Al Pacino is currently filming a bio pic of legendary music producer Phil Spector for HBO and thanks to the NY Post, we get our first look. Written and directed by David Mamet, the as yet untitled made-for-cable movie will focus on the two murder trials after Spector was accused of killing actress/model Lana Clarkson in 2003. The first trial ended in a mistrial after the jury failed to reach a verdict. The second resulted in a conviction and Spector is currently serving 19 years to life in prison.

His defense team was led by the infamous Bruce Cutler, known for defending organized crime figures including John Gotti, numerous media appearances and hosting his own Court TV show, “Cutler & Hayes” with attorney Ed Hayes. Cutler will be played by Jeffrey Tambor (“Arrested Development”). The film will focus on Spector’s relationship with another member of the team, Linda Kenney Baden, played by Bette Midler.

It’s a shame this is what Spector will be remembered for. His famous “Wall of Sound” production style helped to define a sound in the 1960′s specifically with girl groups The Crystals and the Ronettes. He also mixed “Let It Be”, the last album recorded by The Beatles.

The pic appears to be Pacino as Spector in the 1970′s. While he’d always been partial to wild wigs, the pic looks like it’s before the ‘Albert Einstein stuck his finger in a light socket’ wig he sported so famously during his first murder trial 2007.  No word yet on additional casting or when the movie will air, but more than likely it will show in early 2012.

A new international poster for Disney’s new Muppet movie, aptly titled, The Muppets, has just dropped. Unlike all of the trailers that have been released, the poster does not feature any of the human actors, like Jason Segal and Amy Adams, that are appearing in the film.

Written by Jason Segel and Nicholas Stoller and directed by James Bobin  (“The Flight of the Conchords”, “Da Ali G Show”), the first theatrical Muppet movie since 1999 stars Segel, Adams, Chris Cooper, Rashida Jones, Alan Arkin, Jack Black, Billy Crystal, Zach Galifianakis, Neil Patrick Harris, Ricky Gervais and Emily Blunt among many others.  This is the first Muppet movie without Frank Oz, who retired from his “Muppet career” after Muppets in Space, choosing to focus instead on his directorial efforts, although he still occasionally performs on Sesame Street. His characters have officially been taken over by Eric Jacobson.

‘The Muppets’ – Official Movie Trailer

The plot involves Gary (Jason Segel), his Muppet roommate Walter,  and his friend from Smalltown, USA, Mary (Adams) who must help Kermit and company get back together, since they’ve all gone their separate ways (Fozzie now performs with a tribute band called the Moopets, Miss Piggy is a plus-size fashion editor at French Vogue, Animal is in a clinic for anger management, and Gonzo is a wealthy plumbing magnate), in order to put on a show, actually The Greatest Muppet Telethon Ever, to save their old studio, Muppet Theater, when it is scheduled to be destroyed by greedy oil tycoon, Tex Richman. (Chris Cooper).

Who doesn’t love the Muppets? I can’t wait!

Walt Disney Pictures is doing a rolling release for The Muppets. In the US and Canada, we’ll get it on 23 November, the UK not until 17 February 2012 with the rest of the world falling in between.

The world premiere of Pia Toscano’s debut single This Time was played on the Ryan Seacrest radio show this morning. The American Idol finalist is being represented by Interscope Records, Red Light Management and 19 Entertainment and says:

“I am thrilled to be joining the Interscope and 19 Recordings family. [Interscope Geffen A&M Chairman] Jimmy Iovine was an amazing mentor during my time on ‘Idol’ and I’m looking forward to working with him and everyone at Interscope Records and 19 Recordings. This is a dream come true!”

The song will be available for download tomorrow with her album coming out later this year. Have a listen and tell us what you think!

James Franco and Anne Hathaway hosted the Oscars way-back-when (and we’ve all long forgotten about it, thanks a lot James), but James Franco insists on making us relive the nightmare we can’t scrub from our retinas. If you recall, everyone thought he was stoned and that Anne Hathaway took 12 too many happy pills.

