Daily Rounds.....

So this weekend was a full on assault from Mother Nature and today is even worse with 97 degree temps and 95 % humidity. My dog was ready to jump out my second story window yesterday it was so bad. Sex and the City lost its number one spot in Box Office totals to a cartoon panda and Hillary Clinton gave an incredibly eloquent concession speech to a room of supporters on Saturday, so lets just say it was not a good weekend for women over 40. Well except for the lovely ladies of the Golden Girls who were recognized at the annual TV Land Awards, which also saluted Roseanne this past weekend. The program airs this upcoming Sunday and I can't wait to hear what the ladies have to say at the program. Sadly though, Estelle Getty stayed home since she is suffering from dementia and has left show business a few years back.





Overall, we have oodles of pop culture goodies, mainly casting news, to discuss, so let’s get to it.

* Jessica Alba had her first baby this weekend. She and her fiancé Cash Warren named the baby Honor Marie. I’m thinking the relevance of Ms. Alba in Hollywood is diminishing as each second passes.

* Will Smith has apparently donated $1 million to a private school that will use many variations of Scientology teachings to educate children. This story, among others, does not fare well in the whole “I’m not a Scientologist” argument Smith has been delivering to the media for the past 8 years. Speaking of Scientology, John Travolta made an appearance at Nick Loren’s album release party and he had a very interesting look going on. Loren is an and stunt double for Mr. Travolta so don’t get anything twisted here folks. John is just a straight buddy, supporting his friend, very similar to why Tom Cruise and Will Smith can’t go anywhere without each other. Friendship.

* Cameron Crowe, the director responsible for John Cusack’s always lovable character Lloyd Dobbler, is bringing another romantic comedy to life with a few nobodies. Kidding, Crowe will direct Reese Witherspoon and Ben Stiller in an upcoming romantic comedy produced by Columbia Pictures.

* Patrick Swayze has been given the go ahead from doctors to begin production on his upcoming A&E series The Beast, which has Swayze playing an crazy FBI agent who is under secret investigation by Internal Affairs. We all know that the most important role Swayze has already been caught on film.

* Showtime has picked up Diablo Cody’s The United States of Tara, starring one of my favorites Toni Collette. In the half-hour program, Collette will play a wife and mother who is battling dissociative identity disorder, with the help of her husband played by John Corbett, from Sex and the City fame. Steven Speilberg will executive produce the program under the Dreamworks name. The program is expected to begin production later in the summer and find its way onto the network sometime next year.

* AV Club through The Onion interviews one of my favorite humans on the planet right now, Joel McHale the host of E!'s The Soup. He discusses what still scares him after skewers the realtiy nonsense and morons like Tyra Banks on a weekly basis.

* VH1 and Lionsgate will partner up to find the next Scream Queen", a reality show that will help ten unknowns through coaching and auditions for one to become the newest Scream Queen. My reality loving ass will definitely find myself tied to the couch and watching this on my DVR. Ugh.

* And finally the battle continues between Clint Eastwood and Spike Lee. The beyond famous directors are battling over the real truth behind Eastwood's WWII drama "Flags of Our Brothers". Lee was interviewed a while back and discussed the fact that Eastwood did not cast any black actors to take part in the famous act of the flag raising at Iwo Jima. Eastwood fired back at Lee and called him out on not knowing his history. He also told the junior director to shut his mouth. Lee fired back and quoted stories from soldiers of color who were participants on the flag raising and also said that "neither of the directors were on a plantation". While I can appreciate that Lee believes he knows his history and is upset about the lack of representation of African-Americans in period pieces, I am fairly certain that Eastwood himself is not a racist and to bring it to a level that is uncomfortable and completely beyond the appropriate realm of arguments.