BARCELONA (Reuters) - A strange phenomenon hit Hong Kong in late 2011. As the clock hit 10 pm each night a Coca Cola ad aired on television, prompting thousands of viewers to grab their phones and start shaking them frantically to virtually "catch" the falling bottle caps on the screen and win...

NEW YORK (AP) The Tribeca Film Festival will open with a documentary about the National, along with a performance by the Brooklyn band. The festival announced Thursday that "Mistaken for Strangers," which documents the National on tour, will premiere April 17. The film is directed by Tom Berninger,...

LONDON (Reuters) - U.S. singer Anastacia has been diagnosed with breast cancer having successfully battled the disease in 2003, she said in a statement posted on her Facebook page. The 44-year-old, who had major success outside the United States with hits like the 2000 dance favorite "I'm Outta...

FORT WORTH, Texas (AP) For a time in Cold War America, Van Cliburn had all the trappings of a rock star: sold-out concerts, adoring, out-of-control fans and a name recognized worldwide. He even got a ticker-tape parade in New York City. And he did it all with only a piano and some Tchaikovsky...

LOS ANGELES (AP) Lindsay Lohan is committed to turning her life around and wants to record public service announcements on the dangers of domestic violence, alcohol abuse and drunken driving, her attorney said Wednesday. Mark Heller told The Associated Press that the actress' plans are independent...

WASHINGTON (AP) Four major universities are joining theater companies in Boston, Baltimore, Washington and Atlanta in a project to commission new plays, music and dance compositions about the Civil War and its lasting legacy 150 years later. The National Civil War Project is being announced Thursday...

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) Managers for U.S. pop singer Anastacia say she has canceled a planned performance in Dubai and an upcoming European tour after being diagnosed with breast cancer a decade after her first battle with the disease. A statement Thursday says the 44-year-old performer...

LOS ANGELES (AP) Kristen Kish made winning the "Top Chef: Seattle" finale look easy. In reality, preparing her five-course meal on the fly as the Bravo cooking competition's judges and a crowd of diners spectated from the sidelines was a non-stop endeavor requiring several hours of preparation...

CAPE CANAVERAL, Florida (Reuters) - A non-profit foundation wants to recruit a man and a woman - possibly a married couple - for a bare-bones, 501-day journey to Mars and back that would start in less than five years, project organizers said on Wednesday. The mission, expected to cost upwards...

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Comic actor Andy Samberg and musician Joanna Newsom are engaged to be married, a representative of Samberg said on Monday. "I can confirm that Andy Samberg and Joanna Newsom are engaged," Samberg's publicist, Carrie Byalick, said in an email. The former "Saturday Night...

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Emmy-winning actress Christina Applegate quietly married rock musician Martyn LeNoble at a wedding in Los Angeles, a representative of the "Anchorman" star said on Monday. Applegate, 41, and LeNoble, 43, exchanged vows on Sunday while the entertainment world was trained...

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Singer Janet Jackson said on Monday that she married her Qatari businessman boyfriend last year, quashing media reports of upcoming nuptials. Jackson, 46, the younger sister of the late singer Michael Jackson, was engaged to billionaire Wissam Al Mana, 37, last year but...

NEW YORK (AP) Novelist Toni Morrison, speaking Wednesday to dozens of Google employees holding laptops and smartphones, shared her vision for how she would turn the search engine leader into a literary character. "It's like a big, metal, claw-y machine in 'Transformers,'" she said, to much laughter,...

CUPERTINO, Calif. (AP) Apple CEO Tim Cook sought to reassure shareholders worried about the company's sagging stock price that the iPhone and iPad maker is on the verge of inventing more breakthrough products that will prove it hasn't lost its creative edge. "The company is working as hard as...

NEW YORK (AP) Singer Scott Weiland said he learned that he'd been fired by the Stone Temple Pilots when the band released a one-sentence statement to the media Wednesday. "I learned of my supposed 'termination' from Stone Temple Pilots this morning by reading about it in the press," he wrote...

LOS ANGELES (TheWrap.com) - "Almost Famous" star Patrick Fugit has signed on for the ABC drama pilot "Reckless." Fugit will play the lead role of David, whose wife is imprisoned during a political uprising overseas. When the U.S. government stymies his efforts to secure her release in the name...

SEOUL (Reuters) - Former NBA star Dennis Rodman appears to have mixed up his Koreas on a visit to Pyongyang, tweeting that he expected to run into South Korean rapper Psy on his trip to the North. Rodman, famed for his tattoos, piercings and radical hair colours from his time on court, arrived...

