Carrie Prejean fired as Miss California

By Dan Whitcomb
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Beauty queen Carrie Prejean, who ignited a furor at the Miss USA pageant by taking a stand against gay marriage, has been fired as Miss California for violating her contract, officials said on Wednesday.
Prejean, who nearly lost her Miss California crown last month following the same-sex marriage flap and revelations that she had posed topless at age 17, failed to fulfill her duties, a pageant spokesman said.
"This was a decision based solely on contract violations including Ms. Prejean's unwillingness to make appearances on behalf of the Miss California USA organization," Keith Lewis, the pageant's executive director, said in a statement.
The pageant said owner Donald Trump, who had stood by Prejean, 22, despite the uproar over her same-sex marriage remarks and racy photos, backed her dismissal.
"I told Carrie she needed to get back to work and honor her contract with the Miss California USA organization and I gave her the opportunity to do so," Trump said in the statement.
"Unfortunately it just doesn't look like it's going to happen and I offered Keith my full support in making this decision," he said. "Carrie is a beautiful young woman and I wish her well as she pursues other interests."
Pageant officials said first runner-up Tami Farrell would assume the crown and take over Prejean's duties as Miss California.
Prejean's remarks at the Miss USA pageant came after judge and Internet gossip Perez Hilton asked her if every U.S. state should legalize same-sex marriage.
She responded that "in my country, in my family, I do believe that marriage should be between a man and a woman, no offense to anybody out there. But that's how I was raised."
Her views, and the strident reaction to them, came in the midst of heated nationwide debates over same-sex weddings which have recently been legalized in five U.S. states but banned in a California referendum in November.
Prejean defended her answer while acting as a fill-in host on the "Fox and Friends" program on the Fox network. She said her position was similar to that taken by President Barack Obama.
(Editing by Xavier Briand)

Source: Reuters

FCC expects few problems during digital switchover

By James Hibberd and Katy Bachman
LOS ANGELES/NEW YORK (Hollywood Reporter) - Just days before the transition to digital television, 2.8 million households, or 2.5 percent of the TV market, are unprepared.
According to Nielsen, the latest tally is half of the 5.8 million that were unprepared in February, when the government postponed the transition by four months.
At a news conference Wednesday in Los Angeles, acting Federal Communications Commission chairman Michael Copps reiterated the importance of the transition and said the agency was expecting relatively minor problems when the switchover begins Friday.
"This is the biggest transition in television, an even bigger transition than black-and-white to color," Copps said. "Our whole society is going digital, and broadcast needs to be a part of that transition."
Copps said the freed-up bandwidth will help establish a public safety network, as well as provide more room for wireless and broadband applications.
Yet Copps, who Barack Obama appointed as head of the FCC in January, also was critical of the government's handling of the transition during the past two years.
"We've got some humps and bumps to navigate; there's still a number of people who don't know what to do," Copps said. "We knew this transition was coming; the government was late getting itself organized ... but we are where we are and have to make this transition."
The FCC has employed 4,000 phone operators to be standing by through the weekend to handle calls coming through their information line (888-225-5322). Some broadcasters are layering on their own initiatives to help viewers make the switch. For example, in Los Angeles, the TV stations have set up their own phone bank to help ease the transition.
Experts say problems are likely to be concentrated in markets that are least prepared.
The Albuquerque/Santa Fe area of New Mexico is the least ready, with 7.6 percent of TV homes completely unprepared. Several of the nation's largest markets -- including Dallas-Fort Worth, Seattle-Tacoma, Los Angeles and Phoenix -- have unprepared TV households in the 4-5 percent range.
How those percentages will translate into TV ratings is the big unknown.
"This is the d-day, the week it is going to happen," said Stan Statham, president and CEO and California Broadcasters Association. "All Americans will receive better picture, better sound. There is nothing negative about what's happening this week."
(Editing by Sheri Linden at Reuters)

