"Dear Abby" columnist Pauline Phillips, who starting in 1956 under the pen name Abigail Van Buren began giving some 90 million newspaper readers advice on everything from Civil Rights to dating, died Wednesday in Minneapolis, said a family spokesperson. She was 94. For years Phillips had suffered with Alzheimer's disease, the first signs of which began showing in the mid-1990s. By then, she and Jeanne were writing the column together, until such time in 2002 that Pauline could no longer handle the task and Jeanne took over the family's advice business completely. Among the many remarkable facts about Phillips (who took the name Abigail from the Bible and the surname from President Martin Van Buren) is that her identical twin sister, Esther "Eppie" Lederer, was in the same line of work – as columnist Ann Landers. Phillips began her career when she was a 37-year-old housewife, having contacted the editors of the San Francisco Chronicle to tell them she could do better with their advice column. Her first byline appeared Jan. 9, 1956. "They gave her a bunch of letters, thinking that, that they would never see her again – and she immediately took all of the letters to my dad's nearby office and whipped out answers and had answers back the same day. That knocked them off their feet," her son, Eddie Phillips, said. Abigail Van Buren dispensed her words of wisdom for the next 40 years, in more than 1,200 newspapers worldwide – and often addressed sensitive issues that people were afraid to bring up at their own dinner tables. Her style was benevolent but sometimes tough. Readers of her column knew they had to stand on their own two feet, and have the backbone to stand up to very strong convictions. And, always, she championed human rights above all else. As Dear Abby professed in 1964 and which still holds true today: "The purpose of life is to amount to something and have it make some difference that you lived at all." In addition to her devoted readers and, according to the family spokesperson, the millions of friends she made in her lifetime, Phillips is survived by her two children, her husband of 73 years Mort Phillips, four grandchildren and two great-granddaughters.

Our Kind Of Traitor
Ewan McGregor has scored the unspecified lead role in "Snowtown" director Justin Kurzel's adaptation of John Le Carré's "Our Kind Of Traitor." Hossein Amini ("Drive," "Snow White and the Huntsman") penned the script. The story follows an English couple who gets mixed up with a Russian oligarch and major money launderer. Caught up in his plans to defect, they are soon positioned between the Russian Mafia and the British Secret Service.
 It’s a boy for Amanda Righetti! The Mentalist star, 29, and her husband Jordan Alan welcomed their first child, son Knox Addison Alan, on Thursday, Jan. 10, her rep confirmed. Righetti and Alan, 45, producer/director of Cats Dancing on Jupiter and Kiss and Tell, announced the pregnancy in August.  In addition to her current role as Grace on the CBS show, Righetti is also known for her work on Reunion and The O.C., as well as roles in Friday the 13th and Captain America: The First Avenger. The couple married in April 2006 in Hawaii.

Black Nativity
Tyrese Gibson has joined the cast of Kasi Lemmons' musical "Black Nativity" at Fox Searchlight Pictures. Forest Whitaker, Angela Bassett and Jennifer Hudson also star. The story follows a teenage boy from Baltimore who is sent by his single mother to Harlem to spend Christmas with the grandparents he's never met.

Hercules Gets a Release Date
Brett Ratner’s Hercules adaptation (based on the “Hercules: The Thracian Wars” comic book) is coming together this year, with (former) Scorpion King Dwayne Johnson starring. The project was stalled in early development for a while, before Ratner skipped out on directing the Conan the Barbarian reboot and picked up this mythological ancient world blockbuster instead. Back in 2012, reports began circulating that Paramount and MGM want Hercules to begin lensing this year. The studios has pencilled in a Summer 2014 release date, confirming the Johnson vehicle will come right after the five movies featuring ‘The Rock’ hitting theaters this year. Hercules opens on August 8th, 2014.
 Former NFLer and now sportscaster, Ahmad Rashad and his wife Sale Johnson, a society matron in Palm Beach (Fla.), are said to be quietly negotiating a divorce settlement before they go public and file later this year. If you didn’t know, Rashad and Johnson, a former fashion model and heir to the Johnson & Johnson fortune, have been married since 2005. Rashad & Johnson, who share a $5 million home in the luxurious Bears Club in Jupiter, have been living apart for several months and want to work out some financial differences quietly before filing, according to several sources. Sale is believed to have received more than $100 million in her split from Johnson in 2002 and is richer than the 63-year-old Rashad, a former Minnesota Vikings wide receiver and former host of “The NBA on NBC.”  Rashad, who now works for NBA TV, worth is in the $8 million range. Reports say Johnson has grown weary of Rashad’s friendship with soon-to-be Bears Club neighbor and NBA great Michael Jordan and golfer Tiger Woods, who lives in nearby Jupiter Island.

