Has it truly been 13 years since Sharon Stone first uncrossed her legs into our hearts in Basic Instinct? Alas, it has, but the wait for the sequel, delayed for years by legal squabbling between Stone and her producers, is soon over. What's better, the NY Daily News reports that Stone's sex scenes are so over the top in the UK-set Basic Instinct 2: Risk Addiction, it makes her performance in the first film look like Nanny McPhee with an ice pick (and for both you Instinct purists out there, spoiler alert):

Today's LAT has the strange, only-in-LA! story of the aftermath of Joaquin Phoenix's Thursday afternoon car wreck in Laurel Canyon. The stage was set for Hollyweirdness, with Phoenix—an Oscar nominee, you will recall—sitting in the overturned car, dazed and trying to decide if the whiteness before his eyes was the welcoming glow of the afterlife or simply a deployed airbag, when he heard a strange voice:

· For the sports fans out there, there's some good shit going on at pigskin-punishing brother Deadspin today, like pictures of Super Bowl-bound Steelers QB Ben Roethlisberger drinking like a champion and correspondent AJ Daulerio trying his best to piss off the publicists who are trying to keep him out of parties.
· Ever wonder who's inside the rubber wrinkles of that really annoying Six Flags guy? Wonder no more.
· Brad and Angelina...Sonic Youth fans?
· Oh come on, Mr. Judgmental, like you've never tried to nail a Canadian tranny before!
· And while you're at it, try and tell us that you don't experiment with meth when you're bored.

Attention recent Paramount casualties: We understand you are probably still in shock at your untimely displacement, perhaps making dazed circles in the middle of Melrose, cardboard boxes of personal items clutched in your hands, as whizzing cars narrowly avoid curing your woes forever. Fret not we here at Defamer are often the first to hear about Hollywood job opportunities, and we never hesitate to pass them on to you. Here's a plum, sent into to us just moments ago:

Moments ago, Paramount Head Executioner Brad Grey addressed his rapidly depleting workforce to explain some of the executive moves that were made on this Black Wednesday, following the official closing of the DreamWorks acquisition. An excerpt from the e-mail:

Operatives on the Paramount lot have told us that the long-anticipated layoffs resulting from Brad Grey's early Christmas gift to himself, the DreamWorks acquisition, have finally begun. Early reports have Paramount's development and marketing departments getting swept away in favor of the DW staff, but from what we've heard, workers across the lot are so nervous about the cuts that Grey might as well be wandering around in a Grim Reaper outfit, randomly tapping the soon-to-be pinkslipped on the shoulder and yelling "Boo!" Yesterday's rumors were that 70-100 people might be going, but today's whispered number is 170. Developing...

Blogger Boysbriefs wrote to ask us if he was the only one who was experiencing deja vu from a galaxy far, far away looking at wire photos of Boy George entering a Manhattan court today (remember those 13 bags of blow? The case has been postponed until March 8.) Indeed, he has a point: The resemblance is uncanny between the star of Taboo and Anakin Skywalker (the original Jedi Anakin, mind you, none of this Hayden Christensen crap). If Boy George ever decides to play the harmonica line from "Karma Chameleon" himself on a neck-mounted mouth organ, he might find his concert ended early by confused Rebel forces

· Music round-up: Violent Femmes and the Bell Rays at the House of Blues; Hard-Fi at the Troubadour; Fly Better Broken and Satellite Class at the Silverlake Lounge.
· Outfest shows transgender tennis biopic The Second Serve at the Egyptian, while AFI screens the 1931 version of Frankenstein at the ArcLight.. And no, we're not going for some kind of snarky juxtaposition here.
· It may be February, but Alice Cooper, Dennis Quaid, Gilby Clarke, and others are joining Don Felder to Rock Cerritos for Katrina down at the Cerritos Center for the Performing Arts.

We know of no better way to get people's minds off the nastiness of layoffs than by momentarily basking in the joy of a blind item well-guessed. Take another dip in the pool with One Foreboding Blind Vice:

As long as we're on the subject of fan-created works inspired by pop-culture phenomena, it seems that not only has Brokeback Mountain spawned countless parodies, it's also moved some to pick up their brushes in artistic tribute. Several gay-cowboy-admiring virtuosos have offered their wares on eBay (individual auctions here, here, here, and here). Forunately for us all, a search for "paintings inspired by the film Munich" did not produce any results.

