John Mayer makes sure music rises above tabloids
NEW YORK – If you're engrossed in the tabloid Internet-gossip that has come to define the celebrity world, then John Mayer's latest CD, "Battle Studies," could provide enough fodder to fill at least a dozen Perez Hilton b
The single, "Heartbreak Warfare," already has some speculating on its subject with lyrics like: "If you want more love, why don't you say so?... Bombs are falling everywhere, heartbreak warfare."
Hmmm ... could that be a message to a certain famous "friend" who he's been linked with on and off for the last two years? A look into the much-dissected love life of one of music's hottest hunks?
Mention this to Mayer himself, and you'll get a serious eye-roll, followed up with an "Are you kidding me?" look.
"I know some people think that, but it doesn't," a slightly exasperated Mayer says during a break in rehearsals for two upcoming concerts to promote his new CD (his concert airs on Fuse on Tuesday night, the same day as the album's release).
"That would mean that my personal life is more powerful than the music itself, and it's just not. No one's personal life is more powerful than music itself, and it's just not.
"By the way, I'm not the first person to process a personal life into putting out a record," he adds. "I think if there's any intrigue — obviously it would be silly of me to ask somebody not to be intrigued — but I think when the music starts playing, you're not thinking about my life, you're thinking about yours."
Mayer has rarely shied away from attention. He provides must-read updates to his more than 2.6 million followers on Twitter, engaged in a high-profile romance with Jennifer Aniston (which followed the high-profile romance with Jessica Simpson, which followed a romance with yet another startlet), has written for blogs and magazines and is known as one of the wittiest, media-savvy entertainers around.
But he is weary of those who would rather put the focus on John Mayer, the celebrity, and not John Mayer, the critically acclaimed, multiplatinum singer-songwriter-guitarist once heralded by Rolling Stone as one of rock's new "guitar gods."
"I've never liked the idea of somebody co-opting who I am, and I don't think anybody does," says Mayer, sitting in a small room as guitars wail in the background.
It's been nearly a decade since John Mayer burst onto the music scene as the boyish-looking, uncommonly gifted musician on "Room for Squares," with hits like "Your Body Is a Wonderland." Over the years, he's worked with everyone from B.B. King to Buddy Guy, won seven Grammys and created signature hits like "Daughters" and "Gravity." Billed as the "next James Taylor," he quickly created a musical identity of his own.
"Battle Studies" — his fourth studio album — is what he describes as perhaps his most lyrically complex, and yet at the same time, his most straight-forward. Now a veteran musician and producer, he has more confidence and experience when making a record: "I don't see it as a series of winning bets. I see it as something I do for a living."
The album finds Mayer at his most emotionally vulnerable, with songs titles like "Half of My Heart" (which features Taylor Swift) and "Perfectly Lonely." Mayer describes it as the "loose-ends phase of my life."
"I have all the big pieces figured out... I know what I want to do for my life, I know who my friends are, I know how to behave, I know what burns when I touch it because it's too hot," he says. "It's about tidying up those last few things so we can really get to the point in life so the struggle isn't the main event."
But Mayer's romantic struggles have become the main focus in the tabloid world — and he's rarely painted as the wounded party — most notably his relationship with Aniston, which reached its media apex when he escorted her to the Oscars earlier this year (and perhaps its low when he was quoted as confirming their then-breakup to paparazzi last year).
Mayer has dated other celebrities in the past, but the Aniston romance put him into tabloid overdrive. He was at best defined as a Lothario — at worst, a cad. But what has been potentially more damaging is that in some circles, it has overshadowed his musicianship.
"You know what I really like? I like when people say to me, 'Gee, I didn't know he could play like that,'" says drummer Steve Jordan, the album's co-producer who has worked with Mayer for at least five years on various projects. "(People) see a People magazine or a Us (Weekly) magazine and they think that's what it's all about."
And that infuriates Mayer to no end.
"By the way, I didn't really kill anybody. I didn't smash a car, I didn't commit a crime... I don't like the idea that there's an indictment on anything that I do," he says.
"The idea that there has been a sullying of my image ... I'm not going to be buried with an Us Weekly. I don't give a (expletive) about it anymore, I can't worry about it and I don't worry about it. And I don't think people want me to worry about it."
Mayer admits that perhaps a month ago, before he started promoting his album, he might have started to worry about all the tabloid chatter. But then he went to Australia and found himself playing before thousands of fans who didn't care about who he was dating, or his latest Twitter post — just about his music.
And he knew that Mayer, the musician, would be fine.
"I've never played in front of a room full of people who are chattering. I've played in front of a room full of people who are singing along to every word... that's a lot louder than chatter," he says.
