Entertainment News

1. "American Idol" (Wednesday), Fox.

CANNES, France (Hollywood Reporter) - Josh Brolin has a vice president.

CANNES, France (Reuters) - Who said the Web was worldwide? Not director Atom Egoyan, whose new film "Adoration" explores just how confining cyberspace can be when a teenager confronts a culture clash that has damaged him and his family.

CANNES, France - Unless it is one of his "Ocean's Eleven" casino romps, Steven Soderbergh never makes things easy for an audience.

Selected home-video releases:

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - The upset "American Idol" victory by rock singer David Cook drew nearly 32 million U.S. television viewers on Wednesday night, up 3 percent from last year's finale, Nielsen Media Research reported on Thursday.

LONDON (Reuters) - Troubled British singer Amy Winehouse added another trophy to her growing collection on Thursday, winning the 2008 Ivor Novello award for Best Song Musically and Lyrically with "Love is a Losing Game."

1. "American Idol" (Wednesday), Fox.

BELGRADE (Reuters) - Some 100 million Europeans will tune in on Saturday for the annual giddy, big-hair-and-glitter Eurovision song contest that delights in stretching the limits of good taste, of what is music, and who is European.

Though the calendar still says spring, the summer tour season has begun. Tracking your favorite acts, though, can be almost as interesting online as at your local amphitheater.

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. - Political operatives who were involved in the most dramatic election of our lifetimes say HBO's "Recount" brings back the intensity.

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - The upset "American Idol" victory by rock singer David Cook drew nearly 32 million U.S. television viewers on Wednesday night, up 3 percent from last year's finale, Nielsen Media Research reported on Thursday.

LOS ANGELES - The duel between two Davids brought an estimated 30.6 million viewers to the Fox finale of "American Idol," Nielsen Media Research reported Thursday.

1. "American Idol" (Wednesday), Fox.

LOS ANGELES - Did Simon Cowell know David Cook would win? Or was he — gasp! — just being nice?

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Google Inc co-founder Larry Page was in Washington on Thursday to promote the company's proposal for a new generation of wireless devices to operate on soon-to-be-vacant television airwaves.

-Yesterday's Winners: Dancing With the Stars (ABC), American Idol (Fox), NCIS (CBS)

Here are the top 10 rated programs in syndication based on households for the week of May 5, 2008, followed by any highlights of note:

It was another week of split leadership, with CBS first in households and total viewers and Fox No. 1 in the three key demos (adults 18-49, adults 25-54 and adults 18-34) for the week of May 12, 2008. Comparably, this was Fox's 19th consecutive weekly win among adults 18-49. ABC finished second across the board, with NBC fourth, the CW fifth and MyNetworkTV a distant sixth. Three networks -- ABC, NBC and the CW -- were all on the double-digit downside, while the remaining three were close to year-ago levels.

ABC has picked up recent midseason entry Here Come the Newlyweds for a second season, which is expected to go into production this summer.

"A Place Called Canterbury: Tales of the New Old Age in America" (Viking, 366 pages, $24.95), by Dudley Clendinen: A journalist takes readers inside his mother's housing complex for the elderly and inside the complicated reality of aging in America today.

LOS ANGELES (Hollywood Reporter) - You might expect a movie about the controversial presidential vote in Florida in 2000 to have political wonk written all over it.

CANNES (Hollywood Reporter) - Sarajevo filmmaker Emir Kusturica gives Argentine football legend Diego Maradona a big wet kiss in his new documentary, "Maradona by Kusturica," which screened out of competition at Cannes.

NEW YORK (AP) — Is there anything more heartbreaking than what might have been? Recollections of regret are the soul of "Port Authority," a series of three superb, interlocking monologues by Conor McPherson that offers ample evidence why the Irish playwright is one of the finest writers for the stage today.

How does Uwe Boll keep getting work?

1. "The Host" by Stephenie Meyer (Little, Brown)

1. "The Host" by Stephenie Meyer (Little, Brown)

"A Place Called Canterbury: Tales of the New Old Age in America" (Viking, 366 pages, $24.95), by Dudley Clendinen: A journalist takes readers inside his mother's housing complex for the elderly and inside the complicated reality of aging in America today.

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Barnes & Noble Inc reported a wider quarterly loss on Thursday, hurt by a charge, and the bookseller cut its forecast for full-year sales at existing stores, citing the difficult retail environment.

"Black Out" (Crown Publishers. 368 pages. $23), by Lisa Unger: Anybody who has cracked open a mystery novel in the last 25 years knows by now there are two Floridas. There's the sunny, pastel-hued, happy Walt Disney Florida. And then there's the Florida teeming with lunatics in trailer parks and bodies in the saw grass.

Nick Manos, president of Atlanta's Theater of the Stars (TOTS), confirmed to Playbill.com May 21 that his company will produce - with partners - a full Equity touring production of the Broadway musical comedy whodunit Curtains in fall 2009.

Off-Off-Broadway's tiny Michael Weller Theatre will close its doors June 30 owing to the building management's wish to offer the space for lease to potential office tenants.

The organizers of PlayPenn, Philadelphia's professional new play development organization, announced writers and titles for its fourth annual New Play Development Conference, running July 13-July 27 and culminating in public readings of plays.

Producing artistic director Michael Menendian and co-artistic director JoAnn Montemurro, of the 25-year-old Raven Theatre, will receive a Special Award at the 35th Annual Non-Equity Jeff Awards Ceremony on June 9, honoring their contributions to Chicago theatre.

Alabama Shakespeare Festival will give full world-premiere productions to three scripts developed in its Southern Writers' Project. The 2008-09 season is the first time so many new plays will have bowed at the Montgomery, AL, resident theatre.

