Why Anna Nicole Smith chose to go to Entertainment Tonight to break her silence, the same TV rag that gave Larry Birkhead—he of the baby-hair-dyeing suspicions—a platform to announce that he and not Howard K. Stern was the child's true birth father, we have no idea. We suspect Smith wanted to entrust her story to a media outlet she had actually heard of, and once the small matter of ET meeting her quote was addressed, bygones such as the fact that they had broadcast a two-part interview calling her a bald-faced liar just days after her son's death were quickly forgiven. The "World Exclusive" interview, to air tomorrow, features a grieving Anna Nicole who has clearly seen the inside of a salon recently, but whose edgy, new haircut does little to lighten an understandably heavy heart. ET correspondent Mark Steines reports from the Bahamas on the (wait for it) ET field blog:

It's time again for studios to clog the mailboxes of awards voters with their screener DVDs, but this year, some are sending out two versions: plain ones featuring just the movie itself to groups that are uptight about superfluous goodies influencing their principled voters, and fancier ones with extras and nice packaging for associations with looser reins on their swag-whoring membership. [Variety]
The Wachowski Brothers will write and direct a big-screen adaptation of Speed Racer for Warner Brothers. Are they still "brothers"? We've kind of lost track of where they stand in the gender reassignment process. Oops, there we go again, distracting people from the work with some salacious personal stuff. Apologies. [THR]
· We thought that all of the getting-high-and-gorging-on-junk-food questions raised in Harold and Kumar Go to White Castle were sufficiently addressed in the first movie, but we were obviously wrong, as a sequel is now in the works. This time around, the toke-happy pals will be suspected of being terrorists after trying to smuggle a bong onto their flight to Amsterdam. [Variety]
With an episode powered by a completely unexpected plot twist in which its titular, wisecracking doctor makes a crazy diagnosis that was later proven to be accurate, House returned to the Fox lineup with the highest demographic rating of the night, but still lost to Dancing with the Stars in total Tuesday night viewers. [THR]
· Var introduces new blog Wilshire and Washington, which will cover the intersection of entertainment and politics, as illustrated by incidents in which people toss liquids at Barbara Streisand for expressing negative opinions about the President. [Variety]

The new issue of Wired chronicles the fitful journey of Darren Aronfosky's The Fountain from crazy, big-budget sci-fi epic with A-list talent to temporarily shelved project to the crazy, polarizing, smaller-budget sci-fi epic with talent-of-slightly-lesser-wattage that will eventually reach theaters in late November, a frequently emotional trip that entailed the painful separation of the director from his onetime washboard-stomached partner, Brad Pitt:

Realizing that perhaps a single emotional Oprah appearance that betrayed her stouthearted, fake-British composure was not quite enough to completely reverse the public's lingering impression that her recent African charity efforts amounted to nothing more than a calculated and self-serving toddler-snatching, Madonna has reemerged on the U.S. media circuit to plead her case. Talking to Meredith Vieira yesterday, the frequently becameltoed Queen of Pop explained that when she realized that the child who captured her heart on videotape and whom she began to brazenly adoption-stalk (or something to that effect) had a living parent, she first pledged her material support so that he may raise the child himself. He then proudly refused the offer, paving the way for a no-strings, guilt-free baby purchase:

We know that the two days following the announcement of the end of Reese Witherspoon and Ryan Phillippe's marriage have been a dark, confusing time for you, during which you lost hours of much-needed sleep as you tried to understand how the complicated interpersonal dynamics inherent in any Hollywood union where one partner is far more successful than the other (see also: Swank, Hilary and Swank, Guy Who Married Hilary) might have slowly frayed the couple's love-bond. Us Weekly's story about the break-up releases you from your mental torment, as the proffered explanation is simplicity itself: Phillippe has allegedly "grown close to" (i.e., is schtupping raw) a co-star, a relationship-dissolving method recently embraced by leading men far more accomplished than himself. An alert reader has noticed that the actress's IMDb page is already starting to look like a photo album commemorating the blossoming of their professional collaboration to a personal one, lacking only images of the duo retreating to Phillippe's trailer for the downtime rendevzous that always begins with the words, "Tell me again about how you don't have an Oscar. That gets me so hot."

