On Twitter, pope to get different type of followers

VATICAN CITY (Reuters) - Pope Benedict already has 1.2 billion "followers" in the standard sense of the word but he soon will have another type when he enters what for any 85 year old is the brave new world of Twitter.

Vatican officials say the pontiff, who is known not to love computers and still writes most of his speeches by hand, will have his own handle by the end of the year.

"It will be an officially verified channel," said a Vatican official.

Primarily the tweets will come from the contents of his weekly general audience, Sunday blessings and homilies on major Church holidays. They will also include reaction to major world events, such as natural disasters.

The leader of the world's 1.2 billion or so Roman Catholics will not, of course, write the tweets himself, but he will sign off on them before they are sent in his name.

But even divine intervention might not help squeeze the gist of a papal encyclical, which can run to more than 140 pages, into 140 characters.

Those tweets will probably be limited to a link to a url with the entire document.

The papal handle has not yet been disclosed but it is widely expected to be @BenedictusPPXVI, his name and title in Latin.

The pope has given a qualified blessing to social networking.

In a document issued last year, he said the possibilities of new media and social networks offered "a great opportunity", but warned of the risks of depersonalisation, alienation, self-indulgence, and the dangers of having more virtual friends than real ones.

In 2009, a new Vatican website, www.pope2you.net, went live, offering an application called "The pope meets you on Facebook", and another allowing the faithful to see the pontiff's speeches and messages on their iPhones or iPods.

The Vatican famously got egg on its face in 2009 when it was forced to admit that, if it had surfed the web more, it might have known that a traditionalist bishop whose excommunication was lifted had for years been a Holocaust denier.

(Reporting By Philip Pullella; editing by Mike Collett-White)

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Ex-oilman named new leader of world's Anglicans

LONDON (Reuters) - A former oil executive was named leader of the world's 80 million Anglicans on Friday, ending months of closed-door intrigue as the church struggles with bitter rifts over women bishops and gay marriage.

Justin Welby, 56, has been bishop of the northern English city of Durham for barely a year and will replace the liberal incumbent Rowan Williams as archbishop of Canterbury in December.

Welby is against gay marriage but favors the ordination of women as bishops.

Liberal clerics in the United States and Britain are at odds with conservatives in Africa and elsewhere over such issues, and Welby is likely to come under intense pressure to prevent the church tearing itself apart.

His appointment as the 105th archbishop caps a meteoric rise in the Church of England hierarchy since he quit the oil business and was ordained a priest in 1992.

The bespectacled and soft-spoken Welby accepted the appointment at London's Lambeth Palace, the official London residence of the archbishop of Canterbury for 800 years.

He said the job offer had been a daunting one. "My initial reaction was, 'oh no'," a smiling Welby told reporters in a room adorned with portraits of former archbishops and gold chandeliers.

"It's something I never expected. And the last few weeks have been a rather strange experience, to put it mildly."

The long-awaited announcement, made by Prime Minister David Cameron's office, follows weeks of intense speculation that a row over whether to choose a reformer or a safe pair of hands had stalled the nomination process.

"Well this is the best-kept secret since the last cabinet reshuffle," Welby told an audience that included his wife, five children and a baby grand-daughter, after opening his address with a brief prayer.

He has said the death of his infant daughter in a 1983 car crash brought him closer to God.

Speaking with the sleeves of his dog-collared clerical shirt rolled up to the elbows, Welby stressed that he wanted to be defined by his faith rather than his background - he attended Eton, the same elite British school as Cameron.

After a stint at French oil firm Elf Aquitaine, Welby worked as finance director at Enterprise Oil. But in his acceptance speech, he appeared wary of too much emphasis being placed on his former career.

"The key thing is the sense of having lived and worked in a world where the church was felt by many people to be completely irrelevant and how that attitude made you think round what it means to be Christian," he said.

ETONIAN URBANITY

Welby's handling of the issues of gay marriage and women's ordinations as bishops is set to define his tenure.

Commentators said his schooling, financial expertise and extensive conflict resolution work in Nigeria and elsewhere will have furnished him with the tough negotiation skills needed to heal the deep rifts in the church.

"I suspect he has that urbanity and confidence that you often associate with Old Etonians," said Richard Coles, an Anglican parish priest and broadcaster.

"He's worked at a high level that's not marked by sentimentality and gentleness, so I think he's also a player."

Cameron said Welby's corporate experience would stand him in good stead in the new role.

"Having someone who had a life outside the church in business, who understands difficult, complicated issues, will bring a great breath of fresh air to the Church of England," Cameron said, according to the BBC.

In his speech, Welby chose his words carefully when addressing the issue of gay marriage, highlighting the need for respectful dialogue. "We must have no truck with any form of homophobia, in any part of the church," he said.

He won praise from the liberal camp by saying he would vote to allow the ordination of women as bishops at a crucial assembly later this month that is the culmination of over 10 years of debate.

"I am thrilled," said Christina Rees, a former chairman of advocacy group Women and the Church and member of the General Synod, the legislative body of the church.

"To hear the new archbishop of Canterbury saying 10 days before the vote: 'I am strongly in favor', is really going to positively influence the vote," Rees said.

After his speech, the archbishop-to-be smiled widely as he posed for photographs at the imposing entrance to Lambeth Palace, across the river from the Houses of Parliament and Big Ben. He will be formally enthroned as archbishop next year.

"All archbishops of Canterbury get eaten alive by their own kind," said Coles.

"Whether or not Welby survives, remains to be seen."

(Writing by Maria Golovnina; editing by Andrew Roche)

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Stradivarius dealer gets six years for embezzlement

VIENNA (Reuters) - A dealer in rare Stradivarius violins coveted by the world's top violinists was sentenced on Friday to six years in prison for embezzlement after his glittering global empire crumbled.

Dietmar Machold, 63, built his Bremen-based family business into a juggernaut with branches in Zurich, Vienna, New York and Chicago to serve elite musicians and collectors of the instruments that can command prices of several million dollars.

But the business collapsed in 2010, triggering claims against him worth tens of millions of euros (dollars) from creditors and clients who say they were bilked.

"I am a failure. I have lost everything," Machold said in a Vienna court as he was sentenced after being convicted of embezzling client funds and hiding assets from creditors.

"You played for high stakes and you lost a lot, but you understand you have to take the responsibility for this," Judge Claudia Moravec-Loidolt told him.

Prosecutor Herbert Harammer had traced the career of the fifth-generation violin expert who became one of the world's most influential dealers in instruments crafted by 18th-century masters like Antonio Stradivari, whose workshop in Cremona, Italy produced some of the finest violins and cellos ever made.

"This ascent was built on sand," Harammer had told the court, accusing Machold of leading a lifestyle that was a facade for a business that had actually been insolvent since mid-2006.

FIXTURE OF HIGH SOCIETY

A fixture of high society, Machold lived in an Austrian castle, had a fleet of expensive cars and collected watches and cameras. His global network of rare instrument dealerships let him move in the highest circles of music, fame and money.

His former wife and her mother got one-year suspended sentences for helping him hide precious musical instruments and a valuable watch collection as his business imploded.

Machold admitted from the start that he embezzled money made from the sale of instruments entrusted to him by his customers, but denied fraud charges that are being handled separately.

"I did what I did and I am to be punished for it. That is the way it has to be," the German native told the court before sentencing, his voice calm before he teared up and had to pause.

