A glum Sharpay (Ashley Tisdale) and her dog Boi sport matching sequined jackets while sitting atop a pile of pink luggage.

Martha Stewart has apologized to Jessica Simpson for saying she should have watched her Malitpoo Daisy more closely after the dog was dragged away by a coyote in Los Angeles last week.

Stewart, 68, scolded Simpson, 29, calling the incident was "pretty sad." She said Simpson "should have been more careful" and also advised the singer to "get another dog."

But in a segment on her daytime program, The Martha Stewart Show, Stewart changed her tune.

"I said that she should have been watching her dog more closely, but I feel very, very sorry for anybody that loses a pet," she said Thursday. "Jessica, I hope you find your pet, but if you don't, I'm really sorry that you lost one."

 

EOnline.com says "sources confirm" that the Project Runway host and husband Seal are about four months along in the new pregnancy.

The happy couple, who were married in May 2005, already have two boys together, Henry Günther Ademola Dashtu Samuel, 3, and Johan Riley Fyodor Taiwo Samuel, 2. Seal is the adoptive dad to Heidi's daughter Leni Klum, from a previous relationship.

The baby buzz all began when sketches for a couture maternity gown leaked on the Internet. Heidi will need that fashionable bump-accommodating gown as shooting for season 7 of Project Runway kicks off this summer in NYC.

With wife Jennifer Garner noticeable absent, State of Play star Ben, 36, cahtted with the actress-turned-lifestyle guru, 36, while their children played.

"They had a lot of games for the kids, including a reall horse with a cowboy," an onlooker tells OK!.

But did the reunion upset Gwyn's hubby, Chris Martin? The bashful 32-year-old rocker ducked into the house when he saw Ben arrive."Chris didn't want to be around," adds the spy. "As soon as Ben left, he came back out."

The controversy isn't stopping U.S. radio from playing "If You Seek Amy." Six top 40 stations have the song in rotation this week, enough to place the track at No. 92 on the Billboard Pop 100 chart. Leading the pack is WFLZ-Tampa, Fla., which has played it 19 times.

"We're confident the version of the song we air is not crossing any lines," program director Tommy Chuck told Billboard.com, adding that WFLX plays a Jive-created edit of the song that changes "Seek" to "See" as well as a jokey version in which morning host MJ shouts his name every time the word "Amy" appears.

As further details emerge about Madonna and Guy Ritchie’s increasingly bitter divorce proceedings, the exes are finding support in very different areas. While the Material Mom attended NYC’s Kabbalah Centre with children Lourdes, 12, Rocco, 8, and David, 3, on Oct. 25, Guy happily posed with fans outside a Manchester, UK, hotel before letting his hair down over dinner at Stock with celebrity pals Robert Downey Jr. and Jude Law.

Just two days earlier, Guy partied at London’s White Cube gallery with Jude and Robert, who are both starring in Guy’s new movie, Sherlock Holmes.

“They were in a silly, goofy mood,” an onlooker tells OK!. “It was a guys’ night out, and Guy didn’t look one bit upset.”

Madonna, 50, also found time for some fun, taking her kids to Manhattan’s Chelsea Piers gym on Oct. 20 to play on the trampolines, followed by an Oct. 21 helicopter ride over NYC for Rocco and David.

Guy may be staying far away from his ex, but Madonna’s new man, Yankees slugger Alex Rodriguez, is rumored to be looking at $80-million apartments just two blocks from the singer on NYC’s Upper West Side.

Angelina Jolie visits NBC's Today show October 16, 2008 in New York City.

"Not a lot of people get to see a movie where their parents fell in love," Jolie, 33, says - referring to wanting her kids to see the flick - in the New York Times.

One sight she's not ready for her six children to see? Racy internet pictures of herself!

Jolie says she worries, "[Maddox will] look up my name and see some kind of sexy pictures, or read a story about himself that isn't true.

"There's a lot we're going to have to explain to them about how public their family is," Jolie adds.

For now, the kids look at mom and dad as nerds, Jolie says.

"What's going to be funny is when they think Mom and Dad are a little bit cool, because right now, we're not cool Mom and Dad," she says. "Even video games, you know, it's: 'Mom, you can't play this. You don't know how.'

"Oh, they all think I can't do anything, that I'm just there to snuggle with. But the other day, Madd said, 'Can you do a cartwheel?' and I said, 'Yeah I can.' And he was like, 'Wow, Mom,'" she says.

"And I thought 'Oh, yeah. I can do some things. You wait. You'll find out. I'm capable," Jolie says.

The actress says she picks her movie roles based on her kids' schedules.

She asks herself, "Who's in school at that time? How can I be sure I don't do too many long hours? Can the three youngest be on the set every day?

"As long as I can still be with my family, it's fun. But I only want to do that, and I'm not looking for anything else," she says.

For inspiration, Jolie looks to her own mother, who died in January 2007.

"My mom, she was a very, very soft woman. It was hard for her to yell, or even curse," Jolie says. "But when it came to fighting for her kids, she found a strength she didn't always know she had.
 

The former 'Friends' actress, who recently split from 'Gravity' singer John Mayer, gets frustrated by some of the things she reads about herself but has learned not to pay attention and move on.
Jennifer, 39, said: "You hear so many ridiculous stories and things which are just plain lies and you want to go on the record, but you can't because it just inflames things more. 

"I'm so used to it now that I just don't pay attention. I just live my life, focus on my work and stick to the plan. I really don't worry about what's written about me. It's part of the business." 

Jennifer - who can soon be seen in new independent film 'Management' - also revealed she was attracted to the film because it gave her more scope to add her own touches as an actress.

She added: "You can take more chances on an independent film because there isn't as much money or studio pressure riding on it. You don't have to follow all the conventions as an actress, you feel that maybe you can take more chances with your performance."

 Jennifer Aniston makes a good case for proving that acting talent can be absorbed by osmosis. From her father John Aniston's stardom on Days of Our Lives to her relationship with godfather Telly Savalas, the actress was surrounded by plenty of inspiration from an early age.

 As Aniston attended the Rudolph Steiner School as a child, she was interested in many forms of art and proved to be a talented painter, eventually having one of her pieces displayed at the New York Metropolitan Museum of Art. 

Acting also appealed to her, and became her primary focus after graduating from New York's prestigious High School for the Performing Arts in 1987. She took roles in off-Broadway productions such as For Dear Life and Dancing on Checker's Grave before she began honing her skills in television acting with appearances on shows like Quantum Leap and Herman's Head.

 She said: "I don't cook - it's the one thing I can't do!"

 Angelina insists Brad is the parent responsible for the cooking, admitting: "When I get away from filming and doing interviews, I join Brad and the children to have breakfast or lunch. Brad is always thinking about the kids and what to feed them for breakfast. For him it's the most important meal of the day."

 The 33-year-old actress also revealed she likes being as open as she can, but is determined to keep some things private.

 She added: "I'm honest and I like that I don't have to worry about what I say because I don't have the time or energy for it. Sometimes things are taken the wrong way and it's crazy to be misinterpreted - it does bother me. But there's also a lot of people don't know about me.

 "People know about a tenth of my life and because it's a certain kind of life, they assume that's everything. But I do have my secrets."

 Raised mostly by her mother after her parents divorced while she was still a baby, Jolie moved around a lot with her mother and brother. She also did a fair amount of traveling as a professional model, living in such places as London, New York, and Los Angeles before settling for a time in New York as a student at the Lee Strasberg Theatre Institute and New York University, where she first started acting in theater productions.

 The fledgling actress soon moved on to film with a small role in 1993's Cyborg 2, followed in 1995 by her turn as a computer hacker in the more widely seen Hackers.

The Tropic Thunder star - who has a biological daughter Suri, two, with wife Katie Holmes and two adopted children, 15-year-old Isabella and 13-year-old Connor, with ex-wife Nicole Kidman - insists he treats all his kids exactly the same.

He said: "My adopted children are my own children. There is no separation in that for me whatsoever. There's no way there is any difference and anyone who has adopted would say the same.

"I've been up in the middle of the night changing diapers, there's no question in terms of me being the father, that bond couldn't be any stronger."

Tom - who co-starred with Nicole in 1999 movie 'Eyes Wide Shut' - also hinted he is keen to star in a movie alongside Katie in the future.

He said: "I would maybe work with Katie, if I can find the right film. I wouldn't say it's necessarily easier of harder working with a wife or girlfriend - I work well with everyone. Working together is really enjoyable. In the same way Katie and I are creating a family, a home. It's very pleasurable."

Tom Cruise spent the 1980s as one of Hollywood's brightest-shining golden boys. With black hair, blue eyes, and unabashed cockiness, Cruise rode high on such hits as Top Gun and Rain Man.

Although his popularity dimmed slightly in the early '90s, he was able to bounce back with a string of hits that re-established him as both an action hero and, in the case of Jerry Maguire and Magnolia, a talented actor.

It is reported the twins have been named Knox Leon and Vivienne Marcheline and were born by Caesarian section around 8pm on Saturday. Knox Leon was reported to weigh five pounds while Vivienne Marcheline 5.02 pounds. Jolie, whose partner is actor Brad Pit, was admitted to hospital earlier this week.

She gave birth at the Santa Maria clinic.
Pitt was there during the operation, said the doctor, who delivered the twins at the seaside Lenval hospital in Nice in southern France.

"Everything is going well," said Sussmann. "The mother, the babies, the father are doing marvelously well."

He said the Cesarian was moved forward from its originally planned date "for medical reasons" so that the babies could be born "in the best conditions." Sussman did not give details.

The doctor said Jolie is expected to stay in the hospital for a few more days.

The babies' first photograph is believed to have been sold to a US paper for 5.5 million dollars - but the money will go to a humanitarian cause, in keeping with the couple's charitable beliefs.

American Jolie, 33, and Pitt, 44, have one biological daughter together, Shiloh, who was delivered by Caesarean section two years ago in the African country of Namibia.

The couples also are the parents of three adopted children - daughter Zahara from Ethiopia, son Pax from Vietnam and son Maddox from Cambodia.

The couple is known for their humanitarian work from the hurricane struck New Orleans, to Africa and Pakistan. 

“I can confirm she is engaged,” her representative Stephen Huvane told celebrity Web site People.com.

Huvane was not immediately able to be reached for further comment. People.com said the pair began dating last summer, and since then their relationship has blossomed quickly. 

Thurman, 38, has a long list of film credits that include roles in “Pulp Fiction” and “The Producers.” She was previously married to actor Ethan Hawke, with whom she has two children, as well as to actor Gary Oldman.

