Saturday, September 27, 2008

$50,000 to move to Alabama, identity fraud/kidnapping combos and college football's weekend

- As it turns out, reality fashion TV will not be coming to the Lifetime TV channel. “Project Runway” has been barred from making the jump to Lifetime by a preliminary injunction ordered by New York Supreme Court Justice Richard B. Lowe today in a lawsuit filed by NBC Universal against the Weinstein Co., which produces the reality series hosted by supermodel Heidi Klum. NBC Universal had aired the series on its Bravo channel, so when Weinstein made a reported $150 million deal with Lifetime for the show, NBC didn’t take too kindly to it. This temporary injunction bars Weinstein from taking "Project Runway" or any spin-off to Lifetime and contended that evidence showed that Weinstein violated NBC's "right of first refusal" for the show. Not surprisingly, Weinstein Co. said in a statement that it intended to appeal the decision. Lifetime looks to be taking up the fight as well (and what major corporation doesn’t when it stands to lose lots of money?), saying it was disappointed with the ruling and that it will "pursue all measures" to uphold its agreement with Weinstein for the show's sixth season. As part of the injunction, NBC was ordered to put up a $20 million bond, which was significantly less than the $200 million bond Weinstein Co. has asked the court for. In its lawsuit, NBC claimed that Weinstein moved "Project Runway" because NBC wasn’t interested in an attempt to bundle the series with other Weinstein properties that NBC wasn't interested in. For his part, Weinstein said that there was no right of first refusal in the contract and that NBC Universal was offered the deal and was outbid. The two warring parties won't return to court until Oct. 15, so in the interim they could try to negotiate a settlement, but don’t bet on it. The new season of the show is now in production in Los Angeles and was expected to start airing in January on Lifetime. That now looks unlikely, so all you aspiring fashionistas out there will just have to hang tight on this one……..

- Another great college football Saturday today, mostly because of schools that have perennially sucked that are having good years this year, for once. I’m referring, of course, to Duke and Northwestern, schools renowned for being wicked smart but also really, really bad on the football field. That’s especially true for Duke, which has recently sported the longest losing streak in the nation and tasted victory about as often as W. sounds smart. Yet there were the Dukies, b*tch-slapping Virginia to improve to 3-1 and snap a 25-game ACC losing streak in the process. Duke hadn’t won an ACC game since Nov. 13, 2004 against Clemson, and their 3-1 start is their best in more than a decade. Northwestern is also busy proving that smart kids can play ball, rallying in the second half to topple Iowa and move to 5-0 for the first time in 46 years. The Wildcats shut out the Hawkeyes in the second half and scored 12 points of their own to earn a win in their first conference game of the year. Elsewhere, pandemonium reigned in the top 10, with No. 1 USC’s Thursday night loss to Oregon serving as a prelude to the third, fourth and ninth-ranked teams all going down. Georgia fell from its perch at No. 3, getting annihilated by eighth-ranked Alabama 41-30. Florida had been ranked fourth, but a stunning home loss to unranked Mississippi, 31-30, has all but crippled the Gators’ national title dreams. A blocked extra point near the end of the game did in UF, and you can bet that’s one kick that they won't soon forget. Nearly as embarrassing was the late-game choke job pulled by the ninth-ranked Wisconsin Badgers, who led unranked, 1-2 Michigan by a 19-0 margin at halftime and managed to end up on the wrong end of a 27-25 score. Losing to a mediocre team still struggling to find its way under a lying, dishonest, no-character-having coach after being ahead 19 points at halftime is ridiculous, especially if you are allegedly the ninth best team in the nation. So some unexpected teams playing well above their normal level, other teams playing well below the lofty status bestowed upon them and in all, a great weekend of college football….

