me go off her." [The Mirror]
• 16-year-old Miley Cyrus is on the cover of a women's magazine again. This time it's Elle. In the mag she says of her new clothing line with Max Azria for Wal-Mart: "The jeans are my favorite part of the entire line. Because, like, literally this is going to be good for, like, Middle America, and it will be great for kids that really want to be in fashion but that don't have it available." [Just Jared]
• "I turned 50 last year. It came and went and it wasn't a big deal. And it was nice that the anticipation of it was over. Not that I was sitting around dreading it all the time, but it is a big one and you are sort of entering into your second half. You are saying goodbye to your youth, but at the same time you start to look at the glass as half full. At 50, you've lived long enough to have people that you love die and people get really sick and have full-on hard times, so you just take stock and count your blessings. It starts to happen around this age and it has been really liberating for me. 50 isn't just the new 40. It's actually the new 30. Pass it on!" — Michelle Pfeiffer [The Mirror]
• Emma Watson says she's excited about starting college this fall and taking a break from acting. "I'm going to sound really like Hermione Granger, but my comfort - my way of dealing with all of this if I'm ever really stressed - I will go and open a book and sit and read, and that will de-stress me. For me, learning has been my comfort. This is so geeky, but it's what got me through. I love learning and I don't really want to stop. It was always my dream before I did the films, so I didn't see why that had to change." [The Telegraph]

• How did Brad Pitt end up in Inglourious Basterds? Booze and weed maybe:

"All I know is we talked about backstory and we talked about movies into the wee hours," Brad says. "I got up the next morning and I saw five empty bottles of wine on the floor. Five. And something that resembled smoking apparatus, I don't know what that was. Apparently I had agreed to do the movie and six weeks later I was in a uniform." You read that right: He and Quentin Tarantino were wasted and talking about Hitler. [Guardian]

