(CBS) Celebrity addiction expert Dr. Drew Pinsky is weighing in on Britney Spears' problems, saying that the pop star could die if she doesn't get the help she needs. Although the doctor has never treated Spears personally, he told Ellen DeGeneres on her talk show Tuesday, "We are watching somebody who is following the Anna Nicole Smith blueprint to the letter. She's keeping people around her that allow her to keep using and that supports her denial. "She leaves the country, like Anna Nicole, she keeps using; she doesn't follow directions of people."
Spears was taken to Cedars-Sinai Medical Center by paramedics Jan. 10, after police were called to her home because of a custody dispute with ex-husband Kevin Federline over their two young sons. She checked herself out of the hospital two days later.
According to Pinsky, California law does not force drug and alcohol users to remain in treatment long enough to get the help they need.
"You can also only be held against your will for a very short period of time and if you refuse to follow up and take treatment, you're within your right to do that - even if it's killing you. This is a serious medical problem," he said. "This young lady - she is dying in front of our eyes. She needs physician care regularly for a sustained period of time." Pinsky, who's head of the Department of Chemical Dependency Services at Pasadena's Las Encinas Hospital and star of the VH1 reality show "Celebrity Rehab," says he would use a treatment plan similar to one that may be helping another troubled star.
"If I were to treat her, I'd put her in 4-6 weeks of an intensive program in a psychiatric hospital and a year of a residential program very much like what Lindsay Lohan did," he said.
On Monday, a Superior Court commissioner decided to uphold an earlier order suspending Spears' visitation rights to her two sons. Spears was at the courthouse for the hearing, but left before even entering the building. Another hearing is scheduled for Feb. 19. Spears was "trembling," according to the head of a paparazzi agency who says he spoke with the pop star's new boyfriend. Sheeraz Hasan, founder and CEO of Hollywood.TV, told Early Show co-anchor Julie Chen Tuesday that he'd spoken with Spears' new beau, photographer Adnan Ghalib, as the media crush was unfolding Monday. Hasan says Ghalib told him Spears was "really nervous" and "really panicking" when she was being mobbed by the media at the courthouse, and opted to skip the hearing and go to church, feeling she had, at that instant, "no one to turn to, except God."
Tuesday, January 15, 2008
Monday, January 14, 2008
Spears must go to court for custody of kids
BEIJING, Jan. 14 (Xinhuanet)-- U.S. pop singer Britney Spears would have to appear in court in person on Monday if she wants to restore the right to see her children, media reported. "I don't know if she will be there," Federline's attorney Mark Vincent Kaplan was quoted as saying.
If she comes to court, she "will have the opportunity to persuade the court that she can have some visitation under monitored conditions," said Kaplan, adding that it will be "the most significant hearing in the case so far."
Police were preparing for possible media frenzy in the downtown civic center if Spears appears. They issued warnings on Sunday that vehicle and pedestrian violations would lead to summons.
On Jan. 3, Spears refused to return the boys to her ex-husband Kevin Federline at her home. Later there was a standoff, and Spears was sent to hospital in an ambulance.
On Jan. 4, her former husband Federline was awarded sole legal and physical custody of their two boys and Spears' visitation rights were suspended.
Basshunter pips Britney to top chart
LONDON (Reuters) - Basshunter's Euro dance track "Now You're Gone" fought off troubled pop star Britney Spears to become Britain's new number one single.
Spears's single "Piece of Me" climbed 17 places to two, but Basshunter -- the pseudonym used by Swedish DJ Jonas Altberg -- went one better as "Now You're Gone" rose 13 places to take top spot, the Official UK Charts Company said on Sunday.
Earlier this month Spears spent almost two days in a Los Angeles hospital after being taken from her home on a stretcher follow a standoff with police after hysterically refusing to hand back her two children to ex-husband Kevin Federline.
Spears's life has careered out of control since she divorced Federline in 2006. She lost custody of the boys last year.