Businessman and philanthropist Busson was until 2005 involved with Australian model Elle Macpherson, with whom he had two sons. He is the founder and chairman of EIM Group, a fund management business based in London.

 The actress had co-founded a movie production firm called Plan B Entertainment with her ex-husband Brad Pitt, but decided to part ways with the company after the couple split in 2005.

 Now the 39-year-old has formed Echo Films with Hahn, who is best known as an executive producer on Martin Scorsese's  hit movie The Departed.

 The company is already reported to have lined up a variety of projects taken from books and real life stories, most of which will see Aniston take the lead role.

 Confirming the move in a statement, Aniston and Hahn say: "We're drawn to stories about people finding their voice and finding their way because they help us as listeners and viewers do what we feel we're all trying to do, which is making sense of our lives through the stories of others.

 "That's why we chose the name Echo, to echo back an idea, a challenge, something that resonates through all of us."

 Jennifer has also recently revealed her plans to visit the home of her Greek ancestors. The former Friends star recently announced that she is still passionate about her Mediterranean roots and plans to visit her ancestors' homeland.

The 39-year-old, whose father John was born on the island of Crete, said that she would travel to Greece this summer in a bid to get in touch with her roots.

 The reports were confirmed after they were caught kissing and cuddling in public, with Aniston bringing Mayer to a Marley & Me cast party in Miami.

Now, she’s put him to the test by taking him to meet Cox, who she has been pals with ever since they started shooting ‘Friends’.

 Cox, ever protective of Aniston since her divorce from Brad Pitt, was also said to be disapproving of the actress’ relationship with her ‘The Break-Up’ star Vince Vaughn.

In other news, Aniston and Mayer are reportedly set to get matching tattoos.

 Aniston is said to be toying with adding a heart to the one she already has on her stomach - but apparently Mayer has other ideas.

 The pair - who are yet to confirm they are dating - has been photographed regularly together since April, most recently during a romantic weekend in Miami, Florida.

Oscar said yes to "No Country for Old Men" and to European actors on Sunday night.

"No Country," the Coen brothers' brutal tale of a man pursued by death and the law across the bleak moonscapes of West Texas, won best picture at the 80th Academy Awards.

The four acting awards, meanwhile, went to Europeans: Marion Cotillard, Daniel Day-Lewis, Javier Bardem and Tilda Swinton.

The Coens also won best director and best adapted screenplay, and Bardem, who played cattle-gun-armed killer Anton Chigurh, won best supporting actor. Producer Scott Rudin shared the best picture award with the brothers.

"We're very thankful to all of you out there for letting us continue to play in our corner of the sandbox, so thank you very much," Joel Coen said in accepting the directing award.

He observed that the pair didn't think they were doing much different work now from when, as a child, Ethan Coen "got a suit and a briefcase and we went to the Minneapolis International Airport with a Super 8 camera and made a movie about shuttle diplomacy called 'Henry Kissinger, Man on the Go.' "

The Coens, who have been known for their arch style and oddball humor in films such as "Fargo," "O Brother, Where Art Thou" and "The Big Lebowski," received some laughs for Ethan Coen's laconic acceptance speeches.

After the pair won for adapted screenplay, Ethan Coen gave a brief thanks. Upon winning the directing award, he expanded on his speech slightly, sort of: "I don't have a lot to add to what I said earlier. Thank you," he said.

Day-Lewis was more effusive in his thanks after winning best actor for his performance as a misanthropic oilman in "There Will Be Blood."

"My deepest thanks to the members of the Academy for whacking me with the handsomest bludgeon in town," the British actor said as he accepted the award.

"I've been thinking a lot about fathers and sons in the course of this, and I'd like to accept this in the memory of my grandfather, Michael Balcon, my father, Cecil Day-Lewis, and my three fine boys, Gabriel, Ronan and Cashel," he added. See the complete list of winners

As he accepted his first Oscar, Bardem, one of Spain's top actors, thanked his directors and reflected on his role as a creepy killer with a bad haircut.

Actors Daniel Day-Lewis, Tilda Swinton, Marion Cotillard and Javier Bardem toast their success.

Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt Saturday

She put her baby bump on display at Saturday's Film Independent's Spirit Awards. And even though Angelina Jolie didn't actually attend Sunday's Academy Awards, her pregnancy still got a nod from host Jon Stewart.

During a short interlude, the Daily Show star teased about all the expectant actresses in attendance – referencing Jessica Alba and Cate Blanchett – and then announced (as if he were presenting an award), "the baby goes to ... Angelina Jolie!"

Then, the funnyman quipped, "Obviously Angelina couldn't be with us tonight. It's tough getting 17 babysitters on Oscar night."
 
 

Marc Anthony's Sister 'Ecstatic' Over Jennifer Lopez Baby News

Good news travels fast, and when Marc Anthony's sister found out about the double blessing he and wife Jennifer Lopez had early Friday morning, she was overjoyed.


"I learned this morning. I'm ecstatic, I really am. I'm happy for her," Yolanda Santa Maria, Anthony's older sister, told PEOPLE Friday after hearing the birth news on Good Morning America. "She's a mom for the first time. I can just imagine the euphoria she's going through."


And as for her brother? "It's another two blessings for him. He beat me – I have four [kids] and now he has five. I'm so happy for him. I don’t even know what to say. It's like if I had the babies."


Santa Maria, who expects to meet her new niece and nephew soon, added, "I can't wait to see them, I can't wait to meet them. Words don't even begin to express how happy I am for them."

 

Marc Anthony and Jennifer Lopez

Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt

She put her baby bump on display at Saturday's Film Independent's Spirit Awards.

And even though Angelina Jolie didn't actually attend Sunday's Academy Awards, her pregnancy still got a nod from host Jon Stewart.

During a short interlude, the Daily Show star teased about all the expectant actresses in attendance – referencing Jessica Alba and Cate Blanchett

and then announced (as if he were presenting an award), "the baby goes to ... Angelina Jolie!" Then, the funnyman quipped,

"Obviously Angelina couldn't be with us tonight. It's tough getting 17 babysitters on Oscar night."

 

Britney Spears visits her sons

Britney Spears was reunited briefly with her sons Saturday, spending about three hours with the two little boys nearly two months after the troubled pop star last saw them.

Spears' father, James, played a key part in making possible the visit with Jayden James, 1, and Sean Preston, 2, said Elliot Mintz, a spokesman for Spears' ex-husband Kevin Federline.

Mintz wouldn't say where the reunion took place or who else was there, but People magazine reported that Spears' psychiatrist was present.

Spears had not been allowed to see the boys since January 3, when she refused to return the children after a visitation. Police were called to her home, and a scene ensued that ended with Spears being taken to the hospital. She was hospitalized a second time four weeks later.

The visit came a day after Federline's attorney Mark Vincent Kaplan announced that the couple "agreed to a modification of the court's order" that had stripped Spears of her visitation rights

Spears' parents went to Los Angeles around the time of her second hospitalization and have pushed to restore visitation rights to help their daughter recover.

court commissioner gave Federline sole physical and legal custody of the former couple's boys and suspended Spears' visitation rights on January 4.

Leading up the hospitalizations, Spears engaged in bizarre public behavior. Since divorcing Federline in November 2006 she shaved her head, was seen in public without underwear, ran over a celebrity photographer's foot and attacked a vehicle with an umbrella.

Singer Britney Spears poses at a party in
Los Angeles in December 2007.
 

Oscar-winner Hilary Swank says Oscar night really works up an appetite so she comes prepared. When asked on the red carpet why she has dashed to Astro Burger after the awards show for the past two years, she explained, "It's because you're starving!"

But this year she came prepared. Dressed in Versace, the actress showed Ryan Seacrest the contents of her little black bag. Inside? Nuts!

"I already ate the cake," she said.

Jessica Alba has confirmed that she is pregnant with her first child. The saucy actress and her boyfriend Cash Warren are expecting their first child next spring after dating for almost four years together.

 The couple met at the set of the movie Fantastic Four in 2004, where Cash has been working as a director's assistant and have been dating since.

 Alba’s agent confirmed the pregnancy news and that the couple’s baby is expected in late spring or early summer.

 The couple had some trouble earlier this year and split claiming that it’s due to their hectic work schedules, but they got back together soon after that.
Jessica stated earlier that she wants to squash her reputation as a saucy screen siren, insisting that she’s a prude.

And that inspite of her lycra outfit in the Fantastic Four chain, and her role in Sin City, not to mention the various magazines photo shoots, Alba insists that she’s known in the industry for her shyness.

Alba also states that other than her role in Sin City, she doesn’t usually wear skimpy outfits in her movies, and that people know that she’s quite prude.

Alba actually has a no- nudity clause in her contract and only recently did she agree to bare her back for the new movie Awake, stating that it’s above the waist, and only the back is visible, and she was facing a wall.

Shiloh, Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie's daughter has been voted the world's most influential infant.

 Shiloh, who is only 18-month old is the couple's only biological child among their other adopted children.

 The toddler beat off stiff competition from Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes' daughter Suri to top the list compiled by Forbes magazine, which considered the Hollywood children who have the greatest effect on popular culture.

 The publication analyzed the amount of media attention famous children under-five had received and they were then placed according to how well known they are and their parents' consumer appeal rankings.

 Shiloh's adopted two-year-old sister Zahara came third, while the pair's adopted brother, Pax, four, was fifth.

Shiloh who was born in May who had more than 2,000 articles written about her last year, not to mention that her first photographs sold for a reputed $4 million.

 Other famous offspring to make the list include Britney Spears and Kevin Federline's two-year-old son, Sean Preston, and Madonna's adopted boy, David Banda.

Sarah Ivens, from America's OK! magazine, said: "We're now as fascinated to see Suri take off for Paris or Berlin in a little Burberry outfit as we are by what Scarlett Johansson is wearing."

Harry Potter and his fellow wizards attending Hogwarts will continue to work on their teen issues on screen in the next instalment of the movie.
During the next film ‘Harry Potter And The Half-Blood Prince’, all cast members will be dealing with more than share of adult issues, including, love triangles and jealous ex-girlfriends.

Director David Yates reportedly stated that the sixth instalment is the “sex, drugs, and rock and roll” of the “Potter” franchise.

 A relationship triangle starts to develop between Ron and Hermione, and Ron and Lavender, which is bound to be rather interesting to watch.

 Though the wizards and witches will experience social growing pains, the next instalment just might be the Potter film that has the audience laughing.

 Daniel Radcliffe told MTV ‘If we pull it off right, it should be the funniest of the films so far’

 Something that might be making the actors laugh with a little nervous energy could be the on-screen lip-locking between these young wizards and witches.

