• The Wrap reports that despite grossing over $300 million to date in their world tour, U2 is only just on the brink of breaking even — just as the tour is about to shut down for the summer. The expenses of hauling around its giant spider-like prong stage are so immense that despite months of sold out shows they are only just putting their heads above the waterline. According to the piece, however the band, sees the tour as a way of continuing to pump some excitement into the franchise as they enter their twilight years. [The Wrap]

• The weekend box office has been abandoned to the monsters. Pre-Halloween fight films will dominate this weekend with Saw 4 and the continued expansion of Paranormal Activity each tracking in the $25 million range. [LA Times]

• District 9 Director Neill Blomkamp has signed up for his next picture. Media Rights Campaign has committed to financing his sophomore outing, an untitled, unexplained project which will go before cameras in mid-2010. [Variety]

• In his overview of the TV season to date, The Hollywood Reporter's James Hibberd sees the networks, or most of them, staging a bit of a comeback, with a surprising number of new shows actually connecting. Glee, Modern Family, The Vampire Diaries and NCIS: Los Angeles are cited as success stories. The one very dark spot in the network picture continues to be, of course, the black hole of NBC. [Hollywood Reporter]

• Dreamworks has ordered a script for a live action version of the Japanese animated classic Ghost in the Shell. Shutter Island screenwriter Laeta Kalogridi will take a first stab at the project. [Variety]

• Anne Hathaway and Neil Patrick Harris have signed on to do voices in Fox's upcoming Rio, by the animation team that brought you Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs. [Hollywood Reporter]

Hathaway, coming off a much-deserved Oscar nomination for her performance in Rachel Getting Married, is starring in the Shakespeare in the Park production of Twelfth Night opening this week at the Delacorte Theater in Central Park. As a result, Hathaway was featured in a piece in Sunday's New York Times and is subject of this week's New York magazine cover feature.

About her gender-bending role in the play, Hathaway sounded, well, terrified in the Times piece.

"I have a double learning curve, not only because it's my first time with Shakespeare but because this is my first major theatrical production," Ms. Hathaway said. "So just staving off a nervous breakdown has been the main thing for me."

"A lot of people in the cast come up to me at the end of the week and ask how I'm feeling, and I kind of vomit emotions, and they say, ‘Oh, good, that's exactly where you should be,' " she said. "And I remember the first time a bug flew into my face at rehearsal, I turned to Dan and asked, for my own edification, ‘If a bug flies into our face, are we allowed to react or just be stoic?' He just said, ‘Use your discretion.' "

Ms. Hathaway still seemed a bit surprised and thrilled to be in the cast.

"Yeah," Ms. Hathaway said, "I think I live in constant fear of being revealed to be a fraud because I'm with not only exquisite experience, but actors who have so much stage experience. And people who have experience in the park, which is a whole different kind of expertise."

"I had a very naïve, really arrogant adolescent idea that I could do Shakespeare because I did one monologue in an acting class when I was 18," she said. "One thing that dawned on me early in this process: We were sitting around and sharing our knowledge of Shakespeare and some trivia, and I just realized that the study of Shakespeare is cumulative, and I felt really lucky to be getting my first crack at it at such a young age."

In the New York piece, Hathaway noted how she's long yearned to spread her dramatic wings by tackling stage roles and secretly harbors a desire to become a full-blown stage diva.

She likes the long rehearsals, she likes slipping off to the uptown Shake Shack with cast and crew. It's a bit of being the actress she imagined she'd be when, as a child in New Jersey, she decided to take after her mother, who acts in regional theater and has done so forever. "I hounded [Public Theater director] Oskar Eustis for years," she says. After Rachel, "I think it became more of a priority for him to get me onstage." Hathaway stirs her coffee. "I do hope that doesn't sound obnoxious."

Talk of other projects swirls around her, but she's coy about it. "I don't mean to be, but sometimes things don't work out in the end, and then people think it's because you hate someone, and I don't hate anyone!"

It has, however, been confirmed that she'll be playing Judy Garland on Broadway, and that seems about right.

"This is so embarrassing, but one of the waitresses just walked by with a glass of white wine and I almost reached out and grabbed it. It would be lovely to have a bit of release, but no. I have to go to rehearsal. I don't want to be the girl who shows up tipsy. But wouldn't it be fun? Wouldn't it be fun someday to be a grande dame who can get away with anything?"

