Morning Briefing:
Britney fed up? Britney Spears may well be nearing the end of her rope with Kevin Federline. Insiders now say Spears is going to be putting her husband, who has been given the nickname "Spenderline," on a monthly allowance. "Each month, he will be allotted a certain amount of money for personal use -- i.e., clothing, nightclubs, booze and day-to-day activities. Any big items -- cars, or trips that go over allowance -- need to be approved by Brit herself," a source told Page Six. "She acknowledges she has made a great deal of money. However, she is trying to show Kevin that he needs to be responsible and curb his out-of-control spending habits." The Spears-Federlines have been in Hawaii on vacation recently, where another Page Six spy says things have been rocky: "I was in the elevator with Britney, and she was screaming at K-Fed on her cellphone that she had waited in the suite all day for him to call and had been trying to reach him and couldn't sit in there any longer." (Page Six)
FCC -- Frequent Christian censorship? Broadcasting and Cable is reporting that the number of Federal Communications Commission complaints in the first quarter of 2006 is expected to be triple the number made in the fourth quarter of 2005. The commission received 44,109 complaints in the last three months of last year, and since the start of January, it has already taken in about 134,000 -- just for one show, NBC's "Las Vegas." The driving force behind the spike in complaints is the Christian-right group American Family Association, which has been increasingly active in the culture war front on TV. The AFA started a complaint campaign against NBC's "Book of Daniel," which was pulled by the network after only a few episodes -- but not, according to NBC, because of FCC complaints. Last month the AFA turned its sights on "Las Vegas" and has been asking supporters to call in complaints about the Feb. 6 episode of the show, which featured a strip club. The group also placed a video clip of the semiexplicit scene on its site. "We started hearing our strip-club scene was all over the Web," said Gary Scott Thompson, the show's creator. "It was showing up on a bunch of different Web sites. So we backtracked it and realized it had been copied from" the AFA. Thompson noted the inherent irony: "They complained about the scene, but then they put the clip on their Web site where any kid can download it and see it. How is that consistent with their message? My kids found it online easily, thanks to this group, but I wouldn't let them watch my show because of its rating." (Broadcasting & Cable)
Hatcher defends Clooney, Clooney defends Hatcher: Teri Hatcher has responded to the New York Post's kinda weird assertion last week that George Clooney was somehow behind her decision to reveal in a Vanity Fair interview that she had been sexually abused as a child. The Post's theory was that she was only coming forward with the story now after having been seduced and dumped by a mystery man that the paper pegged as Clooney. Hatcher said, "It is truly a shame that the importance of the issue in the Vanity Fair article is being obscured by tabloid sensationalism. The Post has twisted this story into a scandalous report about my personal life, which has nothing to do with George Clooney." Clooney, for his part, rose to Hatcher's side: "It is to Teri's credit that she's telling a very courageous story to help others," he said. "As for the tabloid part of the story, she would never say that. I know the story is attractive but it isn't true and it takes away from her brave decision." (ET Online)
Also:
"Crash" director/writer/producer Paul Haggis is in negotiations to direct a big-screen version of Richard A. Clarke's national security tell-all, "Against All Enemies." (Reuters) ... Jon Stewart got an Oscar bump of his own: Following his hosting gig at the Academy Awards last week, "The Daily Show" had a 7 percent jump in ratings. (N.Y. Post) ... Dennis Quaid has opened up about suffering from anorexia -- which he calls manorexia -- for a period during the mid-'90s: "My arms were so skinny that I couldn't pull myself out of a pool. I'd look in the mirror and still see a 180-lb. guy, even though I was 138 pounds." (Best Life via People) ... Rapper Young Jeezy was arrested over the weekend in Miami on concealed-weapons charges following a reported shootout in South Beach. (Associated Press) ... Former Jane magazine editor Jane Pratt is in talks with Gwen Stefani about the possibility of their starting a new women's lifestyle magazine together. (Women's Wear Daily)
Money Quotes:
Michael Douglas on Brad Pitt's taste in women: "I don't know about Brad Pitt leaving that beautiful woman [Jennifer Aniston] to go hold orphans for Angelina [Jolie]. I mean how long is that going to last?" (Rush & Molloy)
George Clooney, in a piece for the Huffington Post -- titled "I'm a Liberal. There, I Said It" -- on the Democratic Party: "The fear of being criticized can be paralyzing. Just look at the way so many Democrats caved in the run up to the war. In 2003, a lot of us were saying, where is the link between Saddam and bin Laden? What does Iraq have to do with 9/11? We knew it was bullshit. Which is why it drives me crazy to hear all these Democrats saying, "We were misled." It makes me want to shout, "Fuck you, you weren't misled. You were afraid of being called unpatriotic." (Huffington Post)
-- Scott Lamb
Turn On:
Julia Louis-Dreyfus' new series, "The New Adventures of Old Christine" (CBS, 9:30 p.m. EST) premieres tonight, and will help determine the truth of the "Seinfeld" curse. Elsewhere, the clock is still ticking on "24" (Fox, 9 p.m. EST), Howard Stern is on the couch on "David Letterman" (CBS, 11:35 p.m. EST) and Ice Cube talks to Jimmy Kimmel on "Jimmy Kimmel Live" (ABC, 12:06 a.m. EST).
-- Joe DiMento
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