Newly-crowned "Dancing With the Stars" champ Helio Castroneves did a whirlwind of TV appearances Wednesday which required a cross-country flight after the finale to New York City for a live broadcast of "Good Morning America."

Helio and dancing partner Julianne Hough were still energetic as they performed there then on "The View."
"This has been an amazing experience," Helio said on "GMA."It was a big challenge for me...In the race car, you do not move your hips and your feet."

Said Julianne: "I have said from the beginning it's not about me winning. It's about my partners winning. [Helio has] come so far and I'm so proud of him. We've said from day one all we're going to do is have fun and just do the best he can do and it got him the trophy."

Helio, a two-time Indy 500 champion, later told entertainment news show "Extra" that he has split from his fiancée, Aliette Vazquez saying "it was time to let go."

There's speculation about a budding romance between Helio and Julianne who also danced to the championship last season with Olympian Anton Apolo Ohno. If so, it would be the second time a dancer and celeb got togeher this season. Sabrina Bryan and dance partner Mark Ballas were eliminated earlier than expected but their romance has endured.

Helio and Julianne edged Spice Girl Melanie Brown and partner Maksim Chmerkovskiy in what is considered to be the most dramatic finale ever for the show. Fan favorite Marie Osmond was the first to be eliminated in the finals which resulted in the final showdown between the two highest-scoring couples.

Melanie and Maksim appeared on "GMA" via satillite from L.A. and the Spice Girl said: "I'm so amazed that America embraced us so much and voted for us. I am honored to be on this show for this long, truly."

Then she quipped: "We were robbed."

Maksim, who had dissed Marie prior to the finals saying she had played-up some of her personal travails to get votes, said he wouldn't trade the experience but also said he wouldn't be returning next season. He made it to the finals with partner Laila Ali last season.

"I wouldn't trade the two friendships for any trophy," he said. "Helio can keep this one."

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 1:47 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I ask you, how does In Touch Magazine not get sued like, every week?

This magazine splashes so many untruths on its cover, week after week, that I would not line my birdcage with it - if I had one.

The latest cover has the parental skills-challenged Britney Spears as pregnant again - this time with music producer J.R. Rotem's child. Britney sent a message to Ryan Seacrest during his 102.7 KIIS FM radio show this morning, saying, "It's B.S. Don't know who made it up. J.R. doesn't even know what's up. It's completely false."

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 12:54 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Gotcha!

It's the real Daniel Craig and Nicole Kidman at the premiere of their new film "The Golden Compass." I'm certain it will fare better at the box office than their last collaboration, "The Invasion," which was a real summer stinker.

"Compass" bows Dec. 7.

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 12:25 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Bob Barker, who hosted “The Price Is Right” for nearly 35 years, was grand marshall of the Hollywood Santa Parade on Sunday night but before he hit the parade route, I caught up with him for a quick gab.

I quickly introduced myself then just blurted it out: What do you think of Drew Carey as the new host of “Price is Right”?

Bob, a healthy looking man of 83, did not hesitate to talk about his successor: “I think that Drew is his own man. He is not imitating me or anyone else. He's doing the show the way Drew Carey thinks it should be done and that’s exactly what he should do. Now, it’s up to the viewers. If they like his style, the show will go on forever. If they don’t, why they’ll let us know that too.”

Well, that was awfully diplomatic!

Before Bob began hosting “Price,” he had already spent 18 years as the host of “Truth or Consequences.” This is a guy who sure knows how to keep a job! So what’s he been doing now that he isn’t due at the studio every day?

“I have been sitting and doing nothing and I think I excell at it,” he said, straight-faced. “I think I’m going to be a complete success as a retiree, I really do.”

I wasn’t buying it.

Then this longtime animal activist told me what he has really been up to: “Actually, I’ve been very busy. I’ve been out of town. I went to Anchorage, Alaska, to help an elephant get from Alaska down to a sanctuary down in Northern California and I’ve been working on some other aniimal projects. I’ve really been very busy but I’m looking forward to eventually being retired.”

Does that mean no more Bob Barker on TV?

“I have done some spots just recently and I’m gonna write a book and that will take a lot of my time.”

Let's hope Bob does something REALLY fun like the classic cameo he did in "Happy Gilmore" when he kicks the crap out of Adam Sandler on the golf course. I think the sky's the limit - next we should have him taking down The Rock or someone like that.

Could be a riot!

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 12:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

In support of the Writers Guild of America strike, "Ugly Betty" cast members America Ferrera, Judith Light, Rebecca Romijn, Ana Ortiz, Ashley Jensen, Mark Indelicato, Tony Plana, Freddy Rodriguez, Eric Mabius, Christopher Gorham and Michael Urie filmed this very dramatic ad that certainly gets its point across:

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 3:05 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Awe.
Just so beautiful. Here is the very first photo of Valentina Paloma Pinault and her mother, Salma Hayek. Her father is Francois-Henri Pinault...

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 2:12 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

How great it was to chat with Zach Braff and Lisa Kudrow this morning after they announced the nominees for Film Independent’s Spirit Awards in Beverly Hills.

Of course everyone knows Lisa from her role as Pheobe on “Friends” but what isn’t as well-known is her gem of her HBO comedy “The Comeback” which earned her an Emmy nod for her role as actress Valerie Cherish.

But the show, critically acclaimed with a loyal but perhaps too small a following, lasted only a single season.
I asked Lisa about the show and Zach interjected with: “I was just telling her how much I loved it.”
Lisa: “Yeah, me too.”

I wondered if there had been any talk of the series returning and Lisa said: “Oh God, I wish. I would love to do more. \[The cancellation\] was a heartbreak. It was, I was gonna say my pride and joy, but I have a child so he would occupy that space in my heart.”
Zach: “What about “The Comeback: The Movie”?
Lisa: “That didn’t happen either!

The actress next appears in the romantic comedy “P.S. I Love You” out Dec. 21.

Zach, winner of a 2005 Spirit Award for best first feature (he wrote and starred in “Garden State”) said the world of independent film has provided with roles far different than the wacky doctor he has played on “Scrubs” for eight seasons.

“I always say to people that I would not have been cast in that movie had I not written it because it’s hard to break out of what people see you as,” he said. “I think that’s one of the things that’s so wonderful about independent cinema.”

Monday was the last day of shooting on the final season of “Scrubs” which will end six episodes prematurely if the writers strike is not resolved soon.

“This is really sad and I’m sad it’s over and I hope we get to do the last six,” Zach said. “But \[fans\] should know that \[the strike\] is for a really important cause. It’s not really about wealthy people getting wealthier, it’s about the rank-and-file writers who pay their mortgage with residuals. Something has to be done now because all of entertainment is moving to the Internet and those people need to have a way to have an income. So we who have been very successful in the business want to stand by the people who have not been as fortunate and say, ‘We’ll do whatever we can to make sure you are paid fairly.”

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 2:10 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Why is this man smiling?

Maybe it's because the L.A. County District Attorney isn't gonna throw him in the slammer for his little slugfest with a paparazzo recently, according to TMZ.com.

"Los Angeles County prosecutors have decided NOT to file any criminal charges against actor Pierce Brosnan, who allegedly got into a scuffle with a photographer in Malibu last month. The District Attorney's office found that there was insufficient evidence to pursue a battery charge against the former 'James Bond' actor."

Brosnan had been under investigation for allegedly sucker-punching a paparazzo at a Malibu shopping center in October.

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 1:14 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The always chipper Kelly Ripa wasn't Tuesday.
About halfway through the morning's telecast of "Live With Regis and Kelly," Ripa left the location set in the Bahamas where the show is based this week.

She has the flu.

Although she appeared to be uncharacteristically low-energy during the opening segment, she soldiered on and also did an interview with Tim Gunn of "Project Runway." Then it was bye-bye Reege. Philpin told viewers that "Kelly [is]a little bit under the weather right now. We hope she'll be back before the show is over."

She did not return.

Later, Philbin told Extra, "I thought she was pretty brave to come out and try to finish the whole show, but under the sun and everything, I guess she got a little warm."

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 12:55 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

For Kyra Sedgwick playing LAPD Deputy Chief Brenda Leigh Johnson has been a role of a lifetime and the actress’s award-winning performance has made TNT’s “The Closer” the highest-rated drama on basic cable the last two years.

Kyra and the cast return for a special two-hour episode of the show airing Monday. Although the show has a holiday theme, it was filmed last summer so its was never in danger of being impacted by the ongoing writers strike.

“I hope for everyone that they work something out that feels right and fair and good for everybody,” Kyra said when we spoke yesterday. “There’s plenty, there’s enough to go around. Knowing that, this should be solved.”

The episode has Brenda going home to Atlanta for part of it but for her own holidays, Kyra, husband Kevin Bacon and their two kids will not be making a really big deal out of things.
“Thanksgiving is the big holiday for us,” she said. “We always go away for Christmas because we’re not big fans of the holiday. We stay away and give each other one present and that’s the end of it. This year we will go work and be of service as a family somewhere.”

Winner of the Golden Globe Award and twice nominated for the Emmy for her performance as professionally tough but personally vulnerable Brenda, Kyra doesn’t try and tell writers which direction to take the cop with a major sweet tooth.

“I’m so in the part, so in her life that I can’t project myself out of it enough to know what I want for Brenda,” she said. “I really feel like it’s just too hard for me to be that objective. I don’t think she’s the kind of person who has any real insight into where her life is going anyway. I really trust the writers. I think last year was beyond my wildest dreams about where the character got to go and I’m hopeful this year will be the same.”

Kyra has steadily worked in movies for more than two decades, mostly in independent features like “Singles” and “The Woodsman” with Bacon, but occasionally she's been in big hits like “Phenomenon” and this year’s “The Game Plan.” She earned a Golden Globe nomination playing Julia Roberts sister in “Something to Talk About.”

The major success on television has led to more offers, she said, including the upcoming film “Game” in which she co-stars with Michael C. Hall.

“I’m still waiting for that real great, amazing ‘Oh my God’ role \[in movies\] I get more offers now, I don’t have to audition as much although I don’t mind auditioning. It’s hard to find something in the hiatus \[from ‘The Closer’\] The perfect thing doesn’t always come along in that six months period. ‘Game Plan’ was great because it was a big hit and it’s important to be in that kind of movie.”

But a movie role would have to be pretty spectacular if it is to match the richness of playing Det. Johnson each week. Last season, Brenda had a health situation with early onset of menopause which Kyra says "was fantastic to play, not knowing much about menapause. It really is such a huge deal. I can imagine if men went through it, we;d hear about nothing else. It was exciting for me to do the research about it and talk to women.I think eveyeine had sort of a deeper connection to Brenda after seeing her go through that stuff. She kept doing her job, never old a member of her staff and didn't even want to talk about it with her boyfriend. A lot of women have come up to me and say how amazing it was, How wonderful it was to see that on TV. No one ever talks about that on TV."

The special two-hour episode of "The Closer" airs Monday, Dec. 3 on TNT.

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 12:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

You woulda had to be a real Grinch not to get caught up in the holiday spirit at Hollywood's Santa Parade Sunday night, being held for the 76th time along the streets of Tinseltown.

Bob Barker, recently retired host of "The Price Is Right," brought some much-needed star power to the event which had been canceled the Chamber of Commerce then revived three months ago by the city of Los Angeles.

"I was delighted when the city of Los Angeles stepped in and saved the parade," Barker said before the start of the event. "The Hollywood Chamber of Commerce did all they could but they couldn't handle it financially. This gives us an opportunity to continue a true tradition. It gives us an opportunity to invite people from every community, all colors...to join together, to have fun together and together, with one voice, acknowledge that Hollywood is indeed, the entertainment capital of the world."

Barker was joined on the parade route by "Ugly Betty" star Tony Plana, Fred Willard, Dick Van Patten, a number of soap stars, and young performers from various Disney Channel and Nickelodeon shows and a float with firefighters from various Southern California companies.
B efore the celebs took their places in the parade, I chatted with a number of them - whether I'd heard of them or not!

"This is my first time in the parade," said Daniel Curtis Lee, one of the stars of "Ned's Declassified School Survival Guide." "A couple of my castmates had done if before but I was busy in Mississipi for the holidays. It's a great atmosphere."

Rip Taylor, who I have heard of, was telling jokes left and right: "On behalf of Bob, I had my hair neutered today," said the famously wigged comedian who came armed with his trademark confetti in his pocket.

I wanted to know what brings Rip back year after year to this parade: "Cash!" he said, without skipping a beat. "No, no. We don';t get paid for it. We love to do it for the fans, for the city. The kids scream at me and I yell back the little [expletives]. They know me from 'Zach and Cody' and from 'Jackass.' I'm still there, I'm still workin'."

Willard, currently in the FOX sitcom "Back to You," was riding in the parade for the fourth time but he had been attending it regularly for many years.

"When I first moved her, I would being my daughter up to Hollywood Boulevard, she would sit on my shoulders and watch the parade. She's grown up now and today my grandson will be in the car with me. Everyone was so upset when we thought there wasn't going to be a Christmas parade....It's so festive and so much fun. Now it's back and it should go on forever."

Plana had previously participated in the parade when he was a member of the cast of Showtime's "Rescurrection Blvd." and said "I love it because it's a local parade, it's a community parade and most of the people who come to this parade to watch it are Latinos because they live in this area som it's a great connect for me to be able to represent Latinos on television and Latinos in the audience. They love our show."

He said the cast of "Ugly Betty" will be filming episodes until Dec. 6 bringing the season's total to 13 which could be it unless the writers strike is resolved soon. Negotiations are expected to resume today.
"We're hoping that it will be resolved soon so we can go back and finish this wonderful season that we have planned," the actor said.

Kevin Chapman of Showtime's "Brotherhood" had been to the parade the last few years with his wife and kids as a spectator.
"I was just in the crowd, enjoying the parade," he said. "When I was asked to participate this year, it was a slam dunk. It's a really great thing for the community to get everyone together and gets you in the holiday spirit."

Melody Thomas Scott, Nikki Newman on the daytime soap "The Young and the Restless" for 28 years, was riding in the parade for the first time but as a child, she was a regular along the parade route.
"When I was 4,5,6,7,8,9,10, I was at the corner of Chuenga and Hollywood every year," she said. "If someone had told me that I'd grow up and be famous enough to be asked to be to be in the parade, I would not have believed it. It's very exciting to be here."

Scott's co-star, Don Diamont, was among those from the soap riding together. He has played Brad Carlton on the show for 20 years and in 2000, was one of People Magazine's 50 Most Beautiful People.

"I grew up watching the Hollywood Christmas Parade, I never missed it," he said. "Melody called and asked me if I would join her in her car and I jumped at the chance."

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 11:22 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Is this really such a smart idea?

Maksim Chmerkovskiy, who participates in the “Dancing With the Stars” finale tonight with his partner Mel B. (aka Scary Spice), doesn’t think Marie Osmond deserves to be in the final with him and Scary along with Helio Castroneves and partner Julianne Hough.

“Frankly, I think there were a lot of other people better than Marie,” Chmerkovskiy told “Extra,” suggesting that the 48-year-old singer was carried into the finale due to public sympathy over the loss of her father and her 16-year-old son’s recent entry into rehab.

“I know first-hand there are a lot of celebrities on the show that went through similar situations this season and decided not to make it public,” he said.

Ouch!

That might cost Maksim some votes. Marie is a showbiz survivor who enjoys enduring and deep affection from the public.

The final results will be revealed tomorrow night on ABC.

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 1:24 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

As far as celeb mug shots go, Daniel Dae Kim's is not so bad. But it's small consolation to the "Lost" star who was very apologetic and horrified by his drunk driving arrest in Hawaii a month ago.
The day after Thanksgiving, the actor pleaded not guilty to a DUI charge. He was not present in court and was not required to be. His lawyer entered the plea and requested a trial date.
His license has been revoked for six months, the AP says.

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 11:05 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Oprah Winfrey visited her elite Leadership Girls School in South Africa on Sunday which is recovering from an abuse scandal.

