Celebrity Gossip and News

TOKYO (AP) — Bass player and songwriter Donald “Duck” Dunn, a member of the Rock ‘n’ Roll Hall of Fame band Booker T. and the MGs and the Blues Brothers band, has died in Tokyo. He was 70.

Dunn was in Tokyo for a series of shows. News of his death was posted on the Facebook site of his friend and fellow musician Steve Cropper, who was on the same tour. Cropper stated Dunn died in his sleep.

Miho Harasawa, a spokeswoman for Tokyo Blue Note, the last venue Dunn played, confirmed he died alone early Sunday. She had no further details.

Dunn, who was born in Memphis, Tennessee, in 1941, performed on recordings with Eric Clapton, Neil Young and many others, and specialized in blues, gospel and soul. He played himself in the 1980 hit movie “The Blues Brothers.”

He received a lifetime accomplishment Grammy award in 2007 for his work with Booker T. and the MGs.

JOHANNESBURG (AP) — U.S. actor and director Kevin Spacey said he sees opportunity for expanding film making in Africa, Asia and Europe.

Spacey spoke about his international outlook during a brief visit to South Africa Saturday for the premiere of a local short film he helped produce and in which he stars.

With backing from a whiskey company, Spacey ran a contest to find talent from the United States, Russia and South Africa.

A script from each country was chosen, and Spacey starred in and helped produce the three films, including South African Alan Shelley’s “A Spirit of a Denture,” which was given a red-carpet premiere in Johannesburg.

The 26-year-old Cape Town writer-director’s movie is about a workaholic dentist who gets a visit from a pirate.

Spacey recently starred in “Inseparable,” by Chinese-American director Dayyan Eng. In the motion picture, which was filmed in China, Spacey plays an American expat who befriends a Chinese man played by Chinese-American actor Daniel Wu who is bogged down by work and marital problems.

“There is no doubt that as you start to look around the world, you begin to look at the Asia-Pacific region, you begin to look at what’s happening here, you look at what’s happening in European cinema, there’s a lot going on,” Spacey said in Johannesburg.

Spacey, who is artistic director at London’s Old Vic Theatre, added: “I like the idea of going to as many places as possible and (having) as many experiences as you can.”

CHICAGO (AP) — A Chicago jury on Friday convicted Oscar-winner Jennifer Hudson’s former brother-in-law of murdering her mom, brother and 7-year-old nephew in what prosecutors‘ described as an act of vengeance by a jilted husband.

Hudson, who expressed her undisguised disdain for William Balfour when she took the witness stand and who endured weeks of excruciating testimony about the October 2008 killings, was overcome with emotion as the verdict was read. She bit her lip, tears welling in her eyes and streaming down her cheeks. A minute later, she looked over at her sister, Julia Hudson, and smiled.

Balfour, who faces a mandatory life prison sentence, showed no emotion. A few of his relatives looked upset, one repeatedly shaking her head and muttering that the verdict was unfair. As she had during the trial, Hudson looked back at Balfour’s supporters, then whispered something to her sister.

Jurors deliberated for three days before reaching their verdict against Balfour, a 31-year-old former gang member who was the estranged husband of Hudson’s sister at the time of the triple murders. Just an hour before their unanimous verdict on all counts, they sent a note to the judge that three jurors still weren’t fully convinced of his guilt.

With no surviving witnesses to the Oct. 24, 2008, slayings or fingerprints, prosecutors built a circumstantial case against Balfour by calling 83 witnesses over 11 days of testimony. Witnesses said he threatened to kill the entire family if Julia Hudson spurned him.

Balfour’s attorneys proposed an alternate theory: that someone else in the crime-ridden neighborhood on Chicago’s South Side targeted the family because of alleged crack-cocaine dealing by Jennifer Hudson’s brother, Jason Hudson. During the 30 minutes in which they called just two witnesses, however, they presented no evidence to support that theory.

Cook County State’s Attorney Anita Alvarez, who spoke to Hudson after the verdict, said the star was visibly relieved. She said Hudson had been determined to attended each day of the trial out of a sense of obligation to her mom.

“She told me, ‘If it was me (who had been killed) my mom would be here every day. So, I’m going to be here each day,’” Alvarez stated.

Public defender Amy Thompson stated she would appeal the verdict.

“It has always been our position and it still is that William Balfour is innocent of these murders,” Thompson said.

Alvarez reiterated to reporters what prosecutors had told jurors: that the evidence against Balfour was overwhelming.

