US and UK magazine

LONDON (AP) — Publicists say artist Sam Taylor-Wood and actor Aaron Johnson have tied the knot.

A statement Friday from Public Eye Communications said the couple, who have two young children, married on Thursday — the summer solstice — in Somerset, southwest England.

The statement said 45-year-old Taylor-Wood wore a dress by Sarah Burton of Alexander McQueen. The 22-year-old Johnson wore a suit by Tom Ford.

Johnson played the young John Lennon in Taylor-Wood's 2009 film "Nowhere Boy" and went on to star in "Kick Ass" and the upcoming "Anna Karenina."

The statement said the couple would both use the surname Taylor-Johnson.

Thai Buddhist film festival seeks to spark faith

11:54 AM

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BANGKOK (AP) — Religion can be a tough sell nowadays, so instead of waiting for disciples to make their way to temple, some promoters brought 36 films with Buddhist themes to the heart of modern Thailand earlier this month.

The International Buddhism Film Festival was an effort by the government and private religious groups to popularize Buddhism among the younger generations.

"It's like prescribing medicine to children, you have to add a little sweetener there," said Somchai Seanglai, the permanent secretary of Thailand's Culture Ministry. "City dwellers or our young people are not used to the traditional way of practicing Buddhism, so we insert Buddhist dharma into art and culture that people love to consume." Dharma refers to the Buddha's teachings on the meaning of existence.

Initiated by the California-based Buddhism Film Foundation, the movie festival came to Bangkok for the first time this year since its debut in Los Angeles in 2003, and pulled in 3,700 visitors.

"Now many youngsters think of Buddhism as a religion for old people, so the film festival is trying to engage Buddhism with the contemporary world," said Santi Opaspakornkij, executive director of the Buddhadasa Indapanno Archives, an education center dedicated to promoting Buddhism through new channels in Thailand.

About 90 percent of Thailand's population is Buddhist, but many view the religion simply as a rough guide to social do's and don'ts, with vague notions encouraging good behavior.

"I don't go to temples very often," said Napasamon Jeeramaneemai, a third-year architecture student at Bangkok's Thammasat University attending the festival. "Buddhism for me is just a better way to resolve bad situations. Sometimes when you blame them on 'karma,' it's easier to accept them." Buddhists believe "Karma" rules a person's destiny depending on their deeds throughout their existence, which can span many lifetimes.

To make sure the films would cause no major offense, the Buddhadasa Indapanno Archives sought support from three leading Thai monks in the forefront of popularizing Buddhism, including the popular young preacher, Phra Maha Vudhijaya Vajiramedhi, who posts his teachings on his Twitter account for more than 500,000 followers.

The films included "Crazy Wisdom," a documentary released in 2011 by American filmmaker Johanna Demetrakas. It portrays Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche, a controversial Tibetan monk who preached to thousands of students when he lived in the West but whose lifestyle was in defiance of many of Buddhism's ethical principles.

But many people considered his unconventional style a challenging but effective way of presenting Buddhist concepts.

"I personally don't agree with the way Trungpa Rinpoche teaches," Nittaya Weera, a freelance writer on telecommunication, commented on "Crazy Wisdom." ''But I understand the real essence of Buddhism is in the belief itself. The way to get there doesn't really matter."

"Crazy Wisdom" turned out to be the most popular films. Other crowd-pleasers included "Abraxas," a Japanese film about a married punk rocker turned Buddhist, and "Karma," a lighthearted Nepali film about two Tibetan nuns on a journey to get repayment of a loan.

'Devious Maids' finds a 2013 home at Lifetime

8:51 AM

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LOS ANGELES (AP) — The Lifetime channel says it's picking up a new series from the creator of "Desperate Housewives."

The channel said Friday it has ordered 13 episodes of "Devious Maids" from producer Marc Cherry. The series is about maids working for the rich and famous in Beverly Hills and counts "Desperate Housewives" star Eva Longoria as an executive producer.

"Desperate Housewives" ended its run on ABC this season. The network had been weighing "Devious Maids" for its 2012-2013 schedule but passed.

The "Devious Maids" cast includes Ana Ortiz, Judy Reyes, Grant Show and Susan Lucci. Lifetime is aiming for a 2013 debut for the series, which is based on a Mexican telenovela and produced by ABC Studios.