The canny execs at Showtime have co-opted the popular trend among The Gays of "fan fiction" wherein viewers write fantasy episodes of TV shows in which the characters give in to their deepest, lustiest, same-sex inclinations (ex: The OC's Seth and Ryan doing the naked jacuzzi). In their official L Word version of fanfic, viewers are invited to submit scenes for a special "fanisode" (translation: it will be a frosty Friday in lesbian hell before this thing makes it to air), and since most of the show's characters are already bed-hopping sisters of Sappho, half the work's already done for them! The illustration above from the official site is not, as we initially thought, a visual representation of a woman's reproductive cycle, but instead a simplification of the contest's rules, with the multicolored figures in the center representing "L Word Fans" (yes, they all appear to be the men's room symbol, but lesbians don't wear skirts, sorry).

According to the AP, Liu, "didn't speak to the media as she visited the disaster zone with UNICEF, the U.N. children's agency." Maybe because she's ashamed that she's like totally biting Brad and Angelina's relief trip from three months ago? What's next, Miss Last Season's Disaster, a trip to Davos for the World Economic Forum? Well, bad news, Charlie's tardy angel—unless you have a time machine, you're too late. It's already over. Better luck next time.

Wherein we invite our readers to affix the nipple clamps of humpy E! gossip-torturer Ted Casablanca firmly around their areolae and submit to the hurts-so-good-until-the-safety-word pleasures of his weekly blind item. This time, Casablanca sniffs dismissively in the direction of coke-craving starlets in favor of some impending legal disclosures of hot, three-way action. Grab a buddy and mount One Foreboding Blind Vice:

The next Bond movie, Casino Royale, is off to a not-so-great start. True, we have our new 007 and hopefully he's laying off the booze, lest we end up with the rather unrefined image of the superspy flying down the Swiss Alps in a black tie and little else but the other two crucial, pussy-stroking pieces of the Bond puzzle are still missing: the villain and the girl.

· While studios' niche divisions score a bunch of Oscar nominations, the "motherships" were mostly relegated to acting and technical nods. Our elegant solution: The big studios should stop making so many shitty movies. [Variety]
· The Best Picture hopefuls (except for Crash, which is currently clogging the shelves of your local video store) will all go into wider release this weekend, hoping to turn Oscar buzz into the only thing that truly matters: cash. [THR]
· Oscar nominees pat themselves on the back for being serious, topical films. Says Steven Spielberg, never one to turn down a perch on the soapbox, 'This is a wakeup call to all studios: We need to stop worrying only about making the No. 1 film for the July 4 weekend and realize we can all contribute something in terms of understanding the world and human rights issues," apparently already forgetting that he directed War of the Worlds, release date: 6/29/05. [Variety]
· Some of Oscar's Chosen Ones lament the snubbing of their forgotten compatriots. VIIIIGGGO!. [THR]
· The Jim Henson company hires Samurai Jack visionary Genndy Tartakovsky to direct the long-awaited (we've been holding our breath since we were about 8 years old) Dark Crystal sequel. [Variety]

James Frey bashing has quickly evolved into America's favorite new pastime, with millions gathering around the bean dip to catch its Super Bowl equivalent: a 60-minute Oprah inculpation so grisly, it might as well have been dubbed The Passion of the Frey. But once your tall-tale substance abuse memoir has been likened to Holocaust denial on national television, as America's Opinion Maker Oprah Winfrey nods her large, regal head in accord, is there really anywhere else this sport can go? Of course there is! Frey could be dropped by his "people" namely, his Brillstein-Grey literary manager Kassie Evashevski, who explained her logic to Publisher's Weekly:

The deadline for Academy members to cast their votes might be weeks away, but we're ready to call one of the races right now. And the Oscar for Most Disingenuous Quote In Response To An Awards Snub goes to...Harvey Weinstein, for Proof, as he tells the NY Observer:

Today's Page Six describes an unfortunate, if understandable, gaffe by Hilton Posse member Kimberly Stewart, who repeatedly misidentified superproducer Jerry Bruckheimer at a recent party:

Unfailingly reliable British tabloid The Sun claims to have a handle on Brad Pitt's career strategy in the post-Brokeback Mountain world:

· We keep saying that we're not going to laugh at any more Brokeback parodies, and we're made liars again and again. Prepare yourselves for Broke Mac Mountain, geeks. [via Towleroad]
· A little time at the tattoo parlor might cut down on some paparazzi attacks, if you choose the right ink.
· This is easily the best blog post comparing Crash and a straight-to-video volleyball movie we've ever read.
· Oscar trivia: Did you know that George Clooney is the first person to ever be nominated as a director while being recognized for an acting role in a different film in the same year? Now you do!
· A Munich videogame ain't that bad of an idea.
· The Random Celebrity Gossip Generator coughed up a good one: Lindsay Lohan was hospitalized in Londan after cutting her leg at Bryan Adams' home.