People magazine reports this morning that Oprah met with the father of a 12-year-old girl who had allegedly been abused along with her mother. He told the magazine:"The meeting went well. It took about two hours, and I appreciate that Oprah took time to listen," the father said. "Oprah looked beautiful and was so easy to talk to. It went very smoothly...I am very happy and pleased that Oprah heard our side of the story," added the father, whose name is not being revealed. "We have closure."

The emotional meeting is one of several Winfrey had throughout the day.

"I think they are planning new rules and staff for the school," he said, expressing happiness that his daughter will return to complete eighth grade there. (The academy is located in Henley-on-Klip, south of Johannesburg.) "I am so excited because we were invited to the end-of-year school party, which will be on Tuesday. The other pupils and families knew about the party, but we were never told. So it was a big surprise for us when Oprah asked us to join the party."
"I am happy because at last we had a chance to speak. Oprah resolved everything."

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 8:55 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

What an uncool way to find out that your wife is divorcing you...ouch!
LINDA MARIE BOLLEA has filed divorce papers to end her 24-year marriage to TERRY GENE BOLLEA, better known as HULK HOGAN, it was reported by People magazine.

The magazine also reports that according to the St. Petersburg Times, a Times reporter reportedly broke the news to Hogan on Friday night.

He thanked the reporter for the "great information" then called back five minutes later to say, "I'm kind of shocked. You caught me off-guard. My wife has been in California for about three weeks. ... Holy smokes. Wow, you just knocked the bottom out of me. ... I just pulled over to the side of the road for five minutes to find out what was going on here."

The Hogans have most recently been in the news when their son, NICK, 17, crashed a Toyota Supra into a palm tree in the median of a highway. He faces felony charges.

The couple also has a daughter Brooke, 19.

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 12:01 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Brandon Routh, star of "Superman Returns," married his longtime girlfriend, Courtney Ford, on Saturday just outside Santa Barbara. ET.com reports that he was excorted down the aisle by his parents and that the couple wrote their own vows which they recited, overlooking the ocean.
The wedding took place at the 3000-acre El Capitan Ranch owned by "Superman" producer Jon Peters. Among the guests were the film's Lois Lane, Kate Bosworth, the film's director Bryan Singer, and Warner Bros. President Alan Horn.
Routh and Ford have been together for four years and became engaged in August, 2006. They had been high-school sweethearts and reconnected while Routh was bartending at the rehearsal dinner for Ford's brother's wedding.
His bartending days are long behind him!

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 12:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

When a publicist asked if I wanted to chat with Jimmy Jean-Louis at an event last week, I nodded yes - basically as a courtesy. I don’t watch “Heroes,” the hit NBC show on which he plays “The Haitian,” so I did not recognize him.

But after our conversation, I found myself a big fan of this man who has a unique perspective on the sudden that has come to him and the rest of the show’s cast - most of whom were unknowns - over the past year.

“In my case it’s very special because I come from Haiti, a place where I really grew up with nothing. No shoes, no shirt, or anything like that,” he explained. “So to have that kind of beginning and end up where I am now, it’s a huge stretch. So I don’t know if everybody is having the same experience even though we are all on the same show. I know that it’s something quite unbelievable coming from where I’m coming from.”

He moved to Paris as a young man to pursue modeling and began landing roles in French musical theater and in television commercials. Then came a move to L.A. and small roles in some hit films (“The Bourne Identity” and “Monster-in-Law”) and some flops (“Tears of the Sun” and “Hollywood Homicide.”).

But to be cast on “Heroes” and have it be a break-out hit right out of the gate, that was a shocker.

“Amazing, just amazing. Because it was unexpected, you know? Life is unexpected. So to find myself in one of the biggest TV shows in the world, I was like, ‘Wow! OK, what am I gonna do with it?’ So, I’m taking it as it comes and hopefully I’ll be able to keep on moving up with the show but also by doing other projects.”

He co-starred with Mo’Nique in the comedy “Phat Girlz.” But he’s not ready to give up his day job even though production on “Heroes” stopped Nov. 9 due to the writers strike.

“I like the direction they are going with \[my character\]. But the thing about being with “Heroes” is you never know what’s going to happen with your character. They don’t tell you anything until the script is ready to be given to you. So, I’m in the dark the same way the audience is unless I’m shooting.”

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 12:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Nestor Carbonell is part of a big-name cast on the CBS drama “Cane” that has one thing in common: the leads are all Latino.

There’s Emmy-winner Jimmy Smits, Emmy-winner Hector Elizondo and Oscar-winner Rita Moreno, among others.

“I’m so thrilled,” Nestor said when we chatted last week. “You always hope that strides are made and I feel they certainly have been. Even before “Suddenly Susan” when I started \[in 1996\], the kinds of roles that were open to Latinos are nothing like there are today.”

On “Susan,” his role on the Brooke Shields sitcom required that Nestor speak with a thick accent, nothing like the erudite Harvard grad actually sounds.

“You have felt that in the past, the minority characters quite often are ancillary characters to a show. Here, you have a show where most of the cast is Latino. It’s wonderful and we hope that we can break ground and that it doesn’t stop just with ‘Cane.’”

The wealthy Duque family is in the sugar and rum business and Frank is constantly overshadowed by Smits’ Alex character.

I wondered what it was like for Nestor to work with Smits, with whom he shares many heated scenes including a few weeks ago when he landed a right hook to his on-screen brother’s jaw.
“He’s amazing,” Nestor says of Smits.
I then blurt out: “But you punched him!”
Nestor, cool as ever, replied: “I did punch him. It felt kinda good though (laughs).”
“I never knew Jimmy,” he continued. “I had met him sort of briefly at events but never knew him. It’s been a real joy. The star sets the tone for the show and we have an amazing star in him. He’s always looking out for everyone in every part of the process.”

The handsome actor, who turns 40 on Dec. 1, is on a nice career roll. In addition to “Cane,” he will be seen next summer in as the mayor of Gotham City in “The Dark Knight,” the sequel to “Batman Begins.”
Nestor has worked steadily on television since “Suddenly Susan” with recurring roles on “Lost,” “Strong Medicine,” “Resurrection Blvd.” “Kim Possible” and “Cold Case.”

But “Cane” gives him a leading role in a drama for the first time since the short-lived CBS drama “Century City in 2004.

“It is a great role,” he said of Richard. “It’s sort of the brother who’s been passed over and he’s got an ax to grind. But he’s conflicted. He’s got love for his family on the one hand and obviously he’s got this contentious relationship with his adopted brother. It’s great stuff to play.”

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 12:02 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

In Hollywood, most actresses are ready to let inquiring minds know exactly what designer they are wearing on the red carpet.

But when Brittany Snow was asked the question by a People magazine reporter standing next to me on the red carpet of the 15th annual Diversity Awards over the weekend, I just loved her honest reply: "I don't know!"

Then she explained.

"It's been a long night. I had something else to wear, it got ruined. I, at the very last minute, pulled this out of my closet. That's why I'm not exactly sure."

The blond-haired, blue-eyed beauty also seemed perplexed about why she was receiving an award as 2007's rising star from the Multicultural Motion Picture Association when the character she played in the musical smash "Hairspray" was a racist.

"My character didn't like anybody except for herself so that's not very diverse," she said. "It's nice that they recognize that I'm not like my character and that they appreciate the movie and what it stood for."

The movie, one of the highest-grossing musicals in Hollywood history, was released on DVD on Tuesday. It's the biggest hit of Snow's career, which also includes the films "John Tucker Must Die" and "The Pacifier" and a recurring role on television's "Nip/Tuck."

Brittany, who gained fame on the series "American Dreams," hopes people are not only entertained by "Hairspray" but take home the message of tolerance and acceptance of people different from you.

"I'm just really grateful that people have loved it and taken it to their hearts," she said. "The movie has a great message that it shows in a very light-hearted way. It's not hitting you over the head. There is a great message about acceptance and believing in yourself and accepting people for their differences, no matter what it is. All at the same time we are singing and dancing. What better way to get a message across?"

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 12:01 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Nancy Grace took her son John David home from the hospital Wednesday. The boy is the healthier of the twins Grace gave birth to on Nov. 4 and just passed the five pound mark. His sister, Lucy, is at 3 lbs, 6 oz.
"Nancy is thrilled that John David will be home for Thanksgiving," Grace's rep Patty Caruso told PEOPLE. "She is praying that Lucy Elizabeth comes home soon, too."

Grace, 48, had to deliver the babies a few months early after developing a pulmonary edema during the pregnancy. She was released from an Atlanta hospital Nov. 16 and remains on medication. Grace is married to investment banker David Linch.

*******************************************************************************

Then we have actress Isla Fisher ("Wedding Crashers") stepping out with month-old Olive and daddy Sacha Baron Cohen (a.k.a. Borat). They were snapped outside the Four Seasons Beverly Hills.

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 12:28 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I love this young mega-talent, a rising star with a good head on her shoulders. Nikki sang "You Can't Stop the Beat" from the new "Hairspray" DVD at the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade.

Here is a clip:

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 12:15 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Lisa Edelstein of “House” will be giving thanks if the entertainment industry’s striking writers can settle their differences with producers so her show and others can resume production.

“When we got the news that they were going back to the table [on Monday], I felt like about 1,000 pounds had been lifted from my shoulders,” she said when we chatted earlier this week. “It’s been a very sad month. I hope we come to a quick and reasonable resolution.”

Lisa was particularly excited about episodes 13 and 14 which were supposed to air after the Super Bowl. But production on “House” was halted after episode 12 was completed.

The 41-year-old actress first gained notice while still a teenager when she was known as “Lisa E” around the NYC club scene and dubbed a “celebutante” by Newsweek magazine.

But that was a long time ago, well before she became known to viewers in recurring roles on “The West Wing” a high-priced call girl, on “Ally McBeal” as a male-to-female transsexual, and on “Felicity” as the girlfriend of Scott Speedman’s character.

But the real high point has been playing Dr. Lisa Cuddy on the edgy medical drama.

“It’s really fun to play a character for this long and layers of the onion get peeled away and you get to really explore somebody,” she said. “With such smart writing, that makes it even more successful an experience.”
And then there is her leading man, Hugh Laurie.

“I love working with him,” she said. “He’s so talented and a hard worker. If you’re lazy at all, it really shows. You have to step it up with somebody like that. It’s great.”

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 3:50 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Can you BELIEVE it? "That Girl" herself, Marlo Thomas! The multiple Emmy winner still looks like a million bucks, still acts, and runs St. Jude's, the amazing hospital founded by her father, the late Danny Thomas.

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 1:31 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Thinking good thoughts on this Thanksgiving eve for the twin babies of Dennis Quaid and his wife, Kimberly, who are at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in stable condition. Thomas Boone and Zoe Grace, less than two weeks old, were mistakenly being given a massive dose of a blood thinning drug and are in neo-natal intensive care.
Cedars has issued a statement acknowledging the mistake and calling it a “preventable error.” The Quaids said through a spokesperson that they are thankful for people’s concern and are hopeful their privacy will be respected during this difficult time.

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 1:22 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Diana Ross took to the stage for a sell-out concert Tuesday night with a heavy heart. The singing legend had learned that morning that her 87-year-old father, Fred Ross, had died.
Diana, still a knock-out at 63, decided to go on with her show at the Gibson Amphitheatre at Universal City Walk and brought her children up onto the stage at the end. The former Supreme then flew to her hometown of Detroit to be with her family.
She is the latest star to lose a parent in recent weeks with the death of Kanye West’s mother, the Osmond family patriarch, and Martha Stewart’s mother.

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 1:21 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

After a long day at work, the thought of hundreds of kids running around kicking beachballs, singing karaoke and eating deep-fried macaroni and cheese balls sounds like a nightmare. But there I was Monday night at the Highlands in Hollywood where Disney through one heck of a festive party for the DVD release of "High School Musical 2." And ya know what? It was really a lot of fun. The fact that a movie and the music and the stars from that movie makes so many people happy is a wonderful thing.

And those mac & cheese balls? Like crack cocaine. I had three and decided to stand on the other side of the room before I had four, five...25 of 'em.
I missed the screening so waited outside the club for the party to start and there went Zac Efron and Vanessa Hudgens bounding up the stairs. They stopped to pose for pictures with this adorable little blonde girl who just happened to be at the absolute right place and the right time.

Once inside, I saw Cordin Blue surrounded by young fans and cast members Ashley Tisdale and Monique Coleman were among the other cast members present. Also being treated like a rock star was the film's director, Kenny Ortega, who I had chatted with the night before at the Diversity Awards where he was honored.

With the cast so famous, so quickly, I wondered if Kenny worries about them being under such an intense spotlight - especially Zac and Vanessa.
"Yeah, I do. Not that they can't handle it or that they can't be responsible. It's just that they're chased around a lot. I'm discovering that it's hard for them to have personal lives - just to step outside of an apartment and go down the street and grab a sandwich is a thing of their past. That bothers me. They love new adventure, they love being kids, they love going to the movies, they love hanging out with friends and going to parties and that part of being young has kind of been taken away from them. Their interests is what makes them interesting people. You start to pull them back and not allow them to have that sort of full experience."

I tried to get Kenny to shed some light on the phenomenal success of the franchise which has struck a deep cord with this generation of kids and their parents.
"Sometimes you just end up with a lot of the right ingredients. This was not a recipe that anybody sort of laid out and said, 'If you do all this, it's gonna work.' But we took our time I think in putting together a wonderful group of kids and [writer] Peter [Barsocchini] created a wonderful world with some stunning and important themes at the center of it. And then I think the wish fantasy of high school and music and dancing with are always so much a part of young culture. I think all of those ideas coming together made for something that has grabbed the attention of a global youth audience."
"We're doing 'High School [Musical] 3' for the big screen," he added. "We're back at East High, final year, and we're gonna bring in some new characters and have some fun. Mix it up a bit."

With the "High School Musical" franchise such a success and "Hairpsray" and "Dreamgirls" doing some well at the box office, does Kenny think this really is the return of the musical - a genre which used to dominate in decades past but since the 60s has only resurfaced, successfully, every so often.
"I'm hoping that they're gonna stay around and that we're gonna get the chance to make more of them and that audiences will want them," he said. "I just saw Julie Taymor's film the other night, "Across the Universe," and I loved it. Beatles music, brilliant staging, gorgeous casting, wonderful cinematography."

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 10:30 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Another star behaving badly.
Jonathan Rhys-Meyers, the talented actor of television's "The Tudors" and the upcoming "August Rush," was arrested at the Dublin airport over the weekend and charged with public drunkenness and breaching the peace.

The AP reports that the 30-year-old actor refused repeated requests by police to calm down. Police charged him with two counts of violating the Public Order Act. He was allowed to post bail and must return to Dublin District Court on Dec. 5 for arraignment.

He was admitted to a California alcoholism-treatment clinic in April and checked out the following month. He was in Dublin to appear on 'Tubridy Tonight,' a Saturday night national talk show to promote his new film, 'August Rush.'"

They say any publicity is good publcity so we'll see if this helps box office!

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 6:25 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The writers strike has put a stop to many things, but it won’t stop Dame Elizabeth Taylor from returning to the L.A. stage next month for a performance of A.R. Gurney’s “Love Letters” with James Earl Jones.
The great star of such classics as “Giant,” “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Wolfe” and “A Place in the Sun” has been granted a one-night waiver from the Writers Guild of America stike to go ahead with a Dec. 1 performance at a theater on the Paramount Pictures studio lot which writers have been picketing for the past two weeks.
The performance is taking place on World AIDS Day and is expected to raise about $1 million for research and care.
Miss Taylor reached out to the leadership of the guild and WGA West President Patric Verrone graciously offered to remove the picket lines for that evening so the performers and the audience could enter the studio without feeling that they are betraying the writers.
“The Writers Guild of America has shown great humanity, empathy and courage by allowing our little evening to move forward,” Dame Elizabeth said in a statement.
The Hollywood legend also took the opportunity to state her support of writers in their current stalemate with producers.
“Everyone knows that my heart belongs to people with HIV and AIDS,” she said. “I also share my heart with people who must battle unfairness. Without the gifts of writers, the world would be rather empty. I beseech those in power to treat members of the Writers Guild of America with fairness and decency.”

