'American Idol' Spares Stefano Langone, Naima Adedapo, Ashthon Jones

Casey Abrams, Lauren Alaina, Scotty McCreery and more make up voter-approved top 10.
By Gil Kaufman


Stefano Langon performs on "American Idol"
Photo: FOX

After what's felt like years (OK, just two months), "American Idol" finally got to its first live elimination show Thursday night (March 3), and it was not pretty. The biggest cut-down in show history came after host Ryan Seacrest said more than 40 million votes were cast over two performance nights.

The good news was that favorites like Lauren Alaina, Casey Abrams, Thia Megia and Jacob Lusk made the cut, but that meant that a few beloved singers like Brett Loewenstern and Julie Zorrilla were eliminated as the show revealed its top 13 finalists.

After copious time-killing segments, Seacrest finally got to the first elimination nearly 25 minutes into the two-hour episode, with country boy Scotty McCreery moseying into the top 10 while Robbie Rosen was sent packing. Next up were Clint Jun Gamboa, Jovany Barreto and Jordan Dorsey. After blowing it with Usher's "OMG," Dorsey got the hook, along with karaoke host and eyeglass aficionado Gamboa and Barreto.

The girls were in the hot seat next, and it was hard to believe that Pia Toscano and Alaina were standing next to each other, since Toscano got a standing ovation and high praise from the judges, and Alaina has been a favorite for weeks. It was good news for 16-year-old Alaina and, of course, for Toscano as well, as Seacrest reveled in his favorite game of elimination psych-out.

But when Ta-Tynisa Wilson and Julie Zorrilla came up, after a night when both blew their chances with subpar performances, it was no surprise that both missed out on the top 10. It was hard to know who might lose out when glamazon Kendra Chantelle, baby-diva Ashthon Jones and funky bilingual singer Karen Rodriguez took center stage, though. Shockingly Jones was sent packing, as was Chantelle, with Rodriguez filling out the third women's slot.

Young Luther Vandross-alike Lusk huddled up next to bearded wild man and budding sex symbol Abrams and cutie crooner Tim Halperin. Lusk sang hallelujah when he got the call, and to no one's surprise, Abrams was next, as Halperin made the long walk.

The hits kept on coming, as funky soul singer Naima Adedapo, 16-year-old wunderkind Megia and blues mama Lauren Turner all got the boot. With only two spots left, Adedapo and Turner got some bad news, as Megia became the second high-schooler to get a magic ticket.

It was anyone's guess who would be out when two of this season's standouts, spunky ginger Loewenstern and flair-loving showman Paul McDonald stepped up to the spotlight. Alas, sensitive teen Loewenstern would have to hope for a wild-card spot, as McDonald got the call.

Vying for the final spot on the girls' bench were Haley Reinhart and resident quirk Rachel Zevita, who went over the cliff on Wednesday night with a mannered cover of Fiona Apple's "Criminal." Without much drama, Reinhart got the call, as multiple-auditioner Zevita washed out.

The judges were digging Stefano Langone on Tuesday night, certainly more than James Durbin, who took a chance with a Judas Priest song and may have overplayed his rocker card. But only one of the roommates could snag the final men's spot, so it was curtains for Langone and joy for Lambert-like rocker Durbin.

With 14 singers vying for the wild card, the judges chose six to get another chance. Jones was up first, strutting to her spot to sing the song that made Jennifer Hudson a star, the "Dreamgirls" classic "And I Am Telling You I'm Not Going," giving it plenty of attitude, but coming off a bit shouty as she played to the rafters in an attempt to work her way back. Steven Tyler thought she brought it again, Jennifer Lopez felt the passion and Randy Jackson loved the attitude.

Langone picked Smokie Norful's emotional ballad "I Need You Now," filling the tune with lots of passion and turning it into a tour de force that tugged heartstrings and seemed to punch his ticket. Randy loved that Stefano picked one of his favorites and Lopez said he nailed it when he needed to.

Chantelle got the next shot with Hoagy Carmichael's "Georgia on My Mind," starting out low and breathy and then climbing into her high, sweet range and hitting a series of giant notes near the end that felt like her attempt to swing for the fences. Jackson wasn't sure where it was going at first but said she totally pulled it off.

