CANNES, France (AP) Jerry Lewis, so beloved in France, isn't quite overcome with emotion now that he's back at the Cannes Film Festival.

The festival, he says, is "for snobs," and when he meets a reporter from his native land, he exhales, "It's so nice to hear an American." To him, Cannes isn't an epicenter of rabid Lewis fandom, it's simply "business," he says, chomping on gum.

And at 87, Lewis is back in business. Nearly two decades since his last film, he's at Cannes with "Max Rose," a modest independent film in which he stars as an elderly man reconciling himself to life without his late wife.

"I'm very happy to relax and stay home with my family, and if something comes up, I'll consider it," Lewis, in an interview, said of his return to movies. "That's the nice part about 87. You just tell people: Oh, you're very tired."

At Cannes, Lewis has been anything but tired, both burnishing and tarnishing his legacy as a brilliant comedic performer. His Cannes tribute the festival paid "homage" to him in an out-of-competition screening of "Max Rose," as well as with a screening of his 1961 classic "The Ladies Man" has been overshadowed by his views about female comedians.

In a press conference, Lewis told reporters that his earlier-stated feelings haven't changed in recent years: Comedy isn't for women, he claims. A day after his comments roiled women across the Internet, Lewis wasn't apologetic, saying he sees females as mothers, not stand-ups.

"It's the truth. I can't help it," Lewis says, shrugging. "Women, it's just wrong. I don't care that the audience laughs at it and likes it. I don't happen to like it. I have too much respect for the gender. And I think that they are wrong in doing it. I can't expect them to stop working, but just don't work anywhere where I have to look at it."

It's a clearly out-of-date attitude that has turned many away from Lewis. In Cannes, "Max Rose" didn't help his reputation. The film, by first-time filmmaker Daniel Noah, drew terrible reviews at the festival. Variety said only "the most irrationally charitable of Lewis' fans" will appreciate it.

But such opinions mean little to Lewis. He made the film with Noah purely because he liked the script the best he's ever read, he says. It's the rare film to tell a story about the struggles of growing older, featuring a downbeat performance from Lewis far from the elastic farce his fans are accustomed to seeing.

Asked why he hadn't made a film since 1995's "Funny Bones," Lewis responds: "You see the movies they're putting out? What am I going to do, discuss that?"

Noah, who wrote the script based on his grandfather, sought out Lewis with little expectation of landing him. Months after sending the screenplay, Lewis called him and committed over the phone. Lewis told him he hadn't planned to make another film, but decided, "I gotta give them one more Jerry picture."

"I was braced for a difficult experience," says Noah. "I saw nothing but horror stories about how he was controlling and irascible and unpredictable and moody. . But I cannot explain to you the chasm between the man that othjcoers seem to know and the man that I know. I have not had a single moment of tension with him, of difficulty. He has been like a grandfather to me."

Noah says Lewis who helmed more than a dozen films in his career, including 1963's "The Nutty Professor" left the directing completely to him. He gave his famous star little direction, save for the occasional reminder to be more minimal, more "sad clown," says Noah.

"He's a wonderful kid," says Lewis. "When you're 87, almost everybody's a kid."

Lewis has continued to perform concerts "a wonderful way to make a fortune," he says. Retirement is not on the table. "I'm happiest when I'm on the stage," says Lewis, who was honored with the Academy Awards' humanitarian award in 2009 after years of telethon hosting for the Muscular Dystrophy Association.

"Wherever the audience is is where you want to go," he says. "And if you're a ham, like me, you go wherever the action is. You see a lens and a crew and say, 'Yeah!'"

At the press conference in Cannes, Lewis proved that he still has his pugnacious wit and eagerness for laughs.

Asked about Dean Martin, Lewis' famed comedy partner in the '50s, he responded: "He died, you know. When I arrived here and he wasn't here I knew something was wrong." (Martin, with whom Lewis parted acrimoniously, died in 1995.)

"I've worked hard to sustain a reputation of: If you buy a ticket, you know you're going to get entertained," says Lewis. "That's what I was taught."

Lewis may be many things talented, funny, honest, out-of-touch, sexist but perhaps above all else, he's an entertainer. "Max Rose" marks his 82nd year performing.

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CHICAGO (AP) The lawyer for an 87-year-old woman who accuses Donald Trump of cheating her in a skyscraper condo deal told jurors in Chicago on Wednesday that he was personally repulsed because he felt the "Apprentice" star conned his client and lied about it on the witness stand.

Plaintiff attorney Shelly Kulwin's comments came during a sarcasm-filled closing argument at the federal civil trial that pits Jacqueline Goldberg against the billionaire real estate mogul-turned TV showman.

His voice rising, Kulwin portrayed the case as a battle between Trump, who he described as a wheeler-dealer, and a woman with wholesome values learned growing up during the Depression.

Trump, of New York, wasn't in court for the closings. But Kulwin projected a photograph of the beaming developer on a large courtroom screen.

"The thought of my grandma being in the same room with that guy. Yuck!" Kulwin said. The judge told jurors to disregard the comment.

Later, the attorney said Trump was motivated to cheat his client by a love for money.

"It's like his family, those dollars," Kulwin said.

Jurors withdrew to begin deliberations later Wednesday but went home after 90 minutes without reaching a verdict. They were to resume Thursday morning.

City pride intervened during closings when Kulwin appeared to make an unfavorable reference to executives in New York.

"Judge, he's mocking New York," Trump attorney Stephen Novack said, standing to object.

"I can't mock New York?" Kulwin shot back. "I thought it was every Chicagoan's right to do that."

Addressing jurors next, Novack accused Kulwin of resorting to personal attacks on Trump out of desperation and a lack of evidence.

Goldberg alleges Trump persuaded her to buy two condos at around $1 million apiece in Chicago's glitzy Trump International Hotel & Tower by promising she would share in building profits. But, Goldberg says, Trump reneged after she committed to the investment.

"It's called a bait and switch," Kulwin told jurors. "Here's the bait. Here's the switch."

