Britney Spears was committed to the hospital twice this month with psychiatric problems and Heath Ledger was on tons of medication before his tragic death. Now we learn that Alex Kalev of Grey's Anatomy checked in and out of the same psych ward as Britney this week and that Kirsten Dunst is "on the verge of a breakdown" after erratic behavior at the Sundance Film Festival. Even the paps are acting strange, quitting their jobs over something called "guilt." Everyone is exhausted, sad and emotionally burned out. Meanwhile, all the twitchy, unpredictable celebrities are descending on New York for Fashion Week to compensate for missing the about-to-be-canceled Oscars. How to prevent a domino-like series of nervous breakdowns? We should, of course, turn to the sage, calming words of sobriety guru Courtney Love. Her advice for Britney and, really, all the troubled souls of the world, after the jump.

[Actress Kirsten Dunst and Unidentified Friend in Park City, Utah yesterday. They were there for some sort of movie thing. Image via Bauer-Griffin]

PrivacyWatch celebrity sightings are submitted by our readers, and are posted several times a week, so send them in often! Submit yours to tips[AT]defamer.com (please put "sighting" or "PrivacyWatch" in the subject line so we don't lose them) and tell everyone about the time you spotted Alice Cooper buying a box of vitamin-fortified Hitler-O's at the Rose Bowl Flea Market.

Sure, we could all just sit around and gripe about the sorry state of affairs for women writers, directors, producers, and studio execs in 2007 Hollywood, but Glamour magazine, in conjunction with Clinique Happy ("So that you might find the man that will one day make you Happy!"™), have actually done something about it. The concept is simple:

The weekly edition of Variety officially awards its Showmen of the Year honor, the most coveted recognition in all of showbiz trade journalism (and yes, that includes Var's Billion Dollar Director Day celebration), to Sony's Michael Lynton and Amy Pascal, an occasion necessitating the purchase of full-page tribute ads by any talent, producers, or agency ever hoping to get a movie made at their red-hot studio. While none of the ads make direct mention of Pascal's ceremonial bepenising by the publication, this minimalist, phoned-in-by-someone's-unimaginative-assistant offering by Spider-Man's trio of Tobey Maguire, Kirsten Dunst, and Sam Raimi (really, couldn't someone have thrown some spider-related clip art on there?—click the thumbnail to enlarge) nods to the co-president's honorary gender reassignment, a little in-joke that only those who've generated billions in box office grosses can get away without fear of career reprisals.

The film crew for "How To Lose Friends And Alienate People" has been terrorizing New York this week. Last night, they shot what people were told were the final scenes of the movie adaptation of exiled former Vanity Fair journo Toby Young's book. Is it a spoiler if, you know, the film's based on a book? Sort of?

• Kirsten Dunst bailed early on the Spiderman 3 premiere to attend her own birthday party, which seems like a good call to us. [Page Six]
  

Following Monday's Tokyo world premiere of Spider-Man 3, Spidey-Friends™ Sam Raimi, Tobey Maguire, and Kirsten Dunst should have nothing on their minds but basking in the sweet adulation of the throng of Japanese fans who briefly assembled to cheer on their latest cinematic achievement at the Roppongi Hills Mori Tower before retiring to the temporary, movie-themed love hotels a generous Sony had set up on site for the occasion. (We're told the Venom suite, with its paint-on, edible licorice costumes, was especially popular.) Unfortunately, some pushy Entertainment Weekly questions involving director Raimi's possible inheriting of The Hobbit from Peter Jackson will now regrettably shift the focus from celebrating the current film to fretting about the future of the franchise, which a distressed Dunst modestly believes would meet with Batman & Robin-style rubber-nippled doom should the studio try and go forward on a fourth installment without her pals. Reports EW:

The Date: February 16th, 2007, 2am

• 'Hounddog,' the movie featuring Dakota Fanning's ostensibly cheeky, adorable rape scene, couldn't find a buyer at Sundance. Also, Roger Friedman complains that "There is no point that I can find to the child's rape." What, giving us all a chuckle isn't enough of a point? [FoxNews]
  

PrivacyWatch celebrity sightings are submitted by our readers, and are now posted several times a week—so send them in often. Submit yours to tips[AT]defamer.com (please put "sighting" or "PrivacyWatch" in the subject line) and contribute to what could possibly turn into a perfect Terms of Endearment star-spotting trifecta:

Marvel plans to clog the summer of 2008—which may already feature the next Batman movie— with its superhero fare by setting a June 27th date for its Hulk sequel, which will arrive just two months after May 2's Iron Man release. [Variety]
THR releases its annual Next Generation list of "35 executives who represent the future of the industry," providing this year's ambitious also-rans a convenient inventory of the people they'll need to murder in order to advance their rising careers. [THR]
More Borat release hand-wringing: Did Fox leave "money on the table" by going with last weekend's limited release? Will the great buzz drive huge numbers of people to theaters when the movie goes wide on Friday? Will Sacha Baron Cohen's emerging fame rob him of his ability to goad RVs full of drunken, Southern frat boys into musing about the good ol' days of slavery? Developing... [Variety]
Paramount Vantage buys the rights to the supernatural novel A Jealous Ghost for Kirsten Dunst to produce and star in, satisfying the actress's desire to unnerve audiences with something other than her mouthful of creepy baby teeth. [THR]
Microsoft fights back against iTunes' content downloading hegemony by offering films and TV programs as on-demand options over their online service for the Xbox, finally offering viewers a way to watch "movies" and "shows" on a "television set." [Variety]