- The action genre appears to work for Shia LaBeouf, even if it does include the occasional foray into making an overhyped, bad sequel to an action franchise that should have been left in hibernation (yes you, Indiana Jones). LeBeouf’s conspiracy thriller "Eagle Eye" debuted at the top of the weekend box office with $29.2 million and it was release was the second No. 1 premiere for LaBeouf and director D.J. Caruso, who also teamed on 2007's hit "Disturbia." Coming in second place for the weekend was geezer romance flick "Nights in Rodanthe,” featuring Richard Gere and Diane Lane and earning $16.3 million. Last weekend’s top film, “Lakeview Terrace,” dropped to No. 3 with $7 million A surprising entrant into the top five was “Fireproof,” a Christian drama starring Kirk Cameron as a firefighter who turns to God to help save his marriage. It premiered in fourth-place with $6.5 million. Here’s how the rest of the top 10 shook down: 5. "Burn After Reading," $6.2 million, 6. "Igor," $5.5 million, 7. "Righteous Kill," $3.803 million, 8. "My Best Friend's Girl," $3.8 million, 9. "Miracle at St. Anna," $3.5 million, 10. "Tyler Perry's The Family that Preys." $3.2 million. Not exactly an inspiring top 10, not when you consider that both Dane Cook and Tyler Perry are represented in it……..

- People lying about their identity is awesome. Who doesn’t love someone calling themselves by a false name and assuming a totally different identity for criminal purposes? So you’ve got to be down with a German citizen who calls himself Clark Rockefeller pleading not guilty to charges related to the kidnapping of his 7-year-old daughter off a Boston street in July. Investigators say "Rockefeller" is really Christian Karl Gerhartsreiter, who has been living under fake identities since coming to the United States in 1978. Sweet! Dude has been rocking a fake ID for 30 years? And not only has this guy been living under a false identity, he’s been living a criminal lifestyle in the meantime. He has been identified as a "person of interest" in the 1985 disappearance of a California couple in addition to being charged with grabbing his daughter, Reigh, during a supervised visit, shoving away a court-appointed social worker, then fleeing in a hired car AND also with lying to police about his identity. He’s now set to go on trial for the offense involving his daughter and it appears that Magistrate Gary Wilson doesn’t want him going anywhere, because the magistrate set bail at $50 million. Gerhartsreiter has suggested he was a member of the wealthy Rockefeller family, but descendants of the oil tycoon have maintained that he is no relation. That scam finally came to an end when Gerhartsreiter's attorney, Stephen Hrones, conceded that his client had lied about his roots. But he also said there was no basis for the kidnapping charges because the marriage to Reigh's mother was never valid, so no custody agreement could be, either. Good luck getting anyone to believe your client after he’s spent three decades living one of the most outrageous lies imaginable, counselor……

- Are you Jewish and looking to make some extra cash? Boy, do I have an offer for you! By moving to the city of Dothan, Alabama, you could earn $50,000, thanks to some forward-thinking members at the city’s Temple Emanu-El, people like Larry Blumberg. Blumberg put up $1 million to help relocate 20 young Jewish families to Dothan and the congregation took out ads in Jewish newspapers offering up to $50,000 per family. Rabbi Lynne Goldsmith also offers a glowing endorsement of the city of 60,000, which sits in the southeastern corner of
Alabama, near the state's borders with Georgia and Florida. “If you need a robust Orthodox community, we don't have it,” Goldsmith said. “But if you want a community where your neighbors are friendly; where people smile at you in the grocery store even if they don't know you, then Dothan's for you.” The reason for this new recruitment push is that the Jewish community in Dothan has declined from its height, when about 100 families worshipped at Temple Emanu-El. Today, to today, when temple membership is about half that number. There are not very many members, and most are older. Thus, the decision was made that more young families were needed and that cold, hard cash was the way to do it. “We felt like it needed to be something that had enough sizzle that would get attention, and it really has,” Blumblerg declared. Rob Goldsmith, the rabbi's husband, is director of the relocation project and he says the response has been beyond expectation. "We've had 275,000 hits on our Web site, several hundred phone calls and e-mails. We've really gotten the attention," Rob Goldsmith said. Inquiries have come from as far away as China, Cuba, South America, Israel and Europe. Should you be Jewish and looking to relocate to the Deep South or just curious, the group's Web address is http://www.bfjcs.org/. Maybe this is just me, but something about this seems odd, creepy and wrong. Recruiting people to come live in your community and paying them to do so………or maybe I’m just bitter than I’m not Jewish and thus not eligible……..

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