Nothing quite stirs a media frenzy like an heiress to a hotel fortune preparing to surrender all the trappings of luxury for a three-week stay in the county jail.
The countdown to Paris Hilton's incarceration next week has sent the tabloid press into overdrive with stories alternately portraying her as a newly tearful, spiritual socialite or an unrepentant party girl kicking up her heels with the likes of Lindsay Lohan at Hollywood nightspots.
Either way, Hilton is in for a change of pace during the jail time she was ordered to serve after police caught her behind the wheel of her Bentley without a valid license earlier this year, violating probation for a prior drunken-driving offense.
PHOTO: AP
The 26-year-old "celebutante" has been ordered to report to the Century Regional Detention Facility near Los Angeles by tomorrow to start serving her term, which already has been cut from 45 days to 23 days under state sentencing guidelines.
Once she reports, Hilton will forsake her designer clothes, cell phone and other accessories — along with her freedom and privacy — for an orange jumpsuit and a small, Spartan cell with twin bunks and metal toilet (no seat, no lid).
County Sheriff Lee Baca told the Los Angeles Times that steps have been taken to ensure no one smuggles in a camera to get pictures of the jailed Hilton, which would be of immense value to the tabloid media.
But a shortage of cameras behind bars doesn't necessarily mean Hilton is ready to surrender her vanity or fashion sense.
Under the headline: "Before the slammer, Paris planning some glamour," the New York Daily News reported that designers were ordered to Hilton's home to give her a pre-jail makeover.
While Hilton is going to jail, actor Hugh Grant will not face charges over claims he attacked a photographer with a tub of baked beans and kicked at him, the Crown Prosecution Service said on Saturday.
The clash between the star of Four Weddings and a Funeral and photographer Ian Whittaker took place near Grant's London home in April. Whittaker alleged that Grant attacked him after he reportedly tried to take photographs of Grant's former girlfriend Liz Hurley, who lives nearby.
There was too little evidence to charge the 46-year-old actor over the kicking "because there were clear discrepancies between the accounts of independent witnesses and those of the photographers involved," the CPS said in a statement.
"In relation to a second allegation involving a discarded take-away food container, the CPS decided that a prosecution would not be in the public interest in light of the minimal nature of the alleged assault, the lack of premeditation on the part of Mr Grant and the overall circumstances of the incident," it said.
Actor Paul Newman is giving US$10 million to Kenyon College, the Ohio school from which he graduated, to establish its single largest scholarship fund.
The Gambier, Ohio-based school said in a statement on Friday the gift by Newman and the Newman's Own Foundation was part of the college's US$230 million fund-raising campaign, along with US$35 million from two other donors.
"This fund ... is meant to be more than just a gift to a college," Newman, 82, said in a statement. "I believe strongly that we should be doing whatever we can to make all higher education opportunities available to deserving students."
Newman, a 1949 graduate of Kenyon, and his wife, actress Joanne Woodward, were the honorary chairs of Kenyon's most recent fund-raising campaign from 1998 to 2001, the college said.
Last month, Newman, who won an Oscar for The Color of Money, and earned nine other Academy Award nominations for films such as The Hustler, Hud and Cool Hand Luke, said he was retiring from acting. He is also the founder of a food company, Newman's Own, to fund charities.
At Kenyon, Newman studied English, theater and economics and started a popular laundry service to earn extra money.
"I owe Kenyon a great deal," he said. "I even started my first business there, and I depended on that extra US$60 a week. I personally feel great affection and a debt of gratitude for Kenyon."
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