The Liza Family Blog

Cyndi Lauper ~ She boosts a shelter for LGBT youth, she’s crazy about Pride, but don’t call her a gay icon

2010-07-01T08:05:00.000-07:00

By Susan G. Cole

Cyndi Lauper’s a little sick of being called a gay icon. I try it out on her and get a bit of a slapdown.

“Don’t call me that,” she says. “Sometimes the icon thing, it sounds frivolous. It’s not only about makeup.”

She thinks about that for a second and relents. “...although I love makeup. I am the Viva Glam girl. I actually regret that I have only one face for all this makeup.

“But I’m not Streisand, I’m not Liza Minnelli. I don’t even dance. I tried doing that once at the Gay Games in 1994, but the shoes alone made that hard.”

Reading her words doesn’t give you the full sense of what it’s like to chat with one of the world’s most enduring pop stars. Let’s just say that when she gets on a roll, it’s impossible to stop her. We’re eight minutes into what’s supposed to be a 15-minute interview before I try to sneak in another question.

“I just have to finish what I was just saying,” she says.
Then there’s that voice, and the squeaky, heavy-duty Queens accent that makes her sound like she’s five years old and not the veteran singer and actor with 10 albums behind her, a Grammy and an Emmy, too. So “Don’t call me that” comes across as “Dooo’nt coo-all me thee-at.”

Though she rejects icon status, she does allow that she’s super-connected to the queer community. Her story about that is, as she says, not frivolous at all.
“I thought of the gay community as a refuge to get away from, well, straight people, actually, who kept asking, ‘Why are you so different?’ and I couldn’t take it any more.”

When she was asked to sing at the Gay Games in 1994, she jumped at the chance. But she was upset at the way the organizers treated the drag queens.
“The drag performers weren’t celebrated, and nobody wanted to focus on them. They were never even on the Jumbotron,” she recalls. “And I got a little mad and thought to myself, ‘Okay, don’t show them. I’m gonna make a video. I’m gonna make these gays famous. And I’m not just gonna show their shoes – you’re going to get to know them.’”

After she made the video for Hey Now in Europe, her friends encouraged her to get her own float in New York’s Pride parade.

“A guy came up to me and handed me a rainbow flag and said, ‘Your song True Colors inspired me to design this flag,’” she recalls. “I’d written sang the song for my friend Gregory, who died of AIDS.”

Since then, she’s helped launch the True Colors tour, with proceeds going to gay rights groups, and the True Colors shelter for queer youth in New York City. She also recently launched the Give A Damn campaign to promote respect for queer people – that’s the TV spot in which Oscar winner Anna Paquin comes out as bisexual – and appeared on TV’s The Celebrity Apprentice, naming True Colors her charity.

Lauper says she’d been hearing about kids at risk for years.
“When you’re a teenager, the streets are hard – and it’s harder when you don’t have your family. People were writing me, and I kept hearing the same story about being thrown out, losing your friends, losing your job, being discarded. I’m a mother now, and I know I could never do anything like that, fucking never.

“You can’t work in a community and look at people and see something terribly wrong and not step in.”
When I jokingly express the wish – shared by many of her queer fans – that she switch sides and join the gay team, she is again not amused.

“We need straight people to step up and change things, because in our country gay people don’t have civil rights. This is a civil rights movement. We need the straight community to stand beside our gay sisters and brothers to make change. We need the power of the people – and that means all of the people.”

At the June 7 meeting at the 519 in support of free speech at Pride and to organize against Pride’s decision to ban the term “Israeli apartheid” at the big parade (Pride has since changed its mind about that), some activists suggested taking action at Lauper’s big concert Saturday (July 3) at Queen’s Park. Next to the Pride Day parade, her event is considered this year’s biggest draw. When I ask Lauper what she thinks about a protest at her gig, she gives it some serious thought.

“Oh,” she says, and I can almost hear the gears turning inside her head. “In a way it is like apartheid [in Israel], because the Palestinians are outside of the city like the South African blacks were.
“They [Queers Against Israeli Apartheid] should hand out information so people can read about it. For crying out loud, if people can hand out pamphlets for hamburgers or manicures, [QuAIA] should hand out theirs, as long as it’s backed up by information. If you have people’s stories, that’s the best.”
With all the political talk and Lauper’s high-profile support of the LGBT community, it’s easy to forget that she has a new album.

Memphis Blues (Downtown) features covers of blues classics, including Rollin And Tumblin’ and Wild Women Don’t Get The Blues. It could be seen as a major departure for one of the queens of pop, but Lauper says that isn’t so.
“This album is like coming home. I was trained by [jazz singer] Betty Scott. She was the one who taught me to listen to Billie Holiday. This is the basis of everything I’ve ever sung. Everything is based on blues and call-and-response – dance, rock, hip-hop.”
Lauper also got the benefit of some of the genre’s greatest session players.

“When Ann Peebles walked in to do guest vocals, I cried. I wanted to tell her how many times I sang with her in a hotel room, how many times I listened to I Can’t Stand The Rain.”
Lauper even got work from Skip Pitts, the man who played the wah-wah guitar hook on Isaac Hayes’s R&B classic Shaft.

“How many times have I been in a recording studio and said to the guitarist, ‘No, no, I want it like the guitar in Shaft’?” she asks me rhetorically. “Then I’m in the studio and I turn around and there he is – Skip Pitts.”

susanc@nowtoronto.com

NOW
June 30-July 7, 2010
VOL 29 NO 44

Go to Music

SUSAN HAYWARD & LENA HORNE born on this day...

2010-06-30T03:41:00.000-07:00

Personal Quotes

I was unique in that I was a kind of black that white people could accept. I was their daydream. I had the worst kind of acceptance because it was never for how great I was or what I contributed. It was because of the way I looked.

[quoted in Brian Lanker's book "I Dream A World: Portraits of Black Women Who Changed America", New York: Stewart, Tabori & Chang, 1986)] My own people didn't see me as a performer because they were busy trying to make a living and feed themselves. Until I got to café society in the '40s, I didn't even have a black audience and then it was mixed. I was always battling the system to try to get to be with my people. Finally, I wouldn't work for places that kept us out . . . it was a damn fight everywhere I was, every place I worked, in New York, in Hollywood, all over the world.

You have to be taught to be second class; you're not born that way.

It's not the load that breaks you down, it's the way you carry it.
Always be smarter than the people who hire you.

A little nepotism never hurt nobody, honey. If you got it, use it. Press on with it. Remind them of it.

In my early days I was a sepia Hedy Lamarr. Now I'm black and a woman, singing my own way.

On love: Don't be afraid to feel as angry or as loving as you can.
My identity is very clear to me now, I am a black woman, I'm not alone, I'm free. I say I'm free because I no longer have to be a credit, I don't have to be a symbol to anybody; I don't have to be a first to anybody. I don't have to be an imitation of a white woman that Hollywood sort of hoped I'd become. I'm me, and I'm like nobody else.

Susan Hayward in "I Want To Live" Best Actress Oscar Winner 1958.
Trivia

Was diagnosed with brain cancer, allegedly the result of being exposed to dangerous radioactive toxins on location in Utah while making The Conqueror (1956). All the leads John Wayne, Agnes Moorehead, John Hoyt, Hayward and the director Dick Powell died of cancer. The case is still a scandal.

Interred at Our Lady of Perpetual Help Catholic Church, Carrollton, Georgia, USA.

She portrayed an alcoholic in three films, Smash-Up: The Story of a Woman (1947), My Foolish Heart (1949) and I'll Cry Tomorrow (1955)) and was nominated for an Oscar for each performance.

Her footprints at Grauman's Chinese Theatre are the only ones set in gold dust.

Her first marriage to actor Jess Barker was a stormy one and ended with a bitter custody battle of her twin sons and a suicide attempt by Susan. Her second to rancher Eaton Chalkley was a long and happy one until he died suddenly of hepatitis nine years later. She left Hollywood for five years in deep mourning, returning in 1971.

Took over the ballsy role of stage star Helen Lawson in Valley of the Dolls (1967) in 1967 after Judy Garland was fired.

Was one of many starlets in 1939 who auditioned for the part of Scarlett O'Hara in Gone with the Wind (1939).

Measurements: 36 1/2-26-35 1/2 (as noted in "Hollywood Studio Magazine), (Source: Celebrity Sleuth magazine)

Replaced an ailing Barbara Stanwyck in Heat of Anger (1972) (TV), which was to have been a pilot for a TV series to be called "Fitzgerald and Pride."

In Italy, almost all of her films were dubbed by either Lidia Simoneschi or Rosetta Calavetta. She was occasionally dubbed by Dhia Cristiani.
Reportedly did not get on at all with Bette Davis during the filming of Where Love Has Gone (1964).

Was the original choice to play Margo Channing in All About Eve (1950), but was dropped from the project after being considered too young. The part was then given to Claudette Colbert before being given to Bette Davis, who went on to receive a Best Actress Oscar nomination for her performance.

Was born on the same day, and same place (Brooklyn N.Y) as singer Lena Horne .

Personal Quotes

"I learned at a very early age that life is a battle. My family was poor, my neighborhood was poor. The only way that I could get away from the awfulness of life, at that time, was at the movies. There I decided that my big aim was to make money. And it was there that I became a very determined woman."

"I never thought of myself as a movie star. I'm just a working girl. A working girl who worked her way to the top -- and never fell off."

"My life is fair game for anybody. I spent an unhappy penniless childhood in Brooklyn. I had to slug my way up in a town called Hollywood where people love to trample you to death. I don't relax because I don't know how. I don't want to know how. Life is too short to relax."

"When you're dead, you're dead. No one is going to remember me when I'm dead. Oh maybe a few friends will remember me affectionately. Being remembered isn't the most important thing anyhow. It's what you do when you are here that's important."

You aim at all the things you have been told that stardom means -- the rich life, the applause, the parties cluttered with celebrities. Then you find that you have it all. And it is nothing, really nothing. It is like a drug that lasts just a few hours, a sleeping pill. When it wears off, you have to live without its help.

CHITA ~ "All That Jazz" (HOT VERSION)

2010-06-25T06:56:00.000-07:00

Tony Award Winner "La Cage Aux Folles" 2010 Tony performance

2010-06-24T15:04:00.000-07:00

2010-06-08T08:41:00.000-07:00

Joan June 8th
Prince June 7th

Gemini Birthdays

2010-06-08T08:12:00.000-07:00

Sandra June 6th

Judy June 10th
Marilyn ~ June 1st

RUE ~ "Queen of Comedy"

2010-06-03T20:29:00.001-07:00

"Golden Girls" star Rue McClanahan has died after a massive stroke. The actress passed away at 1:00 a.m. on June 3, her rep tells People. McClanahan, age 76, had previously suffered a minor stroke while recovering from bypass surgery earlier this year. Her rep notes that at the time of her death, McClanahan "had her family with her," saying, "She went in peace." Though McClanahan will best be remembered for her "Golden Girls" portrayal of Blanche Devereaux, she enjoyed a 50-year television career that included standout roles in "Maude," "The Love Boat," and most recently "Law & Order" and Tyler Perry's "Meet the Browns." Born in Healdton, Okla., McClanahan attended the University of Tulsa before moving to New York City where she worked as a file clerk before finding success in the theater. She was a life-long animal welfare advocate and vegetarian and supported PETA. McClanahan's death leaves Betty White as the only surviving regular cast member of "The Golden Girls," after Bea Arthur's death in 2009 and Estelle Getty's death in 2008. On a press call with Zap2it in late April, Betty spoke of her good friend and former cast mate. "Oh Ruesy. We talk about every, oh maybe three, four weeks. She lives in New York of course. And she had a bum go. She had a triple bypass and then had a stroke. And she's just doing fine. I talked with her. She's home and doing better and better and speech is all cleared up. She's in great shape. Isn't that good news?" McClanahan is survived by her sixth husband, Morrow Wilson, and her son Mark Bish. In her 2007 book "My First Five Husbands... and The One That Got Away," McClanahan wrote, "People always ask me if I'm like Blanche. And I say, 'Well, Blanche was an oversexed, self-involved, man-crazy, vain Southern Belle from Atlanta -- and I'm not from Atlanta.

Secret Birthday Photo of John F. Kennedy and Marilyn Monroe Goes on Sale

2010-06-02T07:25:00.000-07:00

by David Knowles

It's like a surprise party for gossip columnists and Camelotphiles: A rare photograph of Marilyn Monroe and President John F. Kennedy is up for sale. Just hours after Monroe sang her sultry rendition of "Happy Birthday" to then president Kennedy at Madison Square Garden, the film star attended a private party with the commander-in-chief where White House photographer Cecil Stoughton snapped the shot that has remained secret until now.

Taken at the home of Arthur and Matilda Krim on May 19, 1962, the photo also shows Kennedy's brother, Bobby, chatting with Monroe and the president. Harry Belafonte and his wife can also be seen. According to Kaya Morgan, the man selling the picture, Jackie Kennedy did not attend the party. "The photographer told me that when she heard Monroe would be there, [she] said 'screw this,' and left," Morgan told the Surge Desk.That the photo still exists may be the result of a Secret Service error. When Stoughton was developing his negatives from the famous party, the story goes, agents confiscated all those that showed Kennedy and Monroe together. But they missed one, Morgan said. The price for a previously secret piece of history? "A 30-inch signed original print will go for $23,000," said Morgan, who unveiled the photo on Tuesday in Los Angeles in part to commemorate Monroe's birthday.
Filed Under: Surge Desk
Tagged: Bobby Kennedy, Cecil Stroughton, Harry Belafonte, john f. kennedy, Kaya Morgan, Marilyn Monroe

Ian McKellen ~ turns 71 today...

2010-05-25T18:25:00.000-07:00

Elton John - John's Next Fall Opens To Rave Reviews

2010-05-20T12:00:00.000-07:00

ELTON JOHN & "NEXT FALL" (VIDEOS)

John's Next Fall Opens To Rave Reviews

Melissa Etheridge: My Songs 'Aren't Gay Enough' for 'Glee'

2010-05-18T08:44:00.000-07:00

By Nicki Gostin Posted May 17th 2010 01:34PM

Melissa Etheridge's eleventh studio album, 'Fearless Love,' is dropping at the same time as she's rebuilding her love life from the ground up. The 48-year-old songstress recently broke up with Tammy Lynn Michaels after nine years and having twins together in 2006. Etheridge spoke extremely candidly to PopEater about the painful timing of the split, the "sexphobia" behind the 'Glee'/Newsweek debacle and the absurdities of being called "too gay" or "not gay enough."Did you separate from Tammy before writing this album?It was written before we actually physically separated, but you know, breakups just don't happen overnight.It must suck having the album and the separation emerge at the same time. Do you wish the timing was different?[Laughs] Absolutely! When I saw these things were about to collide for a while there I thought, I don't want this to come up on top of the album, and then I started doing interviews and they're like, "You're such a family girl, your marriage is great, what's the key to a great marriage?" and I was like, "Oh, I can't sit here and lie." But I would have definitely made the timing different.So is the song 'Miss California' about Tammy?That's a political song. It's about California passing Proposition 8.

Have you been following the Newsweek controversy?No I haven't. Give me the scoop!A Newsweek writer said Sean Hayes was too gay to be in 'Promises Promises.' Kristin Chenoweth wrote a letter in his defense and Ryan Murphy from 'Glee' called for a boycott of the magazine.Oh, the gays are getting miffed! Don't tell us we're too gay or not or whatever. Oh lord, what is gay, anyway? Find me the line -- find me the defining line between gay and straight. Find me the defining line between male and female. There is no line. You cannot draw this line in the sand. Yes, there are plenty of people way over there who will never partake in anything straight and there are people way over there who will never partake in anything gay, but there's a whole lot of gray in the middle. Where's the line? Behind all of it is sexual insecurity. It's sexphobia.Have you been accused of not being gay enough?Oh sure. I've had the gay community say, "Why don't you write a song saying 'her'? Your lyrics are non-gender." They're never happy. And the straight folks, they just assume the lyrics are about a woman, and they assume that if they go to a concert it's going to be all gay people. There are stereotypes we all have. But there's no us and them. Good God, we're all the same.Have you ever been approached to have your songs on 'Glee?'No, I don't think they're gay enough. [Laughs]You're a greenie.Yup, no plastic bottles in my house. My car runs on bio-diesel, which is reclaimed vegetable oil from restaurants.Do you compost?I did for a while, but I was horrible at it. I had rats.I reckon someone could start a business in LA tending compost heaps.I can see it! Compost-For-You. Let's do it! I'll invest.Do you like touring?Touring is the payoff after all the days of being alone in my room writing these songs. I get to see people singing them. It's wonderful.You must have tons of groupies.Well, this will be the first time I'm touring and I'm single. But I am not interested in groupies. I don't need that in my life right now. I have my oldest kids with me on tour -- they're 13 and 11.How do you embarrass them?It's funny because they've drawn a line between what I do for a living, getting up there and singing for people. They allow that because they know that's my work, but if I'm standing around at school and I hum or sing something, they're like, "Oh mom, don't!"I think you are quite the sex symbol.Aww, you're sweet, and you're helping this gal. Thank you so much.Aren't you best pals with Brad Pitt?Not for a while. He's a family man. I haven't spoken to him in a while.How's your health?My health is great. I've been six years free of cancer. I figured out health is about balance. It's what you eat, what you feel, how much you sleep. It's really common things that western society doesn't teach us how to do. You've got to take responsibility; you've got to say, "You know what? I don't need to work that hard. I don't have to buy this." It's not what it's all about.

http://music.aol.com/video/fearless-love-with-intro/melissa-etheridge/bc:66180621001

WATCH MELISSA'S "Fearless Love" video.