But Trump's attorney described Goldberg as a detail-oriented investor who knew the contract that she signed stipulated Trump could cancel the profit-sharing offer as he saw fit.

"She knows the drill," Novack said. "Nobody put a gun to her head (to sign)."

He later added: "Mrs. Goldberg went into this deal with her eyes wide open."

Since the contract gave Trump rights to change the profit-sharing offer, Novack said the onus was on Goldberg's attorneys to prove Trump secretly plotted to defraud her before she even signed up to buy.

"What do they call it? A bait and switch," he said. "Switch is not enough. ... There is no evidence whatsoever of a secret plan."

In two days of sometimes combative testimony last week, Trump denied cheating Goldberg. And he told reporters outside court that he was the victim, not her. He declared, "She's trying to rip me off."

On Wednesday, though, Kulwin said Trump took the stand "to lie, evade and spout infomercials."

He also mocked Trump for telling jurors he never took notes of business meetings and therefore couldn't say when certain decisions were made and by whom.

"People who don't want to be found out don't write things down. They're not stupid," Kulwin said. "And Donald Trump may be a lot of things, but he's not stupid."

Kulwin told jurors Goldberg was seeking a total of $6 million in damages.

"Send a message not just to Mr. Trump ... but to others like him," he said pounding his hand on a podium. "You can say to them, 'These people who do these things have crossed the line.'"

In his final remarks, Trump's attorney told jurors their obligation was to the evidence, not to their sense of sympathy or to any urge to send a message.

"This isn't the chance for you to decide that Wall Street is bad ... and (now) we're going to show these fat cats," Novack said. "Look at the facts."

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CANNES, France (AP) A phrase you will hear often at Cannes is: "Let me run the numbers."

The commercial underbelly of the Cannes Film Festival is a nonstop frenzy of deal-making in luxury hotels along the Croisette promenade and aboard yachts moored offshore. Films are pitched with various ingredients a director, a script, a few stars as agents and talent pursue international investors and domestic distributors to bankroll their movies.

For director James Toback, any claims about the running of "the numbers" of treating moviemaking as an analytical science is blatant "pseudo research."

"This is where you really need, desperately, a sense of your own value," Toback said in a recent interview. "A sense of your own value as a person and an artist."

A year ago, Toback swam through Cannes' sprawling marketplace with cameras and Alec Baldwin in tow, documenting the painful, sometimes humiliating process of trying to get a movie funded at Cannes. He and Baldwin returned to the Cote d'Azur festival Tuesday to premiere the product of that shooting, "Seduced and Abandoned."

Even for Toback, a veteran director whose career has ranged from his 1974 debut "The Gambler" to the 2008 Mike Tyson documentary "Tyson," and Baldwin both of whom know well the ways of Hollywood witnessing today's financing process was a sobering experience.

"It's worse than I thought," says Toback. "It's tougher than I thought. The reasons not to do (a movie) are more blatant. And also the flip-of-the-coin idiocy with which decisions are made. There is a pretense of coherent value. There's a kind of Ponzi scheme at work, where people like to believe that they're acting from some sort of covert intelligence."

Baldwin, who has contemplating reentering the film business full-time following his run on the successful NBC TV comedy series "30 Rock," also finds the current film business daunting.

"The movie business is tough, and it's tougher now than ever," he said sitting on a terrace off the Palais, the center of the festival. "Sometimes I wonder if I'll ever make another movie again."

The Cannes market has grown to be the world's largest for the buying and selling movie projects. For decades, it's been standard practice to begin bankrolling a film by first selling international distribution rights. In recent years, Hollywood studios have focused increasingly on major blockbusters with enormous marketing budgets, leaving less room for mid-budget dramas.

"Seduced and Abandoned," which HBO picked up ahead of its Cannes premiere, begins with a quote attributed to the late director Orson Welles: that 95 percent of his life is spent trying to raise money for movies, and 5 percent is actually making them.

"It's no way to live," said Toback.

To capture the reality of the process, Toback and Baldwin ("the Ed McMahon to his Johnny Carson," says Baldwin) last year went around Cannes pitching a film, to be directed by Toback and to star Baldwin and Neve Campbell.

They proposed a version of Bernardo Bertolucci's notorious "Last Tango in Paris," to be titled "Last Tango in Tikrit" that would feature the same "exploratory sex" of the 1972 Marlon Brando original. (Although many later assumed the project was charade for the documentary, Toback insists he still hopes to make it.)

They set out hoping to make the film for $15 million to $20 million, but most people they interviewed tell them it's more likely a $3-5 million project. ("I'm too old for that," says Toback.)

It would be better, too, if they could get a bigger-name actress, they were told. One financier suggested that Baldwin go back to submarine films like "The Hunt for Red October." Another called him a "TV actor."

"The film has to be two things," says Baldwin. "It has to be Jimmy and I humbling ourselves trying to sell a movie here and it is humbling. And then some sort of homage to Cannes."

It also pays homage to movies in general. Interviewed about their irrational love of film are Francis Ford Coppola (who says cinema is "given by the gods"), Roman Polanski, Martin Scorsese, Ryan Gosling, Bertolucci and Cannes director Thierry Fremaux. They're all there to make a case for what Toback calls "the mysterious, intuitive process" of moviemaking.

"Seduced and Abandoned" takes on an elegiac tone of nostalgia complete with a booming score by the late Russian composer Dmitri Shostakovich for the older, more daring days of the movie business.

Shot in a blitz at Cannes, Toback had to figure out much of the film once he got home. They did additional shooting to tie things together after being rejected from the Sundance Film Festival earlier this year.

But Toback says he can't imagine having a better time making a film. Baldwin says it was "exhilarating."

"I would just assume go make more documentaries like this with Jimmy," says Baldwin, who also recently signed on as producer of "Elaine Stritch: Shoot Me," a documentary about his "30 Rock" co-star. "Let's take some iconic tableau in society the Super Bowl, a murder trial . the Country Music Awards. We'll think of something that's just a world unto itself and go and make a documentary."