___
On the Net:
http://www.johnmayer.com
`Twilight' hunks part of film's heartthrob history
LOS ANGELES – Fifteen-year-old Chloe Bates is in love.
A 10th-grader at an all-girls Catholic school, she lights up when she talks about her handsome 17-year-old honey. Chloe doesn't know too many boys, so she stil
Chloe keeps a few pictures of him on her bedroom wall, scattered among snapshots of her and her friends. She also writes about him in her journal. But she can't really get close to him. It's like he doesn't know she exists.
Chloe is in love with Taylor Lautner, one of the hunky stars of the "Twilight" films. And she's not alone.
Girls have been falling in love with movie stars since the dawn of cinema. When teenagers became Tinseltown's prime marketing target, Hollywood delivered handsome heartthrobs any girl could love.
James Dean. Frankie Avalon. David Cassidy. Rick Springfield. Johnny Depp. There are teen icons for every generation. For Chloe and millions of girls around the world, it's Lautner and Robert Pattinson of "New Moon," the latest installment in the "Twilight" series.
These girls aren't just experiencing a movie-star crush, they're participating in a uniquely female rite of passage: The birth of romantic fantasy. And today's technology — online fan forums, Twitter, an endless Web stream of photos and videos — lets them get closer than ever.
Before real boyfriends and first kisses, girls' imaginary relationships with their heartthrobs provide a precursor to adult romance — a love before they know what love might be.
"They're practicing feelings of love and attachment and attraction and romance," says Los Angeles psychologist Wendy Walsh, whose own 11-year-old daughter also loves Lautner. "These are all new feelings, and what a safe way to play them out — in the privacy of their own room with a poster of Taylor Lautner."
The "Twilight" series itself is about first love. "New Moon" centers on Bella Swan, an ordinary teenager in love with the mysterious Edward Cullen (Pattinson), who comes from a family of vampires. Edward is romantic and otherworldly, and though he literally hungers for her, he's gentle and protective. But he leaves and Bella finds comfort with her loyal, longtime friend Jacob Black (Lautner), whom she later discovers belongs to a lineage of werewolves.
"It would be so fun to be Bella," Chloe says wistfully. "I love the idea of having two super-hot mythical creatures fighting over me. I just think that would be incredible."
Chloe hasn't had a real boyfriend yet, but she thinks Lautner would be perfect because he's "that fun, hang out, let's-play-video-games kind of guy that I think would be really fun right now."
Like practically everyone at school, Chloe has read all four novels in the "Twilight" series. She spotted Lautner when she saw the film last year and recognized him from a kids' movie she'd seen a few years earlier.
"Now he's hot," she says. "He's really hot."
Besides his looks, Chloe loves the character he plays: A kid-next-door type who's sweet, funny and just a tad awkward.
"I like him because I can feel like that might actually happen, like this guy could be real," she says.
Pattinson is really hot, too, but Chloe finds his character's infinite devotion to Bella "kind of unrealistic."
Fans of the series fall on two sides: Team Edward and Team Jacob. Chloe aligns firmly with the latter, but "it's pretty much half and half at my school," she says.
Each has his charms. On screen, Pattinson plays a dashing vampire. Off-screen, the British actor is shy and soft-spoken, humbled by all the "Twilight" attention. He's 23, lanky and pale, with thick, tousled hair he constantly runs his fingers through.
Lautner is buff and bronzed, with a gregarious personality, dark eyes and an easy smile. To reprise his character in "New Moon," he packed on more than 20 pounds of chiseled physique.
Pattinson and Lautner may be slightly sexier than teen idols past, but they're cut from the same teen-heartthrob cloth as their predecessors: Smooth-faced stars who seem wholesome — and just a touch away from attainable.
Heidi Hurst, executive editor of teen pinup magazine Tiger Beat, notes that since the magazine was established in 1965, the guys on its pages have been "non-threatening, more on the boyish side of good looks." The November issue features Lautner and Pattinson on the cover.
Most Tiger Beat readers, who range in age from 8 to 16, "still aren't dating boys in real life and this is their first exposure to boys as in `They're cute. I like them,'" Hurst says.
Chloe buys Tiger Beat when it has a good Lautner spread. She'll also Google him from time to time and, until recently, kept a "very hot, shirtless picture" of him as her computer screen-saver. But she's not as obsessive as some of her friends, who check YouTube for him daily and follow various "Twilight" fan sites.
She and a dozen of her friends are planning to make their own Team Jacob T-shirts and see "New Moon" when it opens Friday.
Chloe's mom, Jill Mullikin-Bates, approves of her daughter's love for Lautner, calling the young actor "a wholesome, realistic role model."
