Director Brett Ratner has claimed that Miley Cyrus was as impressive as Madonna when he worked with her earlier this year.
Ratner helped to create the video for her track '7 Things', which was released from the star's Breakout album in May.
"She reminded me a lot of Madonna," he confirmed. "And I hate saying that, but what I bastardly is that like Madonna, she keister be wall hanging out and laughing, and then you put the camera on her and it's like, 'Holy s***!'"
"It was the hardest video I've ever edited because every moment was great," he continued. "Every moment that she was on camera, she was awing. She's got an incredible quality about her. Her instincts ar great. She has outstanding charisma and personality."
Speaking in June, Cyrus revealed that she is hoping to emulate the Queen of Pop by constantly ever-changing her range of a function over the coming years.
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Tuesday 9 September 2008
Saturday 30 August 2008
Uninsured U.S. Residents Will Spend $30B Out-of-Pocket On Health Care This Year, While Receiving $56B In Uncompensated Care, Study Finds
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Uninsured U.S. residents will spend about $30 trillion out-of-pocket on health forethought this year, while former parties -- mainly the government -- will spend about $56 billion on uncompensated care for the uninsured, according to a study published online Monday in the journal Health Affairs, the Wall Street Journal reports. The composition, by Jack Hadley of George Mason University and colleagues, plant that government programs -- including Medicare, Medicaid and state and local programs -- pay about 75% , or $42.9 billion, of the amount uninsured individuals are unable to pay for services received. Some physicians and hospitals also donate time or forgo earnings to forethought for low-income residents, and in some cases secret donations cover the costs.
The report defined uncompensated precaution as the difference 'tween the total the uninsured paid and how much health care providers would have received if the patients had been privately insured.
Hadley aforesaid that uncompensated care does not necessarily translate into higher insurance policy premiums for private be after members as some believe, the Journal reports. He said unfunded care testament have a "very small" impact on premiums, adding, "It's more through taxes than private insurance bills."
The report ground that the total additional cost to the wellness system of covering all uninsured U.S. residents in 2008 would be $122.6 billion, driven by the fact that insured people tend to use more wellness care services than the uninsured. Health care spending accounted for 16.3% of gross domestic merchandise in 2007, or around $2.2 trillion, and this circumstances could nearly double in 10 years, according to federal information (Zhang, Wall Street Journal, 8/25).
Free access to the study, prepared for the Kaiser Family Foundation's Commission on Medicaid and the Uninsured, is uncommitted online.
American Public Media's "Marketplace" on Monday included coverage of the report. The coverage included comments from Hadley (Jablonski, "Marketplace," American Public Media, 8/25).
Reprinted with kind permit from hTTP://www.kaisernetwork.org. You can eyeshot the integral Kaiser Daily Health Policy Report, lookup the archives, or sign up for email livery at hypertext transfer protocol://www.kaisernetwork.
Uninsured U.S. residents will spend about $30 trillion out-of-pocket on health forethought this year, while former parties -- mainly the government -- will spend about $56 billion on uncompensated care for the uninsured, according to a study published online Monday in the journal Health Affairs, the Wall Street Journal reports. The composition, by Jack Hadley of George Mason University and colleagues, plant that government programs -- including Medicare, Medicaid and state and local programs -- pay about 75% , or $42.9 billion, of the amount uninsured individuals are unable to pay for services received. Some physicians and hospitals also donate time or forgo earnings to forethought for low-income residents, and in some cases secret donations cover the costs.
The report defined uncompensated precaution as the difference 'tween the total the uninsured paid and how much health care providers would have received if the patients had been privately insured.
Hadley aforesaid that uncompensated care does not necessarily translate into higher insurance policy premiums for private be after members as some believe, the Journal reports. He said unfunded care testament have a "very small" impact on premiums, adding, "It's more through taxes than private insurance bills."
The report ground that the total additional cost to the wellness system of covering all uninsured U.S. residents in 2008 would be $122.6 billion, driven by the fact that insured people tend to use more wellness care services than the uninsured. Health care spending accounted for 16.3% of gross domestic merchandise in 2007, or around $2.2 trillion, and this circumstances could nearly double in 10 years, according to federal information (Zhang, Wall Street Journal, 8/25).
Free access to the study, prepared for the Kaiser Family Foundation's Commission on Medicaid and the Uninsured, is uncommitted online.
