Morning Briefing:
Mel gets the Diane Sawyer treatment: Mel Gibson sat down with Diane Sawyer recently to talk -- for what he says will be the last time -- about his drunken-driving arrest and anti-Semitic rant in July, and ABC will air the footage on Thursday's "Good Morning America." Sawyer is becoming the go-to gal for "tough" interviews (she recently made headlines with a semi-confrontational interview with Clay Aiken), and a source tells Deadline Hollywood Daily that Mel "needed someone who'd hit him hard. But she was f****** harder on him than I could imagine. I was cringing. No other TV journalist would have been that hard on him." During the interview, Gibson says he has now been sober 65 days, and says his slurs were "just the stupid rambling of a drunkard, you know, and ... what I need to do to heal myself and to be assuring and allay the fears of others and to heal them if they had any heart wounds from something I may have said. So, this is the last thing I want to be is that kind of monster." (Deadline Hollywood Daily)
The continuing saga of Madonna's theoretical adoption: Madonna has adopted a 1-year-old boy in Malawi, at least according a statement from the boy's father. Yohame Banda, 32, says his wife died a month after giving birth and that his son was put in an orphanage shortly after, but he's glad the pop diva is adopting the boy, telling reporters: "I am very, very happy because as you can see there is poverty in this village and I know he will be very well looked after in America." Though she denied the adoption rumors outright last week, the singer's rep now says, "I am unable to make any official statement at this time." (Associated Press)
Also:
Jay-Z's Oct. 23 debut concert in China has been canceled by the Culture Ministry because his lyrics were deemed too "vulgar." (N.Y. Post) ... Novelist Kiran Desai's "The Inheritance of Loss" was named the winner of this year's Man Booker Prize on Tuesday in Britain. (New York Times) ... Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie donated $100,000 to the Daniel Pearl Foundation on Tuesday, on what would have been the journalist's 43rd birthday. Jolie is currently in India shooting "A Mighty Heart," a biopic about Pearl based on the book by his wife, Mariane, whom Jolie is portraying. (People) ... Is the audience member who loudly objected to an anti-Bush sketch at Barbra Streisand's New York show on Monday night a repeat offender? Streisand's rep, Ken Sunshine, says there was a heckler at last week's Philadelphia concert who sounded very similar, and he tells Page Six, "There's something a little weird about it." (Page Six) ... David Lynch has announced he's self-distributing his new movie, "Inland Empire," and that it should arrive in theaters before the end of the year. (Hollywood Reporter)
Money Quote:
Jennifer Aniston on the sexism of Hollywood comedy scriptwriters: "There is just not a lot out there. It's hard because those comedies with male leads are such one-man shows most of the time. Films just don't come along very often with equal female funniness." (ContactMusic)
Turn On:
Tina Fey's new sitcom, "30 Rock" (NBC, 8 p.m. EDT), debuts, and "Twenty Good Years" (NBC, 8:30 p.m. EDT) also has its premiere. Mr. T gets his own reality show with the launch of "I Pity the Fool" (TV Land, 8 p.m. EDT), and it's Part 1 of the season finale of "Project Runway" (Bravo, 10 p.m. EDT).
On the Talk Shows:
Charlie Rose (PBS, check local listings): Sandra Bullock, Toby Jones, Anna Quindlen
David Letterman (CBS, 11:30 p.m. EDT): Jon Stewart, Nick Lachey
Jay Leno (NBC, 11:35 p.m. EDT): Arnold Schwarzenegger, Heidi Klum, La Reve
Conan O'Brien (NBC, 12:35 a.m. EDT): Sarah Michelle Gellar, Robert Randolph
Craig Ferguson (CBS, 12:35 a.m. EDT): David Arquette, Monica
Jimmy Kimmel (ABC, 12:05 a.m. EDT): Wanda Sykes, Sun Ming Ming, Ruben Studdard
Jon Stewart (Comedy Central, 11 p.m. EDT): Lou Dobbs
Stephen Colbert (Comedy Central, 11:30 p.m. EDT): Andrew Sullivan
-- Scott Lamb
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