Machold, who told the court he did not deserve a mild sentence given the magnitude of his misdeeds, had faced a sentence of up to 10 years. His lawyer did not say if he would file an appeal.

Machold said he acted in desperation after losing a lawsuit brought by a construction company which meant his Eichbuechl castle was at risk.

The high-profile dealer had at times given contradictory testimony, at one stage saying he built personal relationships with the instruments in his care that he called "my children".

But later he said he "simply forgot" one expensive violin that he failed to report to administrators.

($1 = 0.7857 euros)

(Editing by Michael Roddy)

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Author Philip Roth says he is done with writing

(Reuters) - Seminal American author Philip Roth, whose novels explored modern Jewish-American life, has told a French magazine that he will write no more books because he has lost his passion for it.

The author of such novels as "American Pastoral", for which he won a Pulitzer Prize, and "Portnoy's Complaint" slipped his retirement announcement into an interview last month with French magazine Les Inrocks.

On Friday, Houghton Mifflin confirmed his decision. "He told me it was true," said Lori Glazer, executive director of publicity at the publisher.

Roth, 79, one of the world's most revered novelists and a frequent contender for the Nobel Prize for Literature, said he had not written for three years.

"To tell you the truth, I'm done," Roth was quoted as telling Les Inrocks. "'Nemesis' will be my last book," he said of his 2010 short novel set against a fictional polio epidemic in Newark, New Jersey, in 1944.

The novella "Goodbye, Columbus" catapulted Roth onto the American literary scene in 1959 with its satirical depiction of class and religion in American life. Published along with five other short stories, it won the National Book Award in 1960. He again received that award in 1995 for "Sabbath's Theater."

Roth, who has written some 25 novels, told Les Inrocks that he had always found writing difficult and that he wanted nothing more to do with reading, writing or talking about books.

He said that when he was 74, he started re-reading his favorite novels by authors Ernest Hemingway, Ivan Turgenev, Fyodor Dostoyevsky and others, and then re-read his own novels.

"I wanted to see whether I had wasted my time writing," he explained. "After that, I decided that I was done with fiction. I no longer want to read, to write, I don't even want to talk about it anymore," he was quoted as saying.

"I have dedicated my life to the novel: I studied, I taught, I wrote, I read - to the exclusion of almost everything else. Enough is enough! I no longer feel this fanaticism to write that I have experienced all my life. The idea of trying to write again is impossible," Roth told the magazine.

Roth's four most recent novels, "Everyman," "Indignation," "The Humbling" and "Nemesis", have been short works, often focusing on ageing, physical decline, depression and death.

New Jersey-born Roth is best known for his semi-autobiographical and unreliable alter-ego Nathan Zuckerman, who appeared in nine of his novels.

Roth told Les Inrocks that he had spent most of his time in recent years preparing material for his biographer, Blake Bailey. "If I had a choice, I would prefer that there is no biography written about me, but there will be biographies after my death so (I wanted) to be sure that one of them is correct," Roth was quoted as saying.

Roth said he had asked his literary executors and his agent to destroy his personal archives after his death once Bailey has finished the biography. "I don't want my personal papers hanging around everywhere," he said.

(Reporting By Eric Kelsey and Jill Serjeant in Los Angeles)

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Mick Jagger's love letters to singer Marsha Hunt up for auction

(Reuters) - Love letters written by Rolling Stones frontman Mick Jagger to American singer Marsha Hunt, discussing poetry and his personal turmoil, will hit the auction block next month.

Hunt, with whom Jagger had his first child, Karis, told Britain's Guardian newspaper she was selling the letters, written in July and August 1969, because she had been unable to pay her bills.

"I'm broke," Hunt, who lives in France, told the newspaper.

The Guardian said on Friday the 10 letters would be sold by Sotheby's on December 12.

The auction house values the letters from between 70,000 and 100,000 pounds ($111,000-$160,000).

Jagger wrote them to Hunt while filming the Tony Richardson movie "Ned Kelly" in Australia.

They are described as showing a sensitive side of the then-young singer, who wrote about the poetry of Emily Dickinson, meeting author Christopher Isherwood and an unrealized multimedia project.

Jagger's relationship with Hunt, who is African-American, was kept under wraps until 1972.

"The sale is important," Hunt told The Guardian. "Someone, I hope, will buy those letters as our generation is dying and with us will go the reality of who we were and what life was."

Hunt has said she was the inspiration for the Rolling Stones' song "Brown Sugar," which Jagger wrote while in Australia.

The rock star also cites in the letters the disintegration of his relationship with singer Marianne Faithful, whom he was also dating at the time, and the death of Rolling Stones' guitarist Brian Jones.

(Reporting by Eric Kelsey; Editing by Jill Serjeant and Peter Cooney)

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VP Joe Biden guest stars as celebrity crush on "Parks and Rec"

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Someone has a big crush on U.S. Vice President Joe Biden - and now she is getting to meet him.

Biden will make his TV acting debut with a cameo on NBC's comedy "Parks and Recreation" as the celebrity crush of actress Amy Poehler's ditzy local councilwoman Leslie Knope, NBC said on Thursday.

Biden, 69, will play himself in the episode "Leslie vs. April," airing November 15, where Knope, a city councilwoman for the fictional small town of Pawnee, Indiana, has a surprise meeting with the vice president in Washington D.C.

Knope has long described her ideal man as having the "brains of George Clooney and the body of Joe Biden."

"Meeting Vice President Biden was a thrill for me and for Leslie," Poehler said in a statement.

"He was a good sport and a great improviser. The vice president maintained his composure while I harassed him and invaded his personal space. The nation of 'Parks and Rec' will be forever grateful," she added.

The scenes with Biden were shot in July in the chambers of the vice president's ceremonial office, during the TV show's recent trip to the nation's capital to film scenes for this season's storylines.

The biggest challenge of landing Biden's cameo was keeping it a secret before Tuesday's U.S. elections. Airing the episode prior to November 6 could have been equivalent to a campaign contribution to advertise a candidate, executive producer Michael Schur told Entertainment Weekly.

"Parks and Recreation" follows the Pawnee Parks department and its tireless deputy Knope, who puts all her efforts into improving her little hometown.

This is a big season for Poehler's character, who is finally elected into city government, gets engaged to campaign advisor Ben Wyatt and meets her political heroes including Senators Barbara Boxer, Olympia Snow and John McCain, who were featured in September's season premiere.

(Reporting By Piya Sinha-Roy, editing by Jill Serjeant)

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"Dancing" co-host Brooke Burke has thyroid cancer

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - "Dancing with the Stars" co-host Brooke Burke said on Thursday that she has been diagnosed with thyroid cancer and will need surgery.

The television presenter and model said in a three-minute video posted on the website Modernmom.com that she will need her thyroid removed.

"I need to have thyroid surgery and a thyroidectomy, which means I'm going to have a nice, big scar right here on neck," Burke said, drawing a finger across her throat.

Burke, a former winner of ABC's celebrity ballroom dancing competition, said she had a biopsy in July, but it had taken her months to go public with the results.

"I'm ready to deal with it, and I'm going to be fine," she said.

There was no word on when the surgery would take place, but Burke's publicist said her work schedule for "Dancing with the Stars" would not be affected.

Burke, 47, said in July that her doctor suggested she undergo a thyroid ultrasound after he felt a lump in her neck during a routine physical.

The thyroid is a gland in the neck that produces hormones that regulate vital body functions, such as heart rate and blood pressure.

