We all remember the Texas-born Swayze from his roles in Dirty Dancing and Ghost, but the actor's real break came from the television adaptation of North and South, a Civil War drama. The actor went on to star in a number of hits, like Point Break.

While we all have fond memories of Swayze's silver screen hits, we are most impressed by his courageous cancer battle. Though he knew his days were numbered, Swayae signed on to star in A&E's The Beast. And, honestly, whatever you'll say about the show, his gumption was commendable. We've previously honored Mr. Swayze with a video tribute, but here;s our absolutely favorite performance from Dirty Dancing, the sleeper hit that helped make him a star.

RIP, Patrick. You touched many lives and, as cynical and mean as we may be, will always be adored

Goody, a multiple-time Big Brother star in England and India, plans to get married and have her two young sons christened on camera, and will sell the photo rights. She's doing it for three reasons, her publicist says:

What she said to me was simply this - 'I'm doing this for three reasons, one: because I want to make as much money as possible for my children, two: because it keeps me busy, it gives me something to think about other than cancer, and what's going to happen to me,' and three: since last August when she announced she had cancer, the amount of women having cervical smears has gone up over 20% right across Britain and that's something she's very happy about.

Which seems fair enough, I guess. If that's the best way she knows how to raise money for her kids, then that's the best way she knows how to raise money for her kids.

Seems kinda rough though.

Explaining her rationale in taking that dramatic step, she said, "I didn't want to go back to the doctors every four months for testing and squishing and everything. I just wanted to kind of be rid of this whole thing for me. This was the choice that I made, and it was a tough one."

Over the next eight months she will undergo reconstructive surgery. "I'm gonna have cute boobs till I'm 90," she quipped, as Roberts pointed out how Applegate's sense of humor has helped the actress endure the ordeal.

Congratulations are in order to Applegate; she had to make a tough decision (informed by her mother's breast cancer experience as well as the discovery that Applegate herself carried the breast cancer gene, BRCA1), and she revealed it with candor and wit. She may not have her breasts, but she's certainly got cojones.

[photo credit: AP]

• Christina Applegate Cancer-Free After Double Mastectomy [People]

But then we were referred over to the blog belonging to Oregonian film critic Shawn Levy, a genuine authority who's neck deep in a Newman biography and recently offered vague confirmation of his own:

I have known for a while that Newman was very ill, probably with cancer, and today the Internet is flooded with the news that it's lung cancer and that it's not good; there aren't very good sources on any of these stories, and nobody has any shocking exclusives, but given what I know I find every word of them credible. ... He's 83, and his next birthday is in January, and we can only hope he'll make it. I suspect I'll be writing an obituary before I hold a copy of my book in my hand.

Well, Shawn, when you put it like that... Though we guess it's not like it could get any sadder, anyway.

[Photo Credit: Getty Images]

• Paul Newman Has Cancer: AP Stands By Story Despite Newman's Hedging [AP]
• Going, Gently or Otherwise, into That Good Night [Mad About Movies]

The acclaimed actor is said to have been diagnosed at New York's Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, where he is currently receiving outpatient treatment and is under a leading New York oncologist's care. One of the few to know about Newman's illness is his Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid costar and good pal, Robert Redford.

Meanwhile, neither the hospital nor Newman's rep has confirmed the reports. We'll hope for the best, shoot a round of 9-ball at lunch in his honor, and pass more word along as it comes in.

• Paul Newman is reportedly very ill with cancer [LAT]

You could check the recently leaked "bibles" of the Church—we don't have time to go through all 600 pages of drug-addled scifi nonsense. But we do know that "people" are not "people," but rather immortal alien spirits called thetans who will indeed live on well after the dead of their shell bodies, so a Scientologist doesn't need to worry about nonsense like cancer. Which could be why they never bothered to remove it from their fancy ship! The Level 8 Operating Thetans on board will live forever anyway.

Of course, without the training courses for OTs available only on the Freewinds, it'll be much harder for celebrities like Cruise and Jenna Elfman to achieve Cleared Theta Clear level, the point at which they become gods capable of creating their own universes.

Scientology Yacht Sealed and Docked in Curacao [IReport]

Since Nixon, mother of two, started her four-year relationship with education activist Christine Marinoni, Nixon's children had to adjust from the standard Mommy and Daddy household to the more modern two-mom arrangement. And as Nixon explains, she most often answers to "Mommy" and the shorter-haired Christine is known as "Mom." But confusion still abounds: "Sometimes my son says 'Mom!' and it's obvious he means both of us." In any case, relationships lasting this long are a rarity in Hollywood, and we're glad Nixon's found a way to make the gossip-attracting union last. While the timing of her announcement is slightly suspect (Nixon was diagnosed in 2006, and SATC: The Movie comes out next month), we're going to give her the benefit of the doubt and applaud her for telling her story at a time when she's guaranteed to get the most press. Manipulative? Who cares. The bigger an audience she has, the better.

• GOOD MORNING AMERICA [ABC]

Lynch, Swayze's co-star in Road House, talked to People about the 55-year-old actor's illness on a red-carpet line at Sunday's premiere for the new Rolling Stones concert film at New York's Ziegfeld Theater. "If anyone can get through this, it's him," said Lynch. She described Swayze as "the most determined, positive, forward-thinking person I've ever met."

One isn't supposed to say this, because the truth is depressing: Lynch's belief is without any scientific foundation. The latest studies confirm the medical conventional wisdom: an upbeat attitude has no measurable effect on patients' lifespans, or response to treatment. What's so wrong about a bit of optimism? It implies that the failure of a round of chemotherapy is the fault of the patient, rather than the result of an unpredictable genetic lottery, and that trope is even more distressing for terminally ill patients.

"The idea that we can control illness and death with our minds appeals to our deepest yearnings, but it just isn't so," says Jimmie Holland, a psychiatrist at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center who's argued against the tyranny of positive thinking. "It is so sad that cancer patients are made to believe that if they aren't doing well it is somehow their own fault because they aren't positive enough."

"Pals say he can't quit smoking despite it being linked to a third of pancreatic cancers...Patrick's wife Lisa, 51, is liquidising high-fat dinners as he is having trouble keeping down solid foods."

So Swayze can't keep down food, but he's still smoking? As, ahem, sometimes-smokers ourselves, that's plenty of incentive for us to quit smoking forever cut down a bit. And, as you might expect, Tom Cruise found a way to insert himself into the situation. Surprisingly, though, he resisted the urge to tear into a propaganda-laced diatribe; , instead, he issued this statement about his co-star from The Outsiders: "We are all praying for a quick recovery." Us, too. Put down the smokey treats, Patrick ... we're all pulling for you.

[Photo Credit: Splash]

• PATRICK SWAYZE SUFFERING FROM CANCER PUFFS ON A CIGARETTE [The Sun]

"[Swayze] has lost more than 20 pounds in the past few weeks and is restricted to a liquid diet because he has trouble keeping down solid food, added the insider. 'It's time to start praying for a miracle.'"

• NATIONAL ENQUIRER WORLD EXCLUSIVE: PATRICK SWAYZE HAS FIVE WEEKS TO LIVE [National Enquirer]