Ms Taylor comes out to play, Ms Mirren comes to town (almost!) and Mr Mochrie goes to the dogs

NO PEOPLE LIKE SHOW PEOPLE: Wheelchair-bound but mobile again, Elizabeth Taylor made her first public appearance in months at Andrea Bocelli’s concert at the Hollywood Bowl. “My mind, my soul were transported

LAW: pajama Dane

by his beauty, his voice, his inner being,” she reports. “God has kissed this man and I thank God for it.” Yeah, she likes him … funnyman John Wing says he was the sixth most famous person on the plane to Los Angeles Monday. Howcum? “The Tragically Hip were on the same flight!” … add director Guy Maddin to the growing list of fans hopelessly smitten by Roger Ebert’s Journals. (And yes, Ebert really does elicit the warmest, brightest, smartest, most literate responses from his devoted readers, including Winnipeg wunderkind Guy … Jude Law is breathing easier these days now that his Hamlet was well received by U.K. critics. Law himself acknowledged that playing the melancholy Dane is “a bit like a great song that’s been covered by a load of different singers.” But at least he’s comfortable on stage. In the London production he’s clad in pajama-like costumes for most of the play … and shhhh, it’s a secret, but Patricia Clarkson wants to play now-92 year-old Phyllis Diller in the still-being-scripted biopic of the legendary comedienne.

DILLER: before ...

CLARKSON: ... and after??

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A TAIL OF TWO CITIES: In Montreal they close Ste Catherine street for the jazz festival and shut down Rue St Denis for the comedy festival. In Toronto we

MOCHRIE: going to the dogs

close Front Street from Jarvis to Yonge for Woofstock, the annual doggie love-in set for the St. Lawrence Market Neighborhood this weekend. New features this year include a Saturday night Yappy Hour at which Wooftinis will be served. Seriously. (Oh c’mon, even I couldn’t make that up!) Headliners participating in Main Stage contests include Mark Breslin, Geri Hall, Colin Mochrie and Nikki Payne, and don’t be surprised to find a lot of four-legged friends on the TTC on Saturday and Sunday. Last year more than 150,000 dog lovers and their canine companions showed up from all over North America.

QUOTABLE QUOTES: “I don’t just sit around and wait for the phone to ring because, you know, I had to write my own script in the first place because I don’t look like Nicole Kidman. And the fact is I still don’t. So I don’t get offered fun, interesting roles. So I’m not going to whine about it; I just sit in my office and I write them.”

The speaker?  Comedy confection Nia Vardalos, currently winning new fans in her romantic comedy romp My Life In Ruins.

 OUR TOWN:  Yearning to be in London’s West End to see Jude Law‘s Hamlet and Helen Mirren‘s Phaedre? Lucky moviegoers will see Mirren ‘live’ on stage at The National Theatre, when Cineplex telecasts the play at key theatres across

MIRREN: On screen from stage

 the country on June 25 … Driftwood Theatre launches its 15th season in Toronto at Todmorden Mills on July 11 & 12. The theatre company is taking two of Shakespeare’s plays on the road — King Lear and The Comedy of Errors — and will roll through 27 locations in Ontario with its Bard’s Bus Tour through to August 23. Stops include outdoor locations in Bloomfield, Cobourg, Dundas, Durham, Kingston, Marmora, Mississauga, Peterborough and more, and all shows are pay-what-you-can … add Sonia Rodriguez to the star power already

RODRIGUEZ: White heat

assembled for Karen Kain’s sizzling White Hot Gala, the National Ballet of Canada’s fourth annual fundraising event next week at the Four Seasons Centre. Sultry high-stepper Rodriguez will partner with Piotr Stanczyk in a Garbo-esque pas de deux from the company premiere of Val Caniparoli’s Lady of the Camellias … … and Art On The Move will launch June 22 in the Distillery District. Mayor David Miller will personally welcome the first three art-wrapped vehicles of the project onto city streets. Art On The Move is a three-year community arts initiative that will ultimately turn 15 selected vehicles into moving canvasses of art.

NET WORTH: Two major Canadian newsmakers, Rick Mercer and former MP Belinda Stronach, received honorary degrees from Brock University

DR. MERCER: class of 2009

yesterday.  Mercer and Stronach were honoured as the co-founders of the Spread the Net fundraising campaign. “I must — from the bottom of my heart — thank the students here at Brock for contributing over 5,500 bed nets for Spread the Net,” Stronach told the crowd. “It’s a great legacy for you to leave behind.” Mercer described a life-changing visit to Africa he and Stronach took to learn about the malaria problem. “I told Belinda, ‘I’m not going to come back from Africa as one of those guys on TV who won’t shut up about Africa.’ Now every time I turn around, I’m on TV telling people to Spread the Net.”