"He's the right age and super cute," says the 47-year-old mother of two. "It totally brings me back to when I was that age and having those fantasies."
Mom's teen heartthrob? Leif Garrett, a late-1970s icon adored for his feathered, Farrah Fawcett-style hair.
Fawcett, of course, was the most popular pinup of her day. But the boys who bought her iconic poster related to her in a completely different way than Chloe does, because they typically don't have relationships with their on-screen idols the way girls do. Most guys want to get physical with their love objects, where girls fantasize about their heartthrob becoming their boyfriend.
"Pinups are more explicitly eroticized where a heartthrob ... is about feelings, being able to imagine romance rather than just sex and sexuality," says Karen Tongson, a professor of English and Gender Studies at the University of Southern California.
Former heartthrob Rick Springfield says he never believed his adolescent female followers were attracted to him sexually: "If they were confronted with this older man and they saw all this body hair and whiskers, they'd probably completely gross out."
He theorizes that young, screaming fans are merely responding to fledgling feelings of attraction they can't yet define. "They're just letting out all this new energy that they're discovering," he says.
Chloe says if she ever met Lautner in person, she'd be "freaking out on the inside but trying to act cool on the outside." Sometimes when she's with her friends, "we pretend what we'd say to him if we were more confident."
As if adolescent emotions weren't enough, today's heartthrob crushes are supported by all manner of merchandising and gadgetry.
"It's so much more elaborate than it used to be," says USC cultural historian Leo Braudy. "Every movie comes fit with its posters and its icons and its bobbleheaded dolls."
Where Chloe's mom had to wait for the latest Tiger Beat to get new photos of Leif Garrett, the media empires that create the latest teen idols are ready with an array of products for every Zac Efron around — albums, posters, ring tones, T-shirts, tote bags and more. Then there's the life-sized cardboard cutout of Lautner that Chloe's mom and dad recently bought for her.
One day the doorbell rang at Chloe's San Fernando Valley home and cardboard Lautner was standing there, wearing a T-shirt and jeans and his trademark sweet smile.
He now stands in her bedroom, near the window and the little table where she writes in her journal — her first vision every morning and the last thing she sees each night.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY BEST-SELLERS
HARDCOVER FICTION
1. "The Gathering Storm (Wheel of Time)" by Robert Jordan, Brandon Sanderson (TOR Books)
2. "The Lost Symbol" by Dan Brown (Doubleday)
3. "True Blue" by David Baldacci (Grand Central)
4. "The Scarpetta Factor" by Patricia Cornwell (Putnam Adult)
5. "Pursuit of Honor: A Novel" by Vince Flynn (Atria)
6. "Last Night in Twisted River" by John Irving (Random House)
7. "The Help" by Kathryn Stockett (Putnam/Amy Einhorn)
8. "Nine Dragons" by Michael Connelly (Little, Brown)
9. "Grave Secret" by Charlaine Harris (Berkley)
10. "The Last Song" by Nicholas Sparks (Grand Central Publishing)
11. "Southern Lights: A Novel" by Danielle Steel (Delacorte Press)
12. "Half Broke Horses: A True-Life Novel" by Jeannette Walls (Scribner)
13. "Wolf Hall" by Hilary Mantel (Henry Holt)
14. "A Touch of Dead" by Charlaine Harris (Ace)
15. "Angel Time" by Anne Rice (Knopf)
HARDCOVER NONFICTION
1. "The Book of Basketball: The NBA According to The Sports Guy" by Bill Simmons (Ballantine/ESPN)
2. "SuperFreakonomics: Global Cooling, Patriotic Prostitutes, and Why Suicide Bombers Should Buy Life Insurance" by Steven D. Levitt, Stephen J. Dubner (William Morrow)
3. "Have a Little Faith: A True Story" by Mitch Albom (Hyperion)
4. "What The Dog Saw: And Other Adventures" by Malcolm Gladwell (Little, Brown)
5. "Arguing With Idiots: How to Stop Small Minds and Big Government" by Glenn Beck (Threshold Editions)
6. "The Pioneer Woman Cooks: Recipes from an Accidental Country Girl" by Ree Drummond (William Morrow Cookbooks)
7. "Knockout: Interviews with Doctors Who Are Curing Cancer--And How to Prevent Getting It in the First Place" by Suzanne Somers (Crown Publishing)
8. "Too Big to Fail: The Inside Story of How Wall Street and Washington Fought to Save the Financial System---and Themselves" by Andrew Ross Sorkin (Viking)
