British author J.K. Rowling , who a week ago published the final Harry Potter book, said in an interview out Thursday that she is already back at work.
The British author says she's sad the Harry Potter series has ended, but will not stop writing.
"I'm sort of writing two things at the moment," she told USA Today. "One is for children and the other is not for children.
"The weird thing is that this is exactly the way I started writing Harry. I was writing two things simultaneously for a year before Harry took over. So one will oust the other in due course, and I'll know that's my next thing," she told the national daily.
Rowling admitted to being angered that the last of the seven-novel series had been posted on a website prior to the official release.
"I was angry," she told USA Today, for her young fans, the "10-11-year-olds who really wanted not to know" how the book ended, until they had a chance to read it.
However, she was heartened that rumored endings included the death of the boy-wizard.
"I was very proud that people thought Harry's death was a genuine possibility. I wanted the reader to feel that anyone might die, as in life," she said.
The books themselves will live on, the 41-year-old billionaire said.
"Do I think they'll last? Honestly, yes."
"In 50 years' time, if people are still reading them, they deserve to be read, and if they're not, then that's OK."
" Harry Potter And The Deathly Hallows " sold an estimated 8.3 million copies within 24 hours of its release, according to its US publisher.
Some 325 million copies of the first six volumes have been sold worldwide, and the books have been translated into 64 languages.
Experts: Lohan Could Get 180 Days in Jail
Lindsay Lohan's best bet for avoiding jail time is to go back into rehab yet again and remove herself from a high-flying party lifestyle, if not, she could be facing up to six months behind bars, legal observers said Wednesday.
Lohan, 21, was less than two weeks out of a recovery program and was voluntarily wearing an alcohol-monitoring device when she was arrested Tuesday in Santa Monica for investigation of misdemeanor driving both under the influence and with a suspended license, and felony cocaine possession.
Her lawyer, Blair Berk, has said she had a "relapse" and was receiving medical care at an undisclosed location.
A call to Lohan's publicist was not returned Wednesday.
The actress completed more than six weeks in rehab less than two weeks ago, and had checked into another recovery clinic in January.
Over the weekend, she was photographed at a party in a pink bikini, with the monitoring device on her ankle.
That behavior won't cut it anymore and neither will spa-style clinics, said Barry Gerald Sands, a Century City defense attorney who's also a certified drug and alcohol counselor.
"Whatever you have done in the past, do a 360-degree turn and go the other way," Sands said Wednesday. "She has to change her alleged friends, people sharing or selling her drugs. She has to lead a clean and sober life.
"Silk-sheet recovery homes don't do the job."
If Lohan is charged with a crime, she could ask a judge to order her to remain in rehabilitation while she awaits trial, Sands said.
A "recovery team" should be in place that includes doctors and addiction specialists who can give the judge alternatives to jail.
And if she is convicted, the rehab time would count against whatever jail sentence is issued, Sands said.
Lohan has never been convicted of a drug or alcohol crime and judges routinely place first-time DUI offenders on probation rather than behind bars. However, Lohan's case could be complicated because she also was arrested for investigation of felony DUI in Beverly Hills on Memorial Day after her Mercedes-Benz crashed into a curb.
That case was submitted to the Los Angeles County district attorney's office last week and is being reviewed, spokeswoman Jane Robison said.
If she is convicted of two felonies in the two cases, she might be eligible for 18 months or more in state prison but such a sentence is unlikely, said Lawrence Taylor, a former Los Angeles prosecutor who runs one of the nation's top DUI defense law firms.
"Our prisons are packed already," he said. "We don't need some recreational (drug) users with a small amount of coke with a clean record."
On the other hand, Lohan probably will have to do some time in county jail simply because prosecutors and judges saw the backlash when Paris Hilton was briefly allowed to serve her DUI sentence at home instead of jail.
"They're going to see how sensitive everything was ... Everything was being looked at with a microscope and broadcast to the entire world, literally," Taylor said. "They saw what happened and judges do run for re-election, and deputy DAs are aware that their bosses run for re-election."