Yesterday afternoon, we urged you to check out hip-hop/househusbanding impresario Kevin Federline's live performance at the West Hollywood Halloween Costume Carnaval, partly because the crushing crowd and anonymity afforded by your costume would make any legal reprisals for hurling empty Red Bull cans on stage exceedingly difficult, and partly because we suspect his musical career will burn so brightly and so quickly that you won't have too many other opportunities to see him ply his trade in public. The Defamer Special Correspondent on Background Dancers Struggling With the Difficult Transition to the Foreground reports that K-Fed's WeHo appearance unfolded exactly as we'd all suspected it would:

A reader sends us saddening news: someone out there is even more dangerously obsessed with AC than we are. She's an enterprising Quebecoise named Robin, and she even has a blog devoted to the man she calls "Anderfox." So there probably wasn't a dry panty within miles of Degrassiland last night when the pumpkin she carved, which features an apparently limbless (but still like sooo hot!) Cooper, made it onto 360.

· In honor of Halloween, Gallery of the Absurd names Mel Gibson its scariest tabloid monster.
Here are some last minute costume ideas (really, aren't you out of luck by now?) courtesy of CourtTV.com. And here's a video of one of the best costumes we've ever seen.
· Camp Crystal Lake is finally getting around to making some much-needed changes aimed at improving their teen-survival numbers.
· Attention PR firms: Comment spam might not be the best way to get bloggers interested in your clients' TV shows.
Don't worry, K-Fed has a byline in the NY Post, but we're pretty sure he still hasn't learned to read or write.
Jay Leno can't wait to show up to the Big Boy parking lot with his new supercar.
Pumpkin catapults: the Halloween season's hidden danger.

For die-hard fans of The Price is Right, today's announcement that Bob Barker plans to retire in June after 35 years with the show hits just as hard as if the beloved octogenarian had stepped up on stage, dramatically brought his quivering skinny-mic towards his lips, and informed the CBS television audience that God Himself had told him (through the voice of deceased announcer Rod Roddy, of course) that He was taking Barker after the very next spin of the Big Wheel. Take heart, Plinko addicts, for you still have more than half a year to enjoy your hero before he finally retreats to the paradisiacal splendor of the exact replica of the Price set he's had built at home, where he will spend the rest of his days being serviced by a private staff of Barker's Beauties, all of whom he's paid handsomely to waive their rights to troublesome sexual harassment claims should they tire of his favorite game, "How Much Did These Funbags Cost?"

Sales may not be brisk for Kevin Federline's upcoming East Coast dates, but he's all but guaranteed an enthusiastic hometown welcome when he takes the KIIS FM Stage at tonight's West Hollywood Halloween Carnaval at 8:45. The appearance comes in support of his album, "Playing With Fire," which had its nicely timed debut on record store shelves and iTunes today. ("Be the first to write a review," Apple's online music store plaintively solicits, as K-Fed stares out blankly from behind a desk on his album cover, as though he were hosting one of his own inevitably underattended CD signings.) And while coming to the festivities dressed up as Britney's background-dancing babydaddy might seem so, like, 2005, we'd encourage last-minute costume scramblers to throw on the wife beater, baggy pants, and baseball cap, and show up anyway, taking the stage behind their inspiration as his backing chorus line of high-kicking, hip-hopping K-Fedettes.

