Friday
· Music round-up: Nuos Non Plus are at Safari Sams, The Bell Rays play the Roxy, and Good Riddance rock the El Rey.
· We think we may have mentioned this already, but for the slow-learners among you, the four-day Star Wars Celebration IV at the Convention Center starts today. Go be one with the Force already!
· Writers Bloc presents the inimitable Elmore Leonard, in conversation with Walter Mirisch, who produced West Side Story and The Magnificent Seven.
Saturday
· Satisfy your enduring obsession with Kim Novak at Hollywood Forever Cemetery's screening of Vertigo.
· The Barnsdall Gallery Theate hosts monologist/performance artist/actress Heather Woodbury's The Last Days of Desmond 'Nani' Reese: A Stripper's History of the World, told from the point of view of a 108-year-old stripper. Boy, does she have Bob Evans stories, don't get her started!
Sunday
· It's your last chance to check out the "latin-flavored" Memorial Day Festival at Alvarado St. & Wilshire Blvd.
Monday
· You may want to take a moment to remember fallen soldiers today, in whatever way you see fit; e.g., Ray "Bubba" Sorensen chooses to paint a 56-ton boulder.

On this second-holiest of Wookiee days (can't forget Life Day), we beseech you to set aside at least some time from you marathon worship of all things Star Wars to appreciate the goods and services of Defamer advertisers, whose various gadgets, cosmetics, thongwear, and filmed entertainments bring you as much corporeal pleasure as a thousand slave Leias could. If you'd like to be included in the Ewok campfire party, everything you need to know is right here.

· Sandra Bullock will star in The Proposal, a romcom about a "demanding female boss" who winds up in a sham marriage to her "young male assistant" in order to avoid deportation to Canada. Hopefully this won't put any bright ideas into the heads of nebbish agents who hired their call-rollers based on their fuckability alone. [Variety]
· Fox has bought the rights to The SIMS videogame series, which they feel has great potential for "traditional story telling," something the simulated gay cowboy love story Brokeback SIMS Mountain has already poignantly proven.
· Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End is on a course for a box office bounty as bloated and incomprehensible as the movie itself. [Variety]
· Despite producers having taken out a full-page ad trumpeting Nicolas Cage would play young(er) Al Capone in The Untouchables' prequel, "scheduling conflicts" won't allow the actor to participate. They can take great comfort in knowing that not only have they dodged a massive bullet, but that white-hot breakout Spartan Gerard Butler is on board, taking over for Sean Connery in the role of Jimmy "That's the Chicago Way" Malone. [Variety]
· TV Networks scan the 2006-2007 ratings data, then promptly crap their pants. [THR]

It brings us no pleasure to inform you that the feud between noted 9/11 conspiracy theorist Rosie O'Donnell and squeaky-voiced hawk Elisabeth Hasselbeck seems to be showing few signs of waning. (Let's take a moment to remember happier, BFF times, when the two threw back some beers and wine before hitting the opening night of Les Misérables on Broadway.) Reports Page Six:

· Celebration IV at the L.A. Convention Center has officially kicked off. Their blog already has some sneak preview video up, including the above, utterly adorable session of the Jedi Academy, in which a group of half-pint Yodas-in-training (so much for the widely held misconception that Star Wars fans don't have sex) face off against Darth Vader. Those kids are to be commended for their bravery—we would have soiled our cloaks at that age. [Celebration IV Blog]
· Oh no! Jabba the Neck Wattle has enslaved Queen Amidala! [theweeklydonut.org]
· 75 "underground artists" were approached to decorate their own Darth Vader helmet, in something called The Vader Project. [LAT] [CIV Blog]
· While George Lucas won't be in attendance, Carrie Fisher is scheduled to make an appearance. This is a great opportunity for you to demonstrate just how much thunder you're packing by whipping off your belt during your pitch for Episode VII: A New Bulge. [THR]

· Sure, it's an old clip from a tired meme, but with today's He-Man remake news, no harm in reliving the magic. [via commenter I'm Waitin' for Dolemite]
· Old friend Bachem Macuno returns with The Bush Twins Save the World.
· Renegade gator brought to justice, sentenced to life term at Griffith Park Zoo.
· Pirates 3 is already breaking box office records.

