She once spent her days partying her life away as part of a dippy, blonde twosome with her friend Paris Hilton.
But Nicole Richie appears to have grown up since becoming a mother, and her new brunette hair colour has added to her new calmer image.
The 28-year-old star was pictured on a post-Christmas shopping trip in Los Angeles with her partner, Good Charlotte rocker Joel Madden.
Authorities say actor Charlie Sheen is accused of using a weapon in an alleged case of domestic violence in Aspen.
Sheen spent part of Christmas Day in jail after being arrested at a home in the Colorado ski resort town.
Police spokeswoman Stephanie Dasaro did not provide details on what kind of weapon Sheen is accused of using.
Sheen also was arrested on investigation of second-degree assault, a felony, and criminal mischief, a misdemeanor.
Sheen’s lawyer didn’t return a telephone call Sunday seeking comment.
Sheen hasn’t been charged and was released Friday after posting an $8,500 bond. Prosecutors will determine whether to file charges.
Usher knows his stuff when it comes to fashion.
The R&B singer describes his style as “flashy classy” and he is known for seamlessly moving between three-piece banker suits and leather jackets. He admires edgier designers such as Rick Owens, Marc Jacobs and Kris Van Assche.
Usher has enough business savvy to say it’s not the right time for him to launch his own label, but he is in New York to promote his new fragrance, Usher VIP, a follow-up to Usher He, which ranked in the top 40 of men’s prestige fragrance sales this year, according to market data researcher NPD.
This is all moonlighting for him, though. Musically, Usher had the No. 3 hip-hop song according to Nielsen/BDS with “Papers.”
On this day Usher is in a luxurious hotel suite wearing a long blue cardigan sweater, dark jeans and black leather boots to answer fashion questions from The Associated Press:
_AP: What’s the most important element of your look?
Usher: It’s about how you feel, not about `fashion.’ It’s about healthy living, the combination of foods you eat. … Those ancillaries are what lead you to `fashion.’ Fashion can be a beautiful scarf, soft cashmere sweater or cool boots.
_AP: Where do you find inspiration for your style?
Usher: My taste develops the more I’m introduced to things, the more I travel and experience different lifestyles. I always go out and embrace where I am
Michale Jackson’s death and Susan Boyle’s overnight sensation are the top entertainment stories voted by U.S. newspaper and broadcast editors surveyed by The Associated Press.
Top two: Michale Jackson & Susan Boyle
1.Michale Jackson
On June 25, Jackson was pronounced dead at the age of 50.
One of the most momentous and shocking deaths in pop culture history, the event reverberated in many ways.
There was the ongoing investigation: Jackson’s death was ruled a homicide, and his personal physician, Dr. Conrad Murray, who says he’s innocent of wrongdoing, is being investigated for manslaughter.
There was the gigantic Los Angeles funeral.
There was the documentary, “This Is It,” of Jackson’s preparations for a comeback concert series.
2. Susan Boyle
Two 21st-century powers — reality TV and the Web – combined to turn the humble, unknown Boyle into an international star.
After Boyle sang “I Dreamed a Dream” on “Britain’s Got Talent” on April 11, the clip spread like wildfire online, totaling more than 120 million views on YouTube.
The breakthrough stars: Taylor Swift & Lady Gaga
3. Taylor Swift
The “Love Story” hitmaker has seen her popularity soar in the last 12 months thanks to her Grammy-nominated album Fearless, the best-selling release of 2009.
4. Lady gaga
More than an ordinary pop star or fashion muse, Lady Gaga seems closer to a gamer’s creation. She is rated No. 3 in Billboard’s annual recap of Top Artists of the year, and was also termed the top new artist on that same list. Her name is among those most often searched on the Web.
The two under arrest: Noriko Sakai & Polanski
5. Noriko Sakai
Japanese actress and singer Noriko Sakai was sentenced to 18 months in jail, suspended for three years, for drug use.
6. Polanski
Oscar-winning film director Roman Polanski was still kept in jail of Switzerland Monday, unless he pays off a full bail payment of 4.5 million U.S. dollars demanded by Swiss court.
7. Kate Winslet
Win or lose at Sunday’s Oscar ceremony, British actress Kate Winslet will enter Academy Award history.
8. “Slumdog Millionaire”
The R&B star that beats his girlfriend
9. Chris Brown
The big story on Grammy night in 2009 didn’t take place on stage but outside the ceremony.
Chris Brown assaulted then-girlfriend Rihanna, an altercation that led to Brown pleading guilty to felony assault in June.
Both R&B stars were in comeback mode before the year was out, releasing new albums just weeks apart.