Burke's co-host Tom Bergeron said on Thursday during an appearance on the CBS chat show "The Talk" that he had known about her condition for several months. "We are all there with her," he said.

"I've known about this for a few months ... I have had experience with this in my family. You never want to hear the word cancer. But thyroid cancer is one of the most treatable cancers. It has an incredibly high success rate," he said.

(Reporting By Eric Kelsey; Editing by Jill Serjeant)

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Chen Guang-who? Chinese official claims ignorance of blind activist

BEIJING (Reuters) - Despite causing a huge diplomatic incident between the world's two largest economies earlier this year, the Chinese official in charge of the hometown of blind legal activist Chen Guangcheng said on Friday that he has no idea who he was.

Chen, one of China's most prominent human rights advocates, slipped away from under the noses of guards and eyes and ears of surveillance equipment around his village home near Linyi in eastern Shandong province in late April.

He then sought refuge at the U.S. embassy in Beijing for six days, embarrassing China and creating an awkward backdrop for U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's visit which happened to fall at the same time.

But asked on the sidelines of a party congress in Beijing about Chen, Linyi's Communist Party boss Zhang Shaojun deadpanned.

"I've never heard (of him)," Zhang told Reuters, before hurrying away into a closed-door meeting.

In May, Chen told Reuters that an unnamed central government official had promised to investigate accusations that local officials engineered his jailing on false charges and subsequent 19 months of extra-judicial house arrest and abuse.

But Zhang, a portly man with thinning hair, said he knew of no such investigation.

"I've never heard of this matter," he said.

Robbed of his sight as a child, the rural-born Chen taught himself law and drew international attention in 2005 after accusing officials of enforcing late-term abortions and sterilizations.

Following intense negotiations between Chinese and U.S. officials, Chen left the embassy and was allowed to apply for a visa to study abroad. He is currently a visiting fellow at the New York University School of Law.

(Reporting by Gabriel Wildau; Editing by Ben Blanchard)

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On Twitter, pope to get different type of followers

VATICAN CITY (Reuters) - Pope Benedict already has 1.2 billion "followers" in the standard sense of the word but he soon will have another type when he enters what for any 85 year old is the brave new world of Twitter.

Vatican officials say the pontiff, who is known not to love computers and still writes most of his speeches by hand, will have his own handle by the end of the year.

"It will be an officially verified channel," said a Vatican official.

Primarily the tweets will come from the contents of his weekly general audience, Sunday blessings and homilies on major Church holidays. They will also include reaction to major world events, such as natural disasters.

The leader of the world's 1.2 billion or so Roman Catholics will not, of course, write the tweets himself, but he will sign off on them before they are sent in his name.

But even divine intervention might not help squeeze the gist of a papal encyclical, which can run to more than 140 pages, into 140 characters.

Those tweets will probably be limited to a link to a url with the entire document.

The papal handle has not yet been disclosed but it is widely expected to be @BenedictusPPXVI, his name and title in Latin.

The pope has given a qualified blessing to social networking.

In a document issued last year, he said the possibilities of new media and social networks offered "a great opportunity", but warned of the risks of depersonalisation, alienation, self-indulgence, and the dangers of having more virtual friends than real ones.

In 2009, a new Vatican website, www.pope2you.net, went live, offering an application called "The pope meets you on Facebook", and another allowing the faithful to see the pontiff's speeches and messages on their iPhones or iPods.

The Vatican famously got egg on its face in 2009 when it was forced to admit that, if it had surfed the web more, it might have known that a traditionalist bishop whose excommunication was lifted had for years been a Holocaust denier.

(Reporting By Philip Pullella; editing by Mike Collett-White)

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Ex-oilman named new leader of world's Anglicans

LONDON (Reuters) - A former oil executive was named leader of the world's 80 million Anglicans on Friday, ending months of closed-door negotiations as the church struggles with bitter rifts over senior women clergy and homosexuality.

Justin Welby, 56, who has been bishop of the northern English city of Durham for barely a year, will replace incumbent Rowan Williams in December.

He is widely regarded as an opponent of gay marriage but in favor of the ordination of women as bishops, two of the most divisive issues facing the Church.

Welby's appointment as the 105th Archbishop of Canterbury caps a meteoric rise in the Church of England hierarchy since he quit the oil business world and was ordained in 1992.

The bespectacled and soft-spoken Welby accepted the appointment at London's Lambeth Palace, the official London residence of the Archbishop of Canterbury for 800 years.

"My initial reaction was, 'oh no'," a smiling Welby told reporters in a wood-vaulted room adorned with portraits of former archbishops and gold chandeliers.

"It's something I never expected. And the last few weeks have been a rather strange experience, to put it mildly."

The long-awaited appointment, announced by Prime Minister David Cameron's office, follows weeks of intense speculation that a row over whether to choose a reformer or a safe pair of hands had stalled the nomination process.

"Well this is the best kept secret since the last cabinet reshuffle," Welby told an audience that included his wife, five children and a baby grand-daughter, after opening his address with a brief prayer.

"It's exciting because I believe that we are at one of those rare points where the tide of events is turning and the church ... has great opportunities to match its very great but often hidden strength."

Welby - who trained as a priest after the death of his infant daughter in a car crash - is likely to come under intense pressure to prevent the Anglican church tearing itself apart over women bishops and gay rights.

Liberal church leaders in the United States and Britain are at odds with more conservative figures in Africa and elsewhere.

"What the church does here deeply affects the already greatly suffering churches in places ... like Nigeria," Welby said.

Williams once famously warned that his successor would need the "constitution of an ox and the skin of a rhinoceros". Commentators say Welby's experience of tough negotiation and deal-making in business will stand him in good stead.

(Writing by Maria Golovnina; editing by Andrew Roche)

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Ex-oil man set to be next leader of world's Anglicans

LONDON (Reuters) - A former oil executive and critic of corporate excess is expected to be named on Friday as the next Archbishop of Canterbury and leader of the world's 80 million Anglicans.

Justin Welby, the Bishop of Durham, is widely tipped in British media to succeed Rowan Williams, capping a meteoric rise up the Church of England hierarchy since quitting the business world and being ordained in 1992.

He has been at Durham for less than a year.

A spokesman for Prime Minister David Cameron said the name would be announced on Friday.

The appointment will follow weeks of speculation that the nominating body assigned to elect the future spiritual leader of the Church of England was split over whether to choose a reformer or a safe pair of hands to maintain the status quo.

Williams has said his successor will need "the constitution of an ox and the skin of a rhinoceros".

The handover takes place at a time when the Church is at a crossroads, with traditionalists and reformers pitted against each other over the issues of same-sex marriage and senior women clergy.

Welby, who is seen as more conservative than the liberal Williams, is widely reported to be against gay marriage but in favor of the ordination of women bishops.

He went to the same elite school, Eton College, as Cameron, London mayor Boris Johnson and Princes William and Harry,

The bespectacled father-of-five suffered a tragedy in 1983, when his daughter was killed in a car accident, an event he described as a "dark time" which brought him and his wife closer to God.

Christina Rees, a religious commentator and a member of the General Synod, the church's governing body, said Welby was well-equipped for the position of archbishop.

"He's known to be a visionary and a strategic leader, he is prepared to take risks, extremely astute," Rees told BBC radio.

Welby has drawn on his financial expertise gained in the oil industry, in which he worked for Enterprise Oil and French company Elf Aquitaine. Since joining the Church, he has served on a government panel investigating banking standards after the Libor interbank interest rate scandal.

