How SAG Stars Got Their Start: Sofia Vergara Credits Her 'Hooker Looks'

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Today, she's one of the world's sexiest stars. But Sofia Vergara wasn't quite as celebrated for her curves early in her career.

The Modern Family actress was among a handful of actors who kicked off Sunday's Screen Actors Guild Awards with personal stories about how they got started in the business. Vergara, 40, joked about her famous figure.

"I grew up in Barranquilla, Colombia, in a very traditional Catholic home," she said. "My father told me that if I ever did anything artistic, I was going to look like a hooker. I told him, 'With these huge boobs that I inherited from your mother, I already look like a hooker!' "

30 Rock's Jane Krakowski had a little fun with Hollywood's reputation for having no use for aging women. At 12 years old, she said, she played Chevy Chase's niece in National Lampoon's Vacation. Krakowski, 44, added: "Today, I would be cast as his wife. In two years, I will play his mother."

Helen Hunt detailed the crazy variety of her roles – "I've played a waitress, a cuckoo clock, a quarterback and a sex surrogate" – while Alfre Woodard said she was surprised she became an actor at all, since she always had trouble remembering people's names.

Chris Tucker said he became "fascinated with the art" as a 9-year-old when he saw Richard Pryor in Stir Crazy.

For Hal Holbrook, the inspiration was simpler. He was lazy – and acting class didn't give you homework.

How They Officially Joined the Club

Other stars reflected specifically on the moment they got their SAG cards – a momentous moment for many, including Anne Hathaway, who mentioned it at the beginning of her speech in accepting the best supporting actress honor for her role in Les Misérables.

"I got my SAG card when I was 14," she said. "It felt like the beginning of the world. I have loved every single minute of my life as an actor. And I have been the recipient of so much kindness and support from actors in this room and out of it. ... Thank you for this award."

Jennifer Lawrence also mentioned getting a SAG card in her acceptance speech, when she won best actress for Silver Linings Playbook. Like Hathaway, Lawrence – who is now 22 – was 14 at the time.

"I want to thank MTV," she said. "I did an MTV promo for My Super Sweet 16. And I remember getting [the card] in the mail and it being the best day of my entire life because it officially made me a professional actor. Which put me in a category with all of you."

"And now I have this naked statue that means that some of you even voted for me," she added.

Like many actors, Twilight's Peter Facinelli and Modern Family's Ty Burrell both got their SAG cards working on Law & Order.

Facinelli, talking on the red carpet, said he dropped out of college after that. "I ran into [Law & Order creator] Dick Wolf. ... I said, 'I didn't get my diploma because of you, but I got my SAG card because of you." But, Facinelli doesn't regret not finishing school: "I was majoring in theater. It all worked out."

Burrell says he was "unmemorable" on the crime show, which allowed him to play different roles on different episodes. "Nobody noticed that now I was playing an assassin," he joked.

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CDC: Flu seems to level off except in the West

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New government figures show that flu cases seem to be leveling off nationwide. Flu activity is declining in most regions although still rising in the West.


The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says hospitalizations and deaths spiked again last week, especially among the elderly. The CDC says quick treatment with antiviral medicines is important, in particular for the very young or old. The season's first flu case resistant to treatment with Tamiflu was reported Friday.


Eight more children have died from the flu, bringing this season's total pediatric deaths to 37. About 100 children die in an average flu season.


There is still vaccine available although it may be hard to find. The CDC has a website that can help.


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CDC: http://www.cdc.gov/flu/


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Fire Department is the hot topic at mayoral candidates forum

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Residents in Pacific Palisades were deeply critical when cuts to the Los Angeles Fire Department were proposed nearly four years ago. At a forum for mayoral hopefuls there on Sunday, community members arrived with a question: What would the candidates do to beef up emergency operations and bring down response times?


Front-runners Wendy Greuel and Eric Garcetti each portrayed themselves as fighters for the beleaguered department, which has been under scrutiny since fire officials admitted they'd released misleading performance data for years.