The controversial ex-Miss California
10. Carrie Prejean
Prejean shot to stardom late last year during the Miss USA pageant, when celebrity blogger and judge Perez Hilton asked the then-Miss California about her stance on gay marriage.
Her response: “You know what, in my country, in my family, I think I believe that marriage should be between a man and a woman, no offense to anybody out there. But that’s how I was raised and I believe that it should be between a man and a woman.”
Her reply, which likely cost her the Miss USA crown, set off a firestorm of criticism from the left and made her a poster girl for the right wing and its campaign for traditional family values.
Actor Hugh Grant said he dreams of running away from Hollywood and publishing a book, in an interview with a German newspaper Sunday.
“I have always promised myself: ‘When you have made some nice films and earned some money, you are going to finally write your novel’,” the 49-year-old star told the Bild am Sonntag.
He said he had already completed half a book but had written next to nothing in the last year.
“I don’t know if it is laziness or some kind of fear of failure,” he said, but revealed no details about his work in progress.
Grant said that as soon as a funny and appealing script lands on his desk, an inner struggle begins: “Shouldn’t I rather make a film, earn money and work with beautiful women?”
A lot happened in Norah Jones’ life between the release of her last album, 2007’s Never Too Late, and her current one, The Fall. The singer/songwriter broke up with longtime boyfriend and musical collaborator Lee Alexander. She became a dog owner, acquiring a long-haired poodle named Ralph, who, she affectionately notes, “looks like Fozzie Bear.”
And not least of all, Jones turned 30 in March.
“It seems to be an age where everyone goes through changes,” she says, sipping water in a restaurant near her downtown Manhattan apartment. “All my good friends have. Everyone’s either breaking up or getting involved or married or having a baby.”
For Jones, a change in creative approach was in order. She describes Fall, which has sold 524,000 copies since its arrival Nov. 17, as “more personal” than its predecessor. “I think I was looking outside myself more at that time, because of where I was and what was going on in the world. The past couple of years, though, I’ve looked inward more.”
The new songs
It was a memorable and merry Christmas in Hollywood as moviegoers shattered box-office records, responding in droves to a diverse array of high-profile releases over the holiday weekend.
The estimated $278 million in weekend box-office revenue broke the previous record of roughly $253 million set in July 2008, the weekend “The Dark Knight” was released.
A diverse group of films drew throngs to the multiplexes: James Cameron’s “Avatar” pushed strongly into its second week while “Sherlock Holmes,” “Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakquel” and “It’s Complicated” all opened.
“Avatar,” the 3-D epic, topped them all, earning $75 million for 20th Century Fox, according to studio estimates Sunday. Remarkably, that was only a 3 percent drop from its opening weekend total of $77.4 million. (Blockbusters typically drop 30-50 percent in the second weekend.) In its 10 days of release, “Avatar” has made $212 million domestically
One month after his one-car crash touched off a sensational sex scandal that drew the world’s attention, Tiger Woods has become an Invisible Man even as his world has collapsed around him.
In the early morning hours of November 27, Woods struck a tree and fire hydrant when he lost control of his car, and was rushed to a hospital with facial cuts and bruises. He hailed his wife Elin as a hero who rescued him by smashing the vehicle’s back windows with golf clubs.
But where was he going at such an hour? What made him lose control of the vehicle? Why smash the windows farthest from Woods? Did a tabloid report days earlier about an affair spark a marital spat?
Answers to those questions remain unconfirmed, despite reports from celebrity website and a reckless driving traffic citation against Woods.
However the golf superstar’s own admissions of infidelity, “transgressions” and “personal sins” give credence to lurid claims by at least 14 women who say they had affairs with Woods.
In one of the most stunning falls from grace ever seen, Woods’s squeaky-clean marketing juggernaut image was destroyed.
An audiotape of a phone call one of the mistresses released with a voice sounding like Woods was followed hours later by a Woods statement vaguely confessing to wrongdoings.
The 14-time major champion, who skipped his own charity event saying that his accident injuries kept him from attending, later announced he was taking an indefinite leave from his pro golf career.
While Woods went undercover, sponsors began pulling his once-omnipresent image from advertisements.
Watchmaker Tag Heuer and razor-blade giant Gillette quit using his image during his hiatus. Telecommunications giant AT&T was reevaluating Woods as a spokesman. Technology, management and outsourcing consultancy Accenture dropped its deal altogether.
Nike however issued unqualified support in Woods’s darkest hour.