Mariah Carey Puts Out Stage Fire Herself

2010-05-18T08:41:00.000-07:00

By PopEater Staff Posted May 18th 2010 06:45AM
Mariah Carey acted quickly to put out a fire on stage before her recent concert in Egypt.

The singer used her Twitter to describe the situation. "In Egypt getting ready to go on stage and suddenly there was a surge of power and an electrical fire started under my feet! Wtf?!"
"Naturally, my emergency instincts kicked in and I put out the flames w/a towel. Lol (yet true)," she added.
She finished, "The funny thing about this ish [sic] is an ol'skool radio station in the other room started playing 'aww freak out!' @that exact moment!"
Carey even tweeted a photo of "the charred remains."

BETTY HUTTON singing in "Red Hot & Blue" (1949)

2010-05-17T19:11:00.000-07:00

Raquel Welch, Reluctant Sex Symbol

2010-05-17T07:26:00.000-07:00

Raquel Welch, Reluctant Sex Symbol,Talks About Making Amends With Her Kids
by Susan Avery (Subscribe to Susan Avery's posts) May 12th 2010 6:30PM

When you think Raquel Welch, you don't think mom. Well, maybe MILF, but only to those who are aware that she left her husband as a young mother in 1963 and took her two kids with her to Hollywood to become a star. What she became -- a worldwide sex symbol -- was not what she intended. And neglecting her young kids in order to pursue fame, was also not part of the plan. She stayed silent on the topic for years, preferring to maintain her image as an untouched bombshell. In private, she says, she suffered. This year, the woman who left men of the 1960s panting, is turning 70. And, after years of keeping her breasts out front and her personal life under wraps, she's written a tell-all, Beyond the Cleavage, about her beginnings, which includes a father who played emotional hide-and-seek with his daughter, her current man-crush and how sex is overrated. An edited version of an interview with the actress follows.ParentDish: Gotta start with the obvious. When you set out, did you think, "I want to be America's sex symbol?" Raquel Welch: Sex symbol was not my plan. Things don't always turn out the way you plan. I thought I would develop myself into a serious actress, but the studio system was in demise back then. There had been a star-making machine but that didn't exist when I got to Hollywood.PD: But you became a star.RW: People responded to me on a very surface level and that's the direction I took. I'm not going to complain about it; I wouldn't have had the career I had. Ginger Rogers, Rita Hayworth, Marilyn Monroe, they were actresses that I loved from that era. But by the time I came along, the whole profession changed radically. PD: You sound disappointed.RW: There was disappointment. I was confused by it. I saw that my image was gathering momentum and there was very little I could do to stop it. I was trying very hard to convince people at the studio that I had more to offer than that, but it just would not take. Movie studios don't care about your own personal ambitions. It's a business. TV today has more of a vested interest in actors and people have more chance to build continuity with their audience who will react to them as total people rather than a physical type.

PD: In your book you also talk about personal disappointments.You say that your breakup with Jim, when you picked up and moved to LA for your career, was the most painful decision of your life. Your exact quote is: "For our children's sake, I should have stayed. The damage I did to my children and Jim taking off as I did is immeasurable... I have no defense for my foolishness, except to say that I was young and pigheaded..."RW: In retrospect it's one of those terrible Catch 22s. In my opinion, at my advanced age, our lives are not meant to be lived for our own gratification and enjoyment. It's for other people and your family. When you have children and a man, you have this obligation to other people and it's a difficult dance to carry on. PD: Does anyone in Hollywood do the balance well? RW: Jennifer Garner. She has a couple of children, but she took time to have those children and provide for her children on the sets she works on. That didn't exist in my day and age. I'm very encouraged by these role models, like Jennifer and Reese Witherspoon, talented women in all areas. They want to do what's right for their children. PD: From your vantage point, what are today's parents doing wrong for their children?RW: A two-parent family is the ideal. My mother made sacrifices and I am eternally grateful for that. Even though my father was domineering, I wouldn't have the sense of self I have today, holding myself to a certain standard. Growing up in the '40s and '50s, we wanted our parents to be proud of us. Their role wasn't about being pals; you did what you were told and you wanted to please them. I think girls want to please their father. For me, it wasn't an unconditional love, it was conditional with my father. If I performed perfectly with a capital P then I got his love and approval. Contemporary young girls are missing that. They don't have a father who says, 'You don't do it that way, you're not going to be wearing those clothes, you're going to apply yourself.' The male had an authoritative voice in those early years. That's one of the things that my daughter didn't have with her own daddy. She was never the apple-of-his-eye on a daily basis. I knew when I was pleasing my father and this is terribly important. PD: If you could go back in time, how would you do it differently? RW: I might have provided more visitation and a closer proximity to the father and not have this idea that I needed to run away. PD: That's very honest of you.RW: I am very harsh with myself about it. I wouldn't give myself an 'A' and my kids wouldn't give me an 'A.' We have a good relationship now, but not without a lot of effort on my part to make retribution and ask for forgiveness of them and rebuild the trust I lost out of the wrong set of priorities. These two children of mine are fantastic human beings and I want them to be at peace. I think if you have parents that you don't forgive -- I forgave my father -- you're carrying around resentment and anger. It's a poison in your system and it will be directed at your own self, and you're going to get sick. I wanted to heal the hurts and the wounds that I many have been inadvertently responsible for. PD: What do you think of today's young people?RW: Not that I want censorship, but now with the internet it's not The New York Times' all the news that's fit to print. It's every darn thing. It's too much exposure to all things in existence on the planet. Where do you find equilibrium in that? Their attention span is shorter and shorter and they are very glib. If everything is on top of you all the time you don't see the forest through the trees. There's no music there.PD: Any solutions?RW: We used to respect our teachers and there were dress codes. People behaved themselves. There was hell to pay if you acted up in the classroom. You didn't get away with stuff. Are we raising a group of little animals out there? You're supposed to be nice to your fellow human beings. The human condition is wrought with pain and difficulty, and being civil is rule number one. I don't know how these kids are getting away with it after being rotten to people. I'm surprised at the meanness. They behave like a bunch of gluttonous sloths, a bunch of wild animals, and they end up on Jerry Springer. PD: What do you do to keep the equilibrium and find peace?RW: I'm very fortunate that I started studying yoga in my late 30s, which lead me in my 50s to touch base with my mother's faith. I was raised as a Presbyterian girl. I was coming into my heyday in the '60s, with drugs, promiscuous sex happening. Here I'm a sex symbol but I've never gotten into substance abuse, or became a sex addict because I had that sense that there were boundaries. That kept me sane and healthy all this time. There was an invisible compass in my head, a sense of decency that relates to my mother. I liked the feeling of doing something that was good and right. PD: Tell me about the search for faith.RW: I went on a quest for a church for a couple of years. I considered myself a Christian when I was growing up, although I fell away from it. It came very late in life and I hit a brick wall. I tried Buddhism, Hindi and this and that and I said, 'just stop it.' I found a renewed faith in a higher power and in certain precepts of behavior that lead to a happier existence. In my later years I needed to connect with that. PD: What precipitated the search?RW: When my mother passed away at 93, she was on husband number three, who was 13 years younger than she was. Her children, all there, gathered around. I thought, 'I've got to look at this more closely' and I went back to bible study. PD: So, would we ever run into you at church?RW: I am a very happy, God-fearing person who goes to church every Sunday. I've met the most lovely people there who have nothing to do with show business. PD: How has your renewed faith changed you?RW: I'm more open to other people, I'm more humble, more giving, more outgoing and happier with my age and my lot in life because I believe in something bigger than me. It started to be self, self, self, self, self. Actresses are big offenders of being self-involved. The Raquel in that poster is not me. I played her, but that's not me. PD: Who is Raquel Welch today?RW: Well, I watch more than my share of reality TV because I'm fascinated with the human condition. Housewives of New York, New Jersey, Orange County. And I have to watch Simon Cowell. As much as I like Ellen, I miss Paula's ditzy quality. Why does everyone have to be so tightly wrapped? If you can just watch people be themselves on camera, who needs actors?PD: So you're plugged into what's on TV. What else are you watching these days?RW: 9 by Design. I am transfixed by that show. What a fabulous earth mother she is, and the guy is a sweetheart. I've never seen her blow her top and I love to see them go moment to moment. They seem to thrive on spontaneity, on making art out of chaos.PD: What about you on Dancing with the Stars?RW: They've asked me a number of times, but I just don't know that I could do that grueling routine and make a commitment to that. I don't want to be the over-the-hill sex symbol on the floor. PD: That's a shame. You would be great.RW: How do you know?PD: Just a feeling. Having replaced Lauren Bacall and, later, Julie Andrews in big Broadway musicals -- Woman of the Year and Victor/Victoria, respectively -- isn't it time for you to star in your own Broadway show?RW: Yes, I wouldn't mind, but I'm not so interested in the starring part. I love theater because the live audience is so special. I had always wanted to be in musical theater and never got a chance in the '60s, so it was great for me to do those things. I'm no Julie Andrews and it's hard to do eight shows a week. Coming up on 70 now, I personally don't have that physical stamina. I would like to do an ensemble comedy, having fun and entertaining people. I would just as soon not have to carry the darn thing. I'm happy to share and I'd be happy to be on the boards again. PD: Well, you're in cardboard now. What was it like for you to write a book? RW: I went on the computer and wrote. It was a supercharged experience, but it was also kind of gnarly and hunkered down. I tore my rotator cuff because of the way I was dropping my body over the keys. You have a high adrenaline rush as a writer, addicted to this keyboard, and when you come up you just have hell to pay because you hunkered down into this thing. I started wearing a harness to pull my shoulders back because I'm very broad-shouldered. I even laid down on a slanted pillow. I don't know how Shakespeare did it.PD: In the book, you give hints as to the famous men in your life – Elvis, Sinatra, Dylan, Burt Reynolds, Richard Burton -- but you never end up with a big reveal.RW: I'm not going to betray a confidence. No, that's it. Exactly what I wrote there is it. It was supposed to be a fun thing. I've been called a tease. PD: Oh, c'mon. Give us something.RW: All that glitters isn't gold is a cliché, but it's true. It's all just another fantasy. I'm just another Jane out there. PD: Fine. Then at least tell us about the Hollywood men you admire today?RW: You're gonna die. I think Alec Baldwin is the bomb. He's very good company, quick-witted and very funny and personable. I think he's coming into his own now. I think he's great, very masculine, which I like. I don't agree with his politics, which is okay, but he's a formidable actor. My sister thinks I'm crazed. Tom Hanks is wonderful, of course. I love Jack Nicholson and Clint Eastwood, Sean Connery. PD: And the women?RW: Sandra Bullock, I love her and God bless her, I wish that the media thing would not make a spectator sport of her personal life. That's what Woman of the Year was about. TV journalist at the top her game and the husband doesn't show up because she was too much and he walked out. It happens to women all the time. It's a bitter pill. PD: You say in the book, "Frankly, in marriage, sex really isn't the glue that holds everything together. Sex, in my opinion, is overrated and constantly hyped far beyond what it can deliver." RW: Sex is being held up for the new generation as the be all and end all. It's supposed to be an expression of your regard for someone. It's in our faces every waking minute. We worship sex, but for most people it doesn't take that long. It has its place, but it's just too prevalent. I know I sound like a prude, but can't we have cheerleaders that don't do spread eagle and grinding? Britney Spears would remember that she was a lot more happening when she wasn't pushing it. I did some of it myself and at some point it wasn't productive.

The poster that took Raquel Welch into the popularity stratosphere. Credit: Mary Evans/Ronald Grant/Everett CollectionPD: The famous poster from One Million Years B.C. was the vision of sex in the '60s.RW: The poster isn't all that prurient. It was nice and athletic, but I tell you, there are times when I think, 'oh gosh, that was not a good moment for me.' But in a way, comparatively speaking, I think I was fairly pristine. I was not into all of that sexual explicitness on camera. Do we really have to go so far where nothing is happening unless we're getting graphic? Can't we use our imagination anymore? A woman is wonderful thing. We are a real prize to be won. It's not an easy role to play, but a beautiful and powerful one. Marina Galperina contributed to the research on this story.

Legendary Singer Lena Horne Dies at 92

2010-05-10T03:01:00.001-07:00

Verena Dobnik AP

NEW YORK (May 9) - Lena Horne, the enchanting jazz singer and actress who reviled the bigotry that allowed her to entertain white audiences but not socialize with them, slowing her rise to Broadway superstardom, died Sunday. She was 92.Horne died at NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital, according to hospital spokeswoman Gloria Chin. Chin would not release any other details.Horne, whose striking beauty and magnetic sex appeal often overshadowed her sultry voice, was remarkably candid about the underlying reason for her success.

"I was unique in that I was a kind of black that white people could accept," she once said. "I was their daydream. I had the worst kind of acceptance because it was never for how great I was or what I contributed. It was because of the way I looked."In the 1940s, she was one of the first black performers hired to sing with a major white band, the first to play the Copacabana nightclub and among a handful with a Hollywood contract.In 1943, MGM Studios loaned her to 20th Century-Fox to play the role of Selina Rogers in the all-black movie musical "Stormy Weather." Her rendition of the title song became a major hit and her signature piece.On screen, on records and in nightclubs and concert halls, Horne was at home vocally with a wide musical range, from blues and jazz to the sophistication of Rodgers and Hart in songs like "The Lady Is a Tramp" and "Bewitched, Bothered and Bewildered."In her first big Broadway success, as the star of "Jamaica" in 1957, reviewer Richard Watts Jr. called her "one of the incomparable performers of our time." Songwriter Buddy de Sylva dubbed her "the best female singer of songs."But Horne was perpetually frustrated with the public humiliation of racism."I was always battling the system to try to get to be with my people. Finally, I wouldn't work for places that kept us out ... it was a damn fight everywhere I was, every place I worked, in New York, in Hollywood, all over the world," she said in Brian Lanker's book "I Dream a World: Portraits of Black Women Who Changed America."While at MGM, she starred in the all-black "Cabin in the Sky," in 1943, but in most of her other movies, she appeared only in musical numbers that could be cut in the racially insensitive South without affecting the story. These included "I Dood It," a Red Skelton comedy, "Thousands Cheer" and "Swing Fever," all in 1943; "Broadway Rhythm" in 1944; and "Ziegfeld Follies" in 1946."Metro's cowardice deprived the musical of one of the great singing actresses," film historian John Kobal wrote.Early in her career Horne cultivated an aloof style out of self-preservation, becoming "a woman the audience can't reach and therefore can't hurt" she once said.Later she embraced activism, breaking loose as a voice for civil rights and as an artist. In the last decades of her life, she rode a new wave of popularity as a revered icon of American popular music.Her 1981 one-woman Broadway show, "Lena Horne: The Lady and Her Music," won a special Tony Award. In it, the 64-year-old singer used two renditions - one straight and the other gut-wrenching - of "Stormy Weather" to give audiences a glimpse of the spiritual odyssey of her five-decade career.A sometimes savage critic, John Simon, wrote that she was "ageless. ... tempered like steel, baked like clay, annealed like glass; life has chiseled, burnished, refined her."When Halle Berry became the first black woman to win the best actress Oscar in 2002, she sobbed: "This moment is for Dorothy Dandridge, Lena Horne, Diahann Carroll. ... It's for every nameless, faceless woman of color who now has a chance because this door tonight has been opened."Lena Mary Calhoun Horne, the great-granddaughter of a freed slave, was born in Brooklyn June 30, 1917, to a leading family in the black bourgeoisie. Her daughter, Gail Lumet Buckley, wrote in her 1986 book "The Hornes: An American Family" that among their relatives was a college girlfriend of W.E.B. Du Bois and a black adviser to Franklin D. Roosevelt.Dropping out of school at 16 to support her ailing mother, Horne joined the chorus line at the Cotton Club, the fabled Harlem night spot where the entertainers were black and the clientele white.She left the club in 1935 to tour with Noble Sissle's orchestra, billed as Helena Horne, the name she continued using when she joined Charlie Barnet's white orchestra in 1940.A movie offer from MGM came when she headlined a show at the Little Troc nightclub with the Katherine Dunham dancers in 1942.Her success led some blacks to accuse Horne of trying to "pass" in a white world with her light complexion. Max Factor even developed an "Egyptian" makeup shade especially for the budding actress while she was at MGM.But in his book "Gotta Sing Gotta Dance: A Pictorial History of Film Musicals," Kobal wrote that she refused to go along with the studio's efforts to portray her as an exotic Latin American."I don't have to be an imitation of a white woman that Hollywood sort of hoped I'd become," Horne once said. "I'm me, and I'm like nobody else."Horne was only 2 when her grandmother, a prominent member of the Urban League and the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, enrolled her in the NAACP. But she avoided activism until 1945 when she was entertaining at an Army base and saw German prisoners of war sitting up front while black American soldiers were consigned to the rear.That pivotal moment channeled her anger into something useful.She got involved in various social and political organizations and - along with her friendship with Paul Robeson - got her name onto blacklists during the red-hunting McCarthy era.By the 1960s, Horne was one of the most visible celebrities in the civil rights movement, once throwing a lamp at a customer who made a racial slur in a Beverly Hills restaurant and in 1963 joining 250,000 others in the March on Washington when Martin Luther King Jr. gave his "I Have a Dream" speech. Horne also spoke at a rally that same year with another civil rights leader, Medgar Evers, just days before his assassination.It was also in the mid-'60s that she put out an autobiography, "Lena," with author Richard Schickel.The next decade brought her first to a low point, then to a fresh burst of artistry.She had married MGM music director Lennie Hayton, a white man, in Paris in 1947 after her first overseas engagements in France and England. An earlier marriage to Louis J. Jones had ended in divorce in 1944 after producing daughter Gail and a son, Teddy.In the 2009 biography "Stormy Weather," author James Gavin recounts that when Horne was asked by a lover why she'd married a white man, she replied: "To get even with him."Her father, her son and her husband, Hayton, all died in 1970-71, and the grief-stricken singer secluded herself, refusing to perform or even see anyone but her closest friends. One of them, comedian Alan King, took months persuading her to return to the stage, with results that surprised her."I looked out and saw a family of brothers and sisters," she said. "It was a long time, but when it came I truly began to live."And she discovered that time had mellowed her bitterness."I wouldn't trade my life for anything," she said, "because being black made me understand."
Filed under: Nation, Entertainment

Remembering Lynn Redgrave

2010-05-04T14:18:00.001-07:00

Marilyn "My Heart Belongs To Daddy"

2010-05-03T15:22:00.001-07:00

CLICK PHOTO ~ FULL VIEW!!!

