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In the news
By Times staff writer Sweet Home debuts in top spotReese Witherspoon's Dixieland comedy Sweet Home Alabama collected $37.5-million to debut as the weekend's No. 1 movie. Two-week champ Barbershop fell to third place behind the $15.1-million opening of Jackie Chan's The Tuxedo, an action comedy in which a man becomes a super spy with the help of a high-tech suit. Barbershop, a comedy-drama about a black neighborhood in Chicago, earned $10.1-million in its third week, a 21 percent drop from the week before. The film has been criticized by the Revs. Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson for a scene in which a barber makes jokes about civil rights icons Martin Luther King Jr. and Rosa Parks. MGM rejected requests to have the scene cut from future versions of the film, and Sharpton has said he will consider organizing a boycott. The romantic comedy My Big Fat Greek Wedding came in fourth with $9.8-million, holding steady from last week. The $5-million sleeper hit has collected nearly $136.9-million over 24 weeks. Schwarzenegger sour on statue ideaArnold Schwarzenegger wants to terminate a plan to build a giant statue in his honor. The Forum Stadtpark wants to build an 82-foot Terminator statue in a park in the actor's hometown of Graz in southern Austria. The metal statue would tower over the park's trees and more traditional statues, and would hold a giant globe above its head. The project would cost almost $5-million -- money that has yet to be raised. Angelika Reitzer, manager for the forum, said Friday that her organization received a letter from Schwarzenegger. "He said he was flattered, but that he thought it would be better to spend the money on social projects and the Special Olympics," she said. Schwarzenegger recently finished filming Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines. VH1 viewers fond of MadonnaMadonna has been voted the greatest woman in music, beating such legends as Billie Holiday and Aretha Franklin in a VH1 poll. Australian pop star Kylie Minogue came in second in the Top 100 poll, voted for by viewers of the music channel, with Celine Dion coming in third. Rounding out the top five were Whitney Houston at fourth and Franklin at fifth. Madonna, who won 17 percent of the 750,000 votes cast, is the most commercially successful female artist of all time, with worldwide record sales of more than $140-million.
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From the wire |
