Celebrity Gossip

[alan45]

Desperate Housewives' star Eva Longoria has filed for divorce to end her three-year marriage to basketball player Tony Parker, following revelations of his text messaging with another woman.

Longoria, Parker - Married three years ago

Longoria, 35, filed divorce papers in Los Angeles Superior Court citing irreconcilable differences.

"It is with great sadness that after seven years together, Tony and I have decided to divorce," Longoria said in a statement posted on her official Facebook page. "We love each other deeply and pray for each other's happiness."

Her spokeswoman had no further comment beyond the posting.

Celebrity TV show Extra said its host Mario Lopez had spoken to Longoria, and she told Lopez she had found 100s of text messages from another woman on Parker's phone. She also told Lopez that Parker had cheated on her before.

"She is devastated, she wants us all to know that," Lopez said in a statement. "But she's strong."

Longoria and Parker, 27, who plays for the San Antonio Spurs, dated for years before being married in a lavish ceremony at a French chateau in 2007.

Their wedding was picture perfect, and they seemed to be living a happily married life -- she, the Hollywood star and he, the handsome athlete. They have no children.

The marriage was Parker's first and Longoria's second. Her marriage to 'General Hospital' TV actor Tyler Christopher ended in 2004 after two years.

[tammyy2j]

Ryan Reynolds has been named the sexiest man alive by People Magazine.

The star of next year's superhero epic 'Green Lantern' has become the winner of the popular magazine award, which is in its 25th year. Previous winners include Brad Pitt, George Clooney and Johnny Deep - who have each received the title twice.

Canadian actor Reynolds joked, "My body naturally wants to look like Dick Van Dyke. When I stop training, I turn into a skin-coloured whisper.

"This gives my family (ammunition) for teasing me for the rest of my life.

"Now it's going to be, 'Sexiest man, take out the garbage. 'That does sound better,' The most difficult part is going to be working this title into a conversation with random strangers."

It's a double celebration for the Reynolds household. His movie star wife Scarlett Johansson was recently named Babe of the Year by GQ Magazine.

Reynolds saw off a host of Hollywood hunks to land the title, beating 'Mad Men's John Hamm, 'Twilight' star Kellan Lutz, Robert Downey Jr. and Jake Gyllenhaal.

[tammyy2j]

John Travolta and wife Kelly Preston are parents to son Benjamin, who was born Tuesday in a Florida hospital. The baby weighed 8 lbs., 3 oz. "John, Kelly and their daughter Ella Bleu are ecstatic and very happy about the newest member of the family," they say in a statement. "Both mother and baby are healthy and doing beautifully." Preston, 48, told People recently that the entire family was in major preparation mode for their new addition as her pregnancy neared its end. "I've been cleaning out everything in the house," Preston said in September. "Ella has been helping too. She's looking forward to being a big sister.

[Perdita]

Norfolk turkey tycoon Bernard Matthews has died at the age of 80, his company has confirmed.

He began his business more than 60 years ago - with 20 eggs and a second-hand incubator.

Mr Matthews, famous for his "bootiful" catchphrase, stepped down from the company's main board of directors in January on his 80th birthday.

The company had suffered some difficult years recently which had included jobs cuts and an outbreak of bird flu.

[Perdita]

Leslie Nielsen has died at the age of 84.

The comic actor, best known for his roles in Airplane! and The Naked Gun, passed away at a hospital near his home in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida, where he was being treated for pneumonia.

Nielsen's nephew Doug announced the news on Canadian radio station CJOB, saying: "Just in this last 48 hours, the infection has gotten too much and today at 5.30am, with his friends and his wife by his side, he just fell asleep and passed away."

Nielsen's agent John S. Kelly later confirmed the news.

The actor, born in Saskatchewan, served in the Royal Canadian Air Force before making his debut on US television in the late '50s, and eventually appearing in a string of hit comedy films in the '80s and '90s.


RIP Leslie

[moonstorm]

Don't call me Shirley! RIP Leslie, one of the true greats.

[Perdita]

Mariah Carey has been reported to be pregnant.

According to Media Takeout, the 40-year-old singer is expecting her first child with husband Nick Cannon.

Carey was recently photographed performing at a concert with a black leather jacket and a long white tank top which emphasised what appeared to be a baby bump.

Meanwhile, in June, Carey revealed a fuller figure while performing in Arkansas.

Mariah Carey has possibly suggested that she and husband Nick Cannon are expecting twins.

However, it is not clear if Carey simply used the word "they" during a radio interview to avoid assiging a gender to her unborn child.

Carey confirmed her pregnancy last month and suggested that the birth will take place in the spring.

According to several media reports, the singer seemed to imply that she is pregnant with more than one child while talking to Radio Disney DJ Ernie D to promote her latest LP Merry Christmas II You.

After revealing that she sings Christmas carols around the house to introduce her baby to holiday traditions, Carey added: "I just hope that they don't turn out hating Christmas!"

The singer previously vowed that she is to be a "hands-on" mother.

