HOLLYWOOD - Top Story: Liv Tyler's Newest Ring Is a Wedding Band
Liv Tyler, the daughter of Aerosmith frontman Steven Tyler, has added a new rocker to her life. The Associated Press reports Tyler wed longtime boyfriend Royston Langdon, lead singer and bassist of the band Spacehog, in a private ceremony at a villa in the Caribbean on March 25. Tyler's publicist said Wednesday the couple is planning a small reception for family and friends next month in New York. It is the first marriage for Tyler, 25, and the British-born Langdon, 30. The actress, who has starred in Armageddon, Inventing the Abbotts and That Thing You Do!, plays elf Arwen in Peter Jackson's epic The Lord of the Rings trilogy.
"War" Singer Edwin Starr Dies
Motown legend Edwin Starr, whose 1970 No. 1 Grammy-winning hit "War" denounced war as good for "absolutely nothing," died of a heart attack at his home in central England, Reuters reports. He was 61. "I am absolutely saddened and shaken up by his death. He was performing right until the end," his manager, Lilian Kyle, said Wednesday. Starr himself served in the U.S. army for three years before embarking on a career in music.
Bruckheimer and WB Ink Multimillion-Dollar Deal
Producer Jerry Bruckheimer has signed a four-year deal that will keep him at Warner Bros. TV through May 2007, Variety reports. Financial details of the complicated pact were not immediately available, but industry insiders said the deal guaranteed Bruckheimer and Bruckheimer Television at least $10 million over four years and covers drama, comedy and reality programming. Bruckheimer, who has managed to translate his big-screen success to primetime, produces the hit CBS shows CSI: Miami and Without a Trace.
MTV Reunites with Tom Green
MTV, which releases a new series nearly every three weeks, has greenlighted two new projects as part of their lengthy development slate, The Hollywood Reporter reports. Beginning June 16,Tom Green will return to the network in a late-night talk show that will invite viewers into his personal life. The second series, which will premiere in August, will feature married performers who were big during MTV's boy-band phase. Nick Lachey of the group 98 Degrees and singer Jessica Simpson will open their home to MTV's cameras to document their first year of marriage.
Linkin Park Debuts at No. 1 on Billboard
Linkin Park's Meteora crashed into the Billboard 200 at No.1, selling 810,000 copies in the U.S. for the week ending March 30, according to Nielsen SoundScan data issued on Wednesday. Despite being released in conjunction with the start of her much-hyped Las Vegas production, Celine Dion's One Heart came is second with 432,000 copies sold. Meteora also beat out debuts from Brian McKnight, the Diplomats and the 12th edition of the Now That's What I Call Music! compilation series, Reuters reports.
Radiohead Tracks Leaked Online
Tracks from Radiohead's upcoming album Hail to the Thief, which comes out June 10, have been leaked on to the Internet. Guitarist Jonny Greenwood said the versions constitute "work we've not finished, being released in this sloppy way, 10 weeks before the real version is even available. It doesn't even exist as a record yet." A source told Billboard.com that album producer Nigel Godrich reviewed the files that are circulating and confirmed they may date from as far back as the first day of mixing. In the past two days, EMI has sent cease-and-desist orders to a number of individuals who were hosting the files on their personal Web pages.
"Potter" Prevails Over "Grotter"
Harry Potter author J.K. Rowling won a court battle Thursday to block the Dutch publication of a Russian novel about a girl wizard called Tanya Grotter, Reuters reports. Grotter author Dmitry Yemets, who has sold more than 500,000 books in Russia, said his book, The Magic Double Bass, was a parody of the Potter novels and trusted his readers could tell the difference between the two. But the court said in a written ruling that the Russian book was an unauthorized adaptation of Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone and its publication in the Netherlands would infringe Rowling's copyright.
Role Call: Urban Joins "Pitch Black" Sequel, Cheadle Set for "Nixon"
Karl Urban, who plays Eomer in The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers, has joined the cast of the Pitch Black sequel The Chronicles of Riddick, which stars Vin Diesel, Judi Dench and Colm Feore. The second installment, written and directed by David Twohy, finds Riddick, now a hunted man, in the middle of two opposing forces in a major crusade. The project begins June 9 in Vancouver ... Don Cheadle, meanwhile, is negotiating to star opposite Sean Penn in The Assassination of Richard Nixon for writer-director Niels Mueller. The film centers on the true story of a Philadelphia furniture salesman who hatches a plot to kill Richard Nixon.