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Video Music Awards Hopes Spears Will Add Magic

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The Tampa Tribune

Published: September 7, 2007

Confirming several weeks of speculation, MTV said Thursday that tabloid fixture and sometime pop singer Britney Spears will perform at Sunday's Video Music Awards.

Spears will open the show with a performance of her new single 'Gimme More.' The show will air live at 9 p.m. from Las Vegas.

The presence of Spears will most likely be a ratings-grabber for the VMAs, which have seen their audience decline in recent years.

Spears has also been working with illusionist Criss Angel to craft 'some of the moments of the performance,' VMA executive producer Jesse Ignjatovic says in a piece on MTV's Web site.

The show will also feature performances by the Foo Fighters, Kanye West, Fall Out Boy, Cee-Lo, Alicia Keys and Nelly Furtado, among others. Beyonce, Justin Timberlake and West are among the leading nominees.

Shepherd Selected For Cast Of 'The View'

Actress Sherri Shepherd will be introduced next week as a new cast member on 'The View,' giving the daytime chat show its first full cast since before Rosie O'Donnell came and went.

The show's creator, Barbara Walters, said Wednesday that she would reveal the new cast member on Monday. That will be Shepherd, a person close to the show said on condition of anonymity.

Shepherd is no stranger to 'The View.' She was a guest host more than a dozen times, many of them this summer as she tried out for a cast slot left empty since Star Jones Reynolds left last summer.

Norman Mailer Fights Asthma Problems
Pulitzer Prize-winning author Norman Mailer spent Labor Day weekend in a hospital with breathing difficulties and has been told not to travel until cleared by his doctors, his editorial assistant said Thursday.

Mailer, 84, has adult onset asthma and was experiencing labored breathing, Dwayne Raymond Prickett said. He spent five days in a Boston hospital undergoing tests.

Mailer has since returned to his Provincetown, Mass., home and is doing well, Prickett said.

Mailer was scheduled to deliver public readings at the University of South Carolina on Sept. 25, and at the University of South Florida on Sept. 27, but those events were canceled, Prickett said.

Porter Split With Diddy Over Daddyhood

Sean 'Diddy' Combs denied fathering a baby with an Atlanta woman when he was asked about it months ago. Now, ex-girlfriend Kim Porter says not only is it true, but it also was a major reason she left him.

The music and fashion mogul was apparently desperate to keep Porter in the dark about the other pregnancy while she was pregnant with the couple's twins.

When Essence magazine reporter Jeannine Amber said to the beauty, 'Speaking of being faithful, there have been rumors about Sean and a baby in Atlanta. ... Is this why you left the relationship?' Porter said, 'That definitely was part of it.'

It's posted on Essence.com, with more to come when the October issue hits stands next week.

Combs' representative did not comment.

Porter, who was with Diddy for 12 years and who also raised two sons with him, moved to Los Angeles in July with the boys and the 6-month-old girls.

Today's Birthdays

Jazz saxophonist Sonny Rollins is 77. Singer Gloria Gaynor is 58. Singer Chrissie Hynde of the Pretenders is 56. Actor Corbin Bernsen is 53. Keyboardist Benmont Tench of Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers is 53. Actor W. Earl Brown ('Deadwood') is 44. Actor Tom Everett Scott ('ER,' 'That Thing You Do!') is 37. Actress Shannon Elizabeth ('American Pie') is 34.

Sources: The Associated Press, People.com

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