9. "True Compass: A Memoir" by Edward M. Kennedy (Twelve)
10. "Outliers: The Story of Success" by Malcolm Gladwell (Little, Brown and Company)
11. "Highest Duty: My Search for What Really Matters" by Chesley B. Sullenberg with Jeffrey Zaslow (William Morrow)
12. "The Conscious Cook: Delicious Meatless Recipes That Will Change the Way You Eat " by Tal Ronnen (Morrow)
13. "Reinventing the Body, Resurrecting the Soul: How to Create a New You " by Deepak Chopra (Harmony)
14. "My Life Outside the Ring" by Hulk Hogan with Mark Dagostino (St. Martin's Press)
15. "Jim Cramer's Getting Back To Even" by James J. Cramer with Cliff Mason (Simon & Schuster)
MASS MARKET PAPERBACKS
1. "The Associate" by John Grisham (Dell)
2. "The Untamed Bride" by Stephanie Laurens (Avon)
3. "Cross Country" by James Patterson (Vision)
4. "Deadlock" by Iris Johansen (St. Martin's Paperbacks)
5. "Hot on Her Heels" by Susan Mallery (HQN)
6. "Bound to Shadows" by Keri Arthur (Dell)
7. "Star Wars 501st: an Imperial Commando Novel" by Karin Traviss (LucasBooks)
8. "Angels at Christmas" by Debbie Macomber (Mira)
9. "Your Heart Belongs to Me" by Dean Koontz (Random House)
10. "Queen of Song and Souls" by C.L. Wilson (Leisure Books)
11. "While My Sister Sleeps" by Barbara Delinsky (Anchor)
12. "Heat Lightning" by John Sandford (Berkley)
13. "To Desire a Devil" by Elizabeth Hoyt (Vision)
14. "Scarpetta" by Patricia Cornwell (Berkley)
15. "The Wicked Duke Takes a Wife" by Jillian Hunter (Ballantine Books)
TRADE PAPERBACKS
1. "Bed of Roses" by Nora Roberts (Berkley)
2. "Push" by Sapphire (Vintage)
3. "The Shack" by William P. Young (Windblown Media)
4. "Say You're One of Them" by Uwem Akpan (Little, Brown)
5. "Olive Kitteredge" by Elizabeth Strout (Random House Trade Paperbacks)
6. "The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo" by Stieg Larsson (Vintage)
7. "The Time Traveler's Wife" by Audrey Niffenegger (Mariner Books)
8. "The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society" by Mary Ann Shaffer and Annie Barrows (Dial)
9. "The Glass Castle: A Memoir" by Jeannette Walls (Scribner)
10. "The Art of Racing in the Rain" (Garth Stein) (Harper)
11. "Run for Your Life" by James Patterson and Michael Ledwidge (Grand Central)
12. "Freakonomics" by Steven D. Levitt, Stephen J. Dubner (Harper Perennial)
13. "I Hope They Serve Beer in Hell" by Tucker Max (Citadel)
14. "Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet" by Jamie Ford (Ballantine Books)
15. "Three Cups of Tea: One Man's Mission to Promote Peace ... One School at a Time" by Greg Mortenson and David Oliver Relin (Penguin)
Animated Shorts 611: ASTRO BOY Flies Again!
Director David Bowers has every reason in the world to sound relieved.
After innumerable trials and tribulations his latest project, the CGI feature film version of "Astro Boy," had its world premiere in J
Flowers, slightly trampled, at NY Fashion Week
NEW YORK – Designers at New York Fashion Week had a new tactic to woo back wary customers: flowers.
Those lovely symbols of spring renewal emerged through rain-drizzled gloom on Sunday as Mercedes Benz Fashion Week
Muted florals — seen at Derek Lam, Adam, Cynthia Rowley, BCBG and Cynthis Steffe — were blurred like they had been caught in a downpour. The sense was one of transition: Spring is coming, but not undaunted.
Retailers should be satisfied with the pops of color, something they want to draw customers into stores. Yet the colors aren't so bright they require sunglasses — designers are aware of the gloomy context, too.
DEREK LAM
It was time for Derek Lam to have some fun, so he turned to a bit of retro carnival atmosphere.
His spring collection was a departure for the designer, who is known for sophisticated and elegant clothes. He went so far in his notes to describe them as a little "tawdry," borrowing details from summer fun destinations.
Tawdry, though, seems to be on a sliding scale: For Lam, there still needs to be luxury — and his customer is that woman who prefers glamour to gimmicks. She got what she was looking for in a wheat suede jacket with a leather back, worn with a jade-colored corset that had black strips of boning.
The palette and prints were all over the place — greens and blues, purple and gold, oversized island florals and star prints — the kind of mix you'd see along the boardwalk.
LELA ROSE
The skies cleared and it was like Lela Rose made it happen. Her spring collection was upbeat, wearable and, dare we say it, pretty.