American Public Media's "Marketplace" on Monday included coverage of the report. The coverage included comments from Hadley (Jablonski, "Marketplace," American Public Media, 8/25).
Reprinted with kind permit from hTTP://www.kaisernetwork.org. You can eyeshot the integral Kaiser Daily Health Policy Report, lookup the archives, or sign up for email livery at hypertext transfer protocol://www.kaisernetwork.
Wednesday 20 August 2008
J. Lo's 'Maid' to Become a TV Series
LOS ANGELES (Hollywood Reporter) - ABC is development a TV series based on the hit Jennifer Lopez quixotic comedy "Maid in Manhattan." (Theo Wargo/WireImage/Getty Images )
Lopez will serve as an executive producer of the hour-long comedy-drama, which has received a pilot commitment. In the 2002 feature of speech, she played a struggling single mother from the Bronx world Health Organization works as a amah at a swanky Manhattan hotel. A rising politician guest (Ralph Fiennes) falls for her after misinterpretation her for a loaded socialite.
"The show is a different maidservant in a different Manhattan," said Chad Hodge, world Health Organization will spell the book for the pilot.
The lead in the TV version will placid be a young Latina from the Bronx working at a Manhattan hotel who tries to make it in the populace. But the series testament focus by and large on her relationships with co-workers.
"While the hotel's business is an obvious part of this world, I'm more interested in the downstairs contribution of 'Upstairs, Downstairs,"' Hodge said, referring to the classic British series.
Lopez, a Bronx native, has been very involved, providing "a fountain of ideas," Hodge said. "She will be very built-in in the pilot and series," he said.
This is the second time that ABC has taken a stab at a series adaptation of "Maid," following a script developed with a different writer during the 2004-05 development season.
"Maid" could be a worthy companion for the network's dramedy "Ugly Betty," which also centers on a hardworking young Latina in New York with big dreams. It, too, was shepherded by a Latina A-lister, Salma Hayek.
Reuters/Hollywood Reporter
Copyright 2008�Reuters News Service. All rights reserved. This material crataegus oxycantha not be published, diffuse, rewritten, or redistributed.
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Sunday 10 August 2008
Cleveland Orchestra, con. Pierre Boulez
Artist: Cleveland Orchestra, con. Pierre Boulez
Genre(s):
Classical
Discography:
Rapsodie espagnole
Year: 1972
Tracks: 4
Pavane pour une infante defunte
Year: 1972
Tracks: 1
Alborada del gracioso
Year: 1972
Tracks: 1
S. Grappelli and S. Asmussen
Wednesday 2 July 2008
TV review: Deja vu strikes in Tudors' return
Are we all Tudored-out yet? TV and the movies seem to be hurling more Plantagenets, pontiffs, cardinals and schisms at us than we know what to do with.
There have been two recent Elizabeth I spectaculars, Ray Winstone doing an enviably common Henry VIII, a frightful adaptation of The Other Boleyn Girl, and of course, Sunday's The Tudors, which returned to TV One this week for its second season.
And didn't your heart just sink when you realised that after all those histrionics last season, we're still only up to Anne Boleyn, wife No 2 of six - and he hasn't even married her yet.
It's a safe bet that this admittedly very well made series will again be consigned to the late-night slot as viewers balk at having to sit through the, now almost tiresomely familiar, story yet again.
The Other Boleyn Girl was so fresh in our minds that during last Sunday night's episode we'd have all cried out, "Oh, the shirt scene again!"
While exclamations of, "Oh-oh, there's the court musician, look out!" will have gone up and down the country. Too, too much of a good - but not that good - thing.
For those who only dimly remember their Jean Plaidy novels from childhood, they're all a useful catchup on how and why church and state skirmished bloodily centuries ago.
The best part of this series is the passion and steeliness with which the clergy and politicians are played.
Jeremy Northam is asterling Thomas More, and James Frain, a man born with a casting-couch villain's face, is the best, subtlest Thomas Cromwell in recent memory.
Past versions have had the pair crabbed and desiccated, and well into middle age. It's refreshing to see virile, early- middle-aged blokes in the role. After all, how do we know they weren't?
And if you can top Peter O'Toole as the Pope, I'd like to know with whom.
