lifestyle MONDAY, JUNE 9, 2014

GOSSIP

Nicole Scherzinger’s urban pop

icole Scherzinger’s new is “urban pop”. The former Pussycat Dolls singer has promised fans her new material - the first since her last LP ‘Killer Love’ was released in 2011 0 is worth the wait. She said: N“Hopefully it’ll be worth the wait. I’m really excited about this album - it’s pop, but urban pop. I’ll just let the music speak for itself.” Asked what her new songs are inspired by, Nicole, who is dating racing driver Lewis Hamilton, claims they are about “life and relationships and love.” She added to Britain’s HELLO! maga- zine: “That’s always pretty expected. It’s natural. It’s the easiest thing to write about. It’s what we work off of, right? Live off of, breathe off of, eat off of, sleep off of, right?” The brunette beauty recorded half of the new record in Los Angeles and the rest in Miami but insists she still loves her second home, London, where she lived while she was a judge on ‘’. She said: “I love recording in London though. After experienc- ing last summer, I feel like England’s got a bad rep. Last summer was glorious and, during my stay here, even though the weather was a bit moody at times, I can be a bit moody so I empathized with it. And I was quite impressed.”

Baldwin Kasem accepts key to remains in critical US city for donation condition ctor Alec Baldwin has received the key to Rhode asey Kasem, host of the “American Top 40” count- Island’s smallest city for his donations to help down for four decades, remained in critical condition Areopen the financially struggling city’s library. Cat a Washington state hospital yesterday and was Baldwin donated $10,000 to the Adams Memorial Library being treated for an infected bedsore, a hospital in Central Falls in 2011 after he read a New York Times story spokesman said. Kasem, who was also the voice of Shaggy about how it was forced to close because of financial prob- in the “Scooby-Doo” cartoons and one of the most recog- lems. He gave another $5,000 in 2012. The 1-square-mile nizable voices on American radio, was admitted to St (2.6-square-kilometer) city emerged from bankruptcy that Anthony Hospital in Gig Harbor last week. The 82-year-old year. Baldwin’s visit Saturday was his first to the library. former DJ has been alert throughout his hospitalization, Library director Joel Pettit says Baldwin accepted the key receiving wound care, intravenous antibiotic therapy, from the mayor on the library steps. He was headlining a blood pressure support medication and treatment for his fundraiser Saturday night in nearby Providence for the pain, hospital spokesman Scott Thompson said. Kasem suf- library. Pettit said Baldwin is a great guy, and he’s hopeful fers from Lewy body disease, a form of dementia with the event will bring attention to the importance of symptoms similar to Parkinson’s disease and hallucinations. libraries. His medical care and visitor access has been at the centre of a legal tussle between the children from his first mar- riage - Kerri, Julie and Mike - and his second wife, Jean Kasem, with whom he has one child, Liberty. A Washington state judge ruled on Friday that Kasem’s care would be decided by his daughter, Kerri, and not her stepmother. As the ruling took effect, a family spokesman said Kasem “won’t be with us much longer”. Rupert Grint’s secret skill upert Grint can play the didgeri- accordion, sax, guitar, and never really doo. The ‘Harry Potter’ actor clicked with any of them. But the Radmits he’s tried to master didgeridoo, I can make pretty decent numerous instruments but he can noise.” The 25-year-old actor, was given make a “decent noise” with the wind a didgeridoo when he was young and instrument developed by Indigenous has a particular technique to help him Australians years ago. He said: “I can play the instrument. He added in an play the didgeridoo fairly well. I’ve tried interview with Empire magazine: “I a variety of instruments in the past - acquired one early on, when I was quite young. It went from there really. It’s quite a tricky technique, you have to do this circular breathing thing where you have a continuous breath.” The flame- haired hunk - who is best known for playing Ron Weasley in the film adapta- tion of JK Rowling’s popular novels - recently lent his voice to the character of Josh in ‘Postman Pat: The Movie’ and is set to hit the big screen in next year’s ‘Enemy of Man’ and ‘Moonwalkers’.

Tough motivator Mark Wahlberg ark Wahlberg will threaten to “crack heads open” to get work done. The ‘Transformers: Age of Extinction’ actor enjoys working behind the scenes as a pro- Mducer and says he is good at the job because he understands how to motivate dif- Jolie ferent groups of people. He said: “I’ve got people where positive encouragement is going to get the best results and other people where I have to threaten to crack their head open.” got emotional The 42-year-old star began his production career with TV show ‘Entourage’ and says he made the change because he wanted to be in control and have the perfect projects to over script work on. He explained: “I got tired of waiting for the right project to drop on to my desk.”If I don’t do it, nobody else is going to do it, and if I don’t tell everybody how to do it, it’s not ngelina Jolie was “really emotional” when her going to be done the right way.” Though Mark does a lot of preparation for his acting roles, children listened to her read ‘Maleficent’. The 38- he insists he turns in a performance with “no great effort”. He told Britain’s GQ magazine: Ayear-old actress plays the title role in the “Everyone’s different. I know some actors have their whole routine where they don’t want reimagining of the ‘Sleeping Beauty’ tale and was anybody around them or they need to play music or whatever, but the James Cagney phi- delighted when her six kids, Maddox, 12, Pax, 10, losophy always made more sense to me. Prepare for the part. Be the part. And with no Zahara, nine, Shiloh, eight, and five-year-old Knox and great effort, play the part. Vivienne, enjoyed the story when she ran through the script with them. She said: “I got really emotional because the script is very powerful. The kids loved it.” Amanda Seyfried Though the tale is aimed at children, the actress - who is engaged to Brad Pitt - thinks it is interesting enough to keep adults gripped too. She told Psychologies mag- azine: “We tried to make this sophisticated enough that will sing in Ted 2 adults will read things into it that kids won’t. “Parents watching the movie will identify with Maleficent in a manda Seyfried will sing in ‘Ted 2’. The ‘Million Ways to Die in the West’ actress has different way, which I think is fun.” The brunette beauty impressed her co-star and writer Seth MacFarlane with her “beautiful” singing voice was overjoyed to be offered the lead role in the film so he wrote a special medley for her to perform in the comedy sequel. Seth said: A because Maleficent is a character she has always been “She’s going to sing in ‘Ted 2’. She has a beautiful voice.” Amanda added: “He wrote a nice “fascinated” by. She said: “I was afraid of her, but I loved medley, a Ted-ley, but I don’t know if I’m up to speed yet.” her too because she was this elegant, sexy, evil crea- While Amanda is comfortable singing on camera, one thing she is relieved she won’t ture. I was drawn to her. “I was fascinated by her as a have to do is master a Boston accent for the role. Asked during an interview to mimic one child. I thought she was the scariest and most interest- of the characters from ‘Family Guy’, another of Seth’s creations, she said: “I can’t, I can’t do a ing of all the Disney characters. But I wanted to know Boston accent.” Seth exclaimed in response: “You can’t do a Boston accent? But you’re star- more about her. Who is that gorgeous, elegant crea- ring in ‘Ted 2’!” Amanda replied: “You said I didn’t have to do that, like, weeks ago. God, if ture? So I loved the idea of playing a Disney villain. It you want me to do a Boston accent, I gotta... I would never embarrass myself in front of sounded so much fun.” him by trying to do his voices.”