She drew inspiration from the waves, surfers and scuba divers of Venice Beach, Calif., with colors borrowed from daybreak and sunset. There were a few pieces, including a green one-shoulder dress with rows of vertical blue laser-cut fabric, that mimicked the rolling tide.
Rose showed a knack for chic daytime dresses (actress Mariska Hargitay was wearing one in the front row). A sea-glass blue cotton dress with an open neck, drawstring waist and zip front would have been perfect on this Indian summer Sunday in New York.
A few ecru-colored jacquard pieces were a little dressier, but the yellow splash floral pattern on them made them versatile for more casual occasions.
VIVIENNE TAM
The butterfly that had a large part in the new Vivienne Tam spring collection made for a bohemian moment that seems rare these days as the industry seems singularly focused on breaking out of the retail-sales rut.
But Tam's light, delicate touch on the runway is most likely an easy-to-sell look. That probably wasn't an accident: Tam seems to have no problem mixing the art of fashion with the business of consumerism. She opened her show with a brief video commercial for technology company HP. Models carried butterfly-decorated handheld computers like clutch purses.
You know what? They looked good, a seamless fit for the clothes that gave a modern twist to the hippie.
The butterfly prints she used were feminine but not too delicate or corny. They worked best on printed silk jersey dresses and blouses.
CHADO RALPH RUCCI
What's makes a Chado Ralph Rucci black cocktail dress different from the countless other lovely black cocktail dresses presented at New York Fashion Week? It's all in the craftsmanship.
Rucci, the only American to be invited to show Haute Couture in Paris under his own name, is a stickler for details, resulting in fine clothes that need to be seen, felt — and probably even better, worn — to be fully appreciated.
For evening, Rucci's interest in the human body was brought to a handful of artsy prints — prints that would be hard to imagine at a socialite gala. A museum opening party, perhaps?
The black-tie pieces that showed Rucci's fascination with Japanese culture fared better. ("Chado" was added to his company name in 1994 after a tea ceremony.) A black-and-gold kabuki gown with an obi waist and checkerboard shawl and a strapless vanilla-silk gown with elaborate gold-wing arms were the kinds of pieces that make a positive, long-lasting impression.
BENHAZ SARAFPOUR
Behnaz Sarafpour tied up her spring collection with ribbons, bows and a little lace.
The tan georgette ribbon dress shown as a finale made for effortless eveningwear, and above-the-knee pleated dresses with knots of ribbons at one shoulder were perfect for cocktails. But on two lace dresses, hot pink and yellow ribbons looked like afterthoughts — neon prison bars on otherwise very wearable outfits yearning to break free.
A better bet were crepe de chine pleated shorts, with a wide, swingy feel. Also on trend were blue georgette dresses in a wispy feather print that fit nicely with the muted florals seen on other runways.
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Associated Press writer Lisa Tolin contributed to this report.
10 Questions About DC ENTERTAINMENT
While some people will see Wednesday's announcement of the formation of DC Entertainment by Warner Bros. as a copycat follow-up to last week's Disney/Marvel mega-deal, this restructuring appears to have been in the work
More on Newsarama:
Warner Bros. Creates DC ENTERTAINMENT To Maximize DC BrandsDr. Oz leaving Oprah Winfrey for his own talk show
NEW YORK – A young production staffer at "The Dr. Oz Show" wasn't buttering up her boss when she took a bite out of a carrot as he approached in an elevator lobby recently.
Vegetables were on the menu. So were frui
"The Dr. Oz Show," starring the heart surgeon and health evangelist, debuts Sept. 14. It's perhaps the most eagerly anticipated syndicated talk show since another Oprah Winfrey associate, Dr. Phil McGraw, went solo in 2002, said Bill Carroll, a market expert for Katz Television.
Oz has a sleek new studio at New York's 30 Rockefeller Plaza in the same room where Conan O'Brien worked before heading West. Its most fearsome element is the "truth tube," a platform that can display a person's weight, body fat and other health indicators, much like "The Biggest Loser" scale.
His goal is to make health information interesting and entertaining without trivializing it.
"There is no question we can save lives every day if we can motivate people to do what we're talking about," Oz said in a backstage conversation over lunch (salads, of course). "The challenge isn't what to say — because we know that — the challenge is how to say it so people are motivated."
He expects few celebrity guests, and no Winfrey visit is on the schedule. The show will typically open with a health "hot topic" like swine flu or immunization, and will end with audience questions. In between, Oz will try different ways to make health advice personal, recognizing that lectures don't work as well as stories viewers can relate to.
In one pre-taped episode, a woman brings her beer-bellied husband for a surprise "intervention." He listens to Oz describe how an unhealthy lifestyle was likely taking years off his life.
