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News Briefs TV, movie and music news

Johnny Depp engaged to Amber Heard

By Thom Geier on Jan 18, 2014 at 8:59AM

Johnny Depp recently popped the question to actress Amber Heard, according to People. The couple, who met on the set of the 2011 movie The Rum Diary, recently wrapped production on the Martin Amis novel adaptation London Fields. In 2012, the 50-year-old Depp split from his partner of 14 years, Vanessa Paradis, with whom he has two children. Heard, 27, who has described herself as bisexual, was previously in a four-year relationship with artist Tasya van Ree.

Laura Linney gives birth to son

By Dan Snierson on Jan 17, 2014 at 9:15PM

The Big C star Laura Linney just entered the Big M — Motherhood — at age 49. READ FULL STORY

Chris Brown assault case prompts internal affairs investigation

By Associated Press on Jan 17, 2014 at 9:57AM

District of Columbia police have opened an internal affairs investigation into statements made by a police officer who responded to reports that singer Chris Brown had punched a man outside a Washington hotel.

The investigation centers on a disputed conversation between the officer and an unidentified acquaintance of Brown, discrepancies that will likely be important for the authorities to reconcile as the criminal prosecution moves forward. The apparent inconsistencies are described in charging documents laying out the basis for the assault case against Brown and his bodyguard. READ FULL STORY

Indian actress Suchitra Sen dies at 82

By Associated Press on Jan 17, 2014 at 9:49AM

Suchitra Sen, a legendary Indian actress known for her memorable roles in both Bengali-language and Hindi Bollywood films, died Friday of heart failure. She was 82.

Sen was hospitalized in Kolkata more than three weeks ago for treatment of a respiratory infection and died following cardiac arrest, said her daughter, Moon Moon Sen, who is also an actress.

She was to be cremated later Friday. READ FULL STORY

'Partridge Family' actor Dave Madden dies at 82

By Associated Press on Jan 16, 2014 at 10:28PM

Image Credit: ABC/Getty Images

Comic actor Dave Madden, who played the child-hating agent on the hit 1970s sitcom The Partridge Family, died in Florida on Thursday at age 82.

Madden died at a hospice center near his home in the Jacksonville area, his niece Mary Frances Miller said.

Towering and rumpled, Madden was best known for his role as Reuben Kinkaid, who managed the Partridge family band and regularly clashed with its impish preteen bassist, played by Danny Bonaduce.

While the series starred Shirley Jones, with her real-life son David Cassidy as the resident heartthrob, it was Madden and the freckle-faced Bonaduce who became the reigning comic duo. Jones said Madden “made the show, I felt.”

“His relationship with Danny Bonaduce is what made the show work: this strange, mad little boy and the grown man who was even worse as a father figure,” she said Thursday. “It was hysterical!”

Though Madden played a guy bedeviled by the youngsters who surrounded him, Jones said that off-camera he “loved kids.”
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One of the last 'Wizard of Oz' Munchkins, Ruth Robinson Duccini, dies at 95

By Samantha Highfill on Jan 16, 2014 at 10:16PM

Ruth Robinson Duccini, one of the last remaining actors who played a Munchkin in The Wizard of Oz, died on Thursday after a “brief illness” at a hospice in Las Vegas, according to the L.A. Times. She was 95.

With the loss of Duccini, the only surviving member of the 1939 film’s Lollipop Guild is actor Jerry Maren, who is 93.

'Orange Is the New Black' team raises money for Michelle Hurst as she recovers from car crash

By Hillary Busis on Jan 16, 2014 at 5:39PM

Image Credit: Paul Schiraldi

The ladies of Litchfield really are a family: The cast and crew of Netflix’s Orange Is the New Black has banded together to raise funds for series costar Michelle Hurst, who suffered serious injuries in a car accident in December.

Hurst — who plays Miss Claudette on Orange — “had major injuries so the doctors put her in a medically induced coma to avoid movement while they did multiple surgeries near her spine,” the team explains on a fundraising page for their comrade.

“She is out of the coma (after 16 days) and has opened her eyes! We can’t send flowers yet because she is in ICU at UNC Chapel Hill Hospital. So we have set up a fundraising page,” the text continues. “All the money will go through Michelle’s sister to help pay for her medical expenses & time off of work.” The page has already exceeded its fundraising goal of $5,000.

Russell Johnson, 'Gilligan's Island' professor, has died

By Associated Press on Jan 16, 2014 at 4:39PM

Image Credit: Everett Collection

The actor who played “The Professor” on Gilligan’s Island, Russell Johnson, has died.

His agent, Mike Eisenstadt, says Johnson died Thursday morning at his home in Washington State of natural causes. He was 89.

Johnson was a busy but little-known character actor when he was cast in the slapstick 1960s comedy about seven people marooned on an uncharted Pacific island.

His character, high school science teacher Roy Hinkley, built generators and other gadgets out of scraps of junk found on the island. Johnson later joked that the one thing The Professor never figured out how to do was to fix the leaky boat so the group could get back to civilization.

During its three-season run on CBS, critics lambasted the show. But after its 1967 cancellation, it found generations of new fans in reruns and reunion movies.

British sitcom legend and 'Harry Potter' actor Roger Lloyd-Pack dies at age 69

By Clark Collis on Jan 16, 2014 at 9:46AM

British character actor Roger Lloyd-Pack has died at the age of 69, according to The Guardian. Lloyd-Pack was much loved in his homeland for playing the dim-witted Trigger in the hugely popular sitcom Only Fools and Horses and the equally slow Owen Newitt in the similarly successful, Richard Curtis-penned show The Vicar of Dibley. But he was an incredibly versatile performer whose big screen credits included Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, Interview with the Vampire, and Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, in which he played Barty Crouch Sr. In addition to his TV and film roles, Lloyd-Pack was an accomplished theater actor and recently appeared alongside Mark Rylance in London productions of Richard III and Twelfth Night. According to his agent, Lloyd-Pack was suffering from pancreatic cancer and died at home surrounded by his family.

Charging Netflix at issue in open-Internet case

By Associated Press on Jan 15, 2014 at 7:08PM

Will broadband providers start charging Internet services such as Netflix to deliver the massive amounts of data that streaming video and other content require?

A court ruling this week gives providers such as Comcast, Time Warner Cable, and Verizon more flexibility to do that, even though immediate changes are unlikely.

Technically, providers have always been allowed to charge Netflix, Google, and others for priority treatment. But the so-called net neutrality rules adopted by the FCC in 2010 discouraged the practice, and any attempt to do it would likely have faced a challenge from the agency.

In striking down those rules Tuesday, a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit lifted any uncertainty and removed any constraints broadband providers might have felt.

Services such as Netflix already pay their broadband providers to send data from their systems. What’s in question is whether they’ll also have to pay their subscribers’ providers for delivery of the data.

Netflix’s stock fell more than 2 percent Wednesday to $330.50 out of concern that if the company may someday have to pay their subscribers’ broadband providers, thereby leaving the company with less money to license content. Investors also worried that Netflix Inc. might pass along any new costs to subscribers in the form of fee hikes.

Netflix had no comment Wednesday.
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