• "'Today' show's Ann Curry can't keep hands off 'Inglourious Basterds' Brad Pitt in Cannes." [NY Daily News]
• Some guy named Kris Allen won this thing called American Idol. Will the Glambert have a career?!?! [Reuters, NY Daily News]
• Simon Cowell has his personal bodyguards watching over Terri Seymour after she was attacked by a disgruntled American Idol fan. [Daily Mail]
• Green Day has the most popular CD in the country, but you can't get it at Wal-Mart; "They won't carry our record because they wanted us to censor it," frontman Billie Joe Armstrong says. The retailer would have offered a "clean" version, but Billie Joe explains: "We just said no. We've never done it before. You feel like you're in 1953 or something." [AP]
• Rihanna was indeed seen kissing rapper Drake, whom you may know as Aubrey Graham, aka Jimmy Brooks on Degrassi: The Next Generation; the guy in the wheelchair. Remember that time he found out he couldn't get it up? Yeah. Anyway click here for a LOL. [People]
• The recent Bruce Springsteen hubub — in which he was accused of having an affair with his neighbor's wife — was actually extortion. The husband thought the rocker would pay "big money" to make the accusations "go away." [NY Post]
• The brother of Jon Gosselin's alleged mistress says: "The rumors are true… Personally, I do think they're going to continue seeing each other. I think they think they can get away with it." [E!]
• Kate Gosselin says the tabloids are making her life hell and she is worried about the kids: . "I don't want them dragged into this. It kills me. I've been saying, 'Let's find a country where our show doesn't air, and let's just go there until this all dies.' I have to laugh about this, or else I'll cry. It's a matter of, when will they stop?" [People]
• Mariah Carey announced the title of her new album via Twitter: "Bcuz I Love U, I want u to be the first to know the title of my new album Memoirs Of An Imperfect Angel. It's very personal & dedicated to u." It is not dedicated to proper spelling, however. [Mirror]
• Talent firms William Morris and Endeavor are merging, which is good news for clients like Amy Adams, Keira Knightley, Ben Affleck and Matt Damon, but bad news for the 100+ people who have been laid off. [Gatecrasher]
• Chris Brown may be working on a country song called "Trapped In A Dream." Doesn't he mean nightmare? [E!]
• Kim Cattrall has written an essay about making Memorial Day meaningful for The Huffington Post. She writes: "My family has served in the military dating back at least four generations, so I can truly appreciate the sacrifices made by those men and women who have fought so courageously in defense of freedom." [HuffPo]
• Kim Kardashian's Dash stores in Miami and Calabasas CA have both been vandalized — the perps scribbled graffiti on the windows, and the kopykat krime in CA included a note which read, "We love you Kim!!" If you love her, why are you spraypainting her windows? [TMZ, E!]
• Susan Boyle: Namechecked on The Simpsons. [Mirror]
• The head honcho at Disney/ABC is being dragged into Kate Walsh's divorce battle — Kate's ex wants him to testify about Kate's finances. [TMZ]
• Josh Lucas has dumped a gf via text message in the past. "I'm sickeningly embarrassed about it to this day." [Gatecrasher]
• A man in Montana — who was accused in 2005 of trying to kidnap David Letterman's son — was denied appeal by the Montana Supreme Court. [AP]
• Michael Jackson canceled the first four opening shows of his 50-date gig at London's O2 arena, which means 80,000 fans who had bought tickets will have to wait up to eight months to see the concerts. Jackson says the cancellation is due to "technical issues." As in, technically, he is not ready to do a huge concert? [Daily Mail]
• Can you ever, ever get tired of seeing pictures of 50 Cent and Bette Midler together? [Gatecrasher]
• James Cameron's Avatar, described by Steven Soderbergh as "the craziest shit ever," may be shown in theaters for THREE MONTHS. [NY Mag]
• Natalie Cole had a kidney transplant on Tuesday; she had been have dialysis three times a week since September. [CNN]
• "'Meet me man to man and I'll save your marriage,' Katie Price's horse 'hunk' tells Peter Andre." [Daily Mail]
• In case you didn't hear, My Name Is Earl has been canceled. [Mirror, BBC]
• Abbie Cornish is in Jane Campion's new flick, Bright Star, and according to this report, she "dyed her locks chocolate brown, filled out her figure to fit with the era's rounder beauty standards and took diction lessons in order to deliver Keats' poetry just so." [WWD]
• Rosario Dawson will star opposite — ugh — Kevin James in a romcom called The Zookeeper. What is up with the schlubby dudes getting hot ladies? [Variety]
• Hank Azaria plays a reanimated ancient Egyptian bent on world domination in Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian and says: "It's kind of my niche — semi-naked, accented freak." [LA Times]
• Rapper/producer Swizz Beatz is in a relationship with Alicia Keys. But he's not yet divorced from wife Mashonda. He wants the court to seal documents related to the divorce so the public doesn't know any details. [Page Six]
• Michael Douglas spent Wednesday night moderating a panel of Washington experts on the issue of ridding the world of nuclear weapons. I watched Clean House. [USA Today]