"We'll see," he adds with a grin. "He and I have some ideas."

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LOS ANGELES (AP) A look at key moments this past week in the wrongful death trial in Los Angeles between Michael Jackson's mother, Katherine Jackson, and concert giant AEG Live LLC, and what is expected at court in the week ahead:

THE CASE

Jackson's mother wants a jury to determine that the promoter of Jackson's planned comeback concerts didn't properly investigate Dr. Conrad Murray, who a criminal jury convicted of involuntary manslaughter for Jackson's June 2009 death. AEG's attorney says the case is about personal choice, namely Jackson's decision to have Murray serve as his doctor and give him doses of a powerful anesthetic as a sleep aid. Millions, possibly billions, of dollars are at stake.

WHAT HAPPENED

Jurors heard from AEG Live's first two witnesses, a pair of choreographers who worked on Jackson's ill-fated "This Is It" shows. Stacy Walker told the panel she never saw any signs Jackson was impaired or ill during rehearsals. Her colleague Travis Payne, who rehearsed one-on-one with Jackson, acknowledged he couldn't say how many times the pair actually rehearsed and said he was concerned the singer was under the influence of prescription medications in the weeks before his death.

An AEG accounting executive testified about the budget for "This Is It," which was planning on paying Murray up to $1.5 million for the first few months of the shows. The former cardiologist was never paid because Jackson died before signing his contract.

WHAT THE JURY SAW

Payne shift from a composed, sometimes-smiling witness to one who fought back tears toward the end of his day-and-a-half of testimony. His devotion to Jackson was evident from his wardrobe, which included a black blazer with an emblem stitched onto each sleeve containing the letters "MJ" and golden wings.

Lots of courthouse hallways and downtown Los Angeles. Friday's session featured a four-hour lunch break due to witness availability issues. The trial's third week featured only three days of live testimony and the jury was kept waiting or sent out of the room numerous times while attorneys argued legal issues.

QUOTABLE MOMENTS

"Sometimes in rehearsal, Michael would appear just a little loopy," Payne said of Jackson's demeanor after visiting his longtime dermatologist Dr. Arnold Klein, who is not a party to the case.

"I just never in a million years thought he would leave us, or pass away," choreographer Stacy Walker said of Jackson. Walker testified for AEG and said she never saw signs Jackson was under the influence of medications or was ill.

OUTSIDE THE COURTROOM

A state attorney urged a court to reject an appeal by Jackson's former doctor, Conrad Murray, stating there were no legal errors by a trial judge and the physician's own attorneys failed to raise issues at the appropriate time. Murray has shown no remorse for playing "Russian roulette" with Jackson's life.

WHAT'S NEXT

A corporate attorney for AEG Live will testify, reflecting a shift in the trial focus away from Jackson and toward a central issue in the case whether Murray was hired by the concert promoter.

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CANNES, France (AP) Emma Watson is reveling in her post-"Potter" freedom at the Cannes Film Festival, relishing a Valley Girl role far from her wise-beyond-her-years Hermione.

The 23-year-old "Harry Potter" actress stars in Sofia Coppola's "The Bling Ring," which premiered Thursday at the French Riviera festival. The British actress plays a celebrity-obsessed, thickly accented Los Angeles teenager who, with a group of friends, burgles Hollywood stars such as Paris Hilton and Lindsay Lohan.

At Cannes, Watson told reporters that while she remains proud of her work on the "Potter" films, they now feel long ago.

"I'm not trying to run away from it," she said. "I've just had an amazing three or four years. I'm really re-enjoying having the chance to transform into new roles and work with new creative people."

"The Bling Ring" is based on a Vanity Fair article about the true story of teenagers who robbed celebrities like Paris Hilton and Orlando Bloom while they were out at premieres and other events. The character Watson plays, Nicki, is modeled on Alexis Neiers, who starred in the reality series "Pretty Wild."

Watson said she watched American TV shows like "The Hills," ''Keeping up With the Kardashians" and "The World According to Paris" to prepare for the role.

"It'd be very easy for Nicki to feel like a parody," Watson said. "Somehow I had to understand and empathize with her and that was really biggest challenge, second to getting the accent down. It's quite a specific dialect."

Since the "Harry Potter" films concluded in 2011 with the second part of "Deathly Hallows," Watson has gravitated to more adult films, including last year's coming-of-age tale "The Perks of Being a Wallflower" and Darren Aronofsky's Biblical epic "Noah," which recently finished shooting. She also makes a cameo as herself in this summer's "This is the End," an apocalyptic comedy.

"For Emma, it was, I think, really interesting to see an actress that you've seen in other things really transform into a completely difficult character," Coppola said.

Young actors often treat Cannes as a coming-out-party, a place to introduce themselves on a more artistically-minded stage. Watson shined with enthusiasm for her experience with the improvisation-friendly Coppola.

"I could work in a way that was a lot more loose than I was used to," said Watson. "I'm used to really having to stick to my lines because a lot of people know them by heart."

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CANNES, France (AP) Sofia Coppola was just 8 years old when she first came to the Cannes Film Festival. Her father, Francis Ford Coppola, was there to premiere a work-in-progress cut of a film he had spent years wrestling with: "Apocalypse Now."

"I have nice memories of Cannes," Coppola said in an interview Thursday on the roof of the Palais, the festival center. "I remember coming here as a kid and then my first movie, 'Virgin Suicides,' had our first screening ever here. I feel like my career started here."

Growing up in such surroundings, one would think, would have heavily informed Coppola's latest film, "The Bling Ring," a deadpan drama about celebrity-obsessed teenagers in Los Angeles who break into the homes of Paris Hilton and other stars. But Coppola says the movie world she grew up in isn't the same as today's star-crazed culture.

"I definitely noticed that people would act different around my dad. It was just part of my growing up," Coppola says. "This world feels unfamiliar to me, this kind of reality-star, tabloid culture."