Speaking at a conference in Zurich last month, Welby criticized banks as being "exponents of anarchy" and said they should become more socially useful following the financial crisis of recent years.

"Finance can move from being the wreckage of a hubris-induced disaster, to retrieving its basic purpose of enabling human society to flourish effectively," he said then.

As the new archbishop, Welby would earn about 74,000 pounds ($120,000) a year. He would have lodgings in the Old Palace in Canterbury, southeast England, and the historic riverside Lambeth Palace in London.

His tenure would last until retirement at 70 or until he decides to move on.

(Editing by Angus MacSwan)

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Rare John Lennon letter to Eric Clapton up for auction

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - John Lennon held out the promise he could bring out more musical greatness in legendary guitarist Eric Clapton in a letter that could fetch as much as $30,000 when it is sold at auction next month, the organizers of the sale said on Monday.

The signed, hand-written letter by the Beatle, who died in 1980 at the age of 40, is one of a selection from some of the world's great musicians that will go under the hammer in Los Angeles at the Profiles in History auction on December 18.

In a draft letter dated September 29, 1971, Lennon expressed his respect and admiration for British guitarist Clapton and suggested that they form a band together.

"Eric, I know I can bring out something great, in fact greater in you that had been so far evident in your music. I hope to bring out the same kind of greatness in all of us, which I know will happen if/when we get together," Lennon wrote in the letter.

The letter will hold special significance for Beatles fans as auctioneer Joe Maddalena said it was widely known that there were problems in the Fab Four's relationships with each other, and that Clapton had almost become a Beatle.

Clapton played in the Plastic Ono Band, formed by Lennon and Yoko Ono in 1969 before the breakup of the Beatles in 1970. He also played on the George Harrison song "While My Guitar Gently Weeps", which was on the Beatles' White Album.

"There was a point in time when George Harrison thought about leaving the band and his replacement was Clapton, so this letter is a link of what could have been," Maddalena said.

The letter is one of 300 manuscripts and letters from literary, musical and political greats, that will be auctioned from the holdings of an American collector.

"What we know of history is from the written word, without these letters, it would all be verbal. It's a really unique area of collecting as you're getting a glimpse into people's minds," Maddalena said.

Other highlights include a handwritten letter from George Washington, with a pre-sale estimate of up to $300,000, and a Charles Dickens manuscript with an obituary of novelist William Thackeray, expected to fetch between $40,000 and $60,000.

Also on the auction block is a signed, handwritten letter from German composer Ludwig van Beethoven to Tobias Haslinger, a friend of his publisher, in which the musician discussed the second performance of his Ninth Symphony and the Missa Solemnis, two of his most revered works.

The letter, written in German, is undated, but both the Ninth Symphony and Missa Solemnis debuted in performances in 1824. Because of the rarity of the letter, it is estimated it will sell for between $40,000 and $60,000.

Other items going under the hammer include a signed letter in Russian by composer Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky, which has a pre-sale estimate of $10,000 to $15,000, and a letter by composer George Gershwin dated March 24, 1932, in which he compares his compositions "Rhapsody in Blue" and "An American in Paris".

The Gershwin letter is expected to sell for as much as $3,000, according to the auction house.

(Reporting By Piya Sinha-Roy; editing by Patricia Reaney; and Peter Galloway)

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Brad Pitt turns designer for high-end furniture collection

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Actor Brad Pitt has turned his talents to creating furniture for a luxury design house with a high-end collection inspired by both Art Nouveau and Art Deco, according to Architectural Digest.

Pitt, who collaborated on the collection with U.S. furniture designer Frank Pollaro, discussed his inspirations for the capsule collection in the December issue of the magazine.

"I'm drawn to furniture design as complete architecture on a minor scale," Pitt said. "I am obsessively bent on quality, to an unhealthy degree."

Pitt said it was his obsession that introduced him to Pollaro, whom he said embodies the "same mad spirit of the craftsmen of yore, with their obsessive attention to detail."

The dozen-piece collection, which will be unveiled by the Pollaro furniture house in New York between November 13 and 15, will include tables, chairs, an elaborate bed and a bathtub made of marble.

The 48-year-old "Fight Club" actor said he was influenced by Scottish architect Charles Rennie Mackintosh's Glasgow Rose, drawn with a continuous line. He designed his collection with the fluidity of a single line, be it geometric or circular.

"There is something more grand at play, as if you could tell the story of one's life with a single line — from birth to death, with all the bloody triumphs and perceived humiliating losses, even boredoms, along the way," the actor said.

Pitt has previously worked with well-known architects for his Make It Right foundation to create affordable quality housing for the victims of Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans. He also designed a diamond ring for his partner, Angelina Jolie, when the couple got engaged earlier this year.

The actor also became the latest and first male face of Chanel's iconic women's fragrance Chanel No.5 last month, mystifying critics and fashionistas with an enigmatic video commercial.

(Reporting By Piya Sinha-Roy; editing by Patricia Reaney, Bernard Orr)

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Sharon Osbourne has double mastectomy: magazine

LONDON (Reuters) - British celebrity Sharon Osbourne has had a double mastectomy after discovering she was carrying a gene that increased the risk of her developing breast cancer, she told Hello! magazine in an interview published on Monday.

Osbourne, 60, told the publication that the decision was a "no-brainer" in the end.

"As soon as I found out I had the breast cancer gene, I thought: 'The odds are not in my favor'," she said in remarks that also ran in the Daily Mirror tabloid.

"I've had cancer before and I didn't want to live under that cloud: I decided to just take everything off, and had a double mastectomy."

Osbourne, who put the eccentric life of her family on view in the reality TV series "The Osbournes", said she did not want to spend the rest of her life with "that shadow hanging over me.

"I want to be around for a long time and be a grandmother to Pearl," she added, referring to her son Jack's first child.

"I didn't even think of my breasts in a nostalgic way, I just wanted to be able to live my life without that fear all the time. It's not 'pity me', it's a decision I made that's got rid of this weight that I was carrying around."

Osbourne raised her profile by appearing as a judge on successful talent shows "The X Factor" and "America's Got Talent". She is married to heavy metal singer Ozzy Osbourne.

Her London publicist referred Reuters to the interview which ran in Hello! and the Daily Mirror when asked to confirm the news.

(Reporting by Mike Collett-White, editing by Paul Casciato)

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Court upholds Baumgartner fine for punching man

VIENNA (Reuters) - Austrian daredevil Felix Baumgartner failed to have a conviction for assault overturned on Tuesday and has apologized through his lawyer for punching a Greek truck driver in a 2010 incident, a court spokeswoman said.

Baumgartner, the skydiver who made headlines around the world last month after jumping from a balloon near the edge of space, lost his appeal against a 1,500 euro ($1,900) fine for hitting the driver during a traffic jam near Salzburg.

"He apologized and was convicted in absentia with the consent of his attorney. The matter is now finished," the spokeswoman for the appellate court in Salzburg said.

Baumgartner, 43, contended he was acting in self-defense when he hit the truck driver, his lawyer said last week.

Baumgartner parachuted from a balloon high above the Earth last month, setting a record for the highest skydive and breaking the sound barrier in the process.

But in Austria, the apparent road rage incident has generated less welcome publicity on the ground.

Austrian papers have quoted the truck driver, identified only as Dimitrios P, as saying he had given Baumgartner only a slight push and had got a fist in the face in return.