• Phil Spector may get life in prison. [Mirror]
• Congrats to Chad Lowe and girlfriend Kim Painter, whose first child, Mabel Painter Lowe, was born on Saturday. [Star]
• Samantha Harris, the lady with the brown hair on Dancing With The Stars, will play Roxie Hart in Chicago on Broadway. [Page Six]
• Heather Mills was approached to be the face of a video game (based around someone with a prosthetic arm), but she wanted six figures to get involved with the project, and the producers were like, No. [The Sun]
• Redmond O'Neal was transferred to a new jail, where he'll begin intensive drug treatment. [People]
• "As she exhibits the bloodstained bag John Lennon's clothes were stored in after his murder, why the ex-Beatle's fans are saying 'You're just a ghoul, Yoko.'" [Daily Mail]
• RIP Wayne Allwine, who was the voice of Mickey Mouse. [Reuters]
• Blind item! "Which top model was dismissed from her agency - all because she became a Scientologist?" [Gatecrasher]
• "Batman's a hell of a lot tougher to do because he's all physical. He doesn't use guns. He's completely physical. John Connor uses guns. It's just a matter of picking somebody off and getting a good shot." — Christian Bale. [Mirror]
• "I've joined the millions and millions of women on the planet who are working mums, and I've discovered it's a real balancing act. I think the most incredible thing for me was that I didn't read any books about how to be a mum. Your instinct kicks in, and it's like you're tapping knowledge that you have in your DNA." — Rachel Weisz. [Mirror]
• "Artistically, me and Brad have been sniffing around each other for a while. The longing looks across the room, the little notes, 'I like you, do you like me.' Pretty quickly into writing I realised this is the one for Brad and then I started getting nervous – 'shit, if he doesn't do it, what the fuck am I going to do?'" — Quentin Tarantino, on Inglourious Basterds. he also says: "I'm never going to explain the spelling. When you do an artistic flourish like that, to describe it, to explain it, to take the piss out of it would invalidate the whole stroke in the first place." [Guardian]
• "We interviewed GfE's. They were intrigued by (the film). They were very helpful, very open. They would have to see the film to let me know if it's an accurate depiction of their lifestyle or not. There was only one of them we talked to that was in a committed relationship. That was one of the things we talked about — how do relationships work when this is your job? Most of them said it really doesn't. Most of them said if I'm going to get serious with someone then I'll stop working for a while and play it out. All of them said it never works out with a client. Whenever you move from the client to a real relationship it never works out. Although the one that we met who was in a committed relationship did meet that person as a client and they have been together for a long time. So I guess there are no absolutes. But in general they seem to think that doesn't work." — Steven Soderbergh, on his new film, The Girlfriend Experience. [Reuters]
• "Every time I am making a movie I feel insecure, and I feel scared, and that's part of the way I work.If one day I would be on the set feeling too secure - that would really scare me." — Penelope Cruz. [Yahoo News via AP]
• "I'd like to offer an apology and a clarification to remarks I made recently. While on the David Letterman program, I joked that I might need a ‘mail-order bride' to achieve the goal of having more children in my life. I believe that most people understood that this was a joke and took it as such. (A dated reference, no doubt, and another sign of my advancing age.) However, I do apologize to anyone who took offense." — Jack Donaghy Alec Baldwin. [MSNBC]
• "Showbiz types are people who grew up talking to themselves alone in a room for hours until they found some sort of outlet. Once they found that outlet, everything fell into place, except for the fact that they still never worked out why they still talk so much. So you see, though filled with deep emotional voids that can never be filled, Showbiz Types are an important part of our Nation's tapestry. I'm a Showbiz Type. (cue penny whistle and marching drums) But I am not a douche!!" — John Mayer. [Perez]
• "FRESH ASS PICTURE!!! YO WHY CAN'T ALL PAPARAZZI PHOTOS BE THIS GOOD? WELL OBVIOUSLY BECAUSE MOST CELEBS JUST AREN'T RIHANNA LOL! ... BUT ON THE REAL, THIS PIC IS HARDCORE. PEEP THE PERSPECTIVE SHOT OF THE CITY IN THE BACK. SOMETIMES THE PAPS OVEREXPOSE THE LENS OR HAVE THE FLASH TOO HIGH TAKING ALL THE EMOTION OUT OF THE MOMENT. THIS MOMENT IS CAPTURED IN TIME NOW. I LOOK AT OUR CURRENT SUPERSTARS LIKE LEGENDS IN THE MAKING... LIKE JUSTIN IS THE NEW MIKE , BEYONCE'S THE NEW TINA TURNER, GAGA'S MADONNA, JAY IS SINATRA... WAYNE IS HENDRIX, THOM YORKE IS ROGER WATERS, THESE ARE THE CHAMPIONS AND SHOULD BE DOCUMENTED AS SUCH. THAT SAID, IT WOULD BE DOPE IF THE PAPS OPERATED WITH THE SAME INTEGRITY AND ATTENTION TO THEIR CRAFT AS THE LEGENDS THEY PHOTOGRAPH..... GOOD JOB ON THIS ONE!" — Your friend Kanye West, complimenting a snap of Rihanna. [Kanye Univercity, NY Daily News]

[Cannes, France. May 17. Image via Getty.]

• Kate Gosselin of Jon and Kate Plus 8 says she and Jon may be through. "I don't know that we're in the same place anymore, that we want the same thing," she says.