We think she'll do just fine and we look forward to seeing her perform in the play. Now, who wants $50 to go out and wait in line for a ticket for us, because we don't have time for that crap.

The Three Sisters of Twelfth Night [New York Times]
Her Enchanted Evenings [New York]

The executives at New Line Cinema can't wait to take more hard-earned cash from women who don't care about storyline and just want to see something about dating and love — again!

That's why there is a project in the works called Valentine's Day. It will hit theaters right before — wait for it — Valentine's Day, 2010. The plot? The plot is iffy. Something about "would-be romantics working their way through a tangle of circumstances in L.A." But that doesn't matter, because Julia Roberts, Anne Hathaway, Jennifer Garner, Jessica Alba, Jessica Biel and Shirley MacLaine will be in it. And Bradley Cooper. New Line will come up with a way to work a story around these people, since all that matters is that there's money to be made. Apparently, He's Just Not That Into You proved that women want to go see "romantic" movies — with other women or a date — right around Valentine's Day.

I have nothing against romance, comedies, or romcoms. I love stuff like When Harry Met Sally, Flirting, and Amelie — thoughtful films with strong writing and characters who are forces of nature. But He's Just Not That Into You — a movie based on a self-help book based on a catchphrase from a TV show — lacked substance and soul; the characters might have well have been cardboard cut-outs with labels like "The Optimist" or "The Seductress" taped to them. And for every bad review, there was a person who said, "I'm gonna see it anyway." Now the studio has 94 million reasons to pull that shit again.

As I wrote earlier this year, when you go see a movie like He's Just Not That Into You, you're casting a vote, telling Hollywood you want more flicks in the same vein. And this is what HJNTIY's box office bonanza hath wrought: Valentine's Day. As a former screenwriting major, it is painful to read that this project is being dictated by a calendar date — along with a cast and director (Garry Marshall) — and not by an actual story someone was inspired to write.

Who knows? Maybe there will be some surprises! Maybe they'll change the title to Single Awareness Day. Maybe some great writer (writers, plural, probably) will be hired by the studio to come up with a perfectly charming Valentine's Day tale. (I can already guess that one woman, who you think will stay single, will suddenly find a date; one woman, who you think will have a date, will suddenly be single; and one couple will remain together despite going through a dilemma that should tear them apart.) But for now, I'm already announcing that I'm just not that into it.

Hollywood Has Feb. 14 Circled in Red [NY Times]

Earlier: Liveblogging He's Just Not That Into You
Cliché-Laden Chick Flick Tries To Convince You It's Not Full Of Clichés
He's Just Not That Into You: Gay Minstrel Show?
More Reasons Not To Get Into He's Just Not That Into You
He's Just Not That Into You - First Review
There's No Way You'll Be Into He's Just Not That Into You

Either you love her or find her humor shallow and strangely dated, but Chelsea Handler is here to stay. For three more years, at least. She just signed a big deal with E!, extending her late-night talk show Chelsea Lately for another three seasons. The show has been a hit for the wan little cable net—the laff riot gets more women viewers, 18-34, than Last Call with Carson Daly, the new Jimmy Fallon show, or Craig Ferguson. Though most of those women are the annoying people who will talk loudly over shows like Project Runway, thinking their jokes are more entertaining than the actual show, so who wants to advertise to them anyway. [Variety]

Like an iceboat forcing its prow through dense North Pole ice, celebrated actress Cameron Diaz is breaking new ground as an artist. She'll be starring in a romantic comedy, her first ever, in which she play's something of a guy's gal. The movie is called Swingles and may not be for those who can't handle change. [Variety] Meanwhile the not-at-all-overhyped, not one bit, Anne Hathaway will be starring in both stage and film versions of the biography Get Happy, about celebrated insane boozebag Judy Garland. Long rumored to be doing a musical (Guys and Dolls, Promises, Promises), this looks to be Hathaway's first confirmed Broadway appearance. She's also doing Viola in the park this summer. [Variety]

