Nicholas Cage is broke

Nicholas Cage is broke, so goes the story.

Well, no, not quite: he's deep in the mire, this is true, but he's not broke by any reasonable standard. He's just sold a house outside Bath for £3.5 million (around $5 million) and another inside the city in England for another $5 million or so (both, in fact, highly desirable places, seriously good architecture). He's also unlaoded his Bavarian castle for a smaller sum.

What's really done to make Nicholas Cage broke is that his financial advisor hasn't been playing straight with him. He got into a serious of highly dubious investments and then lost a lot of money: and also wasn't keeping money back to pay for taxes. And it's Uncle Sam who is after him for north of $6 million as well.

But what will really keep Niocholas Cage from going broke is that he's still a highly bankable star. One more movie is, at his normal pay rates, all he would need to get back on an even keel: or two or three down and dirty quickies.

Don't we all wish we could rustle up that sort of dough in only a year or so's work?

The Circus starring Britney Spears

The promoters of the current Britney Spears world tour have been pretty careful in their descriptions. It's not so much that they advertise it as a Britney Spears concert, of popathon, it's rather that it's a show called "Circus", which stars her.

They can thus rather cut thruogh all of the questions about whether she's actually singing live or not. Which, of course, she is most unlikely to be doing.

It's not just that her voice has never been that strong, rather than Britney Spears has always been a dancer rather than a singer. And so all of her efforst are indeed put into the dancing, not the singing.

And if we're to be quite honest about it, no one can in fact gyrate around a stage in quite that style and still be singing their heart out: no, there's often a great deal of help from something I mae in hte studio before I set out in these shows.