• "I've been struggling with the question of 'Who is this person?' for a while. I remember where I was the first time I heard her name [Jon's alleged mistress]. It's one of those things where you can try to make it go away, but there's blaring, red flashing lights." [People]
• Kate Gosselin's brother Kevin Krieder and his wife Jodi have recorded an interview with Radar Online [in addition to their Star cover story, which was discussed in Midweek Madness]. They claim that Kate told her husband Jon "it's over." As for Jon and Kate Plus 8, Jodi says, "The show is not reality, and has not been for a long time. This is a train wreck." Kevin adds: "Their family is in shambles." [Radar Online]
• Amy Winehouse's concert in St. Lucia was supposed to be her comeback, but it was "more like a cry for help." She forgot some lyrics, danced erratically, and changed a song because she was "bored." The next day she approached the writer of the article and said, in a little girl voice, "I think I love you, Verky." She started running down to the beach then turned and screamed, "Wait! Are you a lesbian? Oh, well neither am I!" [ONTD]
• Wanda Sykes and her wife, Alex, welcomed twins on April 27. Her wife gave birth to the babies, named Olivia Lou and Lucas Claude. [People]
• Carrie Prejean appeared on Sean Hannity's Fox News show last night to explain her topless photos. "I'm from California. A swimsuit for us is no big deal," she said. She says she was doing a photo shoot for a surfing magazine and her vest just blew open because it was windy. "He was sneaking shots … it's inappropriate," she said. She added that she wound not pose for Playboy and has rejected an offer to star in a porn film. [The L.A. Times]
• Dethroned 2007 Miss Nevada Katie Rees is mad that she was punished for personal pictures taken of her showing a breast, flashing her thong, and "doing her best Katy Perry impression" but Miss California Carrie Prejean gets to keep her crown. "At least when those pictures of me came out, I admitted I was wrong and told young women in America how big of a mistake it was and to be careful because everything can affect your future," she said. "That's more than Carrie has done. She has lied about her age when she took the photos, lied about how many there were and hasn't acknowledged that she was wrong by breaking the contract. I don't think that is a good role model and I hope young women recognize that." [Yahoo]
• Court documents from Carrie Prejean's parents' divorce include explicit allegations from her sister that Carrie was physically abused by both parents and sexually abused by her father. The person blogging for Perez Hilton writes, "We're truly sorry to hear these kinds of things." Then snarks that she should speak out on child abuse as her new platform. How sensitive. [Perez Hilton]
• A battle is raging within Carrie Prejean's old school district in San Diego because some people want to make June 1st "Carrie Prejean Day" and of course, many are opposed. TMZ points out that in Canada June 1 is the National Day Against Homophobia. [TMZ]
• Roseanne Barr is Tweeting under the name "RoseanneBigMamai," sharing her insights like, "that miss cali is a rag, a hank of hair and two silicone bags on heels," and "donald trump is a pimp daddy." [ONTD]
• Kiefer Sutherland is back home in Los Angeles after being charged with assult for headbutting a designer in New York. The cast of 24 is rallying around him and Jon Voight reportedly gave him " a loving hug." [Yahoo]
• While staying in their rented Long Island mansion, Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie have taken to hanging out at the local Borders, Stop & Shop, and Dunkin' Donuts. They're trying to teach the kids what's normal, but the Oyster Bay locals aren't really helping "They are off the charts excited and everyone is dolled up, " says a source. "The moms are trying to look a little bit more polished. Instead of schlepping in sweat pants and messy hair, now they wear designer jeans and high heels, which they never wear. Usually it's Tod's or Gucci loafers. Everyone is putting a little more effort. Let's face it – he's a handsome guy." [People]
• Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie are expected to walk the red carpet at the Cannes Film Festival, where Brad's Inglorious Basterds will premiere. [People]
• Harrison Ford has confirmed his engagement to Calista Flockhart. When an Entertainment Tonight reporter asked if they're happy, Ford said, "You'd be the first to know if we weren't, wouldn't you," before adding, "Yes of course we are, I'm delighted." [The Star]
• Police were called to Lindsay Lohan's home because her burglar alarm went off. They thought someone had broken in because her room had been ransacked, but it turned out she had just committed the crime of having a messy bedroom. [People]
• Mad Men creator Matthew Weiner was given a CLIO Award last night, which rewards excellence in advertising. Weiner said, "I grew up loving advertising as a form of entertainment and I still enjoy it. I think about the fact that for some reason or another it is so close as an artist to the process of the mixture of business and art and wit. And I admire very much what you do. Now ironically I get to feel like I am part of the history of advertising, so thank you very much for this award." [AdWeek]
• Here's an audio recording of 911 calls from Victoria Principal, who says her maid is trying to rob her, and the maid, who says Principal is trying to shoot her. They are both suing each other. [TMZ]
• Robin Williams is resuming his Weapons of Self-Destruction and Reconstruction comedy tour after having heart surgery in March. [People]
• Carla Bruni and French President Nicholas Sarkozy are hunting for a new apartment in Paris. They checked out the late Yves Saint Laurent's flat, and if they buy it they'll be two floors up from Bruni's ex-boyfriend, Mick Jagger. [The Times]
• Howard K. Stern and two doctors, Khristine Eroshevich and Sandeep Kapoor, are being arraigned this afternoon in the Anna Nicole Smith drug case. [TMZ]
• When asked about Sarah Palin, Private Practice's Tim Daly said, "Oh, boy, I'm going to try and be as gracious as Mr. Obama has been about her." His attempt: "I'm sure she's an interesting person, but I would rather hope that, whether our politicians are women or men, they would come in a more articulate and better-informed package than Sarah Palin." [U.S. News & World Report]
• Rachel Weisz plays a recluse with lots of time on her hands in The Brothers Bloom and for the film, "I had to learn to look like I could play violin, piano, banjo, guitar. Unicycle, juggle. I had to learn to do a card trick, a really complicated one. That was me doing that card trick, it was one shot. Rap, skateboard, Pingpong. It was a lot of stuff," Weisz said. "I had two weeks to learn all the hobbies, apart from the card trick, and that was a month that I had to practice every single day." [Yahoo]
• Jay-Z's rider says he should be provided with a late-model black Maybach (either the 57 or 62 model) with tinted windows, various alcoholic beverages and, "good quality peanut butter and jelly, one martini shaker, 12 shot glasses, and a pack of Marlboro Lights." [The Smoking Gun]
• Just hours before they announced their separation Katie Price and Peter Andre appeared holding hands at the British Soap Awards. [The Daily Mail]
• Aerosmith is selling scratch off lottery tickets, which will let fans win concert tickets, backstage passes, and memorabilia. [The N.Y. Times]
• In response to reports that Paris Hilton's party guests vandalized her neighbor's cars, she says, "I had nothing to do with this... I would never egg anyone's car, especially to my boyfriend and sister's [Nicky Hilton] neighbors. My blue Bentley was egged, and so was Nicky's Ranger Rover." Nicky lives up the street from Reinhardt. [Radar Online]
• As mentioned in Midweek Madness, Shannen Doherty's broke up photographer Kurt Iswarienko's marriage, according to his mother-in-law. [Star]
• Just so you know, according to Maxim Olivia Wilde of House is the sexiest woman alive. [The Mirror]
• Martin Scorsese is directing a biopic about Frank Sinatra called Sinatra. [Variety]
• An email newsletter from British ski-wear company SkiWear4Less has been banned by the U.K. Advertising Standards Authority for including Natasha Richardson in an ad to sell ski helmets. [VideoGum]
• Wilmer Valderrama has recorded a commercial for PETA in which he urges parents not to take their kids to the circus because the animals are abused. "As an actor, it's my job to entertain people," says Valderrama. "Nobody forces me to perform, but, sadly, animals in circuses aren't so lucky. ... Animals aren't willing performers, so please don't ever take your family to a circus that uses animals." [PETA]
• Vegetarian Alicia Silverstone says "I didn't grow up on vegetarian food. I ate the same things that everyone else did. There were times when I would get selfish and eat meat - at eight years old it's hard to stick to your guns," she said, but eventually, "I started thinking, 'Why am I saving one animal and still eating steak? How can I love these creatures so much... and keep eating meat?' Ultimately I thought that if I wasn't ready to eat a dog, I shouldn't be eating meat at all." [The Daily Express]