Barbra Streisand ( If You Go Away)

2009-10-02T07:00:00.000-07:00

Select and copy web page URL

PAUL NEWMAN January 26, 1925, Shaker Heights, Ohio, ~ 26 September 2008, Westport, Connecticut

2009-01-26T08:18:00.000-08:00

Was so ashamed of his debut in the failed costume drama The Silver Chalice (1954), that he took out an ad in Variety apologizing for his performance.

His father was of German heritage and his mother was of Hungarian heritage.

Lee Strasberg, who trained Newman at the Actor's Studio, said that he would have been as great an actor as Marlon Brando if he hadn't been so handsome. According to Strasberg, Newman had the talent, but he too often relied on his good looks to coast through a role.

Sharon Tate January 24, 1943, Dallas, Texas

2009-01-24T07:46:00.000-08:00

Her favorite lip makeup was Vaseline. She kept little jars of it in her car.

Had enormous brown eyes and a dazzling smile. At the time of her death, she was known as one of the most beautiful women in Hollywood.

FAYE DUNAWAY ~ January14, 1941, Bascom, Florida, USA

2009-01-14T06:57:00.000-08:00

Mini Biography
She was one of the hottest actresses in the 1970s playing neurotic, highly driven women with sex appeal. Life in the 1990s has not been as good. In a much-publicized incident, she was dropped as the lead in the Broadway musical "Sunset Boulevard," (based on the Gloria Swanson classic film Sunset Blvd. (1950)) and her attempt at starring in a television comedy was an unmitigated bomb.IMDb Mini Biography By: Ray Hamel
Spouse
Terry O'Neill
(1983 - 1987) (divorced) 1 child
Peter Wolf
(1 August 1974 - 1979) (divorced)
Trivia
She auditioned for the role of Daisy that went to Mia Farrow in The Great Gatsby (1974). Her 1995 autobiography was titled "Looking for Gatsby: My Life."
Attended Boston University. Gave up a Fulbright Scholarship to the Royal Academy of Dramatic Arts in London to join the original training program at the Lincoln Center Repertory Theater in New York. She got her first starring role in "A Man For All Seasons" just days after graduating from college. She was the daughter of a career army man which resulted in her traveling constantly in her early life.
Her son with ex-husband Terry O'Neill, Liam Walker Dunaway O'Neill, was born in the summer of 1980.
Her ex-husband, Peter Wolf, was with the "J. Geils Band".
Ranked #65 in Empire (UK) magazine's "The Top 100 Movie Stars of All Time" list. [October 1997]
Converted to Catholicism while in Boston. [27 December 1996]
Has a connection with the James Bond - 007 franchise: was considered for the role of Domino Derval in Thunderball (1965), and Octopussy (1983) as the female lead (Maud Adams ended up with the part). Faye had a chance to co-star with Pierce Brosnan (the fifth 007) in the remake of The Thomas Crown Affair (1999).
Competing for beauty titles was considered de rigueur for Southern girls in the 1950s, and Dunaway remembers in her autobiography that she was somehow convinced that she could NOT leave Florida until she won one. She missed being crowned May Queen at Leon High School in Tallahassee by a mere six votes, and had another near-miss at a title when she was voted runner up for Miss University of Florida in 1959. Dunaway finally scored her beauty crown when she was named Sweetheart of Sigma Chi, and promptly transferred to Boston University.
Other actresses considered for Dunaway's breakthrough role of Bonnie Parker in Bonnie and Clyde (1967) included Natalie Wood, Sue Lyon, Carol Lynley, Leslie Caron, and even Warren Beatty's big sister Shirley MacLaine. Tuesday Weld actually turned down the role due to pregnancy.
The role of Evelyn Mulwray in Chinatown (1974) was originally marked for Ali MacGraw, wife of the film's producer, Robert Evans. By the time production started, MacGraw had left Evans for actor Steve McQueen and other actresses were considered for the part. Dunaway's main competition for the role was Jane Fonda.
By her own admission in a New York Times interview many years back, she and late comedian Lenny Bruce were briefly lovers and lived together for a week, circa 1963. She was also engaged to director Jerry Schatzberg in the late 1960s.
In order to be taken seriously as an actress, she turned down a regular role on "The Guiding Light" (1952) in 1965.
Her real-life portrayal of actress Joan Crawford in the critically panned film Mommie Dearest (1981) was ranked #41 on the villains list of the 100 years of "The Greatest Screen Heroes and Legends."
Her portrayal of Bonnie Parker in Bonnie and Clyde (1967) was ranked #32 on the villains list of the 100 years of "The Greatest Screen Heroes and Villains." She shared this honor with Warren Beatty, who played Clyde Barrow.
Member of Pi Beta Phi sorority.
One of only three actresses, along with Halle Berry and Liza Minnelli,to win both the Academy Award for Best Actress and the Razzie Award for Worst Actress (Dunaway shared her award with Bo Derek).
Is only 14 years older than Diana Scarwid, who played her daughter in Mommie Dearest (1981).
Is the only actor/actress to have appeared in both the 1968 version (The Thomas Crown Affair (1968) and 1999 version (The Thomas Crown Affair (1999) of "The Thomas Crown Affair".
Her performance as Evelyn Cross Mulwray in Chinatown (1974) is ranked #36 on Premiere Magazine's 100 Greatest Performances of All Time (2006).
Her performance as Bonnie Parker in Bonnie and Clyde (1967) is ranked #34 on Premiere Magazine's 100 Greatest Movie Characters of All Time.
According to director's commentary on the Mommie Dearest (1981) DVD, Dunaway feels the film's reception ruined her career, to an extent, and she refuses to discuss the film (hence her lack of participation in its release).
Turned down the role in Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice (1969).
Mother of Liam Dunaway O'Neill from her marriage to renowned British photographer Terry O'Neill.

All together now: "Awwwww.... BROTHERS & SISTERS " (Luke Macfarlane as coverboy)

2009-01-06T07:33:00.001-08:00

MARY TYLER MOORE ~ December 29, 1936, Brooklyn, New York, USA

2008-12-29T04:57:00.000-08:00

Personal Quotes
Sometimes you have to get to know someone really well to realize you're really strangers.
There is a dark side. I tend not to be as optimistic as Mary Richards. I have an anger in me that I carry from my childhood experiences -- I expect a lot of myself and I'm not too kind to myself.
Diabetes is an all-too-personal time bomb which can go off today, tomorrow, next year, or 10 years from now - a time bomb affecting millions like me and the children here today.
I'm not an actress who can create a character. I play me.
Diets are for those who are thick and tired of it.

Eartha Kitt Dies ~ at 81 "Singer, Actress"

2008-12-25T17:11:00.000-08:00

By POLLY ANDERSON,
AP
NEW YORK (Dec. 25) - Eartha Kitt, a sultry singer, dancer and actress who rose from South Carolina cotton fields to become an international symbol of elegance and sensuality, has died, a family spokesman said. She was 81.
Andrew Freedman said Kitt, who was recently treated at Columbia Presbyterian Hospital, died Thursday of colon cancer.

Kitt, a self-proclaimed "sex kitten" famous for her catlike purr, was one of America's most versatile performers, winning two Emmys and nabbing a third nomination. She also was nominated for several Tonys and two Grammys.
Her career spanned six decades, from her start as a dancer with the famed Katherine Dunham troupe to cabarets and acting and singing on stage, in movies and on television. She persevered through an unhappy childhood as a mixed-race daughter of the South and made headlines in the 1960s for denouncing the Vietnam War during a visit to the White House.
Through the years, Kitt remained a picture of vitality and attracted fans less than half her age even as she neared 80.
When her book "Rejuvenate," a guide to staying physically fit, was published in 2001, Kitt was featured on the cover in a long, curve-hugging black dress with a figure that some 20-year-old women would envy. Kitt also wrote three autobiographies.
Once dubbed the "most exciting woman in the world" by Orson Welles, she spent much of her life single, though brief romances with the rich and famous peppered her younger years.
After becoming a hit singing "Montonous" in the Broadway revue "New Faces of 1952," Kitt appeared in "Mrs. Patterson" in 1954-55. (Some references say she earned a Tony nomination for "Mrs. Patterson," but only winners were publicly announced at that time.) She also made appearances in "Shinbone Alley" and "The Owl and the Pussycat."

Her first album, "RCA Victor Presents Eartha Kitt," came out in 1954, featuring such songs as "I Want to Be Evil," "C'est Si Bon" and the saucy gold digger's theme song "Santa Baby," which is revived on radio each Christmas.
The next year, the record company released follow-up album "That Bad Eartha," which featured "Let's Do It," "Smoke Gets in Your Eyes" and "My Heart Belongs to Daddy."
In 1996, she was nominated for a Grammy in the category of traditional pop vocal performance for her album "Back in Business." She also had been nominated in the children's recording category for the 1969 record "Folk Tales of the Tribes of Africa."
Kitt also acted in movies, playing the lead female role opposite Nat King Cole in "St. Louis Blues" in 1958 and more recently appearing in "Boomerang" and "Harriet the Spy" in the 1990s.
On television, she was the sexy Catwoman on the popular "Batman" series in 1967-68, replacing Julie Newmar who originated the role. A guest appearance on an episode of "I Spy" brought Kitt an Emmy nomination in 1966.
"Generally the whole entertainment business now is bland," she said in a 1996 Associated Press interview. "It depends so much on gadgetry and flash now. You don't have to have talent to be in the business today.
"I think we had to have something to offer, if you wanted to be recognized as worth paying for."

December 21, 1937, New York City, New York, USA

2008-12-21T04:14:00.000-08:00

Attended Vassar College, Poughkeepsie, NY.
Is the subject of an erroneous urban legend. When Vassar was a women's college, the story goes, Jane Fonda refused to wear the elegant white gloves and pearls that were the attire for the daily Tea in the Rose Parlor. When confronted, Fonda returned to the parlor wearing the gloves and the pearls, and nothing else.

Arrested and charged with drug smuggling (November 1970).
Her birth was the cause of some interruptions during her father's filming of Jezebel (1938) with Bette Davis.

She was, and still is, an exercise maven.
Mother of Troy Garity

Fonda was arrested in 1970 after allegedly kicking a cop when she was found carrying a large amount of what appeared to be pills. All charges were dropped after the pills were identified as vitamins.

Born on the same day Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937) premiered.

Her father was of Italian and Dutch descent and her mother was of Irish and German descent.

Is fluent in French.
Passed on the title role in Norma Rae (1979), which won a Best Actress Oscar for its eventual star Sally Field.

She and her father Henry Fonda are the only father-daughter couple to receive Oscars for

leading roles.

A 1972 visit to Hanoi during the Vietnam war where Fonda campaigned in favor of the communist regime and the subsequent release of several photographs of her atop a North Vietnamese anti-aircraft gun used against American air crews earned her the nickname "Hanoi Jane." As a result of her visit to Hanoi and the accompanying photographs, many Americans continue to regard Fonda with general resentment and hostility to this day.

Was offered the role of Chris MacNeil in The Exorcist (1973).

Jane now openly admits that she suffered from bulimia from age 13 to age 37. While modeling, she said she lived on cigarettes, coffee, speed, and strawberry yogurt.

Shortly after her divorce from Ted Turner, she announced she had become a born-again Christian. Speculations are that this may have played a part in their seperation, since Ted Turner has expressed highly critical opinions on religion in general.

The suicide of her socialite mother Frances Seymour Brokaw was kept from her as a teenager, and she was told that she'd died of heart failure. Household newspaper and magazine subscriptions were canceled, and the staff and student body of Fonda's high school were instructed not to discuss the incident. Fonda learned the truth months later while leafing through a movie magazine in art class.

Protested alongside fellow actresses Sally Field & Christine Lahti, and playwright Eve Ensler urging the Mexican government to re-investigate the slayings of hundreds of women in Ciudad Juarez, on the Mexico-Texas border. (February 2004)

Was nominated for Broadway's 1960 Tony Award as Best Supporting or Featured Actress (Dramatic) for "There Was a Little Girl."

Turned down the role in Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice (1969).
Producer Robert Evans wanted Fonda play female lead in Chinatown (1974).
Was born double-jointed.

Turned down the role of Bonnie Parker, then played by Faye Dunaway, in Bonnie and Clyde (1967) Living in France at the time, she did not want to relocate to the U.S. for the part.
In 1984, her wealth, generated from acting, producing, and fitness videos was estimated at $50 million.

Announced that she became a Christian (2001).

Her aerobics video "Jane Fonda's Workout" sold 17 million copies, making it the best-selling home video ever and her an icon of this form of exercises (1982).

Considers They Shoot Horses, Don't They? (1969) as a turning point in her career.

Danced ballet until she broke her foot in her 40s.

Personal Quotes
Working in Hollywood does give one a certain expertise in the field of prostitution.
I was terrified when I turned 30. I was pregnant and had the mumps and Faye Dunaway was just coming out in Bonnie and Clyde (1967). I thought, 'Oh my God, I'll never work again. I'm old!'
"Acting with [Laurence] Harvey is like acting by yourself - only worse." - Jane Fonda on her 1962 film Walk on the Wild Side
"It hurt so many soldiers. It galvanised such hostility. It was the most horrible thing I could possibly have done. It was just thoughtless." [expressing regret at her support for the Viet Cong]
I, a Socialist, think we should strive toward a Socialist society, all the way to Communism.
"If you understood what Communism was, you would hope, you would pray on your knees that one day we would become Communist." (speaking to students at the University of Michigan in 1970)
People think actresses find public speaking easy, and it's not easy at all; we're used to hiding behind masks.
[accepting her father's Oscar for On Golden Pond]: "I'll bet when he heard it just now he said 'Hey ain't I lucky?' As if luck had anything to do with it."
The image of Jane Fonda, Barbarella, Henry Fonda's daughter ... sitting on an enemy aircraft gun (in North Vietnam) was a betrayal...The largest lapse of judgment that I can even imagine.
I would have given up acting in a minute. I didn't like how it set me apart from other people.
When I start down a path that I know is the right path, I go with all of me.
I'm a very brave person. I can go to North Vietnam, I can challenge my government, but I can't challenge the man I'm with if means I'm going to end up alone.
It's hard to imagine a happy ending to the US-led war in Iraq. What's it going to mean for stability as a nation, for terrorism, for the economy I can't imagine. I think the entire world is going to be united against us.
Ted [Turner] needs someone to be there 100 percent of the time. He thinks that's love. It's not love. It's babysitting.
I wanted to do a tour like I did during the Vietnam War, a tour of the country. But then Cindy Sheehan filled in the gap, and she is better at this than I am. I carry too much baggage.
When I left the West Coast I was a liberal. When I landed in New York I was a revolutionary.