We knew that we could count on our glory-hole-probing sister site Fleshbot to update us on the much-buzzed-about career of porn up-and-comer Katee Holmes, whose noble plan to honor her famous namesake by offering up her virtue on camera was announced in Page Six earlier this week.

Potty-mouthed actor Isaiah Washington currently awaits a call from his agent that will determine whether or not he will continue to show up to the Grey's Anatomy set every day, carrying a warm smile and a box of Sprinkles cupcakes for his co-workers. (It's a small, peacemaking gesture, meant to say, "How could I possibly hate Gays when I come bearing cupcakes—the gayest dessert there is!") In the meantime, you can enjoy what might be your last rendezvous with Dr. Preston Burke as a series regular tonight on the Grey's finale, during which the actor's GLAAD-mandated PSA will run. GLAAD's website offers a preview of the spot, which contains in its call for a choke-free, homoinclusive society the following quote: "When you use words that demean a person because of their sexual orientation, race or gender, you send a message of hate." The spot is truly a master class in "sincerity for the camera," and perhaps the actor's most stirring statement on the matter since a moment of publicist-unassisted damage control inspired him to announce, "I love gay. I wanted to be gay. Please let me be gay!"

With Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End just hours away from swallowing America's multiplexes like a tentacled leviathan, star Keira Knightley has emerged victorious in a legal battle against British tabloid The Daily Mail for having suggested her bony frame was providing unnecessary thinspiration for fanorexic teens. Reuters reports:

· Music round-up: Under the Influence of Giants at the El Rey; Fischerspooner and Dirty Vegas at Avalon; Division Day at Spaceland.
· This could get ugly: Andy Dick does the MySpace comedy night at the Hollywood Improv. Wear a helmet (and bring pepper spray, just to be safe).
· Eric Hoffman, Gary Rudoren, and Bob Odenkirk turn up at Skylight Books to teach you "how to be funny without being talented or original" to support McSweeney's how-to manual Comedy By the Numbers.

In the interest of closure regarding the "Sanjaya is actually some sort of performance art stunt" video we posted on Tuesday that has certainly challenged everything you thought you knew about untalented karaoke competition contestants who refuse to disappear, we invite you to watch the above clip, in which the lusciously coiffed imp admits to some David Blaine-level mindbuggery. Sanjaya, it turns out, is real. All too real. (And now he's friends with Will Ferrell, who seems to be out of good viral video ideas now that he's exhausted all the creative possibilities of the drunk, foul-mouthed baby genre.)

PrivacyWatch celebrity sightings are submitted by our readers, and are posted several times a week, so them in often. Submit yours to tips[AT]defamer.com (please put "sighting" or "PrivacyWatch" in the subject line) and tell everyone about the time you spotted Billy Baldwin dine and dash on Mario Van Peebles.

Your abusive boss is probably already out for the Memorial Day weekend, so this seems like the perfect time to begin that job hunt you've been meaning to get underway ever since he branded the agency's initials on you with a hot wire hanger as a show of loyalty. Hit the Defamer Job Board and get one step closer to freedom, still-healing ICM scar be damned:

By now you've likely seen at least some part of the split-screen smackdown between Rosie O'Donnell and Elisabeth Hasselbeck on The View yesterday: It raised ill-informed, inarticulate political debate to the artful level of jazz improvisation, with O'Donnell keeping rhythm with bassy, angry-lesbian notes as Hasselbeck explored ear-piercing variations on her signature, "Up with dead Iraqis!" theme. Extra caught up with flowy-dress-wearing, right-wing shrew, who's confident the two will patch things up. And because no View feud is complete without the wit and wisdom of the Great Combforwarded One, Extra (way to keep on it, guys!) has these inspirational words from Donald Trump:

