A Newsmax Report

 

1. Leonardo DiCaprio’s Guilt-Free Eco Conscience

Actor and green-scene celeb Leonardo DiCaprio has purchased a luxury condo that overlooks the Hudson River in Manhattan.

The building is a gleaming glass tower with panoramic views. It boasts an indoor 50-foot lap pool, residents-only café, fully equipped gymnasium, landscaped rooftop terrace and giant lobby fish tank.

The place has that something extra, though, for those who can afford the high price of luxury cosmopolitan living: Getting to feel good about yourself, environmentally speaking. We’re talking green to the opulent max.

The building’s surface is covered with low emission paints, adhesives and sealants. Locally acquired sustainable materials were used in construction. There’s a built-in water filtration system. Custom filters purify the air. And rotating solar panels capture the rays. So even though the size of the carbon footprint is more like Penn Jillette’s than Ramiele Malubay’s, greenie residents can pat themselves on the back.

DeCaprio will be able buzz the concierge, tip the doorman, visit the fitness/yoga center, play billiards, stop in the media room and drop his pooch at the dog spa, all without any eco-guilt.

It may be more enviro-friendly than a Park Avenue pad, but it’s worlds apart from Ed Begley Jr. and Darryl Hannah’s eco sensibilities.

2. Tom Cruise’s ‘Purple’ Pot Rage

World famous Scientologist Tom Cruise is well known for the strong stance he has taken against drug use and abuse.

So it’s not surprising that Cruise went ballistic when he found out that medical marijuana was being marketed using his moniker and image.

“Tom Cruise Purple” pot is being sold in legal marijuana clubs in Northern California. The packaging features a picture of a laughing T.C. The product is reportedly strong stuff and can cause hallucinations in users.

If Cruise didn’t give permission to the manufacturer to use his name and likeness, “Tom Cruise Purple” won’t be on marijuana club menus much longer.

To add some incentive, Cruise's lawyers are gearing up for a lawsuit.

 

3. Comedy Court

It had to happen.

Trial lawyers have been filing suits for their clients in record numbers, but a lot of lawsuits these days sound less like legal documents and more like comedy scripts.

Well, someone has decided to turn the amusing legal matters into a bona fide comedy show.

Taped at Hollywood’s Laugh Factory, the “Supreme Court of Comedy” is a new kind of courtroom show being aired on DirecTV.

The program has real folks acting as plaintiffs and defendants.

The set looks like the one on “The People's Court” but there’s a difference in the proceedings. Instead of parties being represented by lawyers, they’re represented by comics.

The judge is also a comedian, Dom Irrera.

The “Supreme Court of Comedy”’s comedic counsel includes Tom Arnold, Paul Rodriguez and Sinbad.

Featured cases involve a defendant who was sued for taking his former girlfriend's clothes and wearing them at a local nightspot, and a plaintiff who filed suit because his house-sitting friend allegedly stole a sex tape.

Tom Cruise is getting back at Viacom Chairman Sumner Redstone for booting him off the Paramount lot in 2006. But Cruise is doing it cinematically.

The actor appears in an upcoming Paramount flick, “Tropic Thunder,” in a secret cameo role as a profanity spewing movie exec.

At a studio screening to promote the film, audience members recognized that it was Cruise playing a caricature of Redstone.

Film journalists had no idea that Cruise had taken a part in the film. He’s not named in the credits, and the scene he appears in is not in the preview footage. Reportedly, director Ben Stiller was trying to keep Cruise's role in the film a surprise.

For Redstone, it must have been a shocker. The mogul recently had dinner with Cruise. Afterwards Redstone indicated that the two had put the past behind them.

Apparently, Cruise was still nursing a grudge.

5. Charlton Heston: Courage and Honor

Charlton Heston was one of the greatest movie stars who ever lived.

He, of course, played the larger-than-life Moses in Cecil B. DeMille’s “The Ten Commandments.” Things don’t get too much bigger than that in Hollywood.

His life was filled with political fervor, too. Second nature, I guess; caring about the country and having the strength of character to actually put thoughts, words and feelings into motion.

Heston supported Democrats Adlai Stevenson and John F. Kennedy and stood alongside Martin Luther King, Jr. in Washington, D.C.

Even though he opposed the Vietnam War, Heston made it a point to visit the troops, look into the faces, grip the hands, ease the load, if only for the moment.

At one point he changed party labels and took on the GOP designation. He became a champion of civil liberties, spurred on by the Robert Bork battle and Bork’s eventual denial of a Supreme Court seat.

Heston became a foot soldier in the fight against political correctness, which he referred to as “tyranny with manners.”

Despite the media and their railing against him, in the 1960s Heston held fast to his civil rights activist promptings. And in the 1990s he upheld “freedom in the truest sense” with his Second Amendment advocacy.

Like dust from a chariot wheel, Heston brushed off the personal attacks of his opponents. “I marched for civil rights with Dr. King in 1963 — long before Hollywood found it fashionable,” he said.

When in a speech he tried to make a point about the concept of pride of heritage, black, white or red, he was called a racist. When on another occasion he took exception to the idea of having special rights based on sexual orientation, he was labeled a homophobe. These are only two of the many blows he suffered in the line of free speech duty.

Still, he remained undeterred in expressing his ideas and beliefs in the public arena.

Heston saw parallels between America of the 1990s and ancient Rome, disturbed by the societal signals he perceived especially in the entertainment realm. “Our culture has replaced the bloody arena fights of ancient Rome with stage fights on TV with Sally, Ricki, Jerry, Jenny and Rosie,” he lamented.

Despite risk to career and legacy, he admonished the Hollywood community, telling them, “We see films made that diminish the American experience and example. And sometimes trash it completely.”

Summing up his professional life, Heston said, “I've played three presidents, three saints and two geniuses and that's probably enough for any man.”

Not just any man, an American archetype.

Go rest high upon the mountain, Chuck.