Source: Reuters

Michael Jackson concerts face legal challenge

By Alex Dobuzinskis
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - A music promoter on Wednesday sued to stop Michael Jackson from performing in London this year, claiming his appearances would violate a prior contract.
New Jersey-based AllGood Entertainment Inc contends in the lawsuit filed in federal court in New York it signed a deal with the singer's manager, Frank DiLeo, in November committing him to an appearance in the U.S. this summer.
Under the agreement, Jackson is not supposed to give another concert before that show, the lawsuit states. Jackson has signed with AEG Live to play 50 shows at London's O2 Arena starting in July.
AllGood Entertainment contends those shows violate the New Jersey company's agreement with DiLeo, which it says predates the singer's deal with AEG Live.
Representatives for Jackson and AEG Live were not immediately available to comment.
AEG Live, which is named in the lawsuit, has previously called AllGood Entertainment's claims meaningless.
Jackson has been rehearsing in the Los Angeles area for the London shows.
AllGood Entertainment contends in its lawsuit its agreement with DiLeo also left the door open for Jackson to perform with other members of his show business family, which includes his brothers from the Jackson Five and sister Janet Jackson.
The company's lawsuit alleges breach of contract, fraud and tortious interference with a contract. It seeks at least $20 million in compensatory damages and at least $20 million in punitive damages.
It also names as defendants Jackson's production company, as well as DiLeo, his company and AEG Live's parent company AEG, a wholly owned subsidiary of the Anschutz Company.
Jackson's series of London shows have been touted as unprecedented. AEG Live says that, all together, the shows will gather the biggest audience ever to see an artist in one city.
(Editing by Bob Tourtellotte and Alan Elsner)

Source: Reuters

Van Morrison's career almost over before it began

By Dean Goodman
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Van Morrison hates the fame game so much that he would have abandoned his music career 40 years ago if one of his early albums had made him a superstar.
The album in question is his second solo release, "Astral Weeks," which failed to crack the U.S. or British pop charts when it came out in 1968 but is now regarded as one of the greatest musical works of the rock era and is generating new interest more than 40 years since its release.
Undaunted by the initial commercial setback, the Irish soul singer says he "just moved on" to his next project: The 1970 album "Moondance" whose title track is one of his best-known songs.
If "Astral Weeks" had generated the sales commensurate with its eventual stellar status and transformed him into a huge pop star, Morrison is in no doubt about his reaction.
"I would have quit the business had that happened," he said in an email interview with Reuters. "I am not one who has ever taken well to fame and what that attracts. It's a drag. I just wanted to be a songwriter and a singer. I did not bargain for all the rest of it."
Morrison, now 63, has spent his entire career trying to dodge "all the rest of it," in the process becoming one of rock's most unknowable figures. A hugely influential artist who was in turn inspired by Ray Charles and Lonnie Donegan, Morrison has earned a reputation as a grumpy old man and has zero tolerance for showbiz frivolity. He even failed to turn up to his Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction in 1993.
FICTIONAL FAVORITE
But Morrison remains proud of "Astral Weeks," which ranks at No. 19 on Rolling Stone magazine's list of the greatest albums of all time and is now a steady seller along with the rest of his vast catalog.
The disc, recorded in less than two days in New York City with a jazz quartet assembled by producer Lewis Merenstein, was a marked departure for the singer of the pop hits "Gloria" (with his band Them) and "Brown Eyed Girl."
Morrison had spent years crafting the songs, setting mysterious lyrics referencing his Belfast childhood to multilayered arrangements. The centerpiece of the free-form improvisational effort was "Madame George," a 10-minute tune whose meaning confounds the writer and his fans to this day.
"I was practicing songwriting," he recalled. "Each composition is a fictional story I made up to work on my craft as a songwriter. The rest of the stories people say about my music is fiction as well. I do not tend to write about me. I write about the collective, the collective unconscious."
While many artists of a certain vintage avoid dwelling on their past glories in an effort to show that they are still relevant, Morrison is simply reveling in "Astral Weeks."
To mark its 40th anniversary, he performed the album in its entirety at two shows in Los Angeles last November, and released the fruits on the DVD "Astral Weeks: Live at the Hollywood Bowl," which has just gone on sale exclusively at Amazon.com. A CD was also released through his own EMI-distributed label.
He has also revived "Astral Weeks" at sold-out shows in London and New York City.
Morrison has been accompanied on stage by an orchestral string section as well as a band comprising two of the veterans from the original "Astral Weeks" sessions. He has also ad-libbed new material to many of his compositions. Continued...
Source: Reuters