The last time this great star and humanitarian was on stage here was back in 1983 when she appeared in “Private Lives” opposite Richard Burton, husband number five and six. Theirs was one of the great loves stories which began on the set of "Cleopatra" in 1961 when both were married to other people. On the very first day of shooting, they knew it was true love.

They finally married in 1964 after their respective divorces were final and went on to make a strong of movies including "Woolf," "The Sandpiper," "The VIPS," "Taming of the Shrew" and "Boom!" They were the Brad and Angie of their day but divorced in 1974, remarried a year later then divorced a second time. But the connection remained and Taylor has always said that Burton and her third husband, producer Mike Todd, were the two great loves of her life. Todd was killed in a plane crash in 1958.

Miss Taylor had made her Broadway debut in “The Little Foxes” in 1980 and was nominated for a Tony Award for best actress in a play. She also brought that show to L.A. and took it to London and the feeling was that she would transition to a stage actress. But after "Private Lives," that was it.

Since then, the two-time Oscar winner has gotten divorced a few times, made some movies, launched perfume and jewelry lines and received almost all the top honors one can get: a special Oscar (the Jean Herscholt Humanitarian Award; The Kennedy Center Honors; the Presidential Medal of Freedom; the American Film Institute Life Achievement Award, and being named a Dame of the British Empire by Queen Elizabeth.

But through it all, her work on behalf of HIV/AIDS has been her first priority and passion in life and for that, so many of us are forever grateful...

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 4:41 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The strike was on the mind of hunky actor Antonio Sabato Jr. (“The Bold and the Beautiful”) when we gabbed last night at the 15th annual Diversity Awards at Universal Studios.

“I finished doing a movie in March and since then, I’ve been involved in other stuff. I have two restaurants in L.A. that I’m opening in March. Prego in Beverly Hills - that’s mine...I just had to get involved with other stuff with strikes going on and people being in charge of our life at this point. I don’t want anybody running my life. I gotta do something else. Actors get really antsy.”

He’s not optimistic about a quick resolution to the strike: “I don’t think it’s gonna be that soon. I think it’s gonna take a little bit of time...People don’t seem to be getting at the table and talking about it so I’m just moving on for the moment and then we’ll see what happens next year.”

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 4:15 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

If you had read the press release for the 15th Annual Diversity Awards, you would have expected to see Janet Jackson present an award to Chris Tucker but neither showed up. In fact, Tucker wasn't even listed in the program. So when I cornered the PR guy handling the event as the awards were underway, I asked if Tucker was present since I hadn't seen him on the red carpet and had pre-written a column for the paper with him in the lede.

"Let me check the script and I'll get back to you," he said.

He did not get back to me anytime soon and I had to junk my column and write one off the top of my head, dictating it into the phone to an editor as i paced the steps outside the Globe Theater at Universal Studios. I would have been a lot more irritated had I not had Mo'Nique there to make my night.

What. A. Woman.

She was the star of the night and got the evening's only standing ovation. We chatted before the event and I wanted to know if she knew how happy she makes people - how much she makes us smile and laugh out loud.

"If you knew how happy people made me...I pinch myself every morning and think, 'God, for real? Another day of this? Thank you! Appreciate ya sugar.'"

Mo'Nique was honored as the 2007 Renaissance Artist last night. After she gained fame as the star of the hilarious series "The Parkers," she used that success to become a real showbiz multi-hyphenate with her best seller "Skinny Women" and new book "Skinny Cooks Can't Be Trusted," a movie star in such films as "Queens of Comedy," "Phat Girlz," "Hair Show," and "Good Fences," a TV host of "Showtime at the Apollo," and the full-figured beauty pageant "Mo"Nique's F.A.T. Chance."

She says: "When you start playing by your own rules and you start playing in your own ball field, it's incredible. And when people start coming out to your games? It's really incredible....You create your own options. Just believe, that's it. People think it's a special formula where you gotta take a pill. Just simply believe. I'm a 250 pound black woman, all you gotta do is believe."

Mo'Nique brought her grandmother to the event and tearfully paid tribue to her from the stage. Earlier, she told me: "My grandmother has been an incredible force in my life. Very humble, very kind. Not real fancy. She's very simple and to the point. So when you see Mo'Nique, you see a whole lot of her."

And there were plenty of other terrific talents on hand including honorees Elijah Kelley ("Hairspray") Brittany Snow ("Hairspray"), Jackie Warner ("Workout"), Kenny Ortega, director of "High School Musical" 1 and 2),
Lisa Edelstein who accepted an award for "House."

Kevin Frazier of "Entertainment Tonight" was a smooth and charming host while E! personailty Debbie Matenopoulos was pretty annoying I must confess. Comedy is not - I repeat, not - her forte.

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 1:11 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Carter Oosterhouse doesn’t want to talk about how good looking he is.

But it’s kinda unavoidable now that one of the former stars of TLC’s “Trading Spaces” franchise is now a leading man of sorts. He’s got his own home improvement show now and it’s even got his name in the title: “Carter Can.”

“I was at the right place at the right time and there was a job available,” Carter said when I caught up with him recently. But being named one of People magazine’s sexiest men on TV probably doesn’t hurt, right?

“Someone said the other day, ‘You look like a model,’” he said. “I was like, ‘Dude, I am not a model, I’m a carpenter.’”

On HGTV’s “Carter Can,” which debuted last month, the 28-year-old Oosterhouse has the chance to show off his carpentry skills to a national audience.

“It’s a blast,” he said of the gig. “Being on a show, being able to rebuild and help people in their homes and being able to get the feedback instantly from fans all over the U.S. I work with the exact same things people are dealing with every day and re-purposing and re-doing things for their homes. When they see what you’re doing and they like it, it’s a great feeling.”
The idea is "not to just put color on the walls but the idea is to construct. We're able to get in there and actually move walls around and make the house what they really want. People don't want to leave their homes, they love their homes. But maybe they want it a little different and that's what we do."

Carter loves to talk about his work. But I want to know things like what it’s like to guest on “Oprah” and to remodel Kirstie Alley’s kitchen when she started losing all the weight?

He looks at me, like I’m from the moon.

“No, I didn’t do Kirstie Alley’s kitchen,” he said patiently. “But there are a lot of kitchens that we have done.”

Not much of a name-dropper this guy.

Carter’s older brothers, Todd and Tyler, are also carpenters and there is still a bit of sibling rivalry among them. He knows though, that he has landed a dream job being able to ply his trade on television.

“It’s great, going to different places to do this,” he said. “You’re able to build this great piece of furniture and then you’re able to leave it in a different part of the U.S. There’s something kinda cool about that.”

Is he surprised at how popular home improvement shows are these days?
“There’s always mindless entertainment and then there’s entertainment that’s almost mindless,” he explained. “But with us, people can learn stuff. They can sit back and relax and watch how to do this and how to do that.”

Carter is mindful of the writers strike that is crippling Hollywood and is worried about it: "We're not affected by the strike, hopefully we will never be affected by that. But are crossing our fingers and hoping it gets resolved real soon. I have a lot of friends who are involved in it."

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 11:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Nazanin Boniadi basically won an actor’s version of the lottery this summer.

She was one of 700 young actresses auditioned for a role in the limited-run “General Hospital” spin off “Night Shift” and one of only three to land a role in the 13-week show the Soapet cable channel. But the 28-year-old actress of Iranian descent made the most of the opportunity and found herself with a regular role on the main soap in the fall.

When we talked this week, it was clear that she was relishing her storyline which has her character of Leyla Mir involved in a love triangle between the characters of Robin Scorio and Patrick Drake.

“I love the fact that she’s the first Iranian character on television that plays a regular person,” she said. “She’s not a terrorist or a beaten wife. She’s just a nurse, she’s a hard worker and she falls in
love just like the rest of them.”

Nazanin said her visibility on the soap is especially important to Iranian-Americans who virtually never see themselves portrayed on television in any kind of meaningful way. Her parents left Iran when Nazanin was less than a month old and raised her in England. But she has always kept her Iranian name.

“I didn't change it, I don't have a stage name," she said. "A lot of people in the industry when I started said fans are not going to pronounce it or remember it. But I felt pretty strong. It's who I am. If people like me for who I am, that's great.”

It would seem that the soap is only the beginning for the actress who is a college graduate and has appeared in several independent films including "Game Face" and "Shades of Ray." She was chosen by director Mike Nichols for a dramatic scene in "Charlie Wilson's War" starring Tom Hanks and Julia Roberts which comes out next month. She also has a brief role as a reporter in next year's "Iron Man" with Robert Downey Jr.

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 9:17 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Developing: The court commissioner in her custody case has just made the ruling.

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 2:10 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Well what fun is this? At least when Paris Hilton went to jail and got an early release, she got dragged back kicking and screaming and crying. Not Lindsay Lohan.

The "Mean Girls" star, who had reached a plea deal on her two DUI cases, reported to Lynwood jail Thursday to serve her sentence which was to be a minimum of 24 hours. Just 84 minutes later, Lindsay's hard time in the hole was up and she was a free woman. All we have to remember it by is this mug shot which, frankly, isn't as good as the one from when she was first arrested. Why couldn't they have just used that one?

The LA County Sheriff's Dept. stated that Lohan, 21 and recent rehab grad, turned herself in at 10:30 a.m., and was released at 11:54 a.m. The jail has a long-standing policy of releasing non-violent offenders early due to overcrowding. Sheriff's spokesman Steve Whitmore told People.com: "Ms. Lohan was cooperative. She was fingerprinted, photographed, and put in a holding cell, but was let go due to our early release policy."

Lindsay still has to complete 10 days of community service which she began on Monday at an American Red Cross blood services facility. She is also on three years probation and must complete an 18-month alcohol program.

Let's hope her lesson has been learned!

Wayne Newton is a showbiz trouper, but even he knows the show can't go on when you have a heart condition.

Wayne had to cancel a two-month engagement at Harrah's in Las Vegas after being diagnosed with a viral infection to the heart, known as cardiomyopathy. He will be able to perform for some shows in the "Dancing with the Stars" tour early next year and will attend the "Dancing" finale in rwo weeks, but won't perform. The doctors tell Wayne that he should be recovered in two months' time.

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 7:45 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Edward Asner turned 78 years old Thursday. After winning seven Emmys and appearing in around 250 television shows and movies, is it time to rest on his laurels?

Not a chance.

I caught up with the star recently and he said: “I’m looking for the next job. One where I don’t have to leap tall buildings. I did give that up, unfortunately. Small buildings I can leap.”

Still, it’s fun to look back and he will do that tonight at The Paley Center for Media in Beverly Hills where the cast of “Lou Grant” (pictured in the late 70s)will reunite. Ed won two Emmys for that 1978-82 show set in an LA newsroom as well as three for the same
role on “The Mary Tyler Moore Show.” He also won for “Roots” and “Rich Man, Poor Man” and been nominated 16 times overall, including this year.

So where does he keep all that Emmy gold?

“Well, we wanted to put them in a shrine overlooking the curb. But, we thought that might be too ostentatious. So, they’re in a recess in the study. We do have a sign that says, ‘“See our display inside.’”

Then I asked him where his star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame is.

"It's right across from Frederick's of Hollywood (at 6363 Hollywood Blvd). I'm very proud of that location." Whenever he goes to visits his star, he said, "I look across the street and admire the selections."

Last year, he had a recurring role on NBC's now-cancelled "Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip" and the season prior, he was part of an all-star cast for the CBS sitcom "Center of the Universe."

"I'm working on a Pixar picture now, it'll be out in 2009. Can't wait to see it with my grandchildren."

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 7:42 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Our damsel of a mess is hell on wheels:
Britney was at the Four Seasons in Beverly Hills last night and a swarm of photographers were there, of course, She hasn't been out in days so everyone needed their fix I reckon.

She makes her way into the parking lot and oops! She did it again! Ran right over a photogs foot. But, according to TMZ.com (who else?) the paparazzi had refused to move. So now, Brit has ran over the foots of three people - including a sheriff's deputy outside court.

I think the photogs are just as much to blame, if not more. This whole thing is out of hand: Britney roams around LA, photogs follow. It's stupid.

Ironically, K-Feds lawyers have called for an emergency hearing tomorrow regarding Britney's driving with her two sons in the car. This stems from her running a red light on Coldwater Canyon last week.

Like I said, Hire. A. Driver. Now.

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 8:54 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

After loving her performance in the comedy “Kissing Jessica Stein” several years back, I have been a huge fan of Tovah Feldshuh.

This great actress, currently co-starring in the feature film “ “O Jerusalem,” rang me up during a recent visit to L.A. to talk about the movie and stepping into the role of Golda Meir again after playing the former Israeli prime minister on Broadway.

“She was much younger in the movie than she was in the play and there was almost literally no rehearsal time,” said the New York-based actress. “The preparation for the movie was quite different from the play because I had to do it in isolation and we shot in three weeks. I spend a year-and-a-half doing ‘Golda’s Balcony’ on the stage.”

Tovah, who turns 55 next month, set a record for the longest-running one-woman play in the history of Broadway and received her fourth Tony Award nomination. She has also been nominated twice for an Emmy, nearly 30 years ago for the mini-series “Holocaust” and more recently for her recurring role as defense attorney Danielle Melnick on “Law & Order.”

“O Jerusalem,” which has been playing in select theaters, re-creates the struggle surrounding the creation of the State of Israel in 1948. The film is told from the alternating viewpoints of the Jews, Arabs and Brits and at the center are two young, American friends - one Jewish, the other Arab.

“They are part of the intellectual youthful elite of New York City and it takes their loving friendship and transplants them into circumstrances of grave danger and two sides pitted against each other,” she explained. “They became face-to-face together with guns...It shows us what can happen to mankind and this need to kill each other is a horrifying thing. It’s tremendous agony and heartbreak.”

Tovah is proud to be a part of it even if two of her best scenes didn’t make the final cut. That doesn’t happen on the stage where she has also done a one-woman shows as Tallulah Bankhead and is in reheasals to play Katherine Hepburn in “Tea at Five.”

“I love to work,” she says. “I’ve been doing this for 30-odd years now. I’m an actor who wants to do all things in all seasons like anybody who strives to be a good transformational artist.”

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 8:45 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Marie Osmond managed to make it to the semifinals of "Dancing With the Stars" last night despite some very heavy things going on in her life. Her father died last week and she revealed today that her 16-year-old son, Michael, entered a rehab facility last week.

Marie told Larry King about it in an interview that airs on his CNN show tonight.

She has released this statement: “My son Michael is an amazing young man, shown through his courage in facing his issues. As his mother, I couldn’t be more proud of him. The press and public have always been kind and gracious in the past and I know they will continue to respect our privacy during this time.”

Michael is one of eight children Osmond has raised with ex-husband Brian Blosil.

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 3:30 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Good afternoon!

Sorry for the huge gap in posts. We are switching to a new system and it has been very difficult to blog in recent days. But things seem to be sorted out now so keep your fingers crossed!
Yesterday really represented the biggest showing of star support to date for the Wrtiers Guild of America who are on strike against the studios and producers over a contract stalemate that is now in its second week.

Among the many actors who showed their support were Katherine Heigl, T.R. Knight, Amy Brenneman, and other members of the casts of Grey’s Anatomy and Private Practice, Brad Garrett and Kat Foster from Til Death, Ray Romano of Everyone Loves Raymond, and casts of Desperate Housewives, The New Adventures of Old Christine, Army Wives, Cold Case, The Big Bang Theory, Without A Trace, Numb3rs, Rules of Engagement, Jericho, Dexter, Mad Men, Women’s Murder Club, Las Vegas..

Here is what some of the famous faces outside Universal Studios had to say:

William Petersen, CSI: “There isn’t an actor I talk to who hasn’t felt what the writers are going through.”