Mercer told reporters that he’s also the proud owner of an honorary high school diploma from a Nova Scotia school for students with learning disabilities — and now he has a doctorate of laws from Brock. “I don’t know if it comes with a prescription pad or not, but I’m going to frame it, hang it on the wall and offer legal advice to my friends.” 

And just before he and his Net partner Stronach left the stage, they imparted a few words of wisdom to the assembled graduating class.

Mercer said that in the meantime, he’s acquired an honorary high school diploma from a Nova Scotia school for students with learning disabilities.

“And from there, I’ve gone to a doctorate of laws,” he said.

“I don’t know if it comes with a prescription pad or not,” he added. “But I’m going to frame it, hang it on the wall and offer legal advice to my friends.” 

Said Mercer: “As you go through life, leave the world a better place for having been here.”

Dead-panned Stronach: “Never order food in a strip club.”

These two should definitely go on the road together.

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Do I hear a Valse for dance dazzler Chan Hon Goh?

 

HON GOH: Dancing the title role tonight

BALLET HIGH: Retiring principal dancer Chan Hon Goh dances Giselle tonight as the National Ballet opens at the Four Seasons Centre for the Arts. You  still have a chance to see the prima ballerina’s farewell fling, however, as she’ll dance the company premiere of Valse Triste by Peter Martins at the NBOC White Hot gala on June 18.  The gala promises an incredible performance of short works specially selected by Karen Kain executed by the National Ballet’s spectacular dancers.  Some orchestra and Ring 3 tickets ($100 each ) and Ring 4 tickets ($75) are still available, as are Ring 5.2 tickets ($20.) Ring 5.1. tickets ($50) are already sold out.

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OUR TOWN: Somebody’s doing something right. For the last three years in a row, average attendance for Canadian Opera Company shows 99.7%. Almost  

PITT: in the Moneyball

95,000 tickets were sold for 2008/09 season subscriptions with gross revenue of almost $10 million. More than 130,000 patrons attended 64 COC performances, and yes, those great seats are expensive. But did you know (I didn’t!) that 150 $20 tickets are available for every COC performance?  Almost 10,000 $20 tickets were sold this season alone … Jersey Boys, the major crowd-pleaser still wowing ‘em at the Toronto Centre For The Arts, will now play to the end of September… and Melanie Doane and the classy Art of Time Ensemble, (Andrew Burashko on piano, Phil Dwyer on reeds, Rob Pilch on guitar, George Koller on bass and Amy Laing on cello) join forces for their final Songbook III concert tonight at Harbourfront Centre’s Enwave Theatre.

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TRIPPLEHORN: Morning

NO PEOPLE LIKE SHOW PEOPLE: New audience favourite Jeanne Tripplehorn (Big Love,) so good as Jackie Kennedy in Grey Gardens, will next tackle the dark screen drama Morning, directed by her husband, Leland Orser, with Laura Linney, Kyle Chandler and Jason Ritter … Aussie ex-pat Josh Lawson has been cast as a lead in the CBS comedy pilot Waiting to Die … Demetri Martin will star opposite Brad Pitt in the big screen adaptation of Moneyball  … and Marlon Wayans has signed on to star in the film adaptation of the book The Year of Living Biblically.  Wayans will also serve as a producer on the project

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HOW SWEET IT IS: I liked the old math. I was willing to learn with the New Math. But my favourite Internet math has gotta be YOUR-AGE-BY-CHOCOLATE math. 

Some of you already know it. But for those of you who don’t.

1. Pick the number of times a week that you would like to have chocolate (more than once but less than 10)

2. Multiply this number by 2 (just to be bold)

3. Add 5

4. Multiply it by 50 (we’ll wait while you get the calculator)

5. If you have already had your birthday this year add 1759…   If you haven’t, add 1758.

 6. Now subtract the four digit year that you were born.

You should have a three digit number

a) The first digit of this was your original number (I.e.., how many times you want to have chocolate each week).

b) The next two numbers are

YOUR AGE! (Oh YES, it is!!!)

Now, how silly is that?

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