Eric Bana
Photo: Gaye Gerard/Getty Images
CELEBRITY BIRTHDAYS
Eric Bana (actor, Troy) is 39
David Steinberg (actor, Curb Your Enthusiasm) is 65
Sam Elliott (actor, MASK) is 63
Barbara Mason (singer, "Are You Ready?") is 60
Melanie Griffith (actress) is 50
Amanda Bearse (actress, Fright Night) is 49
Kurtis Blow (rapper, "The Breaks") is 48
Aimee Mann (singer, "Wise Up") is 47
Whitney Houston (singer) is 44
Pat Petersen (actor, Knots Landing) is 41
Deion Sanders (football player) is 40
Gillian Anderson (actress, The X-Files) is 39
Christopher Cuomo (journalist) is 37
Arion Salazar (bassist, Third Eye Blind) is 37
Mack 10 (rapper, "Backyard Boogie") is 36
Juanes (latin singer, "Adios Le Pido") is 35
THE EVENTS OF AUGUST 9th
In 1952...Kitty Wells became the first woman to top the country charts with "It Wasn't God Who Made Honky Tonk Angels."
In 1962...Robert Zimmerman had his name legally changed to Bob Dylan.
In 1964...In Forest Hills, New York, Joan Baez and Bob Dylan played the same bill for the first time.
In 1967...Jerry Lee Lewis' set at England's Sunberry Jazz and Blues Festival inspired such fervor in the audience that the organizers told him to cut it short.
In 1973...Guitarist Henry McCullough and drummer Denny Seiwell left Wings.
In 1975...Promoter Don Kirshner held the first Rock Music Award Show in Santa Monica, California. Big winners included The Eagles, Bad Company and Stevie Wonder.
In 1977...Bachman-Turner Overdrive called it quits. Their biggest hit was the 1974 number one "You Ain't Seen Nothing Yet."
In 1978...Muddy Waters performed for President Jimmy Carter at the White House.
In 1980...A thief stole ten Gerald Scarfe illustrations based on Pink Floyd's The Wall album. The pictures were exhibited in the foyer of Earls Court, where the band was performing five shows.
In 1991...Rick James pleaded innocent to charges he tortured and sexually abused a woman he and his wife allegedly held prisoner in their California home.
In 1995...Jerry Garcia died of a heart attack at the Serenity Knolls drug rehabilitation facility in California. The Grateful Dead guitarist was 53.
In 1996...The Ramones split up.
In 1997...Elvis Week began in Memphis to commemorate the 20th anniversary of Elvis Presley's death on August 16th, 1977.
In 2002...Alicia Keys won Album of the Year, Top Female Artist, Top New Artist and Top Albums Artist at the Billboard Hip-Hop/R&B Awards.
In 2002...MP3-swapping software company Napster began auctioning off its assets.
In 2003...Gregory Hines, a multi-talented performer who was a tireless exponent of tap dance, died from cancer aged 57.
In 2003...The Who's Roger Daltrey made his L-A stage debut playing "Dr. Doolittle" in My Fair Lady.
In 2005...Rapper Beanie Sigel was released from the Federal Correctional Institution of Fairton, New Jersey. He was serving time for a federal gun charge.
MOVIE MINUTE: DADDY DAY CAMP
Daddy Day Camp is the sequel of sorts to the 2003 flick Daddy Day Care, which starred Eddie Murphy. Oscar-winner Cuba Gooding Jr. replaces Murphy in the role of "Charlie," who takes over at a dilapidated summer camp with no outdoors experience. Cuba told us about working with the young ones in the flick. "Kids are insane, you know? There's always a crafts services table and there's always candy and food around and these kids know that and they take advantage of it (laughs). It's been interesting. I mean, it's great though 'cause that's the exact energy we want to have with Daddy Day Camp." The film was directed by former child actor Fred Savage, best known from The Wonder Years, who talked about working with the kids in the film. "They're so inventive and fearless and they're up for anything. They'll try anything once and they never give you the same thing twice. They're just endlessly creative and full of energy and it makes me very excited so I just love working with young actors." Daddy Day Camp swings into theaters tomorrow...
Us Weekly is reporting about 21-year-old Matt Encinias' six hours with Britney Spears. The college student tells the magazine that over the course of that time, he went from being a video extra to drinking with the singer to eventually locking lips with her. Matt said, "I was told all she wanted to do that night was kiss a boy... And that's what she did. Mission accomplished." He also revealed that Britney was the first one to go shirtless for a game of topless truth or dare. The full story is in this week's issue of Us Weekly...
They've gone and done it: McFarlane Toys has created Jon Bon Jovi and Richie Sambora action figures, and they are planning to unveil them this month. You can take a peek at them over at McFarlane.com. Bon Jovi's latest album, Lost Highway, is in stores now and has sold more than 650-thousand copies...