Both sides would be interested in stalling a court case until the media frenzy ebbs but that is unlikely if the continued scrutiny of Paris Hilton is any signpost, Taylor said.
"Entertainment has become more important than information and the media is looking ... for money. They're looking for audience, they're looking to give the public what they want," he said.
That scrutiny means that Lohan, if convicted, probably will get some jail time regardless of whether it is warranted in her case, Taylor said.
"I would say this woman's going to be doing at least 30 days" and perhaps as long as 180 days if she is convicted of two DUIs along with drug possession, Taylor said.
However, virtually all DUI cases are settled by plea agreements.
If he were running the defense, Taylor said, his team of experts would reconstruct the traffic accident; seek out witnesses, videotapes and audio of the traffic stops; examine repair and usage records for police breath analysis machines; and look into any blood tests Lohan was given to detect drugs and check the qualifications of the officers who stopped her. Medical experts also would check to see if Lohan had some medical condition, say, diabetes, that can affect the tests.
"After a few months of hard work, you can find where all the cracks are, and there will be some," Taylor said.
Then, "I would strongly suggest ... that perhaps this woman needs rehab rather than a long stretch in jail."
A prosecutor faced with possibly losing a case might agree, otherwise, Taylor said, "your much-cherished conviction rate is going to go down and your chances of promotion are going to go down."
Taylor concedes that the type of defense that celebrities can afford is off-limits to the average DUI defendant. and that affects the severity of their sentencing.
"Are you saying does justice have a price? Absolutely? But the same is true of heart surgery," Taylor said. "It's not going to be the same cost and it's not going to be the same result."
Lohan, 21, was less than two weeks out of a recovery program and was voluntarily wearing an alcohol-monitoring device when she was arrested Tuesday in Santa Monica for investigation of misdemeanor driving both under the influence and with a suspended license, and felony cocaine possession.
Her lawyer, Blair Berk, has said she had a "relapse" and was receiving medical care at an undisclosed location.
A call to Lohan's publicist was not returned Wednesday.
The actress completed more than six weeks in rehab less than two weeks ago, and had checked into another recovery clinic in January.
Over the weekend, she was photographed at a party in a pink bikini, with the monitoring device on her ankle.
That behavior won't cut it anymore and neither will spa-style clinics, said Barry Gerald Sands, a Century City defense attorney who's also a certified drug and alcohol counselor.
"Whatever you have done in the past, do a 360-degree turn and go the other way," Sands said Wednesday. "She has to change her alleged friends, people sharing or selling her drugs. She has to lead a clean and sober life.
"Silk-sheet recovery homes don't do the job."
If Lohan is charged with a crime, she could ask a judge to order her to remain in rehabilitation while she awaits trial, Sands said.
A "recovery team" should be in place that includes doctors and addiction specialists who can give the judge alternatives to jail.
And if she is convicted, the rehab time would count against whatever jail sentence is issued, Sands said.
Lohan has never been convicted of a drug or alcohol crime and judges routinely place first-time DUI offenders on probation rather than behind bars. However, Lohan's case could be complicated because she also was arrested for investigation of felony DUI in Beverly Hills on Memorial Day after her Mercedes-Benz crashed into a curb.
That case was submitted to the Los Angeles County district attorney's office last week and is being reviewed, spokeswoman Jane Robison said.
If she is convicted of two felonies in the two cases, she might be eligible for 18 months or more in state prison but such a sentence is unlikely, said Lawrence Taylor, a former Los Angeles prosecutor who runs one of the nation's top DUI defense law firms.
"Our prisons are packed already," he said. "We don't need some recreational (drug) users with a small amount of coke with a clean record."
On the other hand, Lohan probably will have to do some time in county jail simply because prosecutors and judges saw the backlash when Paris Hilton was briefly allowed to serve her DUI sentence at home instead of jail.
"They're going to see how sensitive everything was ... Everything was being looked at with a microscope and broadcast to the entire world, literally," Taylor said. "They saw what happened and judges do run for re-election, and deputy DAs are aware that their bosses run for re-election."