Barreto dedicated Jon Secada's "Angel" to the woman he once loved, figuring he'd try to curry some favor as well by singing a half Spanish/ half English tune. His vocals were strong and moving, but it was unclear if it was enough to get him back in the mix. All Lopez could say was "you did all you could do," which didn't sound promising.

Tyler called Adedapo, which meant the definitive end of the line for Zorrilla, Turner and Wilson. At first Naima didn't seem to have enough in the tank to take on soul icon Donny Hathaway's "For all we Know," but she gave it her all and put some smooth soul into the performance. Tyler felt she dug deep, but Naima's tears signaled that she didn't feel confident.

The final shot went to Rosen, meaning Gamboa, Dorsey, Loewenstern and Halperin said bye-bye. Double-R chose Elton John's "Sorry Seems to be the Hardest Hard," reworking the song into a kind of flamenco torch song, which he sang while flashing his puppy-dog eyes and over-emoting by several measures. Jackson called it nice and tender, saying the decision was going to be a brutal one.

After the break, the judges weren't ready, so Seacrest cued up the glittery video for Lopez's "On the Floor" to give them a chance to deliberate some more. With time running out, it was redemption time for Jones and Langone, as well as Adedapo, who helped fill out the top 13.

The first live performance shows of the season kick off next Wednesday.

Do you agree with the top 13? Did your favorite make it? Let us know what you think in comments below!

Don't miss "Idol Party Live" every Thursday on MTV.com, following the "American Idol" results show, for analysis, celebrity guests and even some karaoke — get in the conversation by tweeting with the hashtag #idolparty! In the meantime, get your "Idol" fix on MTV News' "American Idol" page, where you'll find all the latest news, interviews and opinions.

Source: http://www.mtv.com/news/articles/1659177/american-idol-recap.jhtml

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Kim Kardashian's Day Out with Daddy

With camera crews capturing all of their family doings, Kim Kardashian and father Bruce Jenner paired up while shooting scenes during a visit to a medical center in Tarzana, California on Thursday (March 3).

With the E! beauty nearly taking a tumble thanks to her sky-high heels, the mother/father duo walked along side-by-side as Kim dutifully picked up her daddy after he attended a scheduled checkup with his physician.

Also tending to her daily workout efforts, Kim tweeted during the course of the day, "Whats up world? I had another hard workout today...I am sooo sore, I can't even move!"

Meanwhile, fans can look forward to catching Kim and sister Kourtney in an all-new episode of "Kourtney & Kim Take New York" set to air this Sunday (March 6) at 10/9c on E!.

Source: http://celebrity-gossip.net/kim-kardashian/kim-kardashians-day-out-daddy-483175

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Why Did Paula Abdul Call 911 On Valentine's Day?

Why Did Paula Abdul Call 911 On Valentine's Day?

Paula Abdul had a straight-up bad Valentine's Day. The '90s pop star and former American Idol judge ended her night with a hysterical call to the police -- but don't worry, she's fine. She just had a really bad argument with her boyfriend. TMZ has a clip of the dramatic 911 call that Paula made from her boyfriend's car. You can listen to it here.

During the call, Abdul seems to be pleading with her boyfriend to let her out of his car.

"Drop me off! I wanna go and he won't let me!" says the star, before dissolving into incoherent shrieks. After she tells her Valentine's Day companion that she has emergency services on the phone, she informs the operator that he's dropping her off.

So was that the end of that? Police contacted Abdul an hour after the phone call, and were told that it was just verbal argument. She declined to file a police report. And according to her rep, it was just an innocent fight that got resolved.

"Arguments with loved ones are often times heated," Abdul's rep told E! News. "After the call was made everything was worked out."

Call us crazy, but calling 911 on your date seems a little extreme unless there was something more going on. Then again, Paula is a little extreme, so who knows? We'd like to think that she got home safe and sound, and promptly dumped the guy for a box of chocolates.