Guard your MP3's, there's a new computer virus on the loose and it's going after your music. The worm is called W32.Deletemusic and if it gets on your computer, say goodbye to all your MP3s. The bug removes all MP3 files on a hard drive and any external drive attached to the computer. W32.Deletemusic can be spread by using an infected external memory card. According to Gigwise.com, Internet security experts are advising people to update their anti-virus software and to learn where an external memory drive has been before you put it in your computer. The virus affects PCs running on Windows 2000, 95, 98, Me, NT, Server 2003, XP and Vista. Experts also recommend you back up all your music onto a DVD for safe keeping...
What do Amy Winehouse and "007" man Sir Roger Moore have in common? Well, it's a song lyric. In her tune titled "You Know I'm No Good," Amy sings, "'Cause you're my fella, my guy/Hand me your stella and fly/By the time I'm out the door/ You tear me down like Roger Moore." According to ContactMusic.com, Moore is confused by the lyrics, saying, "I've no idea what it means. Answers on a postcard please." The site also reports that Amy has denied rumors that she will be recording the new "James Bond" theme...
Kellie Pickler cleared the air yesterday morning on a Nashville radio station after the station's intern observed that she was acting drunk behind the wheel. The intern reported that she was spotted intoxicated late Monday night in Music City at a fast food restaurant drive thru. "First of all, I'm not here to defend myself," Kellie said. She told them she wasn't there to tell her side of the story - she was there to tell the truth. She maintained that she was not drunk and was simply dancing in her car and having a good time. She was angry and confronted the intern and asked him why he didn't call the police if he knew someone was driving while intoxicated. Kellie said that she couldn't sleep at all the night before the interview and she admitted that she was truly hurt by the accusations and broke down into tears after the intern apologized. "That really hurt me...or I wouldn't be here right now," she said...
White Stripes frontman Jack White has become a father for the second time. The musician and his wife, model Karen Elson, welcomed a son into the world on Tuesday. The Associated Press reports that the baby is named Henry Lee White. The couple has one other child together, 15-month-old Scarlett Teresa White. A rep for White reports that both mother and baby are "feeling very healthy and happy." Jack and his bandmate, Meg White, head out on the road in September to continue touring their new album Icky Thump. You can catch them in Albuquerque, New Mexico on September 13th...
According to Celebrity-Babies.com, Three Days Grace drummer Neil Sanderson welcomed his first child into the world on July 29th. Sanderson and his wife, Janin, have a brand new baby girl named Violet, and a rep for the band reveals, "Both mom and baby are doing well." Three Days Grace are set to play Hutchison, Kansas on September 8th...
The Police are raking in the dough with their reunion tour. 929,941 concertgoers paid a total of 107,592,002 dollars to see the band's first 38 shows, and that is not including the festivals they recently played. According to Billboard, the most profitable shows took place at Wrigley Field in Chicago when nearly 80-thousand came to watch the performances, making the group 9.5-million dollars. No wonder they are continuing to tour starting on August 28th when they play Europe through October 20th. Don't worry though, The Police will return to the states soon after to play three more weeks of shows, including a sold-out gig at New York's Madison Square Garden on Halloween...
Adolph Hitler's personal distaste for Jews and Russians, as well as his love of classical music, is well known, but some new, interesting facts have now come to light. According to German magazine Der Spiegel, hundreds of gramophone records discovered in a Russian attic that were originally housed at the Fuhrer's headquarters, were the works of Jewish and Russian musicians. The heavily scratched records included such names as Tchaikovsky, Borodin and Rachmaninov. Professor Wolfgang Wippermann, a historian at the Berlin University of the Arts, was not shocked by the news. He told ABCNews.com, "Why not? I'm not surprised that he would, secretly of course, listen to those composers... Hitler loved classical music and he could best relax with his music. When he was young, he used to go to the Vienna opera a lot and he developed a taste for those classical works."...
The girl that allegedly appears in the infamous R. Kelly sex tape will testify on behalf of the R&B superstar when his trial begins September 17th. Rolling Stone reports the girl, whose name is still being withheld even though she is of age now, will tell the court that she is not the person in the blurry tape. But the prosecution says it has lined up testimony from family and friends that will say under oath that it is in fact the nameless young woman in the video, who was only fourteen at the time...
Usher finally wed Tameka Foster this past weekend after their original nuptials were cancelled last minute almost two weeks ago. But according to People, amidst the bliss, one person was missing from the affair, Usher's mother. A source close to Usher's family told the magazine that the singer's mother, Jonetta Patton, spent her son's wedding day at a spa in Atlanta. It is unclear if Usher's mom didn't get an invitation or she chose to skip the event...