Soulja Boy's "Crank That (Soulja Boy)" dropped one place to three, with Canadian rock band Nickelback's "Rockstar" at four, while former X-Factor winner Leon Jackson -- last week's number one -- slipped to number five with "When You Believe".
There was just one new entry in the singles chart's top 10 with U.S. rapper Lupe Fiasco and "Superstar" coming in at number seven.
The album charts also had a new number one with Scottish singer-songwriter Amy MacDonald's debut long player -- "This is The Life" -- pushing rock band Radiohead's "In Rainbows" down to two.
The success of MacDonald, whose record first entered the charts in August, ensured the Oxford-based quintet's seventh studio album held top spot for just one week.
There were no new entries in the album chart's top 10, though Led Zeppelin singer Robert Plant's collaboration with bluegrass singer Alison Krauss -- "Raising Sand" -- made a strong showing, rising 16 places to number six.
Spears's single "Piece of Me" climbed 17 places to two, but Basshunter -- the pseudonym used by Swedish DJ Jonas Altberg -- went one better as "Now You're Gone" rose 13 places to take top spot, the Official UK Charts Company said on Sunday.
Earlier this month Spears spent almost two days in a Los Angeles hospital after being taken from her home on a stretcher follow a standoff with police after hysterically refusing to hand back her two children to ex-husband Kevin Federline.
Spears's life has careered out of control since she divorced Federline in 2006. She lost custody of the boys last year.
Soulja Boy's "Crank That (Soulja Boy)" dropped one place to three, with Canadian rock band Nickelback's "Rockstar" at four, while former X-Factor winner Leon Jackson -- last week's number one -- slipped to number five with "When You Believe".
There was just one new entry in the singles chart's top 10 with U.S. rapper Lupe Fiasco and "Superstar" coming in at number seven.
The album charts also had a new number one with Scottish singer-songwriter Amy MacDonald's debut long player -- "This is The Life" -- pushing rock band Radiohead's "In Rainbows" down to two.
The success of MacDonald, whose record first entered the charts in August, ensured the Oxford-based quintet's seventh studio album held top spot for just one week.
There were no new entries in the album chart's top 10, though Led Zeppelin singer Robert Plant's collaboration with bluegrass singer Alison Krauss -- "Raising Sand" -- made a strong showing, rising 16 places to number six.
Police Brace For Spears Media Blitz At Civic Center
LOS ANGELES -- Police will be on hand to deal with the crowds likely to swarm the Civic Center Monday when troubled pop star Britney Spears has a divorce court date, the LAPD announced Sunday.
The gossip web site and TV show TMZ.com, quoting sources within the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Office, said that negotiations have broken down on arranging secure parking and crowd control around Spears as she arrives and departs the County Courthouse.
Recent court and public appearances by Spears have resulted in chaotic jostling. Dozens of freelance photographers, passersby with cellphone cameras, and tourists interfered with police and fire crews at the star's hillside home a week ago, when she was taken in a city ambulance to Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, reportedly for a mental health check.
The 26-year-old singer is expected to appear in Los Angeles Superior Court at 9:30 a.m. Monday for a custody hearing concerning her two sons with ex-husband Kevin Federline, 29.
Uniformed Los Angeles Police Department and Department of Transportation personnel will be on hand to "facilitate the flow of vehicle and pedestrian traffic" outside the Los Angeles Superior Courthouse at Hill and Temple streets, the LAPD said Sunday.
"We want to let the media know that we will do all we can to facilitate their coverage. But in the event that the coverage of Ms. Spears causes traffic issues, pedestrian issues, etc. and violations are occurring, the Department is prepared to cite those committing infractions," a written statement issued by the LAPD said.
Officers will be cracking down on illegal parking, pedestrian violations, blocking of crosswalks and/or entrances, obstructing vehicle traffic and other rules of the California Vehicle Code and the Los Angeles Municipal Code, authorities said.
TMZ.com also said that Spears' lawyers are telling her she must appear, at jeopardy of losing all rights to see her two sons.
Just last week, police were called when paparazzi trailing Spears allegedly assaulted a security guard at the Four Seasons Hotel.