· Music round-up: Brazilian Girls at the Wiltern; Ladytron and Midnight Movies play Indie 103's Halloween party at the El Rey; Dios (Malos) at the Echo; Devo, Flock of Seagulls, and Bow Wow Wow at the Greek.
· Join half a million or so costumed troublemakers at the West Hollywood Halloween Carnaval along Santa Monica Boulevard, where you stand slightly better than a 50 percent chance of escaping a brutal trampling death beneath the feet of ten tiny Gaysians dressed as the US female gymnastics team. Really, it's much more fun than that sounds, if you don't mind parking in Venice. And if you do, they're actually streaming the event, greatly increasing your chances of surviving the evening from home on your couch.
· And over in Toluca Lake, the Make a Wish Foundation puts on the Halloween Stuntacular, "a theme park-caliber live-action stunt show produced by Hollywood professionals with lighting, music, costumes and special effects." [via Cheapskatin' LA]

While she hasn't yet gone so far as to take the enterprising step of leasing out her baby daughter as a human billboard, Anna Nicole Smith has proven to be a savvy businesswoman when it comes to bartering her family's most private moments of joy and sorrow for cold, hard cash. Larry Birkhead, the photographer who steadfastly insists that he, and not Smith's always lurking lawyer/fake-husband Howard K. Stern, is the child's real father, is now accusing Smith of knowingly tinkering with her baby to make her paternity story seem more plausible:

The Slug blog thinks it sees evidence of creeping Jordan McDeere-ism in fledgling network abomination The CW's hiring practices, throwing together this side-by-side-by-side to illustrate how current programming VP Gayle Hirsch and drama development VP Joanna Klein (or some combination thereof) resemble Studio 60's maverick NBS executive (who herself is supposedly based on ABC/NBC exec Jamie Tarses). Personally, we don't see it, even though we've always maintained that all brunette TV executives look alike (especially on Headshot Day), but we'll allow that we might be thrown off by both CW employees' impressive ability to muster more complex facial expressions in these liberally airbrushed photos than Amanda Peet has in five episodes' worth of appearances on her show.

Our friends over at the Franklin Avenue blog have documented the entrants in the pumpkin carving competition between the tenants of the Wilshire Courtyard office complex, where Variety, E!, the Weinstein Co., and various other entertainment-related concerns are housed. We're a little disappointed that the Weinstein minions passed on a great opportunity to carve their bosses' likenesses into twin Harvey and Bob pumpkins, but understand how sensible self- and job-preservation instincts (a grisly employee-carving competition would surely follow such an entry) led them down a safer path. Our personal favorite is the one shown here, the offering of E! International given the intentionally misleading name of "Sick of Corporate America," but which is quite obviously their attempt to commemorate the reverse-peristaltic majesty of the network's triumphant, globetrotting collaboration with Tara Reid.

Not a bad likeness really. Perfectly captured the unearthly inner glow, not to mention the philosophical implications — you know, a purely decorative creation trotted out to celebrate something that's ultimately fleeting and drained of deeper significance beyond its value as an amusing if temporary distraction.

Because Steven Soderbergh's Che Guevara biopic jones couldn't possibly be satisfied by directing just a single film, he's doing two, The Argentine and Guerilla, with Benicio del Toro as the title character whose image you've long admired on the T-shirt racks of Urban Outfitters. [Variety]
Friday Night Lights easily outperforms the "ratings troubled" Studio 60 during its (alleged) one-week tryout in Studio's Monday night timeslot (with an episode titled "GIT'ER DONE," no less—is there no end to Aaron Sorkin's pain?). Draw whatever dire conclusions you wish about the fate of 60 based on this result, but know that at least NBC's online schedulers are still optimistic about the series' prospects of returning next week. [THR]
Wondering where your hilarious collection of Daily Show and Colbert Report YouTube clips have disappeared to? Ask Viacom, the company that isn't particularly interested in your enthusiasm for sharing your favorite moments from its shows. [Variety]
· The National Labor Relations Board issues a complaint against the Writers Guild for telling TV writer-producers not to cooperate with NBC Universal TV Studios' demands to produce webisodes until the studio agrees to start paying residuals. The Guild insists it's done nothing wrong, while NBC Uni is pleased by the NLRB's initial support of their desire to squeeze free work from their writing staffs. [THR]
Lindsay Lohan gets another chance to impress a new crew and co-stars with her professionalism, joining Keira Knightley in The Best Time of Our Lives, the story of Dylan Thomas' relationship with his wacky, gun-and-grenade-wielding friends. [Variety]