Both sides would be interested in stalling a court case until the media frenzy ebbs but that is unlikely if the continued scrutiny of Paris Hilton is any signpost, Taylor said.
"Entertainment has become more important than information and the media is looking ... for money. They're looking for audience, they're looking to give the public what they want," he said.
That scrutiny means that Lohan, if convicted, probably will get some jail time regardless of whether it is warranted in her case, Taylor said.
"I would say this woman's going to be doing at least 30 days" and perhaps as long as 180 days if she is convicted of two DUIs along with drug possession, Taylor said.
However, virtually all DUI cases are settled by plea agreements.
If he were running the defense, Taylor said, his team of experts would reconstruct the traffic accident; seek out witnesses, videotapes and audio of the traffic stops; examine repair and usage records for police breath analysis machines; and look into any blood tests Lohan was given to detect drugs and check the qualifications of the officers who stopped her. Medical experts also would check to see if Lohan had some medical condition, say, diabetes, that can affect the tests.
"After a few months of hard work, you can find where all the cracks are, and there will be some," Taylor said.
Then, "I would strongly suggest ... that perhaps this woman needs rehab rather than a long stretch in jail."
A prosecutor faced with possibly losing a case might agree, otherwise, Taylor said, "your much-cherished conviction rate is going to go down and your chances of promotion are going to go down."
Taylor concedes that the type of defense that celebrities can afford is off-limits to the average DUI defendant. and that affects the severity of their sentencing.
"Are you saying does justice have a price? Absolutely? But the same is true of heart surgery," Taylor said. "It's not going to be the same cost and it's not going to be the same result."
Potter publisher sues over breach
 Publishers have placed a strict embargo on the book's publication |
Scholastic sued online retailer DeepDiscount.com for breaking the strict midnight Saturday embargo.
In court papers filed in Illinois, the publisher also named its distributor Levy Entertainment for failing to ensure books were not sent out.
It said that only a tiny fraction of its 12m copies had been distributed.
"The number of copies shipped is around one one-hundredth of one per cent," said Scholastic in a statement.
'Please ignore'
The company added that they had a list of customers who had ordered the book from DeepDiscount.com and were asking them to put it to one side if they have already received it by mistake.
A report in The Baltimore Sun newspaper about a customer who had already received his copy prompted Scholastic to take action.
They are seeking unspecified damages from the two companies in question.
A spokesman for Infinity Resources, who own DeepDiscount.com, said: "We take the situation very seriously and are conducting an internal investigation."
JK Rowling has called on fans to dismiss speculation
Levy Entertainment declined to comment.
Scholastic has also asked "everyone, especially in the media, to preserve the fun and excitement for fans everywhere".
Harry Potter author JK Rowling has also posted an appeal on her official website, stating: "Let's all, please, ignore the misinformation popping up on the web and in the press.
"I'd like to ask everyone who calls themselves a Harry Potter fan to help preserve the secrecy of the plot for all those who are looking forward to reading the book at the same time on publication day.
"In a very short time you will know everything!" the statement concluded.
Earlier this week, pictures of what appeared to be pages from the new novel were circulating on the internet.
Minna Fry, marketing director of the book's UK publisher Bloomsbury said: "There have been so many fake books going up on the internet over the past four to six weeks. We have no reason to believe that these are anything other than fake either."US critics pan Beckham TV show
Victoria Beckham's debut on US television as the subject of a spoof fly-on-the-wall documentary has not been well received by critics.
The New York Post said the NBC show was "an orgy of self-indulgence".
As Beckham is shown setting up her new home in Los Angeles, she utters: "It's exhausting being fabulous."
Her husband David has had his first training session with his new team, LA Galaxy, but injury may force him out of a friendly against Chelsea on Saturday.
In the programme, Victoria Beckham Coming to America, she is shown dishing out orders to a new personal assistant, who she insists should not be too good-looking.
"It's got to be all about me," she says.