PATTY DUKE ~ Born on December 14, 1946 in Elmhurst, New York

2008-12-14T07:19:00.000-08:00

Born on December 14, 1946 in Elmhurst, New York, as Anna Marie Duke. Her acting career began when she was introduced to her brother Ray Duke's managers, John and Ethel Ross. Soon after, Anna Marie became Patty, the actress. Patty started off in commercials, a few movies and some bit parts. Her first big, memorable role came when she was chosen to portray the blind and deaf Helen Keller in the Broadway version of "The Miracle Worker". The play lasted almost two years, from October 19, 1959 - July 1, 1961 (Patty left on May, 1961). In 1962, The Miracle Worker (1962) became a movie and Patty won an Academy Award for best supporting actress. She was 16 years old, making her the youngest person ever to win an Oscar. She then starred in her own sitcom titled "The Patty Duke Show" (1963). It lasted for three seasons and Patty was nominated for an Emmy. In 1965 she starred in the movie Billie (1965). It was a success and was the first movie ever sold to a television network. That same year she married director Harry Falk. Their marriage lasted four years. She then starred in Valley of the Dolls (1967), which was a financial but not a critical success. In 1969 she secured a part in an independent film called Me, Natalie (1969). The film was a box-office flop but she won her second Golden Globe Award for her performance in it. In 1976 she won her second Emmy award for the highly successful mini-series "Captains and the Kings" (1976). Other successful TV films followed. She received two Emmy nominations in 1978 for A Family Upside Down (1978) (TV) and Having Babies III (1978) (TV). She then won her third Emmy in the 1979 TV movie version of The Miracle Worker (1979) (TV), this time portraying Annie Sullivan. In 1982 she was diagnosed with manic-depressive illness. In 1984 she became President of the Screen Actors Guild (SAG). In 1986, she married Michael Pierce, a drill sergeant whom she met while preparing for a role in the TV movie A Time to Triumph (1986) (TV). In 1987 she wrote her autobiography "Call Me Anna". In 1989 she and Mike adopted a baby, who they named Kevin. Her autobiography became a TV movie in 1990, with Patty playing herself from her 30s onward. In 1992 she wrote her second book, "A Brilliant Madness: Living with Manic Depression Illness". Anna Marie Duke has had a long and successful career, winning three Emmys. She is a mother, a political advocate for issues such as the ERA (Equal Rights Amendment), AIDS and nuclear disarmament, all despite having Manic-Depression. She has proven her strength as an actress and as a person.

She was the youngest actress at the time (12) to have her name above the marquee title on Broadway ("The Miracle Worker") and the youngest ever (16) to have a TV series bearing her name ("The Patty Duke Show" (1963)).

I subscribe to the theory that says you're a product of all your experiences. And I am finally, most of the time, happy with the product. I now think it is OK to be Patty Duke.

DIONNE WARWICK December 12, 1940, East Orange, New Jersey

2008-12-12T06:22:00.000-08:00

Personal Quotes
My self-imposed mandate is to be the voice for the voiceless.
My songs are like my children. I love every single one of them.

FRANK SINATRA December 12, 1915, Hoboken, New Jersey, ~ 14 May 1998, Los Angeles, California

2008-12-12T06:17:00.000-08:00

Growing up on the streets of Hoboken, New Jersey, made Frank Sinatra determined to work hard to get ahead. Starting out as a saloon singer in musty little dives (he carried his own P.A. system), he eventually got work as a band singer, first with The Hoboken Four then with Harry James, then Tommy Dorsey. With the help of George Evans (Sinatra's genius press agent), his image was shaped into that of a street thug and punk who was saved by his first wife, Nancy. In 1942 he started his solo career, instantly finding fame as the king of the bobbysoxers - the young women and girls who were his fans - becoming the most popular singer of the era among teenage music fans. About that time his film career was also starting in earnest, striking box-office gold early on with a lead role in Anchors Aweigh (1945), a Best Picture nominee at the 1946 Academy Awards. Sinatra was awarded a special Oscar for his part in a short film against intolerance, The House I Live In (1946). His career on a high, Sinatra went from strength-to-strength on record, on stage and on screen, peaking in 1949, once again with Gene Kelly, in the MGM musical On the Town (1949) and Take Me Out to the Ball Game (1949). A controversial public affair with screen siren Ava Gardner broke up his marriage to Nancy Barbato. Record sales dwindled in the early 1950s and although Sinatra continued to act, now, appearing in more dramatic fare such as Meet Danny Wilson (1951), a vocal cord haemorrhage all but ended his career. He fought back, winning the coveted role of Maggio in From Here to Eternity (1953). He won an Oscar for best supporting actor and followed this with a scintillating performance as a deranged assassin in Suddenly (1954) and arguably a career best performance and Academy Award nomination for Best Actor in the powerful drama The Man With the Golden Arm (1955). Known as "One-Take Charlie" for his approach to acting that strove for spontaneity and energy, rather than perfection, he was an instinctive actor who was best at playing parts that mirrored his own personality. He continued to give strong and memorable performances in such films as Guys and Dolls (1955), The Joker is Wild (1957) and Some Came Running (1958). In the 1960s Sinatra became mildly prolific as a producer bringing such films as A Hole in the Head (1959), Sergeants 3 (1963) and Robin and the 7 Hoods (1964) to the big screen. Lighter roles along side Rat Pack buddies Dean Martin and Sammy Davis Jr were lucrative, especially the famed Ocean's 11 (1960), however, Sinatra alternated such projects with more stern offerings, namely The Manchurian Candidate, arguably Sinatra's finest picture, and his directorial debut, None But the Brave, which was the first Japanese/American co-production. That same year Von Ryan's Express (1965) was a box office sensation. In 1967 Sinatra returned to familiar territory in Sidney J. Furie's The Naked Runner (1967), one again playing as assassin in his only film to be shot in the U.K. and in Germany. That same year he starred as private investigator Tony Rome (1967), a role he reprised in the sequel, Lady in Cement (1968). He also starred with Lee Remick in The Detective (1968) a film daring for its time and a major box office success. After appearing in the comic western Dirty Dingus Magee (1970) Sinatra refrained from acting for a further seven years until producing the made-for-TV movie Contract on Cherry Street (1977). Based on the novel by William J. Rosenberg, this fable of vigilante cops turning vigilante against the mob boasted a stellar cast and was a ratings success. Sinatra returned to the big screen in The First Deadly Sin (1980) once again playing a New York detective with a moving, understated performance that was a fitting coda to his career as a leading man. He made one more appearance on the big screen with a cameo in Cannonball Run II (1984) and a final acting performance in Magnum P.I. in 1987 as a retired detective seeking vengeance on the killers of his granddaughter in an episode entitled Laura.IMDb Mini Biography By: David Montgomery

Rita Moreno ~ December 11, 1931, Humacao, Puerto Rico

2008-12-11T05:43:00.000-08:00

American actress Rita Moreno has managed to have a thriving career for the better part of six decades despite the institutional racism that has plagued the entertainment industry, particularly the anti-Hispanic bias that stereotyped Hispanic women as "spitfires" and sexpots. Moreno, one of the very few (and very first) performers to win an Oscar, an Emmy, a Tony, and a Grammy, was born born Rosita Dolores Alverío in in Humacao, Puerto Rico on December 11, 1931. She moved to New York City in 1937 along with her mother, where she began a professional career before she was a teenager. The 11-year-old Rosita got her first movie experience dubbing Spanish-language versions of American films. Less than a month before her 14th birthday on November 11, 1945, she made her Broadway debut in the play "Skydrift" at the Belasco Theatre, co-starring with Arthur Keegan and the young Eli Wallach. Although she would not appear again on Broadway for almost 20 years, Rita Moreno, as she was billed in the play, had arrived professionally. It would take her nearly as long to break through the forces of institutional racism and become the first Hispanic to win an Academy Award.

President George W. Bush & Barbra Streisand embrace - and it's like buttah

2008-12-11T05:36:00.000-08:00

BY BILL HUTCHINSON DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITER
Monday, December 8th 2008, 4:00 AM
Sachs/Pool
Singer Barbra Streisand once described Bush as "an alien sent here to destroy the Earth."

President Bush gingerly embraced one of his biggest bashers last night, bestowing a Kennedy Center Honor on Barbra Streisand.
The two-time Academy Award winner, who once described Bush as "an alien sent here to destroy the Earth," seemed genuinely touched by the nation's top artsy accolade.
"Art transcends politics this weekend," said the Brooklyn-born actress and singer.
Streisand, a Democratic stalwart, has publicly raged that Bush stole the 2000 election and mishandled the Iraq war.
But she played nice Sunday when she was greeted by Bush at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. for a reception before the show at the Kennedy Performing Arts Center.
"Everything went so smooth," said country singer George Jones, another recipient of a Kennedy Center Honor.
Streisand couldn't resist revealing her true feelings when asked if she would have preferred Barack Obama as the President hosting last night's event.
"That would have been lovely," said Streisand, quickly adding, "or [Bill] Clinton."
On the day of Obama's election, Streisand wrote on her Web site: "November 5th... what a day... a new day... finally [the Rev. Martin Luther King's] words ring true. I am so proud of our country."
George Stevens Jr., who created the honors for art and culture 31 years ago, said he wasn't worried about a dustup between Streisand and Bush.
Bush had in the past "graciously honored" critics such as Robert Redford and Ruby Dee without incident.
Other honorees were Oscar-winning actor Morgan Freeman, choreographer Twyla Tharp and Pete Townshend and Roger Daltrey of The Who.
The event, set to air Dec. 30 on CBS, featured performers from New York, Nashville, and Hollywood saluting the honorees, who sat with the President and First Lady Laura Bush.
The young singer-songwriter Ne-Yo sang Streisand's 1965 hit "Lover, Come Back to Me."
"Barbra Streisand is the epitome of emotion in music," he said. "You feel every word."
whutchinson@nydailynews.com

Agnes Robertson Moorehead~(December 6, 1900 – April 30, 1974

2008-12-06T04:37:00.000-08:00

Agnes Robertson Moorehead (December 6, 1900 – April 30, 1974) was an American actress.
Although she appeared in more than 70 films beginning with Citizen Kane and on dozens of television shows during a career that spanned more than 30 years, Moorehead is probably most widely known to modern audiences for her role as the witch Endora in the television series Bewitched. While rarely playing leads in films, Moorehead's skill at character development and range earned her one Emmy Award and two Golden Globe awards in addition to four Academy Awards and six Emmy Award nominations. Moorehead's transition to television won acclaim for drama and comedy. She could play many different types, but often portrayed haughty, arrogant characters.

Fonda Names The Date For Broadway Return

2008-12-05T05:09:00.000-08:00

4 December 2008 5:32 PM, PST From wenn.com See recent WENN news
Jane Fonda will return to the Broadway stage for a 15-week run in Moises Kaufman's 33 Variations in February.
It will mark her first performance on the New York stage in 46 years - she appeared in Strange Interlude in 1963.
The actress will open on 9 March at the Eugene O'Neill Theatre. Previews begin in February.

LIZA'S AT THE PALACE...! After Party

2008-12-04T17:36:00.001-08:00

Michele Lee, Liza Minnelli and Sandra Bernhard

Eugene Louis Faccuito aka Liza's dance teacher Luigi and Liza Minnelli

Retna Ltd & BroadwayWorld.com, represented by: http://www.retna.com/.

Madonna poses seductively on a chair while holding a leg in the Louis Vuitton advert for which she was reportedly paid £6.5 million

2008-12-04T10:27:00.000-08:00

The raunchy pictures were taken by Steven Meisel who shot Madonna's controversial 1992 book Sex

By Daily Mail ReporterLast updated at 5:05 PM on 04th December 2008

Madonna shows that she’s losing none of her sex appeal with age in a stunning ad for Louis Vuitton.
The 50-year-old singer has been pictured sporting unsightly bulging veins - a result of her rigorous exercise regime - in recent months.
But there are no prominent veins in sight as she poses seductively on a chair while holding a leg up - wearing fishnet tights, a tailored jacket and stilettos in the sexy shoot.
The newly-divorced star is said to have commanded a £6.5million fee for the campaign.

Photographer Steven Meisel, who shot Madonna's controversial 1992 book Sex, worked with her on the promotion.
Yesterday Madonna returned to Argentina twelve years after playing the country’s former first lady Eva Peron.

She arrived in Buenos Aires for the Latin America leg of her world tour with her three children and a huge entourage including 200 dancers, technicians and crew members.
Today she announced that she would be postponing the first of four shows in Buenos Aires.

Civil Rights Music Icon Odetta Dies

2008-12-03T07:16:00.000-08:00

AP
posted: 40 MINUTES AGO
WASHINGTON (Dec. 2) - Odetta, the deep-voiced folk singer whose ballads and songs became for many a soundtrack to the American civil rights movement, has died at age 77, the New York Times reported Wednesday.
The Times cited Odetta's manager, Doug Yeager, as saying she died of a heart attack. It did not give a time or place of death.

Odetta Holmes, born in Birmingham, Alabama, on Dec. 31, 1930, told the Times in a 2007 interview that the music of the Great Depression, particularly the prison songs and work songs from the fields of the deep South, helped shape her musical life.
While she recorded several albums and sang at New York's Carnegie Hall, among other prominent venues, Odetta is perhaps best remembered by most Americans for her brief performance at the August 1963 march on Washington, a pivotal event in the civil rights movement at which she sang the song "O Freedom."
The Times said Rosa Parks, the woman who launched the boycott of segregated buses in Montgomery, Alabama, was once asked which songs meant the most to her. "All the songs Odetta sings," was Parks' reply.
Odetta, who moved from Alabama to Los Angeles with her mother in 1937, earned a music degree from Los Angeles City College. But she told the Times her training in classical music and musical theater "was a nice exercise, but it had nothing to do with my life."
She said she found her true voice by listening to blues, jazz and folk music from the African-American and Anglo-American traditions.
Odetta began singing professionally in a West Coast production of the musical "Finian's Rainbow," but said she found a stronger calling in the coffee shops and nightclubs of San Francisco.
Her first solo album, "Odetta Sings Ballads and Blues," influenced another American folk legend -- Bob Dylan. "The first thing that turned me on to folk singing was Odetta," Dylan said in a 1978 interview with Playboy magazine.
In that album, Dylan said he heard "something vital and personal. I learned all the songs on that record," which included "Mule Skinner," "Jack of Diamonds" and "Water Boy."
In the early days of the civil rights movement, Odetta said her songs channelled "the fury and frustration that I had growing up" in segregated America. The many benefits she headlined helped underwrite the movement's work.
While Odetta's career cooled and her performances and recordings became fewer after the late 1960s, she retained her vocal and dramatic power even late in life. "Odetta's voice is still a force of nature," critic James Reed of the Boston Globe wrote of a December 2006 performance.
She remained "a majestic figure in American music, a direct gateway to bygone generations that feel so foreign today," Reed wrote.

Tina Turner recycles that famous flesh-revealing Mad Max dress at the age of 69

2008-12-02T11:27:00.000-08:00

The best is back: Three decades after starring in Mad max, right, Tina Turner recycled her iconic costume, left, as she appeared onstage in New York

Lady in red: Tina gives a storming performance in concert at Madison Square Gardens, New York

By Lizzie Smith Last updated at 1:07 PM on 02nd December 2008

It's nearly three decades since Tina Turner starred alongside Mel Gibson in Mad Max.
And as she approaches her 70th birthday than what better way to show she's still got what it takes than to pull on her old costume.
Tina appeared onstage at Madison Square Gardens in New York last night in a modern interpretation of her chainmail outfit in the iconic Eighties film.

And although this wasn't the original outfit it certainly showed off the 69-year-old's age-defying body to best effect.
The lurex costume showed slightly less of Tina's chest than the original, which she wore in the 1985 film Beyond Thunderdome.
Singer Tina belted her way through the concert in a series of fabulous outfits.

These included a short red sparkling mini dress with a plunging neckline, and a long red gown which revealed her still-shapely pins.
Four decades and 70 millions records after Tina found fame she is still working hard.
Last night's performance was part of a tour which will see her playing arenas across Europe and North America until April next year.

Happy Birthday ~ " The Divine Miss M " BETTE MIDLER

2008-12-01T05:57:00.000-08:00

Bette Midler (born December 1 , 1945 ) is an American singer , actress and comedian , also known (as her informal stage name) as The Divine Miss M. During her career, she has won four Grammy Awards , four Golden Globes , three Emmy Awards , and a Tony Award , and has been nominated for two Academy Awards . She is currently performing a new concert show, The Showgirl Must Go On, live five nights a week as one of the current headliners at Caesars Palace in Las Vegas (together with Cher and Elton John ).

M I L K "The Movie Of The Year!"

