Function Magazine

Betty White celebrated her 90th birthday on January 17, 2012. NBC threw in a big bash for the celebration. You may know her from “The Mary Tyler Moore Show” or from “Golden Girls”. But do you know that the seven time Emmy winner and SAG Lifetime Achievement Award winner is an avid promoter of animal health and welfare?

Her love for animals started at her early childhood. Her father brought in stray animals home and asks Betty whether she want to keep them. Betty says she was a lucky little girl.

Betty’s serious work with animals started in 1970 with the Morris Animal Foundation. It is an animal health organization where she was involved with more than 30 animal health studies. She was president emeritus of the organization.

At the same time she got involved with the Los Angeles Zoo. Her untiring work has resulted in renovating chimpanzee and gorilla exhibits at the zoo. Betty also spearheaded the opening of the new elephant forest at the zoo.

Betty says she is not an animal rights activist but a promoter of animal health and welfare. Betty says she like both, comedy and animals, equally.

NBC threw in a birth day bash on TV for the Golden Girl, Betty White, on Monday, January 16, 2012. She is 90.

Born in Oak Park, Ill, Betty landed her first movie role in a short film, “Time to Kill” at the of age 23 in 1945. Movie was made by the U.S. Armed Forces to encourage solders after the tour of duty.

Betty sang for a Los Angeles area TV station in 1939. By 1952, she had her own daily radio show, “Hollywood on Television”.

First sitcom role came in 1953 in “Life with Elizabeth”. She was the lead and the show lasted until 1955.

Betty married to show producer Alan Ludden in 1963 whom she met at the set of “Password”.

1973 to 1977 she appeared on “Mary Tyler Moore Show” where she won two Emmys.

Perhaps, we all know her very well from her role in “Golden Girls”. Who could not remember four elderly roommates and naive Rose Nylund?

After “Golden Girls”, she made guest appearances in several shows and “The John Larroquette Show” landed her an Emmy.

This is brief may not do the justice for her long career in TV, film and radio. Thank you for being a friend.

It has been announced that Island Records which is a part of Universal Music will release a posthumous album of Amy Winehouses’s songs. It will be released on December 5 and will be called “Lioness: Hidden Treasures”

The album will feature 12 tracks which have previously not been released and alternative versions of existing classics and new Winehouse compositions according to a statement posted on the late singer’s website.

The album has been compiled by Marc Ronson and Salaam Remi , the producers who worked with the singer at the time of her death.

The multiple Grammy award winning singer was found dead at her home in July at the age of 27 as a result of excessive consumption of alcohol with 5 times the legal driving limit in her blood.

Lioness: Hidden Treasures will be her third album following the first album “Frank” in 2003 and “Back to Black” in 2006. The songs to be included in this album will include “Between the Cheats” recorded in 2008, “A song for you”, a demo version of “Wake up Alone”, “tears dry on their own”, “Valerie” and her recently released Tony Bennet duet” Body and Soul”.

Natalie Woods, the beautiful actress who became famous for her portrayal of Maria in West Side Story met with a tragic end when she drowned in 1981 while on a yatch with husband Robert Wagner and friend and fellow actor Christopher Walken. Her death was always shrouded in mystery with various accounts revealed about how she died. The official verdict however was that she fell overboard while trying to launch a dingy and deemed as an accidental death.

Three decades after her death new evidence has emerged that her husband actor Robert Wagner was responsible for her death with the possibility of the police reopening the case. This is in the wake of the ship’s captain Dennis Davern revealing that on the day of her death they have been drinking heavily and the couple has argued violently before she disappeared and Wagner, when told about the disappearance has told him not to spend time looking for her and that it took some time to persuade him to call the police and by that time it was too late for Natalie.

Natalie Wood’s sister Lana Woods always stated that she did not accept the verdict of death mainly due to the fact that Natalie had a deep fear of the water.

The Canadian teen heartthrob who has been the center of a paternity claim is said to have taken a DNA test to disprove the claims. Beiber was alleged by one of his fans Mariah Yeater to be the father of her 3 month old son.

Yeater claims that she slept with the singer backstage after one of his concerts in Los Angeles in October last year. But after making the claims which were vehemently denied by Beiber she controversially dropped the paternity suit earlier this month after her mother said that the child was from a relationship with an earlier boyfriend and after she asked friends to delete all text messages she has sent them with regard to the paternity suit.

Justin Beiber who is currently in a relationship with Selena Gomes despite rumors of a split, was not obliged to take the DNA test but sources have said that he wants to go ahead with it and that he will be fine with it. Yeater will have to submit a DNA sample from her son Tristyn for comparison.