 Actress Bonnie Wright, who plays Ginny Weasley, Ron’s sister, who’s had quite a crush on Harry, told MTV, ‘It’ll be funny to do the love scenes, but it’s just a film! Hopefully people will just enjoy it and not get too jealous.’

Radcliffe is also feeling the awkwardness of “Half-Blood Prince’s” love scenes.

“I knew Bonnie when she was 10, so that’s going to be very odd! It’s going to be fine, but it’s going to be funny,” Radcliffe told MTV with a laugh.

Lohan, 21, left the Cirque Lodge treatment center on Friday afternoon, the magazine reported on its Web site, citing statements from her parents.

"I'm proud of her. She's moving ahead with her life," her mother, Dina, told People Friday. "Things were getting out of control. She took action. She took responsibility. She really needed to heal."

The exclusive center, which promises anonymity to clients, refused Saturday to confirm or deny the report. Calls to Lohan's publicist and attorney were not immediately returned.

Lohan's visit to Cirque Lodge was her third trip to rehab since January, a frenetic year in which she wrecked a Mercedes-Benz, released the box-office flop "I Know Who Killed Me" and was arrested more than once.

Lohan has been prominently in the public eye since becoming a star at 11 in the Disney film "The Parent Trap." She's also appeared in "Mean Girls," "Freaky Friday," "Herbie Fully Loaded" and numerous other films. In recent years, however, she's become better known for nonstop appearances on the Hollywood nightclub scene.

"Now that she is going out into the world, I can only hope for the best," her father, Michael Lohan, told People.

In May, Lohan was arrested after crashing her Mercedes-Benz into a tree in Beverly Hills, California. She was arrested again in July after the mother of Lohan's former personal assistant called 911 to report that her car was being chased by an SUV. The chase ended in Santa Monica, where police arrested Lohan for being behind the wheel.

In both cases, Lohan was found in possession of small amounts of cocaine.

Lindsay Lohan, here in May 2007, was being treated at the Cirque Lodge drug and alcohol rehabilitation center.

Spice Girls, from left, Victoria Beckham, Melanie Chisholm (Mel C), Geri Halliwell, Emma Bunton and Melanie Brown (Mel B) pose for a photocall at the Royal Observatory in Greenwich ahead of their news conference later today on June 28, 2007 in London

The showbuzz.com: Spice Girls Announce Reunion Tour

The Spice Girls wannabe stars again.
Following a calculated publicity buildup, the original Girl Power group of the 1990s announced Thursday they had agreed to get together for 11 concerts around the world in December and January.
They will be the group's first concerts since breaking up in 2001, and the first with all five of the original group since Geri "Ginger Spice" Halliwell quit to pursue a solo career in 1998.

"Imagine you got divorced and you've got back together with your ex-husband," Halliwell said, explaining how she felt about the reunion.

"She just appreciates the fact we've let her back in," Victoria "Posh Spice" Beckham joked.

The group said shows would be in Los Angeles on Dec. 7, Las Vegas on Dec. 8, New York on Dec. 11, London on Dec. 15, Cologne on Dec. 20, Madrid on Dec. 23, Beijing on Jan. 10, Hong Kong on Jan. 12, Sydney on Jan. 17, Cape Town on Jan. 20 and Buenos Aires on Jan. 24.

Halliwell, 34, and Beckham, 33, joined with Melanie "Sporty Spice" Chisholm, 33, Emma "Baby Spice" Bunton, 31, and Melanie "Scary Spice" Brown, 32, to pose for photos and announce tour plans.

"We wanted to say thank you to our fans. It just feels very right for us," Chisholm said.

"Obviously it's nostalgic. But equally, if new fans want to come along, that's fantastic," Halliwell said. "I like to think our songs are universal and they are timeless."

Fans stood outside the news conference, hoping to catch a glimpse of the Girls.

"We found out about this going on and we decided to take a trip," said Nicola Seodon, 21, a shop worker, who traveled the 20 miles (32 kilometers) from Dartford.

"I was a big Spice Girls fan when I was 10 years old. I'll definitely buy their album and I never got to see a concert when they were still around, so this will be a great chance."

The group's first single, "Wannabe," was released in 1996 and topped charts in 31 countries. The Spice Girls went on to sell more than 55 million records.

But their last album, "Forever," released in 2000 and without Halliwell, fared poorly.

You could now call them the Spice Mums, and Beckham said the tour would be designed to accommodate the seven children of band members. Bunton is now pregnant with her first child.

"Our priority is going to be our families. We want to have fun," said Beckham, who has had three sons with her husband, soccer star David Beckham. "That's one of the many reasons for this, for our children to see what we used to do. And I may be the cool one in the family for once."

In conjunction with the tour, EMI said it plans to release the first Spice Girls Greatest Hits album in November. The group also plans to make its first official documentary for TV broadcast.

"It's going to be the most honest story that you've ever heard," Halliwell said. "You get to see the dark side of the Spice Girls, the gritty side, the tears."

Some said the reunion tour would not be as popular as hoped — especially with men.

"They never really had that many male fans to begin with, it was always 16-year-old girls," said Robin Pitt, 22, a fundraiser from London. "But it's the kitsch factor. There will always be people going along for a bit of a laugh."

 

Drew Barrymore is on the look-out for her 'Mr. Right'. The Hollywood actress, who split from her Strokes drummer boyfriend Fabrizio Moretti this year, still believes in true love and is looking for the man of her dreams. She said: "I'm a total romantic and I'm eternally optimistic about finding true love."

However, Drew insists she is happy being single and doesn't need a man in her life.
She added: "I'm happy to be single, and I'm always happy if I'm with good friends." The 32-year-old actress recently confessed she wants to become a mother.

Drew admitted she is getting broody and worries she may never have a baby of her own.

Cameron Diaz is to star in a new horror film which will be directed by 'Donnie Darko' director Richard Kelly.

Variety reports that 'The Box' is based on the Richard Matheson short story 'Button, Button' and has been adapted for the screen by Kelly.

In the film Diaz's character is given a mysterious box by a stranger and told that certain things will happen if she presses certain buttons on it. 'The Box' is due to begin shooting in the autumn.

Diaz's new film, 'Shrek the Third', opens in Irish cinemas today

Julia Roberts, 39, and her husband Danny Moder, 38, have welcomed their third child, a boy named Henry Daniel Moder on Monday in Los Angeles.

Julia and Daniel got married on July 4, 2002. They have had twins, daughter Hazel Patricia and son Phinnaeus Walter, who were born on November 28, 2004.

Jim Carrey will soon play another holiday curmudgeon, Ebenezer Scrooge, and three ghosts who haunt him, in a computerized remake of "A Christmas Carol," the Walt Disney Co. said on Friday.

Oscar winner Robert Zemeckis will direct the movie from his own script, based on the Charles Dickens classic novel, a Disney spokeswoman said.

 

Actress Lindsay Lohan will not be charged with theft after a woman accused her of stealing a shirt and other items of clothing from her.

The actress will not face charges because the district attorney's office has said that there is insufficient evidence that she stole someone else's clothes.

A woman had claimed that the actress stole a number of items of clothing from her while she was visiting her apartment in her absence.

However, photographs of a shirt provided by the woman did not match the plaid shirt that Lohan was later seen wearing.

Deputy District Attorney Greg Somes said: "The bottom line is that Lohan can't be shown to have been seen either taking or to have been later in possession of missing.

Lindsay Lohan

Matthew Perry

Matthew Perry is to star opposite Hilary Swank in a new comedy called Laws of Motion.

The Hollywood Reporter says the film tells the story of a husband (Perry) who is trying to deal with a demanding job and neighbors, and the problems caused by his free-spirited siblings.

Swank will play Perry's neighbor, a character described as "all-too-perfect". Production on the film is due to begin this month with Swank among the producers.

Comedian Jerry Seinfeld took a huge leap of faith to promote his new film Bee Movie at the Cannes Film Festival in France yesterday - by jumping from a hotel roof, dressed as an insect.

The Seinfeld star, dressed in a yellow-and-black bee suit, dived from a hotel and swung out over the Carlton Hotel Pier as photographers took shots way below him.

The comedian joked, "They tell me Scorsese did the same thing last year for The Departed." Bee Movie, set to be released this fall by DreamWorks, features the voices of Seinfeld, Renee Zellweger, Matthew Broderick and Chris Rock, among others.

Jerry Seinfeld

"The King of Queens," starring Leah Remini and Kevin James, celebrates its 200th episode Monday night.

 "I'm not moving anything out of my dressing room just yet," said Leah Remini, still holding out hope for a 10th season of "King of Queens."

The cast and crew of the stalwart CBS sitcom, along with network and studio executives and hundreds of others, had gathered earlier this year to celebrate the show's 200th episode -- only the seventh time a TV comedy has done that since 1990. And there have been hundreds of them.

The cake was enormous and the steins of Heineken overflowed, yet the mood was bittersweet. Despite Remini's optimism, series star Kevin James -- with a film career looming -- had decreed he was abdicating as "King."

"All good things must end and unfortunately this is," he would say.

The end came two weeks ago in a gush of tears during nearly six hours of filming of the series' finale before a live audience on Sony Studios' Stage 28. Then there were the scores of executives, friends and family members crowding the wings.

There weren't enough tissues in co-star Gary Valentine's giant-sized Kleenex box to go around. The scene was not unlike a typical graduation, with long embraces, group pictures and the signing of autographs on copies of the final script.

"It's so unusual for any show to last this long," said a weepy Merrin Dungey, a regular on the series, which returns Monday at 9:30 p.m. EDT for its final seven episodes.

For the past nine years, despite lackluster promotion and scheduling changes, "King of Queens" proved to be a consistent success for CBS, with 8.7 million viewers tuning in to the show each week. And it delivers like gangbusters in syndication.

"We were like a cockroach -- you just couldn't kill us," says James.

The blue-collar comedy follows the hilarious conundrums of delivery man Doug Heffernan (James) and his secretary-wife, Carrie (Remini), as they cope with life in the New York City borough of Queens.

Although the Monday show is the series' 200th episode, the producers opted against any special anniversary theme. The Heffernans find out how best friends Deacon (Victor Williams) and Kelly (Dungey) can afford a vacation home when they can't.

Then the following week, Doug decides to become a vegetarian after accidentally hitting a chicken with his car and keeping it as a pet.

After that, the remaining episodes will begin tying all the show's loose ends together, including whether Doug and Carrie will finally have a baby, and how Carrie's cranky old father, Arthur Spooner (Jerry Stiller), moves out of their wood-paneled basement.

"This was an opportunity for me, for the first time, to test myself as an actor because I never saw myself as more than just a decent actor," says the genteel Stiller, explaining how James lured him out of retirement after "Seinfeld."