Camryn Manheim, Ghost Whisperer: “The writers’ fight is our fight. They’re the ones who make us look good. Writers deserve to be compensated for the entertainment, the stories, the humanity and everything they put into the world. People are benefiting from the writers’ work.”

Jon Cryer, Two and a Half Men: “Everyone knows the Internet is the future. If we don’t get a piece of that, we’re doomed.”

Jason Alexander: “This is not about some big star’s salary. It’s about big company profits. It’s high time writers shared in a percentage of the profits.”

Sarah Silverman: “It’s so crazy ridiculous. All the writers want is a small percentage of the money the producers are making on things they’re writing. The producers will still be incredibly rich, even if they give the writers what they deserve.”

Matthew Perry: “We’re all supporting you guys. I’ll personally stand on this corner until everything works out.”

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 2:23 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Keith Carradine seems to have already done it all.
He won an Oscar for his songwriting ("I'm Easy"), been nominated for a Tony (Will Rogers Follies), and starred in plenty of memorable movies including "Nashville," "The Long Riders" and "Thieves Like Us."

So what's left? A hit television show.

Now he's got that too as a new cast member on the popular Showtime drama "Dexter" about a serial killer (played by Michael C. Hall) who only knocks off bad people. Carradine's character is an FBI agent brought in to investigate after dozens of the victims bodies are found in the bay.

"It's the best kind of show to step into (laughs)," Keith said recently. "If you're invited to join a show for a season and it could be a hit show, yeah, it's great. "They had this role and somebody thought of me, they called me up and sent me a script and I said ,'Yeah!'"

And Carradine's character even strikes up a surprising romance.

"I pretty much interact with all the regulars on the show but I seem to be forming a partnership with Dexter's sister (Jennifer Carpenter) and there seems to be a blossoming romance."

She's a younger woman?

"Very much so," confirms Keith, who is 58. "It's a big scandal."

All of the season's episodes are already shot so the current writers strike has not impacted production of the show. But Carradine feels deeply about what is happening and was among the famous actors who joined picket lines Tuesday in support of striking writers.

"It's just bad for everyone and I hope it comes to resolution quickly," he said. "I'm an actor and I know there's this big audience out there for reality TV but I'm not a part of that audience. I like to be told a story and I like to be told a story by people who are good at it. It all starts with the writers."

I was curious. Keith has been in so many movies over the years, if he had to pick just five of them for some kind of time capsule, which would they be?

He did not hesitate: "'Thieves Like Us," "Southern Comfort," "The Duelist," "Nashville," "The Long Riders" (co-starring his father John and brothers David and Robert) and "Pretty Baby."

I point out that he has named six.

"I know," he said. "I'm lucky, I've been in some really fine films and worked with some wonderful directors."

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 10:07 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Good morning...
It has been so sad watching and reading the coverage of the death of Kanye West's mother, Donda West. She was just 58 and it appears may have died from complications after cosmetic surgery. All the footage aired since her death has shown a mother devoted to her son and vice-versa.
This was not just some stage mom. Donda West was a PHD who worked in higher education for more than three decades and with her son, co-founded the Kanye West Foundation with the mission of helping to combat the severe dropout problem in high schools across the country.
The Grammy-winning hip-hop artist issued a statement of thanks on Monday: "Kanye West, his family and friends would like to thank everyone for the outpouring of support and kind words that have come in from across the country since the death of his mother, Dr. Donda West.".
Instead of sending flowers, the family asks that donations be made in Dr. West's name to the Kanye West Foundation/Loop Dreams Teacher Training Institute. Those donations can be made by visiting the Foundation's Web site, www.KanyeWestFoundation.org or by mail at Kanye West Foundation, 8560 W. Sunset Blvd., West Hollywood, CA 90069.

****************************

It's going to be quite the star-studded picket line this afternoon in front of Universal Studios. The Writers Guild emailed me a list of TV stars slated to appear in support of the strike. They include: William Petersen and Marg Helgenberger of "CSI: Crime Scene Investigation," Doug Savant, Nicollette Sheridan, Dana Delany and Tuc Watkins of "Desperate Housewives," Ray Romano, George Lopez, Katherine Heigl, T.R. Knight, KaDee Stickland, Amy Brenneman and Justin Chambers.
In addition, there will be Vanessa Marcil of "Las Vegas," Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Kate Walsh, Minnie Driver and Brad Garrett.
Others include Bill Paxton and Jeanne Tripplehorn of "Big Love," Danny Pino of "Cold Case," Kim Delaney and Brian McNamara of "Army Wives," Poppy Montgomery,and Enrique Murciano of "Without a Trace," Ben Stiller and Lisa Kudrow are also expected.

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 12:05 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

When Mandy Patinkin abruptly quit the CBS hit show "Criminal Minds" over the summer, there was some question as to whether the series would be able to weather the loss as it entered its third season.
The answer to that has come: Yes!
Ratings are as high as they ever were and one of the reasons is a solid ensemble cast that includes A.J. Cook as Jennifer Jareau who is part of a team of FBI profilers from the bureau's Behavior Analysis Unit.
A.J. (short for Andrea Joy) and I met for the first time last week after she helped to announce the People's Choice Award nominations.
I wondered how things are going post-Mandy who has been replaced by Joe Mantegna. A.J. was surprisingly candid.
"In the beginning, it was very stressful because nobody really knew what was going on but it's been such a great transition. If ever there could be a great transition, this was it. Joe's fabulous, he really does feel like he's been there from the very beginning. He fits in so perfectly."
The cast is currently shooting the 12th episode of the season and likely the last one for the year unelss the writers strike suddenly gets resolved and they are able to resume with new scripts.
"We are entering into the great unknown here and I really feel for our crew. Many of them live paycheck to paycheck and can't afford to have a five or six month strike. I support the writers and I understand, I just want it to be over quickly."
Along with Cook and Montegna, "Minds" also stars Thomas Gibson, Shemar Moore, and Paget Brewster, among others.
"We feel very lucky. We've got great fans that always tune in and our fan base is getting bigger and bigger. We've been in the top 10 like every week. It's crazy. But at the same time, a lot of people don't know that. We're kind of like this quiet success which has been kind of nice. We as a cast and crew and a group, we're like a family and we love to work every day. We feel very lucky."
Like A.J., her television alter-ego also goes by her initials: "I like that J.J. has seriously evolved. She went from being a couple of lines per episode to really coming into her own. I love it whenever she gets to pull her gun out - that's exciting for me. Or when I get to put the FBI vest on and storm a building with everyone else it's a lot of fun. She's badass now, I like it."

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 3:05 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Uh boy.
There is one topic that Barbara Walters is wishing she hadn't given her "View" on last week. The veteran newswoman, co-host and producer of "The View," uncharacteristically ripped on Heather Mills when Paul McCartney's estranged wife went on a publicity blitz slamming the ex-Beatle and the media for their treatment of her,
Then came news, just a day or two later, that McCartney is now dating Nancy Shevell, who is Barbara Walters second cousin. On "The View" Monday, Barbara tried to explain that when she made the negative comments about Heather, she didn;t know that cuz was dating Paul.
"She's my second cousin," she said. "Her mother, who died, was my first cousin. And I have been very close to this young woman. ... She's separated from her husband, who's a nice man. The marriage wasn't going well, and they're separated."
Apparently not so close that Shevell wanted cousin Barbara to know about the relationship.
"I knew that there was someone, but she's very discreet," Barbara said before adding: "Certainly now, I'd like to stay as far away from the topic as possible!"
I believe Babs. Why? Because I found stories of her ripping on Heather last spring when she did not keep a scheduled appointment to appear on "The View" after she was eliminated from "Dancing With the Stars."

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 1:35 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Good Morning...
Thought I'd start with a picture of Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie taken Sunday in London where they were for the premiere of Angelina's new movie "Beowulf." People.com reports that Angelina managed to continue looking radiant despite a wardrobe mishap that involved her tight black pants beginning to split which forced Brad to keep his hand firmly place on her the entire time. Then, she apparently stepped on a wad of gum that stuck stubbornly to her shoe.
Anyway, despite all those silly magazine covers with made-up stories about impending doom in their relationship, this pair of movie star activists go on and mix their glam lives with work and play while rasing their four kids.
....Speaking of kids, Elisabeth Hasselbeck called into "The View" this morning to make a big announcement: the name of her newborn son is (drum roll, puh-leeze)... Taylor Thomas Hasselback! Elisabeth told the ladies that Taylor's big sis, Grace, has taken to her brother immediately: "She loves him. She has him on her lap this morning."
A 2-year-old with an infant on her lap? Sounds like that could be dangerous!

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I ask you, is "Entertainment Tonight" going to the dogs? There have been endless promos in recent days that the show will be featuring Iggy, the dog Ellen DeGeneres and Portia De Rossi gave to friends because he didn't get along with their cats then the mean pet adoption agency came and snatched the pooch from Ellen's pals because the transfer had not been authorized?
Yeah, yeah, I lost endless nights of sleep over it.
So Iggy, who'd probably prefer to be home chasing cats or anywhere else, made a visit to the "Entertainment Tonight" set to help Mary Hart tape a Public Service announcement to help bring awareness to the importance of pet adoption.
I just hope they don't stretch this Iggy thing out all week. Getting an exclusive with a dog isn't excactly like landing, say, Jack Nicholson for an exclusive interview.

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 9:05 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

It hasn’t been easy for Paoloa Turbay to go from being a major star on Spanish-language television living in Miami to an
unknown entity trying to establish herself as an English-speaking actress in L.A.
But landing the role of Jimmy Smits wife on the new CBS drama “Cane” has made the struggle all worth it.

“So many people have seen my shows here in L.A. but usually people who watch Spanish-speaking TV don’t watch English-speaking,” said the actress, who plays Isabelle Vega on the show. “But now, everyone once in awhile, I bump into people who are interested in ‘Cane’.”

The show about a Latino family that works together to run a rum business has some shades of “Dallas” and an formidable cast that also includes Hector Elizondo, Nestor Carbonell and Rita Moreno.

“The cast is amazing, it’s like a gift,” Paoloa told me last week. “It’s really interesting and fulfilling to be able to work knowing that you are surrounded by the best of the best. You learn every day.”

So I was curious. Just how did she manage to go from starring in “Las Noches de Luciana,” “Noticias Calientes” and hosting the dance reality show “Bailando por un sueño - Colombia” to prime-time on CBS?

“It was time to come out here to L.A. during pilot season. I had been auditioning for movies, little parts and TV roles. Of all the characters, Isabelle was my favorite. I was the first one to audition
for that part, she was right there waiting for me.”

The powers that be thought she looked too young (Paola turns 37 on Nov. 29) so she gave up hope. But then came a surprise callback and news that Smits had signed on as leading man.

“They said, ‘She’s the one’ but since I didn’t have credits here in the U.S., they said, ‘We don’t know her. Can she carry the lead female role?’”

What followed were screen tests and auditions in front of top CBS brass.

Finally, the part was hers.

“I love Isabelle because she’s a very strong woman. She has to be strong and interesting to be able to handle a guy like Alex. She has a good heart. Behind every great man there’s a great woman and she’s the one who holds the family together. With a lot of money and power,
there’s a lot of problems.”

Now it’s just a matter of waiting to find out what will happen with “Cane” which was given a killer time slot against established hits "Boston Legal” on ABC and “Law & Order: Special Victim’s Unit” on NBC. There are 13 episodes scheduled to be completed then air through January. With the strike, it’s not known when or if the network will decide to order the additional nine episodes that would give it a full season.

“I hate strikes because it affects so many,” she said. “But I do feel there are certain ways to express what you need. I feel that everyone must receive what they deserve. I think all the unions have to support each other.”

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 12:05 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Marie Osmond broke down talking about being her daddy's only little girl at the funeral Friday of her father, George Osmond, who died Tuesday at the age of 90. The huge Osmond clan gathered in Provo, Utah, for the traditional Morman service with Marie sitting next to brother, Donny Osmond, along with the rest of their siblings on a pew, Entertainment Tonight reports. The eulogy was given by older Osmond brothers Virl, Tom, Alan, Wayne and Merrill. They were joined by Donny and Marie for the song: "I wouldn't Trade the Silver."
Before their father's death, he had been scheduled to appear with his family on Oprah's show Thursday. His kids kept the commitment, in true showbiz trouper fashion. It seemed appropriate since it was George Osmond who guided the careers of his kids from their days on "The Andy Williams Show" in the 60s. Meanwhile, Marie has been learning two routines for tomorrow nights "Dancing With the Stars" and will be there, present and accounted for.
Considering the tough week she's had, I think this means ABC will finally stop showing repeated airing of Marie's faint a few weeks back. I think I saw her hit the floor 82 times.
Enough!

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All Ellen DeGeneres wants to do is make people laugh. Is that so wrong?
The multi-Emmy winner has continued to tape her daytime show without her writing staff which is on strike and their union are none too happy about it. The Writers Guild of America, East, is slamming Ellen and here is part of the statement they have released:
"...The Writers Guild of America, East is extremely disappointed to see that Ellen has chosen not to stand with writers during the strike. Ellen's peers who host comedy/variety shows have chosen to support the writers and help them get a fair contract, Ellen has not. On her first show back, Ellen said she loves and supports her writers, but her actions prove otherwise....We find it sad that Ellen spent an entire week crying and fighting for a dog that she gave away, yet she couldn't even stand by writers for more than one day - writers who have helped make her extremely successful...We ask Ellen to cease doing shows immediately. She should stand by all writers and help us bring this strike to a quick conclusion. We owe that to the thousands of people who are caught in the middle."

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Elisabeth Hasselbeck, conservative co-host of "The View," has given birth to a little Republican!
Elisabeth and her pro football playing hubby Tim Hasselbeck the proud parents of a boy who came in weighing 7 pounds, 15 ounces. He was born in Arizona where the coulple moived last month when Tim began playing for the Arizona Cardinals.
"We're thrilled he arrived safely," Tim said in a statement. "Both mom and son are happy and healthy."
We won't find out the name of the boy until Monday when Elisabeth calls into "The View" to announce it. What a November ratings sweep stunt! Their daughter, 2, is named Grace.
Congratulations to the Hasselbeck family on the birth of a healthy baby!

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SPLITSVILLE: Prince Harry and his girlfriend of three years, Chelsy Davy, looked so in love this summer when they were seen together and the concert in honor of Princess Diana, kissing and hugging in the front row. Well, London newspapers are reporting that they have broken up and Buckingham Palace will not confirm or deny the stories. The papers - which NEVER lie - are writing that Chelsy was upset with Harry's playboy lifestyle, perhaps the lasty straw being when he decided to skip celebrating her birthday with her to attend the rugby world cup fnal in Paris.
C'mon Chelsy, it was the FINAL! WEll, maybe the kids will work it out yet.......It also seems that actress Sara Rue's marriage was "Less Than Perfect." Sorry, could not resist. The star, who I will always love from those two seasons of the cult hit "Popular," She has filed for divorce from her husband of more than four years, Mischa Livingstone. They separated in May and she is citing irreconcilable differences.