Now James is opening up about why he played it low-key and what really went on to make him the way he was (because it’s always everyone else’s fault don’tcha know). And get this, he says that Steven Spielberg allegedly told the show’s producer Bruce Cohen that it was ‘the best Oscars ever’. Bitch, please. If Steven did say that he was either being sarcastic or lying to Bruce Cohen’s face.

Despite saying talking about it is like assigning blame, and not fun, he goes on to assign blame in his Playboy interview:

“For three or four weeks we shot the promos and the little film that played in the opening. In the last week, when we really started focusing on the script for the live show and did a run-through, I said to the producer, ‘I don’t know why you hired me, because you haven’t given me anything. I just don’t think this stuff’s going to be good.’”

He particularly hated coming out dressed as Marilyn Monroe. Did he hate it more than you or I? Who knows:

“I was so pissed about that I was deliberately going to fall onstage and hopefully my dress would fall off or something — they couldn’t blame that on me; I was in high heels,” Franco says. “The plan had been that I was going to sing as Cher and then Cher was going to come out onstage; that got axed when Cher and the song from Burlesque weren’t nominated. I told them, ‘Look, this is the thing people are going to talk about, the images they will take away from the show.

“I just didn’t want to fight anymore, even when they said, ‘You’ll come out as Marilyn Monroe. It’ll be funny.’ Me in drag is not funny,” Franco continues, but he says, he “just didn’t want to argue anymore. I was going with their program; I wanted to do the material they gave me, not be one of the many cooks doing the writing. There were a lot of cooks who shouldn’t have been cooking but were allowed to. There were some cooks my manager tried to bring in, like Judd Apatow, who wrote some very funny stuff that wasn’t used.”

If Judd Apatow was involved you KNOW it would have been funny. You know, perhaps he has a point. Perhaps there were too many ‘cooks in the kitchen’ and all the wrong ones. However he’s a professional and that’s what he was paid for and he really should have at least tried. He came off not trying and it sounds like he somewhat ‘resigned’ himself to the writing, and in the sense that he lost his mojo (although I don’t know if he has a lot of mojo to begin with). He explains his demeanor:

“As far as having low energy or seeming as though I wasn’t into it or was too cool for it, I thought, ‘Okay Anne is going the enthusiastic route. I’ve been trained as an actor to respond to circumstances, to the people I’m working with, and not force anything.’ So I thought I would be the straight man and she could be the other, and that’s how I was trying to do those lines. I felt kind of trapped in that material. I felt, This is not my boat. I’m just a passenger, but I’m going down and there’s no way out.”

Good think Anne Hathaway didn’t follow his footsteps and actually rose to the challenge. Do you think he’s still passing the buck or do you think it was a bad situation that wasn’t going to get good no matter how he acted?

As part of their North American tour, Kate Middleton and Prince William (the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge) landed in Los Angeles over the weekend where on Saturday they hosted the The Foundation Polo Challenge held at the Santa Barbara Polo & Racquet Club.

William’s team (The Royal Salute) won the cup against the Audi team and Catherine (at this point I don’t know whether to call her Catherine, Kate, or Duchess so I’ll use each name at some point, at times) presented him with the Tiffany trophy.

I love me some Kate Middleton and Prince William. As everyone says, these are the accessible Royals. Goodness how times have changed!

You should read the article at the WSJ, as the writer was there and tells how even the Royals used the port-o-potties!

Pictures after the break.

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Last month Sgt. Scott Moore (stationed with the 3rd Battalion 2nd Marines in Musa Qalain, Afghanistan) made a video and posted it on YouTube asking actress Mila Kunis to go with him to the Marine Corps Ball in Greenville, North Carolina.

Mila Kunis and Justin Timberlake were promoting their movie Friends With Benefits over the weekend when Fox News asked her if she had seen this video. Justin then said to her:

“Have you seen this? Have you heard about this? You need to do it for your country,” Timberlake asked Kunis excitedly, before sending out a direct message to Moore. “I’m going to work on this, man. This needs to go down.”

Her repsonse: I’ll do it! Of course she will, she’s cool and she’s Mila Kunis!

And you know we will have coverage of this date going down! Below is the video where he asks her out. Sgt. Scott Moore must feel like he just won the freaking lottery!