"He literally begged me to be in this show. He kissed me. He hugged me. He said, 'I can't do it without you,' " Stiller grins. "I'm susceptible to praise."

But the show got little of that from critics.

"I never really understood why the show didn't get more recognition," says creator-executive producer Michael J. Weithorn.

But, he continues: "The thing that really irked me over the years is that Kevin, Leah and Jerry never won an Emmy -- and Kevin wasn't even nominated until last year ... The work they were doing was so first-rate and definitely on par with the other nominees."

While other networks have pushed out comedy after comedy about young, good-looking, upwardly mobile characters -- including NBC which developed, then passed on, "King of Queens" -- CBS cashed in on its funny, overweight delivery guy.

"It's the simplicity of regular folks that people respond to -- and in such an overwhelming way, it was kind of surprising to me initially," says co-star Williams. "But then it made sense. There's a sort of honesty in that simplicity that I've really enjoyed and I'm really going to miss."

What he won't miss, he says, is his pea-green delivery outfit. "I can not wait to never put on another 'I.P.S.' uniform!"

With sitcoms continuing to struggle on television -- and studios, networks and producers looking at ways to reinvent the genre -- the irony of the success of "King of Queens" is that it was rooted in a format that many would say is dead.

"If you look at the younger generation, they want to see something other than the traditional family with the couch in the living room and the staircase going upstairs," says Steve Mosko, president of Sony Pictures Television.

"But these types of comedies work," he adds. "It really gets down to: Can they execute the format? Is the writing good? In the case of 'King of Queens' it was, and it stood the test of time."

In 2006, it seemed like denizens of the entertainment world, like visitors to the Twilight Zone, increasingly crossed over into another dimension. They moved to a place where reality means nothing; all that mattered was attention, good or bad.

Call it Hiltonworld.

In Hiltonworld -- named after its most famous resident, a person who appears to spend 24 hours a day there -- everyone is your friend. (Even if they're only thumbnails on MySpace.) You have no private life, whether you want one or not. (Mel Gibson and Michael Richards made unwilling forays into Hiltonworld's hinterlands; Britney Spears and Lindsay Lohan reveled in its never-closing nightclubs.) The truth matters less than truthiness. (James Frey took in the sights.)

And there's always a camera on -- attached to a cell phone or YouTube, police car or paparazzo, or even a magazine that feeds off your fame as it dares to call you "annoying." (Such as the year-end issue of the Star, offering an irony whose depth boggles the mind amid the shallowness of Hiltonworld.)

In Hiltonworld the lights are always on, and so are you.

Hiltonworld, or a place like it, is nothing new, of course. Before there was Paris Hilton and her ex- (and future?) pal Nicole Richie, neither known for anything but attracting those cameras, there was the "international playboy," people such as Aly Khan and Paris' great-uncle, Conrad "Nicky" Hilton Jr. -- good-looking men of no discernable ability, who primarily earned their notoriety through their wealth and conquests. (People outside of Hiltonworld prefer to pick on women, however; the men don't like the emasculation.)

Before there was the Star there was Confidential; before there was the New York Post there was the Police Gazette. Celebrity has ignited curiosity as surely as P.T. Barnum's American Museum sold tickets to the Fejee Mermaid.

But the line between the real world and Hiltonworld has gotten thinner and thinner over the years, allowing more people to cross the border. It can be a tempting place to stay -- the lights are so bright, after all -- but once you're there, it's hard to get back.

Take Spears, for example. She's spent a good deal of her life in Hiltonworld, ever since she played the sexy schoolgirl in "... Baby One More Time." By 2006, every part of her life was being played and displayed for public consumption, from driving with her baby on her lap to her husband's nascent rap career, and her singing -- the real-world reason for her fame -- had become an afterthought.

By the time she decided to divorce said husband, she'd been in the public eye with pretty much everything. And her panty-less photographs took care of what was left.

On the other hand, Gibson wasn't a Hiltonworld type. Adore him or abhor him, the man was known as a talented actor and director whose occasional controversial statements were one part of a complex picture.

Then, one night in July, he had a few too many and found himself on the wrong side of the line (and the law). Suddenly he was a mug shot, a slurred voice of prejudice, a drunken star of someone's cell phone video. His determination to leave Hiltonworld as fast as he arrived has apparently paid dividends, with his new film, "Apocalypto," hitting No. 1 its first week at the box office and getting nominated for a Golden Globe; Gibson's face has vanished from Hiltonworld publications.

(And what of Hilton herself? She broke up with a shipping-heir boyfriend, declared a one-year ban on sexual activity, was arrested for suspicion of DUI and put out an album. For what it's worth.)

In the future, everyone may travel to Hiltonworld, if only for 15 minutes or so. Someone may place a video of you on YouTube or send an e-mail about you to 20 of their closest friends. All the news organizations keep at least a part-time correspondent there. You'll find yourself the center of attention.

Hiltonworld isn't necessarily a bad place. There's a lot of money to be made there, and a lot of exposure to be gained. It can be a nice spot to escape to, once in awhile.

.

They've become better known for their behavior than anything else: Britney Spears, Paris Hilton and Lindsay Lohan

Julia Roberts is married to Danny Moder. The couple has two kids, and now a third on the way

Julia Roberts is expecting her third child with her husband, cinematographer Danny Moder, her spokeswoman confirmed to People magazine Friday.

The baby is due this summer, Roberts' publicist, Marcy Engelman, said in a story posted on the magazine's Web site. News of the pregnancy first appeared in the New York Post's Page Six column.

A call to Engelman by The Associated Press wasn't immediately returned.

Roberts, 39, and Moder, 37, have 2-year-old twins, Hazel and Phinnaeus, who were born in November 2004. The couple were married in July 2002 at Roberts' home in Taos, New Mexico.

She won the best actress Oscar in 2001 for "Erin Brockovich." Her screen hits also include "Steel Magnolias" and "Pretty Woman."

Roberts is the voice of the wise spider in the film adaptation of "Charlotte's Web." She'll next be seen in the drama "Charlie Wilson's War," directed by Mike Nichols and also starring Tom Hanks, scheduled for release next year.

She made her Broadway debut this spring in a revival of Richard Greenberg's "Three Days of Rain."

 

Britney Spears is behaving more like her soon to be ex-husband, Kevin Federline, than a pop princess on the verge of a career comeback.

Fresh from her split from the club-hopping Federline, Spears looked hip and wholesome weeks ago in a surprise appearance on David Letterman's show and while ice skating in New York's Rockefeller Center in a Gap sweater. But now she's unleashing her inner wild child, running around with party girls Paris Hilton and Lindsay Lohan, sporting unflattering hair extensions and flashing her apparently panty-less crotch to the paparazzi

"She's a beautiful girl and now that she's single and she's having fun, I think she's just trying to express herself," said New York-based celebrity image consultant Amanda Sanders. "Unfortunately, it's the wrong message that's coming across. And the shame is she was really such a role model."

Spears, who turns 25 on Saturday, and Hilton were inseparable while hitting L.A. hotspots over the holiday weekend. People magazine reported Wednesday on its Web site that the duo will co-host the 2006 Billboard Music Awards, scheduled to air live in Las Vegas on Monday (Fox, 8 p.m. EST).

Representatives for Hilton and Spears did not respond to messages Wednesday.

She's enjoying the single life -- and who can blame her after putting up with K-Fed's antics? -- but many Spears watchers disapprove of her decision to cavort with Hollywood's most infamous heiress.

In a post on Spears' MySpace.com page, a female fan urged Spears "to read this so you understand how your fans may see the situation ... now your children need you so do the right thing brit, and be a mother and forget the partying."

Rosie O'Donnell said Wednesday on "The View" that Spears should stop bonding with Hilton and move in with her, her partner Kelli and their kids so she could have a "stable family around her."

Can the mother of two young sons return to the sexy yet sweet Britney of yore?

Maybe, maybe not. But she might reconnect with her fans by making savvy career moves, said Entertainment Weekly magazine executive editor Lori Majewski -- like doing a duet with ex-boyfriend Justin Timberlake, or sitting -- not jumping -- on Oprah Winfrey's couch.

"The public can be very forgiving and, you know, if she were to go on Oprah, the court of public opinion could quickly turn," Majewski said.

"A few tears and the words 'I'm sorry' can go a long, long way. Or 'I'm embarrassed' or 'I didn't mean to' ... But the ultimate key to the success of a future career for her is a new -- it doesn't have to be a wholesome image -- but a new, cleaned-up image and a hot single."

The girl's worth millions and probably has "fabulous things" spilling out of her closet, Sanders said, but that's not enough to buy class.

It is enough, however, to buy a stylist.

"Now she's got awful extensions and her hair just looks -- it looks cheap," Sanders said. "And I don't want to use Tara Reid as a shining example, but, you know ..."

It's your turn, Britney. Now go and give Oprah a call.

Britney Spears at the American Music Awards last week. She's been spotted wearing rather less.

The Oscar-winning actress Reese Witherspoon

The US actors Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes have left Italy for a honeymoon in the Maldives after their wedding in Bracciano, near Rome, an Italian news agency has reported.

The couple left Rome on a private jet while their Hollywood guests -- Brooke Shields, Jim Carrey, Will Smith and Jennifer Lopez -- left later for California, the Italian airport news agency Telenews revealed.

The Corriere della Sera newspaper criticised on Sunday the security measures surrounding the star-studded wedding which took place far from the gaze of gathered fans.

The couple -- one of Hollywood's most prominent -- did not appear in public after the ceremony at 15th-century Odescalchi castle perched above the lakeside town.

 

A spokesperson for the Council say: "We will be doing all we can to ensure that every film that can shoot in the UK, including Bond, does."

James Bond producers Michael G Wilson and Barbara Broccoli have threatened to stop filming the superspy franchise in Britain - because it's too expensive.

Wilson has blamed rising costs in the British capital for his stance and blasts the British government for failing to help.

He says: "London is the most expensive city in the world right now. To bring talent here and put them up for long periods of time and the cost of doing business here is a factor."

The move means Casino Royale could be the last Bond movie filmed at Pinewood Studios - but the UK Film council insists it will find a way to ensure the British secret agent stays at his natural home.

Spokesman Jack Taylor says, "Calls were made and we have decided to honour the requests of Mr. Pitt's people.

Actor Brad Pitt has forced bosses at Madame Tussauds waxwork museum to pull the plug on a publicity stunt involving himself, girlfriend Angelina Jolie and a Las Vegas wedding.

Tussauds' marketing brains in Sin City had arranged for Pitt's wax double to marry Jolie's new figure in a cheesy ceremony at the museum housed in The Venetian Resort on Wednesday.

