The New York Daily News reported that Sam Smith will take a hiatus from performing to return home, work on his follow-up to In the Lonely Hour and finally have a personal life again, he recently told Entertainment Tonight. "I am sad, but also it feels right," he said. "I've been going now for three years nonstop and it feels right for me to just go home and just live my life and be a 23-year-old." Smith's retreat from the spotlight comes right as Adele, who penned the last 007 theme, has resurfaced with her first single in three years, "Hello."
Chaz Bono has said he cannot find love because he "repels" women, according to a New York Daily News item. Bono, 46, says he has been out on dates but just cannot connect with the opposite sex even though the transgender LGBT advocate was once a member of the opposite sex. Bono split from Jennifer Elia in 2011.
Jane Lynch will host the 2016 People's Choice Awards on CBS, TheWrap reported. Lynch is a four-time People's Choice Award nominee and won for Favorite TV Comedy Actress in 2011. She will also play an outspoken guardian angel in the new CBS comedy Angel From Hell, set to premiere in February 2016.
Cyndi Lauper's True Colors Fund ( www.truecolorsfund.org ) announced the lineup for its 5th annual "Cyndi Lauper & Friends: Home for the Holidays" benefit concert on Saturday, Dec. 5, at New York City's Beacon Theatre to raise awareness about LGBT youth homelessness, a press release stated. Lauper will be joined on stage this year by Boy George, Cam, Judy Gold, Ledisi, Keb' Mo', Sharon Osbourne, Jordan Pundik, Richie Sambora & Orianthi, Valerie Simpson, Anne Steele, Joey Taranto, Justin Tranter, Kurt Vile and host Carson Kressley. Among other things, the fund launched the first #40toNoneDay this year, reaching more than 17 million people online.
Comedian/actress Margaret Cho tweeted about her former life as a sex worker and her experiences of being sexually assaulted, TheWrap reported. "Sex work is simply work. For me it was honest work. I was a sex worker when I was young. It was hard but well paid. There's no shame in it," she posted. "I support sex workers because I was one and I know that it's a job that's needlessly shunned by society when frankly we should be worshipped." Cho recently revealed to Billboard magazine that she was bullied, sexually abused and raped as a young girl.
Boy George said he once slept with Prince during a live taping of The Voice in the United Kingdom, Queerty noted. George joined the show as a coach this season, replacing Tom Jones. When singer and co-judge Palome Faith said that she's "performed with Prince," George responded, "Forget that, darlingI've slept with Prince." However, after producers halted the show's taping and talked with George, it turned out that he actually hadn't slept with Prince after all, and had merely had a Prince poster on his wall.
GLAAD has taken issue with the movie Tomboy, which stars Michelle Rodriguez has a transgender assassin, according to Newsbusters.org . GLAAD has said that gender-reassignment surgery shouldn't be used as a "sensationalistic plot device. Although Nick Adams, GLAAD's director of programs for transgender media, has admitted the organization hasn't read the script, Adams added, "it's disappointing to see filmmakers turning what is a life-saving medical procedure for transgender people into a sensationalistic plot device."
Tony-, Emmy-, Oscar- and Grammy-winning entertainer Liza Minnelli has been advised by her physician to cancel her upcoming concerts in both Oklahoma and Texas, Playbill noted. The actress had been scheduled to play Nov. 12 at The Broken Arrow Performing Arts Center in Broken Arrow, Oklahoma; Nov. 14 at the WinStar World Casino in Thackerville, Oklahoma; and Nov. 28 at the Tobin Center for the Performing Arts in San Antonio, Texas.
Kylie Minogue is releasing her holiday album, Kylie Christmas, on Nov. 13, a press release stated. The album features 13 tracks, including several duets ( with people such as Iggy Pop, Frank Sinatra and sister Dannii Minogue ) as well as a mix of original and classic songs. Also, a DVD featuring six of the tracks will be available.
Onetime matinee idol Tab Hunter, 84, has stated that gay men still can't succeed in Hollywood and that he is a huge proponent of celebrity privacy, according to TakePart.com . Hunter sees no place for advocacy in the entertainment industry. "People love to label you," he said, pointing out that his autobiography, Tab Hunter Confidential, opens with the line "I hate labels" in big bold letters. "What concerns me more is, We're all human beings, but what kind of human being are you? That, to me, is really important." The autobiography has been made into a documentary of the same name that's been recently released in theaters.
Chloe Sevigny and Kristen Stewart are in negotiations to star in an untitled indie movie about infamous murderess Lizzie Borden, who was acquitted of killing her parents with an axe in New England in the 1890s, TheWrap revealed. Sevigny, who will play Borden, was previously attached to play the character in an HBO miniseries from producer Tom Hanks that never came together. Stewart will play the Borden's live-in maid Bridget Sullivan, the only person who was home when the axe murders were committed.