Curiously likable former child star Amanda Bynes has landed an ABC comedy pilot (they do comedy so well!) called Canned, about a young woman who is unwittingly terribly mistreated by her boss. Geez, I can relate! [Variety] Curiously unlikable comedian Robert Wuhl somehow got past security at HBO, though he'd been banned from pitching shows to them since Arli$$ ended (those Funky Teacher things don't count). But somehow he did, because he's developing a father-son comedy about the owners of a Madison Square Garden-esque arena, providing a backstage look at all the sporting events and concerts and stuff that come through. He's also maybe developing those Funky Teacher things into a Broadway show. Inexplicable. [THR]

Here's fun: Catherine O'Hara, Tom Selleck, and Martin Mull are all starring in an action comedy together. Well, OK, the real leads are the unfortunate Ashton Kutcher and Katharine Heigl, but those three enjoyable old-timers will be popping up as well. Can't wait until June 2010! (Yes I can.) [THR] Also teaming up is a band of Injuns for the next Twilight movie, New Breaking Eclipse. They're all playing fearsome and brave werewolves who defend humans against a nasty group of vampyrs. Several different tribes are represented with the casting, and all the kids are making their movie debuts. Finally, we have repaid our debt to Native Americans in full. [THR]

TV vets Maura Tierney and Peter Krause will be starring in the pilot of the series-based-on-a-movie Parenthood. They'll be playing the Dianne Wiest and Steve Martin parts. No casting has been announced for the old lady who gives the lovely rollercoaster monologue towards the end, but I'm keeping my fingers crossed for a heavily made-up Rachel Dratch. [THR]

New York's Public Theater announced today that Hathaway would appear in this summer's Shakespeare in the Park production of Twelfth Night — its sixth mounting of the comedy, but no doubt the first featuring the Oscar-nominated ex of a faux-Vatican CFO. As a man. Sort of: Hathaway will play the female lead Viola, shipwrecked with her identical twin Sebastian in the mythical dukedom of Illyria. Mistaken identity, servitude and cross-dressing ensue, and Viola falls in love with the Duke. Whose role hasn't yet been cast, we hear, though let's be honest: If ever there were a time for Hathaway and Frank Langella to settle their filthy unfinished business, this would be it.

• Anne Hathaway Cast In Shakespeare in the Park 'Twelfth Night' [Broadway World]

Filthy mind

People cornered the Best Actress hopeful at today's Academy nominee luncheon, where she confessed she'll be attending the Oscars with her father — quite the downgrade from the Vatican's disgraced deputy CFO, but no doubt a safer choice than the mysterious, alleged heiress chaser known to trail her on vacation. Her mother and brother will attend as well if she can wrangle an extra pair of ducats (Marion Cotillard's seats may come available — we're just saying). It's a bittersweet scenario that can only end poorly for Frank Langella, that most recent of Hathaway suitors who stands to lose the most when she tipsily gestures over her bare shoulder at the Governor's Ball, leans in and whispers, "My date. *Burp* He promised he'd have me home by midnight."

• Anne Hathaway's Oscar Date – Her Dad [People]

After the FBI got the nude pictures in the Follieri split, the Web debated her taste (or distaste) for anal sex and even Jimmy Kimmel's fire extinguisher got her all hormonally atwitter, it probably shouldn't have surprised us when Hathaway made trouble for her fellow nominees at Newsweek's annual Oscar roundtable. Yet her oneupsmanship with Frank Langella still came as something of a shock, if only because she had hardly sat down before falling into filthy default mode:

LANGELLA: Would you like to hear my most favorite line I have said onstage, after 75 plays?

HATHAWAY: Yes.

LANGELLA: "Suck my dick." I said it to Christine Baranski every night for four months, and I couldn't wait to say it. It was such a great line to say. [...]

HATHAWAY: I was thinking of a moment that involved a dick. It was Julie Christie in Shampoo, when she's having that conversation with a guy, and she's like, I'll give you anything you want. And she's so deliciously drunk, and she goes, "And I want to suck his cock." It's the greatest line reading. And Warren Beatty does this fantastic spit take. Frank, I have a really lame question. Is there anything that you remember thinking, I wish I knew this when I started acting?

A subject change! So unfair, especially, when Langella was probably just about to casually reply with regrets he had waited so long to get into kid vaccination and housebuilding. He's suave like that.

• Inside The Actors’ Studio [Newsweek]

After discerning that Hathaway's 2009 resolution was to try something new every day, Jimmy Kimmel invited her to do just that by blowing out the candles on a birthday cake with a fire extinguisher. And why not. Hathaway seizes the opportunity to crack a number of double entendres and enough "that's what she said" jokes to make even Michael Scott shoot an anxious glance to the camera. This is going straight in your matchmaking file, Anne—be careful, or Ellen may set you up with James Woods. [Jimmy Kimmel Live!]

