1. You might have heard that Charlie Sheen was hospitalized yesterday. What you might not have realized is that it was because he laughed too hard while watching TV and suffered a hernia injury. [via Live Feed]
2. Last night during an appearance on Inside the NBA, guest Tracy Morgan was asked to choose between Tina Fey and Sarah Palin, and then referred to Palin as “good masturbation material.” TNT issued an apology within minutes. [via The Daily What]
3. Gladys Horton, a founding member of Motown girl group The Marvelettes (“Please Mr. Postman”) has died at the age of 66 from complications related to a stroke. [via Rolling Stone]
4. Jesse Eisenberg is hosting Saturday Night Live this weekend, and the show is hoping that Mark Zuckerberg will make a guest appearance alongside of him to “to show he has a sense of humor” — and possibly boost The Social Network’s Best Picture odds. [via NYP]
5. A 450-year-old Madonna and Child work by Titian has sold for $16.9m, setting a new auction record for the Renaissance master. The previous record was $11.9m for the artist’s Venus and Adonis painting. [via BBC News]
Bonus link: The Sound Of Music As A Thriller
Apologies for two 30 Rock-related posts in one day, but Entertainment Weekly just reported that Tracy Morgan underwent a kidney transplant a little over a week ago, and as a result will miss taping at least two episodes of the show while he spends time recovering. (The writers will address his absence with a storyline in which Tracy Jordan has “some sort of a meltdown because of a good thing that’s happened to him.”) Morgan was diagnosed with diabetes — which can cause severe damage to the kidneys — back in 1996, but he only recently started to take the disease seriously. He was spotted at Friday night’s Knicks game, which we’ll take as a sign that he’s doing well!
While we always thought he was funny on Saturday Night Live, over the past few years, it feels like Tracy Morgan has really come into his own. His 30 Rock character Tracy Jordan — a very loose parody of himself — is arguably one of the most hilarious parts of what we consider the best comedy on television. And unlike some comedians who seem to have no personality when they’re not inhabiting a role, he’s able to maintain that same over-the-top charm that makes us love him in interviews and public appearances, as well. As today is Tracy’s 42nd birthday, we thought we’d celebrate his career by telling you 42 things you didn’t know about him before. Enjoy!
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1. According to a new interview, Christopher Nolan’s third Batman film will be titled The Dark Knight Rises and will not feature the Riddler, as was previously speculated. [via Slashfilm]
2. Darren Aronofsky has signed on to direct Machine Man, a film about a gadget geek who decides to give himself a Robocop-style upgrade. It is based on Max Barry’s online serial of the same name. [via Deadline]
3. Tracy Morgan is headlining his first stand-up special for HBO. It airs on November 13th and will cover everything from “airport profiling and terrorism to meeting President Obama.” [via TV Guide]
4. LimeWire has been shut down a by US federal judge in Manhattan. [via Reuters]
5. Harmony Korine has cast Marlon Wayans in his next film, Twinkle, Twinkle, which tells the story of a former hit man who for some inexplicable reason dresses up in a dollar bill costume. [via The Wrap]
Bonus link: Forgotten Bookmarks [via The Daily What]
As part of last night’s Comedy Central telethon, “Night of Too Many Stars: An Overbooked Concert for Autism Education,” Chris Rock joined a bewigged Tracy Morgan on stage for a performance of “Scarborough Fair.” And then Paul Simon showed up to tell them that they needed to work on their harmonies a bit. Click through for Tracy and Chris’ expletive-laced reaction, and be sure to stick around for the hilarious auto-tune action at the 2:50 mark.
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Since we don’t have any context for this brilliant Terry Richardson photo, we thought we’d pair it with a Tracy Jordan quote from season one of 30 Rock: “I can’t read Liz Lemon. My shameful secret is out. Now you know why I’m always running into the ladies bathroom. I can’t read!” [via BuzzFeed]
1. Gary Numan (along with a slew of other British musicians), might not make it to Coachella because of the volcanic eruption. [via Brooklyn Vegan]
2. HBO has snagged the rights for three new docs from Oscar-winning director Alex Gibney: Freakonomics, My Trip To Al-Qaeda, and his untitled Eliot Spitzer project. [via The Playlist]
3. This makes us super jealous of our West Coast friends: Pavement, Sonic Youth, and No Age will play a joint show at the Hollywood Bowl this September. [via 24Bit]
4. Chromeo will release their third album, Business Casual, on August 17. Fun fact: Solange Knowles lends guest vocals on one of the tracks. [via P4K]
5. We had no idea that Tracy Morgan had beef with Tobey Maguire… (video) [via HuffPo]
Bonus link: David Lynch’s Tips for a Great Prom
1. Conan O’Brien has joined Twitter, but he has only tweeted once so far: “Today I interviewed a squirrel in my backyard and then threw to commercial. Somebody help me.”
2. Ben Stiller and Justin Theroux are working on a script for Zoolander 2. Theroux will direct and Jonah Hill is in negotiations to play the villain. [via Deadline]
3. Have you seen the video for Tracy Morgan and Jimmy Kimmel‘s new rap track, “Impregn8ed“? [via Pop Candy]
4. Salman Rushdie is planning to write a book about the decade he spent hiding because of the fatwa. [via Guardian]
5. Opera star Renée Fleming‘s upcoming album Dark Hope will cover pieces by indie rock bands including Muse, Arcade Fire, Band of Horses, and Death Cab For Cutie. [via LAT]
Bonus link: Grown-up Crayon Colors.
Analyze Words is a new and super useful tool for determining other people’s personalities via their posts on Twitter. Developed by James W. Pennebaker, a University of Texas Professor of Psychology, along with his daughter Teal, Roger Booth and Chris Wilson, the program analyzes tweets based on not the “content words” but rather the “style words” — like articles and prepositions — to determine the mental state of the author.
Basically this means that you can plug in anyone’s Twitter handle — including your own — and watch it ranked in Emotional Style, Social Style and Thinking Style. We’ve been playing with this for hours. After the jump, check out some of our favorite tweet analyses of famous people.
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Our friends at Comedy Central worked the red carpet at the New York Comedy Festival‘s Stand-Up For Heroes event, eschewing traditional celebrity reporting to play a game of “Would You Rather?” with Dan Rather, taunt Brian Williams about his newscaster rivalry with Jon Stewart, and temporarily fluster comedian Lisa Lampanelli, otherwise known as the Queen of Mean.
If you live in New York and want to check out some festival offerings, Tracy Morgan plays Carnegie Hall tonight, and Bill Maher closes out the festival on Sunday at Lincoln Center; you can also catch Andy Sandberg that same evening at Town Hall.
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