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Posted by Greg Hernandez at 10:19 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I was at Area in West Hollywood Thursday night for a party celebrating the People's Choice Award nominations. I think I was only cleared for the press line to do red carpet interviews but I did manage to get into the party where I had a diet coke and gabbed with various publicists.
Saw the handsome Brian Howe of "Journeyman" as I walked in and Shawn Pyfrom of "Desperate Housewives." Tuc Watkins of "Desperate Housewives" and "One Life to Live" and the late, great "Beggars and Choosers" was there too but I didn't need to stalk him because we had a good gab outside and I will share that with you over the weekend.
Other stars I talked with included Paula Abdul, A.J. Cook ("Criminal Minds"), Joy Lauren (Bree's daughter, Danielle, on "Desperate Housewives," the very nice Gretchen Egolf of "Journeyman," the ridiculously handsome Carter Oosterhouse, formerly of "Trading Spaces" and now host of "Carter Can." Also talked to one of the surgeons on "Dr. 90210" - not the main guy, but one of the members of the team and I asked him which celebrities he thought had really bad plastic surgery. He wouldn't bite. Then, noticing that his forehead had not moved the entire time, I asked if he had botox injected in there. He wouldn't answer. I asked him to act surprised! He couldn't. Before hurrying away from me, he said that his forehead "has been known to move."
Not tonight, pal.
As part of the print/online press, you are often placed at the end of these long press lines so sometimes the celebs are just plain tired of answering questions! That's why Scott Foley bailed out without talking to me, ditto Ryan Seacrest. I skipped out on the whole Kardashian clan because I don't even want to go there. All I know is Bruce Jenner is their stepdad and he wasn't there so be on your way. Spotted the cast of "Carpoolers" including Jerry O'Connell and Faith Ford but didn't want to wait to interview them and also skipped on Jason Biggs for no particular reason.
OK, so the reason for the party was the announcement of the People's Choice Award nominations - in 38 categories! Good grief! No way to go over them all but you can go to DailyNews.com to see the complete list. But here are some categories I care about:

Favorite Leading Lady: Jessica Alba, Drew Barrymore, Queen Latifah
My pick: Latifah is my queen! i love that she is nominated. Alba leaves me cold.

Favorite Female Action Star: Jessica Alba, Jodie Foster, Keira Knightley.
My pick: Jodie Foster, duh!

Favorite Male Movie Star: Johnny Depp, Denzel Washington, Bruce Willis
My pick: Denzel, Denzel, Denzel

Favorite Male Action Star: Matt Damon,Johnny Depp, Bruce Willis
My pick: Hands down: Matt Damon

Favorite Female TV Star: Sally Field, Katherine Heigl, Jennifer Love Hewitt
My pick: The best actress working in television today: two-time Oscar winner and three-time Emmy winner Sally Field.

Favorite Male TV Star: Patrick Dempsey, Charlie Sheen, Kiefer Sutherland
My pick: McDreamy. He really is. But Kiefer could use a win because I like him tons and he's had some tough times lately.

Favorite Scene Stealing Star: Richard Belzer from "Law & Order: SVU," Neil Patrick Harris from "How I Met Your Mother" and Chandra Wilson from "Grey's Anatomy"
My pick: Love Chandra. But NPH as Barney is a revelation and the very best part of the show.

Favorite Funny Female Star: Ellen DeGeneres, Whoopi Goldberg, Wanda Sykes
My pick: I can't. They are all great, all so funny and so smart. But if I were to admit who makes me laugh the hardest, it would be Wanda.

Favorite Group: Daughtry, Maroon 5, Rascal Flatts
My pick: Is it shallow to pick Maroon 5 because Adam Levine is so beautiful? It is? OK: Maroon 5.

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 5:32 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Don't ya just love crabby Mrs. McKlusky on "Desperate Housewives"?
She is, a hoot!
So last week, when I ran into the actress who won and Emmy playing her, I had to have a chat. She's Kathryn Joosten and she didn't become a professional actress until 20 years ago when she was in her early 40s - a recent divorcee with two kids. She started with theater in Chicago and her first full-time job was as a street performer at Disney World. She came to L.A. in 1995 and within her first few weeks, landed a small guest spot on "Family Matters. But she really hit paydirt when she was cast as Mrs. Landingham, secretary to the President (Martin Sheen), on "The West Wing" in 1999.
Here is our conversation:
Greg: You're so funny. I love you on that show.
Kathryn"I love me on that show.
Greg: That line you said to Bree (Marcia Cross) about her husband having his hand on the knob...
Kathryn: "Your son has bolted out of the closet and your husband's reaching for the door knob (laughs).
Greg: I watch every episode and I think this season is terrific.
Kathryn: I think it's really rolling really good and we've got some real surprises coming up, we've been working overtime doing this particular big surprise. It's a two-parter. I'm intergal. Very much so.
Greg: When you started on this, that first episode when you were the neighbor who had the fight with Lynette. Did you think it would turn into this? Wasn't it supposed to be a one-time deal?
Kathryn: I never thought it would grow into the character that it's grown into. I've been very lucky. Frankly, I was replacing another actress who had the part and was having some mobility problems. So I came in and did it. I thought, 'Wouldn't it be great if...' and, it did.
Greg: Was it because you and Felicity Huffman were so good together?
Kathryn: I'd like to think it was because I was so good!
Greg: You two did have such chemistry together and then you won the Emmy. That's always nice.
Kathryn: Yes. It was a nice scene that I had with the boys.
Greg: Where do you keep that Emmy?
Kathryn: I keep my Emmy on a bookshelf. My joke at home is, 'What's an Emmy good for? A door stop. I thought, 'Emmy! I'll get offered parts, i won't have to audition. That didn't happen. I've gotta go down to Manhattan Beach tomorrow at 4 p.m. for an audition for 'Medium." Friday afternoon at 4 o'clock. i might as well take a picnic lunch and stay over."
Greg: This is the life of a working actress as you've been for awhile.
Kathryn: For awhile, yeah. For 22 years now.
Greg: This is your most high-profile role. What's it like to have something like that come along after 20 years?
Kathryn: It's overnight success! (laughs). It's great. It's really great. I enjoy it so much. I get a kick out of it. I got nothing to lose now. I got my pension so anything that happens is just golden.
Greg: I still can't believe that episode last season when we found out you had your dead husband in the freezer! I thought, 'How is she gonna explain her way outa this?'
Kathryn: (laughs) You notice I only spent one night in jail. It wasn't having him in the freezer that was illegal, but I stole his pension for I don't know how long. But we tend to gloss over those little things you know.
Greg: Are you a fan of the show? Do you like to watch it?
Kathryn: Yeah! I do because the episodes I'm not in, I don't know what happens because I'm not at the table read and they don't just send me a script to be nice. So I have to watch it to find out what happened.
Greg: When you're around town, do people say, 'It's Mrs. McKlusky!"
Kathryn: Absolutely. I get a lot of that. Fans are great. They're very nice and it's very satisfying.
Greg: What about the new neighbors, the gay couple played by Tuc Watkins and Kevin Rahm.
Kathryn: Aren't they fun? I said, 'What's my attitude gonna be? and they haven't decided yet."
Greg: What about Dana Delaney?
Kathryn: She's fun to be around. What a character. What a fun character. Everytime you turn around, they throw somebody else into the stew and it's just great fun dealing with. In addition to this great two-parter, how do I phrase this? We're going to have some interesting cast changes. It's gonna be November sweeps.

I. Can't. Wait.

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 5:26 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The last time I was face-to-face with Tuc Watkins was at El Mirasol restaurant in Palm Springs. My friend James and I were having lunch and noticed Tuc with a group. On our way out, we went over to say hello and James snapped a photo of Tuc and I with his cellphone. I never bothered to download the picture to a file so when the phone broke, the picture of Tuc and I was lost forever. I told him about this when we talked the other night at a party celebrating the People's Choice Award nominations.

Tuc: “I broke your camera?”

Me: “No you didn’t. I dropped it later.

Tuc: “You took a picture with me and your camera broke?

We laugh. The very cool people who run the A Socialite's Life blog snapped the photo below of Tuc and I for which I'm very grateful because now, I have a replacement for the lost cellphone snap!

Tuc is the kind of tall, dark and handsome actor who could easily coast on his looks. But what makes this new “Desperate Housewives” cast member stand apart are his comic chops honed for over a decade as the studly and conniving David Vickers on the ABC soap “One Life to Live.”

So so far on “Housewives,” which casts him and Kevin Rahm as the first gay couple on Wisteria Lane, most of the funnier lines have gone to Kevin Rahm who plays the more domestic, and bitchy, of the two. I mentioned this to Tuc.
“You’re right! it’s sort of the opposite of David Vickers,” he said. “David is usually the one who has the ba-dum, ba-dum ching. The way I think of it as, I’m Andy Griffith and Kevin is Barney Fife. Kevin is always standing a little bit in front of me - I’m usually standing a little behind him and over his shoulder just like Andy and Barney did. We are sort of the yin to each other’s yang. I think he and I really work together well. Sometimes he’s got the funny line and I’m the guy that sort of rolls my eyes at him.

For the 41-year-old Tuc, the role of Bob Hunter on “Housewives” is a prime-time breakthrough in a career that has included more than a decade, on-and-off, on the soap as well as two seasons on the
acclaimed Showtime series “Beggars and Choosers” which cast him as gay television executive Malcom Laffley.

“It’s a lot of fun to join a show that is already running at full steam ahead,” Tuc said. “Kevin Rahm and I are lucky that Marc Cherry was interested in bringing on a gay couple and he’s brought a gay couple on that’s not issue-oriented. We meet a lot of what are considered minority characters through their issues and we’re not issue-oriented, we’re not stereotypical. There’s some sorta gay cliche jokes but then he’ll also take what would be considered a stereotype and spin it on its ear like this horrible fountain we had. Not all gay people have great taste it turns out. It’s a lot of fun to go on and be a couple on the street and not having to explain who you are and just immediately start mixing and mingling and causing trouble.”

I love Tuc on “Housewives” but I wondered if he would ever find another role as good as that of Malcom on “Beggars” which had a stellar cast that also included Brian Kerwin, Charlotte Ross, Beau Bridges, Jim Belushi, and the cutie pie William McNamara who I will never forget from "Doing Time on Maple Drive."

Malcolm had to come out of the closet to clear himself of sexual harassment charges levied against him by a woman. “‘Beggars and Choosers’ was one of the greatest shows I ever had the opportunity to be on,” Tuc said. “I loved that show and I loved playing that character. It was so well-written and I really wish that it had gone on 20 years. Everybody on it was great, we were all huddled together up there in Vancouver and only had each other to lean on. It was a real shame after the second year that the show kind of fell though the cracks.”

Tuc has done scores of guest spots on shows ranging from “Six Feet Under” to “CSI: Crime Scene Investigation” and his film credits include “The Mummy” (pictured, left) and “The Good Shepherd.” But the lying, scheming gold-digging, multi-married (including a trip down the aisle on Friday's show) but very charming David Vickers remains his signature character.

“‘One Life to Live has made it possible that I can go back there and be David Vickers (pictured above with Erika Slezick's Vicki Buchanan) from time to time. I’m based out here in Los Angeles now so I can do ‘Desperate Housewives’ and luckily, the schedules have permitted me to continue to do both and it’s great to play such polar opposite characters.”

While his “Housewives” character is gay and in a steady relationship, Vickers has had many women in his turbulent life.

“I feel very fortunate that I’ve gotten to play a lot of gay characters and a lot of straight characters,” he said. “Most of the gay characters that I’ve played haven’t been what would be considered stereotypes and so I feel proud about maybe changing people’s opinions of what gay people may be...It’s great to be able to do both. So if people want to see me as a role model, then I’m thankful for that.”

ONLINE EXTRA: The great thing about cyperspace is that there is so much SPACE! Here are some tidbits that didn't make the print version:

On the women of Wisteria Lane: "The women on that show have done such a good job of creating
archtypes that are individual but they work collectively. Dana Delaney had a really tough time this year of coming on and finding a niche in a show that already has a full canvas. She’s done an incredible job. She’s really funny and she’s really scary at the same time."

On Prime-time fame: “Every actor should be so lucky as to have the opportunity to play a character that gets watched. So I feel very lucky. Actors, by what they do, they have an audience. We don’t exist in a vacuum, we live in the real world. Sometimes people see you and they see you on their TV in they’re living room and they feel like, ‘Oh! You’re from my living room, I can come and say hi. By and large, people are nice and have nice things to say. It’s actually great. You go to the grocery store and you feel like you’ve got friends.”

On my favorite Beggars and Choosers line: I tell Tuc that my all-time favorite line of his from that series was
when a really handsome computer tech comes into Malcom’s office to fix something and he says to himself, “Hello, lunch!”
Says Tuc: “The way that was written, I was supposed to say, ‘Yummy.’ And I said to the director, ‘Can I try something? Can I try saying something else and he said, ‘OK.’ And I said, ‘Hello, lunch.’”

On being a passanger on a scary JetBlue flight that was forced to circle over Burbank for hours a few years back: “I’m actually a big fan of JetBlue. It sounds like I’m being a paid spokesman. They really handled that situation as professionally as they could. I’ve been asked that question a lot about what it was like and to tell you the truth, it wasn’t as dramatic or terrifying as I think that it may have been made out to be.The way the crew and the pilot handled it, I felt like everything was going to be fine and it was.”

On his "I Think I Do..." and "Beggars and Choosers" co-star Alexis Arquete: "Alexis Arquette is one of the craziest human beings I’ve ever met in my life and whenever I run into him, I always have a big smile on my
face.”

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 5:16 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Tommy Haas, a top 10 tennis pro with movie star looks, thought he had a stomach virus when he fell ill in Moscow in September during a Davis Cup semifinal between Germany and Russia. Russia went on to win and faces the U.S. in the final at the end of the month in Portland, Ore.
The Los Angeles Times reported Wednesday that Haas, Germany's top player, may have been poisoned during the Moscow match!
Tommy, who has been in Rio de Janeiro for commercial commitments, says he still feels unwell six weeks after the incident. He was due to fly to New York today for more medical testing.
Haas told the German newspaper Bild: "I'm shocked that something like that appears possible. When I think of how bad I felt, I can imagine it. . . I was the only one ever to order dessert or a latte macchiato after dinner. If all this is true, since no one else got sick, that must have been when it happened."
Stay tuned!!!

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 4:47 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The writers strike is getting pretty increasingly depressing - especially now that we are finding out that many of our favorite shows will have shortened seasons and some, like “24,” won’t have a season at all.
Big stars are showing support in growing numbers including Felicity Huffman and William H. Macy (pictured abvove) and Ray Romano and his former "Everybody Loves Raymond" leading lady Patricia Heaton also marched in L.A.
"I won't cross the picket line," The Hollywood Reporter quotes Romano as saying. "I was in the writers room every day for nine years (on 'Raymond'). ... Without the writers, (co-star) Brad (Garrett) and I would have been sitting on the couch looking at our feet for 22 minutes."
Others supporting writers Thursday were America Ferrera and Vanessa Williams of "Ugly Betty" as well as several cast members of "General Hospital."
The Rev. Jesse Jackson walked the picket line arm in arm with WGA West president Patric Verrone. Jackson said the strike reflects broader workplace issues in America:"You're fighting for the dignity of the American worker," he said. "You're fighting for the American dream, and that dream is worth fighting for. ... Keep fighting for your jobs, wages, benefits, growth. Your victory is America's victory."
"Prosperity must be shared," he added. "In the media industry, too few people control too much."
In New York, the famous faces walking the picket lines included Robin Williams, David Duchovny, Tim Robbins, Julianne Moore, "SNL" star Seth Myers, and "Law and Order: SVU" stars Chris Meloni and Richard Belzer.

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 3:25 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

This is too funny, and sad.
Mickey Rourke was busted for DUI in Miami this morning. But not in a car folks, he was riding a baby blue Vespa and he had a woman with him riding on the back.
You just can't make this stuff up.
Rourke was partying, hopped onto the scooter and cut off a cop when he had a u-turn.
Bad move, pal. He was pulled over a block later. The Palm Beach Post reports that, according to the arrest report, Rourke let out a four-letter bomb when he was stopped, his face was flushed face, eyes bloodshot and watery, speech slurred.
"I'm not drunk," he insisted to police. "I didn't even drink that much."