• Rihanna has a new song, with guest vocals by Lady GaGa, titled Silly Boy. Kanye West posted it online, and the lyrics are:

"I said I'm not coming back. You fooled me once but you can't have that ego turning… Cause you had a good girl, good girl, girl. That's a keeper. You had a good girl, good girl but didn't know how to treat her… So silly boy get out my face. Why do you like the way regrets taste?" Maybe I'm old, but the vocals sound like they were performed by a GPS unit on a dashboard. [The Sun]

• Wow. Eminem is flying 200 laid-off Toledo auto workers to L.A. to be on Jimmy Kimmel Live May 15. The idea is to "put a face on" the plight of American auto workers. [Toledo Free Press]
• Tourism peeps in St. Lucia are still glad Amy Winehouse performed, even though her set at the St. Lucia Jazz Festival was cut short because of rain. Uh, didn't she walk off the stage? [Yahoo News via AP]
• Madonna is so over Yankee Alex Rodriguez, she took her kids to a Mets game. Burn! [Page Six]
• Although Brooke Shields is calling Kiefer Sutherland a "gentleman," this report notes that one of his former co-stars claims he would "go to the bar immediately after he'd finish working. He'd sit there for hours, putting them back. When it was time to go home, he'd be cantankerous and ornery. He was not a pleasant drunk." Now he faces a $1,000 fine and a year in jail in L.A. for violating his DUI probation. [Gatecrasher]
• Heidi Klum and Seal renewed their wedding vows in a "white trash" wedding, and reporter Rosemary Black writes, "Why is it still PC to make fun of a huge segment of the Caucasian population that is frequently low income and under-educated?" [NY Daily News]
• Will Kara DioGuardi return for another season of American Idol? Seems like she doesn't even know: "I hope I'm here for another season," she says, "but I haven't been asked yet." [Gatecrasher]
• After his stint on Saturday Night Live, Justin Timberlake had dinner with girlfriend Jessica Biel and father Randy Timberlake, who "seemed really proud of him." Aww. [Page Six]
• A lady who works at a St. Louis beauty salon found the Twilight sequel script in the trash outside of a hotel. She returned the New Moon pages to the studio and has been invited to the premiere. [Breitbart]
• The National Enquirer says that Kevin Federline wants more cash from Britney: He currently gets about $40,000 a month but "can't afford the rent, his help, the food and the booze it takes to keep up (his home)." According to a source. [MSNBC]
• Speaking of Britney, Sam Lutfi may have to pay her legal fees from the courtroom battle over the restraining order; that's about $123,142. Not to mention the $72,292 her lawyers are going to try and squeeze out of Adnan Ghalib. [People]
• How will the show Jon & Kate Plus 8 — the fifth season of which premieres in two weeks — deal with the "scandal" its star, Jon Gosselin is involved in? [MSNBC]
• Oh, no. No no no no. Jennifer Aniston wants to be on Mad Men. "I like Mad Men," says Jennifer. "I would love to be in that, it's great. I love the era. I would love it if they offered me a role." But, but, that's part of the charm! That there are no "stars," except for the ones the show created! Sniff. Sob. [Daily Express]
• These drunk pix allegedly caused the marriage of Katie "Jordan" Price and Peter Andre to disintegrate. The "mystery man" makes my gaydar ping, though. [The Sun]
• On Celebrity Apprentice, Joan Rivers sniped that Annie Duke was "worse than Hitler; Hitler never had PMS." Now Rivers says: "It's just an expression. But I stand behind it." [CNN]
• This paper says Joan Rivers is "forever the comeback kid." [NY Daily News]
• In this video interview from August, Farrah Fawcett talks about her terminal cancer: "It's much easier to go through something and deal with it without being under a microscope. It was stressful. I was terrified of getting the chemo. It's not pleasant. And the radiation is not pleasant. It becomes your life. People call, 'How are you?' 'How do you feel?' 'We're praying for you.' 'Do you still have your hair?' 'What do you feel like?' When every single call is that kind of call… it's all you talk about. It's all-consuming. Then, your quality of life is never the same." [LA Times]
• In this video, Farrah Fawcett's friend Alana Stewart talks about the "cutting edge" treatment FF received in Germany. [ET]
• Ryan O'Neal recalls the moment he knew Farrah Fawcett was really really sick; they were walking on the beach: "We used to take that walk all the time to the rocks and back. And halfway there she stopped and said, 'Can we go back?' And Red and I looked at each other and we knew…" Also, Farrah doesn't realize son Redmond visits the house in shackles, since he is currently serving a jail sentence. "When you go in to her," Ryan tells Redmond, "don't rattle your chains." Ryan told Today's Meredith Vieira, "She doesn't know... she just holds him." [People]
• The Gossip Girl spinoff, possibly now called Lily and not Valley Girls, appears to be BACK ON. [NY Mag]
• Heidi Montag Pratt has a new video, which involves writhing in a bikini. Also breaking: The sky is blue. [Perez]
• In this interview with Depeche Mode, Martin Gore talks about giving up drinking and Andy Fletcher comments on the band's 30th year of being together: "I think at first when we found out it was going to be 30 years, I think it was, 'Oh my God, how embarrassing. We're really old!' But I think now we've really got our heads around it, and I think it's something to be actually proud of." [CNN]
• Yoko Ono has unveiled a John Lennon exhibit at New York City's Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Annex. Included is a billboard featuring Lennon's blood-splattered glasses that marked the 30th anniversary of his death. Ono says: "I thought I might be criticized for it.. But it's very important now for people to understand what violence is about." [USA Today]
• Congrats to SNL star Maya Rudolph, who is expecting baby number 2. [People]
• Ooh, Rachel Weisz is in talks to play one of my faves, Hedy Lamarr, in a flick called Face Value. Lamarr was not only a screen siren but an accomplished scientist; she created a method of changing frequencies which is the key to modern wireless communication — which will be the subject of the film. [The Hollywood Reporter]
• Dermot Mulroney will make his directorial debut, Keep It Together, a comedy/drama about "love and divorce." Christopher Walken and Blythe Danner in negotiations to join the cast! [The Hollywood Reporter]
• Scott Speedman is in Atom Egoyan's film Adoration as a tow truck driver: "The guy teaching me didn't realize I was an actor doing it for a movie. He yelled at me up and down. I didn't use a tow double, even though I'm sure they had one at the ready." [USA Today]
• Every anniversary, Tori Spelling's husband slips a new diamond ring on her finger and this year it is a white diamond and a yellow diamond and blah blah blah being rich is awesome. [People]
• Trudie Styler, who co-founded the Rainforest Foundation, flew her hairstylist from New York to Washington, DC, last weekend on a private jet to do her hair and makeup for the White House Correspondents' Dinner. [Page Six]
• Mark Landon, eldest son of Michael Landon, has died at age 60. [Yahoo News via AP]
• The Simpsons stamp could become the nation's most popular stamp, knocking Elvis out of the top spot! [NY Post]
• Blind item! "Which buxom B-list pinup only helps out charities that ply her with cocaine?" [Gatecrasher]
• "How would you like being a young actor walking into a casting agent and the first thing they say is, 'Leave!' " — Liev Schreiber on NPR on the way people used to mispronounce his name. [Page Six]
• "As a mother, you have to read your kids a lot of these books, so it's fun to get involved in the process. I've had such a good time with this. This book is about becoming self aware and that realization in childhood. The title is my nickname, and I hated my nickname when I was seven years old. At that age, I tried to get rid of my freckles and I hated dodgeball - I still hate dodgeball." — Julianne Moore, at a reading of her second children's book, Freckleface Strawberry and the Dodgeball Bully. [WWD]
• "When David and I got to the first shoot we were both standing in our bathrobes, looking at each other and saying, 'Okay, who's going to drop their dressing gown first?' It can be a little intimidating standing half-naked in a studio full of strangers, so it's good to have the support of each other, reassuring and encouraging one another. David is always incredibly supportive of everything I do. I never used to go to the gym before working with Armani – but if you're going to be photographed in your bra and knickers you want to look as good as you can… I still work out every day. I drop the kids at school, and from the school I go to the gym and do the miles on the treadmill. I have worked hard, and if you are going to agree to be photographed in underwear you have to put the hours in, so when you turn up on the day and take off your robe you feel confident that you can do the job. As a 35-year-old mother of three, I'm looking okay." — Victoria Beckham. [The Sun]