Maria Doyle Kennedy as Catherine of Aragon gave an unusually touching portrayal, whereas this Anne Boleyn - played by Natalie Dormer with a snub-snouted smugness that's really quite slappable - is presented not as the usually high- spirited young girl whose head is fatally turned, but as a selfish, spoilt brat who has it coming to her.
The great tedium of most of the new adaptations of this fascinating corner of history is that they seem to compete to see who can cram the most bonking in between each ad break.
Certainly, from our modern appreciation of such matters, Henry VIII's story was all about bonking - inasmuch as it took his fancy and led, or failed to lead to begetting.
The politics arose almost exclusively from Henry's appetites. But here he is portrayed adamantly as a fetching lover, which seems presumptuous in the extreme.
From his conduct outside the bedchamber, wouldn't you take him for rather a wham-bam-thank-you-ma'am sort of guy?
The love scenes, veering from the steamy to the candle-flickeringly romantic, have been rather sickening.
Though not nearly as sickening as the summary justice of the era.
This Sunday's punishment of the cook who - paid by plotters - poisoned half the clergy, was graphically portrayed in a series of screams as he was lowered slowly into boiling water. Hideous, but pertinent to be reminded of the routine cruelty of the era.
Alas and alack, if they ever get as far as Anne of Cleves, most of us will be happily ensconced in Prime's great fun Mad Men by then.
Earlier on Sunday, at 7.30pm, TV2's new gameshow, Dare to Win debuted. It should, under the Fair Trading Act, be called Dare To Make A Prize Prat Of Yourself On TV In Order To Win A Prize It Would Be Much Easier To Just Buy For Yourself Down At Harvey Norman.
But that's not a very snappy title.
Having sat through the gurning and squeaking of four women going to ridiculous lengths - like memorising 50 Star Wars characters - just to win a TV set or new oven each, this reviewer was incredulous.
How can a TV set or a new oven be worth wasting all that brain power and energy over? Let alone on national TV in front of one's peers, who acquire such goods the normal way, with a credit card or on HP.
The week these women spent wearing silly wigs and giggling - a lot - while learning to tell their Wookies from their Yodas might have been used to cram basic Mandarin, or read all of War and Peace.
Even a week spent clearing out the garage would have been preferable to this utterly pointless humiliation.
Dare to Win actually makes those earlier game shows, in which people accepted dares to eat bush insects and jump out of helicopters, seem quite civilised and dignified.
And as the recession deepens, contestants may be induced to make dolts of themselves for mere car stereos and the odd kitchen whiz, so the producers of this rubbish can make insulting TV for even less money.
A nastily consoling thought is that if anyone had offered up such nonsense as entertainment in Henry Tudor's court, he'd have had the water at a nice rolling boil by now.
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Sunday 22 June 2008
'Star Trek's' George Takei gets marriage licence to wed his gay partner
WEST HOLLYWOOD, Calif. - Actor George Takei, known for his role in the science fiction TV series "Star Trek" is preparing to wed his gay partner of 21 years.
The 71-year-old actor, who played Sulu in the series, was the first to pay $70 early Tuesday for a marriage licence in West Hollywood.
Takei was jubilant, saying "it's going to be the only day like this in our lives, and it is the only day like this in the history of America."
Takei will marry 54-year-old Brad Altman in September at the Japanese National Museum in Los Angeles. The marriage licence is good for 90 days.
Takei told reporters and the crowd outside the West Hollywood city auditorium Tuesday "may equality live long and prosper," echoing the phrase used in the television series.
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Sunday 15 June 2008
Black Rebel Motorcycle Club's drummer leaves band
The drummer from Black Rebel Motorcycle Club has left the band for the second time in the group's history.
Nick Jago, who has allegedly suffered from drug problems in the past, posted a blog on the band's website stating he has departed.
He said: "Just had dinner with Rob and Pete and, well, I'm not in the band anymore. They are going into rehearsals tomorrow with Leah, she just finished touring with The Raveonettes and is super nice and cool. They presented it to me like they need a break, I took it as I am fired again and to be honest with you I respect their decision."
Jago added: "I don't make it easy for them, I hope to be able to play with them again in the future as a reunion as there is really no bad feeling other than we all wanna be happy and right now we are not. Maybe playing drums for BRMC all the time is not my calling and there is something else I'm supposed to do. We will see. I�m sorry to all the fans and know that the drums are in good hands with Leah."