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 2:50 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

It takes one heck of an actor to be able to portray a serial killer on television each week and still have the audience rooting for him not to get caught. But that's what Michael C. Hall manages to do each week on the Showtime series "Dexter," a show that I found out last night will be returning for a third season next year.
Hall took on the role following the end of his five-year run on HBO's acclaimed "Six Feet Under" where he played David Fisher, a gay man dealing with his partner and running a funeral home with his brother.
'Six Feet Under' ended and I thought, 'Well, that's it for TV. I'd been spoiled rotten and lightning doesn't strike twice," he said. "The last thing I thought I'd do was another television series. I feel like I left David behind by nature of the way 'Six Feet Under' ended where we all got to simulate our own deaths."
When we talked last night, was a bit jet-lagged after flying in from a film set in Australia for an Academy of Television Arts and Sciences event where most of the cast gathered for a screening of an upcoming episode and a discussion after.
I didn't mention the irony of interviewing Michael at the Academy headquarters in North Hollywood (and his appearance on the cover of Emmy Magazine) given that he was snubbed for a much-deserved Emmy nomination this year. Not only should he have been nominated, but he should have won!
I wondered if it's been tougher to play Dexter this season now that the show has moved beyond establishing his character and has him juggling his duel roles as serial killer (he only kills bad guys!) and forensics specialist for law enforcement in Miami in addition to personal issues galore.
"It's all been a challenge and one that I've welcomed as an actor," he said. "I think some of the twists and turns that the character has taken this season have presented new challenges for me because as he experiences himself in more what could be called human ways, it's my responsibility to honor the fact that he does remain, fundamentally, sociopathic or compelled to kill. So yeah, that's tricky. It's not boring, thankfully."
Last season, we learned that Dexter and his brother has watched as their mother was murdered. He had buried the memory of the mother and of the brother. But when a rival serial killer begins taunting him, it is discovered that he is his brother. While Dexter kills evil folks, the brother killed more for sport and his arrival put Dexter through an emotional ringer that penetrated his carefully constructed emotional walls.
"I think the show is moving forward and evolving. I think the second season really honors the gaping wound that Dexter is carrying around after he lost his brother, a person he never imagined could even exist and he's reeling a bit in a way that he's not even consciously aware of. I think the storyline of the second season honors that reeling and honors the vulnerability that sort of goes along with that. His susceptibility to certain things is exploited in certain ways and he's really on a road to a kind of recovery from that trauma."

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 2:35 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

This is lame.
Let me just say that MSNBC would have been looked at as geniuses if they had been able to snag Rosie O'Donnell for a show on their cable network because it would have broadened their audience and brought them a real water cooler buzz.
I've just read that the deal is now dead because Rosie talked about it during a stand-up routine. Good grief, it's not like she was spitting out numbers and other secrets about negotiations. But this was too much for these execs as Rosie wrote in her blog (in verse, of course):

we were close to a deal
almost done
i let it slip in miami
causing panic on the studio end

well
what can u do

2day there is no deal
poof
my career as a pundit is over
b4 it began

It's not as if she wasn't warned.

Rosie nsists she isn't bitter, noting "everything happens for a reason."

But I am! I want her back on TV!

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 9:54 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Good morning!
Jennifer Lopez is pregnant! Officially!
Sheesh! I thought she was gonna wait until the kid was in kindergarten before she confirmed she was with child. C'mon, we know the sexy star wouldn't have made all those public appearances recently looking big as a parade float if she wasn't preggers.
JLo addressed the crowd at a Miami concert with her hubby Marc Anthony saying "Marc and I are expecting."
Well, glad it's official so we can say...CONGRATULATIONS!!!

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This is just about the strangest things - ever - and I've hesitated to write about it until I saw this photo posted on TMZ.com.
So, here goes:
Oscar-winner George Clooney is having dinner at an L.A. restaurant. Fabio of "I Can't Believe It's Not Butter" fame and the guy who had his nose broken when a bird flew into his face while he was on a roller coaster, is having dinner at a nearby table with a group of women who apparently won some contest.
Photos are taken.
George thinks they are of him. Flips Fabio or someone at the table the bird as you can see. Fabio reportedly confronts him and they have words and a bit of a scuffle.
George thought the pictures were being taken of HIM and was annoyed.
It's all so silly! But funny!

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And already, another episode of "As Britney's World Turns." Is the damsel of a mess not taking her random drug tests? K-Fed's lawyers are going back to court today to arguing that she is violating a drug testing order and will ask that custody be modified...again.
Will Britney show up? Will she be wearing hair extensions? Was she at Taco Bell when she should have been peeing in a cup?
Stay tuned for the next installment of..."As Britney's World Turns."

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 12:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

...at least on the cover of Ebony magazine marking the 25th anniversary of his landmark "Thriller" album. At that time, he was the king of pop, king of the world! Musically, the best. A showman? Wow! Remember his moonwalking on the CBS special marking Motown's 25th anniversary? That was even better than the disastrous reunion of Diana Ross and the Supremes.
And even in 1988, at the Grammys, when he did a medly of "The Way You Make Me Feel" and "Man in the Mirror," Michael Jackson was still at the top of his game.
I can't even begin to understand what happened after that.
"That Michael is probably the same Michael here," he says in the magazine's December issue, on newsstands Monday. "I just wanted to get certain things accomplished first. But I always had this tug in the back of my head, the things I wanted to do, to raise children, have children. I'm enjoying it very much."

Does it bother him that people think he's some kind of freak - or worse?
I don't pay attention to that," he said. "In my opinion, it's ignorance. It's usually not based on fact. ... Every neighborhood has the guy who you don't see, so you gossip about him. You see those stories about him, there's the myth that he did this or he did that. People are crazy!"
Jackson says success "came with a lot of pain."
"When you're on top of your game, when you're a pioneer, people come at you. ... But I feel grateful, all those record-breaking things, to the biggest albums, to those No. 1s, I still feel grateful," says the singer, who has sold more than 750 albums worldwide.
Anyway, here are photos of the ever-changing Michael, through the years.
Does he recognize the man in the mirror?

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 2:40 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Now in its third day, the writers strike is on everyone's mind and more high-profile stars joined writers on the picket line today including T.R. Knight, Katherine Heigl and Sandra Oh of "Grey's Anatomy."
I was among the journalists on a conference call with Ellen DeGeneres awhile ago to discuss her upcoming TBS variety special and after going dark on Monday, she resumed taping shows yesterday with a heavy heart.
"Personally, it;s heartbreaking. I love my writers, we're a family," Ellen said. "It's really hard to have to deal with where they are and where I am because I'm kinda caught in the middle. I'm a host and have 135 staff members depending on me for a paycheck each week."
Ellen says her show is unlike Leno or Letterman's because it's a daytime syndicated program so it continues in production as do such other shows as "The View." But without her writers, it's a tall order.
"I'm really just winging it. I have to figure out how I'm going to walk out there and make people happy."

And finally, I found this on YouTube where writiers on NBC's "The Office" explain their issues while on the picket line in a very amusing but also very clear and concise way. Take a look:

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 1:40 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Rosie did nothing to dispell reports that she is negotiating for a nightly talk show to air on MSNBC when she did a stand-up routine at Live at Lincoln Center, an event to kick off the New York Comedy Festival. She let it accidentally on purpose slip that she is "filming for an unidentified TV station, which I was told that I was not allowed to mention."
Then she added: "You don't tell me what I'm not allowed to say because then I can't help but say it. They told me not to mention this possible show, and they are men in business suits. Nothing is scarier than men in business suits screaming at you over the phone."
She seemed to sum it up best by touching on her leaving "The View" last May and now being ready to resume her career in television which has also included six years of her enormously popular Emmy-winning daytime talk show.
"I don't know if you heard, but I did a TV show last year," Rosie told the crowd. "It's over. It's a new year, a new start. It's a new beginning."

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 9:36 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Good morning...
There's this great line in the movie "Postcards from the Edge" when Meryl Streep, playing a famous actress, says of she and her movie star mom (Shirley MacLaine), "We're designed more for public than for private."
The would seem to be the case for the Osmonds, a showbiz family mourning the loss of their father, George, who died Tuesday at the age of 90. Donny and Marie Osmond flew from Los Angeles to Utah with "Entertainment Tonight" ON THE PLANE! So ET was able to break the news that the family will still appear on this Friday's episode of "Oprah" as planned. The show will tape on Thursday in Chicago. "Dancing With the Stars" handled the situation well Tuesday night in a telecast that opened telling viewers what had happened and sharing right away that Marie was safe from elimination. Marie's dancing partner, Jonathan Roberts, told the audience that "Marie is going to be fine. She is with her family right now. It is going to be a rough week. She had called her dad [Monday] afternoon and told him that our quickstep was dedicated to him. It was a good way to say goodbye."
Marie is one of five contestants remaining on the popular ABC show which is having its most competitive season yet.

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Meanwhile, Jane Seymour who was voted off "Dancing With the Stars" last night. The 56-year-old actress had suffered the loss of her mother last month then had her home threatened by the Malibu fires and had to be hospitalized last week with food poisoning! So maybe this comes as a relief! Seymour handled being voted off with grace and class and will be well-remembered for her efforts.
"It was so worth doing this," Jane told host Tom Bergeron: "This has just been an unbelievable dream. I am kind of teary about it because I had the best time of my life...The biggest thank you of all has to be to the fans, because they have been unbelievable."

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The writers strike begins its third day today. On Tuesday, "Desperate Housewives" star Eva Longoria handed out pizzas to strikers who wondered why if she was supportive of them, why she continued to shoot scenes for the show. Longoria said "We are done and we'll be on the lines supporting you."
The show is wrapping its 10th episode of the season and that will be all for their creatively resurgent season four if the strike is not settled. Marching in picket lines Tuesday were "Old Christine" co-stars Julia Louis-Dreyfus and Wanda Sykes, Screen Actors Guild board member Valerie Harper, and the casts of CBS' "The Big Bang Theory" and NBC's "ER," according to The Hollywood Reporter.
Ellen DeGeneres resumed taping of her daytime show after going dark on Monday in support of the writers. She said during the taping: "I love my writers. In honor of them today, I'm not going to do a monologue. I support them and hope that they get everything they're asking for. ... In the meantime, people have traveled across the country. ... I want to do everything I can to make your trip enjoyable and give you a show."

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And finally this morning, strike or no strike, we do have an episode of AS BRITNEY'S WORLD TURNS: It's been one of those good news-bad news weeks for our pop wreck, Britney Spears. Her new CD debuted at number one on the Billboard sales charts but on Tuesday, she was ordered by a judge to immediately pay $120,000 for ex-husband Kevin Federline's legal bills from their custody battle.
L.A. Superior Court Commissioner Scott Gordon noted in his ruling the "disparity between the parties income" and that "the vast majority of the ... litigation deals with [Spears's] conduct."
It was revealed in court papers last week that Federline grossed $7,436 in 2006 after business expenses. Britney earns approximately $737,000 per month.

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 12:12 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Tony Plana knows that having the opportunity to play the patriarch of a Latino family on a hit prime-time show is nothing short of a miracle.
But that’s what he gets to do each week on ABC’s “Ugly Betty” when he steps into the role of Ignacio Suarez.
“It feels like an epiphany for me after so many years of struggling and watching Latinos as a group try to penetrate the industry and become an intregal part of it, an included part of it,” Tony told me last week at the Television Academy’s “Hispanics and Television: In Transition” event.
Tony has nearly 140 television and movie credits in a career that has included roles in such films as last year’s “Goal!” as well as “Primal Fear,” “Lone Star” and “Salavador.” But I remember him so fondly from the late, great Showtimes series “Resurrection Blvd” where he also played a widowed family patriarch who was a former boxer and far different from Ignacio. While “Resurrection” only lasted two seasons, “Betty” seems destined for a long run given its popularity with viewers and its critical acclaim.
"The fact that we're starting to see an evolution of Latino characters in television that are almost automatically included now as part of the central world in most series. That's huge," said Tony, who remembers a far different situation not so long ago.
"It was bad. The only time you hired a Latino is when they did the gang show, the drug show or the illegal immigrant show. I believe that ‘Ugly Betty’ has gone a long way towards eradicating these very deeply established stereotypes toward Latinos...It has tackled issues in a very intelligent way and still entertained us. That’s what I think is remarkable about this program.”
At the end of last season, Ignacio was deported to Mexico after it was learned that he had illegally immigrated to the U.S. several decades earlier. He hopes the storyline helped to out a human face on the immigration debate that continues to rage in the U.S.

“If anything, I’m hoping that it illicited some kind of compassion and understanding of the complexity of the human element of this problem and the familial element,” he said. “The season finale seperated this family and kind of puts a knife through the heart of this family. ...The people who were watching, I don’t think will ever be able to be dispassionate or cold or cynical about separating families and what that represents."
It's story acrs like that like which provide what Plana calls "disguised learning" to viewers.
"I believe that's the function of art. Art should make us feel and think about those complexities in our society that are difficult to figure out."
The show has also not shied away from including a transgendered character (Rebecca Romijn's Alex) or a gay character (Michael Urie's Marc) or a possibly gay character in Ignacio's grandson, Justin (Mark Indelicante) who is a fashion and Broadway loving junior high schooler whose personality is embraced by the Suarez family.
"That's huge," Tony says. "Especially for a culture that is predominately macho in its ethos and for a male latino father. That was basically the learning lessons for Ignacio in that first season to go from a being afraid for the kid and wanting to change him to a place of acceptance and support and nurturing, encouragement."
So, is Justin gay?
"He's not sexualized yet, he's a boy. So we can't really be talking about a gay character. What's more important is that he's an artist and he;s extremely sensitive to design, to color, to music to art. So if you have a boy born into your family that is different that way, that is not an athlete or he's got these special gifts, you need to not supress those gifts but support them, encourage them, nurture them, celebrate them. That's the real lesson, I think, of Justin's character. His sexuality will be an issue hopefully in the fourth or fifth season, down the line. And either way, it will be interesting. We could explore the stereotype of the gay. Are they always effeminate? No. There are effeminate gays and there are effeminate straights. It does not define them."

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 12:10 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Just days before the entire Osmond clan was scheduled to tape a show with Oprah Winfrey, George Osmond died this morning at the age of 90. Donny Osmond was on the Entertainment Tonight set Tuesday morning when he found out about his loss.
He and sister Marie talked with ET's Jann Carl before boarding a plane to Salt Lake City to join their family.
"He was a man of integrity, of honor," a tearful Marie told Jann. "He was the best man I've ever known... "I wanted my dad to be proud of me."
"Oh he is!" Donny assured his sister.
"His life wasn't perfect, but look at what he's done with it," Donny added.
Marie has been a contestant on "Dancing With the Stars" this season and is the second celebrity to have a parent die in recent weeks. Jane Seymour's mother died last month. George and Olive Osmond, who died in 2004, are the parents of Donny, Marie, Alan, Jay, Jimmy, Merrill, Wayne, Tom and Virl.
Donny said his parents are now reunited.\
"We know our mom and dad are together again."

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 2:40 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

It's risky business getting behind the wheel of your car afdter a drink or two - something
Rebecca DeMornay learned that hard way last week when she was stopped by the Beverly Hills Police Department for a traffic violation the night before Halloween. Officers smelled alcohol on the actress' breath and gave her field sobriety tests. Her blood alcohol level was .09, which is above the legal limit. She was arrested, taken to the Beverly Hills Police Department and released at just after midnight after being cited.

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 2:29 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Singer-songwriter Rosanne Cash has been diagnosed with a "rare but benign condition" that will require brain surgery.
The following post on her Web site explains: "Rosanne is expected to make a full recovery and will return to the studio to complete the recording of her debut for Manhattan Records. Ms. Cash will also resume her live performance schedule in the spring and will complete a new book to be published by Viking in early 2009."
Grammy winning Cash, 52, is the daughter of Johnny Cash, and his first wife, Vivian Cash. She has canceled the remaining four dates of her Black Cadillac album tour.

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 9:55 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Good morning...
The writers strike already has some big-name support with Julia Louis-Dreyfuss, America Ferrera, Marg Helgenberg and Tina Fey (also a writer on "30 Rock") joining writers on the picket lines Monday in a show of solidarity. Jay Leno brought Krispy Kreme donuts to the writers outside NBC while William Baldwin served coffee outside Paramount studios.
At various Hollywood events, the usual "Who are you wearing?" and "What do you think of "Britney" questions have changed to strike-related queries.
"I think it will impact [Hollywood] hugely, everything changes," Josh Brolin told ET at a weekend premiere. Brolin said that during the 1988 strike,"I remember people selling their houses."
At the premiere of his new movie "Fred Claus," Vince Vaughn said: "A strike is never good for anybody but I'll honor whatever they decide and I think that's the right thing to do. It's never easy thing to go through."

