Liz Hodgson's blog

Michael Jackson's estate is to foot the bill for his funeral, nearly two months after the city of Los Angeles paid millions for his memorial ceremony.
Jackson is due to be buried at Forest Lawn Memorial Park in Glendale, California, tonight amid strict security.
Streets around the cemetery were closed off to the public and airspace above it was restricted.
The funeral costs will include reimbursing Glendale for the extra police and traffic control coverage.
“The expenses will be extraordinary, but Michael Jackson was extraordinary,” said Jeryll Cohen, a lawyer for the estate's administrators.

Newly married actor Mark Wahlberg and his wife Rhea Durham are said to be expecting their fourth child.
A source told People magazine the happy news after Durham was spotted at The Grove in Los Angeles at the weekend sporting a baby bump.
The Departed star Wahlberg, 38, and Durham, 30, are already parents to Ella Rae, who turned six yesterday, Michael, three, and 11-month-old Brendan.
Last summer Wahlberg, the youngest of nine, talked about wanting a big family.
“When the kids are good we want eight or nine,” he said, calling life with so many youngsters “hectic, but a lot of fun.”

Hunky Ben Affleck has spent four months working with a top sports coach to get into shape for his new film, The Town.
He has been doing daily cardio and strength training with Walter Norton, strength and conditioning coach for the Boston Celtics baseball team.
“He's dedicated," Norton told the Boston Herald. “He not only has set aside time to train, he gets the proper rest and maintains a proper diet.
“He does the things other people would struggle with on a daily basis, and really excels.
“I'd like to take more credit. But he's pretty strict. He's not a guy who comes up with excuses.”

The troubled Broadway production of Spider-Man is moving ahead thanks to help from Bono, who, with The Edge, wrote the score.
The show was closed down last month because producer David Garfinkle bust his $45 million budget.
But designers and some stage hands were due to go back to work yesterday, and the U2 frontman is said to have been the one coming to the rescue.
“Bono's too smart to but his own money in the show, but word on the street is that's tapped into his vast network of rich friends and business associates to restart production,” said New York Post theatre writer Michael Riedel.

James Bond star Daniel Craig is said to have demanded extra security while he is rehearsing for his Broadway debut.
He has asked for round-the-clock minders while he prepares for A Steady Rain, according to the New York Post.
Co-star Hugh Jackman, on the other hand, has not asked for any protection.
A production source said: “Everybody thinks it's funny because the truth is, Daniel rarely gets approached by the public in the street and at restaurants – especially now that he has the huge handlebar moustache for this role.”
Another Broadway source added: “Security and secrecy around the show are so tight that Jackman and Craig are rehearsing at a secret location outside the city.

Transformers star Megan Fox says she's a one-man woman who has only had a handful of boyfriends.
But she believes women always have the upper hand in relationships with the opposite sex.
Fox, 23, who is back with fiance Brian Austin Green after a break earlier this year, told Cosmopolitan: “I have no problem with commitment – you can't have a real relationship without it.
“I can flip on a switch in my brain and even if the next Brad Pitt is standing next to me I won't look at him. But I can also turn that switch off, and then I collect attractive boys.”
She said she loves putting men in their place when they try to pick her up, especially if they play the celebrity card.

Actress Renee Zellweger has been involved n a minor car accident in Beverly Hills but was unhurt.
The 40-year-old star of Bridget Jones's Diary and Miss Potter was driving alone in her Mercedes SUV.
“A green Ford Explorer made an illegal U-turn in front of her silver Mercedes,” Beverly Hills Police Lt Tony Lee told People magazine.
“Ms Zellweger was not injured, the damage to her car was very minor, She was very polite and sincere.
“The incident will be handled between their insurance companies.”
He added: Ms Zellweger requested her car be towed from the scene and also requested that officers call her a cab.”

Singer Chris Brown has revealed he still loves Rihanna, six months after he beat her up.
And he has denied saying he could not remember the incident in which he left her with a bruised face and bloody lip.
Brown, 20, spoke out after a 30-second segment of an interview with talk show host Larry King was released in which he was asked if her remembered it and he said “no”.
But in a detailed statement to People magazine he said he “misspoke” and that his interview had been manipulated.
“There have been reports on the Internet that I didn't remember what happened that night with Rihanna,” he said. “I want to try and set things straight.

Gangsta rapper 50 Cent cancelled a free show he had planned in the Queens, New York, neighbourhood where he grew up because of security concerns.
The 34-year-old rapper, whose real name is Curtis Jackson, had planned Family Day in a schoolyard near where he was shot nine times in 2000.
The event was to be sponsored by his charity, G-Unity, which supports low-income communities, and the New York Restoration Project, a charity founded by his unlikely friend, singer Bette Midler, to encourage gardens in the city.
After police said they were worried they could not protect him he said he would not perform but simply make an appearance at Sunday's show.
But when authorities said just his appearance could spark violence he cancelled the whole event.

David Beckham may be longing to leave California to return to Europe – but he wants to persuade the rest of us to head to the West Coast.
Becks, 34, has filmed an advert promoting California tourism, reportedly at the request of Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger.
He shot the ad, due to start running next month in Great Britain, Canada and other parts of the United States, on Santa Monica beach.
“They were filming him kicking soccer balls into the ocean,” a witness told E! News.
After the shoot he signed autographs and posed for photographers with thrilled onlookers.
The new campaign from the California Travel and Tourism Commission also features Rob Lowe, Vanessa Williams and Dog Whisperer star Cesar Millan.