CANNES, France (AFP) - Madonna said Thursday her efforts to adopt a child in Malawi and the media ridicule she faced had been as difficult as childbirth, but she was confident of winning permanent custody.

CANNES, France - Unless it is one of his "Ocean's Eleven" casino romps, Steven Soderbergh never makes things easy for an audience.

CANNES, France (Reuters) - American singer Madonna said on Thursday she was happy to be a "guinea pig" in a case she hopes could ease adoptions from Malawi, where an AIDS epidemic has orphaned more than 1 million children.

LOS ANGELES - MTV is rolling out the gold carpet — and the star power — for its 2008 Movie Awards. Sarah Jessica Parker, Ben Stiller, Will Ferrell, Edward Norton and Liv Tyler are among the celebrities set to serve as presenters at the June 1 ceremony, the network said Thursday.

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Aerosmith singer Steven Tyler, a poster boy for rock 'n' roll decadence in the 1970s, has entered a Los Angeles rehab facility after two decades as a passionate advocate of sobriety, according to an report.

EDINBURGH (Reuters Life!) - Salmon is one of Scotland's most feted foods, but who knew those scaly skins could be so useful and attractive on anything other than fish?

New York - The Oscars of the fragrance industry - the FiFi Awards - honored the top fragrances and the people behind them on Tuesday, May 20 at their 36th annual celebration in New York.

New York - Now in its tenth year, the 2008 Gen Art Styles competition presented the next crop of emerging fashion talent at Hammerstein Ballroom in New York on Monday night, May 19, before a panel of judges that included fashion designers Victoria Bartlett and Marc Ecko among others, Sak's Fifth Avenue Fashion Director Michael Fink and Designer & Agent's founder Barbara Kramer.

Los Angeles (E! Online) - Is Madonna going to get swept away again?A source at the Cannes Film Festival says that famed wrap-dress fashion designer Diane Von Furstenberg is hosting an exclusive VIP luncheon tomorrow to toast the Cannes screening of I Am Because We Are, Madonna's documentary about Malawi AIDS orphans.

New York - Reptiles - and more specifically, pythons - were the inspiration that Francisco Costa cited for his Resort 2009 collection for Calvin Klein shown on May 19, 2008 at the Calvin Klein showroom in New York.

DEAR ABBY: I am not sure how to handle my boyfriend's hair loss. "Jasper" is 34 and I'm 23. We have been dating for two years and have a wonderful relationship. We are completely open to each other, and because of that, I feel backed into a corner regarding this subject.

DEAR ABBY: I would like to respond to "Kelly in Austin" (March 24), who wondered if there were more than two men who excel at romance.

DEAR ABBY: Is 33 too young for a man to have a midlife crisis? I honestly believe that is what's happening to my husband. We have been married almost 13 years and have three children. Suddenly he wants out. Don't get me wrong, although our marriage has been rocky, I truly believed that we loved each other.

DEAR ABBY: Last year, my husband, "Steve," was scheduled for bypass surgery. He told everyone -- all our friends and relatives -- that he planned to stop smoking afterward. It has now been nine months, and as recently as last week Steve and I were discussing his amazing willpower with friends.

DEAR ABBY: I have overbearing in-laws who refuse to let their children, all of whom are in their 40s, live their own lives. We are constantly forced to spend time with them by means of manipulation. We have all been under their thumbs for so long that when the opportunity presented itself for our family to start a new life in a different state, we jumped at the chance.

05/16/2008 - DEAR MARGO: A friend of mine is struggling with her teenage daughter.

05/15/2008 - DEAR MARGO: I've had a very good girlfriend for about four years.

05/09/2008 - DEAR MARGO: For more than a year, I have been dating an emergency room doctor who works with her ex-fiance.

05/08/2008 - DEAR MARGO: My husband of a year, "Michael," is everything a partner should be: generous, caring, supportive, intelligent, easygoing and optimistic.

05/02/2008 - DEAR MARGO: Longtime reader, first-time writer.

Creators Syndicate - For years (and years and years), it had been a running joke in my marriage that I looked like a kid.

Creators Syndicate - In what some Democratic Party insiders are calling a particularly ominous sign for Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign, former president Bill Clinton today became the latest super delegate to switch from Sen. Clinton to her rival, Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.).

Creators Syndicate - Just like everybody else, I've been feeling the pinch of a constrained economy, rising gas prices and a virtually stagnant career. (Oh, wait, that last one's just me.) I've been looking around for ways to cut back. Just this past week, in fact, I had to cancel the lawn service.

Creators Syndicate - McCain: Sunnis, Shiites "Trying to Confuse Me"

Creators Syndicate - Last week, I ran out to the supermarket in my wife's station wagon and noticed that the tank was empty. I stopped off to fill it up, and while the gas was running, washed all the windows with the little squeegee thing they have. When I heard the gas pump click off, I turned and glanced at the pump, and nearly had a heart attack right there in the self-serve lane. The little red numbers blinked at $57.

LOS ANGELES - The duel between two Davids brought an estimated 30.6 million viewers to the Fox finale of "American Idol," Nielsen Media Research reported Thursday.

SAN FRANCISCO - In these hallowed halls, Indiana Jones almost seems out of place.

CHICAGO - Prosecutors trying to prove that a woman appeared in a sex tape with R. Kelly when she was underage — over her protestations that she didn't — have turned to one of her childhood friends, the friend's father and two relatives.

SALT LAKE CITY - For fans of Utah crooner David Archuleta, the seventh season of "American Idol" was a fairy-tale ride without the fairy-tale ending.

CANNES, France - Unless it is one of his "Ocean's Eleven" casino romps, Steven Soderbergh never makes things easy for an audience.