She is also shown tottering in high heels as she is taught how to pitch the first ball at a Los Angeles Dodgers baseball game.
However, newspaper critics were not impressed with the programme, which "smacks of too much fame, too much money and too much time spent believing the hype for all concerned", according to the New York Post. 
Beckham's husband David is a LA Galaxy player
The New York Times described the Spice Girls singer as apparently "pleasant and not without a sense of humour".
But it said that this was not enough "to carry viewers through an hour of house-hunting, sunbathing and applying for a driver's licence".
Patt Morrison of the Los Angeles Times said that people in the United States had been "underwhelmed" by Beckham.
"If you're looking for a bad driver, we have Lindsay Lohan, who does it better," she told BBC One's Breakfast.
"If you're looking for rich, we've got Paris Hilton, and if you're looking for thin blondes, if you fire a cannon in Beverly Hills, you hit 100 of them.
"It's a very competitive market, even for a Beckham."
The programme is due to be broadcast on ITV1 at 2100 BST on Tuesday.
Victoria Beckham's US media blitz backfires
Victoria Beckham 's attempts to woo the US media since arriving in Los Angeles soccer star husband David appear to have backfired, with critics savaging a reality show to be broadcast Monday.
"Victoria Beckham: Coming to America," was originally intended as a mini-series, but trimmed to a one hour special by the NBC network.
Billed as a revealing special that "delves into Victoria's larger-than-life world to reveal, among other things, her wicked sense of humor and style," the show failed to impress the mainstream media.
The New York Post gave the show a damning zero-star review, slamming the pop-star turned fashion figure as "relentlessly self-promoting" with "vapid, condescending behavior" in a show described as "an orgy of self-indulgence."
"You'll sit there slack-jawed at the gall of these people who think we are that stupid," the Post's reviewer wrote in a scathing broadside, also laying into the couple's "nightmarishly overdone rococo mansion" in Beverly Hills .
"The 'special' which NBC calls an 'exclusive' inside look at Victoria's larger-than-life life smacks of too much fame, too much money and too much time spent believing the hype for all concerned," the paper wrote.
The New York Times was no more forgiving in its write-up, describing Victoria Beckham as being "somewhat famous for being sort of famous, and is photographed a lot in Britain ."
"She does appear to be pleasant and not without a sense of humor. But that isn't quite enough to carry viewers through an hour of house hunting, sunbathing and applying for a driver's license," the paper's reviewer said.
"There has to be something going on behind the scenes because there is no other way to explain so much time and videotape spent on the moving arrangements of Mr. Beckham's wife.
"If she can retain viewers past the first commercial break, then the results will be conclusive: either there is a vast, media-controlling conspiracy afoot, or there is no such thing as celebrity ditz-fatigue," the paper said.
The US media has been having a field day since the couple arrived in Los Angeles last week, when David began a new chapter at the LA Galaxy soccer club, with the pair appearing on magazine covers, chat shows and television specials.
"Victoria Beckham: Coming to America," was originally intended as a mini-series, but trimmed to a one hour special by the NBC network.
Billed as a revealing special that "delves into Victoria's larger-than-life world to reveal, among other things, her wicked sense of humor and style," the show failed to impress the mainstream media.
The New York Post gave the show a damning zero-star review, slamming the pop-star turned fashion figure as "relentlessly self-promoting" with "vapid, condescending behavior" in a show described as "an orgy of self-indulgence."
"You'll sit there slack-jawed at the gall of these people who think we are that stupid," the Post's reviewer wrote in a scathing broadside, also laying into the couple's "nightmarishly overdone rococo mansion" in Beverly Hills .
"The 'special' which NBC calls an 'exclusive' inside look at Victoria's larger-than-life life smacks of too much fame, too much money and too much time spent believing the hype for all concerned," the paper wrote.
The New York Times was no more forgiving in its write-up, describing Victoria Beckham as being "somewhat famous for being sort of famous, and is photographed a lot in Britain ."
"She does appear to be pleasant and not without a sense of humor. But that isn't quite enough to carry viewers through an hour of house hunting, sunbathing and applying for a driver's license," the paper's reviewer said.