"The Bling Ring," which opened Cannes' Un Certain Regard section Thursday, is Coppola's third film in a row that deals heavily with the famous. Following her "Marie Antoinette" (her modern-styled take on the French royal) was 2010's "Somewhere," a minimalist drama about a renowned actor and his 11-year-old daughter.

"The Bling Ring" is based on a true story, recounted in a Vanity Fair article, about high-schoolers who, after seeing online when certain stars are expected at a premiere or other event, take the opportunity to steal designer bags, shoes and clothes from their homes, lingering to pretend to live in celebrity opulence.

There's wry irony in premiering such a film at Cannes, the decadent French Riviera resort town of high-end boutiques and luxury hotels.

"It seems like the perfect setting for 'The Bling Ring' when you see people walking around in their heels," says Coppola, who favors a less flashy style. "It's a glamorous place, so it feels appropriate."

Coppola cast mainly newcomers in the lead roles (Israel Broussard, Katie Chang, Claire Julien), with the notable exception of "Harry Potter" star Emma Watson, who assumes a thick Valley Girl accent for her character. Watson praised Coppola for her easy calm; Chang noted her gentle openness with actors.

"The Bling Ring," which will be released in the U.S. on June 14, has already drawn comparisons to the recent, day-glo debauchery of Harmony Korine's "Spring Breakers." The differences between the two films are many, but both feature the thrill of young, attractive girls breaking bad for the sake of glorious superficiality. (The movies also share a new distributor, A24 Films.)

Though Coppola hasn't seen "Spring Breakers," she says, "I can understand that there's this sort of trash culture aspect that's in the air."

And if there's an epicenter of that culture, it may be Paris Hilton's shoe closet. Coppola shot in Hilton's mansion where the teens rummage through her footwear and lounge in her nightclub room. (The hotel heiress appears fleetingly in the film.)

Like "Somewhere," ''Bling Ring" paints a light, hazy portrait of Los Angeles.

"I wasn't trying to do a story about L.A. I just came across this article, and you couldn't set it somewhere else," says Coppola, who lived in L.A. in her 20s but now resides in New York with her husband, Thomas Mars of the band Phoenix, and their two daughters.

"There's something exotic about it, and it's not like anywhere else. To me, it's the center of this aspect our culture."

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NEW YORK (AP) CBS on Wednesday revealed a few nips and tucks it is planning next season for what is already network television's most successful schedule, including adding a comedy with Robin Williams playing an unorthodox advertising executive with Sarah Michelle Gellar as his daughter.

It will move "Person of Interest" to Tuesdays, pairing it with "NCIS" and "NCIS: Los Angeles" to have television's three most-watched dramas on the same night and the same network.

Four comedies and one drama will debut on CBS this fall. CBS ordered only eight new series for the season, while rivals ABC, NBC and Fox are introducing a total of 41. CBS will end this season with the widest margin of victory in viewers of any network in 24 years and even win among the advertiser-desired demographic of 18- to 49-year-olds for the first time since the early 1990s, said Leslie Moonves, CBS Corp. CEO.

Moonves took notice of how Jimmy Kimmel called CBS executives smug during ABC's schedule presentation on Tuesday, the late-night comic even adding an unprintable noun. If true, Moonves said, "I guess that means we're winning."

The company's stock just exceeded $50 a share for the first time, said Moonves, who was given a $22 million signing bonus upon extending his contract last year.

The network's annual schedule announcement to advertisers was less of a sales presentation than a celebration. The cast of "NCIS" and "The Big Bang Theory" stood on stage to accept applause for their top-ranked status.

Even David Letterman, who usually avoids these events, appeared at what he called CBS' "little pledge drive." He hugged Moonves, a man he's often mocked on his late-night show, and said the executive was "the man who saved network television."

Dealing with such riches, CBS rejected pilots of a "NCIS: Los Angeles" spinoff and a TV remake of "Beverly Hills Cop" backed by Eddie Murphy. Melissa McCarthy's popular comedy "Mike & Molly" was left off the schedule and stuck in the bullpen, ready to return to plug any holes. CBS ordered 22 episodes of the sitcom.

Williams' comedy is called "The Crazy Ones," a reference to his comic style, and is getting a prime Thursday-night time slot after "The Big Bang Theory," television's most popular comedy. Among its producers is David E. Kelley.

"We think this is going to be the most talked-about show this fall," said Nina Tassler, CBS' entertainment president.

Chuck Lorre, TV's premiere comedy producer, is behind "Mom," a new Monday-night sitcom starring Anna Faris as a newly sober single mom with Allison Janney as her estranged mother. "We Are Men" is about four love-challenged single men living in the same apartment complex, with Tony Shalhoub as one of the stars.

CBS' other new comedy is "The Millers," with Will Arnett playing a recently divorced man whose plans to enjoy the single life are disrupted when his parents move in.

CBS is also trying something new in drama by ordering two limited-run series for its Monday-night schedule. "Hostages," produced by Jerry Bruckheimer, stars Toni Collette as a surgeon who is taken hostage the night before she is to operate on the president. After a 15-episode run, it will be replaced by "Intelligence," about an agent whose smarts are enhanced by a microchip implanted in his brain.

The network is canceling "CSI: N.Y.," ''Vegas," ''Golden Boy" and "Rules of Engagement."

The drama "Hawaii Five-0" will shift from Monday to Friday nights on the schedule. CBS usually runs drama reruns on Saturday, but next year will also air two comedies that night.

Midseason shows include:

"Reckless," a legal drama set in Charleston, S.C., where a Yankee litigator and Southern lawyer have the hots for each other despite being on opposite sides of a long-running case.

"Friends With Better Lives," a romantic comedy. Like its title suggests, it focuses on six friends at different stages of their romantic lives, all wondering if their pals have it better.

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CANNES, France (AP) The Cannes Film Festival got off to a blockbuster, if stormy start, as Baz Luhrmann's "The Great Gatsby" opened on a soggy French Riviera.