(Reporting by Michael Shields, editing by Paul Casciato)

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Rihanna unveils Chris Brown duet "Nobodies Business"

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - R&B star Rihanna unveiled a duet entitled "Nobodies Business" with ex-boyfriend Chris Brown on Tuesday, three years after Brown was charged with assaulting her.

The song was part of an official track list that Barbadian singer Rihanna tweeted to her followers for her upcoming album "Unapologetic," and comes after weeks of speculation in the media that the couple have rekindled their romance being spotted together at numerous events.

While Rihanna, 24, has stayed mum on her relationship status with Brown, the "Turn Up The Music" singer attended Rihanna's Halloween party last week and tweeted a photograph of himself dressed in Arab robes and a rifle.

Brown, 23, is currently halfway through his five-year probation after pleading guilty to assaulting Rihanna on the eve of the Grammy awards in 2009. He was ordered to complete community service and a domestic violence program.

Brown was given permission by a Los Angeles judge to embark on his European tour at a recent hearing overseeing his progress on his probation.

The former couple have had a tumultuous relationship in the last three years, including a restraining order against Brown following the assault.

But recently the two singers have made peace, coming together on a remix of Rihanna's raunchy song "Birthday Cake" earlier this year.

The Barbadian singer told Oprah Winfrey in an emotional interview in August that she and Brown now had a "very close friendship," and that she still loved him.

Other collaborations on Rihanna's upcoming "Unapologetic" album include rapper Eminem, newcomer singer-songwriter Mikky Ekko and rapper Future.

(Reporting By Piya Sinha-Roy, editing by Jill Serjeant)

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Springsteen Sandy telethon raises $23 million, ABC more than $10 million

(Reuters) - Bruce Springsteen, Billy Joel, Mary Blige and dozens of other musicians and celebrities helped raise some $23 million for victims of Hurricane Sandy on NBC television, while a Day of Giving on ABC TV networks raised more than $10 million.

The American Red Cross said the one-hour NBC telethon on Friday, featuring performances by celebrities with strong New York and New Jersey connections, generated a record number of individual donations by phone, text and online for victims of Sandy.

The preliminary amount raised was nearly $23 million, the Red Cross said in a statement.

On ABC on Monday, viewers and celebrities had raised more than $10 million, also for the American Red Cross, midway through a day-long fundraiser for victims of last week's storm, which devastated the U.S. Northeast and killed more that 100 people.

Journalist Barbara Walters made a personal donation of $250,000 and manned phone lines during breakfast show "Good Morning America" along with Katie Couric, actor Ben Stiller and "Jersey Shore" star Nicole "Snooki" Polizzi, ABC said. Donations are expected to rise further during the day-long event.

(Reporting by Jill Serjeant in Los Angeles; Editing by Richard Chang)

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Rare John Lennon letter to Eric Clapton up for auction

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - John Lennon held out the promise he could bring out more musical greatness in legendary guitarist Eric Clapton in a letter that could fetch as much as $30,000 when it is sold at auction next month, the organizers of the sale said on Monday.

The signed, hand-written letter by the Beatle, who died in 1980 at the age of 40, is one of a selection from some of the world's great musicians that will go under the hammer in Los Angeles at the Profiles in History auction on December 18.

In a draft letter dated September 29, 1971, Lennon expressed his respect and admiration for British guitarist Clapton and suggested that they form a band together.

"Eric, I know I can bring out something great, in fact greater in you that had been so far evident in your music. I hope to bring out the same kind of greatness in all of us, which I know will happen if/when we get together," Lennon wrote in the letter.

The letter will hold special significance for Beatles fans as auctioneer Joe Maddalena said it was widely known that there were problems in the Fab Four's relationships with each other, and that Clapton had almost become a Beatle.

Clapton played in the Plastic Ono Band, formed by Lennon and Yoko Ono in 1969 before the breakup of the Beatles in 1970. He also played on the George Harrison song "While My Guitar Gently Weeps", which was on the Beatles' White Album.

"There was a point in time when George Harrison thought about leaving the band and his replacement was Clapton, so this letter is a link of what could have been," Maddalena said.

The letter is one of 300 manuscripts and letters from literary, musical and political greats, that will be auctioned from the holdings of an American collector.

"What we know of history is from the written word, without these letters, it would all be verbal. It's a really unique area of collecting as you're getting a glimpse into people's minds," Maddalena said.

Other highlights include a handwritten letter from George Washington, with a pre-sale estimate of up to $300,000, and a Charles Dickens manuscript with an obituary of novelist William Thackeray, expected to fetch between $40,000 and $60,000.

Also on the auction block is a signed, handwritten letter from German composer Ludwig van Beethoven to Tobias Haslinger, a friend of his publisher, in which the musician discussed the second performance of his Ninth Symphony and the Missa Solemnis, two of his most revered works.

The letter, written in German, is undated, but both the Ninth Symphony and Missa Solemnis debuted in performances in 1824. Because of the rarity of the letter, it is estimated it will sell for between $40,000 and $60,000.

Other items going under the hammer include a signed letter in Russian by composer Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky, which has a pre-sale estimate of $10,000 to $15,000, and a letter by composer George Gershwin dated March 24, 1932, in which he compares his compositions "Rhapsody in Blue" and "An American in Paris".

The Gershwin letter is expected to sell for as much as $3,000, according to the auction house.

(Reporting By Piya Sinha-Roy; editing by Patricia Reaney; and Peter Galloway)

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Aerosmith puts on Boston street concert on Memory Lane

BOSTON (Reuters) - Thousands of music fans clogged a Boston street on Monday to hear Grammy award-winning rock band Aerosmith perform a free concert in front of the apartment building where the musicians began their career four decades ago.

The band blared out hits including "Walk This Way" and "Sweet Emotion" from the back of a specially converted tractor-trailer while area residents hung out windows, sat on balconies and stood on rooftops to hear the noontime concert.

"It feels like the world stood still for this. It feels like it was yesterday," lead singer Steven Tyler told Reuters in an interview after the concert.

The band played to mark the release of its 15th studio album, "Music from Another Dimension," due out on Tuesday.

Aerosmith's five members signed a plaque that Boston plans to mount outside the apartment building in the Allston neighborhood where they lived in the early days of a career that has brought them four Grammy awards and more than 20 Top 40 hits.

"That used to be my bedroom," lead guitarist Joe Perry yelled to a woman looking out a second-story window.

The crowd of thousands included teenagers holding signs declaring that they had skipped school to see the show, celebrities such as New England Patriots quarterback Tom Brady and fans whose history with the band went back to its 1970 founding.

"I always loved Aerosmith. They were one of the first rock bands I got into growing up in Brazil," said Michelle Fernandes, 43, waiting for the concert to start.

When she moved to the United States in 2003, Fernandes was surprised to learn that she was working in an office down the street from where her favorite band got its start, Fernandes said.

"How cool is that?" she said.

The band has always kept up its ties to a city that is home to hundreds of thousands of college students.

"When there's groups of young people like there are in colleges towns like this, there's a lot of passion," Tyler said. "We love that."

While the band relished the chance to see its old neighborhood, Perry declined to go into the apartment, where the band wrote songs including "Movin' Out."

"I didn't want to go into it to see what it looked like today because I like the memory of what it was when we were there," Perry told Reuters. "I didn't want to see it all polished and spiffed up."

On Thursday Aerosmith resumes its tour with a show in Oklahoma City.