Ex-NFL player and Real Housewives of Atlanta personality Kordell Stewart is suing a man who claimed in an online interview that he had sex with him, according to TheWrap. Stewart slapped Andrew Caldwell with a defamation suit after Caldwell claimedand later retracted statementsthat he had an intimate encounter with Stewart. "At all times during his life, Mr. Stewart has been, and is, a heterosexual male," states the lawsuit.
Love and Hip Hop star Miles Brock, 27, was reportedly arrested on Nov. 1 for allegedly assaulting his ex-boyfriend, Milan Christopher, 29, Hollywood Life noted. Christopher reportedly went to the NYPD during the evening of Oct. 30, with claims that he and Brock, who both star on Love and Hip Hop: Hollywood, had been at the same party, where they got into an argument before Brock hit him in the face. Following the alleged altercation, Christopher took to Instagram to thank his fans and express his distress over the situation.
Lesbian comedian Judy Gold thinks society is too politically correct, Page Six noted. "I don't like the fact that we cannot make fun of Caitlyn [Jenner]," said Gold at the Tomorrow Is Tonight Gala benefiting Project ALS, adding, "People are so overly sensitive now." Gold added, "[Caitlyn] lived most of her life as a privileged white male. So don't tell me that you know what it's like to be a woman when you have lived your life as a privileged white male."
There's news involving out actor B.D. Wong. According to TheWrap, the Law & Order: SVU actor is joining the show Gotham as villain Dr. Hugo Strange. Wong's recurring role is of the DC Comics' brilliant psychiatrist hired to run Gotham's infamous Arkham Asylum. Strange's devotion to rehabilitating Gotham's most notorious villains makes him appear altruisticat first, at least.
NBC has become the first broadcast network to start firming its midseason scheduling plans, with a premiere date announcement for the Jennifer Lopez-Ray Liotta vehicle Shades of Blue, Deadline noted. The straight-to-series police drama will debut Thursday, Jan. 14, at 8 p.m. CT with a two-hour premiere episode that Barry Levinson directed. The show will then move to its regular 9 p.m. CT timeslot behind The Blacklist the following Thursday, Jan. 21. There, Shades Of Blue will succeed new fall drama The Player, whose order was recently reduced from 13 to nine episodes.
Abby Wambach, the leading career scorermale or femalein international soccer, announced her retirement from soccer after the U.S. national team celebrated its Women's World Cup victory at the White House, Newser noted. Wambach, 35, said before the World Cup this past summer in Canada that she wanted to cap her 15-year career with the game's most prestigious championship. She will play the final four matches of the national team's 10-game victory tour before stepping away from the team; her final match will be Dec. 16 against China in New Orleans.
"Chita Rivera: A Lot of Livin' to Do"a 60-minute career retrospective featuring interviews, archival performance footage and newly filmed songs from Rivera's concert repertoirewill air on THIRTEEN's Great Performances, Friday, Nov. 6, on PBS, a press release stated. The special celebrating Rivera's career will air as part of the PBS Arts Fall Festival 2015. She has inhabited such roles as Anita in West Side Story and Velma in Chicago.
The controversy-generating Caitlyn Jenner costume was one of this Halloween's most popular, TheWrap noted. Spirit Halloween, the country's largest Halloween retailer and a division of Spencer Gifts, is reporting that the $49.99 costume re-creating the "I Am Cait" star's Vanity Fair cover was among the company's top four best-selling adult costumes this year. The costume was subject to much criticism when it appeared online in August, with LGBT and transgender advocacy groups calling for the costume to be removed from store shelves.
Multi-platinum Grammy-winning R&B singer Mary J. Blige has put her sprawling Saddle River estate on the market for $13 million, NJ.com reported. Bligewho will play the Wicked Witch of the West in NBC's live production of The Wiz! this Decemberbought the 18,250-square-foot estate in 2008, reportedly for $12.3 million cash. The eight-bedroom, eight-bath home on more than four acres features, among other things, two separate dining rooms, a library, wine cellar, screening room and a large home gym.
Fashion designer Jackie Rogerswho as a model was one of Coco Chanel's muses in the 1960s, and appeared in Federico Fellini's classic 8‰ 1/2is turning her experiences into a memoir, Page Six noted. Rogers' upcoming book on her "adventure-packed life" will include anecdotes on Chanel as well as tales of Jacqueline Onassis, Jacques Cousteau and even Hillary Clinton.
Scandal stars Kerry Washington and Katie Lowes are among the executive producers of an untitled comedic drama from Shonda Rhimes and Betsy Beers' Shondaland, Deadline reported. Written by actress-writer Bess Wohl, it is described as an edgy and comical upstairs-downstairs look at the insanity of modern child-rearing and focuses on a clique of young nannies, a trio of interconnected families and their various support staffs.