Greuel, who conducted an audit of emergency response times as city controller, blamed the City Council and Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa for slow responses since the budget reductions began.








She complained that the city hasn't hired a new firefighter in four years and said firefighters have told her: "I don't understand why the mayor and council cut us … and didn't expect it to be a problem."


Councilman Eric Garcetti tersely pointed out that Greuel played a role in the cuts while serving on the council before she was elected controller in 2009.


"We both voted for $56 million in cuts to the Fire Department along with cuts to all of our departments," Garcetti said.


Lawmakers had no choice, he said. When the economy bottomed out during the economic recession, Garcetti said, the cuts helped the city stay afloat. "I will never apologize for balancing the budget in those years."


"The question now," he said, "is what are we doing to restore?" He pointed out that he approved increases to the department's budget last year and has pushed Fire Chief Brian Cummings to draw up a plan mapping out where he would like to add back resources.


"You've seen me hold this chief's feet to the fire," Garcetti said.


Two years ago, the department closed units at more than one-fifth of the city's stations, including in Pacific Palisades, which lost an engine company. Residents feared the cuts would mean longer waits in the hard-to-reach hilly neighborhoods.


Last year, a Times analysis of Fire Department response times found that residents in many of the city's hillside communities wait twice as long as those who live in more dense areas in and around downtown.


Garcetti and Councilwoman Jan Perry said the department needs to focus on upgrading its technology. Plans to install GPS devices in city firetrucks have been in the works for years but slow to be implemented.


Candidate Emanuel Pleitez pledge to install "an in-house roving engineering team" that would look at data in the Fire Department and across the city.


The forum was sponsored by the Pacific Palisades Democratic Club. A fifth candidate, Kevin James, was excluded because he is a Republican.


After the forum, the club's board of directors held a vote to decide whom to endorse in the mayor's race. Garcetti was the winner, receiving at least 60%.


kate.linthicum@latimes.com





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The Lede Blog: Egypt's Soccer Riots, a View From the Ground

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Video posted online appears to show fans of Cairo’s Al Ahly soccer team celebrating a court verdict.

It was one of the world’s deadliest episodes of soccer violence — a clash between fans of the Egyptian team Al Masry, of Port Said, and players and fans from Al Ahly, of Cairo, a year ago that killed 74 and wounded over 1,000.

On Saturday, a court in Cairo handed down death sentences for 21 of those involved in the riots. The violence that the verdict prompted, involving hard-core “ultra” supporters of both teams, killed at least 28 and wounded at least 300, my colleagues David Kirkpatrick and Mayy El Sheikh reported.

Pictures and video from Port Said and Cairo were markedly different. In Cairo, as the video at the top of this post shows, there were widespread celebrations. In Port Said, a city of about 600,000.

Rioters looted and burned a police barracks and set fire to a police station. They attacked members of the news media, damaging television cameras that sought to film the violence and ending their broadcasts. They closed off all roads into Port Said as well as the railroad station, and the Ministry of Electricity and Energy said rioters had attacked a power facility as well.

Video posted online appears to show protesters in Port Said.

In Cairo, Mr. Kirkpatrick and Ms. El Sheikh reported, the families of those killed in the clash last year “held pictures of the victims in the air. Some danced and chanted. A few fainted. And the Cairo ultras celebrated for hours outside their team’s headquarters.”

Video posted online appears to show celebrations in Cairo.

Tara Todras-Whitehill, a photographer in Cairo, posted further pictures of the celebrations on her Twitter account.

It was not immediately clear where the following picture also posted on Twitter, by Tom Gara of The Wall Street Journal, came from. But it apparently shows a man playing an accordion in the midst of one riot.