(Reporting By Scott Malone; Editing by Cynthia Johnston and Bill Trott)

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Brad Pitt turns designer for high-end furniture collection

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Actor Brad Pitt has turned his talents to creating furniture for a luxury design house with a high-end collection inspired by both Art Nouveau and Art Deco, according to Architectural Digest.

Pitt, who collaborated on the collection with U.S. furniture designer Frank Pollaro, discussed his inspirations for the capsule collection in the December issue of the magazine.

"I'm drawn to furniture design as complete architecture on a minor scale," Pitt said. "I am obsessively bent on quality, to an unhealthy degree."

Pitt said it was his obsession that introduced him to Pollaro, whom he said embodies the "same mad spirit of the craftsmen of yore, with their obsessive attention to detail."

The dozen-piece collection, which will be unveiled by the Pollaro furniture house in New York between November 13 and 15, will include tables, chairs, an elaborate bed and a bathtub made of marble.

The 48-year-old "Fight Club" actor said he was influenced by Scottish architect Charles Rennie Mackintosh's Glasgow Rose, drawn with a continuous line. He designed his collection with the fluidity of a single line, be it geometric or circular.

"There is something more grand at play, as if you could tell the story of one's life with a single line — from birth to death, with all the bloody triumphs and perceived humiliating losses, even boredoms, along the way," the actor said.

Pitt has previously worked with well-known architects for his Make It Right foundation to create affordable quality housing for the victims of Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans. He also designed a diamond ring for his partner, Angelina Jolie, when the couple got engaged earlier this year.

The actor also became the latest and first male face of Chanel's iconic women's fragrance Chanel No.5 last month, mystifying critics and fashionistas with an enigmatic video commercial.

(Reporting By Piya Sinha-Roy; editing by Patricia Reaney, Bernard Orr)

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Actress Kristen Bell expecting first child with Dax Shepard

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Actress Kristen Bell is expecting her first child with actor Dax Shepard, her spokeswoman said on Monday.

"Veronica Mars" actress Bell, 32, is expecting the child in late spring with her fiancé, "Parenthood" actor Shepard, 37, the actress' representative Marcel Pariseau told Reuters.

The couple announced their engagement in January 2010 and this is the first child for both.

Bell has forged a successful career in TV shows including "Heroes" and "House of Lies," and movies such as "Forgetting Sarah Marshall."

She starred alongside comedian Shepard in the 2010 romantic comedy "When in Rome" and more recently in this year's independent film "Hit and Run."

(Reporting by Piya Sinha-Roy; Editing by Patricia Reaney and Lisa Shumaker)

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Billionaire Adelson, wife give new $10 million to Romney "Super PAC"

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Top Republican donors Sheldon Adelson and his wife gave another $10 million to the "Super PAC" backing Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney in October, saying they hoped to "level the playing field" with Democrats ahead of the November 6 election.

In a campaign year of unprecedented contributions, Adelson and his wife Miriam have stood out above the rest.

The 79-year-old billionaire chairman of Las Vegas Sands Corp, Adelson emerged as the Republican Party's biggest patron in the 2012 campaign, pouring at least $47 million into Republican coffers with his wife.

The Adelsons gave $5 million each to the pro-Romney Super PAC Restore Our Future, accounting for about half of the fund's cash raised from October 1 through 17, according to Federal Election Commission filings released on Thursday. The filings are the last disclosures before the November 6 elections.

In a statement on Thursday, the Adelsons said they were exercising their "privileges" of free speech to counter the millions of dollars raised by President Barack Obama as well as contributions from liberal billionaire George Soros and labor unions.

"Our family has felt an obligation to help level the playing field by providing support to the candidates and causes on the other side of the equation," according to the statement provided by a Sands spokesman.

A series of U.S. court cases in recent years have shined a spotlight on political spending as a form of free speech.

The rulings spawned Super PACs, outside groups that can raise and spend unlimited funds but cannot formally coordinate with official campaigns.

Soros, a billionaire financier, held the previous political donation record with $27.5 million contributed to Democrats in 2004. In October, Soros gave $1 million to the pro-Obama Super PAC.

The Adelsons have also donated to Super PACs helping Republicans in Congress. They were the largest donors behind the party's convention in Tampa, Florida, in late August.

During the Republican primaries, the Adelsons used their fortune to attack Romney. They gave up to $20 million to presidential hopeful Newt Gingrich, who won the South Carolina primary.

The Adelsons became Romney donors in June when the candidate became Obama's remaining Republican challenger.

Forbes estimates Adelson's fortune to be $20.5 billion.

In September, Adelson told Politico he planned to spend up to $100 million, or "whatever it takes," to defeat Obama.

Adelson may have given another $20 million to $30 million to fundraising groups that do not need to report their contributors, according to Politico.

Adelson has also used his contributions to push for a stronger U.S. defense of Israel's sovereignty. He is a director of the Republican Jewish Coalition and has called Obama's Israel positions too soft.

In the previous presidential campaign of 2008, Adelson was a much less prominent donor, giving about $100,000 to Republican candidates and party funds, according to the Center for Responsive Politics, a non-partisan group that tracks spending.

(Additional reporting by Alina Selyukh and Alexander Cohen; editing by Todd Eastham)

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R&B singer Natina Reed hit and killed by car in Georgia

(Reuters) - Natina Reed, a member of the R&B singing trio Blaque, was struck and killed by a car as she walked in a major roadway in Georgia, police said on Saturday.

Reed, who also appeared in the cheerleader movie "Bring It On" in 2000, would have turned 33 on Sunday.

She was struck by a car at about 10:30 p.m. Friday on a state highway just north of the Atlanta suburb of Lilburn, Gwinnett County Police Sergeant Rich Long said.

The car's driver called 911 and a passenger performed CPR but Reed was pronounced dead at an area medical center, police said. Authorities ruled the driver was not at fault and no charges were expected to be filed, Long said.

Investigators were trying to determine why Reed was in the road, Long said.

As part of Blaque, Reed performed the 1999 hits "Bring It All to Me" and "808" with fellow members Shamari Fears DeVoe and Brandi Williams.

Reed's fellow group members said in a statement on Saturday that Blaque had recently reunited and the group was working on an album and a reality show.

"My world as I know it has forever changed," DeVoe said on Twitter on Saturday. "Until we meet again, may you find comfort in the arms of an angel. I love you Natina."

(Reporting by Colleen Jenkins; Editing by Bill Trott)

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Kate Moss opens up about modeling misery

NEW YORK (Reuters) - If you hate having your picture taken, you're in good company - British supermodel Kate Moss does as well.

"I'm terrible at a snapshot. Terrible. I blink all the time. I've got facial Tourette's," she told Vanity Fair in the December issue, out on Wednesday.

Moss, who has graced countless magazine covers and was emblematic of the waif look popular in the 1990s, added "Unless I'm working and in that zone, I'm not very good at pictures."

Moss, 38, opened up about her years spent before the camera, including now-legendary shoots that left her anxious, demoralized, and hungry.

Among her regrets is a 1992 Calvin Klein session that helped launched Moss' career.

She recalled the shoot, at age 17 or 18, with Mark Wahlberg (then going by his rapper name, Marky Mark) and photographer Herb Ritts.

"I had a nervous breakdown," she said. "It (the job) didn't feel like me at all. I felt really bad about straddling this buff guy. I didn't like it. I couldn't get out of bed for two weeks. I thought I was going to die."

"It was just anxiety," she added. "Nobody takes care of you mentally. There's a massive pressure to do what you have to do (and) I was really little ... I didn't like it. But it was work, and I had to do it."