• Rihanna was the big show-stopper at the Met Ball: Celebs cheered when she took the stage to perform. And! At an after-party, guess who RiRi was in deep convo with?

None other than Ms. Anna Wintour. Will someone be gracing the pages of Vogue very soon? [Gatecrasher]

• Have people stopped returning Lindsay Lohan's phone calls? Apparently Pharrell Williams had offered to help her revive her music career, she tells Interview: "He's an amazing guy. He's only been really kind to me whenever I've met him. He said, 'I'd love to make a great record with you, but I want to take you out of all the elements that you're used to. Let's go away. Let's go somewhere nice where you can be focused, and let's make an album there.'" Of course, she hasn't heard from him since and says: "Pharrell, please call me back!" [Daily Express]
• It seems that Kiefer Sutherland did indeed intentionally headbutt Proenza Schouler designer Jack McCollough, who allegedly knocked over Brooke Shields; Kiefer was coming to Brooke's rescue or something. Met Ball dramz! [TMZ]
• Brooke Shields' rep is saying "nothing happened to her" and "Jack did nothing inappropriate. It's not clear what caused Kiefer to do what he did." [TMZ]
• A source says Kiefer Sutherland "was really drunk and he got accidentally bumped by McCollough. They started arguing and then he just head-butted him." Hmm. Kiefer's been arrested for DUI twice. [Page Six]
• More on this in Midweek Madness, but Us magazine is confirming that star of Jon & Kate Plus 8 Jon Gosselin, 32, has been having an affair with third grade school teacher Deanna Hummel, 23. [Just Jared]
• Amy Winehouse's dad is kicking "freeloading pals" out of her hotel room in St. Lucia — her two friends Violetta and Thalia were having "all-day boozing sessions" on Amy's dime. A source says: "Amy performs for the first time in ages at the St Lucia Jazz Festival this week. Mitch knows she has to get it right." [The Sun]
• Paula Abdul is saying pain killers are to blame for when she would "get weird." [MSNBC Scoop]
• Madonna is planning a concert in St. Petersburg, Russia, but local authorities are calling it a "natural disaster" and want "guarantees that there will be no blasphemy." Ha! [Page Six]
• Victoria Beckham wears her sunglasses at night. In the rain. [The Sun]
• Excellent news: Mindy Kaling has a new deal with NBC; she'll continue to write for and appear on The Office next season while simultaneously developing a comedy in which she would also star. She says: "This is my first step in a Transformers-style way to take over the whole world." [Variety]
• Holy gray T-shirt! These pictures of Simon Cowell's new £15million mansion which looks over the Hollywood Hills are absolutely stunning. [Daily Mail]
• In a deposition regarding a lawsuit that Paris Hilton didn't do enough to promote 2006 box office bomb Pledge This, Paris says she promoted the flick "any chance I got." Her lawyer says, "She's the single busiest person on the planet." [AP]
• "Robert Pattinson 'baffled' by fans." [Mirror]
• The weight watchers have moved from Jessica and Lindsay to the King of Pop: Michael Jackson has allegedly been warned that he is "too thin" and needs to gain about 20 lbs before his 50 live shows in the UK. [The Sun]
• Details on Maggie Gyllenhaal and Peter Sarsgaard's wedding! It took place in a cloister of a convent that's a luxury bed and breakfast in Brindisi, Italy; Jake and Reese were there; guests mingled in the garden, which features a pool, wines from the nearby town of Lecce were served. [People]
• Oprah's Twitter stunt of offering everyone in America a free chicken dinner: Newsworthy. [Time]
• Speaking of Ms. Winfrey, you knew this would happen: Susan Boyle will be on Oprah. [Daily Express]
• Yesterday was Chris Brown's birthday; he turned 20 and it was "low-key." [People]
• Mia Farrow is ten days into her hunger strike for Darfur. A few days ago she said: "At this point I don't think about food. I am weaker and I am mostly in bed. I am clear-minded. I sleep less." She also says: "No one voted for President Obama with more excitement and passion than I did, but he's really been lagging and the people of Darfur can't wait." [Guardian]
• Mia Farrow is documenting her fast on YouTube. [Page Six]
• Joel Madden went on a Twitter rant after he and baby Harlow were surrounded by photographers at an airport: "Let me just say shame on any magazine or blog that post pics of us in the miami airport. The photographers were acting like animals. it was the first time i've ever seen my child scared. Not cool for any parent to see. At least in LA they gave us some space. These guys were sticking flashes in her face and bumping in to us and yelling. The most unnecessary force i've ever seen." [Perez]
• Village Voice columnist Michael Musto says Miss California USA once posed with "trannie extraordinaire" Amanda Lepore. He asked Amanda about it, but she says: "I don't remember meeting her. You know how many pictures I take!" Of Carrie Prejean's pageant answer, Ms. Lepore says: "That was stupid. She could never make a career in TV. Gays monopolize everything! She's a dummy! Now she's trying to have churches help her. That doesn't sound promising. But at least she has big tits. She can marry a high roller and have miserable kids that hate her." Musto adds: "All thanks to opposite marriage!" [Village Voice]
• Unfake my heart: A Las Vegas entertainer faces fraud charges for impersonating Toni Braxton. [AP]
• Back in the '90s, Bono wrote a poem about Elvis; it will be broadcast on the UK's Radio 4 on May 13. [The Sun]
• Rachel Weisz will star in an indie political drama, The Whistleblower, which is based on the true story of a female cop from Nebraska who serves as a peacekeeper in post-war Bosnia and exposes a United Nations cover-up of a sex trafficking scandal. [Variety]
• Will Ferrell is in talks to star in a comedy called Neighborhood Watch, directed by the guy who did Wedding Crashers. [Variety]
• Cameron Diaz plays the mother of a sick child in My Sister's Keeper, and although she appears bald in the film, didn't shave her head: She only needed to be bald for one day of shooting. [LA Times]
• Kate Walsh's divorce continues to be a mess. [TMZ]
• Debbie Matenoppoulos will get $3,595 per month in spousal support from her ex, Jay Faires. She currently lives in the couple's home and is responsible for paying all expenses, including the mortgage. [Radar Online]
• Shimmy shimmy ya: Ol' Dirty Bastard will be memorialized in an upcoming documentary and a series of tribute albums, all produced by his cousin Raison Allah Iceman. [Telegraph]
• Blind item! "Which very taken Oscar winner has been sending lots of flowers to a pretty fashion publicist?" [Gatecrasher]
• "There are many duos we wanted to draw from. Something as eccentric as The Odd Couple to Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, Withnail and I and Laurel and Hardy. It's the kind of friendship you can only have with someone of the same sex, a person you adore but who infuriates you." — Jude Law on the relationship between Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson in Guy Ritchie's new flick Sherlock Holmes. [USA Today]
• "There's tons of stuff in my name. I mean, if I told you how many Facebook pages have my name on it, you wouldn't believe it. But I am going to join Facebook. I've been doing the MySpace thing a long time and I realize a lot of people are doing Twitter, I just don't want to know what people are doing every single second of their day. I find it a little invasive, but people are into it. To each their own. I don't have the desire to send out messages all day long. That's not me. I'd rather be doing something else." — Zach Braff [Time]

(Click on any image to enlarge the pic and view captions.)

The Good:
On most of us, this polka dot number would look like a sack. On Tory Burch, it's suddenly a whimsical retro-revelation, not a bad skill in a designer.


I hate this cutout trend. It's the modern equivalent of - I don't know - bound feet or something else designed purely to designate unlimited leisure, in this case to tone one's flanks. That said? Kate Hudson looks amazing.


I really like when Martha just embraces the old-school dowdy! Two-piece! Do it!


Demi Moore's draped frock has just enough shape.


Do we notice a trend here? Rachel Weisz, with Demi, is ready for a draped Ascot Gavotte!


Dr. Lisa Alran's whimsical frock is Irene Dunne charming! And that's a compliment of a high order.


Sarah Winter has obviously found her perfect LBD.


And Kathleen Kennedy has found hers!


Jessica Biel is palying it extra-safe after the Oscars towel situation. This elegant ecru is a happy consequence!


The Bad:
The top half of Anne Hathaway's dress is one of the prettiest things I've ever seen. Then you scroll down and she's for some reason wearing her little cousin's skirt.


I actually love Erin Featherston's silhouette, but the Barbie fabrication? (And you just know those pants have that distinctive, scratchy remembered Barbie gown texture.) Not so much.


Rachel Zoe literally looks like she's playing dress-up in her mother's closet. And is also sulking because her lollipop was taken away.


Petra Levin totally pulled a Scarlett before coming here.


This I will say, sans sarcasm: props to Daisy Olarte for not using a stylist.


What Say You?
We dig a dapper three-piece well-done...but would you say that's true of JT? I have concerns about the tie pin.


Susan Fales-Hill is really in the spirit of the whole jewel thing. How's that workin' for ya?

[Images via Getty]

• Residents of Oyster Bay, Long Island, NY are mesmerized by the dreamy and mystical presence of Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt, who have been getting cozy in their town.

The heavenly hotties have been doing glam stuff like going to Dunkin' Donuts and Stop & Shop. Oyster Bay Town Supervisor John Venditto says: "When you talk to someone who has met them they're kind of glowing. People love saying they saw them. They feel something very special happened to them." A grocery store manager gushes: "They were so beautiful. They looked like they were airbrushed when they were walking. I went up to Brad and asked if he needed help and he said, 'No thanks.' I was looking at him but I don't really remember it — it was like a dream." [People]

