ODD BITS ...
GREAT GRAN THE QUEEN
The Queen is said to be "delighted" after learning she is to become a great-grandmother for the first time.
Buckingham Palace said Princess Anne's son Peter Phillips and his Canadian-born wife Autumn were expecting their first child in December.
Mr Phillips, the Queen's eldest grandson and 11th in line to the throne, met his wife while working at the Montreal Grand Prix in 2003.
They were married at Windsor Castle in May 2008.
ENTERTAINMENT NEWS …
CELINE DION
Celine Dion is going to be surrounded by men!
The "My Heart Will Go On" singer, who announced she's expecting twins in November, is going to have two boys, Star has learned exclusively.
In May, Celine — who already has a 9-year-old son, René-Charles, with husband René Angélil, 68 — announced that she's pregnant with two bundles of joy thanks to her sixth attempt at in-vitro fertilization.
ODD BITS …
ARCHIE ON US STAMPS
America’s most squeaky-clean teens may start popping up in your mailbox: Archie, Betty, and Veronica of the beloved Archie Comics series are being honored with their very own postage stamp.
The Riverdale High trio will join fellow comic-strip legends Beetle Bailey, Calvin and Hobbes, Garfield, and Dennis the Menace as part of the U.S. Postal Service’s new Sunday Funnies commemorative stamps. The stamps will debut July 16 with a first-day-of-issue ceremony in Columbus, Ohio.
Each of the stamps features the funny-page stars completely in character: lazy Private Beetle Bailey, who arrived on the scene in 1950, laughs as Sarge flips his lid; tot-and-tiger team Calvin and Hobbes, who premiered in 1985, make funny faces; 5-year-old Dennis the Menace, who has been stirring up trouble since 1951, runs off to wreak more havoc; and Garfield, born in 1978, stays true to his catty self by giving eager pooch Odie the cold shoulder.
As for Archie, the forever-17-year-old redhead who was created in 1941 and made his newspaper debut in 1946, is shown sharing a chocolate milkshake with his favorite blonde and brunette gal pals.
To coincide with the honor, issue #210 of the “Archie Double Digest" (which is now available), includes a story in which the Riverdale gang imagine what it would be like to be immortalized in stamp form.
Said Archie Comics publisher Jon Goldwater of the tribute, “The U.S. Postage Stamp signifies just how much Archie Comics and its fabled romantic and comedic adventures of Archie and friends continue to touch our hearts and make us all laugh out loud, not just on Sundays, but on each and every day."
MOVIE NEWS …
THE LITTLE MERMAID
Hans Christian Anderson’s The Little Mermaid is best known in cinematical terms these days as the Disney musical featuring singing crabs and a happy-go-lucky undersea princess who wins the heart of the human prince she loves. But if Working Title and Atonement/The Soloist director Joe Wright have any say in the matter, a very different version will be headed for our screens.
The production company and the director are teaming up for the first ever English-language live action take on the tale, which will follow the young mermaid’s quest to give up her life under the ocean to live with the human she falls for.
Though chances are it could harken back to the darker themes of Anderson’s original 1837 plot, we’re not sure it’ll delve too far, since Wright’s take will be inspired by a children’s puppet theatre production staged by the Little Angel Company in London.
Abi Morgan, who last wrote the script for Brick Lane, has been tasked with turning the story into a screenplay.
Wright, meanwhile, is finishing up work on assassin drama Hanna, with Saoirse Ronan, Eric Bana and Cate Blanchett. Wonder if Ronan might be among the actresses considered to play the mermaid in the new movie?
QUOTABLES …
ANGELINA JOLIE
"I feel sad for someone who has never known love. Love elevates. You know, Brad would joke about me having this conversation about love. Love? It's such a funny word. Brad can find certain phrases of poetry for it. I'm terrible at it. But I know it means wanting the best for the people you love, putting their interests above your own, always. Love does that. Love is what you live for."