When she was even younger, she posed nude for The Face - another regret.

"I see a 16-year-old now, and to ask her to take her clothes off would feel really weird. But they were like, 'If you don't do it, then we're not going to book you again.' So I'd lock myself in the toilet and cry and then come out and do it."

Moss, who became associated with the "heroin chic" look after her early shoots, said "I had never even taken heroin - it was nothing to do with me at all."

"I was thin," she conceded. "But that's because I was doing shows, working really hard ... You'd get home from work and there was no food. You'd get to work in the morning, there was no food ... You don't get fed."

Moss has kind words for her time with Johnny Depp in the mid-1990s, when she said she felt taken care of. After their break-up in 1998, "I really lost that gauge of somebody I could trust. Nightmare. Years and years of crying."

Now, she says, her years of partying and high living have ebbed. She married guitarist Jamie Hince in 2011 after a four-year romance. "I don't real­ly go to clubs anymore. I'm actually quite settled."

"Living in Highgate (in London) with my dog and my husband and my daughter! I'm not a hell-raiser."

Still, she added, "Don't burst the bubble. Behind closed doors, for sure I'm a hell-raiser."

(Reporting by Chris Michaud, editing by Jill Serjeant and Sandra Maler)

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George Clooney is distant cousin of Abraham Lincoln

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Aunt Rosemary was not George Clooney's only famous relative. You can add a certain Civil War American president to the Oscar-winning actor's family tree.

Politics has apparently run in the activist actor's blood for centuries, as website Ancestry.com on Thursday revealed that the "Ocean's 11" star is distantly related to President Abraham Lincoln.

According to Ancestry.com, Clooney is the half-first cousin five times removed from Lincoln, the 16th president. The genealogy website breaks down the connection, explaining the "half" means that two of their ancestors were half-siblings - Lincoln's mother Nancy Hanks was the half-sister of Clooney's 4th great-grandmother Mary Ann Sparrow.

Hanks and Sparrow shared the same mother, Lucy Hanks, but had different fathers. Lucy Hanks was Lincoln's maternal grandmother as well as the 5th great-grandmother of Clooney.

Clooney's aunt was singer and actress Rosemary Clooney, who died in 2002.

Clooney, long noted for his political activism, is a major Hollywood backer of President Barack Obama. He hosted a Democratic Party fundraiser at his Los Angeles home in March that raised $15 million.

Lincoln, a Republican, is considered one of the greatest presidents in the history of the United States. He led the country through the Civil War and is credited with the abolition of slavery, which officially became law in 1865 after his assassination.

He is the subject of an upcoming Steven Spielberg film "Lincoln," starring Daniel Day-Lewis in the title role, which is to open in the United States next week.

Ancestry.com is offering free access to more than 20,000 documents showcasing Lincoln's life, his family tree and the most pivotal moments of his presidential career. The details can be found at www.ancestry.com/lincoln.

(Reporting by Zorianna Kit; Editing by Chris Michaud and Jackie Frank)

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Songwriter Bill Dees,"Oh, Pretty Woman" co-writer, dead at 73

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Singer-composer Bill Dees, best known for his songwriting collaboration with Roy Orbison on the hits "Oh, Pretty Woman" and "It's Over," has died at age 73 in Mountain Home, Arkansas, according to an obituary posted online by a local funeral home.

Dees, a Texas native who got his start in the 1950s with a high school band called the Five Bops, is credited with writing scores of songs in all, some recorded by such performers as Johnny Cash, Loretta Lynn and Glen Campbell.

But Dees' most fruitful collaboration was his work with fellow Texan Orbison, with whom he teamed up to write Orbison's signature 1964 hit, "Oh, Pretty Woman." which was featured years later in the soundtrack to the movie "Pretty Woman," starring Julia Roberts and Richard Gere.

The band Van Halen also scored a hit with a cover version of "Oh, Pretty Woman."

According to various accounts, the song's refrain grew out of an offhand comment Dees made when Orbison's wife, Claudette, walked into the room where the two men were writing together, and Orbison asked her if she needed any money.

Dees cracked, "Pretty woman never needs any money," and the song took shape from there, with the bulk of the composition coming together in less than hour.

As recounted in one biography posted on Dees' official website, Dees also contributed uncredited harmony vocals on the record.

"Oh, Pretty Woman" went to No. 1 in United States and topped the charts in Britain, as did the 1964 Orbison ballad co-written by Dees, "It's Over," a considerable achievement given the dominance of the Beatles and other British groups on both sides of the Atlantic at the time.

Other Orbison singles Dees co-wrote included "Born on the Wind," "Crawling Back," "Communication Breakdown," "Walk On," "Windsurfer" and "So This Is Love."

Dees died last week, on October 24, at Mountain Home, where he had lived since 1989, according to an announcement posted on the website of the Kirby & Family Funeral Home, where a memorial service is scheduled for Saturday, November 3.

(Writing by Steve Gorman; Editing by Eric Walsh and W Simon)

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Billionaire Adelson, wife give new $10 million to Romney "Super PAC"

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Top Republican donors Sheldon Adelson and his wife gave another $10 million to the "Super PAC" backing Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney in October, saying they hoped to "level the playing field" with Democrats ahead of the November 6 election.

In a campaign year of unprecedented contributions, Adelson and his wife Miriam have stood out above the rest.

The 79-year-old billionaire chairman of Las Vegas Sands Corp, Adelson emerged as the Republican Party's biggest patron in the 2012 campaign, pouring at least $47 million into Republican coffers with his wife.

The Adelsons gave $5 million each to the pro-Romney Super PAC Restore Our Future, accounting for about half of the fund's cash raised from October 1 through 17, according to Federal Election Commission filings released on Thursday. The filings are the last disclosures before the November 6 elections.

In a statement on Thursday, the Adelsons said they were exercising their "privileges" of free speech to counter the millions of dollars raised by President Barack Obama as well as contributions from liberal billionaire George Soros and labor unions.

"Our family has felt an obligation to help level the playing field by providing support to the candidates and causes on the other side of the equation," according to the statement provided by a Sands spokesman.

A series of U.S. court cases in recent years have shined a spotlight on political spending as a form of free speech.

The rulings spawned Super PACs, outside groups that can raise and spend unlimited funds but cannot formally coordinate with official campaigns.

Soros, a billionaire financier, held the previous political donation record with $27.5 million contributed to Democrats in 2004. In October, Soros gave $1 million to the pro-Obama Super PAC.

The Adelsons have also donated to Super PACs helping Republicans in Congress. They were the largest donors behind the party's convention in Tampa, Florida, in late August.

During the Republican primaries, the Adelsons used their fortune to attack Romney. They gave up to $20 million to presidential hopeful Newt Gingrich, who won the South Carolina primary.

The Adelsons became Romney donors in June when the candidate became Obama's remaining Republican challenger.

Forbes estimates Adelson's fortune to be $20.5 billion.

In September, Adelson told Politico he planned to spend up to $100 million, or "whatever it takes," to defeat Obama.

Adelson may have given another $20 million to $30 million to fundraising groups that do not need to report their contributors, according to Politico.

Adelson has also used his contributions to push for a stronger U.S. defense of Israel's sovereignty. He is a director of the Republican Jewish Coalition and has called Obama's Israel positions too soft.

In the previous presidential campaign of 2008, Adelson was a much less prominent donor, giving about $100,000 to Republican candidates and party funds, according to the Center for Responsive Politics, a non-partisan group that tracks spending.

