VARIETY: MGM and the Farrelly brothers are closing in on their cast for “The Three Stooges.” Studio has set Sean Penn to play Larry, and negotiations are underway with Jim Carrey to play Curly, with the actor already making plans to gain 40 pounds to approximate the physical dimensions of Jerome “Curly” Howard. The studio is zeroing in on Benicio Del Toro to play Moe. The film is not a biopic, but rather a comedy built around the antics of the three characters that Moe Howard, Larry Fine and Howard played in the Columbia Pictures shorts. The quest by the […]
INBOX: Ever Get The Feeling You Are Being Watched?
Hi, phawker (phawker). Larry Mendte (LarryMendte) is now following your updates on Twitter. Check out Larry Mendte’s profile here: http://twitter.com/LarryMendte You may follow Larry Mendte as well by clicking on the “follow” button. Best, Twitter PREVIOUSLY: Ex-Anchor Pleads Guilty To Email Hackery *** NEW FEATURE: Meet Jeff Tweeney Hey folks, Jeff Deeney here to let you know how this new Twitter project we’re rolling out will work. From now until Philadelphia no longer needs me for cannon fodder in the trenches of the War On Poverty, I will be posting the little overheard snippets of unintentional brilliance and frequently unhinged […]
TRAVESTY OF JUSTICE: NJ Teen Charged With Child Porn Trafficking For Posting Nude Pix of HERSELF
NBC PHILADELPHIA: The social networking world is rife with sexual exploitation of young children, but it rarely happens that the exploiters are the children themselves. A 14-year-old girl was arrested Tuesday for allegedly posting nearly 30 naked photos of herself on MySpace, according to NorthJersey.com. The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children tipped off police that someone was posting naked pictures of a teen on a MySpace profile. As it turns out, the culprit was the teen herself. Authorities investigated the case for a month before zeroing in on the suspect, who said she posted the pictures for her […]
CINEMA: Let The Fest-ing Begin!
BY DAN BUSKIRK FILM CRITIC Barring the outbreak of more ill-timed bickering, starting tonight we should be blessed with twelve days of films from around the world courtesy of the eighteenth Philadelphia Film Festival/CineFest. Just one film is opening tonight at the Prince Theater, 500 Days of Summer, which promises to unleash the fully combined heart-breaking powers of Zooey Deschanel and The Smiths, followed by cocktails happening afterward on the 19th floor of the Park Hyatt Bellevue. On Friday the Festival turns on the faucet with screenings expanding to The Bridge, The Ritz 5, The Ritz East, The International House […]
PAPERBOY: Slow Jamming The Alt Weeklies
BY DAVE ALLEN Like time, news waits for no man. Keeping up with the funny papers has always been an all-day job, even in the pre-Internets era. These days, however, it’s a two-man job. That’s right, these days you need someone to do your reading for you, or risk falling hopelessly behind and, as a result, increasing your chances of dying lonely and somewhat bitter. That’s why every week, PAPERBOY does your alt-weekly reading for you. We pore over those time-consuming cover stories and give you the takeaway, suss out the cover art, warn you off the ink-wasters and steer […]
HEAR YE: Giant Sand Chore Of Enchantment
Now playing on PHAWKER RADIO! Because it’s the best album you never heard. BY JONATHAN VALANIA Giant Sand mainman Howe Gelb has always been one of indie rock’s most beautiful losers. Twenty-some albums into a career that’s brought him all the riches and fame of a Wal-Mart stock boy, Gelb just doesn’t know when to quit. And thank God for it, because Chore of Enchantment (originally released in 2000) remains Giant Sand’s finest hour. Gelb’s music — as intimate as a campfire and as expansive as the desert panoramas it evokes — has always clung to the slippery pole of […]
STYLE COUNCIL: Virtue Is Its Own Reward
REWARD BOUTIQUE 55 N. Second St., 267-773-8675 BY LAURA YACOE STYLE EDITOR Reward, the rookie amongst the Philly clothing boutiques, is the new triple threat of Philly — combining fashion, music and art, the six-month-old boutique is creating a major buzz. Hosting music and art events is what makes the hot spot stand out from other Olde City boutiques. When Shari Roulin, owner and former Urban Outfitters buyer, opened in Reward in September, she wanted to put a new spin on fashion retailing in this town and just maybe inspire the creativity of her customers and competitors. Frightened Rabbit and Chairlift […]