A woman who scrimps on sleep to take care of her family gets on a driving simulator while tired. She's reduced to tears and recognizes how sleeplessness affects more than herself when she "kills" six people, including a family of three, in accidents caused by dulled senses.
Besides controlling what his own staff eats, Oz has been secretly monitoring the food brought in to Jimmy Fallon's studio down the hall. Expect an unflattering public comparison.
"The crew is an experiment for us," Oz said. "If all I offer you is healthy food, you're either going to eat that stuff or you're not going to eat. And most people will eat. After a while, it becomes what you're used to eating. It's a little bit every day that makes a difference."
Oz envisions a "Let's Make a Deal" type game with four contestants to illustrate ways of curing vitamin D deficiency. One contestant opens a box with a "prize" of cod liver oil. Another reveals a picture of the sun, and wins a tropical vacation.
That's the tightrope Oz walks — fall off and he makes the serious seem silly. He's convinced this is the best way for people to remember what they've learned.
Carroll suggested Oz has the personality to make it work. The new show faces competition from "The Doctors," another health hour that premiered to modest success last season, but Carroll said there's room for both.
"The audiences can tell when you are real, and he is real," he said. "He's very likable. He's the person you wish was your doctor."
Oz had a decent enough career before television beckoned. He's a prominent surgeon with expertise is repairing heart valves. (Disclosure: His partner, Dr. Craig Smith, performed a quintuple bypass on this reporter two years ago.) He will continue to perform surgery one day a week.
Yet Oz noticed that he was getting more jazzed up persuading people they didn't need surgery than operating on them.
He landed a show, "Second Opinion," on the Discovery Channel and persuaded Winfrey to appear. "Before Oz went on Oprah, Oprah went on Oz," he said. That opened the door to Winfrey's media kingdom, resulting in 55 appearances on her talk show in five years, and eventually his own show. It's co-produced by Winfrey's Harpo Productions and Sony Pictures Television. He's contractually prohibited from airing in direct competition with her.
Oz likes to point out how real-life versions of Dr. Marcus Welby, the fictional doctor from a hit ABC series in the 1970s, are dying out — the ranks of general practitioners thinned by specialists, and the desire for high-tech solutions profound. The missing human touch is now often supplied by real-life TV doctors like ABC's Tim Johnson and CNN's Sanjay Gupta.
"I found myself going to work and taking care of people who wanted to get better who believed that their only path to salvation was through my scalpel," he said. "I can heal with steel. I know how to do that. But it's very disenfranchising when you realize the true solutions are outside the operating room."
___
On the Net:
http://www.doctoroz.com
___
EDITOR'S NOTE — David Bauder can be reached at dbauder(at)ap.org
Court: Paris Hilton can pursue Hallmark lawsuit
NEW YORK (Reuters) – The celebrity and heiress Paris Hilton may pursue her lawsuit against Hallmark Cards over its use of her picture and catchphrase "That's hot" on a greeting card, a federal appeals court
Hilton had contended that Hallmark violated her privacy and right of publicity by ripping off a scene from her reality TV show "The Simple Life" on a birthday card captioned "Paris's First Day as a Waitress."
A three-judge panel of the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals rejected Hallmark's argument that its depiction of the Hilton Hotels heiress was protected speech as a matter of law.
It sent the case back to a lower court, which had turned aside Hilton's claim of trademark infringement but rejected other Hallmark defenses.
Lincoln Bandlow, a lawyer at Lathrop & Gage LLP in Los Angeles representing Hallmark, said "the analysis of the First Amendment defense is incorrect. It will leave a lot of speakers subjected to meritless right of publicity claims."
He said Hallmark will evaluate options including a possible appeal to the full 9th Circuit or the U.S. Supreme Court.
Brent Blakely, a lawyer for Hilton, was not available for comment.
The card showed Hilton's face superimposed on a cartoon of a waitress serving a plate of food to a restaurant customer.
Hilton tells the customer, "Don't touch that, it's hot." The customer asks, "What's hot?" Hilton responds, "That's hot." The inside of the card reads "Have a smokin' hot birthday."
The appeals court rejected Hallmark's argument that the card was sufficiently "transformative" as to deserve automatic protection because the setting was different and the phrase "that's hot" referred to the temperature of a plate of food.
While noting differences from the TV show, including that the cartoon body was of a generic female and not Hilton, Judge Diarmuid O'Scannlain said "the basic setting is the same: we see Paris Hilton, born to privilege, working as a waitress."
He concluded that Hilton "has at least some probability of prevailing on the merits before a trier of fact."
The private equity firm Blackstone Group LP took control of Hilton Hotels Corp in 2007. Hallmark is privately held and based in Kansas City, Missouri.