Elvis Presley's crypt pulled from auction block

5:05 AM

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LOS ANGELES (AP) — Elvis Presley's crypt has left the auction block.

Celebrity auctioneer Darren Julien said Friday that his company has agreed not to sell the crypt after fans worldwide demanded that it be kept as a shrine to his memory.

Julien's Auctions announced in May that it would sell the empty tomb at the Forest Hill Cemetery in Memphis, Tenn., at its "Music Icons" auction Sunday. Julien said the company won't sell the crypt "until Forest Hills finds a plan that best suits the interests of the fans while respecting and preserving the memory of Elvis Presley."

Presley was interred there alongside his mother, Gladys, after he died Aug. 16, 1977. Two months later, they were reburied at his Graceland home. The original crypt has remained empty ever since.

With NBC silent, Curry keeps working at 'Today'

1:33 AM

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NEW YORK (AP) — Ann Curry showed up again for work at NBC's "Today" show Friday as the network maintained its silence on reports that she's about to be replaced.

Curry was in her familiar co-host role with Matt Lauer on Friday, helping introduce musician Kenny Chesney for a performance outside the show's Rockefeller Center studio.

NBC is reportedly discussing a plan to remove her as co-host a year after she replaced Meredith Vieira. After 16 years of unquestioned dominance in the morning, "Today" is in a tough fight with ABC's "Good Morning America."

Veteran Washington lawyer Robert Barnett, hired by Curry to represent her in talks with NBC about her future, also had no comment Friday.

It is making for another awkward transition at a network that prides itself on smooth ones, recalling the memorable few weeks shortly before Conan O'Brien was kicked out as host of the "Tonight" show.

When she appeared on the air Thursday less than 24 hours after reports she would lose the hosting job surfaced, Curry had one apparently unintentional indignity piled on. At one point as her picture filled the screen, a graphic beneath her face read: "Here Today, Gone Tomorrow."

The "Today" show had its biggest audience of the week on Thursday, just under 4.5 million, and its biggest margin of victory over "Good Morning America," according to preliminary ratings by the Nielsen Co.

Meanwhile, the Ladies' Home Journal released excerpts of an interview Curry had conducted earlier for the magazine's August cover story, where she said it was hard not to take it personally when questions about her performance surfaced during this spring's ratings competition with ABC. "Good Morning America" in April ended a "Today" winning streak in the ratings that stretched back to 1995 and has won three other weeks since.

"You worry, am I not good enough?" Curry told the magazine. "Am I not what people need? Am I asking the right questions. When people say negative things or speculate, you can't help but feel hurt."

She said she'd love to be on "Today" for 20 years. She started as a news anchor in 1997.

Tuesday, June 26, 2012

NYPD: Man swipes Dali painting from art gallery

10:11 PM

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NEW YORK (AP) — A thief who swiped a Salvador Dali painting off the wall of a New York art gallery may have escaped, but experts say the painting will likely be recovered when it comes back onto the art market.

Police are searching for a slim man with a receding hairline who walked into a Madison Avenue art gallery on Tuesday posing as a customer and walked out with the $150,000 Dali watercolor and ink painting in a large black shopping bag.

The man asked a security guard if he could take a photo, then removed the painting as soon as the guard stepped away, the New York Daily News reported. Surveillance cameras captured the man, who was wearing a black-and-white checked shirt, on his way out the door.

The 1949 painting, called "Cartel des Don Juan Tenorio," was part of the Venus Over Manhattan art gallery's very first exhibition. The gallery, which opened to the public in May, did not respond to a request for comment Friday.

The vast majority of high-end paintings such as this one are eventually recovered because they are such rare works of art and easily tracked, said Robert Wittman, an art-security consultant and former investigator for the FBI's national art crime team.

"Generally speaking, art thieves are fairly good criminals, but they're terrible businessmen," he said. "And the true art is not the stealing, it's the selling."

While the gallery's security measures are unclear, Wittman said most galleries and museums have electronic surveillance, guards on duty and specific protocols in place to prevent such thefts. When one of these measures breaks down, theft is more likely to occur.