2008-11-30T19:05:00.000-08:00

Geraldine Page (November 22, 1924 – June 13, 1987)

2008-11-22T07:38:00.000-08:00

Geraldine Sue Page (November 22, 1924 – June 13, 1987) was an American actress. Although starring in at least two dozen feature films, she is primarily known for her celebrated work in the American theater.

Page was born in Kirksville, Missouri. She attended the Goodman Theatre Dramatic School in Chicago and studied acting with Uta Hagen in New York. She began appearing in stock at the age of seventeen.

Page was a trained method actor and worked closely with Lee Strasberg.

Page gave celebrated performances in films as well as her work on Broadway. Her film debut was in Out of the Night (1947). Her role in Hondo, garnered her a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress. In all, despite her relatively small filmography, Page received eight Academy Award nominations. She finally won the Oscar in 1986 for a wonderful performance in The Trip to Bountiful, which was based on a play by Horton Foote. Had she not won for Trip to Bountiful, she would have held the record for most nominations without a single win. When she won (F. Murray Abraham, upon opening the envelope, exclaimed "I consider this woman the greatest actress in the English language"), she received a standing ovation from the audience. She was surprised by her win (she openly talked about being a seven-time Oscar loser), and took a while to get to the stage to accept the award because she had taken off her shoes while sitting in the audience. She had not expected to win, and her feet were sore.

Today's Birthday's ~ GOLDIE & MARLO...

2008-11-21T07:58:00.000-08:00

GOLDIE 63 MARLO 71

Madonna and Guy strike deal...

2008-11-20T07:31:00.000-08:00

For richer: Madonna seen at a charity gala in New York last night as it emerged she and guy Ritchie have agreed a divorce settlement.
By Daily Mail Reporter
Last updated at 2:10 PM on 20th November 2008

Madonna and Guy Ritchie have reached agreement on their divorce - with the British film director refusing to take a penny of the pop star’s cash, it has emerged.
An announcement could come by the end of the month, a source close to the negotiations tells London's Evening Standard.

Another report, in The Times, claimed that notice of a decree nisi would be posted in the Registry of the Family Division in London within twenty-four hours.

Madonna, who attended a charity gala in New York last night looking much younger than her fifty years , will walk away from the eight-year marriage with her fortune, estimated at £300m, intact.

LANA TURNER~The Bad and The Beautiful

2008-11-18T15:43:00.000-08:00

One time "Sweater Girl" Lana Turner led a tempestuous life filled as much with torment and heartache as it was with glamour and romance.

She Will Be Preserved In Memory As She Was On celluloid: a platinum archetype of the silky-voiced siren, a luminous sex goddess whose looks could melt a monk's resolve. The Sweater Girl, they called her. In fact, Lana Turner spent four decades making 54 films, playing every variety of girl-good, bad, sometimes heartless, but never less than glamorous. Even off screen, she looked every inch the movie diva. "She never appeared in public," recalls Van Johnson, her costar in 1945's Weekend at the Waldorf, "unless she was beautifully coiffed and dressed exquisitely."
And yet "she never played The Star," says Hope Lange, who was a 19-year-old ingénue when she met Turner, then 36, on the set of 1957's Peyton Place. "She had no sense of self-importance. There wasn't an ounce of condescension to her." Despite her indelible portrayal of the icy adulteress in 1946 The Postman Always Rings Twice, "she was the opposite of her hard-boiled image," Says Terri Garr, who in 1980 worked with Turner on her last film, the never-released Witches' Brew. "She was very sweet; a gracious, genteel, lovely woman."
And surprisingly shy. Publicist John Springer recalls how, just before Turner was scheduled to reminisce about her career in front of an audience at New York City's Town Hall in 1975, "we literally had to push her onstage. At first she was trembling and barely able to speak, but the audience absolutely adored her. By the end, "adds Springer, "she was as bright and funny as could be."
Her life, however, was filled with sadness and pain. She had seven failed marriages, three miscarriages, two abortions and a suicide attempt. More vividly remembered than any of her movies perhaps, is the great scandal in which she played a leading role. In 1958, the actress's 14 year old daughter, Cheryl, fatally stabbed Turner's gangster boyfriend, Johnny Stompanato, in Turner's Beverly Hills home.
Lana somehow managed to survive it all. What finished her finally, was throat cancer; a heavy smoker, she died on June 29 at aged 74 in her two bedroom condo in L.A. with her maid of forty-four years Carmen Cruz by her side. Eve since her diagnosis in 1992, Turner had lived reclusively, leaving her high-rise only for her radiation treatments. Until the end, she kept up her facials and manicures and insisted that a hairdresser come twice a week. But there had been few public sightings. As one recent biographer quotes her, "I want my fans to remember me as I was."
But who was that, really? She was born Julia Jean Turner on February 8, 1921 in the mining town of Wallace Idaho, the daughter of Mildred Frances Cowan, who at 15 had eloped with 24 year-old John Virgil, a gambler and bootlegger. When Julia was 9, Virgil was murdered after a big win in a crap game. "The shock I suffered then may be a valid excuse for me now," she said many years later. "It may explain things I myself do not understood."
In 1935, when Julia was 14, she and her mother moved to L.A. (Mildred's respiratory problems mandated the shift to a drier climate.) A year later, Julia, then a student at Hollywood High School, decided to cut classes one day and dashed across the street to grab a coke at the Top Hat Cafe-not Schwab's Drugstore, as Hollywood legend has it. She was spotted by Billy Wilkerson, the influential publisher of the Hollywood Reporter. Wilkerson introduced her to Zeppo Marx (of Marx Brothers fame), who was running his own casting agency. Zeppo, in turn, sent her to director Mervyn LeRoy, who had been looking for a special girl-someone with box sex appeal and innocence, he said- to cast in a thriller called They Won't Forget. No one who saw it did.
The sight of the voluptuous 15-year-old in a tight skirt and clingy knits drew so many wolf whistles at a screening that an embarrassed Turner and her mortified mother slunk outside to a waiting taxi. (Turner was proud, however, of her new screen name-Lana-which according to her 1982 autobiography, she dreamed up herself after rejecting LeRoy's choices: Leonore or Lurlene.)
While some critics belittled Turner's talent, all agreed on one thing. "In any posture," said TIME, "Lana suggests she looking up from a pillow."
For a woman who made a living promising carnal bliss, "sex was never important to me," she wrote in her memoirs. The preliminaries though, were another matter. From her earliest days as a $100-per-week MGM contract player, she was known as Hollywood's Nightclub Queen and partied until dawn with escorts including Robert Stack and Fernando Lamas at Ciro's and the Trocadero. Mickey Rooney, who had starred with Turner in 1938's Love Finds Andy Hardy, claimed her as conquest. Later, armies of men of men would shower her with lavish gifts. But the man she called "the great love of her life" was Tyrone Power, who romanced her in the late 1940's. However they never wed.
Other suitors did become husbands. Turner tied the knot 7 times in 29 years. Her first marriage, to bandleader Artie Shaw in 1940, lasted less than six months. In 1942 she wed Stephan Crane, a gambler turned restaurateur-only to learn five months later, that he was not yet divorced from his first wife. He and Turner wed legally in 1943, five months before their only child, Cheryl Christina Crane was born. A year later though, Lana sued for divorce. In 1948, balding, overweight multimillionaire Henry J. (Bob) Topping finally won her over when he plopped a 15-carat engagement ring in her martini. But his alcoholism and philandering became too much to bear: She slashed her wrist in 1951 after suing him for divorce. Husband number 4, onetime Tarzan Lex Barker, sexually abused 10-year-old Cheryl. When Turner found out about it in 1957, she gave him 20 minutes to clear out. (In 1973, when Barker dropped dead of a heart attack on a Manhattan street, she dryly inquired, "What took him so long?") In her 1982 memoir, she reflected, "Somewhere there was a pattern, something in me that made me choose takers over and over again."
But none of Lana's romances was a bigger train wreck than her fling with Johnny Stompanato, a minor hood and crony of gangster Mickey Cohen. On Good Friday, April 4, 1958, Cheryl overheard Stompanato threatening to kill her mother during a domestic dispute. The girl grabbed an eight-inch kitchen knife and flung open the door to Turner's room. "I thought she hit him in the stomach," Lana later testified. "They came together and then they parted. I never saw the blade." His kidney and aorta punctured, Stompanato choked, gurgled and died. For days, gawkers cruised past Turner's lavish Beverly Hills Home. District Attorney William B. McKesson declined to charge Cheryl for the crime, noting that she had never had a true home "either with her mother or father." Although Lana retained legal custody, a court ordered Cheryl to live with her grandmother Mildred. But Cheryl continued to have emotional problems, and at 17 she began a 10-month stay at a mental hospital in Hartford, Connecticut. Now a successful business woman, Cheryl reconciled with her mother in 1981. "Our old strained relationship began to turn into one of friendship and understanding," Cheryl wrote in her 1988 memoir, Detour: A Hollywood Story.
Ironically, Lana's biggest hit, Ross Hunter's Imitation of Life (1959), tells the story of an actress who sacrifices her daughter's affection for her career. The movie made more money for Universal than any previous film in the studio's history.
But that and Madame X in 1966 were among Turner's last career high points. In the 70's she toured briefly with several stage productions, played haughty Jacqueline Perrault in the CBS prime time serial Falcon Crest and even touted a chain of Lana Turner Mini spas.
In 1983 she officially retired and lived quietly for the next nine years. Then in1992, word began to circulate that she was undergoing radiation treatments for throat cancer that had spread to her jaw and her lungs. True to form, on her birthday two years ago she told friends-in a hoarse whisper-that she was "completely recovered." It was a final fitting performance from the redoubtable star. For Lana Turner in the words of her former manager, Taylor Pero, lived by only three precepts: Image before truth, facade rather than fact, and pride over all."

Zeta-Jones goes blonde as Lana Turner! (rumored)

2008-11-18T15:25:00.000-08:00

Catherine Zeta-Jones will soon find out if blondes have more fun when she takes on the role of Hollywood bombshell Lana Turner.
The 38-year-old star has been cast as Turner in the upcoming movie Stompanato, about the actress' stormy relationship with Los Angeles underworld figure Johnny Stompanato, who was stabbed and killed by Turner's 14-year-old daughter.
Zeta-Jones has played brunettes throughout her career, and admits it was a little weird to see herself as a blonde.
While the script is still in development, Zeta-Jones said she was looking forward to discussing the role with her father-in-law, Kirk Douglas, who starred with Turner in the 1952 film The Bad and The Beautiful.

Stompanato (2010)

Writers:Sebastian Gutierrez (writer)David Webb Peoples (writer)Release Date:2010 (USA)
Genre:Crime Drama
Plot:Lana Turner and Johnny were sweethearts--until the day in 1958 when the screen queen's daughter, Cheryl, stabbed the hot-tempered gangland figure before he could make an exit from her mom's Beverly Hills bedroom.
Cast

Catherine Zeta-Jones
As Lana Turner (rumored)

Rock Hudson (November 17, 1925 – October 2, 1985)

2008-11-17T06:52:00.000-08:00

Rock Hudson (November 17, 1925 – October 2, 1985) was an American film and television actor, recognised as a romantic leading man during the 1960s and 1970s. Hudson was voted Star of the Year, Favorite Leading Man, and similar titles by numerous movie magazines and was unquestionably one of the most popular and well-known movie stars of the time. He completed nearly 70 motion pictures and starred in several television productions during a career that spanned over four decades. Hudson was also one of the first major Hollywood celebrities to die from an AIDS related illness.

While Hudson's career was blooming, he was struggling to keep his personal life out of the headlines. Throughout his career, he epitomized wholesome manliness, and in 1955, after several male lovers, he married his agent's secretary Phyllis Gates. The news was made known by all the major gossip magazines. One magazine story, headlined "When Day Is Done, Heaven Is Waiting," quoted Hudson as saying, "When I count my blessings, my marriage tops the list." The union lasted three years. Gates filed for divorce in April 1958, charging mental cruelty. Hudson did not contest the divorce, and Gates received an alimony of US$250 a week for 10 years.

In Gates' 1987 autobiography My Husband, Rock Hudson, the book she wrote with veteran Hollywood chronicler Bob Thomas, Gates insists she dated Hudson for several months and lived with him for two months before his surprise marriage proposal. She claims to have married Hudson out of love and not, as it was later purported, to stave off a major exposure of Hudson's sexual orientation. However, after her death from lung cancer in January 2006, some informants reportedly stated that she was actually a lesbian who married Hudson for his money, knowing from the beginning of their relationship that he was gay.She never remarried.

According to the 1986 biography, Rock Hudson: His Story, by Hudson and Sara Davidson, Rock was good friends with American novelist Armistead Maupin and a few of Hudson's lovers were: Jack Coates (born 1944); Hollywood publicist Tom Clark (1933 - 1995), who also later published a memoir about Hudson, Rock Hudson: Friend of Mine; and Marc Christian, who later won a suit against the Hudson estate.

The book, The Thin Thirty, by Shannon Ragland, chronicles Hudson's involvement in a 1962 sex scandal at the University of Kentucky involving the football team. Ragland writes that Jim Barnett, a local low-level promoter, engaged in prostitution with members of the team, and that Hudson was one of Barnett's customers.

A popular urban legend states that Hudson married Jim Nabors in the 1970s. While Hudson was closeted at the time, the two never had anything beyond a friendship. The legend was originated with a group of "middle-aged homosexuals who live in Huntington Beach", as Hudson put it, sending out joke invitations to "the marriage of Rock Hudson and Jim Nabors". Despite the obvious impossibility of such an event, the "Rock-Pyle Wedding" was taken seriously by some. As a result of the false rumor, Nabors and Hudson never spoke to each other again.

Get a Load of Rob Marshall's 'Nine'!

2008-11-13T19:49:00.000-08:00

By: Brad Brevet Friday, November 7, 2008

The first photo from the set of Rob Marshall's musical Nine has just arrived and it is impressive! The picture you see above is just the center piece to the atmopsheric and smoky jazz vibe given off by the complete full-size image which you can see right here.
Nine stars Daniel Day-Lewis, Nicole Kidman, Marion Cotillard, Judi Dench, and Sophia Loren, Penelope Cruz, Kate Hudson and Stacy "Fergie" Ferguson. The film is based on the Tony Award Winning Broadway musical and inspired by Fellini's classic film 8 1/2 telling the story of Guido (Day-Lewis) a film director stuck in neutral as he tries to make a film while haunted by the demands of all the women in his life, including a wife, mistress and even his deceased mother.
The film is being shot in England at Shepperton Studios, and in Italy on location and at Cinecitta Studios in Rome and is set for a limited release on September 9, 2009.

Jim Bailey Is Judy Garland - Live In Concert

2008-11-13T14:33:00.000-08:00

Herbst Theatre - San FranciscoSaturday, December 20, 2008 at 8:00 PMWorld-renowned artist, Jim Bailey, live in concertaccompanied by a full orchestra, performs his highly acclaimed tribute to the world's greatest entertainer-Judy Garland.Celebrating 40 years in a career that has taken him from Carnegie Hall to the London Palladium to over 80 television and film appearances, Mr Bailey continues to enthrall audiences with his stunning visual and vocal mastery.Accompanied by a full orchestra, Jim will perform the most well known songs from the Garland repertoire, including "The Trolley Song", "Swanee", "Old Man River","The Man That Got Away", to name just a few, plus special selections to commemorate the holiday season.This appearance celebrates the 40th year anniversary of when, in 1968, Jim Bailey, at the beginning of his career, was joined on a Los Angeles stage by Garland herself and sang "Bye Bye Blackbird" as a duet. This was the beginning of a close friendship which endured until Garland's death a year later.The London Times noted "He defies disbelief".The Boston Globe stated "He is an inspiration; the next best thing to Garland herself"."One of the most astonishing acts to ever tread the boards..."

This Event has only one Performance which is open for Sale.
Automatic Redirect to the Performance Detail Screen.
If you don't get redirected within the next 10 seconds, click here.

Jim Bailey Is Judy Garland - Live In Concert
Saturday 12/20/20088:00 pm
Herbst TheatreSan Francisco, CA

Me and Rita ~ Patrick O Sanchez

2008-11-10T17:23:00.000-08:00

Patrick & Tony meet the divine Rita Moreno!
Patrick as Liberace!

HI Kids,
Last night I saw Rita Moreno's cabaret show and it was fabulous. She looks great sounds great and is great. Here is a picture she took with my partner Tony and I. I also added some Halloween pics of me as Liberace.
~ Patrick O Sanchez

Grief-stricken: Angelina Jolie stars as Christine Collins in Clint Eastwood's new film Changeling. In 1928,son went missing and was never seen again

2008-11-08T09:52:00.000-08:00

By GLENYS ROBERTS...She was a devoted mother, hard-working, determined and tough. Then, one spring morning, Christine Collins kissed her little child goodbye (leaving him under the eye of neighbours), before returning in the evening to an empty house. Her beloved son had vanished without a trace.
A continent-wide hunt was launched and a shocked nation was kept agog by a string of leads - only for their hopes to be cruelly dashed as each clue led to a dead end.
The child was never seen again, the mother was heartbroken and the community was left divided by suspicion and mistrust. It is all the more powerful because it is based on a horrific true story.