Lance to Oprah: I used PEDs

He did it. He finally admitted it. Lance Armstrong doped. He was light on the details and didn't name names. He mused that he might not have been caught if not for his comeback in 2009. And he was certain his ''fate was sealed'' when longtime friend, training partner and trusted lieutenant George Hincapie, who was along for the ride on all seven of Armstrong's Tour de France wins from 1999-2005, was forced to give him up to anti-doping authorities. But right from the start and more than two dozen times during the first of a two-part interview Thursday night with Oprah Winfrey on her OWN network, the disgraced former cycling champion acknowledged what he had lied about repeatedly for years, and what had been one of the worst-kept secrets for the better part of a week: He was the ringleader of an elaborate doping scheme on a U.S. Postal Service team that swept him to the top of the podium at the Tour de France time after time.''I'm a flawed character,'' he said. Did it feel wrong? ''No,'' Armstrong replied. ''Scary.'' ''Did you feel bad about it?'' Winfrey pressed him. ''No,'' he said. ''Even scarier.'' ''Did you feel in any way that you were cheating?'' ''No,'' Armstrong paused. ''Scariest.'' ''I went and looked up the definition of cheat,'' he added a moment later. ''And the definition is to gain an advantage on a rival or foe. I didn't view it that way. I viewed it as a level playing field.''  He dodged few questions and refused to implicate anyone else, even as he said it was humanly impossible to win seven straight Tours without doping. ''I'm not comfortable talking about other people,'' Armstrong said. ''I don't want to accuse anybody.'' Whether his televised confession will help or hurt Armstrong's bruised reputation and his already-tenuous defense in at least two pending lawsuits, and possibly a third, remains to be seen. Either way, a story that seemed too good to be true - cancer survivor returns to win one of sport's most grueling events seven times in a row - was revealed to be just that. ''This story was so perfect for so long. It's this myth, this perfect story, and it wasn't true,'' he said. Winfrey got right to the point when the interview began, asking for yes-or-no answers to five questions. Did Armstrong take banned substances? ''Yes.'' Did that include the blood-booster EPO? ''Yes.'' Did he do blood doping and use transfusions? ''Yes.''  Did he use testosterone, cortisone and human growth hormone? ''Yes.'' Did he take banned substances or blood dope in all his Tour wins? ''Yes.''  In his climb to the top, Armstrong cast aside teammates who questioned his tactics, yet swore he raced clean and tried to silence anyone who said otherwise. Ruthless and rich enough to settle any score, no place seemed beyond his reach - courtrooms, the court of public opinion, even along the roads of his sport's most prestigious race. That relentless pursuit was one of the things that Armstrong said he regretted most. ''I deserve this,'' he said twice. ''That defiance, that attitude, that arrogance, you cannot deny it.'' Armstrong said he started doping in mid-1990s but didn't when he finished third in his comeback attempt. Anti-doping officials have said nothing short of a confession under oath - ''not talking to a talk-show host,'' is how World Anti-Doping Agency director general David Howman put it - could prompt a reconsideration of Armstrong's lifetime ban from sanctioned events.
 With a new single about to drop, a solo album in the works and a starring role in a national tour of a Broadway musical, you'd be hard-pressed to tell that Michelle Williams once had difficulty just getting out of bed. The singer-actress — one third of Destiny's Child alongside Beyonce and Kelly Rowland — said that in the past few months she has emerged from years of suffering from moderate depression. Her dark cloud lifted thanks to exercise, therapy and positive thinking. "I've dealt with depression," the 32-year-old said during a break in rehearsals for a new touring production of "Fela!" that kicks off later this month. "I had to choose to get out of bed and do whatever I needed to do to be happy." Williams says she suffered her first bout of depression at 15 or 16 and has managed to avoid medication. She is speaking out for the first time about her battle to encourage others to seek help. "We're taught, 'Just go to church and pray about it. The Lord is going to heal you.' Well, in the meantime, I believe God-gifted people, physicians, doctors, therapists — that's your healing. Take advantage of it," she said. "Go see a professional so that they can assess you. It's OK if you're going through something. Depression is not OK, but it is OK to go get help."  Williams will be playing the role of Sandra Isadore, who was Fela's African-American lover. Maija Garcia, the tour director and choreographer, said the presence of a Destiny's Child member in the cast "empowers the musical." The show, which made it to Broadway in 2009, is set for a 16-city tour starting at the Shakespeare Theatre Company in Washington, D.C., on Jan. 29. By the time summer rolls around, it will have visited Miami, Atlanta, Cleveland, Dallas, Los Angeles, Seattle and Nashville, Tenn. Williams is looking forward to cheese steaks — extra provolone, please — and fabulous food on the road. "I know it doesn't look like I eat — I'm just blessed with a high metabolism right now," she said. "I'm having a time trying to gain weight." The Jan. 29 date is important to Williams for another reason. That's when Destiny's Child releases "Love Songs," a collection of previously released songs as well as a new track co-written by Williams, "Nuclear," the group's first new recording since 2004.