But Pitt has vetoed the quirky plans telling museum bosses he's "disappointed" with their approach to the unveiling of Jolie's new waxwork.

We're disappointed but we have an excellent relationship with celebrities and felt it best to cancel this event."

 

Brad Pitt &  Angelina Jolie

Jennifer Aniston and Vince Vaughn make a scene in "The Break-Up."

Jennifer Aniston says she would like to reprise her role as Rachel Green in a reunion show of TV's most famous group of "Friends."

"The only thing I can think of doing is maybe for fun doing a Thanksgiving episode," Aniston said in a TV interview that was set to air Monday on Channel Four. "Our Thanksgiving episodes were really fun."

"Friends," which centered on the lives of six young friends living in Manhattan, ended its 10-year run in 2004.

The NBC comedy also starred Courteney Cox, Lisa Kudrow, Matt LeBlanc, Matthew Perry and David Schwimmer.

Aniston, 37, was in London to promote her new film, "The Break-Up," co-starring Vince Vaughn.

She gave little away when asked to comment on speculation that she and Vaughn are dating.

"Where did you hear that?" she said to Judy Finnigan, co-host of the "Richard and Judy" talk show.

"Listen, he's a great man, he's a great friend, he's a great actor and so much fun," Aniston said.

Owen Wilson's latest film character is a real doofus, and he knows it -- but he admires the character's upbeat attitude.

"Dupree doesn't have a job, he gets around on a 10-speed from like 1981, and his heyday was probably back in seventh grade," says Wilson. "But he's not like a cynical slacker. He has lots of ideas and even a philosophy and an enthusiasm. He stays hopeful."

While he might have the purest of intentions, Randy Dupree manages to wreak havoc as an unwanted houseguest in the new movie "You, Me and Dupree."

His best friend Carl (Matt Dillon) takes pity on Dupree and invites him to crash for "a couple of days," much to the disgust of his wife Molly (Kate Hudson). Carl and Molly have just returned from their honeymoon, and would prefer to settle into wedded bliss without the slob sleeping in the buff on their couch.

During his stay, Dupree manages to clog two toilets, set fire to the living room, and send Carl into fits of paranoia, thinking Dupree is making moves on Molly. But he's also able to be a hero and help patch things up when the newlyweds' relationship hits rock bottom.

Owen Wilson plays a good-natured slacker in "You, Me and Dupree."

Capt. Jack Sparrow, played by Johnny Depp, returns to the seas in "Dead Man's Chest."

"Pirates of the Caribbean" is looking more like "Treasure Island."

Already a record-shattering blockbuster, Johnny Depp's sequel, "Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest," earned $62.2 million in its second weekend, raising its 10-day total to $258.2 million, according to studio estimates Sunday.

The movie has quickly become the year's top-grossing film, rocketing past "X-Men: The Last Stand," which has taken in $232 million in eight weeks. The "Pirates" sequel has grossed an additional $125 million overseas.

"It's really fun when you're riding a comet like this," said Chuck Viane, head of distribution for Disney, which based the "Pirates of the Caribbean" movies on its theme park attraction. "This thing is just unbelievable. It creates its own wake."

Sony's "Little Man," the Wayans brothers' slapstick farce about a pint-size thief masquerading as a baby, opened as the No. 2 movie with $21.7 million. The tale stars Shawn and Marlon Wayans, who co-wrote it with brother Keenen Ivory Wayans, the director.

Universal's comedy "You, Me and Dupree," starring Owen Wilson as a houseguest causing chaos for a buddy and his new bride (Matt Dillon and Kate Hudson), debuted at No. 3 with $21.3 million.

Hollywood's business dipped for the first time in two months. After eight straight weekends of rising revenues, overall receipts totaled $156 million, down 5 percent from the same weekend last year, when Depp also was at the top of the box office, with "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory."

Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton. Nicole Kidman and Tom Cruise. Melanie Griffith and Antonio Banderas. Alec Baldwin and Kim Basinger. Penelope Cruz and Matthew McConaughey. Jen and Ben. Angelina and Brad

High-profile pairings all. And all share another thing: love bloomed on the set.

The latest addition to the list, Jennifer Aniston and Vince Vaughn -- whose coupledom has been reported widely, though they refuse to officially confirm it -- met while making "The Break-Up," which opens Friday.

Cynics might say these set-sparked couplings are nothing more than publicity stunts. Experts, though, insist workplace romances are common and make perfect sense. The workplace for movie stars just happens to be bathed in a spotlight.

Celeb partnering is "an almost surreal example of what happens in real life," said Kristin Kelly, spokeswoman for the dating Web site Match.com. "It's natural for people who are in the same profession who spend so much time together to forge a relationship."

There's more to it than that, said Helen Fisher, a biological anthropologist and author of "Why We Love."

Like attracts like, in terms of looks and lifestyle, and "a movie star rarely runs into somebody as good looking as they are," Fisher said. Except maybe on the set.

Actors might also be more vulnerable to falling in love. Those who seek performance as a profession tend to be risk-takers, she said.

Plus, she added, the on-set environment can induce an intoxicating physical reaction.

"Any kind of novelty or excitement drives up dopamine in the brain, and dopamine is associated with romantic love," Fisher said. "I wouldn't be surprised if movie sets literally set the stage for romantic love."

It's easy to believe, considering some stars fall for their leading ladies or men again and again. Cruz dated Cruise ("Vanilla Sky") and Matt Damon ("All the Pretty Horses") before hooking up with McConaughey, her "Sahara" co-star.

McConaughey was previously linked with two of his "A Time to Kill" co-stars, Ashley Judd and Sandra Bullock. Cruise connected with Kidman, his wife of 10 years, on "Days of Thunder."

Ben Affleck met Jennifer Lopez on the "Gigli" set and they got engaged. Then he met Jennifer Garner on "Daredevil" and they got engaged. He and Garner are now married and have a 6-month-old daughter, Violet.

Pitt hooked up with his former longtime love, Gwyneth Paltrow, while filming "Seven." He previously dated Juliette Lewis, his co-star on the TV movie "Too Young to Die," and Jill Schoelen, with whom he starred in 1989's "Cutting Class."

Vince Vaughn and Jennifer Aniston are allegedly a pair. The two met on "The Break-Up," due Friday.

Paris Hilton's diaries, along with photos of her in various stages of undress, are among a trove of the celebutante's personal effects that have found their way into the hands of a broker aiming to sell them.

David Hans Schmidt, known for handling deals involving celebrity porn, is trying to auction off the Hilton belongings, which had been locked away in a Los Angeles-area storage locker until a few months ago.

The pricetag? $20 million.

Schmidt told the Los Angeles Times the items include 18 diaries in which Hilton recounts past sexual dalliances, celebrity encounters and other adventures. Also included are photographs of Hilton at "wild parties" on yachts and in private homes, as well as her computers, clothing, videos and furniture.

Hilton's publicist, Elliot Mintz, has said the belongings were "illegally seized" from the storage facility, but would not comment on Schmidt's description of the items because he has not seen them.

Mintz said the belongings were left at the storage facility during a 2004 move. The items were sold to an unidentified buyer after a "bureaucratic foul-up" resulted in payments not being credited to the heiress' account.

Hilton was "incredibly upset and angry" and felt "victimized," Mintz said, adding her lawyers are threatening legal action against anyone in possession of the items.

Of the videos, Mintz told The Associated Press he was certain there are "personal moments" on the tapes, but added "we're not talking at all along the lines of the infamous videotape."

In late 2003, a sex tape made with then-boyfriend Rick Salomon surfaced just before the start of Hilton's reality TV series, "The Simple Life."

Schmidt declined to describe the diaries' contents, but said they include "everything that would be dear to a woman's heart -- relationships, personal feelings, sex, love, breakups, sexual experiences -- all those little things that make up a little girl's life. Her deepest, darkest secrets."

Kaiser Chiefs and James Blunt led the field with five nominations apiece when the shortlist was announced on Tuesday for the Brit Awards, the British music industry's big night of the year.

Hot on their tails with four nominations was Coldplay, whose third album "X&Y" was one of the biggest releases of 2005.

Next in line with three nominations were KT Tunstall, the Scottish singer-songwriter whose debut album has sold 1 million copies in Britain alone, and Scottish rockers Franz Ferdinand.

In the international award categories, the leaders with three nominations each were Montreal rockers Arcade Fire and Madonna, whose album "Confessions on a Dance Floor" has been a chart success on both sides of the Atlantic.

But Madonna faces stiff competition in the fight for accolade of International Female Solo Artist of the Year from Bjork, Kelly Clarkson, Mariah Carey and Missy Elliot.

In Britain, album sales fell by 2.7 percent last year, although the success of homegrown artists such as Blunt, Tunstall and Robbie Williams ensured it was not as sharp as the 7.2 percent decline in the United States.

Yet many British acts concede that cracking the key U.S. market is still a prime objective.

"In the golden era of the 60s, the Beatles and the Rolling Stones dominated the American charts," said Ricky Wilson of the Kaiser Chiefs.

"Today, the United States is a much tougher nut to crack for British artists," he told Reuters before performing at the nominations ceremony in London.

Madonna scored three nominations

Jennifer Aniston and Kevin Costner in "Rumor Has It

There are a couple of classic caveats about Hollywood: Never put your own money into a movie and avoid working with animals or children. Here's another: Do not draw comparisons between your run-of-the-mill movie and a great one.

That's the built-in problem with the latest movie in Rob Reiner's slow slide toward oblivion, "Rumor Has It," starring Jennifer Aniston as a woman who learns her messed-up family may have been the inspiration for the book and movie "The Graduate."

At first glance, it sounds like a potentially cute idea, and perhaps with some wit, energy and bite to it, the story could have been a blackly comic successor to Mike Nichols' 1967 masterpiece.

But "Rumor Has It" does not even rise to the level of trivially pleasant romantic comedy. The movie just sits there, lumbering along with nothing to offer but occasionally caustic sparks provided by Shirley MacLaine as the supposed source of Anne Bancroft's Mrs. Robinson.

There are few laughs and little drama to the movie, whose inclusion of the famous seduction scene between Bancroft and Dustin Hoffman and some verses of Simon and Garfunkel's "Mrs. Robinson" only emphasize what a dreary, artificial affair Reiner and screenwriter T.M. Griffin have concocted.

Aniston plays Sarah Huttinger, a New York Times obituary writer whose career has stagnated and who has faintheartedly agreed to marry her boyfriend, Jeff (Mark Ruffalo).

With Jeff in tow, Sarah returns home to Pasadena for the wedding of her sister (Mena Suvari), and an awkward reunion with her widower dad (Richard Jenkins), whose late wife would equate to Katharine Ross' character, Mrs. Robinson's daughter, in "The Graduate."