Actors Halle Berry and Olivier Martinez announced they're splitting after two years of marriage, USA Today noted. "It is with a heavy heart that we have come to the decision to divorce," the couple announced in a joint statement. Martinez is Berry's third husband; she was previously married to baseball player David Justice and to R&B singer Eric Benet.
The CBS premiere of Supergirl, starring Melissa Benoist in the title role, established a ratings record, according to Newser. The show set a record for this fall's new-series premieres, pulling in 12.9 million viewers and achieving a 3.2 rating in Nielsen's preliminary national estimates with adults ages 18 to 49. It helped that the show was preceded by The Big Bang Theory, which drew its own 15.9 million viewers and a 4.2 rating, and CBS is hoping the buzz won't die down.
Rapper Angel Haze took to Twitter in outrage over Raven-Symone's comment that the child victim of the Spring Valley assault was in the wrong to have been on her phone, an assertion she made on The View earlier that day, The Huffington Post noted. "I guess yesterday I went on a Twitter rant, and I asked Raven-Symoné to fight me," Haze told HuffPost Live's Alex Miranda. "Which, by the way, I totally mean. Someone needs to smack her because the things that she says are just ridiculous."
Designer Marc Jacobs has raised eyebrows by reportedly hosting an orgy with up to 10 people, whom he invited via the gay social app Grindr, according to Page Six. A source who claimed to have attended the all-male flesh bacchanal told us Jacobs sent guests a shirtless shot, seemingly posing in a walk-in closet, showing his washboard absplus two more pics with no pants from the side and back. Jacobs has commented he's used Grindr with one of his past boyfriends, former porn star Harry Louis. Jacobs later took to Instagram ( after his Grindr account was canceled ), saying, "Goodbye ( for now ) Grindr! It was fun for 'group' get-togethers, but what really excites me is my work!"
Two weeks after she was indicted on 20 counts of fraud with a possible five years behind bars and $5 million in fines, Dance Moms' Abby Lee Miller has pled not guilty, Deadline noted. In a short arraignment in the federal courthouse in downtown Pittsburgh, Miller paid a bond of $10,000 and entered a plea of not guilty, and also asked for a jury trial. Miller and Collins Avenue recently settled a lawsuit first filed by actual dance mom Kelly Hyland back on Feb. 13, 2014.
Rihanna is returning to the world of film ( after Home and Battleship ), securing a role in the time-travel movie Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets, The Guardian noted. The film's director, Luc Besson, announced the news on Instagram, posting a picture of the singer with the caption: "Rihanna is in Valerian!!!! ... and she has a big part!! I'm Sooo excited!!!" The film, which is based on a French graphic novel and set in the 28th century, will also star Cara Delevingne, Clive Owen and Dane DeHaan.
Singer Lionel Richie is launching a non-music business. According to a press release, "the Lionel Richie Home Collection will feature iconic dinnerware, barware, serving and entertaining accessories and luxuriously fragrant candles that reflect a look and feel Lionel has captured as he traveled the world throughout his remarkable career." The collection will be available starting January to high-end retailers as well as hoteliers and restaurateurs.
A struggling out-of-work musician, Jessie Braham, is suing Taylor Swift, claiming she ripped off his lyrics for her hit song "Shake It Off," CNNMoney reported. Braham claims that his song, "Haters Gone Hate," has the same 22-word phrase that Swift used in her hit song. Braham said he copyrighted "Haters Gone Hate" in February 2013. He is seeking $42 million in damages from Swift and Sony, her record label, and also wants to have his name added as a songwriter to "Shake It Off."
Casey Moss, who plays J.J. Deveraux on NBC soap opera Days of Our Lives, was arrested for trying to hit a bartender, TheWrap noted. Police say that an intoxicated Moss tried to hit the bartender after he refused to continue serving the actor. The 21-year-old actor faces charges of assault, disorderly conduct and resisting arrest.
Nathaniel Marstonan actor best known for his six-year stint on the ABC soap opera One Life to Livewas involved in a serious car accident on Oct. 30 near Reno, Nevada, that may leave him paralyzed from the neck down, TheWrap reported. Marston's mother, Elizabeth Jackson, has indicated that he had suffered a broken neck and shoulder, a collapsed lung and fractured neck vertebrae.
In anticipation for this year's Record Store Day Black Friday ( Nov. 27 ) event, Rhino is preparing eight limited-edition releases for some of its most celebrated artists, including The B-52's, Buzzcocks, Circles Around The Sun, Phil Collins, Gang of Four, The Jesus And Mary Chain, Otis Redding and Brian Wilson, a press release stated. Fans can expect a variety of colored vinyl options, double-LP sets and 7-inch singles. For a list of participating stores, visit www.recordstoreday.com .