His band mates, Peter Hayes and Robert Levon Been, also released a statement.
They said Jago's departure didn't mean he wouldn't return.
The statement said: "Peter and I would like to clarify a few things from our perspective. It's true, Nick wont be joining us for the upcoming European tour, but it's not true that he is fired. We just feel Nick needs time to sort out exactly what he wants right
now. His heart and all his energy and attention is on his own solo project and he needs to see that through."
The pair concluded: "We welcome his singing and songwriting in BRMC, but his focus, at least at the present time, is on doing his own thing and we wish him the best. He is our brother, our musical partner, and we love him dearly and look forward to playing with him again in the future."
Nick Jago, who has allegedly suffered from drug problems in the past, posted a blog on the band's website stating he has departed.
He said: "Just had dinner with Rob and Pete and, well, I'm not in the band anymore. They are going into rehearsals tomorrow with Leah, she just finished touring with The Raveonettes and is super nice and cool. They presented it to me like they need a break, I took it as I am fired again and to be honest with you I respect their decision."
Jago added: "I don't make it easy for them, I hope to be able to play with them again in the future as a reunion as there is really no bad feeling other than we all wanna be happy and right now we are not. Maybe playing drums for BRMC all the time is not my calling and there is something else I'm supposed to do. We will see. I�m sorry to all the fans and know that the drums are in good hands with Leah."
His band mates, Peter Hayes and Robert Levon Been, also released a statement.
They said Jago's departure didn't mean he wouldn't return.
The statement said: "Peter and I would like to clarify a few things from our perspective. It's true, Nick wont be joining us for the upcoming European tour, but it's not true that he is fired. We just feel Nick needs time to sort out exactly what he wants right
now. His heart and all his energy and attention is on his own solo project and he needs to see that through."
The pair concluded: "We welcome his singing and songwriting in BRMC, but his focus, at least at the present time, is on doing his own thing and we wish him the best. He is our brother, our musical partner, and we love him dearly and look forward to playing with him again in the future."
Wednesday 4 June 2008
Basia Bulat
Artist: Basia Bulat
Genre(s):
Folk
Discography:
Oh My Darling
Year: 2007
Tracks: 12
Canadian singer/songwriter Basia Bulat came on the face of it verboten of nowhere to become one of the most talked about new artists in both Canada and the United Kingdom with the release of her number one uncut album, Oh, My Darling, in 2007. Originally from Toronto, Bulat lives and writes in the quieter community of London, Ontario, where she recorded a self-released EP in 2005. Bulat's rich, expressive voice is the ideal fomite for her songs, which manage with love and life-time with a combination of unhappiness and wonder, and her melodies are bolstered by a band that incorporates strings and keyboards along with the traditional drums and guitar. In 2006, producer Howard Bilerman, c. H. Best known for his operate with the Arcade Fire, took Bulat and her band into the studio to disk her first full-length album; the upshot, Oh, My Darling, caught the ear of the honored U.K. label Rough Trade, which signed Bulat and released the disc in the springtime of 2007 ahead she had a deal in Canada or the United States. British reviews for Oh, My Darling were wildly enthusiastic, and a circuit of England and Europe impressed both critics and fans. Canadian main label Hardwood Records (home to famed singer/songwriter Hayden) signed Bulat in the summertime of 2007, with Oh, My Darling scheduled for release in the fall.
Saturday 31 May 2008
Indiana Jones - Ford Waxes Chest For Charity
INDIANA JONES star HARRISON FORD has had his chest waxed for a new advertising campaign to promote awareness of deforestation.
The 65-year-old actor is seen gritting his teeth and wincing with pain as a wax strip is pulled from his torso.
But the stunt is all for a good cause as the 30-second ad has been filmed for Conservation International - an environmental campaign group - to help raise awareness of the effect of deforestation on global warming.
Ford is seen saying, "Every bit of rain forest that gets ripped out over there really hurts us over here."
And Conservation International boss Peter Seligmann insists the Hollywood star really went through with the waxing, and his pained expression was totally genuine.
He says, "I didn't have to talk him into anything. I was there when he filmed it. It really hurt. There's nothing about the expression on his face that was fake."