Sarah's saucy grandma (MacLaine) lets slip that just before her parents married, her mom ran off with another man, returning home to wed her dad after a brief fling. An aunt reveals the other guy was best buddies with "Graduate" author Charles Webb, and Sarah's off and running to find the connection between her own family and the strange triangle of the Robinson gals and Hoffman's Benjamin Braddock, who made off with Ross' Elaine Robinson moments after she married another man.

The trail leads to Kevin Costner as Beau Burroughs (get it? Initials "BB," just like Benjamin Braddock). Beau's an Internet tycoon, and it's best we say no more about what transpires between him and Sarah to avoid spoiling things for anyone who might actually want to see "Rumor Has It."

The actors all are fine, Reiner's technical direction is fine. Everything about the movie is just fine, which translates to bland on a comedy scale.

The director who once had unerring comic timing in "When Harry Met Sally ...", "The Sure Thing" and "This Is Spinal Tap" hasn't been able to buy a laugh with a string of duds that include "Alex & Emma," "The Story of Us" and now "Rumor Has It."

When your highlights are a few snippets of dialogue and a musical clip from the 38-year-old film whose coattails you're soiling, odds are your movie's heading into the drink. No rumors. That's a fact.

As Shakira slyly announces on "Oral Fixation Vol. 2," she has a 24-inch waist and "humble breasts"; she'd love to be her man's "cherry pie," not to mention "the owner of the zipper" on his jeans.

But please don't misunderstand; while Shakira has no problem playing up her tangible looks and sexuality, she's a belly dancer with global ambitions. Her 2001 U.S. breakthrough, "Laundry Service," was divided between English and Spanish tracks, and now she's gone one step further.

Earlier this year came "Fijacion Oral Vol. 1," an all-Spanish album that integrated garage rock, lounge cooing, and mild electronica. The hot-on-its-heels sequel, "Oral Fixation Vol. 2," aims for a different segment of the market: With the exception of one French verse, she sings entirely in English.

Like volume 1, "Oral Fixation" wants to go where few mainstream records venture. Mariachi horns bump up against surf guitars in the tart "Animal City," a don't-go-there warning against fame and fake friends; bossa nova accents wind through "Something," one of only two tracks reprised from "Fijacion Oral."

Shakira's voice has an alluring, serpentine quality that allows her to be throaty-sexy one moment and soothing the next. Admirably, she's unafraid to slip a few poli-sci statements into the mix, taking veiled digs at overseas military action in "Timor" and American muscle in "How Do You Do." The latter -- truly weird musical science -- features a blend of Gregorian chant, Latin murmurs, and a fully lubricated guitar solo.

Given those sorts of adventurous touches and the cred-boosting involvement of the ubiquitous Rick Rubin (listed as executive producer), "Oral Fixation Vol. 2" has the makings of a world-beat crossover for eggheads and rock geeks. So why isn't the album more thrilling? The answer is surely tied to her goals.

In spite of her creative curiosity, Shakira still wants to be a large-scale star, and beneath "Oral Fixation's" exotic window dressings lies fairly conventional pop -- savvier than Ricky Martin's, but hardly radical. Remove the Gypsy-caravan violin and marauder guitar from "Your Embrace," and what remains is teardroppy, adult-contemporary balladry. Yearning odes like "Dreams for Plans" and "The Day and the Time" are well-crafted but banal; "Don't Bother" and "Illegal" are sister-of-Alanis catfights we've heard before.

The splashes of rock feel a bit stale too. The battering-ram guitars on "Animal City" and "Costume Makes the Clown," wherein she cops to cheating on her guy, come off as factory-assembled.

Although "Oral Fixation" is hardly the first time a Latina act has aimed straight for the middle of the North American road and nearly lost control of the wheel in the process, it's among the most disappointing. For all the musical ingredients at her disposal, Shakira winds up with a relatively bland dish.

Mariah Carey accepts an award for best R&B song at the third annual Vibe Awards

Mariah Carey walked away with four honors at the Vibe Awards, a celebration of hip-hop and R&B that went smoothly after last year's ceremony was marred by a brawl and stabbing

Carey won Artist of the Year, R&B Voice of the Year, Best R&B Song for "We Belong Together" and Album of the Year for her comeback hit, "The Emancipation of Mimi."

"Whatever you're going through in your life, don't ever give up," Carey said at the Saturday night event. The taped show was scheduled to air Tuesday on UPN.

The Diplomats were named Best Group.

With cognac and champagne flowing freely, rappers sporting diamonds and gold "grills" on their teeth mingled peacefully, although they had to pass through metal detectors to enter and police and security guards were plentiful.

Even hardcore rapper T.I., who won the Street Anthem award for "U Don't Know Me," acknowledged he didn't look very "hard" in a dapper velour suit and cravat. "But y'all just keep it pimping," he said onstage.

Last year, violence overshadowed the show when audience member Jimmy James Johnson approached rapper and producer Dr. Dre, seated at a table in front of the stage, and appeared to ask for an autograph before punching him. A chair-throwing melee ensued and Johnson was then allegedly stabbed by rapper Young Buck.

Around this time of year -- like a visit from the flu bug -- Hollywood is bitten by a severe case of B.O.B, "Blatant Oscar Bid." "North Country" is one of this year's first full-blown cases

Three Oscar winners are in the cast just to help make the point. Charlize Theron stars as Josey Aimes, a poverty-ridden single mother escaping an abusive relationship who becomes an unlikely activist against a male dominated mining company.

Sissy Spacek plays her emotionally conflicted mother, and Frances McDormand gives a great turn as her friend, Glory, another female miner, who is responsible for helping Josey get her job in the first place.

Attempting to follow in the steps of "Silkwood," Norma Rae," and "Erin Brockovich," "North Country" carries its importance like a tattered flag. It never lets you forget that this is a meaningful film about an important subject.

This movie -- very, very, very loosely based on a true story -- tells the tale of a group women of who broke the status quo by working as iron miners in the remote, male-dominated world of northern Minnesota's bleak Iron Range.

The movie is framed by scenes in a courtroom as Josey brings a class action suit against the mine for sexual harassment. The story then returns to the courtroom throughout the film in order to underscore what is happening at the mine.

Charlize Theron, as Josey Aimes, addresses a room of mine workers in "North Country."

Toni Collette and Cameron Diaz in "In Her Shoes."

Before contemplating the mind-bending Hollywood notion of bikini-clad Hispanic shiksa goddess Cameron Diaz playing a Jewish granddaughter surrounded by elderly Miami shuffleboard mavens in the learn-and-hug comedy "In Her Shoes," let us pause.

Because, first, we should salute the familiar sight of scarf-draped Shirley MacLaine playing a mother -- in this case also a grandmother -- who's far from sure that the whole maternal route is for her.

MacLaine's alpha Golden Girl Ella Hirsch may hail, nominally, from a culture of chopped liver, but the character is related to every tough, nonsectarian, drive-your-daughter-crazy bird the actress has played from "Terms of Endearment" to "Bewitched." And once again, the old broad plays an old broad like an old lioness pawing her cubs.

The widowed Ella makes an inconstant Jewish grandma -- she's the rare member of her retirement community who doesn't speak with the inflections of a lifelong bagel eater -- but she's a rock for her younger granddaughter, Maggie (Diaz), who shows up at Ella's Florida condo door one day after screwing up her life back home in Philadelphia.

As novelist Jennifer Weiner decreed in the popular specimen of chick lit on which the movie is based, Maggie is a promiscuous man-magnet who can barely read, an irresponsible slob who can't hold a job.

On the other hand, Maggie's older sister, Rose (Toni Collette), is a frumpy workaholic who can't find a man, depressed by her apparently hopeless state of being overweight and overstocked with refrigerated tubs of ice cream. (Through the fun-house mirror of Hollywood, the miseries of obesity have been reduced to size 10 worries.) The two fight like fats-and-thins, but they're also bound by love, siblings made motherless at an early age who are united in their love of expensive footwear.

"Mean Girls" may have been the coming out party for Lindsay Lohan, but considering Rachel McAdams' red-hot career, some revisionist history may be in order

McAdams, who portrayed the head of the Plastics (the hot girl high school clique) in 2004's "Mean Girls," has emerged as 2005's most talked-about young actress. In the recent hit comedy "Wedding Crashers," she plays Owen Wilson's love interest.

The 28-year-old Canadian -- called "America's new sweetheart" in the August 22 Newsweek -- grew up in St. Thomas, Ontario, and has been on the rise since the romantic film "The Notebook" last summer. She won the MTV Movie Award for breakthrough female performance earlier this year.

In the upcoming Wes Craven thriller "Red Eye," McAdams plays a woman held hostage -- on an airplane -- by Cillian Murphy, a rising star himself after "28 Days Later." Come fall, she'll appear in "The Family Stone" with an ensemble cast including Diane Lane and Luke Wilson.

"The Family Stone" will give her another chance to try her mantra: "If you think it, the camera will see it."

Rachel McAdams is in three 2005 movies -- "Wedding Crashers," the August 19 "Red Eye" and this fall's "The Family Stone

Jackson, followed by attorney Thomas Mesereau, leaves court after his acquittal.

Michael Jackson's lead defense attorney said Tuesday that he believes his client's behavior will change now that Jackson has been acquitted of charges including child molestation.

Thomas Mesereau Jr. says Jackson needs to be "tougher with who he lets into his life."

"He's allowed families to come into his life, not just young boys. Their parents were allowed to stay over, they did stay over, everything was done with the parents' permission," Mesereau said. "They were allowed to come in and out of his room. The prosecution tried to misinterpret and misconstrue what Michael Jackson did, and they failed, as they should have."

Mesereau bristled when asked if he believed Jackson would cease sleeping in the same bed with young boys.

"You've misinterpreted what he's said in the past," Mesereau told CNN's Soledad O'Brien, who asked whether the not-guilty verdict meant the sleepovers would stop.

Jackson was accused of molesting a 13-year-old boy two years ago when they were sleeping alone together in his bed at Neverland Ranch in Santa Barbara County.

The jury acquitted Jackson on all 10 counts.

Alicia Silverstone is, like, totally married.

The 28-year-old "Clueless" star wed longtime boyfriend Christopher Jarecki at Lake Tahoe on Saturday, said Silverstone's publicist, Elizabeth Much, confirming a report in People magazine.

It's the first marriage for both Silverstone and Jarecki, lead singer of the band S.T.U.N. The pair have been together for eight years.

The wedding was held for 135 friends and family at a private lakeside estate. The couple exchanged vows while barefoot on the beach, People reported Monday.