Source: http://www.ivillage.com/why-did-paula-abdul-call-911-valentines-day/1-a-328538

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Charlie Sheen Set for ABC?s 20/20 Tuesday (VIDEO)

Charlie Sheen, in all of his bizarre glory, will grace our television screens for yet another interview this week, this time on ABC?s 20/20. The sit-down is scheduled for Tuesday night at 10/9c. After watching his relatively incoherent chat with ?Today? this week, I?m beginning to wonder if he ever acted a day in his [...]

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/RightCelebrity/~3/Ra3sFGgCtp0/

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Coldplay, Led Zeppelin Album Covers Featured On New British Stamps

Album art from Pink Floyd, Blur and David Bowie also included.
By James Montgomery


Coldplay's new British stamps
Photo: Royal Mail

On Thursday (January 7), the U.K.'s Royal Mail unveiled a series of 10 new stamps, honoring the most iconic album covers of the past 40 years.

The albums featured in the new series are the Rolling Stones' Let It Bleed, Led Zeppelin's IV, David Bowie's The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders From Mars, Mike Oldfield's Tubular Bells, The Clash's London Calling, New Order's Power, Corruption and Lies, Primal Scream's Screamadelica, Pink Floyd's The Division Bell, Blur's Parklife and — the most recent album on to make the cut — Coldplay's A Rush of Blood to the Head.

Meant to honor "the most potent graphic images of modern times, many of which have provided a visual soundtrack to people's lives," the series is the end result of a lengthy research process by the Royal Mail, who looked through thousands of album covers by British artists before deciding on the final list. And, during a Wednesday night BBC Radio broadcast, it was revealed that the queen herself actually approved each design.

Led Zeppelin guitarist Jimmy Page — who helped design the cover for IV — was on hand to celebrate the release of the stamps and recalled the mysterious nature of the album's iconic imagery.

"Almost 40 years after the album came out, nobody knows the old man who featured on the cover, nor the artist who painted him," he said. "That sort of sums up what we wanted to achieve with the album cover, which has remained both anonymous and enigmatic at the same time."

Of course, any great honor is befitting of an equally great contest, so, on the same day the stamps were made available to the general public, Coldplay decided to give one of their Rush of Blood stamps away. In a message on their official site, the band held a contest to send one lucky fan "a letter using a Coldplay stamp, postmarked with today's issue date."

"We visited our local post office earlier today and bought some of the Coldplay stamps," the message read. "Very nice they are too."

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Source: http://www.mtv.com/news/articles/1629227/coldplay-led-zeppelin-album-covers-featured-on-new-british-stamps.jhtml

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How Do Oscar Hosts James Franco, Anne Hathaway Stack Up?

Franco's 'distracted' delivery and Anne's 'charming' turn has drawn inevitable comparisons to past emcees like Alec Baldwin and Steve Martin.
By Eric Ditzian


Anne Hathaway and James Franco host the 2011 Academy Awards on Sunday
Photo: Getty Images

In the wake of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences' effort to infuse some youthful vitality into Sunday's Oscar ceremony by tapping James Franco and Anne Hathaway to emcee the event, positive praise for the hosts' joint performance has been hard to find.

The New York Times called Hathaway "charming and charismatic" but said Franco came off "a little distracted and even blasé" and that "together they had an odd absence of chemistry." The Washington Post declared that while Hathaway "worked her derriere off," Franco seemed "sort of heavy-lidded and smirky." And USA Today simply said Franco appeared to be "preparing for a remake of 'Dazed and Confused.' "

A match made in awards-season heaven these two certainly were not, and early ratings numbers have the show's audience declining 7 percent from last year (though still higher than 2008 and 2009). At the very least, Franco and Hathaway were likeable throughout, excelling in their pre-taped segments and, if anything, suffering from weak writing during their live, scripted banter.

Last year's hosts, Alec Baldwin and Steve Martin, by contrast, were nearly universally lauded. The Los Angeles Times called them "the best hosts the show has had in years." The veteran duo's jokes were hardly Ricky Gervais-edgy, but Hollywood doesn't always have the best sense of humor about itself. They zinged Meryl Streep ("[She] holds the most nominations for any actor," Martin said. "Or, as I like to think of it, the most losses"); "Precious: Based on the Novel 'Push' by Sapphire" (saying that it "lived up to its video game"); and didn't shy away from some entertaining presenter intros ("He directed 'A Single Man,' she weighs a single pound: Tom Ford and Sarah Jessica Parker").