(Additional reporting by Alina Selyukh and Alexander Cohen; editing by Todd Eastham)

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R&B singer Natina Reed hit and killed by car in Georgia

(Reuters) - Natina Reed, a member of the R&B singing trio Blaque, was struck and killed by a car as she walked in a major roadway in Georgia, police said on Saturday.

Reed, who also appeared in the cheerleader movie "Bring It On" in 2000, would have turned 33 on Sunday.

She was struck by a car at about 10:30 p.m. Friday on a state highway just north of the Atlanta suburb of Lilburn, Gwinnett County Police Sergeant Rich Long said.

The car's driver called 911 and a passenger performed CPR but Reed was pronounced dead at an area medical center, police said. Authorities ruled the driver was not at fault and no charges were expected to be filed, Long said.

Investigators were trying to determine why Reed was in the road, Long said.

As part of Blaque, Reed performed the 1999 hits "Bring It All to Me" and "808" with fellow members Shamari Fears DeVoe and Brandi Williams.

Reed's fellow group members said in a statement on Saturday that Blaque had recently reunited and the group was working on an album and a reality show.

"My world as I know it has forever changed," DeVoe said on Twitter on Saturday. "Until we meet again, may you find comfort in the arms of an angel. I love you Natina."

(Reporting by Colleen Jenkins; Editing by Bill Trott)

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Kate Moss opens up about modeling misery

NEW YORK (Reuters) - If you hate having your picture taken, you're in good company - British supermodel Kate Moss does as well.

"I'm terrible at a snapshot. Terrible. I blink all the time. I've got facial Tourette's," she told Vanity Fair in the December issue, out on Wednesday.

Moss, who has graced countless magazine covers and was emblematic of the waif look popular in the 1990s, added "Unless I'm working and in that zone, I'm not very good at pictures."

Moss, 38, opened up about her years spent before the camera, including now-legendary shoots that left her anxious, demoralized, and hungry.

Among her regrets is a 1992 Calvin Klein session that helped launched Moss' career.

She recalled the shoot, at age 17 or 18, with Mark Wahlberg (then going by his rapper name, Marky Mark) and photographer Herb Ritts.

"I had a nervous breakdown," she said. "It (the job) didn't feel like me at all. I felt really bad about straddling this buff guy. I didn't like it. I couldn't get out of bed for two weeks. I thought I was going to die."

"It was just anxiety," she added. "Nobody takes care of you mentally. There's a massive pressure to do what you have to do (and) I was really little ... I didn't like it. But it was work, and I had to do it."

When she was even younger, she posed nude for The Face - another regret.

"I see a 16-year-old now, and to ask her to take her clothes off would feel really weird. But they were like, 'If you don't do it, then we're not going to book you again.' So I'd lock myself in the toilet and cry and then come out and do it."

Moss, who became associated with the "heroin chic" look after her early shoots, said "I had never even taken heroin - it was nothing to do with me at all."

"I was thin," she conceded. "But that's because I was doing shows, working really hard ... You'd get home from work and there was no food. You'd get to work in the morning, there was no food ... You don't get fed."

Moss has kind words for her time with Johnny Depp in the mid-1990s, when she said she felt taken care of. After their break-up in 1998, "I really lost that gauge of somebody I could trust. Nightmare. Years and years of crying."

Now, she says, her years of partying and high living have ebbed. She married guitarist Jamie Hince in 2011 after a four-year romance. "I don't real­ly go to clubs anymore. I'm actually quite settled."

"Living in Highgate (in London) with my dog and my husband and my daughter! I'm not a hell-raiser."

Still, she added, "Don't burst the bubble. Behind closed doors, for sure I'm a hell-raiser."

(Reporting by Chris Michaud, editing by Jill Serjeant and Sandra Maler)

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George Clooney is distant cousin of Abraham Lincoln

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Aunt Rosemary was not George Clooney's only famous relative. You can add a certain Civil War American president to the Oscar-winning actor's family tree.

Politics has apparently run in the activist actor's blood for centuries, as website Ancestry.com on Thursday revealed that the "Ocean's 11" star is distantly related to President Abraham Lincoln.

According to Ancestry.com, Clooney is the half-first cousin five times removed from Lincoln, the 16th president. The genealogy website breaks down the connection, explaining the "half" means that two of their ancestors were half-siblings - Lincoln's mother Nancy Hanks was the half-sister of Clooney's 4th great-grandmother Mary Ann Sparrow.

Hanks and Sparrow shared the same mother, Lucy Hanks, but had different fathers. Lucy Hanks was Lincoln's maternal grandmother as well as the 5th great-grandmother of Clooney.

Clooney's aunt was singer and actress Rosemary Clooney, who died in 2002.

Clooney, long noted for his political activism, is a major Hollywood backer of President Barack Obama. He hosted a Democratic Party fundraiser at his Los Angeles home in March that raised $15 million.

Lincoln, a Republican, is considered one of the greatest presidents in the history of the United States. He led the country through the Civil War and is credited with the abolition of slavery, which officially became law in 1865 after his assassination.

He is the subject of an upcoming Steven Spielberg film "Lincoln," starring Daniel Day-Lewis in the title role, which is to open in the United States next week.

Ancestry.com is offering free access to more than 20,000 documents showcasing Lincoln's life, his family tree and the most pivotal moments of his presidential career. The details can be found at www.ancestry.com/lincoln.

(Reporting by Zorianna Kit; Editing by Chris Michaud and Jackie Frank)

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Songwriter Bill Dees,"Oh, Pretty Woman" co-writer, dead at 73

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Singer-composer Bill Dees, best known for his songwriting collaboration with Roy Orbison on the hits "Oh, Pretty Woman" and "It's Over," has died at age 73 in Mountain Home, Arkansas, according to an obituary posted online by a local funeral home.

Dees, a Texas native who got his start in the 1950s with a high school band called the Five Bops, is credited with writing scores of songs in all, some recorded by such performers as Johnny Cash, Loretta Lynn and Glen Campbell.

But Dees' most fruitful collaboration was his work with fellow Texan Orbison, with whom he teamed up to write Orbison's signature 1964 hit, "Oh, Pretty Woman." which was featured years later in the soundtrack to the movie "Pretty Woman," starring Julia Roberts and Richard Gere.

The band Van Halen also scored a hit with a cover version of "Oh, Pretty Woman."

According to various accounts, the song's refrain grew out of an offhand comment Dees made when Orbison's wife, Claudette, walked into the room where the two men were writing together, and Orbison asked her if she needed any money.

Dees cracked, "Pretty woman never needs any money," and the song took shape from there, with the bulk of the composition coming together in less than hour.

As recounted in one biography posted on Dees' official website, Dees also contributed uncredited harmony vocals on the record.

"Oh, Pretty Woman" went to No. 1 in United States and topped the charts in Britain, as did the 1964 Orbison ballad co-written by Dees, "It's Over," a considerable achievement given the dominance of the Beatles and other British groups on both sides of the Atlantic at the time.

Other Orbison singles Dees co-wrote included "Born on the Wind," "Crawling Back," "Communication Breakdown," "Walk On," "Windsurfer" and "So This Is Love."

Dees died last week, on October 24, at Mountain Home, where he had lived since 1989, according to an announcement posted on the website of the Kirby & Family Funeral Home, where a memorial service is scheduled for Saturday, November 3.

(Writing by Steve Gorman; Editing by Eric Walsh and W Simon)

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