Meantime Beiber’s team is considering taking legal action against Mariah Yeater for the allegations made by her against the singer.

Singer George Michael had been admitted to hospital in the Austrian capital Vienna to be treated for pneumonia. Sources from the hospital have since then said that he is being treated for a serious heart problem, but his agents have denied this. It is reported that he was admitted to the Wiener Rudolfinerhaus private clinic where he was examined and as his condition was worsening was transferred to the intensive care unit of the AKH General Hospital.

He was in Vienna to perform for his Symphonica tour and was due to perform hours before he was taken to hospital. Gigs in the cities of Cardiff, Vienna and Strasburg have been called off due to his health problems. More shows from his Symphonica European tour which began in Prague in August might have to be cancelled as a result.

George Michael has been a heavy smoker for years and also has a history of drug abuse, both of which can result in the person developing pneumonia.

He rose to fame in the eighties when he performed as Wham with Andrew Ridgelely with songs like “Last Christmas”. His first solo single was Careless Whispers and his solo album “Faith” sold over 25 million copies worldwide.

E News host Guiliana Rancic has revealed that she was diagnosed with breast cancer while undergoing IVF treatment. In an emotional interview on the “Today” show she said that it was a shock.

She was due to undergo another round of IVF treatment when the doctor insisted that she have a mammogram since pregnancy accelerates the spread of any potential cancer. The 36 year old has been planning on doing a mammogram after the age of 40 and was initially reluctant to have the test.

She will now undergo surgery to remove the lumps from the breast followed by six weeks of radiation therapy. She said that the prognosis was good since the cancer was detected in the early stages.

Guiliana who is married to the first “Apprentice” winner Bill Rancic, a property developer has a reality show “Guiliana and Bill” which detailed the couples struggle to have a baby. She has said that she will postpone her bid to get pregnant until after the surgery and cancer treatment.

“I still want this baby, because this baby has saved my life,” she said. “If I had gotten pregnant later down the line, I could have been a lot sicker.”

Lindsay Lohan was arrested for the fifth time in four years at the age of 25. Lohan was arrested on October 19 for violating her probation where she was warned by the judge and was led out of court in handcuffs.

She was first arrested in July 2007 when she was arrested for a second DUI and was ordered to go back to rehab. The second arrest in November 2007 was for a DUI and she was behind bars for 84 minutes. The “Mean Girl’s” star faced her third stint in jail in July 2010 for violating her probation and was sentenced to 90 days in jail but was released after spending 14 days. In September 2010 her probation was revoked after failing a drug test. Following this arrest she spent three months at the Betty Ford Center.Earlier this year Lohan was ordered to serve 360 hours of community service as a punishment for stealing a gold necklace from a jewelry shop.

She is said to have been released from jail after posting a $100,000 bail.

She was ordered to report to the morgue and complete 16 hours of community service by cleaning the morgue between now and her hearing date in November.

Brad Pitt made scathing remarks about his marriage to Jennifer Aniston in an interview with Parade magazine stating that he was not living an interesting life and that his marriage to Aniston had something to do with it since he was trying to pretend the marriage was something that it wasn’t.

This came as a surprise to many as the couple was considered the “Golden Couple” in Hollywood with both of them reaching the heights of their success and popularity at the time. Pitt had remained tight lipped about his marriage since the divorce in 2005 until now.

But he has tried to down play the comments by issuing a statement where he says that “It grieves me that this was interpreted this way,” “Jen is an incredibly giving, loving, and hilarious woman who remains my friend. It is an important relationship I value greatly. The point I was trying to make is not that Jen was dull, but that I was becoming dull to myself and that, I am responsible for”.

Since his split from Aniston he has been in a relationship with Angelina Jolie with whom he has six children.

At the MTV Video Music Awards held on 28 August Beyonce made the surprise announcement of her first pregnancy with rapper husband Jay Z. Wearing an orange color Lanvin dress, the 29 year old singer told reporters “I have a surprise for you” while walking down the red carpet, but did not confirm anything until after her energetic performance of “Love on Top” from her latest album “4” when she opened her jacket to reveal maternity pants and her growing baby bump.

The announcement saw a record breaking number of tweets of over 8,000 per second on Twitter overtaking the earlier record of almost 7,200 tweets per second during the women’s football world cup.

Beyonce Knowles rose to fame as a member of “Destiny’s Child” and continued to have a successful solo career as well as acting in films like Dreamgirls, Austin Powers: Goldmember, Pink Panther and The Fighting Temptations. She has won a total of 16 Grammy Awards and was the first female artist to be awarded the International Artist Award at the 2007 American Music Awards.

In addition to her singing and acting career she has a successful clothing line “Dereon” which she co owns with her mother Tina.