Amid heavy rain, dancing flappers flocked down the Cannes red carpet Wednesday night, bringing a touch of the Jazz Age to the Croisette. "Gatsby" stars Leonardo DiCaprio, Carey Mulligan and Tobey Maguire helped give the festival's opening day a strong dose of star power.

At the opening ceremony, DiCaprio, joined by his "Gatsby" co-star, Bollywood actor Amitabh Bachchan, declared the 66th Cannes officially begun.

Over the next 12 days, dozens of the world's most artistically ambitious films will premiere on Cannes' global stage. But Wednesday was a day for blockbusters both the big-budget "Gatsby" and Hollywood's most accomplished director of spectacle: Steven Spielberg.

Spielberg is serving as jury president at this year's Cannes. His presence here is a rarity (he's had films at Cannes before, including "E.T." and "Sugarland Express," but never had a movie in competition), and he was received like a visiting head of state, a king of cinema.

The "Lincoln" director received a standing ovation at the opening ceremony and was serenaded with a performance of "Miss Celie's Blues" from his 1985 film, "The Color Purple."

He heads the jury that will decide the prestigious Palme d'Or, given to one of the 20 competing films, with entries ranging from the Coen brothers ("Llewyn Davis"), Alexander Payne ("Nebraska") and Steven Soderbergh ("Behind the Candelabra").

This year's jury is an intimidating, starry bunch, including Nicole Kidman, Ang Lee and Christoph Waltz.

"Everyone sits in judgment of us," Spielberg said. "So it's our turn."

Luhrmann's 3-D adaption of F. Scott Fitzgerald's novel, starring Leonardo DiCaprio, is this year's festival opener, a choice that surprised many since the film opened last week in North America. Cannes typically takes precedence over release schedules, but "Gatsby" sails to the Croisette after a robust weekend haul of $51.1 million.

After Luhrmann noted in a news conference that the film had pushed Fitzgerald's novel to the top of the bestseller list (selling more copies in a week than in the author's lifetime), DiCaprio added with a grin: "And a little film adaptation is doing quite well at the box office."

But while "Gatsby" is getting a victory lap on the Cannes' red carpet, it comes to the festival with the sting of mixed reviews. Many film critics have taken issue with the movie's stylistic flourishes.

"I knew that would come," said Luhrmann, noting Fitzgerald's 1925 novel was also initially received poorly. "I just care that people are going out and seeing it. I really am so moved by that."

"Gatsby" plays out of competition at the festival, but Spielberg should have his hands full with a slate lacking any obvious favorite. Internationally-respected filmmakers like Roman Polanski ("Venus in Fur"), Asghar Farhadi ("The Past) and Jim Jarmusch ("Only Lovers Left Alive") are to premiere their films in competition.

Every year, the Cannes jury president is psychoanalyzed to help predict the Palme d'Or winner. This year is no different, with onlookers guessing that Spielberg will either gravitate toward the kind of warm-hearted films he's best known for, or seek to deliberately contradict that assumption with a more audacious choice.

The international jury also includes Romanian director Cristian Mungiu, Scottish filmmaker Lynne Ramsay, Japanese director Naomi Kawase, French actor Daniel Auteuil and Bollywood star Vidya Balan.

"I'm going to have to look at the Sidney Lumet film '12 Angry Men,' again as a tutorial to prepare myself for the final day of deliberation," Spielberg said with a smile.

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Associated Press Writer Jill Lawless contributed to this story.

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NEW YORK (AP) As the Twitterverse expands with millions of users, it can be hard to have a unique voice. Nicole Richie doesn't have that problem.

Some examples:

"'It's 8:30am & I've already gotten into 5 fights' - thugs, and parents of toddlers."

"This therapist is going to be GREAT for me once I stop lying to him."

"I'm gonna dress up as an iPhone so my husband pays attention to me."

Tweets like that earned her not only millions of followers but the attention of production company Telepictures, which was already aware of Richie's popularity and wanted to work with her.

"As soon as we began pursuing her we also began following her on Twitter," recalls Sheila Bouttier, Sr. Vice President of Development of Telepictures. "We were struck by how funny and candid she was and wanted to really showcase that side of her personality, which we haven't seen in a long time."

They teamed up with AOL to create the web series (hash)CandidlyNicole. Each video is about five minutes and a new one is posted every Tuesday morning.

The first webisode, where 31-year-old Richie consults with a doctor about having her "tramp stamp" (or tattoo on her lower back) removed, earned 1 million views in just its first week. (Try not to at least smirk as she keeps referring to the doctor as "Dr. Tatt-off.")

In a recent phone interview, Richie said she's "thrilled" by the response but still has a hard time grasping that she's funny.

"My husband (musician Joel Madden) doesn't think I'm funny at all," she said. "He has not laughed at a joke of mine since 2006. I don't necessarily always just mean to be funny. I just kind of say whatever's on my mind but I do know that I have a very specific way of looking at my life."

Of course, Richie is no stranger to television. She first appeared alongside Paris Hilton on "The Simple Life," where they were filmed working in fish-out-of-water situations as interns or camp counselors. Richie also just wrapped a second season as a mentor on the competition show "Fashion Star" on NBC.

But Richie appreciates the format of the webisode.

"We are living in a world where everything needs to be a little bit shorter to keep people's attention," she said. "Especially the younger audience, which is why I think Twitter is so great."

She gets together once a week to film with a small camera crew. They go over ideas of what to shoot, but each video really is born from a Tweet she has posted. When the video gets posted she says she looks to her little sister for reassurance.

"I have a very hard time watching myself, which is another reason why I'm glad it's only five minutes. I let my sister watch them first. She's 14 (years-old) and the harshest critic so I kind of wait in the other room and see if her and her friends laugh."

Bouttier says even though viewers could see Richie on TV each week on "Fashion Star," it was just a glimpse of who she is and "her fans have been dying to hear from her for a long time."

Now that (hash)CandidlyNicole is a hit online, the next question is, could it be reformatted for television?

Both Telepictures and Richie say they're game. Bouttier says they've already received calls from various networks.