Ryan Leaf moved to state prison

Former NFL quarterback Ryan Leaf is in prison after threatening a staffer and violating his therapeutic plan at a drug treatment center. Leaf was serving nine months of a five-year sentence at the Nexus Treatment Center after pleading guilty to burglary and criminal possession of dangerous drugs.Montana Department of Corrections documents released Thursday say Leaf told his roommate he wanted to drag a program staffer by his hair. Leaf also wrote that he wanted to throw the staffer against the wall and smash his glass into the man's head. Adult Community Corrections Division administrator Pam Bunke writes Leaf was too great a security risk to leave in a community setting. A disciplinary hearing was held Jan. 9. A hearings officer found him guilty and said Leaf is not right for a therapeutic environment.
 It’s no secret that with the success of Dr. Dre's Beats line, boutique headphones are seriously in style nowadays, and even Tim Tebow is getting in on the game. On Thursday Tebow officially launched his signature series of headphones at the 2013 International CES conference in Las Vegas, according to Mashable. The headphones are a collaboration between Tebow and Soul Electronics, a company founded by rapper Ludacris. Among the available items under Tebow’s line are the Combat+, which has noise-cancelling properties but is designed for athletes and heavy stress. However, another series of headphones might raise some eyebrows coming from Tebow, as the quarterback has named his headphones designed for airplane travel “Jet.” In fact, a spokesman for the company jokes that the airplane series might not be known as Jet for “too much longer — we might change the name,” to which Tebow also reportedly laughed. Although the official release was Thursday, Tebow has been making the promotional rounds lately, as a spokesman for the Soul’s flagship series of headphones. Ludacris, himself, recently posted a picture to Instagram with him and Tebow buddying up in Las Vegas.

TV NEWS
Geena Davis has landed another TV show: TNT announced today that it has ordered an untitled drama pilot starring the Oscar winner (The Accidental Tourist) as an unorthodox bail bondswoman. Inspired by the true story of Mackenzie Green, the show chronicles the tales of a bounty hunter who relies on unconventional methods to get the job done.


Franklin & Bash, meet your new boss. Melrose Place alumna Heather Locklear has joined the TNT dramedy for Season 3 as a series regular.

Body of Proof‘s revamped third season has been pushed back — but just a smidge. The Dana Delany-starring drama, which was originally slated to premiere Tuesday, Feb. 5, will now launch two weeks later on Feb. 19 at 10/9c.


Lifetime is not moving forward with its Kim Raver-starring drama pilot The Secret Lives of Wives. The project centered on the marriages of four women.

Tonight's Premieres:Investigation Discovery: Desperate Measures at 9p
HBO: Real Time with Bill Maher at 10p
OWN: Police Women of Dallas at 10p
VH1: Best Week Ever at 10p
Tonight's Finale:FOX: Fringe (series finale) at 8p
Saturday's Premieres:Cooking Channel: Drop 5 lbs with Good Housekeeping at 1030a
BBC America: Ripper Street at 9p
Science Channel: An Idiot Abroad 3 at 9p; Stuff You Should Know at 10p
Saturday's Finale:Investigation Discovery: Fatal Vows at 10p
Sunday's Premieres:Style Network: Big Rich Atlanta at 8p
E!: Kourtney & Kim Take Miami at 9p; Chasing the Saturdays at 10p
Sunday's Finale:DIY Network: Million Dollar Contractor at 10p