Reports followed at dizzying speed, the latest being Elin having hired a Hollywood celebrity divorce lawyer and taken her children with Woods — 10-month-old son Charlie and two-year-old daughter Sam — to an island home she bought in Sweden.
Clearly, Woods had hopes for a better first Christmas for his son.
Woods was said to be hitting golf balls alone at night to cope with the firestorm. Other reports said he had rekindled a relationship with Rachel Uchitel, the New York show club hostess who was the first mistress revealed.
Uchitel was visiting the same Australian hotel as Woods when he was playing an event Down Under, and claimed she was visiting her parents over the holidays when she showed up in Palm Beach, Florida, close to where Woods has his 20 million-dollar luxury yacht “Privacy” docked.
Bikini-clad beach photos of Uchitel were making the internet rounds over the holiday weekend.
As the scandal unfolded, Woods became a punch line for comedians, with even Disney working a line about the score of alleged Woods affairs into a show at Disneyland.
As 2010 loomed, so did a US PGA Tour season without Woods, whose absence cuts attendance at tournaments and television viewership by 50 percent, adding stress to a sponsor list already weakened by the struggling economy.
A scandal that began with unanswered questions now has one major mystery — when, if ever, will Woods return to his quest to break the record 18 major titles won by Jack Nicklaus?
Nearly everyone with a connection to the matter expects a whirlwind of media attention and huge global interest when Woods plays in his next event, just as they understand why Woods might need a break to cope with the revelations of a life far different than model family-man he portrayed.
Reminding people why they were fascinated with him in the first place could be the road back for Woods, but long months await the superstar once known for his uncanny ability to focus on his game under the most tense pressure.
This time, he’s in the game of his life.
Hordes of excited fans besiege them, slipping phone numbers into their pockets, whispering hard-to-refuse invitations in their ears and grabbing whatever flesh they can find.
But this is not Westlife or Take That. Nor will the fans see their teenage years again; in many cases, they won’t see their 40s again.
The followers of No.1 classical boy band Blake include an army of middle-aged women old enough to be their mothers. They call themselves the Blakettes and will stop at nothing to get up close and personal.
‘Though most of our fans are polite, well-behaved ladies, there is a group of increasingly naughty and suggestive panthers, as we call them,’ says Jules Knight, the band’s baritone, who attended St Andrews University with Prince William.
‘Unlike the sweet, more mature ladies who tend to want to take us home and make us a cup of cocoa, this group of sexually charged vixens have much darker desires.
A top Hollywood studio head has expressed hope that China will allow more foreign films into the country, as the move would benefit both domestic and foreign filmmakers.
“We would prefer to be able to bring more movies to the market,” James Gianopulos, chairman and chief executive officer of Fox Filmed Entertainment, told China Daily.
“It makes sense to allow people to have access to the legal products, rather than seeing films in pirated form. And, piracy doesn’t just steal from us, it steals from the government and the economy of countries like China it doesn’t benefit anyone,” he said.
Gianopulos was in Beijing to promote Avatar, the studio’s latest sci-fi extravaganza that will premiere in China on Jan 4.
Gianopulos’ statement comes close on the heels of the World Trade Organizationturning down a Chinese appeal and upholding on Monday its earlier ruling against Chinese regulations on the import and distribution of books and audio-visual products.
It said the Chinese regulations failed to comply with world trade rules.
China expressed its regret over the ruling the next day.
“China has conscientiously carried out its obligations under WTO rules in terms of access to the publishing market since its entry into the WTO,” Yao Jian, a spokesman for the Ministry of Commerce, said on the ministry’s official website.
“China regrets the appeal panel ruling. China believes that cultural goods combine commercial and cultural value, and should be managed in a different way than other products.”
China imports 20 foreign films a year for theatrical release. The ruling, however, does not force China to let in products it thinks are harmful to public morals, which means the 20-film quota stays.
Over the past five years, the country’s box office revenue has grown by 20 percent annually, touching $630 million last year.
US blockbusters, such as Titanic and Transformers, have been among the highest grossers ever in China, but local films too have become competitive, contributing 60 percent to the revenue last year.
Gianopulos said more local films would boost the whole market, rather than shrinking the space for foreign films.
“Local films encourage people to enjoy going to the movies, and when people go to the movies, more theaters are built and more movies are made,” he said.
“When people get into the habit of enjoying films, sometimes it would be a local film that will top the box office receipts, sometimes, fortunately, it will be our films, but what’s important is for people to have the opportunity to see films and to like the habit of going to the movies.”
Avatar, directed by James Cameron, is a sci-fi fantasy featuring the latest 3-D technologies.
It will be screened here in both the 2-D and 3-D versions.
