Susan Boyle pre-orders a record for Amazon

Boyle pre-orders a record

The upcoming debut album by British singing sensation Susan Boyle has become the largest global CD pre-order in the history of Amazon.com, the online retailer said Thursday.

Boyle’s album, “I Dreamed a Dream,” will be released Tuesday by Sony Music Entertainment.

It is the first album since the 48-year-old church volunteer from Scotland took the Internet by storm with her unlikely star turn on the TV show “Britain’s Got Talent” in April.

Amazon said Boyle’s album is not only the top CD pre-order in the United States, but it’s also the biggest around the world in the 14-year history of its website.

-- Reuters Russert’s office at Newseum

Museum visitors in Washington will get the chance to step into “Meet the Press” moderator Tim Russert’s old NBC office, which has been reassembled at the Newseum.

An exhibit opens today with the office re-created to look as it did in June 2008 when Russert died of a heart attack at age 58. Russert was NBC’s Washington bureau chief.

Newseum Chief Executive Charles Overby has said the only other journalist who gets such prominent treatment is Edward R. Murrow.

The journalism museum will keep the office on display through 2010.

-- Associated Press Jackson glove to be auctioned

The Holy Grail of Michael Jackson memorabilia will go on the block Saturday in an auction of one of the King of Pop’s famous white gloves and hundreds of other rock ‘n’ roll relics.

The sale at the Hard Rock Cafe in New York includes a car driven by Jackson, David Bowie’s guitar and a slew of memorabilia from acts such as the Beatles and Bo Diddley, according to Julien’s Auctions, the company running the sale.

But Julien’s has no doubt that the white glove, worn by Jackson when he debuted the moonwalk dance at the 1983 “Motown 25” television special, will generate the most interest.

The auction company says it estimates the value of the glove conservatively at $40,000 to $60,000 but expects it to sell for much higher.

-- Reuters Not worth what they’re paid?

Funnyman Will Ferrell and British actor Ewan McGregor on Wednesday head a Forbes.com list of Hollywood’s most overpaid stars when looking at the financial returns of their movies.

Billy Bob Thornton, Tom Cruise and Jim Carrey also made the top 10 tally of actors who cost more to hire than they appear to be worth at box offices.

Ferrell took first place, largely because of the flop of his summer movie “Land of the Lost,” which Forbes said cost an estimated $100 million to make but earned just $65 million at box offices worldwide for movie studio Universal Pictures.

The movie followed a disappointing $43-million box office take for Ferrell’s 2008 outing “Semi-Pro,” and $128 million for “Step Brothers.”

Using a formula that calculated the actor’s estimated salary on each film, including DVD and TV sales, compared to the film’s revenues from theater box offices and elsewhere, Forbes.com said that for every dollar Ferrell was paid, his films earned an average $3.29.

-- Reuters Herzog to head Berlin film jury

German director Werner Herzog will head the jury at the 2010 Berlin film festival, organizers said Thursday.

The 67-year-old is considered one of the leaders of the New German Cinema movement of the 1960s and 1970s, and he has made more than 50 films in a career spanning five decades.

“Werner Herzog’s films convey the artistic strength of cinema,” said festival director Dieter Kosslick.

Herzog gained a reputation partly through his collaborations with actor Klaus Kinski, who starred in several of his movies, including “Nosferatu the Vampyre” and “Fitzcarraldo.”

Herzog is also a documentary maker, earning an Academy Award nomination for “Encounters at the End of the World,” and has presented opera productions at the Bayreuth Festival and at La Scala in Milan.

The 2010 Berlin film festival runs Feb. 11 through 21.

-- Reuters Movie deal for ‘Flamel’ series

Lorenzo di Bonaventura and his Di Bonaventura Pictures have signed a deal with international bestselling author Michael Scott in which Di Bonaventura would produce a series of films based on Scott’s New York Times bestselling six-part fantasy series for young adults: “The Secrets of the Immortal Nicholas Flamel.”

“Michael’s fantastic series is a natural evolution from Harry Potter,” said Di Bonaventura, whose most recent credits include “G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra” and “Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen.”

-- From a Times Staff Writer