Jurors told reporters afterward that their deliberations were thorough and cordial, and that Jennifer Hudson’s celebrity didn’t influence them. They stated it took time to piece everything together, and that a key was cellphone records showing Balfour was in the area when the killings happened.

Jennifer Hudson, who was in Florida at the time, attended every day of the two weeks of testimony, sobbing when photos of her relatives’ bloodied, bullet-ridden bodies were displayed to jurors during closing arguments.

Alvarez stated Hudson wouldn’t talk to the media about the verdict but would release a statement “at the appropriate time.”

The jury foreman stated he hoped the verdict would bring Hudson closure.

“I hope she has the ability to put this thing behind her and get on with the rest of her life,” Robert Smith, a 47-year-old employee at Chicago Public Schools told reporters outside court.

Hudson, 30, rose to prominence as a 2004 “American Idol” finalist. But she became a bona fide star for her performance in the film adaptation of the musical, “Dreamgirls,” for which she won the 2007 Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress.

Hudson was the first witness prosecutors called to testify, and during her more than 30 minutes on the stand she talked about her murdered family members and spoke endearingly about her nephew, Julian King, whom she called Tugga Bear. She stated she knew Balfour since the eighth grade and always deeply disliked him.

Balfour had lived in the Hudsons’ three-story Englewood home after marrying Julia Hudson in 2006. He moved out in early 2008 after falling out with his wife, but witnesses told jurors he often stalked the home.

The killings occurred the morning after Julia Hudson’s birthday, and prosecutors stated he became enraged when he stopped by the home and saw a gift of balloons in the house from her new boyfriend.

After his estranged wife left for her job as a bus driver on the morning of Oct. 24, 2008, prosecutors said Balfour went back inside the home with a .45-caliber handgun and shot Hudson’s mother, Darnell Donerson, 57, in the back; he allegedly then shot Jason Hudson, 29, twice in the head as he lay in bed.

Prosecutors said Balfour then drove off in Jason Hudson’s SUV with Julian — Julia’s son, whom she called Juice Box — and shot the boy several times in the head as he lay behind a front seat. His body was found in the abandoned vehicle miles away after a three-day search.

The defense tried to counter the portrayal of Balfour as an embittered husband by noting Julia Hudson continued to have sex with him until just days before the killings.

In heated closings Wednesday, Thompson, almost shouting, said prosecutors had failed to prove their case. Prosecutor James McKay shot back that the defense was exploiting a popular misunderstanding that circumstantial evidence is lesser evidence.

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Follow Michael Tarm at www.twitter.com/mtarm

SAN ANTONIO (AP) — The American taxpayer may be getting into the movie business.

In a real-life case of drugs and extortion that could itself make a pretty good screenplay, federal prosecutors have forced a Mexican drug trafficker to turn over his stake in a planned prequel to Mel Gibson’s 2004 blockbuster “The Passion of the Christ.”

If the movie gets made, the U.S. government will receive a cut of the profits.

Some of the large names behind the Hollywood project include megachurch pastor Joel Osteen, who had no idea about the script’s unsavory backstory.

“When you get a script, you just don’t think to state ‘Hey, was this script ever tied to a Mexican cartel?’” stated Donald Iloff, a spokesman for Osteen’s Lakewood Church in Houston. The script was already being handled by a legitimate production company when Osteen got involved.

Jorge Vazquez Sanchez pleaded guilty this week in federal court to extortion and money laundering in a deal that required him to give up a 10 percent stake in future profits of “Mary, Mother of Christ,” which is scheduled to begin production this year and includes Osteen as an executive producer.

The script was written by the same person behind “The Passion of the Christ,” which became a worldwide smash and earned more than $611 million.

Aloe Entertainment, the Los Angeles-based production company that paid more than $900,000 for the script, said it knew nothing about Vazquez, who was sentenced to seven years in prison.

Had Vazquez kept his stake, “we don’t know what would have happened,” the company said in a statement. “We have assembled an breathtaking team to bring it to the big screen. Now the American taxpayers can be part of this breathtaking project.”

The screenwriter, Benedict Fitzgerald, had to give control of the script to a company called Macri Inc. after it foreclosed on a loan to Fitzgerald, stated Richard Rosenthal, attorney for Aloe.

Then Vazquez and one of his co-defendants extorted Macri’s owner, a San Antonio businessman named Arturo Madrigal, to wrest the script away. At one point, the conspirators even kidnapped Madrigal’s brother in Guadalajara, Mexico, according to court documents.

