Plans being finalized for actor's wedding

SYDNEY, Australia -- The bride has arrived and so has Italian fashion designer Giorgio Armani with her dress. Despite a planning hiccup, the chapel is ready and tents are up to protect guests from the prying eyes of the media.

But that hasn't stopped reporters and photographers from trying to peek at the preparations for Russell Crowe's wedding to girlfriend Danielle Spencer -- mostly from helicopters hovering over the Oscar winner's ranch.

Crowe's publicist, Wendy Day, said Friday that news crews' attempts to cover the Monday nuptials were "irresponsible and outrageous."

"The (local) council has even acknowledged that these guys (helicopter operators), if you pay them enough, they'll be daredevils, they'll go below the safety line," Day said. "Frankly, I just think it's irresponsible and outrageous."

Crowe will marry Spencer on his 39th birthday in the family chapel on his ranch in the lush hills near Coffs Harbor, a resort town halfway between major east coast cities Sydney and Brisbane.

Meat Loaf announces final world tour dates

NEW YORK -- You can love Meat Loaf -- you can love him forever -- but you can't see him in concert for much longer.

The singer-actor is embarking on his final world tour, which will last 15 months. The U.S. portion is scheduled to begin June 22 in Saratoga, Calif., and end Sept. 29 in West Springfield, Mass. Then he'll travel to Europe, Australia and Asia before returning to Europe and the United States.

"He wants to tour and then devote himself to acting," his spokesman, Dan Forman at Susan Blond Inc., said Friday. "He has the acting bug -- he's been doing that for a while and he's appeared in some great films."

Meat Loaf's movies include "The Rocky Horror Picture Show," "Fight Club" and "Formula 51."

Born Marvin Lee Aday in Dallas, the 51-year-old singer made his name with theatrical stage productions and operatic songs, including "Paradise by the Dashboard Light," "Two Out of Three Ain't Bad" and "Bat Out of Hell." He won a Grammy for his 1993 hit "I'd Do Anything For Love (But I Won't Do That)."

RA201 Binoche; AXJA104 Dean

LONDON -- Paul McCartney says he was inspired by his young four-piece band to breathe new life into old Beatles classics for his European tour.

"I used to have a very, very strict view that the Beatles stuff was sacrosanct. It's slightly different this time and that mainly came from the band," McCartney said in an interview published Friday in The Times newspaper.

The singer's first European tour in a decade, which began in Paris last week and comes to Britain this weekend, includes at least 15 Beatles songs such as "Lady Madonna," "All My Loving" and "I Saw Her Standing There."

The tour includes a free concert outside Rome's Coliseum in May that's expected to attract an audience of up 300,000.

Many songs being featured have never been played on stage because there wasn't the technology to reproduce live tracks from "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band," "Abbey Road" and "Let It Be."

Reviews of the sellout American leg of the tour last year noted that the renditions of the Beatles standards were less reverent and more edgy.

McCartney, 60, said he didn't direct his band how to play but said he was delighted when guitarist Rusty Anderson began playing his own version of George Harrison's solo on one song.

"He just started playing a solo, and I thought, that's nice. I like what he plays -- and I like the idea that he changes it each night," he said.

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MAYS LANDING, N.J. (AP) -- The former head of the Miss America Pageant has won a summary judgment in his lawsuit against pageant officials, claiming they breached a confidential agreement reached when he resigned last year.

Robert Renneisen Jr., a former casino executive, will receive an undisclosed settlement under the order issued March 12, The Press of Atlantic City reported in Friday's editions. The ruling came after pageant officials had sought to have the lawsuit dismissed.

Renneisen, who served as the pageant's CEO for two years before stepping down last March, filed the lawsuit last May. According to court papers, he agreed to a separation agreement in which he'd receive $265,000, less any tax or other lawful withholdings.

Both parties also agreed to keep the agreement confidential and, if one discussed the deal publicly, the other could go to court and seek a $100,000 judgment against the offending party.

Renneisen claimed his successor, George Bauer, had mentioned his name improperly in comments he made to newspaper reporters after he resigned. Bauer told reporters he'd been hired by the pageant to take some of the burden off Renneisen, who had suffered a heart attack.