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Michelle Kwan's Wedding Brings Olympic Stars Together: Pics Then & Now

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Catch up with Michelle Kwan and the all-star figure skaters who attended her Jan. 19 dream wedding








Credit: Caitlin Maloney



Updated: Friday Jan 25, 2013 | 05:00 PM EST
By: NANCY MATTIA AND CYNTHIA WANG




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CDC: Flu seems to level off except in the West

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New government figures show that flu cases seem to be leveling off nationwide. Flu activity is declining in most regions although still rising in the West.


The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says hospitalizations and deaths spiked again last week, especially among the elderly. The CDC says quick treatment with antiviral medicines is important, in particular for the very young or old. The season's first flu case resistant to treatment with Tamiflu was reported Friday.


Eight more children have died from the flu, bringing this season's total pediatric deaths to 37. About 100 children die in an average flu season.


There is still vaccine available although it may be hard to find. The CDC has a website that can help.


___


CDC: http://www.cdc.gov/flu/


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Muslim students convicted of disrupting 2010 speech file appeal

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Ten of the so-called Irvine 11 Muslim students convicted of two misdemeanor charges to conspire and then disrupt a 2010 speech by Israeli Ambassador Michael Oren at UC Irvine have filed an appeal in Orange County Superior Court.


The 10 defendants, Muslim UC Irvine and UC Riverside students, were convicted in 2011 and sentenced to three years of informal probation and 56 hours of community service.


Charges against an 11th student were dropped after he agreed to 40 hours of community service at Someone Cares Soup Kitchen in Costa Mesa.





The case sparked fierce debate over whether the students' or Oren's free speech rights were violated and whether the district attorney's office should have filed criminal charges in the first place.


In an appeal brief filed this week, attorneys alleged that the students were convicted on the basis of an "unconstitutionally vague" state law prohibiting the willful disturbance of meetings.


"The basic premise is that this statute, as applied, makes completely lawful political speech a criminal act, and the 1st Amendment was never intended to allow that," said Dan Stormer, one of several lawyers representing the group.


Though a 1970 California Supreme Court decision "tried to fix the statute" by giving it more specific limits, the jury's instructions on how to apply the statute in question were still fuzzy, said Lisa Jaskol, directing attorney of the Public Counsel Law Center's appellate law program.


But Assistant Dist. Atty. Dan Wagner, a prosecutor working on the case, said that because the California Supreme Court had already ruled on the constitutionality of the statute, he's confident the conviction will be upheld.


"Furthermore, their behavior is not the type of behavior or conduct that is protected by the 1st Amendment," he added. "The evidence showed they were intent on taking away the ambassador's right to free speech."


Prosecutors have at least a month to file a response.


The students have completed their community service, Stormer said, and are "all doing very well."


"These young people are the cream of our academic crop," he said. "The idea that you could stand up in a meeting and make a political statement and that is a crime is absolutely abhorrent to our justice system."


jill.cowan@latimes.com





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The Lede Blog: A 'Black Bloc' Emerges in Egypt

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While using Twitter to narrate events in Tahrir Square on Friday, people in Egypt described tires burning in the street, protesters blocking traffic and hurling rocks, and police officers launching tear gas in an effort to break up crowds that had gathered to protest against the Muslim Brotherhood and the country’s new Islamist president.

Many of the actions described on Friday appeared to hew to a script that has become familiar over the past two years, but some in the crowds of protesters appeared to be using new tactics, dressing from head to toe in black, covering their faces with bandannas or kerchiefs and brandishing black flags as they skirmished with security forces.

“Asked one of them who they are they said we don’t talk to media but we are black bloc,” wrote ‏the British-Egyptian journalist Sarah Carr, adding that a member of the group had “mentioned anarchism.”

An article filed on Thursday by The Associated Press reported the presence of a “previously unknown group calling itself the black block.” The article continued, “Wearing black masks and waving black banners, it warned the Muslim Brotherhood of using its ‘military wing’ to put down protests.”

