HOLLYWOOD - Top Story
As Moulin Rouge premiered in London on Monday, attention seemed to be on the film's star, Nicole Kidman. According to Reuters, Kidman told reporters that she is considering a return to the British stage and has talked to director Sam Mendes about the possibility. She said the play would probably be at the Donmar Warehouse, the same theater where she made her London debut in The Blue Room.
Prince Charles, who attended the premiere, took time to chat with Kidman and said he was interested to see what the sequined cancan dancers had to do. The dancers were there as part of the glitzy British premiere.
Kidman also turned heads last week when she appeared at the Venice Film Festival with Italian film producer Fabrizio Mosca. This is the first time Kidman has dated publicly since her divorce from Tom Cruise was finalized Aug. 8. The two were also spotted holding hands at the Cannes festival in May.
Deaths
New Yorker magazine film critic Pauline Kael died on Monday at her home in Massachusetts after a long battle with Parkinson's disease, Reuters reports. Kael, 82, grew up in San Francisco and began writing about film in 1955, supplying detailed notes on the movies she programmed while running the Berkley Cinema Guild and Studio. She began writing for the New Yorker in the mid-1960s. She retired in 1991 after her Parkinson's disease worsened. She told Modern Maturity magazine that she felt she had nothing new to say. "Old critics tend to be tiresome," she said. "I didn't want to be one of those old farts."
In General
Christina Aguilera and Jimmy Smits will co-host the 2nd Annual Latin Grammy Awards to be broadcast on Sept. 11 from the Forum in Los Angeles on CBS. Michael Greene, President/CEO of the Recording Academy and the Latin Recording Academy also announced that Marc Anthony will performing as well as and Destiny's Child.
A free concert in Hollywood featuring alt-rock band System of A Down went awry Monday night after fans went on a rampage. The trouble began after many more concertgoers than were expected turned up for the show to be held outside the club Vinyl. When it appeared that the band was not going to perform after all, the fans rioted. According to Reuters, the audience trashed the stage set up in the venue's parking lot and threw rocks and bottles at police who used tear gas and rubber bullets to disperse the crowd. Six people were arrested and charged with various offenses, including assault with a deadly weapon, felony vandalism and receiving stolen property. The group was promoting their new album Toxicity, which is due in stores on Tuesday.
Courtney Love and Don Henley will attend a hearing in Los Angeles on Wednesday to denounce California's 1987 amendment that allows music labels to sue artists for undelivered albums after seven years. Opponents of the amendment claim artists are often strong-armed into accepting impossible terms when signing record contracts.
Jerry Lewis' 36th annual Muscular Dystrophy Association Telethon raised a record $56.8 million this Labor Day weekend, the Associated Press reports. The show featured a variety of celebrity co-hosts including Ed McMahon, Norm Crosby and Casey Kasem.
The American Film Institute will announce on Tuesday plans to hold its own awards show in January on CBS, according to AP. Scheduled for Jan. 5, the event will occur two weeks before the Golden Globes and two months before the Academy Awards. The AFI will also honor TV's best drama and comedy series, as well as name the top 10 movies of the year.
Billboard announced last week the winners of its first R&B/Hip-Hop Awards, AP reports. Misiq Soulchild led the winners with four awards, while R. Kelly took home three. Other winners include Shaggy, Jill Scott and OutKast.
Steven Spielberg will not be attending the Venice Film Festival this year because of religious commitments, Reuters reports. Spielberg has instead sent a seven-minute video to festival organizers to be shown before the screening of his film A.I.: Artificial Intelligence. Spielberg said his son's Bar Mitzvah, as well putting finishing touches on his latest film Minority Report, have kept him from attending the festival. A.I. will screen in Venice on Sept. 6.
Grand Royal, the Beastie Boys' record label, is closing its doors after eight years. According to The Hollywood Reporter, the label blamed mounting debts, decreasing assets and exceedingly harsh industry conditions for the closure. The Beastie Boys founded Grand Royal in 1993 and were the first top-selling artists to form an independent record label.
ABC is planning a follow-up to the 1978 hit movie Grease, which starred John Travolta and Olivia Newton-John, BBC News reports. The film would drop in on the characters 20 years after the first Grease, which was set at mythical Rydell High School in the 1950s. Didi Conn, who played high school dropout Frenchy, will be producing the film. Conn said that viewers would learn about the original characters through their children.