Breaking Entertainment News and Analysis

  • 3 More Move Up …

    Does Fox actually program their “Idol” shows now with the knowledge that everyone is watching on Tivo? How else to explain the hour-long Results Show? And the filler. Did I mention filler? Oh, sorry, they call them “recaps.” First, there was a video montage RECAP of the hopefuls’ “Idol Journey,” which mainly featured our contenders…

    By

    Jennifer Kelly

  • At Eminem’s Trial: How Is an Online Music Sale Different?

    The legal battle between Universal Music Group (UMG) and Eminem’s publishing company continued Thursday, as the music company tried to prove in a downtown Los Angeles courtroom that a record sale is the same in both the physical and online world.

    By

    Amy Kaufman

  • A Jonas Brothers Virus Survival Kit

    Disney’s “The Jonas Brothers: The 3D Concert Experience” opens tonight at midnight, and the pressure to attend the very first showing is hanging around our home like a cold that just won’t go away. The Jonas Brothers virus hit our home about two years ago and has not lifted its tight grip off my 13-year-old…

    By

    Suzette Valle

  • Box Office Upset: Madea in 2nd Weekend Beats Jonas 3D in Debut

    In a box office upset, Tyler Perry’s ‘Madea Goes to Jail’ from Lionsgate beat the Disney teen sensation ‘Jonas Brothers’ by a mile

    By

    Lauren Horwitch

  • More Motion Picture Fund: $14 Million for Consultants?

    An interesting tidbit I’ve just excavated from the audited accounts and tax returns of the Motion Picture and Television Fund: The troubled entertainment industry retirement home and medical network spends close to $20 million a year on what it describes as “professional fees.” That’s a whole lot of money. It’s money that simply does not…

    By

    Andrew Gumbel

  • From Waves to Wax to Ones and Zeros

    In the beginning there was music. It happened all by itself and it went completely unnoticed. The sound of thunder echoing off a distant canyon. A waterfall pouring down into a clear deep pool. Dragonfly’s wings beating the night air. Then early man began banging rocks together and, later, he stretched some hides over hollowed…

    By

    Peter Himmelman

  • Yahoo’s Bartz Seeks To Rebrand, Clean House

    The company’s new chief executive Carol Bartz handed CFO Blake Jorgensen a cardboard box on Thursday in a broad, if expected, reorganization plan.

    By

    Lew Harris

  • Updated: Garcetti Talks About Plans for Film Czar

    After years of declining movie production in Los Angeles County, the city may finally get an official devoted to keeping Hollywood here, and happy.

    By

    Sharon Waxman and Lauren Horwitch

  • Bland, Bland, Bland, Bland, Bland

    Unlike a certain curvaceous diva who is touted as a great songstress yet chose to lip-synch on Oscar night, at least last night’s contestants actually sang live.    You’d never have known it. As the judges continue to stress, with only three people from each group moving forward, now is the time for these would-be’s…

    By

    Jennifer Kelly

  • Chernin’s Next Act: Viacom? Apple? Microsoft?

    The business world is thick with speculation over where one of the top media executives in the country will land.

    By

  • Slim Shady and Universal Go to Court

    Eminem wants a bigger cut of digital downloads; music companies say they still have high costs.

    By

    Amy Kaufman

  • Long Live Liz Smith

    No one in the gossip world can touch the hem of Liz Smith’s pantsuit. It is a sad day indeed, when the Doyenne of All Things Gossip loses her column in a major New York tabloid. This is outrageous! Especially coming on the heels of a racially charged editorial cartoon that provoked King Rupert Murdoch…

    By

    Naomi Serviss

  • Will the Web Kill Comedy?

    So, I’m sitting here in my swanky Hollywood condo, in beautiful downtown Tinseltown, reading a story in TheWrap on some viral video guy hardly anybody knows who’s getting better ratings then NBC’s prime time lineup (of course that’s not a huge undertaking, since NBC’s ratings pretty much suck) …and I literally hurl my morning bran…

    By

    Ester Goldberg

  • Updated: SAG’s White Responds to TheWrap

    His consulting company was shut down because of its ties to Marc Dreier, a lawyer accused of a $380 million hedge fund scheme.

    By

    Lauren Horwitch

  • Is Murdoch’s FCC Waiver in Trouble?

    Angered by a cartoon that appeared last week in the New York Post, Rev. Al Sharpton and NAACP chief executive Benjamin Jealous are meeting today with officials at the Federal Communications Commission in Washington. Sharpton says that they will urge the FCC to review the waiver that allows the News Corps’ Rupert Murdoch to own…

    By

    Johanna Neuman