Most Emailed Entertainment News

BERLIN - Irish rockers U2 returned to Berlin for a free mini-concert Thursday in front of the Brandenburg Gate, playing its classic singles and a duet with Jay-Z even as the show was obscured from public view by a nearly 6-1/2-foot (two-meter) high metal barrier.

NEW YORK - Oprah Winfrey is removing gospel singer BeBe Winans from her show's "karaoke challenge" until charges against him for allegedly pushing his ex-wife to the ground are resolved.

NEW YORK - Rihanna said Thursday that she regrets going back to ex-boyfriend Chris Brown after he left her bruised and battered during a February assault, warning other women facing domestic violence to not let themselves become blinded by love.

NEW YORK - Mo'Nique likes to laugh. A lot.

NEW YORK - When the Killers started out, they wanted to raise a ruckus like their favorite rock stars did on the road: Frontman Brandon Flowers heard of the legendary exploits of Led Zeppelin and David Bowie and wanted to emulate those experiences.

NEW YORK - Green Day already has New Year's Eve plans: They'll be ringing in 2010 with Carson Daly.

DEAR ABBY: Please print this for me on behalf of myself and all the other well-intentioned folks out there who have lent money to others.

NEW YORK - On-air promos for a sexual threesome on an upcoming episode of "Gossip Girl" have spurred the Parents Television Council to ask affiliates of the CW network to pre-empt the show.

GUANGZHOU, China - President Barack Obama's half brother has broken his media silence to discuss his new novel — the semi-autobiographical story of an abusive parent patterned on their late father, the mostly absent figure Obama wrote about in his own memoir.

LOS ANGELES - No Doubt is suing video game maker Activision for putting words in band members' mouths.

LAS VEGAS - With nominations in five categories including album of the year, the Puerto Rican reggaeton duo Calle 13 is a favorite to win a Latin Grammy in Las Vegas — which might have producers of the international awards ceremony on edge.

NEW YORK - Big Bird is leaving Sesame Street!

DETROIT (Billboard) - Now that he's revisited the rootsy country and early rock terrain of his first-post Creedence Clearwater Revival days on "The Blue Ridge Rangers Rides Again," John Fogerty says he's ready to start sounding like, well, John Fogerty again.

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - "Golden Girls" star Rue McClanahan is recovering in a hospital after having heart bypass surgery this week, her manager said on Thursday.

NEW YORK - Some suicide prevention groups aren't laughing over a scene in "The Office" where Steve Carell's character tries to scare young children by struggling in a hangman's noose.

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Singer Bette Midler will end a nearly two-year concert run in Las Vegas this coming January, her representatives said on Thursday.

LAS VEGAS - Bette Midler will perform her Las Vegas show "The Showgirl Must Go On" for the last time on Jan. 31.

NEW YORK - Celebrity chef Gordon Ramsay has some new people to yell at. The verbally abusive star of Fox's "Hell's Kitchen" has signed a deal with Fox for a second show. Tentatively called "Masterchef," it will feature Ramsay trying to turn people who have no experience in the food industry into expert cooks. Not surprisingly, producers say Ramsay won't be afraid to tell the would-be cooks the cold, hard truth about their work.

NEW ORLEANS - Actor Tom Hanks says viewers are in for a realistic "wartime experience" when the new film he produced, "Beyond All Boundaries," opens at the National World War II Museum in New Orleans on Friday.

JACKSON, Miss. - Morgan Freeman has settled a lawsuit related to a 2008 car accident that seriously injured him and a passenger, according to court records posted Thursday. Terms of the settlement were not released.

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Shel Dorf, the founder of Comic-Con International in San Diego, one of the biggest comic book conventions in the world, has died at age 76, a spokesman said on Wednesday.

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - After being beaten by singer Chris Brown in February, pop star Rihanna felt embarrassed she fell in love with the type of man he was and left him to set an example for young women, she said in an interview on Thursday.

NEW YORK (Billboard) - Bruce Springsteen is dusting off his catalog once again, as he and the E Street Band have announced two more full-album performances this coming weekend at Madison Square Garden in New York.

LOS ANGELES (Hollywood Reporter) - Are "Numbers'" days numbered?

LONDON (Billboard) - The Beatles remasters are coming out on a limited-edition apple-shaped USB drive in time for Christmas, marking the first time the Fab Four's catalog has officially been sold as digital files separate from the CDs.

LOS ANGELES (Hollywood Reporter) - Sony Pictures is taking on some Risk, acquiring the film rights to the classic Hasbro board game, in which players vie for world domination.

NEW YORK - Chris Brown says he is unsure about how the public perceives him since he attacked Rihanna.

PARIS - After weeks crossing the high seas, Claude Levi-Strauss breathed in his first lungful of the New World, a perfume tinged with pepper or tobacco. The sensory awakening was the start of a journey that turned a young Parisian scholar into a founder of modern anthropology.

BEIJING (Hollywood Reporter) - Rupert Murdoch's wife is among the producers of "Snow Flower and the Secret Fan," an English-language Chinese drama starring Zhang Ziyi, perhaps the country's most exportable actress.

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Oprah Winfrey has not yet made a decision on a possible move of her syndicated chat show -- one of the TV industry's biggest money makers -- to her new cable network OWN, her production company said on Thursday.