Silverstone played Valley Girl-with-a-heart-of-gold Cher Horowitz in the 1995 film "Clueless." Her screen credits also include "The Babysitter" and "Beauty Shop."

Alicia Silverstone

Paris Hilton shows off on a red carpet. The hotel heiress is starring in a feature film, "House of Wax."

American princess now appearing in 'House of Wax' For someone with a wilder-than-wild party girl history and a faker-than-fake reality TV show, Paris Hilton is surprisingly real

In person, what you see -- glammed up, glammed down, hair extensions in, hair extensions out -- is what you get. She doesn't hide her silly spoils, like her dog's designer carrying case, and has perfected her paparazzi pout. The result? Ever-increasing fame for the omnipresent hotel heiress turned sex tape star and reality TV supernova.

Now Hilton, 24, is moving into acting. In "House of Wax," opening Friday, Hilton does horror. She'll later surface in "National Lampoon's Pledge This!" and "Bottom's Up." But when it comes to her tabloid-tracked personal life, Hilton insists she's become more interested in playing housewife than club hopper.

Other than the husband, two kids and white picket fence, Hilton seemingly has it all. And it's all about Paris: a self-titled fragrance, self-titled nightclub chain, self-titled jewelry line. She's also working on a self-titled boutique hotel chain, as-yet-untitled makeup and clothing lines and a more-than-likely mild CD.

During a recent interview, Hilton's trendy SoHo hotel room had the frenzied atmosphere of a children's play area. A plate with scrambled egg remnants lingered on an end table. Makeup bags doubled as a throw pillows on the couch. Bottles of vitamins fought for space on a cluttered coffee table. Two smiley publicists leered from the bedroom while a makeup artist prepared his palette and a hairdresser prodded the top of Hilton's head, installing her latest set of hair extensions.

With her infamous Chihuahua, Tinkerbell, half-awake in her lap, Hilton rested in the eye of the storm, unfazed by a barrage of silly questions and the yanking of her new locks. Other than refusing to utter Backstreet Boy and ex-beau Nick Carter's name, Hilton purred freely about her sex tape, her falling out with "Simple Life" cohort Nicole Richie, her naughty "House of Wax" scenes and her death. Her most shocking revelation: Hilton wants a simpler life.

The way it usually works in a horror sequel is, some foolish teenager who hasn't learned from experience -- even though half his buddies have expired under gruesome circumstances -- does something dumb (again) like walk into a dark place alone or pick up a telephone and follow the instructions of a maniac

Teenagers make poor choices (and therefore good horror-flick patsies) because that's what teens are wired to do as they test the thrills and dangers of adult sexuality: They go back for more while their audience warns, Don't!

The scariest thing in the not-scary-enough "The Ring Two" is the notion that even smart, attractive adults -- yikes, even mothers -- just never learn, either. They may mean well. But in trying to have it all -- career, personal life, toned abs, home-cooked dinner with the brood -- women inevitably fall down on the job.

And therein lies hell for the children, aggravated by the harmful effects of that mechanical mommy: the TV screen.

At least I think that's what "The Ring Two" is saying, when stripped of its baroque, now less-than-novel visual tics. And for a horror flick founded upon such an arresting concept as contagion via technological consumerism, that's a pretty dumb follow-up.

Having survived the curse of the world's scariest videotape a few years back in "The Ring," and subsequently skedaddled from Seattle to the vaunted safety of a smaller Oregon fishing town (as if isolated burgs on the water's edge ever bring anything but terror, rain and the creepy cawing of gulls), you'd think that investigative reporter Rachel Keller (Naomi Watts again) would at least update her home entertainment equipment and monitor the viewing habits of her son, Aidan (David Dorfman again), more closely. But she doesn't.

Apparently, she can't, so consumed is she by guilt about what happened in part 1, when she was a much more work-oriented and less kid-sensitive type. (Watts, who cemented her stardom with "The Ring," has always exhibited a certain pared-down efficiency in her performances that can read as hardness, in contrast with her small, soft, vulnerable physical presence.)

Settling into her new job at a newspaper with a puny circulation and poking nervously around a local crime scene involving a dead teenager with a face frozen in a rictus of terror (uh-oh), spongy carpets and, yes, a mysterious videotape, Rachel makes two gruesome discoveries.

First, that DVD technology is slow to arrive in small fishing towns. Second, that the satanically vengeful girl-ghost Samara (Kelly Stables), who made her unhappiness so vividly known by the end of the first movie, is on a tear again -- and she knows where Rachel and Aidan live.

Naomi Watts and David Dorman reprise their roles in "The Ring Two."

 Leonardo DiCaprio in "The Aviator"

The obsession of Leonardo DiCaprio

Leonardo flies high

Leonardo DiCaprio likes to think he and buddy Martin Scorsese share at least some of the obsessive fixations of Howard Hughes, the subject of their latest collaboration, "The Aviator"

Living through a mammoth project when it looks like it might capsize, as DiCaprio did with "Titanic," which went on to become the biggest modern blockbuster.

Becoming so engrossed in a story it occupies years of your life and requires a massive resurrection of another era, as Scorsese did with "Gangs of New York," which took 25 years to develop and a colossal construction job to re-create 19th-century Manhattan.

"The Aviator" screenplay hooked them from the start, with an early sequence detailing Hughes' fanatic devotion to his World War I film "Hell's Angels." Using his own money, Hughes spent $4 million on the 1930 film, at the time the biggest movie budget ever, and reshot it for sound after deciding the silent era was finished.

"I think Marty and I can both relate to, when we read the script, we both immediately read 'Hell's Angels, year three.' We were like, wow, we know what that's like, being a part of an epic that just goes on and on and on," DiCaprio said in an interview with The Associated Press. "Persevering against all the odds and trying to make the best film, being a perfectionist, trying to make the story the best it can be.

"I certainly can't imagine taking things to the level Hughes did in his life. It's too exhausting. The man led 20 different lifetimes in one life."

"The Aviator" casts DiCaprio as Hughes during his scrappy years from the late 1920s to late 1940s, when he fought the Hollywood establishment and pushed bounds on sex and violence in film, dated parades of starlets, and oversaw creation of the world's biggest and fastest planes.

The retired tennis hottie created waves last week when she reportedly told onlookers at a charity event that she had tied the knot with boyfriend Enrique Iglesias.

"Enrique is great. Everything is awesome. We are married," she said, while flaunting a wedding ring, according to Us Weekly.

However, sources close to Iglesias have told E! that the PDA-heavy pair have not swapped vows and remain legally, if not physically, unattached.

It's not the first time Kournikova has served up a false story about her marital status. She has joked about being married to Iglesias in the past and also denied that she was ever married to hockey star Sergei Fedorov. (The twosome wed briefly in 2001.)

A source close to Kournikova told People magazine that the camera-friendly pair had not taken the steps to make their love match official.

"They definitely did not get married," the source told People. "They're very happy together, but marriage is not something that they're planning in their lives right now."

As for the so-called wedding ring Kournikova flashed, another source close to the blonde bombshell told People that it is simply an ordinary ring that the oft-Googled athlete has owned for over a year and wears often.

The duo was said to have wed in an ultra-private ceremony on a beach in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico, according to Us Weekly; however, the last time the couple were together in Puerto Vallarta was reportedly back in October--months before their supposed wedding was said to have taken place. Meanwhile, officials in the region have said no paperwork had been filed to make any such ceremony legal.

Anna Kournikova

Leonardo DiCaprio plays Howard Hughes in "The Aviator"

There's Hollywood, and then there's Hollywood

The former is an enclave within Los Angeles long associated with the entertainment business. The latter is an adjective, a description, a state of mind: He's gone Hollywood. Or: It's a Hollywood movie.

The second phrase has come to mean that not only is it not an independent movie, it's often big-budget, star-filled, pre-chewed entertainment with predictable characters, glitzy special effects and happy-ever-after plot. Think summer blockbuster or December tearjerker.

(It's revealing that in a recent Entertainment Weekly column, movie critic Owen Gleiberman noted that "The Godfather" -- one of the great films of all time and the biggest blockbuster of its day -- would probably be considered an art film today.)

Miss Peru, Maria Julia Mantilla Garcia, an aspiring high school teacher, was crowned Miss World 2004 on Saturday night in the southern Chinese beach resort of Sanya.

Miss Dominican Republic Claudia Julissa Cruz Rodriguez was the first runner-up and Miss USA Nancy Randall was second runner-up.

Mantilla Garcia, 20, wearing a turquoise gown, blew kisses to the crowd as she was crowned. The other contestants then mobbed her with hugs, as pop star Lionel Richie sang his '80s hit "Dancing on the Ceiling" and golden confetti was shot out of cannons from the balcony.

Outside, fireworks lit up the sky.

The title carries a US$100,000 (euro75,000) prize.

Organizers said the winner was selected by pageant viewers voting by Internet, phone and mobile phone text message. Votes were weighted so contestants from large countries wouldn't get an unfair advantage, organizers said, though the formula wasn't released.

A total of 107 women from around the world competed for the crown in this beach resort on Hainan Island in the South China Sea.

"I'm very surprised but I'm also very happy," Mantilla Garcia told reporters. She said she wanted to do charitable work as Miss World and "help all the people that I can."

A panel of celebrity judges was on hand to offer commentary and help pick the winner in case the high-tech voting system failed.

They included Australian television star Kate Ritchie, West Indian cricket legend Sir Viv Richards, Chinese fashion photographer Li Shaobai and Krish Naidoo, an Ireland-based businessman.

The hosts were British model Lisa Snowdon, Hong Kong television host Angela Chow and Troy McClain, a former contestant on the U.S. reality TV series "The Apprentice."

This was the second straight year the London-based Miss World pageant has been held in Sanya. Organizers announced Friday that the event would be held in Sanya again next year.

Maria Julia Mantilla Garcia waves after being crowned Saturday night

Destiny's Child's new album is called "Destiny Fulfilled." A more apt title might have been Destiny "We always insisted we would do another group project together after going solo, so here it is, obligation taken care of, now let's move on with our lives."

This album, coming three years after the Grammy-winning, multiplatinum "Survivor," shows that Beyonce Knowles, Kelly Rowland and Michelle Williams can still make beautiful harmonies together. Yay for that, because there's not much else going for it.

Of the 11 tracks on this album (which was recorded in only three weeks), only a couple stand out. There's the first single, "Lose My Breath," a Rodney Jerkins production driven by a drum line that's sure to be a college band favorite in no time. "Through With Love," produced by Mario Winans, is another where the drums, melody and lyrics come together to create a song that lingers in the mind.