• Did Beyoncé send a look-alike for a personal tour of a museum in Vienna while the singer herself went shopping?!?!?? [AFP]
• Because she hasn't been exposed enough, Heidi Montag will pose for Playboy. Except she won't show nips or vag; she'll be tastefully covered. The mag's new editor was previously at Maxim so this makes sense somehow. No, wait. None of it makes sense. The world has gone mad. [Perez]
• Madonna is holding private Kabbalah prayer sessions at her home in which the focus is on being able to adopt Mercy. Apparently 12-year-old Lourdes prays with her mom for a new sister every day. [Daily Express]
• Chris Brown, who is facing two felony charges for beating Rihanna, has reportedly worked out a plea deal with the court. He'll be back in front of the judge today, so more later, probably. [Radar Online]
• By the way, the jewelry Rihanna was wearing the night of the assault — $1.4 million dollars worth — was borrowed, and the jeweler is asking for her to hand it over. But the baubles are evidence now; Rihanna's lawyer is hoping the judge will release the jewels today. [TMZ]
• More on this in Midweek Madness, but Us is reporting that Jon from Jon & Kate Plus 8 was leaving a club at 2 am with a "mystery woman" and wasn't wearing his wedding band. They've got pictures! [Us]
• Amy Winehouse plans on living in St. Lucia. Like, settling down there. The weed must be awesome. Also, we can haz guest haus? [The Sun]
• Oh, good news: Sam Lutfi has been ordered to stay away from Britney Spears for three years. [Reuters]
• In case you haven't already seen it, here's a video of Julia Roberts and her filthy mouth. She really likes the word "fuck." [Pop Eater]
• Dita von Teese has a new man; he's a French aristocrat 11 years her junior. Count Louis-Marie de Castelbajac, 25, is the actor-son of fashion designer Jean-Charles de Castelbajac and his ex-wife Catherine de Castelbajac. Get it, girl! [Page Six]
• Sam Ronson DJ'd a stripper party but the ladies had to keep their clothes on until she was done, or else she couldn't concentrate. [Page Six]
• Ginger alert! Prince Harry will take his first official royal trip to the United States next month. He'll hit a charity polo match in New York and a few parties. He's single and looking to mingle! [Daily Mail]
• Oprah is bored with Twitter already. Look, if you're not one of Miss O's favorite things, you are a failure. Sorry, Twitter. [Silicon Valley Insider]
• Mel Gibson and girlfriend Oksana Grigorieva, the singer signed to his record label, went to the screening of Wolverine last night. His rep says: "Mel has been single for almost three years and it's nice to see him getting out and enjoying himself." Uh, what? His wife filed for divorce two weeks ago. [People]
• Start hyperventilating: Christian Bale has signed on for a third Batman flick. Hey, can we get a kick-ass leading lady this time or what? [Wired]
• Kate Winslet says she's not middle class. She is working class. "People don't believe that. People literally think I'm lying. Because I speak nice. My dad was very much a struggling actor and spent more of his life as a postman, as a member of a tarmac firm, as a van driver. He'd sell Christmas trees. Anything. That was my dad. […] Honestly, it was hand-me-down shoes and 10p pocket money on a Saturday that didn't go up until I was 11." [Telegraph via Marie Claire]
• LOL: Catherine Zeta-Jones wants to play Susan Boyle in a film of the singer's life. [Telegraph]
• Would a Susan Boyle book sell? One publishing dude says: "She has a story, but it's a short story." [Page Six]
• Ed Westwick and Chace Crawford might be tired of living together. Cue the offers in the comments to give Chuck Bass somewhere to sleep. [Page Six]
• Speaking of Ed Westwick, aka Chuck Bass, he has a tattoo which says "I ♥ Romance" and one that says "Heartbreak Hotel." [Gatecrasher via Interview]
• Moby hurt his ankle walking into the ring of a kickboxing session. [Page Six]
• Will Benicio Del Toro, who is in my top 3, play Bret Easton Ellis on film? [Cinematical]
• Kylie Minogue hearts golf and spent £40,000 on gear. [The Sun]
• "Rubina Ali's house is flooded with sewer water, and her feet itch. She's discovered a world of creepy-crawlies in the opaque gray water: scorpions, rats and slithery creatures with lots of legs. Two months ago, the child star of the hit movie Slumdog Millionaire was worrying about what to wear to the Oscars. Now she has come home to a very different problem: How to get the fetid water out of her family's one-room shack." [Times Of India]
• Lil Wayne's track, "I Feel Like Dying," contains a copyright infringing sample from Karma-Ann Swanepoel's song, "Once," so Lil Wayne is suing the producer who created the track. [USA Today]
• An Iggy Pop insurance ad has been banned because rock stars would actually not be eligible for coverage with this particular type of insurance. [Telegraph]
• "A stalker who threatened to kill Little Britain's David Walliams was allowed to 'marry' the star in a mock ceremony in her mental ward." [The Sun]
• Perfect timing: Michael Douglas and Oliver Stone are going to make a sequel to Wall Street. Get your tissues ready, this one is gonna be sad, we think: Fox spokesperson Gregg Brilliant says of the new Gordon Gekko flick: "We need to keep the story line under wraps, but it's literally ripped from today's headlines. It's going to be very big and very cool." Madoff-style losses? Sniff. No, not the yacht! [AP]
• Farrah Fawcett's condition: Unchanged. [Breitbart]
• An ambulance driver and a former senator have pleaded not guilty to charges that they tried to extort millions from John Travolta after his son died. [USA Today]
• Poor Ed McMahon. It's always something. Now he is suing Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in L.A. for allegedly misdiagnosing a broken neck. [TMZ]
• Blind item! "Which A-list actor's wife belongs to a secret lesbians-only club in L.A.? To keep things discreet, the club staggers arrivals so its members aren't photographed together." [Gatecrasher]
• "Writers have always been interested in my parents and in my teenage years, which I find so weird, especially now that I'm in my late thirties. That's always made me feel infantilized, like they are talking to me as if I were still 10 years old. I'm made to feel as if I were Annie in the musical." — Rachel Weisz. [BlackBook]
• "[Carrie Prejean's] 'opposite sex' marriage thing made me laugh. I've never heard it expressed that way. She said, 'In America, you have the choice between same sex marriage and opposite sex marriage,' like it was a flavor at Baskin-Robbins. You can have rocky road or mint chocolate chip." — Rosie O'Donnell. [Gatecrasher]
• "I don't think I wanna go back anymore. Seriously, I watched some old tapes recently — Harry [Hamlin, her husband] and I were going through stuff. It doesn't feel right! It feels weird. I've changed my mind. You can't go back!" — Lisa Rinna, who, after vigorously campaigning to get on the new Melrose Place, has changed her mind. [Hollywood Insider]
• "Paula's frustrating, she's annoying and I can't understand half of what she's talking about - but there's incredible comfort between us. I think we're possibly secretly in love with each other." — Simon Cowell. [Mirror]
• "One of the best things about being married is having separate bathrooms. There's nothing worse than saying 'I've got to go, I've got to go,' when it's already occupied!" — Joan Collins. [Daily Express]
• "I was bullied for being chubby. Where are they now!" — Kate Winslet, who says they called her Blubber and locked her in the art cupboard when she was in school. [Daily Mail via Marie Claire]
• "I ran into Mia in Chad this January. She'd been living in the camps and villages on the border of Darfur for weeks. She is as dedicated to this cause as any activist I know. It's these kind of efforts that help keep this tragedy in the spotlight." — George Clooney, who applauds Mia Farrow's hunger strike to call attention to Darfur and Sudan. [Daily Express]
• "I am totally confident that I am an incredible artist and performer. I am extremely confident about my body, the way I dress, the way I want to look. But I have no confidence when it comes to men. Men are a disaster area for me. It's so weird because I believe I am super sexy. I believe I am incredible, but I have absolutely no luck with boyfriends." — Lady GaGa. [The Sun]

