The BBC is hoping that its decision to suspend Jonathan Ross for 12 weeks will end the crisis caused by crude prank phone calls he made with Russell Brand on a radio show, media commentators said on Friday.
While newspapers generally welcomed the corporation’s action against Ross, one of the BBC’s highest paid presenters, the decision by Lesley Douglas, the head of Radio 2, to quit over the furor was greeted with sadness.
The BBC acted on Thursday after the “deplorable” messages left on actor Andrew Sachs’ phone drew 30,000 complaints, criticism from Prime Minister Gordon Brown and media condemnation.
Following an emergency meeting between BBC Director-General Mark Thompson and the BBC Trust, the BBC’s independent governing body, Ross, 47, was suspended without pay but kept his job for what Thompson described as his “utterly unacceptable” behavior.
However, Thompson said it was a “final warning” for Ross, who has been suspended for 12 weeks.
Douglas, who was appointed controller of the music and chat station in 2003, then made the decision to quit.
The prank had already led to the resignation of Brand, 33, a flamboyant comic who has branched out into acting in Hollywood films including the romantic comedy Forgetting Sarah Marshall.
The row erupted after the duo joked Brand had slept with the granddaughter of 78-year-old Sachs, who played Spanish waiter Manuel in the cult comedy series Fawlty Towers.
They also joked that Sachs might kill himself after hearing messages left on his phone.
Newspapers said the BBC had taken far too long to take action and Douglas was a victim.
The new James Bond film, Quantum of Solace, debuted in Britain on Friday to record one-day ticket sales of US$8 million, distributor Columbia Pictures said on Saturday. The total tops Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, the previous record holder with an opening day haul of US$6.5 million in 2005, and it also beat the US$4.72 million first-day total for the last Bond flick, Casino Royale (2006), Columbia said.
Fashion icon Victoria Beckham is the spokeswoman for the new Armani fashion house lingerie line following in the footsteps of husband David Beckham, who also appeared in the fashion house’s underwear campaign.
The company said Friday that Beckham will debut in the spring-summer 2009 advertising campaign of Emporio Armani women’s underwear.
Giorgio Armani called the former “Posh Spice’’ of the Spice Girls a “style icon, a dynamic lady whose influence and recognition will add great excitement’’ to the ad campaign.
Joaquin Phoenix is quitting movies to focus on music.
“He has said that Two Lovers is his last. But this is not strange. Joaquin has been directing music videos and been involved in music for the last number of years,’’ Susan Patricola, Phoenix’s publicist, said Friday.
Phoenix first talked about his decision to Extra last week while attending a fundraiser in San Francisco, abruptly ending the interview after the reporter wondered whether he was joking.
Patrick Swayze, filming again less than a year after being given a grim diagnosis of pancreatic cancer, described chemotherapy as “hell on wheels” but said work had kept him feeling positive. Swayze, 56, best known for his dance instructor role in the movie Dirty Dancing, underwent months of chemotherapy and an experimental drug treatment to beat one of the most virulent forms of cancer, which experts say has only a 5 percent five-year survival rate.
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