"No matter what, this will be a developmental tool for me to build my brand so whether it's TV or whatever, I think doing it in a digital space is a nice way to experiment," added Richie.

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Online:

http://on.aol.com/show/517742769/episode/517775397

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Alicia Rancilio covers entertainment for The Associated Press. Follow her online at http://www.twitter.com/aliciar

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NEW YORK (AP) Univision Communications said Tuesday that it is pairing with filmmaker Robert Rodriguez on the English-language El Rey television network that is geared to young viewers and scheduled to debut this December.

Rodriguez is a filmmaker whose projects include "From Dusk Till Dawn." The first scripted series for El Rey will be an expansion of that movie, with the extra time allowing him to expand the story and explore richer Aztec mythology, he said.

The company that runs Univision, the most-popular Spanish-language network in the country, said Tuesday it has invested in El Rey. Terms were not disclosed. It is set to begin in December with a national distribution agreement with Comcast, the nation's largest cable company.

The network is expected to have a mix of reality, scripted, music and sports programming, along with movies.

"El Rey Network will serve as a launching pad to satisfy the tastes of young adults looking for exciting, cinematic, action-packed content," Rodriguez said.

Univision has expanded over the past two years, creating several new networks. One partnership with ABC is called Fusion, an English-language news network geared toward a Latino audience.

The Univision network said it will premiere two new telenovelas during the next season. "La Tempestad" will star William Levy and Ximena Navarrete, a former Miss Universe. "Mentir para Vivir" will star David Zepeda and Mayrin Vilanueva.

Randy Falco, president and CEO of Univision Communications Inc., told advertisers Tuesday that the company is at the intersection of two big growth opportunities: the Latino market and digital.

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Oscar-winning actress Angelina Jolie announced on Tuesday that she had a preventive mastectomy after learning she had a gene that significantly raised her risk of breast cancer. Here's a crash course in the procedure Jolie had and why.

Q: What kind of surgery did Jolie have?

A: Jolie had a preventive double mastectomy, meaning she chose to have both her breasts removed even though she had not been diagnosed with cancer.

Q: Why did she have the mastectomies?

A: Jolie says that she has a "faulty" version of the BRCA1 gene that means she had an 87 percent chance of getting breast cancer. By having both breasts removed preventively, she said her breast cancer risk drops to below 5 percent.

Q: What did the procedure involve?

A: In double mastectomies, surgeons typically remove as much breast tissue as possible. In Jolie's case, because she was having a reconstruction done shortly afterward, the doctors preserved the skin covering her breasts, inserting "fillers" where the breast tissue would have been, to keep the skin elastic. According to Jolie, she had implants put in nine weeks later.

Q: How many women have this faulty gene?

A: Only a small percentage of women have this same faulty gene, or a similar mutated version of a related gene, BRCA2. These mutations are most commonly found in women of Eastern European Jewish descent; one study found 2.3 percent of women in that group had the mutations about five times higher than in the general population. Other ethnic groups, including the Norwegian, Dutch and Icelandic people, also have slightly higher rates of these mutations.

Q: How do these genes increase a woman's risk of breast cancer?

A: The average woman has a 12 percent risk of developing breast cancer sometime during her life. In comparison, women who have inherited a faulty version of a breast cancer gene are about five times more likely to get breast cancer. In the U.S., about 5 to 10 percent of breast cancers are thought to be linked to harmful versions of the BRCA1 and BRCA2 genes.

Q: How can women find out if they have these gene mutations?

A: A genetic test using a blood test can usually detect these genes. In the U.S., there are no standard guidelines recommending women for BRCA1 or BRCA2 genetic testing. The test can cost several thousand dollars but may often be covered by insurance companies if women have risk factors that justify it. Women may be at higher risk for having a harmful mutation if they have close family members diagnosed with breast or ovarian cancer at an early age. Jolie says that her mother fought cancer for nearly a decade before dying at age 56.

Q: What other options might Jolie have had?

A: Doctors would likely have suggested earlier screening tests, including mammograms or MRIs, but those would only help them spot breast cancer earlier, not prevent it. They might also consider using breast cancer drugs preventively, though trials into their long-term use are still ongoing. "This is not a decision that people take lightly," said Dr. Emma Pennery, clinical director at the British charity, Breast Cancer Care. "You cannot decide to have a double mastectomy next week."

Q: How relevant is Jolie's decision to other women?

A: For most women, genetics will not play a big part in whether or not they get breast cancer. "The majority of women considering their breast cancer risk should focus on things like a healthy lifestyle, eating a balanced diet, keeping a healthy weight and not drinking too much alcohol," said Dr. Peter Johnson, chief clinician at Cancer Research U.K. About one third of breast cancer cases in Britain are largely tied to modifiable lifestyle risk factors.

But for women with a similar genetic risk to Jolie, it's possible her decision to go public about her double mastectomies will prompt more procedures. "It's a very empowering message that women are not helpless when faced with a genetic cancer risk," Johnson said.

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NEW YORK (AP) Beyonce is canceling her Tuesday concert in Belgium because of dehydration and exhaustion.

In an email to The Associated Press, the singer's publicist says Beyonce has been advised by her doctors to rest. She was scheduled to perform at the Sportpaleis in Antwerp. The show will be rescheduled and tickets can be used at that show.

Her next tour date is Wednesday at the same arena. The statement says "she is awaiting word from her doctors before making a decision."

Beyonce, 31, launched her "Mrs. Carter World Tour" last month in Belgrade, Serbia. It wraps Aug. 5 at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, N.Y.

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Online:

http://www.beyonceonline.com/us/home

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MANILA, Philippines (AP) A film that weaves together stories of the anguish and desperation of American and Filipino soldiers during the notorious Bataan Death March could have been shot on location in a large-scale production.

Filipino director Borinaga Alix Jr. instead chose to film "Death March" in black-and-white and almost entirely inside a studio using hand-painted backdrops, with close-ups of actors' painted faces portraying their struggles with nightmares and hallucinations in one of the bloodiest episodes of World War II.

