The NYT today reveals that Leibovitz took out more than $15 million in loans from Art Capital Group—essentially a very high class pawn shop specializing in art.

Last fall, Annie Leibovitz, the photographer, borrowed $5 million from a company called Art Capital Group. In December, she borrowed $10.5 million more from the same firm. As collateral, among other items, she used town houses she owns in Greenwich Village, a country house, and something else: the rights to all of her photographs.

In addition to the lawsuit for more than $700k from unpaid vendors, Leibovitz reportedly used the cash to pay back taxes and finance "a lengthy, costly and litigious renovation on the three adjoining town houses." Why one would pawn their town houses in order to raise money to renovate them, I do not know.

Obviously, a $2 million per year income is no savior from hard times. And hey, Julian Schnabel also pawned some real estate with the same firm to help finance his goddamn monstrosity of a pink, constantly-discounted celebrity condo building, Palazzo Chupi. Pawn shops prey on the rich just as they do the poor. Fairness!

[NYT. By bullshit trend specialist Allen Salkin, but with actual value! Good story Allen. Pic via]

WHAT'S NEW: Look, what more can we say about The Dark Knight? It's terrifically well-made, it's tracking hotter than train on fire and even Terry Gilliam backslid his way into publicizing it. All that matters anymore are the numbers: Warners is unloading this thing on more than 9,000 screens worldwide, including 4,366 in the US. That's a record, reports Variety, though word on the street is that its 152-minute running time and multiplex competition will keep it from breaking Spider-Man 3's record $151 million opening last year. We're not so sure; $145 million isn't out of the question, especially with IMAX screenings sold out literally everywhere and overflow heading into neighboring theaters.

Universal, meanwhile, has exactly the thing for the Batman-o-phobic moviegoer in Mamma Mia!, the Meryl Streep-starring adaptation of the hit ABBA stage musical. We'd rather chew off our tongues than sit through this, but that doesn't mean it couldn't turn around a nice $32 million or so as pretty much the only escape from DK fever. Also opening: Not much, really, with the all-access doc A Very British Gangster and the Kilmer/Dorff prison drama Felon bringing up the art-house rear.

THE BIG LOSER: With Meet Dave presumably a top-10 goner, Fox faces its second consecutive hurdle this week with Space Chimps. This isn't necessarily a "loser," though, looking at roughly $9 million from the families too young for the decidedly dark Knight en route to its DVD/cable future. Call us optimists, but everyone might pretty much get what they want this weekend.

THE UNDERDOG: We recommend Lou Reed's Berlin with a slight reservation: We haven't seen it. But! We did attend the concerts at which Julian Schnabel filmed Reed's live revival of his 1973 masterpiece — a feel-bad epic of drugs, domestic abuse and suicide that makes The Dark Knight look like Batman and Robin. We can vouch for the cinematic quality of the music itself, brought storming from the dead by producer Bob Ezrin and accompanied by vocalist Antony and original, astounding session guitarist Steve Wagner. It took Reed years to reclaim this form (if he did at all; it's debatable), and to catch it through Schnabel's lens, itself at the top of its craft... Well, that doesn't even seem fair.

FOR SHUT-INS: This week's new DVD's include the crackling, commendable Jason Statham heist flick The Bank Job; the Oscar-short-lister Brazilian coming-of-ager The Year My Parents Went on Vacation; the B-thriller Asylum ("From the director of Final Destination 2"!); and for you Emmy-season latecomers, the first season of Holly Hunter's TNT drama Saving Grace.

So, how's the line for Dark Knight? Are are you Team ABBA this weekend? Maybe catching up a bit on your Statham canon? We can't say we blame you. Tell us any best-kept secrets we might have missed!