With a small but symbolic cross-section of critics having reported at Rotten Tomatoes, Bride Wars has inspired the first — and what may prove the most vicious, depending on how that Towelhead sequel is coming along — beatdown of 2009. A sampling to date:

· "Kate Hudson and Anne Hathaway, who play the would-be brides, are good actors and quick-witted women, here playing characters at a level of intelligence approximating HAL 9000 after he has had his chips pulled." — Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times

· "Bride Wars pretends to be a satire of wedding mania, but since there's virtually nothing else to the movie, the satire comes depressingly close to endorsement." — Owen Gleiberman, Entertainment Weekly

· "A crass, despicably sexist piece of Hollywood trash." — Josh Bell, Las Vegas Weekly

· "Will make you hate brides." — Victoria Alexander, FilmsInReview.com

· "The most lamentable thing about the dismal Bride Wars is the total absence of fatalities." — Nick Schager, Slant Magazine

Dammnnnn. The glass-half-full observer in us takes solace from that last, scorching rebuke from one of our '08 Listy winners, but the other half worries that Hathaway's Best Actress Oscar hopes for Rachel Getting Married may find the bad-taste brick wall too tall to climb by late February. We hope we're wrong, but if the wedding dress is the new fatsuit, here's also hoping that lovely new Golden Globe will suffice.

• 'Bride Wars' [Rotten Tomatoes]

The talk show host attempted to extract a veritable personal ad from Hathaway (must love getting shitfaced and "processed metaphysics"!) on her show today, though her prey put up a fight:

"If you need someone, I will find you a boyfriend," the TV host tells the Bride Wars star on the Ellen DeGeneres Show to air Thursday. "I'm really good at it."

"Did you see how nervous I just got?" responds Hathaway.

"You don't even have to date," advises DeGeneres, who herself is married, to Portia de Rossi. "You can straight to commitment." [...]

In terms of what she's now looking for in a guy, "At this point I would just like him to be law abiding," says Hathaway.

We're afraid that the newly insistent DeGeneres is merely giving the anti-gay marriage foes more grist for the mill; imagine an ad where a happy, beaming Mormon explains, "I have lots of gay friends! I just don't want them to become smug marrieds."

• Ellen DeGeneres to Find Mr. Right for Anne Hathaway [People]

When quizzed by E! about what she expects in 2009 from Barack Obama, Hathaway burnished her gay bona fides (already sparkling after starring in Brokeback Mountain and saving her brother's same-sex wedding) and noted, ""I expect him to explain that choice of Rick Warren. I don't get it. All my friends and I were trying to figure it out, but we just can't. So I'd love that." You know, Anne, sometimes you get sweet-talked by an apparently charitable man, invite him into your life, and then find out that his overseas transactions were a lot shadier than you'd originally thought. Who can't relate?

• Anne Hathaway Takes Obama to Task! Go Anne! [E!]

Hathaway found out firsthand just how little the ET anchor cares for her knowledge-knowing at the Palm Springs International Festival, where the actress was being honored for her work in Rachel Getting Married. Sadly, her acceptance speech struck the wrong note for some, who will only tolerate her erudite rambling when she's kohl-eyed and interrupting her sister's wedding party:

Anne Hathaway, a Desert Palm Achievement Award recipient, seemed to lose the audience while discussing “process metaphysics.” That prompted a surprised comment from almost always perky emcee, Mary Hart. “Did I hear that from backstage correctly? We just got into metaphysics? Whatever happened to good ol' blonde bimbos?” she quipped.

Why, they emcee awards shows in Palm Springs, Mary!

• Palm Springs International Film Festival [My Desert]

Kate explained that Anne is her costar in Bride Wars, and Letterman quipped, "She's nice, isn't she? I think her old boyfriend is in prison." Kate tried to change the subject and tactfully maneuver around Letterman's jabs, but admitted that she watched when he grilled Anne about Follieri. "I was like, 'Oh, you're giving it to her," Kate told Letterman. And just when things seemed to die down, Letterman mentioned how Follieri dressed up as the Pope. Clip above.