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As far as celebrity mug shots go, this one of Shia LaBeouf, the 21-year-old star of "Transformers" and "Disturbia" is a pretty good one. Look, he's even smiling. And it's kind of a silly arrest really. The kid had a few too many and just didn't want to leave that Walgreens store in Chicago where he was loitering. He was arrested and booked on a misdemeanor charge of "criminal trespassing."
That's such a lame charge to have your booking mug added to the hall of shame alongside Lindsay Lohan, Paris Hilton, Nicole Richie, Michael Jackson, Nick Nolte and all the rest. Police even said he was "very courteous and polite" during booking, according to published reports.
It coulda been worse. At least Shia wasn't behind the wheel of a car.

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Love this!
The NY Times is reporting that Rosie O'Donnell is in negotiations for a prime-time show on cable news channel MSNBC which just sounds like the perfect fit! Let's face it, since Rosie left "The View" last May, she has needed more of a soapbox than her blog.
The Times writes that Rosie could be given the 9 p.m. slot each weeknight on MSNBC, where she would go head-to-head with two heavyweights of cable talk: “Larry King Live” on CNN and “Hannity & Colmes” on Fox News. The show with Rosie would replace the low-rated “Live with Dan Abrams.”
But NBC executives who spoke with the paper anonymously cautioned that still to be determined before a deal is sealed is when the show would appear, Rosie's salary, and whether she would also be seen on the NBC broadcast network which has been courting her in recent months for a variety of jobs, including hosting a game show.

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 8:12 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Sunday night marked the 100th episode of the CBS crime drama "Cold Case" which has been a top 20 hit since its debut back in the fall of 2003. There from the very beginning has been Danny Pino, who plays Det. Scotty Vallens opposite Kathryn Morris' character of Lilly Rush. They are a formidable pair of Philadelphia police detectives working unsolved "cold cases" for the department's homicide squad.
The show, which usually features music from the year the unsolved homicide took place, is one of the many scripted TV hits that face a shortened season if the writers strike that began on Monday stretches on over several months.
"Our writers are pretty incredible," Pino told me last week at an event at the Television Academy in North Hollywood. "They come up with so many imaginative ways to make an investigation interesting and at the very end, to deliver the emotional impact of death and an untimely death and how people have had to deal with either their love one dying or being a person who killed a victim and having to either hold it for so many years or finally being able to give that up. That guilt sometmes eats away at them. It's a fascinating balance that the writers find and I'm constantly in awe of what they're able to do."
Prior to the series, the actor had made quite an impression on FX's "The Shield" where he had a recurring role as notorious drug lord, rapist and gang leader Armadillo Quintero. He had just come off portraying Desi Arnaz in a television movie, "Lucy," about the relationship between Arnaz and Luciile Ball, when "Cold Case" began its run of five seasons and counting.
"I don't think you ever think, 'This is gonna be a huge hit.' I think you think, 'Well, we'll give this a shot and hopefully it does well and we'll see how it goes," he said.
"And thankfully, it's turned out in our favor. You don't hear of shows being successful too often anymore and so to be one now, is definitely something that makes me feel very lucky and very grateful."
But there is a down side for the married father of two young kids: "To be on a successful show, there aren't many negatvies other than the fact that you don't see your family all that much and that is a huge negative for me being so familiial."

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 12:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Barbara Walters usually tries to be so diplomatic on "The View." But this morning, she confessed that when the ladies were discussing the bizarre actions of Heather Mills last week, she wanted to call in (she was off that day) and give her two cents.
So she did it Monday.
Walters has done two interviews with Mills, currently going through a prolonged divorced battle with Paul McCartney. Walters said that after the first interview, when Mills was best known as a model who lost a leg and had dedicated herself to getting artificial limbs for similar victims, "I was very touched by her."
But the second time, after she was with McCartney, "she was so impossible with our producers" and at one point complained that a glass of water brought to her was "not at room temperature."
"All we thought was that this is not a very nice woman," Walters told her co-hosts. "This picture of her being 'poor little me' is something we did not feel."
Walters told viewers that on the day of the second interview, she told McCartney that Mills was "a tough woman" and he replied "I like tough women."
The hilarious Sherri Shepherd piped in Monday after Walters' comments and said: "I was trying to defend you Heather but Barbara says you are not nice!"
After the show, I looked up some articles and discovered that the bad blood between Walters and Mills dates back to earlier this year when Mills skipped out on a scheduled appearance on "The View" after her elimination from "Dancing With the Stars."
"I have very mixed feelings about Heather Mills," Barbara said on an earlier show. "I did a -- I thought -- very positive [interview] piece about her [background and charity work several years ago and] then we began to hear that she was lying about this and lying about that so we did another piece in which I brought up a little of the material that maybe everything she had said was not totally true and a whole other side of her came out. She didn't like that we brought up some of these things."

Well, I guess we won't be seating THOSE two women next to each other at dinner!

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 11:22 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Despite being "shaken to the core," Oprah Winfrey gave an emotional press conference this morning via satellite to South Africa vowing to continue her academy for girls there which has been rocked by allegations of abuse at the hands of a dormitory matron.
"When I first heard about it I spent about a half-hour going around my house crying," Oprah said during the session with reporters which was aired on several morning shows.
Oprah was told by girls at the school that they were told to "put on happy faces" when Oprah made her visits to the school as school officials tried to hide the facts of the case. She said she is "prepared to do whatever is necessary" and promised a shake-up of the school's administration.
Oprah said after she learned of the allegations, "I spoke to all the girls personally and encouraged whoever had been harmed to come forward. I told them that although they had been living in an atmosphere that oppressed their voices, this was to take their voices back ... As a result of their conversation, five other brave girls came forward ... The following weekend ... I met with the parents and their daughters, I apologized for the circumstance and promised to institute changes."
The Oprah Winfrey Leadership Academy for Girls opened outside Johannesburg on Jan. 2 with former President Nelson Mandela among those attending. It aims to give 152 girls from deprived backgrounds a quality education in a country where schools are struggling to overcome the legacy of apartheid.
"What I know is that no one — not the accused nor any persons — can destroy the dream that I have held and the dream that each girl continues to hold for herself at the school," she said.
When Oprah called this one of the most devastating experiences of her life it seems quite understandable since she was the victim of sexual abuse as a child beginning when she was 9. She has since used her fame and power to campaign for laws in the United States to protect children from abusers.
"As often is the case, child abuse, sexual abuse happens right within the family, right within the confines of people you know," she said Monday.

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 9:45 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Good morning...
Well, it has happened. The entertainment industry's writers have gone on strike after talks broke down last night just before the deadline. How long it will last, no one knows. We'll feel the pain right away without our daily fixes of Jay Leno, David Letterman and Jon Stewart - among others - since their daily shows are heavenly dependent upon writers every day and the hosts themselves are part of the writing staffs.
Writers have locked horns with producers over revenue from content on the Internet and electronic devices and want a bigger share of DVD revenue. On his show on Thursday, Letterman called producers "cowards, cutthroats and weasels."
Some of our favorite prime shows could run fresh episodes through February if the strike persists but it's a case-by-case basis. Patrick Dempsey, for example, told Entertainment Tonight over the weekend that "Grey's Anatomy" has been behind schedule and does not have as many shows in the can as it should.
"The problem is that we're not that far ahead scriptwise," Dempsey said. "I think we'll have enough shows that take us through Christmas, and after that we'll see if that's the season or not."
McDreamy added that the strike is "going to be very bad for television, certainly. The season will be wiped out if [the strike] continues for too long...My concern is not so much for myself really, because I'll be alright, but I think how long this strike lasts is going to affect a lot of people that are living paycheck to paycheck -- they are going to be damaged profoundly by this, and I think that's a real tragedy. I think a lot of people and a lot of families are going to be in a difficult place in their lives; hopefully we can come to some sort of understanding and resolve this soon enough that it doesn't affect those people."

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There were a couple of familiar faces among the masses running the NYC marathon on Sunday. Seven-time Tour-de-France champion Lance Armstrong ditched the bike for this race and completed the 26 mile event. Meanwhile, Katie Holmes also completed the course and at the finish line it was, of course, photo op time with hubby Tom Cruise and their baby Suri.

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AS BRITNEY'S WORLD TURNS: We have learned that the spectacle that is her personal life has not hurt Britney Spears' album sales. Her new CD is a shoo-in to debut in the number one spot on the Billboard charts after selling briskly in its first week out...Meanwhile, TMZ.com reports that Britney was out Saturday night and ran into Kevin Federline's attorney in their custody case. Only in L.A....
Was watching "Entertainment Tonight" and there was the still cute Valerie Bertinelli, who was a child star herself, going off on Britney: "I mean, how many times do you have to go to the gas station or Starbucks when you know the paparazzi are out there? Stay home, put your underwear on and take care of your children."
Then she gets sweet again: "Here I am judging again, I don't know this girl...I have an imagination of what life might be like, because I had a lot happening when I was 25, too."

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 12:10 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Alex Trebeck, Pat Sajak and Ty Treadway?
They are the hosts of the three game shows still on the air that were created by the late Merv Griffin. While Alex Trebeck of “Jeopardy” and Pat Sajack of “Wheel of Fortune” are game show institutions, Ty is the new kid on the block as the host of “Merv Griffin’s Crosswords.”
“It’s an amazing and surreal experience,” Ty told me recently. “I hope I can live up to what they’ve done. The beauty of both of them is they make it look so easy when I know it’s not.”
Just about four months before he died, Griffin personally chose the 40-year-old Treadway for the gig and his selection was definitely a decision to appeal to younger viewers.
“Actually I’m 85,” Ty joked. “I just look younger. It’s all the botox.”
He’s still amazed at how quickly he landed a job that he felt was a real longshot.
“I thought I was going to have to go through 20 or 30 levels of executives before I ever got a glimpse of the man behind the curtain himself. As fate would have it, I walked into that very first meeting on March 2 and the first hand that reached out to shake mine was Merv himself...I couldn’t feel any more honored or privileged to hopefully carry the torch for his legacy.”
Ty gained fame on the ABC soap “One Life to Live” in 2000 and after his character was killed off a year later, he returned as his nicer twin brother. He spent three more years on the show until his character went insane!
The soap exposure led to his co-hosting “Soap Talk” on the Soapnet cable network with Lisa Rinna. They had a four year run and were nominated for Emmys three of those years.
Does he miss being a soap stud?
“What do you mean? I’m still a soap stud! (laughs). There are things that you miss about it, there are things that you don’t miss. You don’t miss having to take your shirt off every five seconds and I’m really glad I have a job that lets me use my other assets such as my brain. But occasionally I think, well, maybe I’ll take my shirt off for ‘Crosswords.’ No, I’m kidding. You get to eat a little bit, you get to enjoy life a little bit more. You don’t always have to be on your toes workout-wise.”
But he does he miss acting sometimes.
“Yeah, because acting is very much about yourself, you’re in the spotlight, you are the instrument and you only have yourself to work with. Hosting, a lot of it is about the other person. Their number one job is to make people feel comfortable and bring out the best in them while entertaining people in the downtime in between."

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 7:35 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Oh no!
Shia LaBeouf, the breakout star of "Transformers" and "Disturbia," was arrested in downtown Chicago early this morning outside a Walgreens! CBS2 in the Windy City reports that the young actor appeared to be drunk and had repeatedly been asked by a security guard to leave. He wouldn't.
Still, police told CBS2 that LaBeouf was "very courteous and polite" after his arrest. He posted bond before 7:00 a.m. after being charged with misdemeanor criminal trespassing.
He's scheduled to appear in court on November 28.

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 11:37 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

How nice it is to see a famous woman who is making public appearances, obviously with child, to simply confirm it to the world. Are you listening Jennifer Lopez?
Oscar-winner Cate Blanchett confirmed Saturday night that she is pregnant with her third child.
"Yes, I am," Blanchett, 38, said at the Sydney premiere of her film Elizabeth: The Golden Age, according to the Sydney Morning Herald. "...It's early days yet. It's due in April."
The actress and her writer-director husband, Andrew Upton, are the parents of sons: Dashiell John, 5, and Roman Robert, 3.
Blanchett had already said she planed to spend more time in Australia where she and Upton will be co-directors of the Sydney Theatre Company. The goal was to be more settled for the sake of the children rather than being on various film locations.

Meanwhile, singer Christina Aguilera says in the new issue of Glamour magazine she will "enter into mommyhood" next year. She says she will be a working mom who'll "balance" caring for her child and tending to her career, reports the BBC.
"I want to get it right," she is quoted as saying.
Aguilera says husband Jordan Bratman is "thrilled! He's just great....so supportive and amazing through everything. He came with me on the last leg of the tour and he was my support system. ... I gush. I'm a lucky girl."
The confirmation is anti-climactic since in September, Paris Hilton introduced the singer at a Las Vegas event by saying: "Congratulations to the most beautiful pregnant woman in the world."

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 8:30 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Interviewing Jennifer Tilly is a lot like being at a really good party: You hear lots of great stories, you laugh a lot, and it all ends far too soon.
All I needed was a drink!
Jennifer was calling from Puerta Vallarta to talk up her movie “Intervention” which won best feature honors at the San Diego Film Festival last month and earned Jennifer the best actress prize.
“Actors, we always love to get awards,” admits Jennifer, nominated for an Oscar for Woody Allen’s “Bullets Over Broadway” in 1995. “It’s really nice to get validation and we worked really hard on that film. The entire movie was improvised and everyone came up with their own characters.”
With the strong reviews for “Intervention,” might there be another chance at Oscar?
“I never thought I was going to become major, major,” she said. “The Oscar nomination came out of nowhere. I did my own little campaign, I did my own ads. Overnight, I had the paparazzi, who would take pictures of me if I hung around long enough looking hopeful. Once in awhile, ‘Entertainment Tonight’ would ask me something if no one was around. Then everyone wanted my opinion about eveything! It was hard to realize my social status had changed.”
While Jennifer is best known for her comic roles in such films as “Bullets,” and “Liar Lair” and as the voice of Bonnie Swanson on “Family Guy,” “Intervention” gives her a chance to show her dramatic chops. She plays a woman confronting the possible disintegration of her marriage as her husband goes through drug rehabilitation.
“I do a lot of comedy, comedy is fun and I like to make people laugh. This entire movie was improvised and everyone came up with their own characters. When I’m faced with that situation, I like to come up with the kind of character no one casts me as.”
“There’s a scene where Rupert [Graves] and I sit down at rehab and it disinegrates into a brawl and you just realize these people are hopeless. It’s the epitome of a destructive relationship where they really want to be together but are destroying each other. Everyone has been in that relationship.”
Once famously dubbed the hardest working actress in Hollywood, six films in the can waiting for release.
One of the movies on tap is “Silver Valley” which Jennifer describes as “the most expensive movie China ever made. The whole movie is in Chinese except my scenes. It’s a sweeping epic. The Chinese girls in scenes with me had to learn to speak English phonetically.”
Not only does she do a lot of work in independent films, but she attends professional poker tournaments throughout the world. She won the World Series of Poker bracelet in 2005 and regularly appears in televised poker events.
“My boyfriend \[Phil Laak\] is a professional poker player and I have an alternative career. I won the gold bracelet and it’s like winning an Olympic Gold Medal. Poker is one of those amazing games like chess where you never master it. It’s been hard having two careers...I have literally in my hallway eight suitcases that have not been unpacked. I’m always on the go. I’ve always been a workaholic.”
Always in demand for film roles, a few years back Jennifer made her first foray into series television as Henry Winkler's girlfriend in the CBS sitcom "Out of Practice." She is still smarting over the cancellation of the show which had solid ratings but was not renewed for a second season.
The show also starred Stockard Channing and Christopher Gorham, among others.
“They kept taking us off the air,” she said. “I honestly think the future in acting for actresses over 40 is in television. The roles are great and so is the writing.”
Whatever she does, Jennifer has long has a loyal audience of gay and lesbian fans which only intensified when she played a lesbian in the cult classic, "Bound."
"I get a lot of lesbian respect which is very, very gratifying. Lesbians are women, they don't care as much what other people think as regular girls do. They are going places and doing things."
"I think the gay audience is sophisticated with a highly developed sense of humor and before "Bound" I had a huge following, I think, because I'm, a little like a drag queen. "Bride of Chucky," oddly enough, was popular with gay audiences and in "Seed of Chucky," there was a transgender child and me in all my glory playing an over the top movie star. It's fun to make fun of myself.”