The case is Hilton v. Hallmark Cards, U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals (Pasadena), No. 08-55443.
(Reporting by Jonathan Stempel; Editing by Gary Hill)
Lee Pace is magic in `Daisies'
Relaxing on the set of his critically praised series, "Pushing Daisies," Pace taps the air teasingly with his forefinger. It's how Pace's character, Ned, makes others live or die
It's also how Pace keeps British actress Anna Friel, his lively co-star, in line during long production hours. Friel plays Ned's longtime love, Charlotte "Chuck" Charles.
"When Anna acts up on set, I just touch her like this," Pace said, pointing a magic finger.
The finger-tap is a joke on Ned and Chuck's deadly dilemma on "Pushing Daisies" (8 p.m. EDT Wednesday). In the show's pilot Ned resurrected Chuck after she was murdered. Now they live together. If Ned touches Chuck once more — directly, skin-on-skin — she's back in a casket, pronto.
"Just sitting together in a car, it's life or death stakes for them," Pace said of the seemingly doomed (or at least physically frustrated) couple. "Every day when we block scenes, I think, `Now how should we hold our bodies?'"
In fact, the physical intimacy of Ned and Chuck is carefully chaperoned on the Warner Bros. lot in Burbank, especially by executive producer Barry Sonnenfeld ("Men in Black"), who also directs the series.
"Barry's always going, `Ooops! Don't you dare touch Anna,'" Friel said. "It's hard, trying to fit together into a tight two-shot."
On a recent day of production, Friel was fighting a bad cold in her trailer. "Don't get too close," she said.
"We actually did try going for a week with no touching at all on set," Friel said of her co-star. "We didn't do too good. We're both — particularly me — incredibly tactile. By day three I was dead three times."
If "Pushing Daisies" carries a message about sexual abstinence, "that was never the intention, but you can certainly read it in," Fuller said. "I suppose the show is really about the dangers of any kind of intimacy, not just physical intimacy."
Fuller previously created "Dead Like Me," the Showtime series about grim reapers, and "Wonderfalls," the short-lived Fox series in which inanimate objects talked. With "Daisies," he meshes fantasy, comedic romance, comfort food and murder.
When he's not baking perfect pies, Ned investigates homicides, with help from Chuck and private eye Emerson Cod (Chi McBride). Zap, and Ned revives victims long enough for them to reveal their killers. Zap, and they're dead again.
"Ned's real gift is the understanding of the value of life and death," Pace said. "He's not careless with his powers. But after he brought Chuck back to life everything is different for him. It's like his life is happening for the first time."
Fantasy elements aside, playing Ned is not a stretch, Pace said. Not after his previous roles as a transgendered female entertainer in the 2003 Showtime telefilm "Soldier's Girl" and an inscrutable CIA agent in the 2006 movie "The Good Shepherd." He also played a supporting role in "Wonderfalls."
"There's a way that Bryan writes for Ned that's the way I speak," Pace said. "I ramble. And a big challenge with Ned is just trusting that less is enough. Ned's range of emotions is like this," he said, squeezing a bit of air between thumb and forefinger.
Indeed, much of the acting on "Pushing Daisies" is understated, by design.
"That's a tribute to Barry Sonnenfeld's directing style," Fuller said. "Since everything in the show is so vivid, if the acting were also vivid it might be too much."
Visually, "Pushing Daisies" pops with rich colors and quirky sets including the Pie Hole, Ned's restaurant-in-the-round with a crust-shaped roof.
"Daisies" is also an ongoing homage to one of Fuller's favorite filmmakers, Alfred Hitchcock. A future episode will feature a take on the dream sequence in Hitchcock's "Vertigo," Fuller said. Another episode will send up the infamous shower-stabbing scene in "Psycho."
"And there's a big homage to Hitchcock's `The Birds,' with a character who's pathologically afraid of birds," Fuller said.
On the romantic side of the series, visual jokes abound. Ned and Chuck must never brush flesh against flesh. But they adopt an array of inventive protective barriers, including cellophane, body bags and beekeepers' suits.
"Actually, there's something about the not-touching that's kind of hot," Pace said. "Ned and Chuck are turned on by wishing they could touch. When they cross each other in a doorway, they share that moment of, `I wish I could kiss you, I wish I could run to bed with you — but I can't.' But there's still something sexy about it, you know?"
___
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Critics at loggerheads in Toronto
Any description of the 2007 Toronto International FilmFestival undoubtedly will depend on which part of the festivalgot sampled. Even looking at the reviews of some high-profilepictures, a reader can only conclude that the festival played adirty trick on poor critics by screening entirely differentfilms with exactly the same titles. Some critics loved"Elizabeth: The Golden Age." Others didn't bother suppressingyawns. Some hated the pretentiousness of "The Assassination ofJesse James by the Coward Robert Ford." Others were enthralled.No one seemed to be discussing the same picture.