The short film mirrors a scene from 2005 movie The 40-Year-Old Virgin, which sees actor Steve Carell screaming with pain during his chest hair removal session.
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Thursday 29 May 2008
Pop princess Kylie Minogue turns 40
Pop princess Kylie Minogue celebrates her 40th birthday today - and she's not being allowed to ignore it.
Cannes Film Festival - Movie Reviews Indiana Jones And The Crystal Skull
Film critics who held off their reviews of Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the
Crystal Skull when it premiered at the Cannes Film Festival last weekend are
having a go at it today (Thursday), the official opening day of the movie. Manohla
Dargis in the New York Times gives it merely a so-so critique. "There's plenty
of frantic energy here, lots of noise and money too, but what's absent is any sense
of rediscovery, the kind that's necessary whenever a filmmaker dusts off an old formula
or a genre standard," she writes. But who needs that? Ty Burr seems to ask in the
Boston Globe. What audiences want, he remarks, is "engaged nostalgia, I think,
and on that level Crystal Skull delivers. This isn't a reinvention but a reunion,
of characters, creators, even techniques." Mick LaSalle in the San Francisco Chronicle
faults director Steven Spielberg for insisting on making the action nonstop,
resulting in what he calls "probably the worst of the Indiana Jones movies." Nevertheless,
he adds, that action "is more inventive, more lovingly detailed and a lot more pleasurable
than anything you could hope to see in [other] action movies." Stephen Hunter in
the Washington Post welcomes back "the hero." There's a pleasure, he writes,
in seeing the Indiana Jones character. He "hasn't a crystal jaw, much less a glass
one. Hit him, he gets up and hits you back. He always figures out a way to win. ...
It's romantic manliness at its purest, almost but not quite schmaltz, ideally calcula
ted to please true believers and ironic snorters at once."
22/05/2008
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Pete Doherty - Pete Dohertys Solo Show Rescheduled
PETE DOHERTY is planning a solo concert at London's Royal Albert Hall.
The gig was supposed to take place on April 26th but was delayed due to Pete's incarceration and will now happen on July 12th.
According to NME magazine, fans who purchased tickets for the original date will be able to exchange them for new tickets valid for the rescheduled date.
The publication adds that this show will not be Pete's first since he regained his freedom as he is set to join his band BABYSHAMBLES on stage at the London Kentish Town Forum on May 13th.
Pete was released from Wormwood Scrubs Prison, where he was serving time for breaching the terms of his probation, on Tuesday after 29 days of his 14-week sentence had passed.
OK! magazine reports that a special post-prison welfare fund set up by an online retailer, designed to furnish Pete with money to get his life back into shape, raised just £17.20 from the sale of stripy tops.
A spokesman from the website said: "Sales have been somewhat disappointing - we only sold six stripy tops.
"We had planned to do a big presentation and get a big cheque made up but it seems pointless for a mere £17 quid and change."
07/05/2008 12:04:11
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Steve Angello
Artist: Steve Angello
Genre(s):
House
Other
Discography:
Teasing Mr.Charlie Vinyl
Year: 2006
Tracks: 3
Tool Box EP
Year: 2004
Tracks: 3
The Look
Year: 2004
Tracks: 2
Acid and Euro Record 2
Year:
Tracks: 3
Acid and Euro Record 1
Year:
Tracks: 2
Fans lash out after Radiohead show
Nas - Sharpton Praises Nas For Dropping Controversial Album Title
LATEST: Rapper NAS' decision not to call his new album N**GER has been praised by civil rights activist REVEREND AL SHARPTON.
The 34-year-old New York native wanted to use the title to make a political statement about the hypocrisy in hip-hop.
But criticism from Def Jam record executives and fear of a decline in sales persuaded him to pull the title on Monday (19May08), just six weeks before the album hits stores on 1 July (08).
And Sharpton is calling the rapper's decision a "partial victory" for racial-equality activists.
He says, "The record companies have to consider the downside of using it, business-wise. That would not have happened if we hadn't protested.
"I have a lot of respect for Nas. I liked what he said about (police shooting victim) Sean Bell. We have a fundamental disagreement on this. He can rap against me. I'll preach against them. We're still friends."
But Nas insists the album's original title will still resonate with his fans.
He says, "The streets have been waiting for this for a long time. The people will always know what the real title of this album is and what to call it."
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