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 12:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Oprah Winfrey is mighty grateful that an arrest has been made in the troubling abuse case at her new girl’s school in South Africa.
Police told Reuters that so far, seven women at the Oprah Winfrey Leadership Academy for Girls have alleged physical and sexual abuse and that a 27-year-old former dormitory employee has been arrested on several charges. The woman’s name has not been released.
Oprah, not wanting to interfere with prosecution, released a statement Friday: "I'd like to thank the South African Police Services for bringing this investigation at my Academy to a timely resolution. I am grateful for their compassion and sensitivity to the girls during this difficult time. It means the world to me. It is my deepest hope that the accused is brought to justice and that this serves as a reminder that any time a child has the courage to step forward, it is our duty as adults to listen and take immediate action."

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 2:00 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

In today's episode of "As Britney's World Turns," our tragic pop princess is aparently under investigation for allegedly running over the foot of an LA County Sheriff's deputy as she left court after her custody hearing last Friday.
Is it time for Britney Spears to hire a driver?
TMZ.com reports that a "traffic collision complaint" was filed by the Sheriff's Department and the LAPD is conducting an "active investigation" and that the LAPD is looking at the possibility of hit and run. The officer on duty at was trying to help Britney leave her custody hearing and she thanked her by rolling over her foot! As the officer was directing Britney through the usual crowd of photographers, she apparently went right when the officer said left. TMZ says the officer is on critches but no broken bones were suffered.
This came just a week after Britney ran over the foot of a TMZ photographer in Beverly Hills.
When will the madness end???
Meanwhile, Lance Bass - the former bandmate of Britney's first love Justin Timberlake - has a memoir to sell so hey, why not pay Britney a visit and talk to PEOPLE mag about it?
"I saw her last night," Bass, 28, told PEOPLE on Thursday at a Los Angeles signing of his new memoir, Out of Sync. "I went over to the house. It was great. I went over to see the kids, and you can tell she's really trying so hard to get herself back in order."
"She was one of the first people that I came out to. We grew up together, basically. She was the first opening act that we had," he said at the signing, "and she was dating Justin. We'll always have that family vibe between us."
Bass partly perceives her problem as a matter of being a single act as opposed to having been in a group.
Bass's advice to his old pal is this:. "Just be yourself, and remember where you came from."
That's all for now.
Tune in for the next installment of "As Britney's World Turns."

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 1:05 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Here is Tom and Katie at the ArcLight ylast night for the LA preniere of "Lions for Lambs" as part of AFI Fest. It was a star-studded event that even brought out David Beckham. I'm sure you'll see and hear all about it on TV but you won't read about it here. Why? I was told by AFI that United Artists "doesn't want any print reporters on the red carpet."
That's a slap!
I still love the movie though with the great Meryl Streep doing another Oscar-worthy turn as a journalist and Cruise giving his best performance in years as a U.S. Senator.
The movie opens in theaters a week from today.

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 12:22 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Ran into Eric Winter last night at a Television Academy event in North Hollywood which he accompanied his beautiful girlfriend, Roselyn Sanchez of "Without a Trace" to. Eric could not have been nicer but he is sad about the quick cancellation of his CBS series "Viva Laughlin" after just two episodes but will be returning to "Brothers & Sisters" as the brother of Rob Lowe's character and the boyfriend of Kevin Walker (Matthew Rhys).
"I'm gonna go back for a little while," Eric says. "I don't know what's going on storyline-wise. I'm sure they have something fun cooked up. But I will be bringing my face back there, yeah."
I wondered if Eric was aware of how many "Brothers & Sisters" fans want him back on the show - so much so that more than a few were rooting for the demise of "Viva Laughlin."
"I know. [Laughs]. 'Brothers & Sisters' is a class act of a show. Those creators are phenomenal and I loved going to work with those people every day. And the actors, you can't say more about the talent. It's amazing. So, I get it completely why the support is there. I loved "Viva Laughlin." I loved my experience with CBS and my cast on "Viva" so I was very heartbroken. We put a lot of effort into singing and the acting on the show so it was hard. But you know, all you can do is move on and be thankful that there's other opportunities."
Fortunately for Eric, the storyline on "Brothers & Sisters" has his preacher character gone overseas to do missionary work with Kevin remaining committed to the relationship - for now. It makes his return not only easy, but potentially quite dramatic since Kevin is getting closer to his ex-boyfriend Scotty (Luke MacFarlane) in Jason's absence.
"They have been so great to me over there," he says. "Coming off of "Viva" has been rough in the beginning and now I'm coming into my own with other stuff."
In all, seven episodes of "Viva" had been completed but only two aired before CBS yanked the series off the air because of low ratings. He hopes the remaining shows somehow see the light of day.
"I don't know what's going to happen with them, Maybe something will be put together. I'd love to see some of the stuff that we shot. The great thing, and the sad thing, is that the episodes were getting better and better, storylines getting so much more interesting. The songs were so great. I have a really cool scene in episode six where I'm singing "I Need You Tonight" from INXS and I was so much looking forward to seeing the sequence put together...You know what's gonna happen, they're gonna put these on YouTube and we're gonna develop this huge fan base and they're gonna want us back! (laughs)."
Back to "Brothers & Sisters." So, what's it like to play Rob Lowe's younger brother?
"You can't go wrong there. When I first read, they said, 'You're gonna play Rob Lowe's younger brother 'and I thought, 'Who doesn't want to be Rob Lowe's younger brother?' That guy's an icon with the things he's done in his career. Nicest guy on the planet too so I've had so much fun working with him."
And finally, what about Matthew Rhys as a boyfriend?
"Such a cool guy. Talented. Immediately, because a lot of my stuff was with him, immediately made me feel welcome on set. That's quite an intimidating cast because everyone's so major and you walk into that. But everyone there was so welcoming and he was a big part of that, making me feel at home."
And what about that kiss at the end of last season in the pantry when they practically knock each other over?
"It was my first time because it was my first time playing a gay role. They make you feel right at home like they would any other acting piece. As actors, you welcome anything you're gonna do no matter what and you just enjoy doing it in the sense of putting on a good performance with whatever character you're playing. You want people to support it and be all about it. And so far, the fans have been very supportive of our characters."
With Kevin's boyfriend back, what's gionna happen with Scotty who is also popular with audiences?
"People are talking about that, what's gonna happen. Is there gonna be a break-up? an arguement? Am I gonna walk in on sometning? I don't know. It's gonna be really interesting."

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 9:55 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

I need a free day to just sit through three or four movies. But who has the time?
Was glad to get "Lions for Lambs" in this week but still want to see "American Gangster," "We Own the Night," My to-see list includes Denzel Washington and Russell Crowe in "American Gangster,""Gone Baby Gone," and "Man From Plains." But if I do manage to make it to the multiplex this weekend, I have a feeling it will be with my niece and nephew to see "The Bee Movie" which they have been buzzing about for weeks.
I look at the prospects of that movie and other new wide releases in my weekly column BOX OFFICE BUZZ which appears on Fridays in the LA Daily News, the Long Beach Press Telegram and the Torrance Daily Breeze.
Check it out!

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 9:35 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Marcia Gay Harden is one of the busiest actresses in the movie biz.
She has roles in two films currently in theaters: the Sean Penn-directed “Into the Wild” and “Rails and Ties” opposite Kevin Bacon (pictured below). Marcia also appears in “The Hoax” with Richard Gere, an overlooked but critically praised drama released on DVD a few weeks ago.
When I met the actress recently, I greeted her by saying: “It’s Oscar winner Marcia Gay Harden!”
She laughed and said: “Oh, I love the way you just say that.”
The Oscar came in 2001 for her role in “Pollock” and she was nominated three years later — again in the supporting-actress category — for her dramatic turn in the Clint Eastwood-directed “Mystic River.”
I had to know. Where does Harden keep her Oscar?
“It’s in my office, in Harlem,” she said.
So has that golden statuette resulted in this flood of scripts?
“Oh, I get them all the time,” she joked. “You read them while you’re having bon-bons in bed. It’s bubble baths and bon-bons all the way.”
But the actress, who also appears in yet soon-to-be-released “Canvas,” juggles all the work with motherhood. She and husband Thaddaeus Scheel have three-and-a-half-year-old twins (a son and a daughter) and a nine-year-old daughter.
“Life is great,” she said. “I have a bon-bon, go home and change a diaper, that’s what it’s like!”

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 5:10 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

...legal problem!
Sheesh. Now her former manager Johnny Wright is suing Spears claiming she owes him in excess of $15,000 in back commission. The suit was filed in Florida on Monday, according to TMZ.com. It states that Spears was obligated to continue paying Wright Entertainment Group for deals negotiated when Wright was her manager through 2008. According to the suit, she stopped paying commissions in 2006.

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 4:37 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

This is a really sad end to a great career.
Martina Hingis, the youngest number one player in the history of tennis, said Thursday that she has been accused of testing positive for cocaine use at this year's Wimbledon tournament and she has decided to retire from tennis rather than fight the allegations.
I was no fan of Martina when she was ruling the game 1997-99 because she appeared so arrogant and was disrespectful of the legendary Steffi Graf in her final years on tour. One of my sweetest memories in 20 years of watching tennis was when the supposedly over-the-hill Graf came back from the brink of defeat to beat Hingis in the finals of the 1999 French Open.
Graf retired from the game a month later. Hingiis was never the same.
But after Hingis' young body broke down and she was forced to take four years off from the tennis tour, I found myself rooting for her during a successful comeback that had her winning some big titles and rising to as high as number six in the world. Watched her practice this spring during a tournament I attended in Palm Springs and the fans were so happy to see her there.
So to see that comeback, less than two years in, cut short is sad to me.
"I find this accusation so horrendous, so monstrous that I've decided to confront it head on by talking to the press," Hingis, 27, said at a press conference in Switzerlkand today. "I am frustrated and angry. I believe that I am absolutely 100 percent innocent."
Hingis said the positive test, which could lead to a doping suspension of up to two years, led to her retirement because she doesn't want to spend years fighting the case.
She had won three straight Australian Open titles from 1997-99, and Wimbledon and the U.S. Open championships in 1997. Last year, she won the prestigious Italian Open title and retires ranked number 19 in the world.
"They say that cocaine increases self-confidence and creates a type of euphoria," she said in a statement. "I don't know. I only know that if I were to try to hit the ball while in any state of euphoria, it simply wouldn't work. ..I would think that it would be impossible for anyone to maintain the coordination required to play top class tennis while under the influence of drugs. And I know one other thing -- I would personally be terrified of taking drugs...I have no desire to spend the next several years of my life reduced to fighting against the doping officials. The fact is that it is more and more difficult for me, physically, to keep playing at the top of the game. And frankly, accusations such as these don't exactly provide me with motivation to even make another attempt to do so."
Sad way to go out.

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 4:25 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Heather Mills decision to speak out about her treatment by the media - she appeared on both "Today" and "GMA" this morning - is apparently not going over very well at all. Her publicist quit two days ago in protest of her plans, British newspapers had unflattering headlines today and the ladies on "The View" showed her no mercy.
Ouch!
"She's a gold digger! Let's face facts," Joy Behar said during the Hot Topics segment of "The View." "The girl is asking for $100 million." She accused Mills of "talking out of both sides of your mouth girl...that's why people don't like you Heather."
Behar characterized Mills as "crying her little heart out...she's saying the media is responsible for her discomfort. She puts herself in that position."
Whoopi Goldberg was critical of Mills for appearing on "Dancing With the Stars" if she doesn't want press coverage: "Don't take you and all your baggage across the pond and go on 'Dancing With the Stars....then say boo hoo....Once you open that door that says, 'Here I am.' They come after you.'"
Whoopi was also critical of Mills talking publicly about alleged death threats: "When death threats were coming in my direction, they said you don't discuss them."

These ladies are harsh! But they are pussycats compared to the British media. Here is a sampling oif some of the headlines from today:

- The Sun, which regularly refers to Mills as "Mucca" for her topless modeling past, splashed this headline on iuts front page: "Mucca on the Edge," and described her as "out of control" and "wild-eyed."

- London's Daily Star: "Halloween? Mucca's Far More Scary!"

- The Mirror characterized her round of interviews as a "day of unhinged ranting."

Meanwhile, Mills publikcist, Phil Hall, quit on the eve of Mills' press tour telling People magazine that "it doesn't sit [well] with our company when one of our clients is attacking newspapers while we are trying to build relationships."

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 11:09 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Some couples fight over money, sure, but usually it's over whether they can really afford to remodel the kitchen or buy that new flat-screen TV..
Not Heather Mills and Paul McCartney.
Heather was on "The Today Show" this morning and she told Matt Lauer that the thing the former couple fought about the most was that she wanted him to give more of his massive fortune to charities.
“How can anybody have that kind of money and not do more for charity?” she asked. “That’s what we argued about all the time.”
In contrast to Wednesday's tearful appearance on British television when she said she had been suicidal, Mills was composed when talking with Lauer via sateillite from London. She told him that she had spoken to McCartney two days ago to tell him of her plan to go public to try and clear her name after 18 months of negative press. She said he initially told her to do what she had to do but then phoned her to tell her it wasn't such a good idea.
Mills, who appeared on ABC's "Dancing With the Stars" last season, told Lauer that their divorce proceedings have dragged on for 18 months for reasons other than money.
“I insist on being cleared,” she said. “Money — that’s the least of my interests. I have to clear my name....When we first split, I said to Paul, ‘I’m going to be crucified. I’m going to have a modern-day stoning. You know why we split, you know the truth.”
Mills said she told him to stand up and say, “‘I’m responsible for the breakup of this marriage.’” She said she was willing to walk away with nothing at that point if the former Beatle had done that.
Mills said she has received death threats which put their daughter, Beatrice, at risk because she spends so much of her time with her. She said McCartney has done nothing to try and stop the media assault against her.
“I pleaded with him for 18 months,” she said. “I said, ‘You’ve never had any bad press. How do you think Beatrice is going to feel about this when she’s 12 or 13, reading that you allowed this to continue? How do you think she’s going to feel about that?’”
Lauer asked Mills that, given McCartney's iconic status as a former Beatle, didn't she know what she was getting herself into?
“I fell in love with a man, not a Beatle,” she replied. “I fell in love with a man who chased me for three months. He was a broken man when I met him. I was a huge support for Paul.”

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 9:55 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Caught Dr. Phil McGraw on "The Today Show" this morning where he talked to Meredith Viera about the allegations of physical and sexual abuse at the girls school in South Africa founded by his friend Oprah Winfrey. Oprah has flown twice to the school in recent weeks to talk to parents but has not spoken out because she doesn't want to jeopardize any prosecutions.
"Oprah is an open book and she would love to talk about this right now," Dr. Phil said. "She wants these people prosecuted...This is one of the most devastating - of not the most devastating thing she's ever had to go through in her life."
Because of her own abuse as a child, "she knows the pain that is involved her," said McGraw who said Oprah used the word "sorrowful" to describe the situation. "This is personal for her."
He added that the school "is a personal mission for her. This is something she feels she was put on this earth to do...Oprah will not let this deter her commitment to these girls."

Posted by Greg Hernandez at 9:20 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)