Earlier: Letterman Grills Anne Hathaway About Her Jailbird Ex

This week, the mags are about 90 percent celebrity weight loss stories and 10 percent entirely made up cover stories about stars who might get married, reproduce, or not reproduce in 2009. Below, we pick out the small bits of gossip sprinkled like confetti throughout the pages of Ok!, Us, Life & Style, In Touch and Star.









Us
It's unclear why the mag describes the 28 pages of blathering about celebrity diets as a "bonus" on the cover, since that makes up almost the entire issue. Here's some New Year's Eve advice: If you want to look like Britney or Jennifer Aniston just start eating fish ... and doing two hours of yoga per day. Elisabeth Hasselbeck is a "baby weight winner" because she lost 20 lbs by obsessively working out and insisting she has celiac disease. Hef once told Kendra from The Girls Next Door that she was getting fat and suggested she hit the gym. Charming. Here's some actual gossip: After a W magazine photo shoot with model Jesus Luz, Madonna invited the 20-year-old to a party in Brazil where they kissed, hugged, and danced until 5:30am, when they both retired to Madge's hotel room. A source says, "she goes after the youngest, hottest thing around," so it looks like 33-year-old A-Rod is out. Is Drew Barrymore dating Jason Segel? Segel's rep says they're just friends, but at the very least they're friends who make out at Chateau Marmont.
Grade: F (Standing out in the snow for hours to see the ball drop)

Ok!
Brad "longs to hold another infant" but Ok! theorizes that since Angie reportedly developed preeclampsia and gestational diabetes and had two emergency C-sections, having another biological child would be risky. Brad will have to settle for holding the two six-month-old babies he has at home or the African infant he is possibly adopting. Next: In an interview with the mag Alanis Morisette reveals that she lost 20 lbs by following a vegan diet. The mag says realizing she had gained weight was harder for Alanis to swallow than a "Jagged Little Pill." Sigh. Sort of moving on: Even more diet tips! Ok! suggests if you want to look like the stars you should become a professional dancer like Julianne Hough, breastfeed and have six kids like Angie, or get some plastic surgery like Heidi Montag. We finish with 12-pages of 2009 horoscopes. They advise that if you're a cancer, "the stork could drop by for a visit, especially after October 29." So should we be looking for a baby bump on cancers Ashley Tisdale, Meryl Streep, and Harrison Ford?
Grade: F+ (Having to watch a few minutes of Ryan Seacrest to see the ball drop on TV)

Life & Style
The cover claims they have the first photos of Bronx Mowgli, but it's just that picture Ashlee Simpson and Pete Wentz put online a few days ago. False advertising! Next up, brace yourselves: George Clooney went to dinner with Paris Hilton two nights in a row and an insider says "they definitely plan to get together in the new year." Paris's new BFF came on both "dates" and Ridley Scott and Marvel studios chairman David Maisel were in attendance for the second dinner, so we're hoping for George's sake this was just business. Moving on: K-Fed didn't want to let the boys visit Britney on various stops during her upcoming tour, so Brit invited Kevin to join them. The pair did fall in love on tour, but a friend points out that Kevin's relationship with his bowling teammate is getting pretty serious. Mandy Moore and DJ AM split up again. Finally, the best celebrity weight loss story of the week: "Obama Shapes Up to Be President." An Obama insider describes how the future president shed a few pounds by not having to eat "corn dogs at the Iowa State Fair or ribs in Austin, Texas," like he did on the campaign trail. Yes, there is a shirtless before and after picture. (Fig. 1)
Grade D- (Noisemaker-induced temporary deafness)

Star
Nicole Richie is planning on conceiving a second child, so like most moms-to-be she's taking pre-natal vitamins, dropping her intense vegan diet, and sketching maternity clothes she'll have made for herself. In other news, Katie Holmes spent her 30th birthday alone because Tom Cruise was away promoting Valkyrie. Katie is stressed and exhausted (as evidenced by a cold sore on her lip) because Tom nixed a ladies-only spa weekend with her mom and girlfriends. Next: Angelina Jolie's long-time bodyguard Michey Brett quit recently because he clashed with Brad, and now he's threatening to write a tell-all book. Judging from his revelation that Brad and Angie forced him to buy them supplies from a sex shop, including "kinky rubber suits and face masks," it's going to be a good read. Moving on: Anne Hathaway has been dating boyfriend Adam Shulman for a few months, which clearly means they'll be getting married in 2009. Star thinks Anne is trying to send secret messages about her impending wedding because her most recent projects are Rachel Getting Married, Bride Wars, and the upcoming film The Fiance. Blind Item: Which Disney heartthrob better pass next time someone offers him a puff? The teen's taste for pot has become a real problem on the set of his latest project. Finally, some celebrities have hideous physical flaws that the editors of Star would like to point out to you. Victoria Beckham had some gunk in her ear, Kelly Rowland forgot to shave her armpits once before hitting the red carpet, and J.Lo has some back fat. How dare they.
Grade: D (Champagne headache)