British actress Emily Blunt is engaged to John Krasinski, star of the American version of The Office.
Blunt, 26, who starred in The Devil Wears Prada and The Jane Austen Book Club, have kept their relationship low key and arrived separately at the Screen Actors Guild awards.
A spokesman for Krasinski, 29, told People magazine: “We can confirm that John and Emily are engaged.
Blunt, 26, who dated Canadian singer Michael Buble for three years, has said she does not like talking about her love life
She told USA Today: “Unfortunately, when you invite those questions in, then when things go south, people still have the assumption that you want to talk about it. And unfortunately, I don't.

Disc jockey DJ AM has been found dead in his New York flat, nearly a year after surviving a fiery plane crash which killed four others. He was 36.
The celebrity spinner, whose real name was Adam Goldstein, was found by police on Friday afternoon after a worried friend reported he had not been seen for two days.
The cause of death has not been determined but New York Police Department Deputy Commissioner Paul Browne said there were no signs of foul play.
Police sources said prescription drugs were found in the flat.
Goldstein's publicist said in a statement: “The circumstances surrounding his death are unclear. Out of respect to his family and loved ones, please respect their privacy at this time.”

Denis Leary will hang up his fireman's helmet on Rescue Me in 2011, to mark the 10th anniversary of the September 11 terror attacks.
The firefighting drama has always focused on the New York City force in the aftermath of the attacks which levelled the World Trade Center and killed nearly 3,000 people, more than 300 of them firefighters.
Peter Tolan, co-creator and executive producer of the show said: “Within the next couple of weeks we're going to begin shooting the last 19 episodes, which will be the final two season of the show.”
While the shows will be shot together, he told TV Guide: “I think they're stretching the airing of it out until the 10th anniversary.

Ocean's Eleven star George Clooney has broken his hand by slamming a car door on it.
The 48-year-old hunk was rumoured to have been injured in a motorcycle accident with girlfriend Elisabetta Canalis, riding his Harley Davidson around Lake Lugano on the Italian and Swiss border.
But his spokesman Stan Rosenfield told People magazine: “There was an accident and he did break his hand. He was not riding a motorcycle. It was not in Switzerland.
“He was on his property in Italy and he shut the car door on his hand.”
Clooney was treated at the Ars Medica clinic in Gravesano, Switzerland, about a 40 minute drive from his lakeside mansion near Bellagio, on Lake Como.

Actress Mischa Barton has denied it was a mental breakdown that sent her to a psychiatric ward last month.
But she admits she was “down in the dumps” thanks to a combination of stress, work – and wisdom tooth surgery that went wrong.
Barton, whose new television show The Beautiful Life starts in the United States next month told Time Out New York: “It was a nightmare. I've never had surgery before – it all went wrong and I had to have a second surgery and it almost delayed shooting.
“So with the travel and surgery and prep for the show, it was hell.”
She said a combination of factors made her place a non-emergency call to police from her Los Angeles house on July 15.

Songwriter Ellie Greenwich, who wrote or co-wrote a string of 1960s hits, including Da Doo Ron Ron, Be My Baby, River Deep, Mountain High and Then He Kissed Me, has died, aged 68.
Greenwich died of a heart attack in a New York hospital where she was being treated for pneumonia.
She had many collaborations with Wall of Sound creator Phil Spector, as well as with her ex-husband Jeff Barry, with whom she wrote leader of the Pack.
Other hits included Baby, I Love You, Christmas (Baby Please Come Home), Chapel of Love and Sunshine After the Rain.

Singer Chris Brown may have broken his probation just hours after being sentenced for assaulting his ex-girlfriend Rihanna by going to a nightclub.
Even though he was only seen drinking water at trendy Guys & Dolls, at 20 he is too young to be there legally unless he was hired as a performer.
And under-age performers are required to stay in an area where no booze is being sold or drunk. Brown's table ordered 10 bottles of Champagne.
Under the terms of his five-year probation he is required to “abstain from the use of all alcoholic beverages and stay out of places where they are the chief item of sale.”
Guys & Dolls has a licence which makes it a bar or nightclub, not a restaurant.

Sexy Jessica Biel has been named the most dangerous celebrity in cyberspace.
The 27-year-old star of The Illusionist and 7th Heaven poses a serious risk to fans looking for information about her on the Internet.
Security technology company McAfee says they have a one in five chance of clicking a link which could take them to spyware or viruses which could damage their computers.
“Cyber criminals are star watchers too,” said Jeff Green, senior vice president of McAfee's product development.
“They latch onto popular celebrities to encourage the download of malicious software in disguise.”
After Biel came Beyonce, Jennifer Aniston, American football player Tom Brady and Jessica Simpson.

Actor Jerry O'Connell has revealed he and his Ugly Betty star wife Rebecca Romjin are not having any more children – because of nasty nappies.
Romjin, 36, had twin daughters Dolly and Charlie last December, and Crossing Jordan actor O'Connell, 35, said they are as much as they can handle.
“The hardest thing is being in a public place like a store or a restaurant – or on your wife's TV show set – and smelling number two and knowing it's one of your children,” he told E! News.
“Those situations are always embarrassing.”
He said the girls have also embarrassed him when he visited Romjin on the set of her new series, Eastwick.

The troubled son of Ryan O'Neal and the late Charlie's Angels star Farrah Fawcett is turning his battle with drugs into a reality television show.
Redmond O'Neal, 24, is currently in jail undergoing an intense rehab programme after pleading guilty to breaching his probation on a drugs conviction by possessing methamphetamines.
He was expected to spend at least a year in the programme but could now be released by Christmas.
“Redmond has signed the deal that was brokered for him by his dad,” a friend told In Touch Weekly. “Ryan will be on the show too.
“Redmond wants to do this to honour his mother. He really wants to get better to honour her memory.”