Japan truly loves all of Britney
Business is already heavy in Tokyo’s subway system. But it’s about to increase because the city’s subway authority has approved an ad featuring a nude and pregnant Britney Spears.
HB Japan Inc., publisher of the Japanese edition of Harper’s Bazaar, plans to rent ad space at the posh Omotesando station next week to promote its October issue with Spears posing naked on the cover.
The ad, in which Spears, 24, bares her belly but covers her breasts with her hands, is the same one used in the August issue of the magazine’s U.S. edition. The pop star is pregnant with her second child with husband Kevin Federline.
Tokyo Metro Co.’s obscenity screening team made the exception, saying it understood the publisher’s intention was to portray a happy mother – not to be sexually explicit.
Kayoko Higashino, the magazine’s deputy chief editor, said, “I’m glad the subway officials understood the meaning of the photo.”
Thanks, uh, and no hard feelings
Being a celebrity isn’t easy. Take what happened to Nick Lachey when he accepted an award at the recent eighth annual Teen Choice Awards, an event co-hosted by ex-wife Jessica Simpson. “I just want to start off by saying, awkward, a little bit,” Lachey told the audience.
Soldiering on, not so privately
Former prisoner of war Jessica Lynch, whose 2003 “heroic” rescue in Iraq was exaggerated by the Army, is pregnant. She and boyfriend Wes Robinson are expecting their first child in January, publicist Aly Goodwin Gregg said Thursday. “I was not sure if this could ever happen for me,” Lynch, 23, said in a statement. “Learning to walk again and coping with the internal injuries that I still deal with pale in comparison to the tremendous joy of carrying this child.”
He shot the banker
The Bank of Jamaica is releasing commemorative coins in gold and silver with the late Bob Marley‘s dreadlocked likeness. The 1,000 coins, produced by the British Royal Mint, are being sold for $100 each, bank spokeswoman Jacqueline Morgan said Wednesday. The coins were intended to mark the 60th anniversary of Marley’s birth, which was celebrated in 2005.
Host himself is a ‘Survivor’
Whatever else you might want to say about “Survivor” host Jeff Probst, the guy’s honest. Responding to criticism of the show’s lack of ethnic diversity over its 12 seasons, Probst said, “The truth is 80 percent of the people that apply are white. And television, in general, is white. So all these criticisms were valid.”
The birthday bunch
Actor Van Johnson is 90. Actor Mel Ferrer is 89. Game show host Monty Hall is 85. Actor Sean Connery is 76. Talk show host Regis Philbin is 75. Actor Tom Skerritt is 73. Actor Anthony Heald is 62. Actress Anne Archer is 59. Actor John Savage is 57. Gene Simmons of Kiss is 57. Singer Rob Halford of Judas Priest is 55. Musician Elvis Costello is 52. Director Tim Burton is 48. Country singer Billy Ray Cyrus is 45. Guitarist Vivian Campbell of Def Leppard is 44. Actress Joanne Whalley is 42. Actor Blair Underwood is 42. DJ Terminator X of Public Enemy is 40. Singer Jeff Tweedy of Wilco is 39. Country singer Jo Dee Messina is 36. Model Claudia Schiffer is 36.