Leona Gage, Former Miss USA, Dies

Oct 112010

Leona Gage, a former Miss USA who was stripped of her title, died in Los Angeles on Tuesday at the age of 71.

Gage succumbed to heart failure after being in Sherman Oaks hospital for several weeks.

The former beauty queen, who was born in Texas, won the Miss USA title in 1957. She was stripped of the crown just one day later when pageant officials learned that she was a married mother of two, which is forbidden in the rules. She’d also lied to officials about her age, saying she was 21 instead of her true age of 18.

Gage reaped the benefits of the publicity from the scandal, appearing on numerous talk shows including The Ed Sullivan Show. However, she received tons of hate mail because of the incident and admitted that she felt “one half of the U.S. hated me” because of the scandal. Leona tried to pursue an acting career, but it never took off.

She had difficult time during her life with six failed marriages and she even lost custody of her five children, two of which died before her. She battled drug addiction and attempted suicide during her remaining years.
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Is Brandon Davis Dead?

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Sep 262010

Is Brandon Davis Dead Brandon Davis is dead. The question is: Which Brandon Davis? After all, that’s probably a fairly common name, wouldn’t you think?

So: Brandon Davis, the 31-year-old grandson of Marvin Davis, heir to a boatload of money, former dater of Mischa Barton and the guy who deftly referred to Lindsay Lohan as a “firecrotch,” (can’t say the guy was wrong there) is not dead.

Brandon Davis, the 26-year-old resident of Las Vegas who we really don’t know anything about, is dead.

Both TMZ.com and Perez Hilton reported the Hollywood socialite Davis was the one killed in a gas station explosion in Vegas last week. This is one of those rare instances TMZ is wrong and one of those daily instances Perez Hilton is wrong.

Deepest sympathies to the family of the deceased Brandon Davis.

Drew Carey’s Weight Loss : The Price is Right

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Sep 212010

Drew Carey’s weight loss made its television debut Monday on the season opener of The Price is Right. The comedian looks almost handsome without the extra 70 lbs. he once carried and his improved health made a positive difference in his on-stage demeanor.

Hollywood let out a collective gasp when Carey, 52, showed off his svelte build at a July event. When asked at the time, Carey credited his weight loss to a strict no-carbohydrates diet and cardio workouts.

“It sucks being fat, you know,” Carey told People Magazine. “I’m not diabetic anymore, no medication needed.”

His motivation for finally shedding the pounds? His fiancee’s young son.

“I’d love to be able to play with him without getting tired, enjoy my life and watch him grow,” he told US Weekly.

Fans of The Price is Right will get to see Carey grow as a host during the game show’s 39th season. Carey’s received some criticism since taking over the show in 2007. Former host Bob Barker even insulted Carey and said he wasn’t as entertaining as he was.
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Comedian Robert Schimmel Dies at 60

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Sep 052010

Standup comic Robert Schimmel passed away Friday after a week-long battle with injuries sustained in an Aug. 26 car accident, his rep confirms to E! News. He was 60.

Known for is his raunchy HBO specials, as well as countless, equally explicit appearances on Howard Stern’s radio show (as was his style), Schimmel was well loved by his peers in the comedy realm.

While traveling in Arizona last Thursday, Schimmel’s 19-year-old daughter Aliyah swerved to avoid an oncoming car, causing the vehicle containing herself and her father to flip multiple times. Aliyah survived the accident and is currently in stable condition.

No stranger to health woes (or tragedy), Schimmel lost his son Derek to cancer at age 11, then won his own a battle with Stage 3 Non-Hodgkin lymphoma back in in 2000. The comic was currently awaiting a liver transplant, after learning in January that he’d contracted cirrhosis from a Hepatitis C-infected blood transfusion. No word on whether the diseased liver played into his untimely death.

The comedy community was rocked by Schimmel’s sudden passing Friday, and took to various social media outlets to say a sad so long to their friend.

“Robert Schimmel was one of the funniest and nicest guys in comedy,” Jimmy Kimmel tweeted Friday night, noting that he hoped he’d be given “bad information” regarding the loss. Added his friend Dane Cook: “Robert Schimmel was one the first people in comedy to call when my folks were fighting cancer. No ego no bs no small talk just inspiration.”

“I’m so sad about Robert Schimmel dying,” wrote fellow funnyman Penn Jillette. “I’ve been checking the news for 3 hours hoping it wasn’t true. He was very funny and wonderful.”

Onetime Fear Factor host Joe Rogan also tweeted his disbelief, saying: “If this has been confirmed, it’s terrible news. He was one of the nicest guys in comedy. F——–k. I loved that dude. He was SUCH a nice guy, and f–king hilarious.”

Schimmel’s brother Jeff Schimmel also took to his Facebook page, confirming the death with an emotional tribute to his sibling:

“ROBERT SCHIMMEL. Son, Brother, Father, Grandfather, Comedian, Generous Man. I have always loved you, admired you, and was proud to be your biggest fan. I will never forget a single moment. R.I.P.”

Schimmel is survived by his six children.

Bowlegged Floyd Little Gets to Canton

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Aug 082010

Jerry Rice and Emmitt Smith (and others) get their yellow jackets tonight. Travesty. What’d either of them ever accomplish?

