All of you Usher fans should bow down and be utterly thankful to that old walking negro spiritual he calls a wife (yeah, I said it) for finally giving him her permission to return to the studio to complete the follow-up to his history-making, 9x platinum-selling 2004 release Confessions which crowned Usher as the only R&B artist in Soundscan music history to sale more than 1 million copies in its first week. Usher spent 40 weeks in the No. 1 position on The Billboard Hot 100– which is more than any other male artist in the nearly 50 year history of the chart.
Citing Chris Rock's character's most memorable line in the movie Boomerang: 'First the Fat Boys break up, and now this.' I swear on everything I know, the CW is most definitely trying to make me have a coronary conniption. First, they abruptly cancel Girlfriends without giving the cast a proper send-off, now they've gone and announced their fall 2009 line-up and guess what? There's no mention of whether or not The Game, which is a spin-off of Girlfriends, will ever return. I mean, really! It's bad enough we don't have any drama series with a predominately black cast on any major television network (the last one I remember was City of Angels with Vivica A. Fox--before she was replaced with Gabrielle Union, Blair Underwood, Hill Harper, Niecy Nash and Maya Rudolph) and now they want to take this away from us too?!!
Bow Wow, Evan Ross, Chi McBride and The Great Debaters star Jermaine Williams are confirmed to star in the independent film Driving Lessons, according to the Hollywood Reporter. The comedy stars Hope Davis as a woman who takes advantage of her sudden memory loss and tries to mend fences with her husband and evangelical, right wing son after having an interracial affair with her neighbor. McBride will play the neighbor, while Bow Wow and Williams will suit up as wannabe thugs who bring havoc to the rest of the characters. Selma Blair has been cast as a sardonic lesbian high school teacher who has an affair with one of her students. Production is scheduled to begin next month in Los Angeles for a 2009 theatrical release.
The award-winning family comedy series, Everybody Hates Chris from co-creator and narrator Chris Rock, will join the Nick At Nite line-up in fall, 2009, according to Cyma Zarghami, President of Nickelodeon/MTVN Kids and Family Group. "Following in the success we've had with George Lopez and Home Improvement, this show has all the makings to be our next big hit for kids and parents on Nick At Nite," Zarghami said. "Chris Rock is a comedic genius hugely popular with adults, and he's created a great kid-centric character and story that will be relevant to both our kid and adult audience. It's a great addition for us." Beginning September 2009, Nick At Nite will become the exclusive basic cable home to the half-hour series which stars Tyler James Williams as Chris, Terry Crews as Julius, Tichina Arnold as Rochelle, Tequan Richmond as Drew, Imani Hakim as Tonya and Vincent Martella as Greg.
I don't know about yall, but the last time I saw Lauryn Hill graced the big screen was when she played a small role in the 1997 movie, Hav Plenty. Now reports are surfacing that the troubled-singer has been handpicked by Bob Marley's widow, Rita Marley to portray her in an all-new biopic on the life of her late husband. "Lauryn would be ideal. She sees my life as her life." Marley told Reuters of Hill, who is married to Rohan Marley (Bob Marley's son with Janet Hunt). Rita Marley is executive producing the as-yet-untitled adaptation of her 2004 autobiography No Woman No Cry: My Life With Bob Marley, a chronicle of the musician's childhood and their tumultuous 15-year marriage through his death from cancer in 1981. Producer Rudy Langlais (The Hurricane) says the film will be an "epic romance," including the Marleys' life and the assassination attempt on the couple. "It's miraculous that Rita is still here after being shot in the head," he says. 
Quincy Jones' daughter Rashida says she has suffered and endured racism throughout her life all because she's biracial. The 32-year-old (who stars in Fox's Unhitched sitcom--Sunday nights at 9:30) star's father is black and her mother, actress Peggy Lipton is a white Jewish woman. And Jones claims her looks--particularly her skin complexion and hair texture--alienated her from black and white social groups while she attended Harvard University, where she was turned away from pledging an all-black sorority. She says, "I definitely learned my lesson. I'm back to that place were I'm like, 'You know what? I'm black, I'm white, I'm Jewish, I'm Irish, I'm Portuguese, I'm Welsh, what the f*ck ever.' To me it's so inconsequential. People still say things to me like, 'Oh my god, you're black? I would've never guessed that.' And I just think, I can't help your ignorance. There are bi-racial people who look like me or who look like Alicia Keys or who look like Halle Berry. I'm so proud to be so many things."
Multi-platinum-selling artist, Janet Jackson says she is considering freezing her eggs so she never grows too old to become a mommy. The singer/actress, 41, fears she's leaving motherhood a little late and is pondering her options. During her appearance on The Tyra Banks Show on Tuesday (March 4), Jackson revealed she's willing to let science help her out, telling Banks, "I'll have kids some day... My doctor thinks about that, believe you me." This isn't the first time Janet mentioned freezing her eggs for future use. As previously reported, says she's fed up with family and friends' attempts to persuade her to have a baby - because she isn't ready to become a mother. Jackson says although she eventually wants to start a family with Dupri, she still isn't convinced she is mature enough to raise a child. "I just have to hurry up. I get so much pressure from people I don't even know and I think, 'My God, am I missing my moment?' Even my mother mentioned something to me the other day. But now you can have your eggs frozen and there are all sorts of things you can do. I've got to get a little more kid out of me first before I move on and be childish with my child."
When it comes to birthing babies and whatnot, Mariah Carey's outlook on raising a child mirrors Janet's...sort of. Carey says she has no plans to enter into motherhood anytime soon - because she still struggles to look after her puppy. The singer, 38, admits she cannot imagine starting a family at this point in her life, because she won't be able to dedicate her full attention to her offspring. She says, "Obviously, having a kid is a commitment for life. I really would have to be very, very positive that I was in a place where I could completely focus and put everything into the job of being someone's mommy, because it's hard enough to have a puppy." (Peep Mariah--click on the pic on the right--feeding her pooch a hamburger while vacationing in St. Tropez)
The video for Gnarls Barkley's new single, Run, may feature a cameo from Justin Timberlake, but it's still not quite ready to air on MTV. That's because of its strobe effects, which caused the clip to fail the Harding Test -- guidelines established to prevent TV images from triggering epileptic seizures. However, the Happy-directed video is available on various online outlets, and Gnarls Barkley's Danger Mouse tells Billboard he's hopeful the situation can be resolved shortly. "I don't know exactly what's going on, but we're having issues. I think [the video] is cool. It works for me. But I'm not necessarily that easily seasick," he says with a laugh. "We can't predict how people are going to interpret it."