- Angelina Jolie
TRIVIA BITS …
STATUESQUE 2
La Fuega d’Attila
by Alessandro Algardi
Lions at the base of Nelson’s Column
by Edwin Landseer
The Little Mermaid
by Edvard Eriksen
Madonna and Child
by Henry Moore
Mt Rushmore President’s Heads
by John Gutzon Borglum
Night and Day
by Jacob Epstein
MOVIE TRIVIA …
RENEE ZELLWEGER
In preparation for her role in Bridget Jones’ Diary (2001), Renee Zellweger spent several weeks at a well known London publishing company.
Her unsuspecting colleagues knew her as Bridget Cavendish but also noticed that she bore a strong resemblance to a certain Hollywood actress. She was accepted as genuine and her colleagues tried to help her with tips on breaking into the book business.
One of them later told a newspaper - “I did wonder why she’d stuck a small picture of Jim Carey on the side of her computer, but didn’t really dwell on it” (The Daily Telegraph 26 March 2001)
THIS WORLD ...
DEEP SEA CREATURES
Scientists have discovered a host of bizarre-looking deep-sea creatures in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean.
More than 10 previously unknown marine species were found thousands of metres below sea level on a six-week voyage by researchers from the UK's University of Aberdeen.
The scientists believe some of the colourful and transparent creatures could provide the missing evolutionary link between backboned and invertebrate animals.
SUPERSTITIONS ...
CLOCKS
If a clock which has not been working suddenly chimes, there will be a death in the family.
QUOTABLES …
KATHARINE HEPBURN
“Howard [Hughes] and I were indeed a strange pair. We each had a wild desire to be famous. I think this was a dominant character failing. People who want to be famous are really loners. Or they should be.”
- Katharine Hepburn
ENTERTAINMENT NEWS …
WICKED LEE MEAD
LEE MEAD IN WICKED
At 28, Lee Mead has achieved the sort of breakout fame that comes rarely to those on the UK musical scene.
Three years ago, he was chosen through the BBC reality TV casting show Any Dream Will Do to play the title role in the latest West End incarnation of Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat (surely the most celebrated musical ever to star a loincloth).
After 600 performances, he moved on to study acting in New York, have a go at Oscar Wilde’s Lord Arthur Savile’s Crime on the road in England and, most crucially, to marry TV presenter and West End performer Denise Van Outen (Song and Dance), seven years his senior. They welcomed a baby daughter, Betsy, on May 1.
The curly-haired Mead is now back on the West End through February 2011 as Fiyero, the object of Glinda and Elphaba’s affection in the megahit Wicked. This time, unlike the male-oriented Joseph, it’s the show’s heroine that goes whizzing toward the roof.
TRIVIA BITS …
STATUESQUE 1
Abraham Lincoln
by Daniel Chester French
Angel of the North
by Antony Gormley
Awakening
by Paul Philippe
The Cenotaph
by Edward Lutyens
Christ the Redeemer
by Paul Landowski
The Feast of Herod
by Donatello
The Kiss
by Auguste Rodin
MOVIE NEWS …
DESPICABLE ME
Universal Pictures is making its first foray into the realm of digital animation with Despicable Me, starring Steve Carell and Jason Segel, and they've released a full gallery of stills from the film, featuring all the colorful characters!
In a happy suburban neighborhood surrounded by white picket fences with flowering rose bushes, sits a black house with a dead lawn. Unbeknownst to the neighbors, hidden beneath this home is a vast secret hideout. Surrounded by a small army of minions, we discover Gru (Carell), planning the biggest heist in the history of the world: He is going to steal the moon!
Gru delights in all things wicked. Armed with his arsenal of shrink rays, freeze rays, and battle-ready vehicles for land and air, he vanquishes all who stand in his way. Until the day he encounters the immense will of three little orphaned girls who look at him and see something that no one else has ever seen: a potential Dad.
THIS WORLD …
EARTH WAVE FORMATIONS
The Oceans give us magnificent photographs of wave formations.
These photographs show some wave formations that occur within nature on land.
Enjoy!
