Nothing quite stirs a media frenzy like an heiress to a hotel fortune preparing to surrender all the trappings of luxury for a three-week stay in the county jail.
The countdown to Paris Hilton's incarceration next week has sent the tabloid press into overdrive with stories alternately portraying her as a newly tearful, spiritual socialite or an unrepentant party girl kicking up her heels with the likes of Lindsay Lohan at Hollywood nightspots.
Either way, Hilton is in for a change of pace during the jail time she was ordered to serve after police caught her behind the wheel of her Bentley without a valid license earlier this year, violating probation for a prior drunken-driving offense.
PHOTO: AP
The 26-year-old "celebutante" has been ordered to report to the Century Regional Detention Facility near Los Angeles by tomorrow to start serving her term, which already has been cut from 45 days to 23 days under state sentencing guidelines.
Once she reports, Hilton will forsake her designer clothes, cell phone and other accessories — along with her freedom and privacy — for an orange jumpsuit and a small, Spartan cell with twin bunks and metal toilet (no seat, no lid).
County Sheriff Lee Baca told the Los Angeles Times that steps have been taken to ensure no one smuggles in a camera to get pictures of the jailed Hilton, which would be of immense value to the tabloid media.
But a shortage of cameras behind bars doesn't necessarily mean Hilton is ready to surrender her vanity or fashion sense.
Under the headline: "Before the slammer, Paris planning some glamour," the New York Daily News reported that designers were ordered to Hilton's home to give her a pre-jail makeover.
While Hilton is going to jail, actor Hugh Grant will not face charges over claims he attacked a photographer with a tub of baked beans and kicked at him, the Crown Prosecution Service said on Saturday.
The clash between the star of Four Weddings and a Funeral and photographer Ian Whittaker took place near Grant's London home in April. Whittaker alleged that Grant attacked him after he reportedly tried to take photographs of Grant's former girlfriend Liz Hurley, who lives nearby.
There was too little evidence to charge the 46-year-old actor over the kicking "because there were clear discrepancies between the accounts of independent witnesses and those of the photographers involved," the CPS said in a statement.
"In relation to a second allegation involving a discarded take-away food container, the CPS decided that a prosecution would not be in the public interest in light of the minimal nature of the alleged assault, the lack of premeditation on the part of Mr Grant and the overall circumstances of the incident," it said.
Actor Paul Newman is giving US$10 million to Kenyon College, the Ohio school from which he graduated, to establish its single largest scholarship fund.
The Gambier, Ohio-based school said in a statement on Friday the gift by Newman and the Newman's Own Foundation was part of the college's US$230 million fund-raising campaign, along with US$35 million from two other donors.
"This fund ... is meant to be more than just a gift to a college," Newman, 82, said in a statement. "I believe strongly that we should be doing whatever we can to make all higher education opportunities available to deserving students."
Newman, a 1949 graduate of Kenyon, and his wife, actress Joanne Woodward, were the honorary chairs of Kenyon's most recent fund-raising campaign from 1998 to 2001, the college said.
Last month, Newman, who won an Oscar for The Color of Money, and earned nine other Academy Award nominations for films such as The Hustler, Hud and Cool Hand Luke, said he was retiring from acting. He is also the founder of a food company, Newman's Own, to fund charities.
At Kenyon, Newman studied English, theater and economics and started a popular laundry service to earn extra money.
"I owe Kenyon a great deal," he said. "I even started my first business there, and I depended on that extra US$60 a week. I personally feel great affection and a debt of gratitude for Kenyon."
After The People’s Republic of China (PRC) published 22 new guidelines on June 21 that allow its courts to try in absentia and sentence to death “Taiwan independence separatists,” the Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) upgraded its travel advisory to the PRC and the Special Administrative Regions (SARs) of Hong Kong and Macau to level 3, or “orange” alert, meaning Taiwanese nationals shouldn’t visit unless “absolutely necessary.” Surveying commuters in Taipei’s bustling Main Station on Thursday, the Taipei Times found only 20 percent of people we spoke to had not heard that the travel alert had been raised to orange. Similarly, only
Once again, we are listening to the government talk about bringing in foreign workers to help local manufacturing. Speaking at an investment summit in Washington DC, the Minister of Economic Affairs, J.W. Kuo (郭智輝), said that the nation must attract about 400,000 to 500,000 skilled foreign workers for high end manufacturing by 2040 to offset the falling population. That’s roughly 15 years from now. Using the lower number, Taiwan would have to import over 25,000 foreigners a year for these positions to reach that goal. The government has no idea what this sounds like to outsiders and to foreigners already living here.
Over the past year, a peculiar phrase has begun to litter Asian women’s social media accounts: “Oxford study.” An Asian woman vlogging about her dating life — and particularly about dating white men — gets commenters reacting to her updates with the words “Oxford study.” A young Asian student showing off her prom dress with her white boyfriend sees “obligatory Oxford study comment” on her TikTok. “I can already hear the oxford study comments coming,” one Asian woman captions a video of her dancing with her white partner. The phrase “Oxford study” refers to just that: an academic study out of Oxford
In spite of the next local elections being over two years away, there is already considerable intrigue and jockeying for position by politicians and their supporters. The local press runs quite a bit of content, mostly speculative, on who will run in what races and what the outcomes might be. This is an overview for English language readers to get a taste of the state of play. Four races in particular are drawing a lot of heat, those of mayors of New Taipei City, Taichung, Tainan and Kaohsiung because in all four the incumbent mayors will be term-limited out. In