MUSIC/ FLOWERS & BURKE TOP UK CHARTS: The Killers lead singer, Brandon Flowers, debuts at #1 on the UK album chart this week with his 1st solo effort, "Flamingo". The set is due for release this week in the US. Last weeks #1 album, Katy Perry's "Teenage Dream," falls to #2. The XX move up 13 spots to #3 this week with their self titled set in the wake of winning the Mercury Prize this past week. Other new entries on the album chart include "Happiness" by Hurts in at #4, "Audio Secrecy" by Stone Sour in at #6 and Ray LaMontagne at #17 with "God Willin". On the singles chart, former "X-Factor" winner Alexandra Burke scores another #1 debut with her new single "Start Without You". Last weeks #1 single, "Please Don't Let Me Go" by Olly Murs falls to #4. Other new entires in the singles chart include "For the First Time" by The Script in at #5, "Party Girl" by McFly in at #6, "This Day" by Emma's Imagination in at #10 and Alesha Dixon's "Drummer Boy" is new at #15.
MUSIC/ 50 CENT ANGERS GAYS: The Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (GLAAD) is mounting a campaign against 50 Cent after the rapper tweeted threatening comments to blogger Perez Hilton last week, including a violent photo of 2 men in suits running from a mob. "Perez Hilton calld me douchebag so I had my homie shoot up a gay wedding. wasn't his but still made me feel better," read the tweet with the photo attached. The rapper also Tweeted Hilton: "stop being so sensitive its a joke. Your acting like a big baby" and, "my next song will make your sweet ass dance lol chill out." "It's wrong to make jokes and promote violence against the gay community," said a GLAAD spokesman. "Taking down the post is not enough. We wanted him to tell his Twitter followers that what he did was wrong." A rep for 50 Cent had no comment. But it wasn't the 1st time he has run afoul of the gay community. He told Playboy in a 2004 interview, "I ain't into faggots. I don't like gay people around me, because I'm not comfortable with what their thoughts are, I'd rather hang out with a straight dude. But women who like women, that's cool."
A controversial pro-euthanasia television ad, which was to air tonight, has been banned. The ad's creator, lobby group Exit International, says the ban is a violation of free speech and they will try with a different version within days. The ad shows an ill-looking actor sitting on a bed in his pyjamas. He reflects on the choices he has made throughout his life, then says he did not choose to be terminally ill. "I didn't choose to starve to death because eating is like swallowing razor blades," he says in the ad, which can be seen online. I've made my final choice. I just need the government to listen." Free TV Australia, which regulates the industry, withdrew its permission for the $30,000 ad to be screened on the grounds that it promotes suicide. Exit International will press ahead with plans for a billboard version in Sydney, and will to try to screen the TV ad in New Zealand. Euthanasia is not legal in Australia. State laws prohibit anyone from assisting or giving advice to another person to commit suicide. The Northern Territory legalized euthanasia but the Howard government intervened to override it. The banned ad can be viewed on the Exit International website.
Kevin McCarthy, the veteran stage and screen actor best known for his starring role as the panicked doctor who tried to warn the world about the alien "pod people" who were taking over in the 1956 science-fiction suspense classic "Invasion of the Body Snatchers," died yesterday. He was 96. McCarthy died of natural causes at a Cape Cod Hospital. During a career that spanned more than 70 years, beginning on stage in New York in the late 1930s, McCarthy played Biff Loman opposite Paul Muni's Willy in the 1949 London production of "Death of a Salesman." McCarthy had appeared in several other films and had a string of TV anthology-series credits behind him when he was cast as Dr. Miles Bennell in "Invasion of the Body Snatchers," director Don Siegel's thriller about an unsuspecting California town whose residents were being replaced by emotionless alien clones grown in oversized seed pods. In the film's most memorable scene, McCarthy's frantic Bennell runs into traffic, screaming to motorists, "Stop and listen to me, they're not human, can't you see? Everyone! They're here already. You're next!" The low-budget film became an enduring cult classic that was selected for preservation in the Library of Congress' National Film Registry in 1994. McCarthy's long career included numerous guest appearances on TV series such as "The Twilight Zone," "Burke's Law," "Flamingo Road" and "Murder, She Wrote." He also appeared in about 50 films, including "An Annapolis Story," "40 Pounds of Trouble," "The Prize," "The Best Man," "Kansas City Bomber," Buffalo Bill and the Indians," "Piranha" and "The Howling."
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