Downey just can’t stop singing the 12-step blues
Robert Downey Jr., who has long struggled with drug addiction – even doing some jail time as a result – says music helped him out of that madness. “Music is great therapy. It really is,” says the 38-year-old actor, who just released his first full-length album, “The Futurist.”
The album’s title “means a lot of things, if you look at its definition,” he says. “But, essentially, to me, it means I’m not as I was before.”
While he has sung before for film and TV projects (notably the soundtracks for “Chaplin,” “Ally McBeal” and “Two Girls and a Guy”), Downey found making “The Futurist” considerably harder than acting.
“Because it’s so autonomous, you know?” he says. “I can’t say, ‘My God! I’ve got this director who didn’t know what he was doing.’ Or, ‘God! Can you believe those words I had to say? This guy who wrote those things is a real hack.’ “
Actually, he’s more of a queen
Robert Downey Jr., by the way, got a frosty reception at the Kennedy Center Honors ceremony by introducing Elton John as “the other first lady.”
John, opera diva Joan Sutherland, conductor John Williams and actors Warren Beatty, Ossie Davis and Ruby Dee were honored in a ceremony scheduled for broadcast Dec. 21 on CBS.
Downey said three things came to mind when he thought of the openly gay John: “genius, life saver, the other first lady.”
Bad news for all those Faithfull fans
British singer Marianne Faithfull canceled a European tour after collapsing before a show in Italy last week.
Doctors told her that she has chronic exhaustion and ordered her to rest for three months.
Faithfull, 57, gained fame in the 1960s as the girlfriend of rocker Mick Jagger and as the pure-voiced singer of “As Tears Go By.” After battling drug addiction, she re-emerged in 1979 with the album “Broken English.”
Now she’ll really be begging pardon
Country singer Lynn Anderson, who won a Grammy for “Rose Garden” in 1970, has been charged with drunk driving after police found her passed out in her car on the shoulder of a Texas highway.
Anderson, 57, was the Country Music Association’s female vocalist of the year in 1971. She recently released her first album in 12 years, “Pure Country.”
Stevie always takes the higher ground
Stevie Wonder is taking on Eminem for ridiculing Michael Jackson’s plastic surgery and child molestation charges.
In the video for “Lose It,” the rapper dresses as Jackson and is shown on a bed with young boys. His nose also falls off and his hair catches fire.
Jackson has asked TV stations to stop playing the video, describing it as “outrageous and disrespectful.”
“Kicking someone when he’s down is not a good thing,” Wonder told Billboard magazine. “I was disappointed that (Eminem) would let himself go to such a level.”
The birthday bunch
Actress Rita Moreno is 73. Actor Ron Carey (“Barney Miller”) is 69. Singer David Gates (Bread) is 64. Actress Donna Mills (“Knots Landing”) is 62. Singer Brenda Lee is 60. Actress Linda Day George is 60. Actress Teri Garr is 56. Actress Bess Armstrong is 51. Singer Jermaine Jackson is 50. Bassist Nikki Sixx (Motley Crue) is 46. Actor Gary Dourdan (“CSI: Crime Scene Investigation”) is 38. Actress-comedian Mo’Nique (“The Parkers”) is 36. Rapper-actor Mos Def is 31. Actor Rider Strong (“Boy Meets World”) is 25.