In Touch
Jen and Angelina are in a made-up race to the altar, which means the mag has to plan two made-up weddings! Jen is going to make it a classy affair by borrowing Girls Gone Wild host Joe Francis's Mexican villa for a spring wedding. Angie wants her fake wedding to be smaller and will wed in September at Chateau Miraval with only family in attendance. Moving on: In Touch has an exclusive interview with Tori Spelling called, "How I got my bikini body back" which we did not read because it involves photos of a bikini-clad Spelling making sexy faces and we had to turn the page. In the requisite article about Jessica Alba losing the baby weight they use a photo of her pregnant for the "before" and the photoshopped Campari ad for the "after." Ha! Next up: OMG. "Is Oprah too hung up on Obama?" Oprah's friendship with the president-elect is described as "oddly close" and there is a sidebar pondering if Stedman and Michelle might be jealous. A psychiatrist who doesn't treat anyone involved says Stedman and Michelle "likely realize they can't relate to Oprah and Barack on a certain level because the pals share the "loneliness-at-the-top syndrome, which could draw them closer." Finally, "Hollywood's hooked on hookers." This article is like a three page blind item, with both gay and straight prostitutes recounting their adventures with anonymous A-list stars. We most want to know the identity of the straight "manly man" whose dominatrix invited gay porn star Nick Capra to her "dungeon" to see how far she could make her celebrity "slave" go.
Grade: D+ (Confetti in your underwear)

Fig. 1

Hathaway sat down with Modern Bride to promote the dreaded, nearly-upon-us comedy Bride Wars, and when asked to recall her favorite wedding, she cited her older brother Mike's (that's him with Hathaway on the left). As beautiful as she says the ceremony was, things almost didn't go as planned until Hathaway and company took charge:

"When Mike and Josh booked the place, it was before daylight savings time, and the sun was pretty high up in the sky," she continues. "Now it was at eye level, and it was blinding! Burn-your-retina bright!

"We sent my cousin's boyfriend down to Canal Street [in New York City] with $250 to buy as many sunglasses as he could, and we put them on every other seat. Everybody just put on their sunglasses, and we have some great pictures of that!" she says. "It's all about crisis management, isn't it?"

Sadly, Hathaway's quick thinking doomed a secret scheme set up by her then-boyfriend Raffaello Follieri, who had conferred with the Pope to set the sun just so, all the better to abscond with the blinded crowd's wallets, purses, and carb-free slices of gay wedding cake.

• Anne Hathaway's "Favorite Wedding Moment?" When Gay Brother Got Hitched! [Us]

It's a welcome diversion for reader and subject alike, who, for too long, have been treated to the media's limited view of Hathaway as merely the dog-abandoning, Senator-meeting ex ensnared in a lousy Italian boyfriend's Vatican-land baron delusion. We think it's really over now that the actress has finally made it to London for a bit of on-the-record, boutique-crashing catharsis:

"Look, she's buying cheap knickers!" somebody says. And, indeed, Hathaway is in the lingerie department, surveying the three-for-£7 panties in polka dots and funny florals—girly things. She's also interested in camisoles, jumpsuits (she tries on a strapless black corseted romper), and things that in her mind fall into the "lounge around" category. [...]

We're back to knickers for one last look. It's a psychologically charged moment. For the truth is that Hathaway recently split up with Raffaello Follieri, her boyfriend of four years, and is trying to replace all the clothes and underpinnings she associates with that relationship and that she has since tossed out—i.e., domestic apparel, those sweatpants and T-shirts and his/her sweaters in which you tackle crosswords and struggle for the remote control. "This is harder than I thought," she suddenly confesses. "I haven't done this yet. I don't know how I want to look when I lounge around."