Renneisen said he didn't think Bauer was trying to disparage him, but feared that those comments could hurt his chances of getting another job. He declined to comment on the lawsuit or the judge's decision.

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NORMAN, Okla. (AP) -- Veteran actor and Oklahoma native James Garner is giving $500,000 to help aspiring actors at the University of Oklahoma.

Garner's gift will be used to endow a $1 million faculty chair in the university's School of Drama.

The university will request matching funds from state regents to create the James Garner Chair in Drama, the drama school's first endowed position. The chair will be designated for the director of the school.

"It is appropriate that the first endowed chair in drama would come from James Garner, who has remained so dedicated to the university and to his hometown of Norman throughout his nationally acclaimed career as an actor," OU President David Boren said.

Garner, 74, got choked up as he spoke to the standing-room-only campus crowd that gathered for the announcement.

"Oh, has somebody got a Kleenex?" the Norman native said. "Strangely enough, I have a fear of public speaking. I don't have it in front of a camera because I know I can always do it over."

Garner has starred in several TV series including "Maverick" and "The Rockford Files." He also has made more than 40 movies, including "Murphy's Romance," for which he received an Academy Award nomination in 1985.

OU's School of Drama, founded in 1903, is the oldest drama school west of the Mississippi River and the second-oldest university theater school in the United States.

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LOS ANGELES (AP) -- Former U.S. Education Secretary and federal anti-drug czar William Bennett is taking the 1960s-style teach-in where it has seldom been before -- to the right.

Bennett stopped at the University of California, Los Angeles, this week during a cross-country tour of college campuses intended to convince students that the war in Iraq is justified.

"Did we have sufficient reason and motivation and justification to go into Iraq?" Bennett asked his audience of 300 Wednesday night. "Absolutely. It's a dangerous world. It's a particularly dangerous world since 9-11. The threshold for action has been lowered."

Bennett said he's determined that teach-ins not be the exclusive province of liberals and leftists.

He launched the campus initiative, which is funded by private donations, in March 2002. He argues that most of the hostility to conservative causes on college campuses comes from the faculty, not the students.

"Usually, you get something of a chill from the faculty and administration," Bennett said before Wednesday's teach-in. "We're not welcomed to campus by any adults."

Although a handful of protesters held signs during the appearance, the audience was quiet and attentive.

"I was surprised to see how people were listening, there was polite applause," said Henry Kerner, a UCLA graduate who attended. "I don't think everyone agreed, but they were open-minded. I was really proud of my alma mater."

Bennett was President Reagan's education secretary from 1985-88 and President George H.W. Bush's drug czar from 1989-90.

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CAPE TOWN, South Africa (AP) -- French actress Juliette Binoche said portraying a journalist covering South Africa's Truth and Reconciliation Commission has been "emotional and demanding."

Binoche is shooting "Country of My Skull" in Cape Town. The film, directed by John Boorman and co-starring Samuel L. Jackson, is based on the book by Antjie Krog.

The Truth and Reconciliation Commission, which ended in 1998, investigated political crimes during the decades of racist apartheid rule in South Africa in an attempt to heal the wounds of apartheid.

Maintaining that the country couldn't move into a peaceful future without understanding its past, amnesty was granted to perpetrators willing to tell the truth about their crimes.

"(The film) is about the horror," said Binoche, 39, who won an Oscar for 1996's "The English Patient."

Boorman told reporters that the movie would do justice to the country's painful past, the South African Press Association reported Thursday.

"Everyone is conscious of what the (commission) has been for South Africa in this period of transition," Boorman said. "We are determined to make it as accurate and serious as we can."

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NEW YORK (AP) -- Former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean has taken one more step that demonstrates he's a presidential candidate: He's writing a book.

Simon & Schuster, which also has deals with likely Democratic contenders Sen. Joseph Lieberman of Connecticut and Sen. John Edwards of North Carolina, announced Thursday that it has reached an agreement with Dean for a book to come out this fall.

Financial terms weren't disclosed.

According to Simon & Schuster, Dean's book, not yet titled, will focus on "his life, his political accomplishments and his vision for America in the future."

Dean, a physician, served as governor of Vermont for 11 years before stepping down in January.