"Baldwin and Steve Martin proved to be classy and quippy throughout the night, very piece-of-cake — not that anyone expected otherwise," Hank Stuever wrote in The Washington Post last March.

In 2009, host Hugh Jackman's bravura opening musical number was enough to assure happy memories, even two years later, of the actor's time on the Oscar stage. As New York magazine put it at the time, "Hugh Jackman saves the Oscars!"

On Sunday night, there actually seemed to be lingering sadness that Jackman didn't reunite with Hathaway — after their unexpectedly funny "Frost/Nixon" duet in '09 — for another satirical tune. Hathaway was left to sing by herself, and it just wasn't the same. Yet here's the thing: Jackman hardly knocked it out of the park after his opening shtick; it's interesting what people end up remembering after the show's over. In some sort of backhanded compliment in '09, the New York Times said, "Hugh Jackman was a shrewd, even thrifty choice for a recession-era Oscar night — the hosting equivalent of a value meal."

A similar critical shrug greeted Jon Stewart in 2008, after he and his team rushed to prep an act in the wake of the writers' strike. Variety argued that the comedian "played it pretty safe" but generally "earned his keep by maintaining a playful, irreverent tone throughout the night." That was about as positive as the reviews got, with The Washington Post on the other end of the spectrum saying, he "did only a fair-to-middling job, mostly middling."

Hosting the Oscars, then, is a truly thankless task. And perhaps an explanation for Franco's sleepy performance can be found in the advice Stewart jokingly gave him on "The Daily Show" a few weeks ago.

"Go at it with the attitude that you're above it all, with an ironic detachment bordering on contempt," Stewart told Franco. "They will eat it up." What did you think of Anne and James as Oscar hosts? Tell us in the comments!

Stick with MTV News on Oscar night and beyond for red-carpet fashion coverage, analysis of the winners, plus interviews, photos and more from your favorite Hollywood stars!

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Source: http://www.mtv.com/news/articles/1658871/oscars-hosts-anne-hathaway-james-franco.jhtml

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Britney Spears Makes Your Body Pop On Femme Fatale Teaser

Producer Dr. Luke gives fans a snippet of 'How I Roll' from Brit's March 29 album.
By Jocelyn Vena


Britney Spears' <i>Femme Fatale</i>
Photo: Jive

Judging by the snippets we've heard from Femme Fatale, Britney Spears is ready to dance. Late Wednesday night, Spears' producer Dr. Luke tweeted out another tease for the track "How I Roll."

"I just might be feeling like giving u another snippet ..... maybe," Luke wrote. "Should it be a [producers] bloodshy and avant song??? something like that," he added before sending a link to the song.

The teaser opens with Britney cooing "ooh ahh" as beats and synths kick in. Those are jumbled with handclaps before Spears begins singing lines like, "Show your knee socks/ With tequila on the rocks/ Till you make your body pop/ To the speakers."

"In my opinion, this is her strongest album ever. It's somewhat of a departure from what she's done. It's more mature," manager Larry Rudolph told MTV News about Femme Fatale, which he even likened to a Madonna classic. "It's more of a dance record. ... This really is Britney's Ray of Light album."

Spears herself has hinted that the album will have fans dancing. "I would describe it as moody, edgy pop with A LOT of energy. I co-wrote a couple of songs. I think it's some of the best work I have ever done. There are a few mid-tempos that could be considered ballads," Spears said during a Twitter Q&A this month.

"I have a lot of history with #MaxMartin and @TheDoctorLuke so it's always fun to collaborate with them," she continued. "They make such incredible music. I'm so excited and I can't wait for you guys to hear it. I think its some of the best work I have ever done!"

What do you think of what you've heard so far from "How I Roll"? Tell us in the comments!

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Source: http://www.mtv.com/news/articles/1658608/britney-spears-how-i-roll.jhtml

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