Stella McCartney pregnant

LONDON, UK- Fashion designer Stella McCartney, daughter of former Beatle Sir Paul McCartney, has announced that she is expecting her first child. McCartney made the announcement Thursday at the launch of her new spring/summer collection during Paris Fashion Week. A spokesman for the designer confirmed she was 3 1/2 months pregnant. The designer told The Daily Telegraph newspaper she did not know whether the baby would be a boy or a girl. "I want it to be a natural thing," she was quoted as saying. "I want it to be a surprise." McCartney, 33, married former publisher Alasdhair Willis in August 2003. The baby will be the third grandchild for the former Beatle - his eldest daughter, Mary, has two boys. Sir Paul's wife, Heather Mills McCartney, gave birth to a daughter, Beatrice, last year.
 

Nude Bush removed from display

WASHINGTON, DC - A cartoonish painting of President Bush in the nude has been taken down from the wall at the City Museum of Washington. The picture, called "Man of Leisure, King George," adopts the pose of a famous Impressionist painting, Edouard Manet's "Olympia," that scandalized Paris in 1863, and now hangs in the Gare d'Orsay Museum in Paris. The painting by local artist Kayti Didriksen, shows a caricature of Bush, reclining in the nude on a chaise lounge, his head propped up by pillows. Instead of the female servant who stands behind Olympia's couch, a man in suit and tie resembling Vice President Dick Cheney stands nearby, holding a cushion with a crown and a miniature oil rig on top of it. The painting was part of a "living room art" show called "Funky Furniture" - a variety of painted furniture and other items that were set up in the museum last week. Expected to formally open this month, the show, including the Bush painting, was abruptly shut down Monday after some of the artists' themes were considered unsuitable. Myra Peabody Gossens, a public relations consultant for the museum, said the exhibit was not what had been expected. "The museum is not an art museum," she explained. "It gets mostly groups of children, with teachers trying to tell them something about history." In addition to the Bush painting, the exhibit included a decorated church pew with pictures and writing that accused former President Reagan of ignoring the AIDS crisis and an end table decorated with drug paraphernalia with a quote from former District of Columbia Mayor Marion Barry, who was jailed for drug possession. "This is not what we were bargaining for. We thought we were getting functional furniture," Leslie Shapiro, co-chairman of the museum's board of directors, told the Washington Post. The City Museum of Washington, operated by the Historical Society of Washington, D.C., is primarily a place where local and regional history is on display. The museum's executive board decided the museum was "not an appropriate venue" for the exhibit. Art-O-Matic 2004, a confederation of local artists which organized the project, now is looking for another space to house the exhibit, said Jim Tretick, a member of the group's board of directors. "About a dozen people may have seen it on Sunday," said Tretick. "The exhibit wasn't completely mounted. Then it was taken down on Monday when the museum was closed." -AP
 

Walken Honored in Hollywood

LOS ANGELES, California- Actor Christopher Walken made an impression on Hollywood as he left his hand and footprints Friday at the fabled Grauman's Chinese Theater. "This is a thrill, a big day for me," Walken said at the ceremony. "I'm not sure how I arrived at this place today, but one sure thing: I've been lucky. Thank you for this day." The 61-year-old Oscar winner said he stamped prints of dancing shoes into the theater's cement, recalling his childhood training as a dancer. "These are my favorite shoes," Walken said. Though the dancing shoes were crusted with cement, Walken joked that he might hang them off his car's rearview mirror. The ceremony coincided with the opening of Walken's latest film, "Around the Bend," about four generations of men in a broken family who reunite. Walken's role in 1978's "The Deer Hunter" earned him an Academy Award for best supporting actor. He also was nominated for a 2002 Oscar for his performance in Steven Spielberg's "Catch Me If You Can." Overall, he's starred in more than 50 films, including "Pulp Fiction," "Biloxi Blues," "Pennies from Heaven," "Man on Fire," and "Annie Hall." The first footprints at Grauman's Chinese Theater were made by Norma Talmadge in 1927. Legend has it that she accidentally stepped in wet concrete outside the building. Since then, more than 180 stars have been immortalized, along with hands and feet and, in the case of Jimmy (The Schnozz) Durante, even a nose. -AP