Spears apparently went to the Four Seasons Hotel on Doheny Drive and Burton Way, where she was escorted out by hotel security, the Daily News reported.
Paparazzi were in tow, and one of them kicked a security guard, who called police, the newspaper reported.
"LAPD took a battery report from the security guard but the paparazzi wasn't there," said LAPD spokesman Mike Lopez. "We're looking for a male, with a camera."
The gossip web site and TV show TMZ.com, quoting sources within the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Office, said that negotiations have broken down on arranging secure parking and crowd control around Spears as she arrives and departs the County Courthouse.
Recent court and public appearances by Spears have resulted in chaotic jostling. Dozens of freelance photographers, passersby with cellphone cameras, and tourists interfered with police and fire crews at the star's hillside home a week ago, when she was taken in a city ambulance to Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, reportedly for a mental health check.
The 26-year-old singer is expected to appear in Los Angeles Superior Court at 9:30 a.m. Monday for a custody hearing concerning her two sons with ex-husband Kevin Federline, 29.
Uniformed Los Angeles Police Department and Department of Transportation personnel will be on hand to "facilitate the flow of vehicle and pedestrian traffic" outside the Los Angeles Superior Courthouse at Hill and Temple streets, the LAPD said Sunday.
"We want to let the media know that we will do all we can to facilitate their coverage. But in the event that the coverage of Ms. Spears causes traffic issues, pedestrian issues, etc. and violations are occurring, the Department is prepared to cite those committing infractions," a written statement issued by the LAPD said.
Officers will be cracking down on illegal parking, pedestrian violations, blocking of crosswalks and/or entrances, obstructing vehicle traffic and other rules of the California Vehicle Code and the Los Angeles Municipal Code, authorities said.
TMZ.com also said that Spears' lawyers are telling her she must appear, at jeopardy of losing all rights to see her two sons.
Just last week, police were called when paparazzi trailing Spears allegedly assaulted a security guard at the Four Seasons Hotel.
Spears apparently went to the Four Seasons Hotel on Doheny Drive and Burton Way, where she was escorted out by hotel security, the Daily News reported.
Paparazzi were in tow, and one of them kicked a security guard, who called police, the newspaper reported.
"LAPD took a battery report from the security guard but the paparazzi wasn't there," said LAPD spokesman Mike Lopez. "We're looking for a male, with a camera."
Janice Dickinson on Britney: ‘I’d slap her silly!’
Self-proclaimed original supermodel also says Lynne Spears should be jailedThe always outspoken Janice Dickinson sat down with Access Hollywood's Tony Potts and unleashed her thoughts on Britney Spears, Spears' mom and Dr. Phil.
Dickinson feels in order to get to the root of Spears' problems, Lynne Spears should be held responsible.
"My opinion on Britney Spears, is Mrs. [Lynne] Spears should be jailed. Britney's mom is responsible for all this stuff going on."
As for how Dickinson would handle Spears?
"I'd slap her silly! I'd slap the living s**t out of her!" Dickinson told Potts.
After taking a moment to seriously consider the question, Dickinson told Potts, "I would beg Britney just to give it all up. I would say. 'You're rich enough! Give it up and try to focus on the two boys.' I seriously hope that Britney doesn't kill herself. I seriously hope that she doesn't damage herself."
But Spears and her mother were not the only ones Dickinson was taking on. As for her thoughts on Dr. Phil, the former model said, "I think Dr. Phil is pathetic. Pathetic sensationalism."
Dickinson has faced her own set of demons. Now in recovery, Dickinson has had multiple stints in rehab. She credits the Alcoholic Anonymous Twelve Step program with saving her life.
"I am an alcoholic and a chemically dependent person, said Dickinson. "I would just beg Britney to try to find a twelve-step program for her that works, because, like [with] myself, it can happen again and again until you finally find it. Thank God I found it."
Dickinson and all her antics can be seen Tuesdays on Oxygen on "The Janice Dickinson Modeling Agency."