Little has stopped fretting over the notion that being the only great player on a very bad team was being held against him, even though he produced numbers comparable to other great players who entered the Hall of Fame with much stronger supporting casts. He is focused on the possibility that other forces could have been at work all these years.

“Maybe it was in God’s plan for me to be in at this moment,” Little said. “I come in on the 44th Super Bowl, I come in with the 44th president, I come in with my son being 44, (and there were) 44 voters (on the selection committee).” [NFL.com]
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NBC New Tony Robbins’ shows a glorified infomercial

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Jul 282010

It would be a lot easier to know what to make of NBC’s “Breakthrough with Tony Robbins” if it were possible to separate the actual breakthrough from Robbins’ upbeat motivational patter.

In the show, which premieres Tuesday, the two are intertwined, and viewers only can hope that the permanent breakthrough Robbins promises throughout the show actually will occur.

Robbins, among the best known of motivational speakers, has filled arenas and made a fortune parceling out such platitudes as “Confront your real issues” and “Exceed your expectations.” In this six-episode series, he tries to apply this advice to people facing big obstacles.

In the premiere, Robbins takes on the desperate case of Frank and Kristen Alioto. Their dream of a destination wedding in December 2008 in lovely Puerto Vallarta, Mexico, turned into a nightmare that same evening. Just hours after the ceremony, Frank jumped into the pool, broke his neck and became a quadriplegic. In moments, Kristen’s role changed from wife to caretaker, her duties performed between bouts of crying. For Frank, life became a series of pills taken with meals.

Can Robbins turn things around for this unlucky but loving couple? He promises them “greater joy and freedom than you ever knew before.” In return, Frank provides a commercial/testimonial for Robbins, one of the show’s executive producers. “I know Tony’s met with world leaders, and I know he’s met with important people, but now he’s taking time to talk with me.”

Magnanimous as that might seem, it is the raison d’etre for the show. Although Robbins delivers on his promise in one feel-good scene after another, there’s little here to indicate that the joy and freedom will remain after the production crew packs up. What’s more, there’s even less to indicate that the help he gives the Aliotos would be available to anyone else in a similar situation who lacked a seven-figure bank account.

Robbins flies the couple to his home island of Fiji for skydiving. Stateside again, he sends Kristen to a spa and outfits Frank for the wheelchair sport of murderball, a sort of rugby on wheels. (The show repeatedly refers to him as a quadriplegic, but he has some limited use of his arms.) And with lots of help from friends, Frank converts an old truck into a hand-controlled desert racer.

It’s heartwarming to watch Frank do things he never thought he could. And he and Kristen learn he isn’t as fragile as they thought. At the same time, other issues — from having children to changing catheters — never are adequately addressed.

So was this a life-altering breakthrough or a one-time Dream Factory-type experience? Could other paraplegics without the resources for trips to spas and Fiji even hope for their own breakthroughs? If not, the biggest breakthrough here might be the way in which an infomercial gets transformed into a network primetime TV series.

The Fake ‘American’ Rappers

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Jul 202010

It turns out that they are a couple of friends called Gavin Bain and Billy Boyd, who were aspiring to get a career as rappers. After trying so hard to impress the people in charge of auditions and talent scouts and failing (not because of their talent, but because of their accent), they finally decided to change their identities and use an alias.

But they even went as far as creating a story for their characters. And also claimed they were Americans that went to live to London, this made all the difference for the couple of friends:

“These lyrics were just the same when we did them again in American accents, There was nothing different, and all of a sudden, people were saying, ‘Oh, wow. They’re just as good as Eminem.’ But in the Scottish accent, they’re saying, ‘Oh, no. They don’t have any talent.’ ”

The rappers went on to sign a deal with Sony and publish three albums.

Gavin Bain and Billy Boyd were two college friends from Dundee, Scotland, trying to make a name for themselves in rap music. But despite a talent for spinning rhymes, they couldn’t make it past the local scene. They even traveled to London for open auditions to become the next Eminem, but were told that they sounded more like a rapping version of the thick-accented pop group The Proclaimers.
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Katt Williams Show

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Jul 192010

The Still Blingin Tour, headlined by comedian Katt Williams, slated for Friday, July 16 at the Harlingen Municipal Auditorium has been officially postponed, but questions remain about whether the star was ever set to arrive in Harlingen.

Flyers first emerged in early June advertising Katt Williams with a $45 ticket price; no opening acts were listed. Harlingen’s director of arts and entertainment Joel Humphries confirmed the comedian would be doing a show in the city.

Complications with the event arose Thursday, July 8, when promoters announced Williams had canceled his appearance because of medical reasons, leaving ticket-buyers without the option of receiving a full refund.

Last week, when Festiva contacted David Brown of Marjai Entertainment, the show’s promoter, he revealed the Still Blingin Tour was actually an R&B and hip hop show featuring A’niyah, Jamaica Dennis and Durty Kash, with Katt Williams only appearing as a special guest host. He said the Still Blingin Tour would still go on but that funnyman Paul Rodriguez would step in as host.
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