Vazquez, a Mexican citizen identified in court documents as a drug trafficker who laundered money, acquired the screenplay in 2008.

Aloe, known at the time as Proud Mary Entertainment, then paid one of Vazquez’s co-defendants $925,000 for the script, believing it was held by a San Antonio real estate mogul.

Before the company issued a payment, Aloe executives hired an entertainment copyright attorney who spent more than three months researching the screenplay’s origins. Federal prosecutors contacted them last year seeking documents for the transaction.

When prosecutors moved to seize Vazquez’s assets, the stake he had retained in the film’s profits was included. Vazquez’s lawyer, Donald Flanary, stated his client didn’t contest the forfeiture.

If the movie becomes a reality, it will probably be “the first time that a major motion picture was made in which 10 percent of the profits went to the American taxpayers,” Rosenthal said. “It would be an incredibly one-of-a-kind story.”

The case was first reported by the San Antonio Express-News.

Prosecutors alleged that Vazquez and others laundered millions of dollars in drug proceeds by funneling the money through various currency exchanges, bank accounts and real estate ventures in the U.S. and Mexico.

Vazquez was arrested in late 2010 in Chicago.

Osteen’s Lakewood Church signed onto the project last year.

“It’s a beautiful script,” Iloff said. “I’m so saddened that it was tainted this way. I hope that it doesn’t slow it down.”

NEW YORK (AP) — New “America’s Got Talent” judge Howard Stern states that his critics should watch before attacking him.

Stern debuts Monday as Piers Morgan’s replacement on NBC’s summertime talent show. Yet a group that calls attention to bad language and risqué content on TV has already written to advertisers asking them to stay away. The Parents TV Council said the radio shock jock’s addition “will likely result in a sharp increase in explicit content.”

In an hour-long, expletive-free news conference on Thursday, Stern dismissed those concerns and said that he fully comprehends that “America’s Got Talent” is a family show.

“I really feel a responsibility to the people who love this show already,” Stern stated. “In no way do I want to get in the way of it. I want to broaden it and make it superior.”

Stern said his critics “are entitled to their view. They just sound awfully foolish when they haven’t seen the show.”

Still, his reputation precedes him. Stern noted that before an appearance on “The View” Thursday, executive producer Bill Geddie came over to teach Stern on what he could or couldn’t say on the air. “I know the rules,” Stern said. “Bill, I’m 58 years old. I feel like I’m 14″ getting a lecture, he stated.

“Hopefully America will like this and put everybody’s fears to rest,” he stated.

NBC moved the show’s base from California to Newark, N.J., to accommodate Stern’s satellite radio schedule when he concurred to replace Morgan. He stated he has taken the role of being the “honest” judge who doesn’t sugarcoat things for contestants.

Stern said he was a fan of the show before being asked to be on it, preferring it to “American Idol” because the wider variety of acts on “America’s Got Talent” makes it seem like vaudeville.

“I didn’t need the money,” he said. “I didn’t need more fame. I certainly feel famous enough. I’m comfortable in my life. I just love the show and thought how much fun it would be to do it.”

He’s paired with Howie Mandel and Sharon Osbourne as judges, and he offered praise of their work. He flashed attitude about some rivals, though: “American Idol” makes him want to throw up, he stated, and host Ryan Seacrest is “tired.”

“J.Lo, I don’t even know what she’s doing there,” he said of “American Idol” judge Jennifer Lopez. Of Britney Spears, under consideration as a new judge on “The X Factor,” he said people are going to tune in to see “if she can function through the whole thing.”

Stern said he thinks his radio audience is ready to see him try something new. He’s curious about how it turns out; his usual experience is turning around a low-performing asset, but in “America’s Got Talent,” he’s joining a show that already has a successful track record.

“If it doesn’t work, I’ll crawl back into my hole at Sirius and lick my wounds,” he stated. “If it does work, I’ll be thrilled.”

CHICAGO (AP) — Jurors returned to a Chicago courthouse Thursday to resume deliberating the case against Jennifer Hudson’s former brother-in-law, who is accused of murdering three of the Oscar-winner’s family members because her sister refused to take him back.

Judge Charles Burns ordered the jurors sequestered at a hotel for the night after they deliberated for four hours Wednesday following closing arguments in the case against William Balfour.

Balfour, 30, pleaded not guilty to three counts of first-degree murder in the October 2008 slayings. The former gang member faces a mandatory life prison sentence if he’s convicted on all charges.

Prosecutors state Balfour murdered Hudson’s mom, brother and 7-year-old nephew in an act of vengeance because his estranged wife at the time, Hudson’s sister Julia Hudson, refused to reconcile with him.