What passes for consensus fell on two films that cocktailchatter tends to label as "small," but perhaps that word needsre-examination. Are we talking budget? Certainly not ambitionin the terms of the two surefire hits of Toronto '07: "TheVisitor" and "Juno."
I asked a top exec at a studio classics division about hisinterest in Tom McCarthy's "Visitor." The look on his face saidit all: Too tough to market. So upstart Overture Films pickedup U.S. rights for a reported $1 million-plus, which probablyis a smart sale because the film does need a committed anddetermined distributor to create audience awareness for thissmall gem -- there's that adjective again -- as was the casewith McCarthy's last small gem, "The Station Agent."
Character actor Richard Jenkins plays a widowed professorwho gets involved in the lives of two illegal immigrants, whowere scammed into renting his Manhattan flat. It's a lovely,humane and surprising film -- the kind that reminds you why youfell in love with movies in the first place.
Repeat that last phrase for Jason Reitman's "Juno" from FoxSearchlight. To say this comedy focuses on an unintendedpregnancy is like saying "Sideways" is about wine. Accurate butnearly irrelevant. The film is a highly stylized and originalcomedy about growing up and responsibility and the strengththat comes in both friendship and family. There also is aterrific performance from Ellen Page that deserves an Oscarcampaign.
That's right, Toronto is supposed to be all about Oscar. Orat least insofar as it is part of a crucial axis that includesTelluride and Venice, which will prepare the way for fallcandidates for Oscar '08.
It didn't seem to work out that way this year, though. Tobe certain, Cate Blanchett seems set in two acting categoriesas best actress for "Elizabeth," whatever anyone thought of themovie, and for best supporting actress as Bob Dylan in "I'm NotThere."
Other familiar names are apparently in the mix: thebrothers Coen, Ang Lee, David Cronenberg and Brian De Palma.Writer-director Tony Gilroy seems to have won friends andinfluenced people with "Michael Clayton," which also is anotherfeather in George Clooney's hat. Sean Penn has made his mostaccessible film as a director with "Into the Wild," and youknow how Academy voters love to nominate him. Other than that,the crystal ball is fuzzy.
There seemingly were many more films arriving here withouta distributor. Some say it was a deliberate effort on the partof organizers to be more of a "discovery" festival likeSundance. For what it's worth, many Toronto staffers made theirfirst-ever trip to Park City in January to check out how thingsoperate there.
Several Toronto films might not get released in time forOscar contention. Alan Ball's "Nothing Is Private" was pickedup by Warner Independent Pictures but probably won't bereleased until the middle of next year at the earliest. UmaThurman received positive response for her role in VadimPerelman's "In Bloom," but it is being self-distributed by ToddWagner and Mark Cuban's Magnolia Pictures, which has yet toannounce a release date.
While such films as Paul Haggis' "In the Valley of Elah,"Neil Jordan's "The Brave One" and Noah Baumbach's "Margot atthe Wedding" divided viewers, you'd still have to considerTommy Lee Jones ("Elah"), Jodie Foster ("Brave One") andJennifer Jason Leigh and Nicole Kidman ("Margot") as earlyOscar contenders.
It was mostly thumbs down, though, for Oscar-winner GavinHood's political thriller "Rendition," Julie Taymor's musical"Across the Universe" and Woody Allen's "Cassandra's Dream."And there was an overall grumpy reaction from critics to the"Iraq films," meaning not just documentaries that focused onthe war but also films made under its influence, which, onecould argue, even includes "Elizabeth."
That didn't prevent multiple standing ovations for "Body ofWar," from veteran documentarian Ellen Spiro and a newcomer bythe name of Phil Donahue. (Yes, that Phil Donahue.) But thosestanding Os, coming largely from Toronto residents, had much todo with appearances onstage by the subject of the film, KansasCity's Tomas Young, who returned from deployment in Iraq shotand paralyzed and is now a leading anti-war advocate, androcker Eddie Vedder, who sang two songs he composed for thefilm.
The festival sleeper might be "Brick Lane," bought by SonyPictures Classics a week before its Toronto debut. Like"Visitor," this London-based story tells of the plight ofimmigrants, an increasingly common movie theme, though in thiscase the focus is on identity and self-worth. Directed by SarahGavron, the film displays terrific acting from a mostly Indiancast and the intelligence to let audiences discover its themeswithout hitting them over the head through undue dramaticemphasis. This too is a film that reminded you why you lovemovies. Which is what film festivals are really about, afterall.
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