Expounding on the Truly Tasteless Halloween theme that began with a post on Bill Maher's stingray-speared Crocodile Hunter costume, we continue with this picture of a North Hills residence that has foregone clichéd skeletons and tombstones to decorate their front yard as something far creepier: no, not Courtney Love, but an ultra-realistic plane crash scenario, thanks to the painstaking arrangement of actual airplane parts obtained by the mechanic who lives there. Luckily, the coroner who lives next door refused to supply the scattered body parts they sought to complete the illusion.

There is probably nothing sadder than watching a celebrity's good intentions, especially the kind manifested in large monetary donations made to regions that have previously proven themselves to be fertile adoption grounds, taken advantage of by those hoping to prey on their charity. Never one to be a victim, Angelina Jolie has announced that she may sue a man she alleges has been lining his own pockets with the money she sent to be dispersed to a conservation cause in Cambodia:

This weekend, while many of you are still picking candy corn kernels out of your pubis, we will finally learn whether the coming of Borat—and, looking ahead, Universal's $42 million investment in Bruno—was a matter of the right man at the right time, or yet another overhyped Hollywood fiasco fated to elicit sneers of SoaPy derision for years to come. One thing is certain: The first ones to accuse Borat of having jumped the goat were the Kazakhs themselves, and they still have strong opinions on the subject on the eve of their mainstream debut. A Kazakhstan-in-the-klieg-lights round-up:
· The country's embassy website offers their official "Take on 'Borat,'" in which they claim the movie has "nothing to do with the real Kazakhstan," but that they "hope the movie will spur increased interest" in the country. To help their case, they include a photograph of the recent crowning of a freshly depilated Miss Kazakhstan 2006, Gaukhar Rakhmetalyeva. (Very nice...How much?) [Kazakhstan News Bulletin]
· The populations of Salem, VA and Almaty, KAZ bridge a nearly insurmountable cultural divide with a common desire to literally string up and gut Sacha Baron Cohen: "'I'd kill this impostor on the spot,' said Eltai Muptekeyev, who makes his living in Almaty by posing for photos with a blindfolded falcon clinging to a thick leather glove on his hand." [AP]
· Galymzhan Zhakiyanov, a leader of the opposition party, uses the movie as an opportunity to highlight the current Kazakh administration's shortcomings, saying, "If human rights and freedoms were not being violated, if Kazakhstan did not become famous for its corruption scandals around the world, then Sacha Cohen would've chosen some other country for his jokes." He then removed the blindfold from his own falcon (cellphone technology has not yet reached their borders), tied the statement to its leg, and sent it to the local Reuters bureau. [Reuters]

A few of our readers on the East Coast e-mailed to let us know that tenuously lucid rocker/local personality Courtney Love made the The View the latest stop on her Trip Back From The Bottom Tour, where in the course of continuing to promote her 15 months of sobriety, took some time to lament how cruelly those "awful new websites, you know, the Defamers" treated daughter Frances Bean after paparazzi caught them horseback riding on Mother's Day. We, of course, take umbrage at being lumped in as part of some blogging monolith obsessed with tormenting the teen, as we're sure we'd never cover something as inconsequential as this particular mother-daughter equestrian outing; we're far too busy with weightier matters, like stories about Mom trying to circumvent Starbucks' pet policy, loudly defending the cinematic talents of pal Brett Ratner, or catching a much-needed nap during the Borat premiere. We'd hate for Love to think that she has to compete with her own offspring for our fawning attention.