With his new band Velvet Revolver going strong, Slash is talking about the tiffs he and his former Guns N' Roses bandmates would get into, and it turns out, he is sorry for them. It took until after the guitarist left the band in 1996 for him to realize how childish the feuding was. In fact, it wasn't until he recently witnessed the fights Van Halen had that he truly understood the futility of the GN'R arguments. According to MonstersAndCritics.com, Slash said, "Recently, Velvet Revolver had to induct Van Halen into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame because they were fighting and couldn't do it themselves. It changed my view. Fighting with band members is so childish." Slash also explained that in 2005, he tried ending his strife with frontman Axl Rose. He said he showed up unannounced at Axl's house and apologized to the rocker, revealing, "When Velvet Revolver started, we were promoting the new record and I was harboring so much resentment about what happened at the end of Guns N' Roses that I vented all my feelings to the press. I never got that s**t off my chest. So I apologized for all that." Slash plays Montreal with Velvet Revolver on Saturday...
The 11th Hour is the new documentary produced and narrated by Leonardo DiCaprio. It explores how humanity has impacted the Earth's ecosystem and what we can do to change our course. The film features dialogues with experts from all over the world, including renowned scientist Stephen Hawking, former Soviet Prime Minister Mikhail Gorbachev and many more leading scientists, thinkers and leaders. DiCaprio explains that the global warming is much more than a political issue. "I think that we specifically talk about this issue having to not belong to any political party specifically. We talk about the whole segment in the movie, that in the 1970's, the Clean Air Act was passed and the Clean Water Act was passed and this was done by Republicans and Democrats working across the board. This is a huge issue, this is an issue that the whole world has to embrace." Leonardo added that the film is meant to get people to work together to solve the global crisis. "We as the United States, we all need to start learning through films like this, through the message from the media, through public awareness that we need to work together and this is one tiny little piece in that puzzle." The 11th Hour was directed by Nadia Conors and Leila Conners Petersen. It arrives in theaters on August 17th...
A London judge has dismissed a suit over a U-K photo agency using a 2004 image of J.K. Rowling's three-year-old son. According to Bloomberg News, the judge said that the legal action didn't have a realistic chance of success. In a statement, Rowling said, "Our aim has only been to protect our children from press intrusion during their childhood." Rowling added that she and her husband plan to appeal the ruling...
Actress Gwyneth Paltrow will grace the upcoming cover of W magazine and in it she discusses having more kids with her husband, Coldplay frontman Chris Martin. According to USA Today, the star, who has two children with Martin, hopes to have more, saying, "I have a dream version where I think, maybe in four years I'll have two in a row really quickly again — how fabulous to have a whole bunch of them! But then at that point, when everyone's potty-trained and sleeping through the night, are you really going to go back? ... My husband really wants to adopt. So I don't know; I'm sort of open for anything." Paltrow stars in the upcoming film The Good Night, which comes out in October, and is also filming Iron Man with Robert Downey Jr....
TV Guide is reporting that Kristen Bell is close to an agreement to join the cast of Lost. Bell is rumored to be playing the role of "Charlotte," who, according to the magazine's Michael Ausiello, is "precocious, loquacious and funny...a successful academic who knows how to handle herself in the real world."...
Chris Noth will reprise his role as "Mr. Big" in the Sex And The City movie. The story, which ran in TV Guide, seems to counter reports that the film would begin with the death of "Mr. Big," and it ensures that the entire cast of the celebrated HBO series will now play some role in the feature film. Cameras are set to roll on the project this fall...
A New York Mets fan - who was able to purchase seats in the right field stands at AT&T Park just before game time - won the battle for the ball Barry Bonds hit for his 756th home run Tuesday night. The hit made Bonds baseball's all-time home run leader. Sports Illustrated reports Matt Murphy from Queens, New York emerged from the scuffle for the ball with face bloodied and clothes torn. San Francisco police quickly surrounded Murphy and escorted him from the stadium. Murphy and a friend were en route to Australia and had a one-day layover in San Francisco and decided to take in the game between the Giants and the Washington Nationals as a last-minute decision. Experts estimate the home run ball - which is specially marked to avoid imposters - could bring Murphy up to half-a-million dollars if he decides to sell it...
The 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing, China are about a year away, and NBC has revealed how they will cover the sporting event. According to Reuters, there will be 36-hundred hours of coverage in all, 14 hundred of which will air on NBC and its cable channels. The remaining 22-hundred hours will be available for free on the Internet. The Peacock Network has also guaranteed that the finals of big events like swimming, gymnastics and beach volleyball will air live in the U-S, despite a 12-hour time difference. The Beijing Summer Olympics begin on August 8th, 2008...
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