· While the two-hour American Idol finale-clusterfuck dominates the ratings, it was down about 20 percent from last year's season-ender. Might this have been God's way of punishing Fox for allowing the ludicrously drawn-out show to stretch nine minutes over its allotted running time, fucking over DVR owners who didn't think to also record the local news if they actually wanted to see who won? Are we bitter? Nah, not much. [Variety]
· Just in case you missed the make-up announcement late yesterday afternoon, Alec Baldwin and CAA are back together. Always fucking or fighting, those two! [THR]
· CBS Corp. head Les Moonves is named MIPCOM "Personality of the Year." In an unrelated story, the family of the trade show's president, who had mysteriously gone missing at the beginning of Personality of the Year voting, was returned to safety shortly after the announcement. [Variety]
· Mary-Kate Olsen returns to TV (we know what you're thinking, but nope, no Ashley this time—free at last!) in a recurring role on Showtime's Weeds, in which she'll play a troubled customer whose eating disorder is so severe she can't even eat Mary Louise Parker's delicious pot brownies without purging. [THR]
· Warner Bros. acquries the rights to children's fantasy book Skulduggery Pleasant, hoping their possible movie franchise will turn out more Harry Potter than Lemony Snicket. [Variety]

It's been 20 years since Hollywood pooped out Dolph Lungren vehicle Masters of the Universe, the big-screen version of the moderately beloved (let's be honest here: it was no Thundercats) 1980s after-school toy infomercial, so in keeping with the industry's loosely observed Two Decade Rule for the re-adaptation of previously exploited material, superproducer Joel Silver and Warner Bros. now feel enough time has passed to do another He-Man movie. The early plans already sound as if the creative team isn't going to sidestep the Gay He-Man Question, as recent queer-cinema blockbuster 300 is cited as an inspiration for their vision; once the deal is finalized and the script finished, production should begin on a cavernous Warner Bros. soundstage, where the prodigiously muscled, well-oiled actors playing He-Man, Ram-Man, and Fisto will gather in front of a green screen to battle the six-packed legions of darkness led by a liberally pierced Skeletor and equally terrifying, orally fixated henchman Trap-Jaw.

Beyond baby Dannielynn, we have precious few direct blood ties to America's departed diet pill spokeswoman, Anna Nicole Smith. Luckily, her busty, downwardly spiraling legacy lives on in Donna Hogan, who's mulling some pneumatic personal improvements in anticipation of Playboy's very special Less Attractive Half-Sisters of Former Playmates Issue. From Page Six:

Unless you've been napping in a sensory deprivation tank buried a mile beneath the earth's surface for the last ten or so hours, by now you know that Jordin Sparks (just 17, as we were reminded every 30 seconds of this past season) is this year's American Idol, a conclusion so foregone that runner-up Blake Lewis put in an application to run the mechanical bull at Saddle Ranch mere minutes after the finalists were announced last week. Indeed, the only real questions left unanswered before the bloated two-hour finale began were: What sexagenarian-and-up singers would call in favors to perform in front of a television audience of tens of millions of teenage girls? (Answer: Tony Bennett, Bette Midler, Gladys Knight, Smokey Robinson, a hologram of Fat Elvis, and the ghost of James Brown.) And: What washed-up celebrity would be this year's David Hasselhoff, caught weeping while lost in a transcendent moment in which all melts away but him, the singer who has reached down deep inside him and caressed his very soul, and Idol's all-seeing, audience-scanning cameras? The answer to this query comes after the jump, at precisely 3:44 of Midler's moving performance of that one song she does:

After fifteen decreasingly entertaining seasons of Entourage, there is hardly a premium cable subscriber in America unaware that the character of Ari Gold, memorably portrayed by Emmy-winning Matsuhisa pariah Jeremy Piven, was inspired by Endeavor superagent Ari Emanuel. (Fun fact: Gold's "Hug it out, bitch" catchphrase was adapted from Emanuel's far less succinct, "I will fuck your skull until your head explodes, toss your body in a dumpster behind the CPK, then maybe send a nice muffin basket to your widow to show there's no hard feelings.") In today's Gatecrasher column, the NY Daily News' Ben Widdicombe induces an anonymous former Endeavor employee to explain how watching his fictional doppleganger's amusing antics has affected the behavior of the genuine Ari article:

· We thought that bachelor auctions only existed on bad TV shows, but we suppose we were wrong about that.
· In other Clooney news, he and his Ocean's 13 pals had some fun joshing the media about an eye-lift he may or may not have had.
· Harvey Weinstein vs. Luc Besson: It is so on.
· Joss Whedon is not a Captivity fan, to say the least.
· Another day, another O'Donnell/Hasselbeck slapfight.