• Lindsay Lohan just keeps on blogging: her latest MySpace message promises a "really important" response to "an email that someone sent me about a sh** friend of theirs" and ends with a shout out to Britney Spears. Lohan, who apparently is "currently listening" to Spears' Circus album, ends her message as such: "On another note. In support of a talented woman...Enjoy the music, Love always,Lindsay." [Popdirt]

• Britney, meanwhile, will be spending her time celebrating the holidays with her family: "It's family time... do the tree thing. The family comes over. It's fun," Spears says. [US Magazine]

• Heath Ledger was posthumously awarded the Australian Film Institute's international award for Best Actor last night. His sister Kate was there to accept the award, and stated: "We are so proud of him and humbly accept this award on behalf of his beautiful daughter (Matilda) who we will cherish forever." [Reuters]

• Kanye West is reportedly taking a break from music in order to seriously focus on his fashion career. [ShowbizSpy]

• Sasha Fierce may not be afraid of anything, but apparently Beyonce is: the singer claims that she is "terrified of delivering a child because I saw my nephew being born. That traumatized me." [Shine]

• OMG: The Kids in The Hall are returning to television with an all new show![CBC]

• Yikes: Alyssa Milano is currently seeking protection against a stalker that she claims "hiked miles" to come and see her. [Yahoo]

• After two years together, Ginnifer Goodwin and Chris Klein are dunzo. [People]

• Jessica Simpson has a super creative nickname for her boyfriend, Tony Romo: "Cowboy." [US Magazine]

• Pink Power Ranger and Felicity actress Amy Jo Johnson has given birth to her first child, a daughter named Francesca Christine.[People]

• Liam Gallagher is over his badass rockstar days: "I'm some old dude, man," Gallagher says, "Who wants to be a drug addict at 41? Listen, I'm 41, I've got two kids, I don't expect a 16-year-old to be looking to me for inspiration. It's the Arctic Monkeys' job now. I've done my bit. Now we go in the studio and it's just like, let's make some records." [PageSix]

• Miley Cyrus claims she'd do her infamous shoot with Annie Leibovitz all over again: "Everyone outside of America liked it a little bit more," Cyrus says. "The States are really conservative." [PageSix]

• Is Mischa Barton going to guest star on Ugly Betty?[PopCrunch]

• Actress Beverly Garland, who played Fred MacMurray's wife on My Three Sons, has died at the age of 82. [MSNBC]

• Rachel Weisz is set to play Blanche Dubois in a West End production of A Streetcar Named Desire.[BBC]

• John Rich, one half of the country duo Big & Rich, married his girlfriend Joan Bush on Saturday. The two have been dating for 5 years.[People]

• In completely random news, Vinnie Jones, who played "Juggernaut" in X-Men: The Last Stand, was arrested after getting in a bar fight in South Dakota. [NYTimes]

• Ouch: After a 17-year hype buildup, Guns and Roses' Chinese Democracy only made it to #3 on the Billboard charts. [Reuters]

[Los Angeles, December 4. Image via Bauer-Griffin]

[Images via Getty]

• Kate Moss' line for TopShop sells out in 15 minutes! "Crowds of young women, who started queuing at 7.45am, scooped up the must have designer gear without even trying it on. " [Daily Mail]
• Rachel Weisz on method acting:"We were talking about the character of Penelope when I suddenly ran upstairs and brought down these old boots. They’re basically a cross between a clown boot and a Victorian lace-up boot....They suit Penelope because they don’t go with anything, they’re really clumpy and they gave me a funny walk. The character came entirely out of those boots — I wear them in every single scene!" If shleppy shoes equal verite, color me Stella Adler! [ElleUK]
• Piaf-impersonator Marion Cotillard signed by Dior. [WWD]
• Lagerfeld descends upon the Green Mountain State. He'll be the cadaverous one in the high collar who calls you "demode." [Fashionista]

• Peter Som leaves Bill Blass. “This was an extremely difficult decision for me...At this time, however, I have chosen to focus on my own namesake collection and the development of the Peter Som brand.” [WWD]
• NARS sells condoms. With Orgasm blush, natch. They also hedge their bets with a "ways to say no" package which, yes, also comes with the blush. As long as you have Orgasm! Sales benefit Amfar programs to promote global safe sex education initiatives. [BeautyAddict]
• Louboutin ups the ante with an 8" heel. The truly fashion-forward amongst us sigh up for stiltwalking, purchase matching Uncle Sam outfits. [Guardian]
• Way to de-sexy underwear moddles: "According to Make Me A Supermodel stylist Tiana Wallace, just one slice (of bread) wedged in the front of a pair of briefs is the secret ingredient to achieving the sought-after "smooth look.'' The crumb potential sounds uncomfy! [News.com.au]
• As elections approach, American Apparel amps up its "Legalize LA" campaign. [Reuters]
• Bluefly.com introduces shop-by-character Gossip Girl pages. Best part? You can skip the tedious "say-you-love-me-first" plotline! [Extra]
• Want to see something weird? Warning: there's music. [Live Science]
• Levi's introduces the new "Ultimate Lift 544 jeans." To wear with the new ass bras, perhaps? [WWD]
• Estee Lauder is up, but cautious. [Reuters]
• Did Paul Smith plagiarize this artist's work? [Flight404]
• Just in time for the recession, Tom Ford introduces $9,240 fur boots "calculated to appeal to wealthy glam junkies and luxury ski freaks in places like Aspen and Gstaad." Barf. [Luxist via New York]
• Even Rachel Roy can't find anything in picked-over NYC thrift stores! [FabSugar]
• Just in time for Halloween, Beyonce grotesque distorted by Armani photoshoppers! [Photoshop Disasters]
• U.S. retailers cut orders, unsurprisingly; designers worry. [WWD]