Baying for blood at the Britney Spears rodeo
The gossip rags are hoping it gets worse (for Britney) so they can make a bigger profit
I HAVE long dreamed of getting ringside seats at Madison Square Garden, but my nocturnal fantasies usually centre around rock concerts or basketball games.
They certainly don’t include cowboys and bulls.
Last Saturday night, I accompanied my friend Lauren Glassberg to the Professional Bull Riders’ Invitational. Whoa, I hear you say. And whoa would be right. The PBR Invitational is a rodeo with wild bulls instead of horses.
Glassberg, a TV News reporter for WABC’s Channel 7 and a native New Yorker who should have been the fifth woman on Sex and the City, was covering the event, and, after flirting with the cowboys, we were given the best seats in the house, so close to the action that a bull kicked gravel down my cleavage.
Professional bull riding is billed as “the toughest sport on dirt”. The concept behind holding this event in New York?
The toughest sport meets the toughest city, though that didn’t seem to stop the MC from asking the crowd for “a little New York hospitality”.
Whatever that is. I felt like I had walked off the streets of true blue Manhattan into red-hot Bush country.
There were adverts for the US army and billboards for chewing tobacco, Jack Daniel’s, Wrangler jeans and pick-up trucks. Men wore Stetsons and T-shirts that read: “Real men last eight seconds.”
Everybody seemed to walk a little funny, and there was a whole lot of spitting going on.
When Jewel trotted by us to go backstage before re-emerging in the ring to sing the national anthem, we mistook her for Pamela Anderson. Big blonde hair and boobs was a definite theme.
The whole idea behind this testosterone-laced happening is that bull-riding superstars from the US, Brazil, Mexico, Australia and Canada gather to see who can stay on the bull for at least eight seconds. These guys can earn more than $4-million for their pain. And it has to hurt.
When the three-time champion of the PBR Invitational, a Brazilian named Adriano Moraes, took to the stage, Glassberg leaned over and whispered:
“Isn’t he cute?” (He is). And then: “His face is reconstructed from titanium plates.” As Moraes mounted his bull and the animal begun to buck furiously under him,
she whispered: “I wonder if they can have kids?” Good question.
Moments later, a bull named Scaredy Cat threw his rider to the ground and stomped on his ear, drawing blood. The crowd groaned. After a bull called Carlito’s Way had had his way with another cowboy, a clown began to do a rendition of Britney Spears’s Baby One More Time, which brings me to the subject of the world’s most maligned pop diva, and the bloodthirstiness that we have developed for her downfall. Before I went to the PBR Invitational, I was planning to dedicate this column to her latest meltdown. But having a mental breakdown is not a spectator sport and neither should having a hard time be one. I don’t know if she has an undiagnosed bipolar condition or if she is just highly manipulative, selfish and addicted to drugs and the media attention that she seems to court, but the vitriolic attention and the paparazzi baying for her blood even when she’s being wheeled away on a gurney cannot lead to anything but further harm for her and her children.
Make no mistake: the gossip rags who pay for the pictures are hoping it gets worse so they can make a bigger profit.
And then there are the bandwagon riders. From Dr Phil, who tried to film a special show from her hospital room (he swears the Spears family asked him to intervene), to a rock group called Bandarazzi who performed in front of the ambulance that was removing her from her home so they can include it in their music video. When she was admitted to hospital, we heard howls of outrage on newspaper websites and blogs demanding that the media stop goring her due to her apparent fragility. What needs to stop is our demand for this kind of news. If you are buying into the frenzy, obsessively refreshing TMZ.com for the latest update, know that you will have blood on your hands too should she end up like Anna Nicole Smith.
The bulls have animal-rights supporters picketing for them outside Madison Square Garden. Who does Spears have?
I HAVE long dreamed of getting ringside seats at Madison Square Garden, but my nocturnal fantasies usually centre around rock concerts or basketball games.
They certainly don’t include cowboys and bulls.
Last Saturday night, I accompanied my friend Lauren Glassberg to the Professional Bull Riders’ Invitational. Whoa, I hear you say. And whoa would be right. The PBR Invitational is a rodeo with wild bulls instead of horses.