RITA MORENO~San Francisco's Premiere Night Club "Little Tributes" Rrazz Room Debut! Through Sunday, November 23 ONLY!

2008-11-07T18:52:00.000-08:00

For those of you think RITA MORENO is ageless, the lady herself begs to differ, as she freely admits to being about to turn 77 next month. Nonetheless, anyone who catches her 90-minute act at the RRAZZ ROOM will still find it hard to believe.

MUSIC REVIEW: Moreno"stellar Rrazz showcase, by David Wiegand, Chonicle Staff Writer in SFGate...Nov 7, 2008.

SALLY FIELD TURNS 62...we really like her!

2008-11-06T08:18:00.000-08:00

Sally Margaret Field (born November 6, 1946) is an American two-time Academy Award-winning actress. She is also a three-time Emmy Award winner and two-time Golden Globe Award winner who became a household name at age 20 as Sister Bertrille in the 1960s sitcom The Flying Nun. She has won two Oscars, for Norma Rae in 1979, and for Places in the Heart in 1984.
More recently, Field stars as Nora Holden Walker on the ABC hit drama Brothers & Sisters, as the Walker family matriarch.

Oprah Winfrey and other big stars join the Obama celebrations.

2008-11-05T11:13:00.000-08:00

VIVIEN LEIGH (November ~5~ 1913 ~ July~8~ 1967.

2008-11-05T09:42:00.000-08:00

Vivien Leigh, Lady Olivier (5 November 1913 – 8 July 1967), was an English actress. She won two Academy Awards for playing "southern belles": Scarlett O'Hara in Gone with the Wind (1939) and Blanche DuBois in the film version of A Streetcar Named Desire (1951), a role she had also played on stage in London's West End.
She was a prolific stage performer, frequently in collaboration with her husband, Laurence Olivier, who directed her in several of her roles. During her thirty-year stage career, she played parts that ranged from the heroines of Noël Coward and George Bernard Shaw comedies to classic Shakespearean characters such as Ophelia, Cleopatra, Juliet and Lady Macbeth.
Lauded for her beauty, Leigh felt that it sometimes prevented her from being taken seriously as an actress, but ill health proved to be her greatest obstacle. Affected by bipolar disorder for most of her adult life, she gained a reputation for being a difficult person to work with, and her career went through periods of decline. She was further weakened by recurrent bouts of chronic tuberculosis, with which she was first diagnosed in the mid-1940s. She and Olivier divorced in 1960, and Leigh worked sporadically in film and theatre until her death from tuberculosis, in 1967.

Obama Wins Presidency ~ The 44th President of The Unided States

2008-11-04T20:05:00.000-08:00

WASHINGTON (Nov. 4) - Barack Obama was elected the nation's first black president Tuesday night in a historic triumph that overcame racial barriers as old as America itself.
The 47-year-old Democratic senator from Illinois sealed his victory by defeating Republican Sen. John McCain in a string of wins in hardfought battleground states — Ohio, Florida, Virginia and Iowa.

Jane Fonda Returns To Broadway After 46 Years!

2008-11-04T08:11:00.000-08:00

3 November 2008 5:29 PM, PST From wenn.com See recent WENN news
Jane Fonda will return to Broadway for the first time in 46 years when she takes on a starring role in Moises Kaufman's 33 Variations.
The movie great will play a modern-day musicologist attempting to unravel the mysteries of composer Beethoven's inspirations.
Fonda says, "I can't wait to get back on stage... in this role that I understand so well."
And thrilled Kaufman adds, "I am delighted to be working with one of America's greatest actresses, a performer of such insight, intellect and heart."
Fonda's last appearance on Broadway was in the 1963 drama Strange Interlude.
The play will open in New York this winter.

Our NADINE Raves "TINA TURNER " In Concert last night...

2008-11-03T08:21:00.000-08:00

Hi ALL
Just woke up, got in very late last night we went to see TINA. All I can say is number 1 I am still having trouble hearing but it was worth it and my God Tina is one of THE best performers I have EVER seen in my life. I enjoyed it so much, the sets were AMazing with fire and flames and fireworks and she did 9 costume changes including Tina dressing as she did in Mad Maxx, her voice is incredible and she has to have the best damned legs of anyone I have ever seen. WE were very close to her, her skin is amazing, she bounces around that stage like a 20 year old and it was just marvelous to hear her do all her hits. The crowd never sat they were wild and at one point Tina was on something that resembled a ladder on a hook and ladder truck, it came out over the audience and the concert was about 3 1/2 hours with a 30 minute intermission. I am SO glad I went. I had never seen her live before and it is something I will never forget. For 68 she is INCREDIBLE. there was so much demand for her that they added an additional night on Sat night. Way to go Tina.

If you have the chance to see her RUN don't walk, at 68 this could be her very last tour. I walked out of there last night SO incredibly happy to have been in that audience, the love for her, she had a 7 minute standing ovation when she came out. Her opening was incredible, she was on a pedestal high up in the air and stood there for 7 minutes while the audience never sat and she had to quiet down to finally begin. I have never seen anything like it.

Nadine.
Nadine

Kay Thompson ~ live! "I've discovered the secret of life: a lot of hard work, a lot of sense of humor, a lot of joy, and a whole lot of tra-la-la !"

2008-11-02T10:58:00.000-08:00

Kay Thompsom TV (1954)

Kay Thompsom "3 AM In The Persion Room" (1956)

Gary, Sammy, & Tom go to lunch!

2008-10-31T20:40:00.000-07:00

Tom & Gary

Gary & Sammy...Musicman you are awesome, I had the best time and am looking foward to many more, love Sammy & Tom.

Lunch: 'The Menu'?

Dear Bryan, well we talked and talked and talked about the group(wouldnt you like to know teehee!!) and we talked about old movies, stars, computers, sex, food, Liza of course, sex, art work, musicians and artists, sex, friendships, our favorite shows on TV, sex wait a minute there is a pattern here lol but I am only half kidding. We literally watched the lunch crowd turn into the dinner crowd. The best part is how Sammy and I switched our salads that were meant to be taken home for a munch later or the next day. You can imagine our face when we both discovered that we each had taken tyhe wrong package home. My garbage really enjoyed that lol. Anyway with a larger group including you peanuts and the rest of the gang as Liza would say OH MY NERVES and we would still be there up until and including breakfast the next day. A geat time was had by all and we missed everybody else. And Bryan you are so F******* nosy anyway. All my love toyou and everyone, Gary S from TBA.

Dancing with The Stars...

2008-10-27T18:10:00.001-07:00

ANGIE meets Kathy Griffin!

2008-10-24T15:37:00.000-07:00

My date couldn't make it at the time of the show, so
I went by myself here in Sarasota.
Sooo, after the show, I asked this very "drunk" lady to take a pic
of Kathy and me...hahaha
It is sooo bad, as you can see! haha
She had nooo idea how to take a picture! I'm so disappointed with it, cause
that's the only one I got of me and Kathy together...booo hooooo
I took others and I've attached those for ya also.

She always puts on a HELL of a SHOW!
Love ya sweetie!
Angie

Transformation: Beyoncé gained 15 pounds for her role as ETTA JAMES in Cadillac Records

2008-10-24T15:29:00.001-07:00

WATCH MISS M FOR OBAMA!

2008-10-23T17:48:00.000-07:00

Patti Labelle, Nona Hendrix, & Sara Dash reunited on new CD " LABELLE ~ BACK TO NOW"

2008-10-23T17:41:00.000-07:00

THE DIVINE MISS M ~ Bette Midler hosts the Krave for Change Barack Obama Rally at Krave Nightclub in Las Vegas.

2008-10-22T18:37:00.000-07:00

Bette Midler hosts the Krave for Change Barack Obama Rally at Krave Nightclub in Las Vegas. Aimed at the "lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender" community, the event was held to convince any undecided voters in the LGBT community to vote for the Democratic presidential candidate, Barack Obama. October 20, 2008

Kathy Griffin ~ IN BED WITH LIZA MINNELLI!

2008-10-21T09:52:00.000-07:00

Beyonce donning a retro blond wig as ETTA JAMES for her new movie, Cadillac Records.

2008-10-20T19:00:00.000-07:00

Check out these new movie stills of Beyonce donning a retro blond wig for her new movie, Cadillac Records.
Exploring the 1950s musical era, the film chronicles the life of the influential Chicago-based record-company executive Leonard Chess (Adrien Brody), and the singers who recorded for Chess Records. Beyonce, 27, who also serves as executive producer, stars as the legendary blues singer Etta James.
Pictured below: Emmanuelle Chriqui and Gabrielle Union. Check out more stills at BlackFilm.com.
Cadillac Records opens in theaters everywhere on Friday, December 5

Middle-aged man claiming to be secret love-child of Marilyn Monroe and JFK launches bid to claim president's estate

2008-10-17T18:27:00.000-07:00

By Daily Mail Reporter
Last updated at 3:49 PM on 17th October 2008
A middle-aged man has launched a bizarre legal bid - claiming to be the secret love child of John F Kennedy and Marilyn Monroe.
John Fitzgerald Kennedy, 53, insists he is the legal heir to JFK's cash - and is suing the late President's estate for what he says is his fair share.
And he says he has kept his identity secret for 45 years since Kennedy's death because he was hoping his estate would "do the right thing" and pay him.
Lawyers for the estate dismissed it as a "frivolous lawsuit" which they would "vigorously defend against".
However Kennedy - also using the name John R. Burton - insisted he was the love child of America's most loved President and the screen goddess - although he could not provide any family photos.
"They were great parents," he insisted. "I couldn't ask for anything better."

Asked why he waited 45 years after the president's assassination to come forward, Kennedy, of Queens, New York, said: "You wait for people to do the right thing, and they don't.

"That's how you end up in my position." The Manhattan federal court filing insists "Plaintiff is a child of President Kennedy" and insists that he's been shut out of his "father's" fortune.
His suit names the current administrators of the trust that was set up for Kennedy's family, Edwin Schlossberg and Martin Edelman.
"In [his] will, each child of President Kennedy was to receive a certain amount of money each year pursuant to the terms in said will," the suit says, and because he's a Kennedy child, he deserves his share.
The suit, which seeks an unspecified "past and present" share of Kennedy's estate, also asks for the chance for Kennedy to prove he is who he says is he is by dragging relatives of the slain president into the case.
"Plaintiff requests this court order DNA testing so that plaintiffs[sic] may prove that [sic] bona fides of his claim," and order "genetic (DNA) testing of environmentalist Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Congressman Patrick Kennedy."

"Upon such proof being made," Kennedy wants a judge to recognize him as a rightful heir, the suit says.
Edelman and Schlossberg's lawyer, Susan Frunzi, said, "It's hard to imagine we would not vigorously defend against" the claims.
"I assume it's a frivolous lawsuit, and it wouldn't be the first time that people have filed frivolous lawsuits against this family." His lawyer, Paul Dalnoky, did not return a call for comment.
The late president had two kids, Caroline and John Jr. JFK Jr. died in a plane crash in 1999. Caroline Kennedy and Schlossberg are married.

NATALIE COLE ~ STILL UNFORGETTABLE...new CD!

2008-10-17T18:18:00.000-07:00

Dame Shirley Bassey 70, & Miss Joan Collins 74...

2008-10-17T18:12:00.000-07:00

Gale Harold "QUEER AS FOLK" star in motorcycle accident

2008-10-16T10:32:00.000-07:00

Posted Oct 15th 2008 2:28PM by TMZ Staff
We've learned Gale Harold, the actor who plays Teri Hatcher's boyfriend on "Desperate Housewives," was seriously injured yesterday in a motorcycle accident. And, contrary to what Harold's rep says, a hospital spokesperson just told us the actor is in "critical condition."

He's being treated at the L.A. County - USC Medical Center in the Intensive Care Unit. We're told his shoulder was screwed up. Harold's rep just issued a statement saying his shoulder was fractured and he's in "stable condition," despite what the hospital rep said. And the slightly ominous words from his rep -- "Everyone is hopeful for a full recovery.""D.H." creator Marc Cherry says Harold has swelling of the brain but is expected to recover.BTW, Harold also starred in "Queer as Folk."

'We ARE divorcing,' confirms Madonna as she faces £150m split

2008-10-15T13:48:00.000-07:00

In happier times: Madonna, Guy, Rocco and Lourdes attend a London film premiere in January 2007
By Daily Mail Reporter
Last updated at 5:08 PM on 15th October 2008
Madonna and Guy Ritchie have ended months of speculation about the state of their marriage by announcing they are to divorce.

The Material Girl's spokeswoman Liz Rosenberg today released a statement confirming the couple are to separate after nearly eight years of marriage but have not agreed on a settlement yet.

The short joint statement read: 'Madonna and Guy Ritchie have agreed to divorce after seven-and-a-half years of marriage.
'They have both requested that the media maintain respect for their family at this difficult time.'

A divorce settlement could potentially leave film director Guy pocketing up to £150million, which threatens to become the costliest in showbusiness history.
It is believed the couple did not sign a pre-nuptial agreement.
Madonna, 50, is one of the world's richest women, with an estimated fortune of £300 million.

Ritchie, 40 - director of Lock, Stock And Two Smoking Barrels and recently RocknRolla - has his own independent wealth but it comes nowhere near his wife's.

Reports earlier this year suggested that Madonna had already hired lawyer Fiona Shackleton - who represented Sir Paul McCartney in his courtroom battle with Heather Mills, and helped him reduce her claim on his £825million to £24million.

A claim by Ritchie for a share of Madonna's fortune would be based on their 10-year relationship, his support of her career and the fact that they have two children, Rocco, eight, and adopted David Banda, two.

Ritchie is expected to move out of their London home and into his Wiltshire property.
It is not clear where Madonna's daughter Lourdes, 12, and her siblings will live.

Madonna's determination to adopt a second child from Africa is said to be one of the main reasons for the separation.
Her husband fiercely opposes adding to the family in this way as their marriage was placed under severe strain two years ago when they adopted toddler David from Malawi.
The couple are said to have had a string of rows in recent months. But over the past three weeks it has become so strained they are thought to have communicated only through their personal assistants.
Madonna, who is currently on a gruelling world tour, is said to have wanted to postpone any separation until the New Year.

VIDEO: Madonna leads fans in anti-Palin chant ,'I'm gonna kick her a** if she don't get off of my street!'

2008-10-09T13:16:00.000-07:00

By Daily Mail ReporterLast updated at 4:18 PM on 09th October 2008

Singer Madonna has made it clear where her loyalties lie in the upcoming US presidential election.
In a rant at her Madison Square Garden show earlier this week, she told thousands of fans: 'You know who can get off of my street? Sarah Palin!
'I'm gonna kick her a** if she don't get off of my street!'
Madonna performed a string of hits including the song 'I Love New York', which song features the line, 'Get off my street'.

And her attack on the Republican's bid for vice-president comes days after she told thousands of fans in New Jersey at the weekend: 'Sarah Palin can't come to my party. Sarah Palin can't come to my show.'

With her audience full of celebrity fans and friends, including Rosie O' Donnell, and Diddy, Madonna continued with her anti-Palin rant.
The 50-year-old superstar then mocked the Alaskan governor's accent, before sarcastically telling the audience: 'I love her.'

Even Palin's husband Todd didn't escape Madonna's wrath, as she shouted 'This is the sound of Sarah Palin's husband's snowmobile when it won't start up in the wintertime', before unleashing some deafening feedback on her ever-present electric guitar as she launched into hit single 'Hung Up'.
Madonna has already raised eyebrows on her current world tour by projecting images off presidential candidate Barack Obama next to Mahatma Gandhi, while rival John McCain was compared with Adolf Hitler.
Madonna joins fellow celebrities Matt Damon, Brigitte Bardot, and Pamela Anderson , who have all been vocal critics of the self-described 'hockey mom'.

MADONNA TOUR

Complaints pour into BBC after EastEnders screens gay kiss before the watershed

2008-10-09T13:09:00.000-07:00

Christian Clarke (John Partridge ) and Lee Thompson (Carl Ferguson ) engage in a passionate kiss. The scene was screen before the 9pm watershed

By Daily Mail ReporterLast updated at 6:02 PM on 09th October 2008

The BBC has been flooded with 145 complaints after screening a gay kiss on EastEnders before the 9pm watershed.
The 'offensive' scenes were screened on Tuesday's episode of the soap and showed Christian Clarke (John Partridge, 36) and Lee Thompson (Carl Ferguson, 27) engage in a passionate kiss.
In a statement the BBC defended itself by saying it was down to parents to decide whether the content of the show was suitable for children to watch.

But some viewers were left deeply unimpressed.
One viewer wrote on the BBC’s Points Of View internet messageboard: 'I am appalled by the display of homosexual kissing before the watershed shown on EastEnders.
'This is disgraceful whilst young children are watching and sets the wrong example.'Another, Pat, wrote: 'I had to explain to my seven-year-old son what was happening.'He now thinks he is gay because he kisses his dad.'