DAMN: The Double Atomic Wedgie Of A So-Called Life
TELEGRAPH: Tsutomu Yamaguchi had already been a certified hibakusha, or radiation survivor, of the Aug 9, 1945, atomic bombing in Nagasaki. But officials have now confirmed that he also survived the attack on Hiroshima three days earlier. Mr Yamaguchi was in Hiroshima on a business trip on Aug 6, 1945, when a US B-29 dropped an atomic bomb on the city. He then returned to his home in Nagasaki just in time for the second attack, officials said. “As far as we know, he is the first one to be officially recognised as a survivor of atomic bombings in both […]
President Tells Worried Nation To Chill The F*ck Out
NEW YORK TIMES: For just under an hour on Tuesday night, Americans saw not the fiery and inspirational speaker who riveted the nation in his address to Congress last month, or the conversational president who warmly engaged Americans in talks across the country, or even the jaunty and jokey president who turned up on Jay Leno. Instead, in his second prime-time news conference from the White House, it was Barack Obama the lecturer, a familiar character from early in the campaign. Placid and unsmiling, he was the professor in chief, offering familiar arguments in long paragraphs — often introduced with […]
Congress Considers ‘Newspaper Revitalization Act’
REUTERS: With many U.S. newspapers struggling to survive, a Democratic senator on Tuesday introduced a bill to help them by allowing newspaper companies to restructure as nonprofits with a variety of tax breaks. “This may not be the optimal choice for some major newspapers or corporate media chains but it should be an option for many newspapers that are struggling to stay afloat,” said Senator Benjamin Cardin. A Cardin spokesman said the bill had yet to attract any co-sponsors, but had sparked plenty of interest within the media, which has seen plunging revenues and many journalist layoffs. Cardin’s Newspaper Revitalization […]
WHAT HAPPENED NEXT: Stranger Than Pulp Fiction, Funnier Than Borat, You Can’t Make This Sh*t Up!
Straight outta the WTF Files of Phawker, the following item from the Inquirer was posted here in April of 2008: INQUIRER: A 20-year-old Philadelphia man was attacked and forced to put on handcuffs in a room at the upscale Chestnut Hill Hotel, then got free and fought with his assailant down an elevator and into the lobby of the historic inn last night, police said. Akiva Israel, 24, of Middletown, N.J., was arrested after the bizarre incident and is expected to be charged with aggravated assault, false imprisonment and related offenses, police said this morning. The two men have known […]
CHANGE: Obama Halts Mountain Top Removal Mining
WASHINGTON INDEPENDENT: Yes, elections do matter. Putting a quick halt to an Orwellian Bush administration rule allowing mining companies to kill mountain streams, the Environmental Protection Agency this afternoon announced that it will delay hundreds of mining permits while it takes a closer look at how the operations will affect local waterways. “EPA will use the best science and follow the letter of the law in ensuring we are protecting our environment,” EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson said in a statement. Of all the methods used to extract coal, none is so destructive to ecosystems as mountaintop mining — a process […]
NPR FOR THE DEAF: We Hear It Even When You Can’t
FRESH AIR Alejandro Junco de la Vega runs daily newspapers in three of Mexico’s largest cities: Reforma in Mexico City, Mural in Guadalajara and El Norte in Monterrey. Junco was born in Monterrey and earned his journalism degree from the University of Texas. He returned to Mexico to become the publisher of El Norte in 1973. Even at the beginning of his newspaper empire-building, Junco fought for freedom of the press — he hired a UT journalism professor to teach journalistic ethics and techniques to the reporters of El Norte. After El Norte became successful, Junco founded Reforma and Mural. […]