Filmmaker Morgan Spurlock was nominated for an Oscar for his McDonald's documentary Super Size Me, but the reviews were mixed for a profanitylaced, politically incorrect speech he gave to several hundred high school students.
Spurlock, who ate nothing but McDonald's meals for 30 days to make his Oscar-nominated 2004 documentary Super Size Me, spoke Friday at Hatboro-Horsham High School in suburban Philadelphia during its first-ever Health and Wellness Fair.
In his hourlong presen-tation before 700 students, Spurlock joked about the intelligence of McDonald's employees, using an Indian accent as he imitated a cashier trying to figure out how to ring up a Quarter Pounder hamburger. He also joked about ``retarded kids in the back wearing helmets'' and teachers smoking pot in the balcony.
PHOTO: AP
There actually were special education students in the back row. Teachers led them out during the hourlong presentation.
``If you put the whole package together, the use of the F-word and poking fun at teachers and the comments about special-needs students, it just wasn't appropriate,'' Superintendent William Lessa said.
Spurlock said he has never had a complaint after giving similar talks at other high schools and colleges.
``The greatest lesson those kids learned today was the importance of free speech,'' he said. ``I didn't talk to them the way most lecturers do and bore them. I made an unaccessible [sic] topic accessible and left the room with more friends than enemies.''
Pio Leyva, a singer and composer in the Buena Vista Social Club band of veteran Cuban musicians, died on Thursday of a heart attack. He was 88. Leyva, who won a bongo contest at the age of six and made his singing debut in 1932, had suffered a stroke on Sunday and died early Thursday morning in hospital, his daughter Rosalia said.
Bon Jovi lead guitarist Richie Sambora is seeking joint custody of his eight-year-old daughter with actress Heather Locklear, who filed for divorce last month after 11 years of marriage.
In papers filed in Los Angeles Superior Court on March 17, Sambora asks for joint physical and legal custody of the estranged couple's daughter, Ava Elizabeth, and requests the pair's premarital agreement be enforced.
Sambora also asked the court to terminate its jurisdiction to award spousal support for Locklear.
Aerosmith singer Steven Tyler will undergo throat surgery this week, forcing the veteran rock band to scrap the remaining 12 dates on its North American tour, a spokeswoman said on Tuesday. Tyler, who turned 58 yesterday, will be unable to sing for two to three months following the operation. The spokeswoman declined to elaborate on his condition.
When it comes to furniture and his love for Katie Holmes, Tom Cruise just can't help himself.
The megastar was the guest of honor at Yahoo's quarterly Influential Speakers event Tuesday at the company's headquarters in Sunny-vale, California, bantering with chief executive Terry Semel and answering questions from the crowd.
After an impromptu armwrestling match with Semel, Cruise jestingly recreated his Oprah sofa-hopping episode, this time on a chair, to trumpet his joy about his fiancee and their soon-to-arrive offspring. Then he brought the heavily pregnant Holmes onto the stage, where he beamed and patted her round belly. And, yes, he then sealed the interlude with a kiss.
A judge said on Thursday he would take control of Marion "Suge" Knight's assets, including his Death Row Records label, after finding the rap mogul had avoided paying a US$107 million civil court judgment. Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Ronald Sohigian said Knight, who co-founded Death Row with rapper Dr. Dre in the early 1990s and helped launch the careers of performers Snoop Dogg and Tupac Shakur, could stave off the order if he fully disclosed his assets in a debtor's exam set for April 1.
J.R.R. Tolkien's epic tale The Lord of the Rings, recast as the most expensive musical ever produced, opened in Toronto late Thursday to wretched reviews.
"It feels rushed, not so much in tempo as in lack of weight," the National Post said of the three-and-a-half-hour play, watched by some 2,000 guests at the Princess of Wales theater.
The Daily Telegraph in London, where producers said the world premiere would have been launched had there been a theater available during preparations, said the US$24-million play proved "you can't always solve a problem by chucking money at it."
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