A high-level Defamer operative submitted this report about Monday night's Sufjan Stevens show, where lustily booed, but blithely indifferent, cinematic monarch Kirsten Dunst suffered the twin indignities of being obsessively observed by one of our spies while drunkenly pricing sizzling meat products, and of having her stardom go unrecognized by scalpers, even after a gentle reminder about one of her more notable roles:

Nearly every actor who has found success in Hollywood has endured enough professional humiliation to have developed mental strategies to deal with the psychic distress associated with the near-constant stream of rejection experienced during their "dues paying" phase. For example, when confronted with the upsetting circumstance of being booed during the Cannes Film Festival premiere of Marie Antoinette, star Kirsten Dunst merely deflected the criticism with a culturally based rationalization:

Let's just all agree that caption contests are supremely retarded, and they rightly inspire responses of supreme tardation. Really we just wanted to run this photo of superpublicist Stephen Huvane picking gum off Kirsten Dunst's shoe, and we also had the Spiegeltent tickets to give away, and lo, two birds met our mighty one stone and were thus killed. And now, it's time to check the victors. Second runner-up:

• If there were a lesbian tryst that no one in the world would ever want to imagine, it'd involve the ladies of The View. Nevertheless, they'll push the issue while they can, as once Rosie O'Donnell shows up as resident bulldyke, the lesbo jokes will have to stop. God forbid O'Donnell took them seriously on the matter. [Lowdown (2nd item)]
• But if Rosie wants a shot at Oprah, why not? The lady doth protest too much on the matter of Gayle King, after all. [TMZ]
• Leonardo DiCaprio helps the cripples see Madonna. As your heart melts, allow us to salute his publicist Ken Sunshine for this impeccable placement. Flawless execution! Bravo! [Page Six]
• If you look like crap, rest assured that Kirsten Dunst will let you know. Even if you're a complete stranger. [R&M (bottom of page)]
• Miss Puerto Rico Zuleyka Rivera Mendoza faints 40 minutes after being crowned Miss Universe. Doctors blame her tight dress and heavy, calcified breasts. [Us Weekly]
• So Linda Evangelista may have been artificially inseminated — honestly, who the hell cares? It's 2006, find us a pregnancy that didn't involve a petri dish. [Page Six]
• In its own review of Tabloid Wars, the News just can't resist poking at former-stringer Hud Morgan. [NYDN]

PrivacyWatch celebrity sightings are submitted by our readers. Send yours to tips[AT]defamer.com (please put "sighting" or "PrivacyWatch" in the subject line) and let everyone know about the (most recent) time you saw Tyra Banks and Brittany Murphy high-fiving the night away.

One of our operatives on the Paramount lot dropped us a note to let us know that the studio is currently hosting the Spider-Man 3 shoot for about a week, so we thought we'd use our exclusive satellites (available only to those with absurdly exclusive "web browser" technology) and a little Photoshop to illustrate his report:

· Jessica Alba still wants that Playboy pulled, but the magazine's people make a very good point: When Donald Trump was on the cover, no one expected to see him spread-eagle on one of his incredibly tacky dining room tables.
· Every backlash has its anti-backlash. Craignotbond.com, meet Givecraigachance.com.
· Cracked teaches you how to win your very own Oscar. Hint: Anal sex is the new ugly.
· If this morning's post didn't satisfy your craving for Eddie Murphy tranny stories, there's a lot more where that came from.
· We've never seen a Kirsten Dunst impression before, but this YouTuber kind of knocks it out of the park.

· The LAT gives some front-page Calendar section love to "Peggy Archer," the pseudonymous set-dwelling. lighting-tech troublemaker behind the Totally Unauthorized blog, one of our favorites.
· "Listen here, Mr. Dreamy Eyes, I don't care if Heath didn't brush his teeth this morning. Plug your nose and kiss that cowboy like your life depends on it! I'm gonna get that Oscar nomination even if it makes your damn lips fall off."
· "'I went through some very lonely times,' the King Kong star said while promoting the movie. 'I spent a lot of time in my car crying my eyes out. One night, I drove along thinking, maybe I’ll take a left here, over the cliff, because I can’t take it any more.'” Then Naomi Watts remembered that was just a scene from Mulholland Drive, not her real life, and everything was fine again.
· Kirsten Dunst turned out for Saturday's USC-UCLA massacre.
· Leonardo DiCaprio produces a film about global warming, finally attains the coveted media honorific "actor-activist."