"At some point, when that person was given access to the painting, the guard was not looking," Wittman said. "That would be against any kind of protocol."

The gallery's inaugural exhibit has several dozen works of art from the 19th century to the present on display.

Dali painted the work when he was creating the backdrop and set designs for a theater production in Madrid, said William Jeffett, curator at the Dali Museum in St. Petersburg, Fla.

"It seems to be a design for the poster that they used to promote the theatrical production," Jeffett said.

Last year, a wine steward went on a bicoastal binge of plucking pricey art off gallery walls in California and New York. Mark Lugo, 31, pleaded guilty to taking a $350,000 drawing by Cubist painter Fernand Leger from a lobby gallery at Manhattan's Carlyle Hotel.

He also admitted to snatching a $275,000 Picasso drawing called "Tete de Femme" ("Head of a Woman") from the Weinstein Gallery in San Francisco.

Investigators found a $430,000 collection of stolen art — including the Leger, a 1917 piece called "Composition with Mechanical Elements" — hanging in Lugo's apartment in Hoboken, N.J.

"Galleries are usually more open or vulnerable to theft," Wittman said. "Because museums are built to keep the art in. Galleries are built to put the art out."

Composer, lyricist Richard Adler dies at 90 in NY

6:14 PM

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NEW YORK (AP) — Composer and lyricist Richard Adler, who won Tony Awards for co-writing snappy and infectious, songs for such hit Broadway musicals as "The Pajama Game" and "Damn Yankees" and who staged and produced President John F. Kennedy's birthday celebration featuring a breathy Marilyn Monroe, has died. He was 90.

Adler died Thursday at his home in Southampton, N.Y., his widow, Susan A. Ivory, said.

Some of Adler's biggest songs are "You Gotta Have Heart," ''Hey, There," ''Hernando's Hideaway," ''Whatever Lola Wants," ''Steam Heat," ''Rags to Riches," and "Everybody Loves a Lover."

Adler staged and produced several shows for U.S. presidents, including the unforgettable 1962 extravaganza for Kennedy at Madison Square Garden where Monroe sang "Happy Birthday."

He and Jerry Ross wrote the music and lyrics to "The Pajama Game," a light comedy about labor-management relations at the Sleep-Tite Pajama Factory, which won the best musical Tony in 1955.

In a 2006 interview with The Associated Press, Adler recounted how the song "Hernando's Hideaway" began from "The Pajama Game." The show's authors, George Abbott and Richard Bissell, needed a tune for the second act, and Abbott approached Adler.

"He said, 'Write a song that can be performed in a dimly lit, smoke-filled nightclub with a lot of fervent-looking people. Oh, and make it Latin,'" Adler said. "It was a piece of cake for me."

What emerged was a frothy Latin tango with the lyrics: "I know a dark secluded place/A place where no one knows your face/A glass of wine a fast embrace/It's called Hernando's Hideaway... Ole!"

The song went on to have a successful life outside the theater, hitting the top of the pop charts and later being recorded by Archie Blyer, band leader Billy May and even Ella Fitzgerald.

Did Adler think it would be a hit? "No. I had no idea," he said.

Adler teamed up with Ross again for "Damn Yankees," in which a rabid baseball fan sells his soul to the devil in exchange for a chance to lead his favorite team to American League pennant glory. It won the best musical Tony crown the next year.

The fruitful Ross-Adler union ended when Ross died of a lung ailment in 1955 at age 29. Adler went on to earn a Tony nomination for writing the lyrics and music for 1961's "Kwamina."

Adler was born in New York City in 1921 and graduated from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 1943. He served in the U.S. Naval Reserve during World War II.

He composed several symphonic works, including "Wilderness Suite," which was commissioned by the U.S. Department of the Interior, and "The Lady Remembers," to celebrate the Statue of Liberty's centennial. He also composed two ballets for the Chicago City Ballet: "Eight by Adler" in 1984 and "Chicago."

Adler also produced works on Broadway, including the play "The Sin of Pat Muldoon" and the musical "Rex." He is a member of the Songwriter's Hall of Fame.

Adler is survived by his wife; his children, Andrew Adler, Katherine Adler and Charles Shipman; and three grandchildren, Damien and Scarlett Adler and Lola Jane Shipman.