"There has to be something going on behind the scenes because there is no other way to explain so much time and videotape spent on the moving arrangements of Mr. Beckham's wife.
"If she can retain viewers past the first commercial break, then the results will be conclusive: either there is a vast, media-controlling conspiracy afoot, or there is no such thing as celebrity ditz-fatigue," the paper said.
The US media has been having a field day since the couple arrived in Los Angeles last week, when David began a new chapter at the LA Galaxy soccer club, with the pair appearing on magazine covers, chat shows and television specials.
What Ever Happened to Momma Rose?
Marriages made in heaven don’t always translate to earth. If any actress of her generation seemed fated to play Momma Rose, the juggernaut of a stage mother in the musical “Gypsy,” it was Patti LuPone, the juggernaut of a Broadway star.
After all, Ms. LuPone became famous for her no-holds-barred portrayal of an actress of ravenous and ravening ambition in the title role of “Evita” three decades ago, and ambition is Momma Rose’s oxygen. What’s more, Ms. LuPone has lungs and larynx of brass to rival those of Ethel Merman, the rafter-shaking star of the original “Gypsy” in 1959, to whom Ms. LuPone has often been compared.
Yet in the enjoyable but unenthralling production of “Gypsy” that opened Saturday at City Center and runs through July 29, part of the new Encores! Summer Stars series, Ms. LuPone does not, for once, feel like an unstoppable force. As Rose, the child-flattening maternal steamroller with Broadway dreams, she seems to be still fiddling with the gears and looking over her shoulder when she needs to be plowing full speed ahead with blinders on.
There’s a lot to recommend in Ms. LuPone’s performance and even more in the production itself, directed by Arthur Laurents, who wrote the show’s book. Ms. LuPone has endowed the thwarted Rose with charm, sensuality, a sense of humor, a startling lack of diva vanity and even a spark of bona fide mother love.
Contrary to what you might have anticipated, Ms. LuPone is less a Rose of billboard-size flair and ego than the sort of pushy but likable woman you might compete with at the supermarket for that last perfect sole fillet. (You’d lose, but you wouldn’t hate her.) Ms. LuPone has given us a human Rose, with doubts and a nagging tug of self-awareness. But once you introduce such traits into Momma Rose, the air starts to leak out of her.
I do believe there’s more than one way to make Rose flower. Though I didn’t see Merman, I did catch Angela Lansbury (1974), Tyne Daly (1989) and Bernadette Peters (2003), and could happily defend the wildly different approaches of each.
What they all projected, though, was Rose’s ferocious, unswerving single-mindedness. Ms. LuPone, in contrast, seems to slide in her purposeful focus, the way her voice — more trombone than trumpet — famously slides around on notes.
She can’t resist playing jokes for jokes’ sake, giving lines a Mae West-style spin that, however amusing, puts a distance between star and character. And in singing Jule Styne’s adrenaline-stirring melodies, she never pursues a straight line, so that the great Act 1 finale, “Everything’s Coming Up Roses,” has a feeling of distracting, internalized restlessness.
Without a tidal wave of a Momma Rose, this production lacks the emotional momentum to be a transporting “Gypsy.” Nonetheless, anyone seeing “Gypsy” for the first time should have no difficulty understanding why this adaptation of the memoirs of the stripper Gypsy Rose Lee is the great American musical.
Like two hit revivals currently on Broadway, “Chicago” and “A Chorus Line,” “Gypsy” is an anatomy of the obsessions that draw people into show business and keep them there, even when they’re drowning. Neither as cynical as “Chicago” nor as touchy-feely as “A Chorus Line,” “Gypsy,” set in the dying days of vaudeville, is both clear-eyed and celebratory about the energy and egotism that feed even marginal forms of theater.
This exciting, double-edged quality is evident in every aspect of the show, to which a young man named Stephen Sondheim contributed the lyrics. Mr. Styne’s score melds razzle-dazzle audacity with a breath of wistfulness for the unobtainable. And as might be expected from an Encores! production, the orchestra (overseen by Patrick Vaccariello) gives life to that score with a fullness that itself justifies the price of a ticket.