With no surviving witnesses to call on to testify, prosecutors spent two weeks presenting a largely circumstantial case against Balfour.

His attorney, Amy Thompson, seized on that during her closing argument, saying prosecutors had failed to meet the burden of proof needed to convict Balfour of murdering the three victims. Defense attorneys suggested someone could have killed the three because of something related to Hudson’s brother’s alleged drug-dealing.

Prosecutors presented 11 days of testimony and called 83 witnesses, starting with Hudson, who was an “American Idol” finalist before winning the 2007 Academy Award for Ideal Supporting Actress for her role in the film adaptation of the musical, “Dreamgirls.” Hudson told jurors about the last time she saw her three family members alive and spoke with distain about Balfour, whom she had known since eighth grade.

The defense called just two witnesses — two detectives who had testified earlier — in a bid to recommend investigators botched the triple-homicide investigation.

Prosecutors say Balfour shot Hudson’s mother, Darnell Donerson, 57, in the living room of the Hudson family home on Chicago’s South Side on Oct. 24, 2008, then shot Hudson’s 29-year-old brother, Jason Hudson, in the head as he lay in bed.

Balfour then allegedly abducted Julia Hudson’s son, Julian King, and shot him as he lay behind a front seat of an SUV. His body was found in the abandoned automobile miles away after a three-day search.

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Follow Michael Tarm at www.twitter.com/mtarm

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Jermaine Paul was front and center on “The Voice.”

The 33-year-old background singer from Harriman, N.Y., was declared the winner of the NBC singing competition Tuesday.

Paul, who was coached by country singer and “Voice” mentor Blake Shelton, was awarded the show’s grand prize of $100,000 and a record deal with Universal after crooning R. Kelly’s “I Believe I Can Fly” for his final solo performance Monday.

“I just want to state thank you to everybody that supported me from day one,” said Paul through tears.

Juliet Simms, the 26-year-old indie rocker from San Francisco who was coached by Cee Lo Green, came in second place. She was followed by Tony Lucca, the 36-year-old former Mouseketeer from Detroit, who was guided by Maroon 5 frontman Adam Levine. Chris Mann, the 30-year-old classical singer from Wichita, Kan., who was shepherded by pop diva Christina Aguilera, rounded out the final four.

Javier Colon won the first season of “The Voice” last year.

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NBC is controlled by Comcast Corp.

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Follow AP Entertainment Writer Derrik J. Lang on Twitter at http://www.twitter.com/derrikjlang .

HIGHLAND PARK, Mich. (AP) — Rima Fakih, the first Arab-American to be crowned Miss USA, has been sentenced to probation and community service in a Michigan drunken driving case.

The 26-year-old former beauty queen avoided the possibility of jail time during Wednesday’s hearing in Highland Park, an enclave of Detroit. Judge William McConico put her on six months’ probation, ordered 20 hours of community service and said she must pay $600 in fines and costs.

Fakih also must attend an alcohol safety class. She pleaded no contest last month to driving while visibly impaired.

She has stated she wasn’t drinking on the night of her arrest in December, but two police breath tests put Fakih’s blood alcohol content at more than twice the legal limit.

The former Miss Michigan was crowned Miss USA in 2010.

LOS ANGELES (AP) — One of Hollywood’s biggest and best-paid stars is supporting President Barack Obama’s call for higher taxes on the country’s top earners.

Will Smith said while promoting “Men In Black III” last week that he supports the move.

“I’m very supportive of that idea,” Smith told The Associated Press in an interview. “America has been fantastic to me. I’ve no problem paying whatever I need to pay to keep my country growing.”

Obama has proposed that everyone earning $1 million a year or more should pay at least 30 percent of their income in taxes. One research group said the change would affect around 210,000 taxpayers.

Vanity Fair has reported that Smith was paid an estimated $20 million for “Men In Black III.”

PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) — Actor Matthew Fox, star of the TV series “Lost,” has been charged with drunken driving in Oregon.

Police in Bend state the 45-year-old who lives in the Central Oregon city was stopped early Friday after an officer noticed a motorist failing to signal properly or stay within a lane of traffic.

During the stop, the officer decided Fox was driving under the influence and took him to the Deschutes (duh-SHOOTS’) County Jail.

Fox was released Friday after he was booked into custody. He has a court appearance scheduled for June 17.

The authorities would not release the police report or any additional information.

Fox’s lawyer didn’t return a call seeking comment.