andPOP - Pop Culture With Substance

STEVEN SPIELBERG has donated $1 million to the OCEAN’S THIRTEEN African charity push after learning stars like GEORGE CLOONEY and BRAD PITT had raised $8 million at the Cannes Film Festival.

The cast of the movie staged a fundraising evening for their Save Darfur campaign at the festival at the weekend – and raised a fortune.

Ocean’s Thirteen producer Jerry Weintraub reveals, “We’ve raised $9.2 million. We had $8 million and then Spielberg sent in another $1 million.

“(Brad) Pitt, (Don) Cheadle have been all over to the Sudan and we’re just trying to shine a light on what’s happening over there.”

Fundraisers are being planned to accompany every upcoming Ocean’s Thirteen premiere.

(c) 2007 WORLD ENTERTAINMENT NEWS NETWORK LTD. All global rights reserved. No unauthorized copying or re-distributing permitted.

STEVEN SPIELBERG can add TV ideas man to his impressive resume after developing an idea for a new US cable sitcom.

The movie mogul is the brains behind new 30-minute show THE UNITED STATES OF TARA.

According to trade paper Daily Variety the sitcom will revolve around a married mother of two struggling with a multiple personality disorder.

(c) 2007 WORLD ENTERTAINMENT NEWS NETWORK LTD. All global rights reserved. No unauthorized copying or re-distributing permitted.

Filmmaker STEVEN SPIELBERG is reeling after an FBI investigation discovered his NORMAN ROCKWELL painting had been stolen from a gallery over three decades ago.

The director bought RUSSIAN SCHOOLROOM from a dealer in 1989 and was alerted to its background when one of his employees saw the painting on a FBI website which listed stolen artworks.

After the FBI was alerted, an investigation concluded last week and its authenticity was confirmed on Friday.

The painting was stolen from the Clayton Art Gallery in Clayton, Missouri in the late 1970s.

Spielberg’s spokesman MARVIN LEVY says, “(Spielberg is) certainly one of the collectors of Rockwell. We have a few in our office on the Universal lot.”

The New York City-born artist died in November 1978 of emphysema.

(c) 2007 WORLD ENTERTAINMENT NEWS NETWORK LTD. All global rights reserved. No unauthorized copying or re-distributing permitted.

Steven Spielberg?s next film, titled Munich, will be about the kidnapping of Israeli athletes from the 1972 Olympics, says BBC News.

In an interview with Time magazine, the director has called his latest project ?a prayer for peace.?

“I don’t think any movie or any book or any work of art can solve the stalemate in the Middle East today. But it’s worth a try,” he said.

The film will be released on Dec. 23 in the U.S., but leaders of Jewish and Muslim groups along with diplomats and foreign policy officials will get a sneak peek before its opening date.

The Olympic kidnapping, which was organized by Palestinians, resulted in the deaths of 11 Israeli athletes, five kidnappers and one German policeman.

The film focuses on the Israeli response to the kidnappings. Eric Bana (The Hulk, Troy) plays a Mossad agent alongside Geoffrey Rush and Daniel Craig, the new James Bond.

Steven Spielberg’s love affair with sci-fi will continue… When Worlds Collide!

Sorry, I couldn’t resist. But it is true – Spielberg is remaking another 1950s sci-fi classic, hot on the heels of his blockbuster War of the Worlds. EOnline.com reports that the Oscar-winning director has signed on to executive produce When Worlds Collide for Paramount, taking over from Stephen Sommers.

Sommers (the guy behind The Mummy franchise) was planning on writing, directing and producing When Worlds Collide, but he dropped out to direct A Night at the Museum, a family-friendly action-comedy about a guard at a natural history museum who unwittingly triggers an ancient curse. Sounds zany, Sommers.

The original 1951 version of When Worlds Collide supposedly launched the golden age of science fiction. It’s the story of an astronomer who discovers that two rogue planets have entered our solar system and are on a crash course with Earth.

Yes, there’s a race against time, a skeptical White House, and a motley group of heroes who build a Noah’s Rocket.

There’s been speculation that Spielberg will also direct the remake in addition to producing it; however, Variety reports that no official decision has been announced.

“He’s going to be a producer,” says Spielberg’s publicist, Marvin Levy. “I don’t know that it’s totally out of the question [that he would direct], but it’s probably not likely, based on other things potentially on his plate.”

The director is currently shooting his next Oscar bid, Munich, a dramatization of the 1972 Munich terrorist attacks and its aftermath. After that he’s got an Abraham Lincoln biopic starring Liam Neeson and, lo and behold, the long-awaited fourth Indiana Jones movie.

Additionally, Spielberg is producing several other films, including DreamWorks’ Memoirs of a Geisha and Sony’s Legend of Zorro.