And another angry fan added: 'I think pre-watershed standards have been irresponsibly lowered in recent years.'
Tuesday night's scenes saw Christian and Lee caught in the act by busybody Dot Cotton as they kisses on Arthur Fowler's memorial bench.

EastEnders past: Michael Cashman
She tells them that she is as liberal as the next person, but does not approve of canoodling in public places.
The latest outrage comes 21 years after EastEnders screened the first gay kiss in a British soap.
Back then, Colin Russell – played by Michael Cashman, 57, who is now a Labour MEP – gave Barry Clark (Gary Hailes, 42) a kiss on the forehead. The move resulted in a record number of complaints and there were even questions asked in Parliament about whether the scene was appropriate.
In a statement the BBC confirmed it had received complaints - but refused to say how many.
The statement read: 'We approach our portrayal of homosexual relationships in the same way as we do heterosexual relationships.
'We believe that the general tone and content of EastEnders is now widely recognised.
'Parents can make an informed decision as to whether they want their children to watch.'

Jane Fonda, Shirley MacLaine, & Nicole Kidman

2008-10-09T09:48:00.000-07:00

Tue, 10/07/2008 - 6:00am by Molly

Some all-star women actresses came together in LA last night for ELLE Magazine's 15th Annual Women in Hollywood Tribute. Nicole Kidman, Isla Fisher and Halle Berry were among the honorees...

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO THE LIBRA BOYS!

2008-10-07T15:42:00.000-07:00

Cher in health mystery as she cancels six Vegas shows

2008-10-06T09:41:00.000-07:00

Singing legend Cher is at the centre of a health mystery after cancelling six Vegas shows in less than a month.
The 62-year-old is suffering from asthma-related bronchitis, according to Caesar's Palace in Las Vegas, where she backed out of shows on Saturday and Sunday, her last performances scheduled there for the year.
However her publicist Liz Rosenberg claims she is suffering from 'Vegas throat' a condition caused by the dry desert air at the gambling resort.

Rosenberg also denied rumours that Cher has chronic abdominal problems.
Vegas celebrity columnist Norm Clarke pointed out that Caesars spent millions of dollars installing a special humidifier in The Colosseum showroom, which was especially built for Celine Dion's long-running show, to protect the Canadian singer's delicate throat.
Caesars Palace issued a statement saying: 'Cher looks forward to her return to The Colosseum early next year with performances to be announced soon.'
According to Clarke, there is also speculation that her problems are related to her recent split from her boyfriend, Hell's Angel Tim Medvetz, 38.

What's Age Got To Do With It? Tina Turner makes spectacular comeback at 68 (and the dress is as short as ever)

2008-10-06T09:31:00.000-07:00

By Liz ThomasLast updated at 4:29 PM on 06th October 2008

She may be old enough to be Madonna's mother, but Tina Turner proved she was the queen of pop with a triumphant return to stage.
Eight years after her farewell tour the star kicked off her comeback in front of a crowd of 20,000.
Miss Turner, who is 69 next month, showed she was in remarkable shape with a series of thigh-skimming dresses and skin tight trousers.

There was not a trace of cellulite as she jumped around the stage with her trademark pins on show.
In contrast to Madonna, whose overly muscular body has raised eyebrows, the soul legend has opted for a more natural look.
One fan said: 'I just cannot believe she is pushing 70. She looks and sounds fantastic.'
The star sang hits such as What's Love Got to Do With It, Private Dancer and Steamy Windows.
She also performed classic cover versions including It's Only Rock'n'Roll, Help and Addicted To Love.

Tom Cruise and Oprah Winfrey were in the audience at Chicago's United Centre.
Miss Turner said she came out of retirement because of demand from fans, and the insistence of close friend Sophia Loren.
She said: 'Everywhere I went people were asking me when I was going back on tour. The demand never stopped. People want to see you live. Even Sophia Loren asked me: 'When are you going back to work? You were born with a gift. You have a responsibility. She made me feel like it was a duty.'
'I wouldn't want to diminish my credibility, so if I was ever going to do it, now is the time. I'm in shape, and once I saw some of the costumes and I started getting excited.' In an energetic show the only suggestion that age may be catching up with the star, was the inclusion for the first time of an interval.

What's Age Got To Do With It? Tina Turner makes spectacular comeback at 68 (and the dress is as short as ever)
By Liz ThomasLast updated at 4:29 PM on 06th October 2008
Comments (30)
Add to My Stories
She may be old enough to be Madonna's mother, but Tina Turner proved she was the queen of pop with a triumphant return to stage.
Eight years after her farewell tour the star kicked off her comeback in front of a crowd of 20,000.
Miss Turner, who is 69 next month, showed she was in remarkable shape with a series of thigh-skimming dresses and skin tight trousers.

Triumphant comeback: Tina Turner dazzled the audience at a concert in Chicago on Saturday
There was not a trace of cellulite as she jumped around the stage with her trademark pins on show.
In contrast to Madonna, whose overly muscular body has raised eyebrows, the soul legend has opted for a more natural look.
One fan said: 'I just cannot believe she is pushing 70. She looks and sounds fantastic.'
The star sang hits such as What's Love Got to Do With It, Private Dancer and Steamy Windows.
She also performed classic cover versions including It's Only Rock'n'Roll, Help, and Addicted To Love.

Name in lights: The singer performed in front of a 20,000 strong crowd
Tom Cruise and Oprah Winfrey were in the audience at Chicago's United Centre.
Miss Turner said she came out of retirement because of demand from fans, and the insistence of close friend Sophia Loren.
She said: 'Everywhere I went people were asking me when I was going back on tour. The demand never stopped. People want to see you live. Even Sophia Loren asked me: 'When are you going back to work? You were born with a gift. You have a responsibility. She made me feel like it was a duty.'
'I wouldn't want to diminish my credibility, so if I was ever going to do it, now is the time. I'm in shape, and once I saw some of the costumes and I started getting excited.' In an energetic show the only suggestion that age may be catching up with the star, was the inclusion for the first time of an interval.

Lady in red: Tina looked in better shape that ever
She explained: 'I've always given a full rock 'n' roll show and plowed straight through. Instead of running around so much, I'm making it a little easier on myself. I might need a break.'
It has been eight years since she announced she was quitting music to retire and live in Switzerland with partner Erwin Bach, a German record company boss. After 44 years performing, her farewell tour in 2000 and made more than £55 million over 89 shows. She said at the time: 'It's time to hang up my dancing shoes. I can't sing without jumping around and it's getting harder. I'm happy I can do it one last time so people can remember me at my best rather than as a caricature. My dream is to have an empty diary. I just want to have no schedule at all for what seems to be the first time in my life. That is what I want.' This not the first comeback for the soul legend, who made her name singing with ex husband Ike in the sixties and early seventies on hits such as River Deep, Mountain High, Proud Mary and Nutbush City Limits. While initially they seemed like a golden couple behind the scenes she suffered years of abuse, the full extent of whic was revealed in her autobiography I, Tina. She famously walked out on the marriage with just a few pence in her pocket, but struggled to find work. Miss Turner refused to comment when her ex-husband died last year aged 76, she revealed the pair had not spoken in more than 35 years. After years in the musical wilderness, she resurrected her career in the mid 1980s and won a new generation of fans with hits such as What's Love Got to Do With It and Simply the Best.
Her critically acclaimed 1986 album Private Dancer sold more than 12 million copies. When she retired she had sold more than 75 million albums and insisted she wanted to be out of the limelight. She said of her decision to return to touring now: "I never wanted to be out here all my life, but my music doesn't sound dated. It's still standing strong. Like me." Miss Turner will play 36 dates in America before coming to Europe early next year. She will play venues in London and Manchester in March. Billboard magazine's touring editor Ray Waddell said: "Tina is one of those perennial draws. She is known as one of the most dynamic live performers ever. And there has to be a sense that there won't be that many more opportunities to see her fabulous legs in high heels stalking the stage." She is the latest veteran performer to make to go on a comeback tour.

Sammy Davis Jr. sings "There's A Boat That's Leavin' Soon"

2008-10-05T18:05:00.000-07:00

ZSA ZSA GABOR at 91

2008-10-05T12:03:00.000-07:00

ARREST: June 14, 1989
CHARGE: Battery against an officer; disobeying an officer; driving without a registration; driving without a license; driving with an open container of alcohol.
It was a sunny June day as Zsa Zsa Gabor, actress and author of the gold digger's Bible, The Complete Guide to Men, drove her Rolls Royce Corniche through Beverly Hills. A motorcycle police officer, Paul Kramer, appeared alongside the Rolls and directed her to pull over. He then instructed the actress to hand over her license and registration.
Ms. Gabor retrieved both items from the glove compartment. Unfortunately, they had both expired. After a ten-minute wait, while officer Kramer was checking her for priors, Ms. Gabor uttered a few choice words and drove off. Officer Kramer gave chase and pulled Ms. Gabor over again. This time he asked her to step out of the car and she came out swinging, slapping the officer in the face, knocking his regulation sunglasses to the asphalt.
Officer Kramer arrested Ms. Gabor and called for back-up to take her to the police station. According to Ms. Gabor's statement, Officer Kramer had handcuffed her so tightly that her wrists were bruised so severely she was unable to attend a charity event that evening. A cursory search of her vehicle turned up a silver flask of bourbon, adding another charge to her arrest. Ms. Gabor was taken to the Beverly Hills police station and booked on five charges. At the station house it was discovered that Ms. Gabor had indeed renewed her registration.
However, she had overpaid for it and the ensuing bureaucratic red tape delayed receipt of her now tags. The flask turned out to be the property of Ms. Gabor's eighth husband, Prince Frederick von Anhalt. After leaving the station, Ms. Gabor remarked to assembled reporters that her police experience "was like Nazi Germany." About Officer Kramer, she told People magazine, -You should have seen the hatred in his eyes." As for slapping the officer, she quipped, "I have a Hungarian temper."
Later dissatisfied with the trial proceedings in Beverly Hills Municipal Court, which seemed to be heading to a routine sentencing, Ms. Gabor's attorney, Harrison Bull, called six witnesses to support his motion for a new trial. When Judge Charles Rubin denied the motion, Mr. Bull called three witnesses to defend Ms. Gabor's character. Judge Rubin found her guilty of slapping Officer Kramer and of two of the traffic offenses. He then sentenced Ms. Gabor to seventy-two hours in jail, one-hundred-and-twenty hours of community service, and $13,000 in court costs.

A Royal Read: Tina Turner Takes Aretha Franklin To Task Over "Queen" Controversy

2008-10-05T09:22:00.000-07:00

Posted Oct 2nd 2008 5:06PM by Jawn MurrayFiled under: BV Buzz, Entertainment
By Jawn Murray, BlackVoices.com

After an eight-year retirement, Tina Turner kicked off her "Tina Turner Live" tour at the Sprint Center in Kansas City, Mo. on Oct. 1.
Performing for the first time in almost a decade isn't the only thing the 'What's Love Got To Do With It' singer is doing.
The 68-year-old singer also broke her silence and addressed the controversy surrounding her appearance with Beyoncé Knowles on the 50th anniversary of the Grammy Awards where they performed together for the first time.

In Knowles' introduction of Turner, she referred to the rock icon as "the queen," a reference that upset the "Queen of Soul" Aretha Franklin.

The day after the Grammy telecast, the 66-year-old 'Respect' singer released a statement that said: "I am not sure of whose toes I may have stepped on or whose ego I may have bruised between the Grammy writers and Beyoncé, however, I dismissed it as a cheap shot for controversy."
(See also: 'Royally Dissed: Aretha Franklin Feels Snubbed By Beyonce')
Turner told 'USA Today' that she wasn't surprised by Franklin 's overreaction to the incident.
"Aretha has always been like that. We've always accepted that from her. She's the queen of soul, and I'm the queen of rock 'n' roll. There were so many kings and queens there that night. Her ego must be so big to think she was the only one," she laughed. "That's how queens are!"
"Tina Turner Live" will play 22 cities in the U.S. through Dec. 6, with the last show being in Hartford, Conn.
The tour then goes international, playing Canada, Germany, Belgium, Austria, Switzerland, England, France and Ireland.
The concert is 150 minutes, includes a 30-minute intermission, and features Turner tunes like 'Better Be Good To Me,' 'Private Dancer,' 'We Don't Need Another Hero,' 'Let's Stay Together,' 'Proud Mary,' and 'Nutbush City Limits.

CHITA RIVERA An American National Treasure! Exclusive San Francisco Appearance!

2008-09-29T17:46:00.000-07:00

Through Sunday, October 5 ONLY!

An accomplished and versatile actress/singer/dancer, the legendary Chita Rivera has won two Tony Awards as Best Leading Actress in a Musical and received seven additional Tony nominations. In addition to her critically-acclaimed theatre and concert performances, Chita has been seen regularly on television, with appearances on every major show from New York including Dinah Shore, Garry Moore, Judy Garland, Carol Burnett and Ed Sullivan. Other television credits include Will & Grace, Pippin(Showtime), Kennedy Center Tonight, Broadway Plays Washington, her own Chita Plus Three(HBO), The New Dick Van Dyke Show and Live From Wolftrap.

Hot Property: Home once owned by Judy Garland and Sammy Davis Jr. is listed at $4,995,000

2008-09-28T17:54:00.001-07:00

Hot Property
By Ann Brenoff July 21, 2008
The allure of living where a long-dead celebrity once lived largely escapes me. Nevertheless, it is clearly tremendous in Los Angeles. To that end, we bring you the house where both Judy Garland and Sammy Davis Jr. once hung their dancing shoes – not at the same time, of course.
The property, set high in the hills above Sunset Strip and listed at $4,995,000, has a 5,000-square-foot main house plus a guesthouse. There are five bedrooms and 7 1/2 bathrooms in total, plus views galore. The 1940s Hollywood glamour-traditional-style home has a pool, a state-of-the-art kitchen and a home theater. The dining room seats 12 to 14. There are maple floors, myriad French doors leading to terraces and many period details. A large bedroom area opens to a two-story great room.
Too bad there are no talking walls, because the scenes they’ve witnessed would surely be worth hearing about.
Garland, who died in 1969 at age 47 of an accidental drug overdose, bought the house, and possibly the lots on both sides of it, in 1945 with then-husband Vincente Minnelli. Daughter Liza was born the following year. The couple hired architect John Woolf to design an addition, which included a baby’s nursery. Garland and Minnelli separated in December 1950.
According to one account, when Sammy Davis wanted to buy this house in the 1950s, it was necessary for his manager to secure the purchase for the singer because the owner would not sell to African Americans. Davis married singer Loray White in a ceremony at the home in 1958. The couple were divorced in 1959. Davis died of throat cancer in 1990 at age 64.
Gillian Caine of Coldwell Banker, Beverly Hills, is the listing agent.

Legendary Actor Paul Newman Dies

2008-09-27T10:29:00.000-07:00

WESTPORT, Conn. (Sept. 27) - Paul Newman, the Academy-Award winning superstar who personified cool as an activist, race car driver, popcorn impresario and the anti-hero of such films as "Hud," ''Cool Hand Luke" and "The Color of Money," has died. He was 83.
Newman died Friday after a long battle with cancer at his farmhouse near Westport, publicist Jeff Sanderson said. He was surrounded by his family and close friends.

In May, Newman he had dropped plans to direct a fall production of "Of Mice and Men," citing unspecified health issues.
He got his start in theater and on television during the 1950s, and went on to become one of the world's most enduring and popular film stars, a legend held in awe by his peers. He was nominated for Oscars 10 times, winning one regular award and two honorary ones, and had major roles in more than 50 motion pictures, including "Exodus," ''Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid," ''The Verdict," ''The Sting" and "Absence of Malice."
Newman worked with some of the greatest directors of the past half century, from Alfred Hitchcock and John Huston to Robert Altman, Martin Scorsese and the Coen brothers. His co-stars included Elizabeth Taylor, Lauren Bacall, Tom Cruise, Tom Hanks and, most famously, Robert Redford, his sidekick in "Butch Cassidy" and "The Sting."
He sometimes teamed with his wife and fellow Oscar winner, Joanne Woodward, with whom he had one of Hollywood's rare long-term marriages. "I have steak at home, why go out for hamburger?" Newman told Playboy magazine when asked if he was tempted to stray. They wed in 1958, around the same time they both appeared in "The Long Hot Summer," and Newman directed her in several films, including "Rachel, Rachel" and "The Glass Menagerie."
With his strong, classically handsome face and piercing blue eyes, Newman was a heartthrob just as likely to play against his looks, becoming a favorite with critics for his convincing portrayals of rebels, tough guys and losers. "I was always a character actor," he once said. "I just looked like Little Red Riding Hood."