Although largely new in Cairo, the term “black bloc” has been used for years in the United States and Europe to describe a tactic commonly used by anarchists and anticapitalists during large-scale political demonstrations that occasionally devolve into street fights with the authorities.

Participants in the bloc typically dress in black to foster a sense of unity and to make it difficult for witnesses to differentiate between individuals. Members of the bloc often blend in with larger groups of protesters, then break away, linking arms as they rush down streets.

In the United States, at least, black bloc members usually eschew violence against people but have few compunctions about damaging property.

The tactic received attention during the 1999 protests in Seattle against the World Trade Organization, when youths dressed in black broke windows and spray-painted graffiti on buildings.

In St. Paul, during the 2008 Republican National Convention, black bloc members roamed through the city smashing bank windows and using hammers to batter a police car.

It is unclear whether there are any connections between American and Egyptian black bloc participants, but the site anarchistnews.org posted a message about occurrences in Cairo, quoting the blog Even If Your Voice Shakes.

Last night, anarchism left the graffitied walls, small conversations, and online forums of Egypt, and came to life in Cairo, declaring itself a new force in the ongoing social revolution sparked two years ago with multiple firebombings against Muslim Brotherhood offices. Later, the government shutdown the “Black Blocairo” and “Egyptian Black Bloc” Facebook pages, but they were soon re-launched.

The site went on to say that Egyptian anarchists had firebombed the Shura Council.

As my colleague Robert Mackey reports, an Egyptian journalist, Sarah El Sirgany, wrote on Twitter, “Vendors tell me it was the Black Block group that attempted to storm the Ikhwan Online building sparking the fight.”

Later, she added, “Now those who had continued the fight are heading to Tahrir, flag of Black Block flying high.”

Opinion on the black bloc in Egypt was not united. In a place where sexual assaults and gropings have become common, one Twitter user, Ghazala Irshad ‏@ghazalairshad, seemed to sound an admiring note: “Egypt’s new Black Bloc (self-proclaimed anti-MB militia) has female members too — just saw one running wearing niqab & angle-length skirt.”

But the activist bloggers Gigi Ibrahim ‏and Adel Abdel Ghafar were more skeptical.

This week a man named Ahmed Ibrahim, who has previously posted YouTube videos that appear to be from Egypt, posted a video titled “Black Bloc Egypt.”

Accompanied by driving music the video shows masked people marching while holding aloft black banners, a black flag with an anarchy symbol and an Egyptian flag.

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Liberty Ross Files for Divorce from Rupert Sanders

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By Dahvi Shira





01/25/2013 at 08:20 PM EST







Liberty Ross


Michael Buckner/Wireimage


It's over for Rupert Sanders and Liberty Ross.

The Snow White and the Huntsman actress, 34, filed for divorce Friday from her director-husband Sanders, 41, in Los Angeles County Superior Court on Friday, PEOPLE confirms.

News of the filing comes about six months after Sanders's highly publicized cheating scandal with Huntsman's star, Kristen Stewart.

Stewart has since patched things up with boyfriend Robert Pattinson, who she was dating during the fling.

In the court documents, Ross seeks joint custody of the couple's two kids, 5 and 7, TMZ reports. She also asks for spousal support and attorney's fees.

Sanders, who has filed his response to the divorce petition, also seeks joint custody of the kids, and wants to share legal fees with Ross, according to TMZ.

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CDC: Flu seems to level off except in the West

Label:

New government figures show that flu cases seem to be leveling off nationwide. Flu activity is declining in most regions although still rising in the West.


The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says hospitalizations and deaths spiked again last week, especially among the elderly. The CDC says quick treatment with antiviral medicines is important, in particular for the very young or old. The season's first flu case resistant to treatment with Tamiflu was reported Friday.


Eight more children have died from the flu, bringing this season's total pediatric deaths to 37. About 100 children die in an average flu season.


There is still vaccine available although it may be hard to find. The CDC has a website that can help.


___


CDC: http://www.cdc.gov/flu/


Read More..

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