Some other songs are so-so. "Soldier" featuring rappers T.I. and Lil Wayne, is an ode to the 'hood which has the ladies singing, "Better be street if he looking at me." It's catchy, although somewhat silly since it comes from such clean-cut women. Williams has released two gospel albums, for goodness' sake.

"Girl" has a nice sound, laid-back and relaxed. Too bad the lyrics are a complete mismatch, about women reaching out to a friend in a bad relationship.

The rest of the album is blah R&B, in some cases downright cringeworthy.

In "Cater 2 U," Knowles offers to give her man a foot massage and manicure, while Rowland promises to keep in shape, maintain her hairstyle and wear hot clothing. Yikes. Weren't these ladies just singing about being independent women?

Clearly, these women have proved they can do their own thing. Williams has been on Broadway, Rowland has had a hit song of her own, and Knowles, well, she's an entertainment empire in the making. Movies, perfume, multiple Grammys, a well-known love interest in rapper Jay-Z, she's got it all.

There's no real compelling musical reason for Destiny's Child to exist anymore, and if the songs on this album are any indicator, the ladies would seem to agree.

Actress-singer Jennifer Lopez has married her current boyfriend, salsa singer Marc Anthony, barely five months after breaking her much-publicized engagement to actor Ben Affleck, Us Weekly reported Saturday.

The magazine said Lopez, 33, married Latin music star Anthony, 34, at her home in Los Angeles Saturday in front of about 40 guests. Us Weekly said it had pictures of a giant tent assembled on the estate and of guests coming and going among tables covered in white table cloths and flower centerpieces.

"It was a lovely low-key intimate affair for the closest friends and family, " Us reported a friend as saying.

"She didn't hardly tell anyone. Everyone was surprised," another unidentified friend told the magazine.

Representatives for Lopez and Anthony could not immediately be reached for comment.

The reported marriage comes less than a week after Anthony was granted a quickie divorce in the Dominican Republic from his wife of four years, Dayanara Torres, a former Miss Universe.

It would be the third marriage for Lopez, the sultry star whose previous trips down the aisle have both lasted a little over a year.

Tabloid news reports have linked Anthony and Lopez for weeks.

They noted that Lopez had recently returned the giant pink diamond engagement ring she was given by Affleck during the stormy "Bennifer" affair that rose to a fever pitch last September when the couple called off their wedding at short notice, citing excessive media intrusion.

Affleck and Lopez officially broke their engagement in January and both have maintained a low profile since then. But by May, Lopez was seen wearing another diamond, reportedly given to her by Anthony.

Jennifer Lopez

Quentin Tarantino's "Kill Bill" saga slayed its movie rivals once again, with part two of the vengeance tale following its predecessor as the country's No. 1 weekend draw.

"Kill Bill -- Vol. 2," with Uma Thurman as an ex-assassin continuing her bloody quest for revenge against former colleagues, debuted with $25.6 million, according to studio estimates Sunday.

That was up 16 percent from the $22.1 million opening weekend that "Kill Bill -- Vol. 1" delivered last October. Part two is expected to match or exceed the $69.9 million domestic total of "Kill Bill -- Vol. 1," said Rick Sands, chief operating officer of Miramax, which released the movies.

Another tale of retribution, the comic-book adaptation "The Punisher," opened in second place with $14 million. The movie stars Thomas Jane as an ex-FBI agent targeting the crime boss (John Travolta) who wiped out his family.

"A very big weekend for revenge," said Paul Dergarabedian, president of box-office tracker Exhibitor Relations. "Revenge in movies is very cinematic. Everyone lives vicariously through characters in movies, and they can safely get their revenge fix without actually doing it themselves."

Nia Vardalos -- writer and star of the weekend's other big new release, "Connie and Carla" -- was unable to recapture the box-office magic that made "My Big Fat Greek Wedding" a blockbuster.

"Connie and Carla," about two musical-theater singers posing as men in a drag-queen revue while hiding from mobsters, finished well out of the top 10 with $3.26 million. The movie co-stars Toni Collette and David Duchovny.

Vardalos' "Greek Wedding" debuted in 108 theaters two years ago with little fanfare, grossing $597,362 and averaging a solid $5,531 per cinema over opening weekend. Audience word of mouth gradually built the romantic comedy into a $241 million sensation.

In contrast, "Connie and Carla" debuted in 1,014 theaters and averaged a weak $3,210.

Studio polls found audience reaction was good for "Connie and Carla," "so I hope there's a little bit of life left in it," said Nikki Rocco, head of distribution for Universal, which released the movie.

The overall box office dipped slightly after seven straight weekends of rising revenue. The top 12 movies grossed $86.6 million, down 2 percent from the same weekend a year ago.

By splitting "Kill Bill" into two parts, Tarantino and Miramax gambled that audiences would be willing to pay twice the ticket price to catch both chapters.

The risk paid off nicely. The two movies cost a total of $60 million to produce, and "Kill Bill -- Vol. 1" alone has grossed $180 million worldwide, with the movie's video release last week selling 2 million copies in its first day, padding revenues by about $40 million more.

"It was a terrific decision financially," Sands said.

After an Easter surge that lifted it back to the No. 1 spot the previous weekend, "The Passion of the Christ" fell to ninth place with $4.2 million. Since opening on Ash Wednesday, the movie has taken in $360.9 million domestically.

Disney's expensive flop "The Alamo" came in at No. 10 with $4.05 million in its second weekend. "The Alamo" cost about $140 million to make and market but has grossed just $16.3 million.

Blindly following society's edicts and becoming a housewife is bad. Thinking for yourself and following your own path is good

You don't need a degree from Wellesley to figure that out. But apparently the makers of "Mona Lisa Smile" think they need to educate you by beating you over the head with feel-good feminist platitudes.

The lesson might have been helpful -- or even relevant -- if the film, set in 1953, hadn't come out 50 years later. But that was then and this is now, rendering "Mona Lisa Smile" archaic.

As is, director Mike Newell's film plays like "Dead Poets Sorority," with Julia Roberts in the Robin Williams role as a forward-thinking Wellesley College professor urging her students to free their minds.

Aside from amassing an arsenal of talented young actresses (including Kirsten Dunst, Julia Stiles and Maggie Gyllenhaal), dressing them in sweater sets and pearls and finding just the right shade of red lipstick to match their skin tones, the film seems pointless.

Stiles, by the way, pulls off the Eisenhower-era look flawlessly with her blonde bobbed hair and prim carriage. Roberts seems an anachronism, though, for the same reason Tom Cruise does in "The Last Samurai" -- this person's larger-than-life persona as a contemporary Hollywood star overshadows her ability to immerse herself believably in a period piece.

In "Mona Lisa Smile," she plays art history professor Katherine Watson, who's come to Wellesley from UC Berkeley to teach art history. Her methods are considered unorthodox by the all-women's college's conservative standards -- she teaches about Picasso and Pollock! -- and the words "progressive" and "subversive" are used so often to describe her, it could be a drinking game.

Not that the hubbub matters; most of her students, including society girl Betty (Dunst) and overachiever Joan (Stiles), are more interested in walking down the aisle in a wedding dress than ever wearing a cap and gown. For that education, etiquette teacher Nancy Abbey (Marcia Gay Harden) is far more useful.

But Katherine provokes some others, including bad-girl Giselle (Gyllenhaal) and shy Connie (Ginnifer Goodwin). She also provokes the attention of Bill Dunbar (Dominic West), the hottie Italian professor who has a reputation of sleeping with his students, even though she has a boyfriend (John Slattery) back home.

Eventually, the administration feels threatened and demands to see and approve her lesson plans. And despite her efforts to inspire these bright young things, Katherine ultimately must resign herself to her initial impression: Wellesley is "a finishing school disguised as a college."

The actresses manage to overcome the material somewhat -- namely Dunst, playing against her good-girl type as a manipulative blue blood; the sexy, scene-stealing Gyllenhaal; and Harden, who brings her usual grace to her role as a withering spinster.

And cinematographer Anastas Michos ("Man on the Moon") films them and the lush Wellesley campus with the appropriate autumnal glow.

But since everything else about the script from Lawrence Konner and Mark Rosenthal ("The Beverly Hillbillies") is so pat and facile, there's no way the ending could be anything short of inspirational.

Julia Roberts plays a bohemian art professor in "Mona Lisa Smile."

Sandra Bullock would rather be laughed at than loved -- at least on screen. And she would rather be Jim Carrey than "America's Sweetheart" these days.

Bullock, 38, has described "Two Weeks Notice," her new film with Hugh Grant, as her last look back at romantic comedy -- the genre that gave her star status in 1995's "While You Were Sleeping" but now threatens to became a straitjacket.

The film opened in the United States Friday, and had a good opening weekend at the box office.

"I say no more romantic comedies but that doesn't mean that I won't do comedies," Bullock, who produced the film, told Reuters. "Women who do comedies are thought to be romantic comediennes but men who do comedies with romantic elements are thought to be comedians. I always wanted to be able to do comedy like Jim Carrey and like the women of the '30s and '40s could do."

With an old-fashioned sensibility that harks back to the sly but chaste screen comedies of the 1940s, "Two Weeks Notice" features Grant as George Wade, a real estate mogul who butts heads with, falls for, and loses the guileless lawyer played by Bullock.

In an interview with Reuters, she said she wanted a script "that didn't have a great obstacle keeping us apart. What was keeping us apart was the thing that keeps most human beings apart: their inability to step up to the plate."

She added that the plot evolved from a real-life experience but she was as coy as possible about the details.

"For me, when I fell hard, the person I fell for was the last person on the planet to know. He said, 'I thought you hated me,' " she said, declining to name the man in question.

What are Jay Leno and Jerry Seinfeld doing, sitting in the dingy, graffiti-streaked back room of a Los Angeles club?

These millionaire comedians ask themselves the same question. It's the same sort of hole they worked so hard to get out of, and now they're going out on the stage again to try to tickle the funny bones of smart aleck, drunk patrons.

They don't have to do this anymore to make a living -- they just HAVE to do it.

Watching scenes like that in the fascinating new documentary "Comedian," it seems that the world's greatest comics are born from the same thrill-seeking urge that drives people to skydiving or climbing mountains.

The film is partly about Seinfeld's efforts to come up with a one-hour act of brand-new material and partly about the efforts of a little-known comic named Orny Adams to make it big.

Director Christian Charles, a former advertising executive, and producer Gary Streiner followed Seinfeld for more than a year with two hand-held digital video cameras. Despite the grainy format, they capture small moments of joy and dejection and use an upbeat jazz soundtrack to highlight emotion

What are Jay Leno and Jerry Seinfeld doing,

Your Local Time