Last month we noted that there was some tension between Courtney Love and whoever decided to put a parody of "Smells Like Teen Spirit" in the new Muppets movie. To break things down: In one corner, you have Primary Wave Music, who may or may not have exclusive rights to distribute Nirvana's entire catalog, depending on who you're talking to. In another corner, you have Dave Grohl and Krist Novoselic signing off on the production using the song, along with Primary Wave. In another you have the Hollywood set, like the movie's writer Jason Segel. And in another you have Courtney Love, who this week decided to speak up in our very own comments section on the whole ordeal. Here is (most of) her comment and a preemptive [sic]: more ›

The funeral for Whitney Houston is open only to invited guests—who include Aretha Franklin, Kevin Costner, Jay-Z, Beyonce, Oprah Winfrey, and Stevie Wonder so far—but the public will get a chance to observe the services through a livestream. The AP will broadcast the funeral at http://livestream.com/aplive: "It will provide a much-needed connection for fans who have lacked a formal place to eulogize Houston, one of the world's best-selling artists who died in Beverly Hills, Calif., on Saturday at the age of 48." more ›

Well, here's an interesting little bit of neighborhood drama: Bar Veloce, whose East Village location was once famous for being the scene of a batsh*t crazy kerosene-fueled crime, is once again under attack, but this time from a slightly less dangerous assailant. Someone has been posting incriminating flyers along Second Ave urging patrons to boycott Veloce (which also has a location in Chelsea) because its owners allegedly refuse to pay staff overtime and dip into the staff tip jar on a regular basis. more ›

We all thought that Robert De Niro's testimony in court would prove to be the most dramatic moment in the art theft trial of a gallery director accused of pocketing $77,000 from the sale of De Niro's father's paintings. But it turns out that all the really nutty, overly-dramatic stuff was actually going on behind-the-scenes between deliberating jurors who name-dropped Hillary Clinton, cursed at each other, and brought 20 million Afghan refugees into the mix. more ›

So much for nyet: according to ESPN, the Nets have begun talking to the Denver Nuggets about disgruntled star Carmelo Anthony again. And according to one source, "New Jersey has come back strong. They really want Anthony." Last month, Nets owner Mikhail Prokhorov made a big show of cutting off negotiations between the two teams after several near-deals fell through. But could this all be a ruse to piss off and/or motivate the Knicks? more ›

Who is the most famous high school freshman in all of New York City? Probably Lourdes Leon, Madonna's 13-year-old daughter, who was one of 77% of public school students attending the first day of school (the low attendance is due to the fact that today and tomorrow are school holidays). The Daily News was at LaGuardia High School of Music & Art and Performing Arts and reports that the teen "hugged a few friends and chatted with others after arriving at the Manhattan school at 8 a.m." and wore "sported ankle-high leather boots, a black skirt and a plaid sleeveless shirt over a white T-shirt. She clutched a cell phone, with a multicolored wristband on her right arm offset by an assortment of bracelets on her left." more ›

The Pulitzer Prize for Drama was awarded to a show that was not one of the three nominated by the jury, and the chairman of the jury is pissed. LA Times theater critic Charles McNulty has written an angry editorial denouncing the Pulitzer board for overridding its jury and bestowing the prize on Next to Normal. Maybe you've heard of it; it's a critically-acclaimed Broadway musical. But are you familiar with jury selections The Elaborate Entrance of Chad Deity and Bengal Tiger in the Baghdad Zoo? Not so much. To be fair, the third jury pick, In the Next Room (or the vibrator play), premiered in NYC, but wow was that overrated. more ›

While it lacks the visceral intensity of the San Francisco bus fight video masterpiece, in some ways this audio recording of a nasty argument on the D train is even more enthralling, because it leaves something to the imagination. (We're picturing Edith Bunker vs. Rachel Dratch.) Commuter Joellen Nicholson, who published the video on YouTube, calls it "just another night on the D train comin' home from work. Kudos to the subway Samaritan, who I've named 'Father Subway,' for taking control of the situation." more ›

On Friday, the website for Columbia's student newspaper, the Columbia Daily Spectator, went down amid "some serious internal - and possibly legal - drama going down." Now it seems like its online editor went rogue, to protest the editor-in-chief and managing editor, and "decided to take the website down until the demands put forward by the managing board members were met." Kids today! more ›

Stephon Marbury is officially a persona non grata to the Knicks: A meeting to discuss his future with the team ended with, the Daily News reports, "storming out" and the Knicks asking the point guard to stay away! more ›

No doubt the NY Post got a call from momager Dina Lohan this morning. The paper is reporting that her eldest, Lindsay, was such a nightmare on the set of Ugly Betty that her episodes were cut from 6 to 4. They say that LiLo "smoked 24/7, and after she left, they had to repaint her dressing room it was such a mess." It gets better! She allegedly "would obsessively cut pictures of herself out of the tabloids like she was creating some sort of scrapbook" (creepy!) and while rehearsing for a scene where America Ferrera had to "pants" her, they claim she wasn't wearing any underwear (the episode aired last night). Her friends defend her by saying the starlet "wears underwear all the time now." No doubt she has a whole scrapbook of photos to prove it. more ›

Mike Bartlett’s modest drama Artefacts, in town as part of the Brits Off Broadway festival, peers into the abyss of post-war Iraq society through the eyes of the aptly named Kelly, an indifferent English teenager played with nervy brio by Lizzy Watts. Kelly’s ordinary life with her single mom (Karen Ascoe) is upended by the sudden appearance of the father she never knew, an erudite Iraqi named Ibrahim (Peter Polycarpou) who runs the National Museum of Baghdad. Ibrahim has just an absurd ten minutes to introduce himself before catching a flight back to his war-torn home, but the eventful encounter climaxes when Kelly callously smashes his reconciliation gift: a priceless Mesopotamian vase he “borrowed” from the museum. more ›

Today there's talk of the chaos that ensued after Remy Ma's sentencing yesterday. To recap, so far in this ongoing saga there's been an alleged theft, a shooting, a conviction, a Rikers Island almost-wedding, an attempted jail break, a sentencing...and finally, what is hopefully the last bit of drama: the courtroom outbursts. more ›