[alan45]

Leslie Nielsen is best known for playing bumbling cop Frank Drebin in the Naked Gun series and the doctor in Airplane! who hated being called Shirley.

Yet the Canadian actor spent nearly 30 years playing it straight in hundreds of film and television productions before he became a cult comedy figure.

Born in 1926 in Regina, Saskatchewan, Nielsen grew up 200 miles south of the Arctic Circle at Fort Norman, where his father was an officer of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police.

Upon graduating high school at 17, he joined the Royal Canadian Air Force and served as an aerial gunner, despite being legally deaf.

After World War II, Nielsen worked as a DJ at a Calgary radio station and studied at the Academy of Radio Arts in Toronto.

Moving to New York on a theatre scholarship, he got his first acting break in 1950 on Studio One - a series of hour-long dramas.

He went on to make more than 100 appearances in numerous TV dramas, among them Rawhide, Dr Kildare and Peyton Place.

In 1956 he went to Hollywood to make a film, The Vagabond King, with Casablanca director Michael Curtiz.

The movie, which he dubbed "The Vagabond Turkey", flopped. But MGM still signed him to a seven-year contract which saw him appear in sci-fi classic Forbidden Planet.

Tall and prematurely white-haired, Nielsen began a long career playing villains, cowboys, doctors and officials in films like Beau Geste, Gunfight in Abilene and The Poseidon Adventure.

"I played a lot of leaders, autocratic sorts," he once said. "Perhaps it was my Canadian accent."

Meanwhile he remained active in television, taking starring roles in The New Breed, The Protectors and Bracken's World. Yet all were short-lived.



Click to play

Click to play

Leslie Nielsen in Airplane! Courtesy Paramount Home Entertainment
In 1980, the star was cast as the doctor in Airplane!, a spoof disaster film that launched him into comedy.

His role as Dr Rumack saw him deliver inane non-sequiturs with a straight face, as well as utter his most famous phrase.

That came in response to the line "Surely you can't be serious?" - to which he replied; "I am serious, and don't call me Shirley."

Critics argued he was being cast against type. Yet Nielsen disagreed, saying comedy was what he intended to do all along.

"I've always been cast against type before," he said of his early years in Hollywood.

The film's success led to Nielsen being cast as Frank Drebin in the 1982 TV series Police Squad.

Double entendres

Though cancelled after only six episodes, it spawned a big-screen success in 1988 when it was made into The Naked Gun.

The film, in which Nielsen appeared with George Kennedy, Priscilla Presley and OJ Simpson was a huge hit and led to two sequels.

Filled with slapstick action and double entendres, the films saw his character beat up the Ayatollah Khomeini, grapple with the Queen of England and scrub a birthmark from Mikhail Gorbachev's head.


Drebin had a close encounter with 'The Queen' in The Naked Gun
Between the first two Naked Guns, Nielsen started making TV commercials in Britain that capitalised on his Drebin character.

His later movies, mostly parodies of well-known films, included Dracula: Dead and Loving It, Spy Hard, Stan Helsing and Superhero Movie.

Nielsen also had a serious side, touring in the late 1990s with his one-man show on the life of attorney Clarence Darrow.

In a 2000 BBC interview, however, he said he was unlikely to play more serious roles on screen.

"This play gives me a certain liberty," he said. "But if I were to do something similar on screen the public would, I'm sure, stay away in their droves.

"I have already gone down in history as the man in Naked Gun and I will always be remembered for raising a laugh."

[Perdita]

Stella McCartney has given birth to her fourth child with husband Alasdhair Willis.

E! Online reports that the fashion designer, who is daughter of Paul McCartney and his late wife Linda, gave birth to a girl last week.

The baby has been named Reiley and joins older siblings Miller Alasdhair James, 5, Bailey Linda Olwyn, 4, and Beckett Robert Lee, 2.

Reiley weighed in at 8lbs when she was born in London on November 23.

Stella is reportedly planning on cutting short her maternity leave as a result of her current workload and new collection.

The new addition to the family is the seventh grandchild for former Beatle Paul.

[Perdita]

Leslie Nielsen has died at the age of 84.

The comic actor, best known for his roles in Airplane! and The Naked Gun, passed away at a hospital near his home in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida, where he was being treated for pneumonia.

Nielsen's nephew Doug announced the news on Canadian radio station CJOB, saying: "Just in this last 48 hours, the infection has gotten too much and today at 5.30am, with his friends and his wife by his side, he just fell asleep and passed away."

Nielsen's agent John S. Kelly later confirmed the news.

The actor, born in Saskatchewan, served in the Royal Canadian Air Force before making his debut on US television in the late '50s, and eventually appearing in a string of hit comedy films in the '80s and '90s.


RIP Leslie

LEGENDARY comic LESLIE NIELSEN was laid to rest yesterday.

Family and friends flocked to the funeral of the late actor near his Fort Lauderdale home in Florida.

Wife Barbaree was accompanied by the Canadian Mounted Police as The Naked Gun theme tune was played.

The silver-haired funnyman, 84, died in his sleep last month from complications after battling pneumonia.

He'll Shirley be missed.