NEW YORK (AP) The desire to produce a quick documentary on Olympic runner Oscar Pistorius (pihs-TOHR'-ee-uhs) and the shooting death of his live-in girlfriend has led to a new partnership between two television networks. The Investigation Discovery Network on Sunday will premiere a special, "Beauty...

NUTLEY, N.J. (AP) A New Jersey woman widely known as "the tanning mom" is celebrating a grand jury's refusal to indict her on a charge she unlawfully let her 5-year-old daughter into a tanning booth. Patricia Krentcil addressed reporters outside her Nutley home Tuesday night by yelling: "cha-ching!"...

(Reuters) - American pianist Van Cliburn, who awed Russian audiences with his exquisite Tchaikovsky and Rachmaninoff concertos and won fame and fortune back home, died on Wednesday at the age of 78. Cliburn passed away at his home in Fort Worth, Texas, after suffering from advanced bone cancer,...

CUPERTINO, California (Reuters) - Apple Inc CEO Tim Cook acknowledged on Wednesday that his shareholders were disappointed with a five-month slide of more than 30 percent in the company's share price, but urged a focus on the longer term. The world's most valuable technology corporation headed...

LOS ANGELES (AP) The Hallmark Channel is making a new Friday night home for family movies. The channel announced Wednesday that it will launch the showcase March 15 with the debut of "Return to Nim's Island," starring Bindi Irwin, the 14-year-old daughter of the late Steve Irwin, the Australian...

NEW YORK (AP) The party's over for Fashion's Night Out. The annual shopping event has been part of New York Fashion Week each September since 2009, when it was created in response to the recession. It was masterminded by Vogue's Anna Wintour and championed by Mayor Michael Bloomberg and the Council...

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Singer Bobby Brown, the ex-husband of the late Whitney Houston, was sentenced to 55 days in jail on Tuesday after admitting to driving drunk last year. Brown pleaded no contest, an admission of guilt under California law, to driving under the influence and driving on a...

TEHRAN, Iran (AP) Iranian state media has run altered images of first lady Michelle Obama's Oscars appearance, making her gown look less revealing. The first lady wore a sleeveless, scoop neck gown. The semi-official Fars news agency ran an altered photo that covered her shoulders and neckline...

LOS ANGELES (AP) Lindsay Lohan's attorney has suggested to prosecutors that the actress serve as a motivational speaker and perform non-jail activities to resolve her latest criminal case, according to a letter obtained Tuesday. The letter from lawyer Mark Heller proposed several alternatives...

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Australian mining entrepreneur Clive Palmer on Tuesday unveiled blueprints for Titanic II, a modern replica of the doomed ocean liner, although he stopped short of calling the vessel unsinkable. The ship will largely recreate the design and decor of the fabled original, with...

SEATTLE (Reuters) - A top Microsoft Corp executive side-stepped questions on Tuesday about any plans the software maker may have to bring its Office suite of applications to Apple Inc's iPad. Talk has circulated for more than a year that Microsoft wants to bring native versions of its most profitable...

LONDON (Reuters) - David Bowie's first album of new music in a decade sees the influential musician back to his best, critics said in reviews rushed out on Tuesday, two weeks before its release. "The Next Day", which hits stores in Britain on March 11 and a day later in the United States, could...

LOS ANGELES (AP) The TV series "Duck Dynasty" is coming between Morrissey and Jimmy Kimmel. The singer and animal rights activist says he canceled his appearance Tuesday on ABC's "Jimmy Kimmel Live" because "Duck Dynasty" cast members will be on the talk show. Morrissey says he can't perform...

PYONGYANG, North Korea (AP) Flamboyant former NBA star Dennis Rodman is heading to North Korea with the VICE media company tattoos, piercings, bad-boy reputation and all. The American known as "The Worm" is set to arrive Tuesday in Pyongyang, becoming an unlikely ambassador for sports diplomacy...

(Reuters) - Former U.S. Surgeon General C. Everett Koop, whose anti-smoking campaign and outspoken, controversial positions on abortion, AIDS and drugs, elevated the obscure post to one of national influence, died at his home in Hanover, New Hampshire, on Monday. He was 96 years old. Koop, a...

NEW YORK (AP) Janet Jackson knows how to keep a secret: The singer has been married since last year. A representative for Jackson confirmed Monday that the musician and Wissam Al Mana wed last year. This is Jackson's second secret marriage. She secretly married Rene Elizondo Jr. in 1991. They...