In it, she runs down some of her favorite Santa Monica haunts. Ignore, if you can, their too-irreverent-by-half intro, and skip directly to #5. There you'll find tantalizing clues as to what might have gone down that fateful night, the actress's unfamiliarity with a barstool rendering her tolerance against the Schnabel-shushing effects of an open bar virtually negligible. (And God knows those DGA cheapskates would sooner relinquish final cut than part with whatever it costs to adequately feed you!) And while we have no idea which "2 people have saved this user as a favorite," we like to imagine that users Doctor Bombay and Yun are the legendary crazy-lady's secret admirers, Jimmy Woods and Julian Schnabel themselves.

• Sean Young's Santa Monica Favorites [LAT]

THR's Gold Rush blog finally delivers video of the incident, though from the director's perspective; you'll probably have to turn up your speakers to make out Young's now-infamous "Get on with it!" exhortation, but the perturbed honoree's now-poignant "Have another cocktail" retort is clearly documented by the Reporter's camera. Presumably, the clip brings this turbulent chapter in awards show history to an anticlimactic close, at least until some blurry cameraphone footage of Young's subsequent ejection from the event makes its way to YouTube.

• Video Exclusive: Sean Young vs. Julian Schnabel [THR]
• Previously: Julie Chen Shares The Story Of Sean Young's Drunken DGA Awards Meltdown With Millions Of 'Late Show' Viewers [Defamer]

THE INSIDER has confirmed that actress Sean Young voluntarily admitted herself yesterday to a rehabilitation center for treatment related to alcoholism. It is understood that Young has struggled against the disease for many years.

Our hearts are with the troubled actress, who'll spend the next long weeks battling her 40-proof demons, and their imprudent suggestions that she fill in for an absent orchestra swell with drunken outbursts whenever awards show speeches threaten to run too long. We'll leave her to her healing, including the composition of a fearless and searching moral inventory that will most likely include the entry, "And I really should never have called Marion Cotillard a 'pute sans talent avec une vilaine bouche comme celle d'une grenouille.' That was just petty."

• Sean Young Enters Rehab [TheInsiderOnline]

Despite our adoration of Diving Bell, plus our general appreciation of loony boys from Brooklyn who build pink townhouses in the middle of Manhattan, we can't really blame Brown after reading through the article. Speaking of his reviews for the Oscar-nominated Bell, Schnabel says, "'Have you read them?' making no attempt to hide his glee. 'If my mother wrote them they couldn't be nicer.'" And after being reminded of his famous declaration that he's "as close to Picasso as you are going to get in this fucking life," he goes on to beat a dead horse hard:

"No, no - I think this is important. If you don't have the work, you don't fucking play...I don't know if people really know too much about painting, and that's not to be condescending. It's so obscured by personalities, the market and people's fascination with money. Making art is an act of peace. And people forget that."

· Julian Schnabel learned of his Best Director win at New York City airport baggage carousel, upon turning his cellphone on: "It was very glamorous. It was one of those existential moments. I was extremely happy." [USA Today]
· Like Ernest Borgnine's bash, Sweeney Todd producer Richard Zanuck made it a family affair, taking in the press conference from his son's home in Beverly Hills—which is nice, but not, like, seated next to Johnny Depp with lots of water glasses and fancy silverware nice: "I must say, it's a wonderful thing to be seated at a table and all the suspense of that. All that was nonexistent (tonight), but it doesn't take away from the honor." [Variety]
· "Glenn Close, best TV actress/drama for FX's Damages, was in a bar in New York's meatpacking district with the show's cast and crew. 'It's a wonderful way to watch — we were rooting for our team.'" She then mounted the counter at the Brass Monkey for a celebratory striptease patrons won't soon forget. [ABC News]
· Best Actor in TV Series, Musical or Comedy winner David Duchovny went to see a movie while the winners were announced: "I kinda didn't want to watch, it would just make me tense or nervous, so I went out to see a movie at four (o'clock) and I knew I wouldn't be home until it was announced. I knew if my phone was ringing when I walked into my hotel room that I would have won. And it was. Nobody calls a loser." And with that, this year's ceremony wiped the snot from its nose as it checked its phone in vain for any congratulatory messages. [AP]