Film, TV music composers urge copyright law change

By Sue Zeidler
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Nathan Barr has scored horror films like "Hostel" and the HBO vampire series "True Blood," but what really keeps the composer up at night is fear he will not get paid for music distributed online.
"'True Blood' is my first big show for TV and it's definitely going to see a lot of play on the Internet. It's a big issue for me," Barr, 36, told Reuters in an interview. "I don't understand why composers don't get paid if someone downloads it."
The issue is the latest digital copyright debate pitting creators in the entertainment industry on one side and studios, broadcasters, cable operators and technology companies on the other. Barr underscores how a growing number of artists -- writers, actors and, yes, composers -- feel they are not fairly compensated for content distributed on the Internet.
Actors and writers have aired their grievances and demanded Hollywood studios pay up. Now, composers, along with publishers, are urging Congress to change copyright law so that when music airs in an audio-visual download, it is considered a public performance that earns them royalties.
The stakes are high: Industry experts believe composers could potentially earn nearly $100 million in additional royalty payments annually as Internet viewing grows -- if the law was changed to deem downloads of music in audio-visual works as public performances.
"We see audio visual as a vigorous growth area for composers, whether it's on Hulu, Netflix or iTunes, and a big issue is clarifying public performance rights as they apply to digital downloads," said Richard Conlon of Broadcast Music Inc (BMI), a performing rights group that collects royalties on behalf of artists.
The copyright issue, apart from being proposed legislation, is also expected to be the subject of a House Judiciary committee hearing in July, industry experts say.
At the center of the debate is a federal court ruling in April 2007, considered a victory for companies like AOL, RealNetworks and Yahoo! Inc YHOO.O> that found that downloading a music file was not considered a "performance."
AU REVOIR
Composers are arguably one of most overlooked among the so-called frontline entertainers behind a movie or TV series.
"Most composers don't get pensions like other people ... and we're now realizing we're not covered for much of the way entertainment is viewed online," Barr protested.
Performing rights group American Society of Composers Authors and Publishers (ASCAP) is appealing the 2007 ruling.
And ASCAP, BMI, and various other publishing and songwriting groups sent a letter in March 2009 to Congress urging a change in the U.S. Copyright Law.
"It's important these markets get locked down as composers really rely on public performance royalties," Conlon said.
Meanwhile, the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA), a trade group for Hollywood studios such as General Electric Co's Universal Pictures, Viacom Inc's Paramount and Walt Disney Co, strongly opposes these efforts, arguing that a download is not a performance. Continued...
Source: Reuters

Denzel Washington takes humble turn in "Pelham"