Unlike previous Encores! fare, this one is presented not as a concert but as a full-dress production, with cheerfully seedy sets (by James Youmans) and costumes (by Martin Pakledinaz) that emphasize the quality of showbiz fable. The ingenious, plot-propelling choreography by Jerome Robbins, who also directed the original, has been appealingly recreated here (by Bonnie Walker). And Mr. Laurents, who directed the Broadway revivals of 1974 and 1989, obviously knows the show’s impeccably assembled mechanics better than anyone alive.
Which is not to say this production is mechanical. As brilliantly structured and paced as it inherently is, “Gypsy” doesn’t play itself. There’s enough complexity for wide variation in character and emphasis. And Mr. Laurents, while occasionally overdoing the comic broad strokes, also elicits refreshing insights from the supporting performances.
True, the strippers who initiate Gypsy into their art are the usual set of endearing cartoons (with Marilyn Caskey’s nearly comatose Electra the most endearing of all).
But Boyd Gaines, as Rose’s long-suffering beau and business partner, Herbie, is affectingly credible, and he and Ms. LuPone generate a relaxed sexual chemistry that explains why he stays with her. And Rose’s younger daughter, June, has never been more completely drawn, both as a child (Sami Gayle) and a young woman (Leigh Ann Larkin). There’s steel beneath the frills of this June from the beginning, and a shrewd ambition that eclipses her mother’s.
I have never been more conscious of the ambivalence between June and her sister, Louise, the hang-dog tomboy who grows up to be Gypsy Rose Lee. Laura Benanti, late of “The Wedding Singer,” is delicious in the title role. (The appealingly watchful-faced Emma Rowley plays her younger self.) Ms. Benanti invests even her early scenes with a tincture of latent ambition that makes her apotheosis as burlesque queen seem inevitable.
But the show’s surprising high point is when Louise and June finally sit down to talk — or this being a musical, sing — about the problems of life with Mother, in a version of “If Momma Was Married” that becomes an eye-opening moment of rival sisters discovering what they have in common, too late.
This “Gypsy” is especially good on shining a light on family frictions, and Ms. LuPone contributes beautifully to this dynamic. The early scene in which she sends both her young daughters to bed, focusing the beam of her affection exclusively on June, tells you everything you need to know about this prickly parent-child triangle and the problems it’s bound to generate.
Ms. LuPone has other such moments throughout. Her scenes with Mr. Gaines are uniformly excellent. (I’ll never forget her Rose, suggesting an abandoned army tank, standing in a dressing room after Herbie walks out on her.) And she brings a harrowing psychological nakedness to the big nervous-breakdown number, “Rose’s Turn.”
Given such moments, combined with Ms. LuPone’s dazzling performance in Mr. Sondheim’s “Sweeney Todd” two seasons ago, I suspect there’s still a first-rate Momma Rose waiting to emerge. For the moment we only have the preliminary sketch. Any halfway decent “Gypsy” — and this one is more than that — is a fine summer night’s diversion. But it needs a Momma Rose in full control to carry its audiences away.
Zeta-Jones uses $400 shampoo
Catherine Zeta-Jones has a unique way to stay beautiful - she spends $400 (€290)-a-time on caviar shampoo.
The Beluga caviar treatment may carry a hair-raising price but it has been credited with giving the actress' hair an unbeatable shine. It is flown from Iran five days before her visit to a beauty salon in London, UK.
A source at the salon tells British newspaper the Daily Mail: "Catherine discovered the caviar treatment last summer and was astounded by the difference it made to her hair."
The Beluga caviar treatment may carry a hair-raising price but it has been credited with giving the actress' hair an unbeatable shine. It is flown from Iran five days before her visit to a beauty salon in London, UK.
A source at the salon tells British newspaper the Daily Mail: "Catherine discovered the caviar treatment last summer and was astounded by the difference it made to her hair."
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