Oh, Annie, you don't need Vogue for that. Ask the FBI — there's evidence.

• The Awakening [Vogue]

And now, the day after the Cracked X-mas Fundraiser where the actress auctioned off a drinking date with herself and a few of your close friends, we know that's as good a pick up line as any:

"I'm not usually very forward, but I thought if there was ever a crowd for me to do something like this, this is my crowd so I would like to auction myself off," Hathaway announced, "for drinks somewhere fabulous and basically get you totally s—- faced. Tell me what I'm worth." [...] Hathaway, 26, was embarrassed when her price kept going up. "I'm blushing," Hathaway said during the bidding process. "Wow, I feel really good right now."

Enjoy it while you can, Annie, before a troop of FBI agents arrives at your door, waving a search warrant and the sharing the heartrending disclosure that the proceeds intended for a "crisis helpline for LGBT" youth were diverted instead to some skeevy underground phone-sex empire. Not the same thing! Worse yet, you didn't even get a John McCain boat ride out of it! We hope we're wrong, of course, but we — and you, God knows — have seen this one before. Tread carefully.

• Date with Anne Hathaway Goes for $12,000 [People]

There's often little sense to make of the Spirit Awards beyond the volume of tables that the organizers at Film Independent can sell to its nominees, and this year, with Jonathan Demme's Rachel Getting Married and Sundance award-winner Frozen River receiving six nods apiece, expect Sony Pictures Classics to bring the most guests. The microbudget fest-circuit favorite Ballast earned six nods as well; its producers are expected to valet through the host's opening monologue before settling into their own, smaller table in a beachside annex to watch the show on closed-circuit TV.

The diversity of the other major categories is a testament to the sloppy overlap between indie upstarts and the Oscar mainstream that continues to sustain them:

· The Wrestler and the Michelle Williams-and-her-dog drama Wendy and Lucy join Rachel, Ballast and Frozen River as this year's Best Feature nominees;

· Rachel helmer Jonathan Demme duels lauded indie filmmakers Courtney Hunt (Frozen River), Ramin Bahrani (Chop Shop) and Lance Hammer (Ballast) for Best Director. Tom McCarthy is in there for The Visitor, too; Overture Films must have pledged two tables or something.

· Williams and likely Rachel Oscar nominee Anne Hathaway face off against Frozen River's Melissa Leo and even Towelhead star Summer Bishil for Best Female Lead;

· Jeremy Renner earned a Best Male Lead for The Hurt Locker, an acclaimed Iraq film that hasn't screened anywhere outside the Toronto Film Festival. His opponents: Sean Penn (Milk), Javier Bardem (Vicky Cristina Barcelona), Wrestler star Mickey Rourke and Oscar underdog Richard Jenkins (The Visitor);

· In the screenwriting category, Woody Allen (Vicky Cristina Barcelona) and Charlie Kaufman (Synecdoche, New York) will do battle against Sundance '08 alums Anna Boden and Ryan Fleck (Sugar) and Howard Rodman (Savage Grace);

· Along with Penn, Bardem, Williams and Hathaway, round out the starfucking quotient with Best Supporting Actress nominee Penelope Cruz (Vicky Cristina Barcelona). Ben Lyons may decide to show up with his camera after all!

Look for other Defamer Attractions underdog alums scattered around the room as well: Best First Feature candidates Chris Eigeman (Turn the River) and Chris Zalla (Sangre De Mi Sangre); John Cassavetes Award contender Alex Holdridge (In Search of a Midnight Kiss); and Best Documentary front-runner Man on Wire, directed by James Marsh. Congrats to all, and may none of you still be busing tables in the show's tent if/when your names are called Feb. 21.

• 'River,' 'Rachel,' 'Ballast' Lead Spirit Award Nods [IndieWire]

Or so says a source who tattled to Page Six: "Adam is known as an opportunist. When he was at Brown [University], he went after all the heiresses. It's like Anne is addicted to losers." Hold it — can you be more specific? Because we've heard Hathaway isn't what you'd call a cheap date, and nobody actually dates for love in this town anyway, do they? Then again, he got this far without having to vaccinate any poor kids or build someone a house, so maybe he is all about the shortcuts.

• ANNE'S NEW GUY [NYP]