"Death March" is competing against 17 other movies at the Cannes Film Festival that opens Wednesday, including Sofia Coppola's "The Bling Ring," French director Claire Denis' "Les Salauds" and fellow Filipino director Lav Diaz's "Norte, Hangganan ng Kasaysayan." The entries were made in the category for art house and experimental films.

Some 70,000 starving, sick, and exhausted American and Filipino prisoners of the Japanese Imperial Army marched under a brutal sun for five days in April 1942, covering 105 kilometers (65 miles) from the Bataan peninsula to a prison camp in Tarlac province. Survivors told stories of atrocities, with many of the prisoners stabbed or decapitated by their Japanese captors if they so much as stopped to drink water or collapsed to the ground. Thousands died from illness or exhaustion.

After reading the script by Rody Vera, Alix said he was struck by the war's emotional and psychological effect on soldiers.

"It felt like they were sleep walking their nightmares," Alix said in an interview. He said he wanted to highlight how the event shaped the soldiers' psyche.

Instead of the initial plan to go on location, he consulted the production designer and decided "to shoot in a controlled environment where all the elements were synthetic, except the actors, to heighten the surreal feeling of the film."

The multi-character movie stars Filipino actors Sid Lucero as a Filipino soldier who fights to stay sane after his friend is shot in front of him, and Filipino-American actor Sam Milby as an American soldier taking care of his sick captain but also thinking of ways to escape from the Japanese.

Other Filipino actors whose stories converge in the film are Zanjoe Marudo, Jason Abalos, Carlo Aquino and Felix Roco.

Japanese actor and producer Jackie Woo, who has starred in two previous films directed by Alix, also plays several roles.

"At first I was surprised because he was Japanese," Alix said of Woo. "I know it is a very delicate subject matter especially for them, because the world has stereotypes of how the Japanese were during that time."

But he said he was happy that Woo loved the script, which last year won first prize for screenplay at the Palanca Memorial Awards, the Philippine literary version of the Pulitzer Prize.

"He said he is not afraid to produce it because at the end, all these three countries are victims of the war," Alix added.

Shooting lasted 18 days over about four months. At least 15 local artists had to hand-paint the backdrops for two months before shooting began. The movie went over the budget at around 10 million pesos ($244,000) because of the decision to shoot in a studio.

Alix said that while shooting indoors was confining and more expensive, it was worth it.

"The audience might feel a certain discomfort because it's not as real as it is, but at a certain point you also feel like you are in a journey with the characters" he said.

The 34-year-old director, named in 2010 by The Hollywood Reporter as among Asia's best and brightest entertainment personalities below 35, said he was thrilled that his movie will be competing in Cannes.

"For me it's just an honor to be in the same lineup of these directors because I love their work," said Alix, whose co-directed movie "Manila" also had a special screening in Cannes in 2009.

He said being in the festival gives small films like his the buzz and exposure that can boost sales.

Two French distributors have signed up to market the movie in France and elsewhere, he said.

"What is important now for us is to show that there is a movement that is coming from the Philippines, because in the past six years there have been a lot of Filipino films that have been screened in festivals and we get a lot of reviews," he said.

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Follow Teresa Cerojano on Twitter at https://twitter.com/mtmanila

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NEW YORK (AP) NBC is giving the public more than just a new slate of programming. There are prizes to be had, too.

The network said Sunday that it's holding a Twitter-based sweepstakes linked to its fall schedule presentation to advertisers a social-media twist on the annual TV rite occurring this week.

One of the prizes is a trip to Los Angeles to attend a final taping of Jay Leno's "Tonight Show." The other is a New York visit to see one of the first tapings of the relocated "Tonight" with new host Jimmy Fallon.

The contest opens Monday, when the network announces its lineup, and it runs through June 13. Fans can enter by following NBC's Twitter accounts of its upcoming schedule, which will include a new Sean Hayes sitcom.

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LOS ANGELES (AP) Members of Slayer say Jeff Hanneman died of alcohol-related cirrhosis.

The guitarist died last week at a hospital in Hemet, Calif., at age 49. It was initially theorized that Hanneman's death might have had something to do with a suspected spider bite that led to a case of necrotizing fasciitis, nearly costing him his arm.

The band disclosed Hanneman's cause of death on its website Thursday, and a publicist said Friday the determination was made by his attending physician. She did not know the doctor's name.

The statement says Hanneman was not aware of the extent of damage to his liver until his last days.

The band also says it is planning a public celebration of Hanneman's life later this month with details to come.

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Online:

http://slayer.net

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TRENTON, N.J. (AP) Gov. Chris Christie will guest-host the "Today" show later this month.

NBC announced Tuesday that Christie will be a co-host for an hour of the May 24 show, which will broadcast from the Jersey shore as part of its "Great American Adventure" road trip. A location for the appearance hasn't been finalized.

The road trip segment involves the show's anchors traveling together to five U.S. destinations in a single week. Christie has stressed the Jersey shore's importance as a tourist destination in the wake of Superstorm Sandy.

Christie joins Sarah Palin and Laura Bush as other political figures who have co-hosted an hour of the morning show.

The Republican governor is running for a second term. A spokesman confirmed Tuesday Christie had undergone weight loss surgery in February.

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LONDON (AP) Beyonce loved voicing Queen Tara in the new children's movie "Epic" at least once she stopped crying.

Queen B has gone from pop royalty to screen royalty, becoming the forest queen in an animated movie that she hopes her 15-month-old daughter Blue Ivy will be proud of one day.

The film was her first work since giving birth and she says her hormones were raging.

"I literally had tears when I played the voice," Beyonce told The Associated Press in an interview between concerts in London. "There was a scene where Queen Tara picks out her pod and I just imagined seeing my child."

From the creators of the "Ice Age" and "Rio" series, "Epic" follows a teenager who is transported into a secret forest world then embroiled in a battle between good and evil and has to protect a special flower pod to save the forest. The film is being released in the U.S. on May 22.