By Alex Dobuzinskis
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Denzel Washington has played soldiers, gangsters and tough cops, but in crime drama "The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3" opening on Friday, the actor wanted to strike a more humble pose as a lowly subway dispatcher who must save passengers on a hijacked train.
Walter Garber's ordinary day turns hellish when a criminal played by John Travolta takes over a train filled with commuters, and Garber must negotiate for their freedom.
Washington told reporters recently that to play Garber, a kind of everyman, he simply went to "the deli."
"Not New Delhi, the deli," Washington joked. "Just ate a lot and kept getting smaller and smaller sweaters to wear and spilled coffee on myself."
Washington has played many standout characters in his long career. He won Oscars for his roles as a U.S. Civil War soldier in "Glory" and a corrupt cop in "Training Day." More recently, he was a drug kingpin in 2007's "American Gangster" and a police detective in 2006 film "Inside Man."
Washington said he was concerned about comparisons to "Inside Man," where his character also negotiated for the release of hostages, and he wanted this role to be different.
"I just liked the idea when they hand him a gun that he had never held one before, that he was an ordinary guy in an extraordinary situation," Washington said.
"The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3" is a remake of a 1974 film of the same name that starred Walter Matthau and Robert Shaw.
In the latest film, a team of armed men led by former convict Ryder (Travolta) take over a full subway car and demand a ransom. Ryder builds a rapport with Garber over the two-way transit radio, and demands that Garber negotiate for the hostages' release, instead of a police official.
As tension builds, Garber is forced to go into the subway tunnel to meet with Ryder and try to free the hostages.
TRAVOLTA'S RETURN
Travolta's starring role in "The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3," which was filmed last year, is his first movie appearance since his 16-year-old son died of a seizure while the family was on vacation in the Bahamas.
Travolta has avoided interviews about the movie to spend time with his grieving family, and this week issued a statement saying the efforts of others to promote the film "have allowed my family the additional time to reconcile our loss."
"I talked with John two and a half weeks ago and he just would say that he's struggling," Washington told reporters. "So, more than talking to him, I listened to him for about two or three hours."
Tony Scott, the director of "The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3," said Travolta plays a "dangerous" villain, but that the actor has "a big heart." Continued...
Source: Reuters

Cuban art market shows signs of vitality

By Walker Simon
NEW YORK (Reuters) - The Cuban art market is showing signs of vitality as the economic recession weakens demand for works from elsewhere in Latin America, collectors said.
A Cuban painting was the top seller in May's Latin American art auctions in New York. American collectors of Asian art are now snapping up Cuban contemporary works and Cuban art galleries are also springing up.
For years late Cuban artists of the 20th century, like surrealist Wifredo Lam, have pierced the $1 million mark. A 1943 painting by Mario Carreno fetched nearly $2.2 million at Christie's last month.
Prices have multiplied even faster for living artists, many of them based in Cuba.
"What you could buy for $25,000 four or five years ago could now easily be at least $100,000 and could go up to half a million dollars depending on size, date and rarity," said U.S. collector Howard Farber.
The technical virtuosity of artists is what is attracting buyers, as well as the African influence. Others find novelty in political humor and the use of religion as a vehicle for political comment.
Farber switched to collecting Cuban art after he auctioned his contemporary Chinese art collection for $20 million in 2007. His 58-piece Cuban art show, including "El Sagrado Corazon," traveled in the United States and is due to go to Canada before heading to Europe.
Cuban art bought by Donald Rubin, who has acquired more than 150 pieces from living artists based in Cuba, will also be in touring exhibitions, according to Rachel Weingeist, of The Shelley and Donald Rubin Foundation.
Farber and Rubin represent opposite poles of art collectors who came to Cuban art in recent years, said Sandra Levinson, executive director of the non-profit Cuban Art Space in New York, which houses over 10,000 contemporary Cuban art works.
Farber, she said, is drawn in part by artists' skill and contemporary themes. Rubin leans toward works that may express spiritual strains. Much Cuban art refers to symbols drawn from a blend of Catholic and African religious practices, according to Cuban Art Space curator Bernardo Navarro.
But Jose Fuster, whose 77-work show is on display at the Cuban Art Space, said his inspiration came from Europe.
"My artistic father is Picasso, my favorite uncle is Gaudi," Fuster said in a documentary showing at the gallery in an exhibit running until July 18.
His paintings include views reminiscent of the Last Supper, but with a Caribbean twist. A smiling crocodile frames a semi-circle around the diners. Fish also smile in seas skimmed by boats framed by the icons of the Havana skyline.

Source: Reuters