Glassberg, a TV News reporter for WABC’s Channel 7 and a native New Yorker who should have been the fifth woman on Sex and the City, was covering the event, and, after flirting with the cowboys, we were given the best seats in the house, so close to the action that a bull kicked gravel down my cleavage.
Professional bull riding is billed as “the toughest sport on dirt”. The concept behind holding this event in New York?
The toughest sport meets the toughest city, though that didn’t seem to stop the MC from asking the crowd for “a little New York hospitality”.
Whatever that is. I felt like I had walked off the streets of true blue Manhattan into red-hot Bush country.
There were adverts for the US army and billboards for chewing tobacco, Jack Daniel’s, Wrangler jeans and pick-up trucks. Men wore Stetsons and T-shirts that read: “Real men last eight seconds.”
Everybody seemed to walk a little funny, and there was a whole lot of spitting going on.
When Jewel trotted by us to go backstage before re-emerging in the ring to sing the national anthem, we mistook her for Pamela Anderson. Big blonde hair and boobs was a definite theme.
The whole idea behind this testosterone-laced happening is that bull-riding superstars from the US, Brazil, Mexico, Australia and Canada gather to see who can stay on the bull for at least eight seconds. These guys can earn more than $4-million for their pain. And it has to hurt.
When the three-time champion of the PBR Invitational, a Brazilian named Adriano Moraes, took to the stage, Glassberg leaned over and whispered:
“Isn’t he cute?” (He is). And then: “His face is reconstructed from titanium plates.” As Moraes mounted his bull and the animal begun to buck furiously under him,
she whispered: “I wonder if they can have kids?” Good question.
Moments later, a bull named Scaredy Cat threw his rider to the ground and stomped on his ear, drawing blood. The crowd groaned. After a bull called Carlito’s Way had had his way with another cowboy, a clown began to do a rendition of Britney Spears’s Baby One More Time, which brings me to the subject of the world’s most maligned pop diva, and the bloodthirstiness that we have developed for her downfall. Before I went to the PBR Invitational, I was planning to dedicate this column to her latest meltdown. But having a mental breakdown is not a spectator sport and neither should having a hard time be one. I don’t know if she has an undiagnosed bipolar condition or if she is just highly manipulative, selfish and addicted to drugs and the media attention that she seems to court, but the vitriolic attention and the paparazzi baying for her blood even when she’s being wheeled away on a gurney cannot lead to anything but further harm for her and her children.
Make no mistake: the gossip rags who pay for the pictures are hoping it gets worse so they can make a bigger profit.
And then there are the bandwagon riders. From Dr Phil, who tried to film a special show from her hospital room (he swears the Spears family asked him to intervene), to a rock group called Bandarazzi who performed in front of the ambulance that was removing her from her home so they can include it in their music video. When she was admitted to hospital, we heard howls of outrage on newspaper websites and blogs demanding that the media stop goring her due to her apparent fragility. What needs to stop is our demand for this kind of news. If you are buying into the frenzy, obsessively refreshing TMZ.com for the latest update, know that you will have blood on your hands too should she end up like Anna Nicole Smith.
The bulls have animal-rights supporters picketing for them outside Madison Square Garden. Who does Spears have?
Britney Spears To Become A Muslim?
Britney Spears is supposedly so in love with her new man she's considering converting to Islam to marry him.In other plans demonstrating how fragile her mental state is at the moment, friends report the troubled popstar has also considered faking her own death in order to reinvent herself.
A pal tells the News Of The World, "She's been discussing all these wacky plans to reinvent her life. She has discussed in depth a fake death, moving abroad and even plastic surgery. It is scary to hear her romanticise about these insane plans.
"She believes she could spend six months away and make a comeback as Britney the world's best mother."
Britney has also talked about how important her new man, paparazzi boss Adnan Ghalib, is to her now.
She reportedly told a doubting relative of his over the phone, "We're taking care of each other. He's the only one who understands me. It's serious."
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