Newman had a soft spot for underdogs in real life, giving tens of millions to charities through his food company and setting up camps for severely ill children. Passionately opposed to the Vietnam War, and in favor of civil rights, he was so famously liberal that he ended up on President Nixon's "enemies list," one of the actor's proudest achievements, he liked to say.
A screen legend by his mid-40s, he waited a long time for his first competitive Oscar, winning in 1987 for "The Color of Money," a reprise of the role of pool shark "Fast" Eddie Felson, whom Newman portrayed in the 1961 film "The Hustler."
Newman delivered a magnetic performance in "The Hustler," playing a smooth-talking, whiskey-chugging pool shark who takes on Minnesota Fats — played by Jackie Gleason — and becomes entangled with a gambler played by George C. Scott. In the sequel — directed by Scorsese — "Fast Eddie" is no longer the high-stakes hustler he once was, but rather an aging liquor salesman who takes a young pool player (Cruise) under his wing before making a comeback.
He won an honorary Oscar in 1986 "in recognition of his many and memorable compelling screen performances and for his personal integrity and dedication to his craft." In 1994, he won a third Oscar, the Jean Hersholt Humanitarian Award, for his charitable work.

His most recent academy nod was a supporting actor nomination for the 2002 film "Road to Perdition." One of Newman's nominations was as a producer; the other nine were in acting categories. (Jack Nicholson holds the record among actors for Oscar nominations, with 12; actress Meryl Streep has had 14.)
As he passed his 80th birthday, he remained in demand, winning an Emmy and a Golden Globe for the 2005 HBO drama "Empire Falls" and providing the voice of a crusty 1951 car in the 2006 Disney-Pixar hit, "Cars."
But in May 2007, he told ABC's "Good Morning America" he had given up acting, though he intended to remain active in charity projects. "I'm not able to work anymore as an actor at the level I would want to," he said. "You start to lose your memory, your confidence, your invention. So that's pretty much a closed book for me."
He received his first Oscar nomination for playing a bitter, alcoholic former star athlete in the 1958 film "Cat on a Hot Tin Roof." Elizabeth Taylor played his unhappy wife and Burl Ives his wealthy, domineering father in Tennessee Williams' harrowing drama, which was given an upbeat ending for the screen.
In "Cool Hand Luke," he was nominated for his gritty role as a rebellious inmate in a brutal Southern prison. The movie was one of the biggest hits of 1967 and included a tagline, delivered one time by Newman and one time by prison warden Strother Martin, that helped define the generation gap, "What we've got here is (a) failure to communicate."
Newman's hair was graying, but he was as gourgeous as ever and on the verge of his greatest popular success. In 1969, Newman teamed with Redford for "Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid," a comic Western about two outlaws running out of time. Newman paired with Redford again in 1973 in "The Sting," a comedy about two Depression-era con men. Both were multiple Oscar winners and huge hits, irreverent, unforgettable pairings of two of the best-looking actors of their time.
Newman also turned to producing and directing. In 1968, he directed "Rachel, Rachel," a film about a lonely spinster's rebirth. The movie received four Oscar nominations, including Newman, for producer of a best motion picture, and Woodward, for best actress. The film earned Newman the best director award from the New York Film Critics.
In the 1970s, Newman, admittedly bored with acting, became fascinated with auto racing, a sport he studied when he starred in the 1972 film, "Winning." After turning professional in 1977, Newman and his driving team made strong showings in several major races, including fifth place in Daytona in 1977 and second place in the Le Mans in 1979.
"Racing is the best way I know to get away from all the rubbish of Hollywood," he told People magazine in 1979.
Despite his love of race cars, Newman continued to make movies and continued to pile up Oscar nominations, his looks remarkably intact, his acting becoming more subtle, nothing like the mannered method performances of his early years, when he was sometimes dismissed as a Brando imitator. "It takes a long time for an actor to develop the assurance that the trim, silver-haired Paul Newman has acquired," Pauline Kael wrote of him in the early 1980s.
In 1982, he got his Oscar fifth nomination for his portrayal of an honest businessman persecuted by an irresponsible reporter in "Absence of Malice." The following year, he got his sixth for playing a down-and-out alcoholic attorney in "The Verdict."
In 1995, he was nominated for his slyest, most understated work yet, the town curmudgeon and deadbeat in "Nobody's Fool." New York Times critic Caryn James found his acting "without cheap sentiment and self-pity," and observed, "It says everything about Mr. Newman's performance, the single best of this year and among the finest he has ever given, that you never stop to wonder how a guy as good-looking as Paul Newman ended up this way."
Newman, who shunned Hollywood life, was reluctant to give interviews and usually refused to sign autographs because he found the majesty of the act offensive, according to one friend.
He also claimed that he never read reviews of his movies.
"If they're good you get a fat head and if they're bad you're depressed for three weeks," he said.
Off the screen, Newman had a taste for beer and was known for his practical jokes. He once had a Porsche installed in Redford's hallway — crushed and covered with ribbons.
"I think that my sense of humor is the only thing that keeps me sane," he told Newsweek magazine in a 1994 interview.
In 1982, Newman and his Westport neighbor, writer A.E. Hotchner, started a company to market Newman's original oil-and-vinegar dressing. Newman's Own, which began as a joke, grew into a multimillion-dollar business selling popcorn, salad dressing, spaghetti sauce and other foods. All of the company's profits are donated to charities. By 2007, the company had donated more than $175 million, according to its Web site.
In 1988, Newman founded a camp in northeastern Connecticut for children with cancer and other life-threatening diseases. He went on to establish similar camps in several other states and in Europe.
He and Woodward bought an 18th century farmhouse in Westport, where they raised their three daughters, Elinor "Nell," Melissa and Clea.
Newman had two daughters, Susan and Stephanie, and a son, Scott, from a previous marriage to Jacqueline Witte.
Scott died in 1978 of an accidental overdose of alcohol and Valium. After his only son's death, Newman established the Scott Newman Foundation to finance the production of anti-drug films for children.
Newman was born in Cleveland, Ohio, the second of two boys of Arthur S. Newman, a partner in a sporting goods store, and Theresa Fetzer Newman.
He was raised in the affluent suburb of Shaker Heights, where he was encouraged him to pursue his interest in the arts by his mother and his uncle Joseph Newman, a well-known Ohio poet and journalist.
Following World War II service in the Navy, he enrolled at Kenyon College in Gambier, Ohio, where he got a degree in English and was active in student productions.
He later studied at Yale University's School of Drama, then headed to New York to work in theater and television, his classmates at the famed Actor's Studio including Brando, James Dean and Karl Malden. His breakthrough was enabled by tragedy: Dean, scheduled to star as the disfigured boxer in a television adaptation of Ernest Hemingway's "The Battler," died in a car crash in 1955. His role was taken by Newman, then a little-known performer.
Newman started in movies the year before, in "The Silver Chalice," a costume film he so despised that he took out an ad in Variety to apologize. By 1958, he had won the best actor award at the Cannes Film Festival for the shiftless Ben Quick in "The Long Hot Summer."
In December 1994, about a month before his 70th birthday, he told Newsweek magazine he had changed little with age.
"I'm not mellower, I'm not less angry, I'm not less self-critical, I'm not less tenacious," he said. "Maybe the best part is that your liver can't handle those beers at noon anymore," he said.
Newman is survived by his wife, five children, two grandsons and his older brother Arthur.
Copyright 2008 The Associated Press.

ELLEN will be the new face of Covergirl

2008-09-22T09:25:00.000-07:00

Ellen will be the new face of CoverGirl
Filed by: Waymon Hudson
September 21, 2008 11:00 AM

Ellen DeGeneres confirmed on her daytime talk show that she will be the new face of CoverGirl Cosmetics starting in January:

You know how I always like to share what's going on in my life with you all, and I was going to give you some news, and unfortunately rumors started circulating all over the internet. I am here to set the record straight right now. I am not pregnant. It just turned out to be a bump. I went and had it checked out. ... That's not the news. I am the new face of CoverGirl.

DeGeneres will be the first out celebrity to be the face of the CoverGirl. DeGeneres has been making waves and breaking down barriers for some time now.

Ellen has also used her fame on her incredibly popular show to bring LGBT issues to the masses. She put out a powerful message about the murder of openly gay 15 year old Lawrence King and the cultural attitudes that made the teenager killer think it was okay to shoot Lawrence. She took on gun-toting homobigot Sally Kern.
Ellen also took McCain to task on his stance on marriage equality and brought it up to Laura and Jenna Bush as well. She has talked openly and honestly about her marriage to Portia de Rossi, even sharing her wedding photos and video on her show.
There has been some debate on whether Ellen's visibility on LGBT issues is enough. In Karen Ocamb's blog about Prop 8 funding yesterday, the fact that DeGeneres has not given money to help defeat the proposition was brought up by some. The lack of her financial support to No on 8 PACs was made even more evident by the news that Ellen and new wife de Rossi are throwing a fundraiser event for Prop 2, an animal rights bill.
I actually think that DeGeneres has given a lot to the fight against Prop 8 and other anti-LGBT initiatives with her outspokenness. I would love to see her write a check or throw a fundraiser, but if I had to choose, I would hope she continues to change hearts and minds with her public star power.
All in all, it is great to see her continue to not only succeed while being so out and vocal, but also do it with such grace, class, and humor. She is doing what many of us cannot- taking the fight for LGBT rights into people's living rooms every day.

Like what you read? Subscribe to The Bilerico Project by Email.

Pitt's donation marks the largest thus far to the anti-Prop. 8 campaign by an A-list celebrity.

2008-09-19T08:25:00.000-07:00

"Because no one has the right to deny another their life, even though they disagree with it, because everyone has the right to live the life they so desire if it doesn't harm another and because discrimination has no place in America, my vote will be for equality and against Proposition 8," the actor said in a statement.

Pitt's donation marks the largest thus far to the anti-Prop. 8 campaign by an A-list celebrity.

Great Garbor born on this day!

2008-09-18T06:05:00.001-07:00

Jane Fonda : L'Oreal ~ Paris ads...

2008-09-17T13:54:00.000-07:00

The GREAT Joan Baez~new release...

2008-09-13T12:37:00.000-07:00

Raquel Welch is 68 today!

2008-09-05T11:36:00.000-07:00

SHIRLEY MACLAINE "Out On A Limb" interview

2008-09-03T15:22:00.000-07:00

Cher Harassed by Drunk Fan in Nashville Bar

2008-09-02T13:08:00.000-07:00

By Alexander Toldt , June 25th 2008
A Nashville man was arrested for harassing Cher at "The World Famous Tootsies Orchid Lounge". Police arrested the 36-year-old Calvin Hutton Houghland after he repeatedly tried to talk to famous singer at the club early Wednesday morning. The man didn’t get the idea the first time and insisted until he was asked to leave.According to the police report, the man left when asked but came back after a while and this time turned aggressive after he was refused again. Houghland grabbed Cher by the waist as she sat in a roped-off area. The man was once again escorted from the bar, but wouldn’t give up and once again approached the 62-year-old diva in an aggressive manner. That’s when security personnel intervened and blocked the man’s advances."He managed to reach past the roped off area and grabbed Cher by the waist," the police report said.Houghland called 911 and said he had been assaulted. When police arrived, Cher refused to prosecute the man for assault and for grabbing her. Nevertheless, the aggressor asked to be arrested, the police report shows."She declined to prosecute. Houghland was repeatedly told to leave the area by officers. He left again, came back, and this time said that he wanted to be arrested," the police report said.Houghland admitted he had been drinking and failed a sobriety test which he also requested. He was arrested around 1:00 AM and was charged with public intoxication and disorderly conduct. His bond was set at $3,000.© 2007 - 2008 - eFluxMedia

LIZ recently out on the town, asked about marrying again!

2008-09-02T09:28:00.000-07:00

CHER~"One Wig Room"

2008-09-01T12:28:00.000-07:00

Cher & Halston

Does the wig make the woman or does the woman make the wig? When the woman in question is Cher, the wigs carry enough clout to require the privacy of their own personal dressing room.

Gary's night at the theatre with RITA MORENO

2008-09-01T12:16:00.000-07:00

Well gang heres an old story of mine that I have written before but I think its worth sharing again. Going back to the 80's I went to a matinee of The Rink which starred Liza with Chita and low and behold who was sitting in the seat right next to me RITA MORENO. We were both alone, we had a most friendly coversation which included how much of a Liza fan she was and absolutley adored the talented Chita Rivera. We all know that Rita did Chitas original part in West Side Story but according to Rita this was indeed an honor for her as she went on to win the Oscar in 1961 and was quite and fan and friend of Chitas. Put aside a supposed feud of any kind. Rita was so sweet and looked fabulous that she offered me a piece of her Chuckles candy remember those?? Anyway we both loved the show and adored both Liza and Chita who won her first Tony that year as Liza's mom in The Rink. Wasn't it a hoot to share that with Rita? I did see Chita in the original West Side Story in 1957 and if you asked me who was the better in the part I would have to be diplomatic and say that they were BOTH wonderful. What a way to see a show, what company what a great moment, all my love, Gary s from TBA

Patrick talks CHITA & RITA...

2008-08-29T21:28:00.000-07:00

Hi Kids,
I'm sure most of you have seen this before, but I wanted to share it with you again.
I was thinking of Chita today because I just found out that she is bringing her cabaret act to San Francisco at the Rrazz Room Sept 23 - Oct 5. I am so excited. My partner and I saw her last November at Fiensteins in NY. We were seated at the front table and Chita was of course wonderful. I saw her before the show in the lobby right before she was to go on. She said " Hey honey! ". She remembered me from when I have met her many times before in SF. The show was amazing and Rosie O'Donnell was even in the audience seated a few tables behind us with her partner and friends. Chita reached down and gave me a hug during her curtain call. After the show I had to meet Rosie. We gave each other a hug and kiss. It was great.

Sorry I went on. If anyone is in the area during that time maybe we can meet up. Also Rita Moreno is doing her cabaret at the same place in November. I can't wait to see that too. I'll share my stories of Rita another time.

Happy Labor Day Weekend.
xoxoxoxo Patrick

PS I'll think about you all on Sunday. I'm going to my favorite piano bar in SF "Martuni's" with some friends to sing and drink martinis. The last time I was there the bartenders pulled me up to sing "Cabaret" of course.
~ Patrick O Sanchez
" Nothing like a show to sober you up!"

Michael Jackson turns 50...

2008-08-29T09:42:00.000-07:00

ELLEN inspires singer & Liza fan Louise Scott...

2008-08-28T15:20:00.000-07:00

I've been keeping up to date with all the latest Liza info, busy girl!!
There is also another girl in my life right now. That is Ellen DeGeneres. I've always really really liked her but at the moment I'm going through a bit of a change mostly to do with the fact that I am so comfortable with myself now and proud of the fact that I'M GAY. If you haven't realised this, what took you so long? Yeah, so Ellen is my hero and lately after watching a lot of her, I've realised that this woman risked a whole lot just to be comfortable in herself and not live a lie anymore and I respect her a whole lot. She also inspires me to be proud and happy and gives me a great outlook for my future as a gay woman in society. So, to round it off, I totally love her!

Anyway, Hope everyone is well and happy and hope you all had a great summer.
Hi baby, I love you!!!

love, Louise
Louise Scott

Patti LaBelle live @ Brooklyn's Wingate Field, 8~25~08

2008-08-27T09:45:00.000-07:00

Ellen and Portia's wedding day!

2008-08-26T09:11:00.001-07:00

Ricky Martin Has Twins ... for Serious!

2008-08-20T15:59:00.000-07:00

NEW YORK (Aug. 20) - There won't be much "livin' la vida loca" for Ricky Martin these days - he's now the father of twin boys.
The Latin superstar had the children via a surrogate mother, and the babies were born a few weeks ago, according to a statement from his representatives.

"The children, delivered via gestational surrogacy, are healthy and already under Ricky's full-time care," said the statement. "Ricky is elated to begin this new chapter in his life as a parent and will be spending the remainder of the year out of the public spotlight in order to spend time with his children."
A representative said there was no further information on the details of the children's birth.
Martin, 36, is a multiplatinum singer who is best known for English-language hits like "She Bangs!" and "Livin' la Vida Loca." In recent years, the Puerto Rican star has been active in charitable efforts, including the prevention of sexual exploitation of children.

Ellen and Portia Are Newlyweds

2008-08-18T13:31:00.000-07:00

Aug. 17) - A toast is in order. Ellen and Portia have tied the knot.

DeGeneres and de Rossi were married Saturday evening at their home in Los Angeles. Their spokesperson confirmed the news to PEOPLE.
DeGeneres, 50, and de Rossi, 35, both wore Zac Posen and exchanged rings by Neil Lane during the Saturday ceremony. Their big day also featured arrangements by L.A. florist Mark's Garden.
The intimate ceremony was attended by 19 guests, including DeGeneres's mom Betty and de Rossi's mother Margaret Rogers, who witnessed the couple exchange handwritten vows. Get More Details on the Ceremony From PEOPLE
DeGeneres had announced the couple's plans on her talk show after California legalized gay marriage.