This role in "Epic" is not the superstar's only brush with royalty of late. When performing in London last week on her "Mrs. Carter Show" world tour, the singer inadvertently singled out Princess Eugenie in the crowd to sing with her. The 23-year-old is sixth in line for the British throne. Beyonce giggled as she revealed that she had no idea who Eugenie was.

"'I didn't know, and I still don't know. Someone told me and I don't know what's going on, but I hope they had a great time and I hope I didn't insult anyone, making them sing into the mic," Beyonce said. "But you know royalty likes to have fun and have a good entertaining night."

Her sellout world tour has also caused some controversy for its racy costumes and explicit lyrics in the song "Bow Down (I Been On)," but for Beyonce it's simply all part of the show.

"I'm an artist and I love being able to express myself and I'm not one-dimensional," she said. "I have different feelings every day and now that I've done movies I feel like I can try and recreate these characters on the stage."

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PARIS (AP) A French mayor says Oscar-nominated actress Keira Knightley has said "oui" to rocker James Righton in a small wedding ceremony in southern France.

Aime Navello said Sunday the couple followed French tradition when he married them at the Mazan town hall on Saturday. Navello read the service in French and the couple responded in French and English. He said about 10 people were present.

Righton is keyboard player for the rock group Klaxons. He and Knightley got engaged a year ago.

Knightley first won notice for her role as a soccer-playing teenager in "Bend It Like Beckham."

She went on to star in the first three "Pirates of the Caribbean" movies and was nominated for an Oscar for playing Elizabeth Bennet in an adaptation of Jane Austen's "Pride and Prejudice."

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LOS ANGELES (AP) A jury will hear more Wednesday about the troubled finances of Michael Jackson's doctor from a police detective who investigated the physician and saw his mounting debts as a possible motive for improper treatments on the pop superstar.

Los Angeles Police Detective Orlando Martinez on Tuesday told jurors hearing a civil case against Jackson's concert promoter that Conrad Murray was more than $500,000 in debt and his finances were "severely distressed."

The doctor's Las Vegas home was in foreclosure proceedings, he owed back child support and had liens and judgments spread across several states.

Martinez said that led him to believe Murray's actions were motivated by the $150,000 a month he expected to be paid by AEG.

"He may break the rules, bend the rules, do whatever he needed to do to get paid," Martinez said. "It might solve his money problems."

Murray's finances were not a factor in the criminal case that ended with his 2011 conviction for administering a fatal dose of propofol to Jackson.

The former cardiologist is not a party to the case, but he is a key figure in Katherine Jackson's negligent hiring case against concert giant AEG Live. The Jackson family matriarch contends AEG did not properly investigate Murray before allowing him to serve as Jackson's tour physician for the ill-fated "This Is It" shows planned for 2009.

Martinez testified he found most of the debts against Murray in public records.

AEG denies it hired Murray, and its attorney has noted that Jackson and his children had been treated by the doctor before the shows were planned.

The detective's testimony will be brief on Wednesday. Court will recess early to allow an alternate juror to attend a family funeral.

Martinez is the second witness called in the case, which in its early stages will focus on Jackson's death. Potential witnesses later in the trial include stars such as Diana Ross, Quincy Jones and Spike Lee. Jackson's mother, several siblings and his two oldest children, Prince and Paris, are also listed as potential witnesses.

Millions and possibly billions of dollars are at stake in the trial, which may last 90 court days.

AEG attorneys said they intend to call Murray as a witness. He remains in a Los Angeles jail and is appealing his conviction.

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Anthony McCartney can be reached at http://twitter.com/mccartneyAP

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NEW YORK (AP) Netflix's groundbreaking "House of Cards" may be the first digital series nominated for a best drama Emmy. But it will start with a Webby.

The Webby Awards are honoring "House of Cards" producers Kevin Spacey and Dana Brunetti with a Webby special achievement award. The political thriller, for which Netflix released all 13 episodes at once, proved that digital media can produce cable-quality drama. Netflix also won for best streaming media site.

The 17th annual Webbys, which celebrate Internet achievement, are to be officially announced Tuesday. Winners range from Justin Bieber (for the social media campaign for his fragrance launch) to The Onion (now with a record 19 total Webbys) to Nate Silver's FiveThirtyEight blog for The New York Times.

The Webby person of the year is Frank Ocean, the R&B singer, whom the Webbys hailed "for proving the power of the Web as a medium for cultural change when he announced his bisexuality to his Tumblr community."

Singled out for outstanding comedic performance is Jerry Seinfeld, whose 10-episode Web series "Comedian in Cars Getting Coffee" showcased the "Seinfeld" star hanging out with comedian friends.

Webby categories are split into a regular award, chosen by the International Academy of Digital Arts and Sciences, and a "people's voice" award. The Australian rail safety public service campaign Dumb Ways to Die, which went viral, is an unlikely awards leader with seven Webbys.

GIF file inventor Steve Wilhite also will be honored with a lifetime achievement award. While working at CompuServe in the 1980s, Wilhite created the compressed 8-bit GIF (or Graphics Interchange Format) that remains a popular tool for lo-fi viral sharing.

Another special achievement award will go to President Barack Obama's election campaign for its use of technology in last year's presidential election. Claire Boucher, the Canadian synth-pop singer who performs under the name Grimes, is the Webby's artist of the year.

Other winners include HBO Go (four awards, including best media streaming service), Lady Gaga (for best celebrity-fan social presence), Conan O'Brien (for best celebrity-fan website) and The New York Times (best news social presence). A complete list of the awards will be posted later Tuesday at: http://Winners.WebbyAwards.com.

The awards will be handed out in a ceremony hosted by Patton Oswalt on May 21 in New York, and available to stream the following day. Acceptance speeches are famously limited to five words.

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Online:

http://www.webbyawards.com/

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Follow AP Entertainment Writer Jake Coyle on Twitter at: http://twitter.com/jake_coyle

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