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The Spokesman-Review Newspaper
Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883

The kids get their say at Nickelodeon awards

John Rogers Associated Press

LOS ANGELES – Justin Timberlake gave up his burping title but took home a trophy as favorite male singer Saturday night in a raucous, slime-drenched 20th Annual Nickelodeon Kids’ Choice Awards.

Other winners included Adam Sandler as favorite male movie star, Dakota Fanning as favorite female movie star and Ben Stiller as winner of the night’s top honor, the Wannabe Award, for the celebrity kids most want to be like.

The Kids’ Choice Awards are Hollywood’s messiest, most raucous celebration honoring kid viewers’ personal picks for best movies, music and TV shows. Timberlake, this year’s host, delivered on a pre-show promise to make this year’s version the slimiest ever.

The show’s hallmark is the drenching of a celebrity in green slime, but this year hundreds of celebrities and audience members got the treatment.

The show began with Timberlake descending from the ceiling on a large orange Nickelodeon blimp, and breaking into a Broadway show tune in which he taunted the audience, saying he was too famous to be slimed.

“You’ll never get a drop of slime on old J.T.,” he sang.

By the end of the song, of course, he had been drenched in the green goo. So had actors Jackie Chan and Chris Tucker.

Timberlake, the only person to win the show’s celebrity burp-off twice, defended his title this year against all 12,000 people in the audience at Pauley Pavilion, who burped simultaneously in a mass belch that sounded like it was augmented by special-effects. He was roundly defeated.

In a speech mocking awards speeches, Sandler put on his “Happy Gilmore” voice as he thanked the inventor of the potato chip bag and the pillow, and everyone in the audience “for not making fun of me for talking like this every speech I do.”

The award presentations have always been an afterthought on the light-hearted show, which also included musical performances by Gwen Stefani and Maroon 5.

Other award winners were Black Eyed Peas for favorite musical group, “American Idol” for favorite TV show and Drake Bell for favorite TV actor. Bell also won that award last year.

Kids vote online to select the winners in each category. Approximately 25 million votes were cast last year, according to Nickelodeon.