A couple of weeks ago, Sylvester Stallone appeared in the pages of the NY Times to guilt fans into going to see Rocky Balboa by framing their ticket purchase as a message sent to Hollywood that it can't dispatch him and his contemporaries to the Faded Action Stars Retirement Home before they're good and ready to go. Stallone now reappears in the new issue of Newsweek with more heartstring tugs meant to loosen moviegoers' purse strings:

Sacha Baron Cohen has much to celebrate today, as not only has he been named best actor by the Los Angeles Film Critics Association, but one of his lingering legal headaches—the lawsuit brought about by the two frat boys who took issue with their (mostly accurate) screen depiction as drunken, insensitive louts—is now fake-Kazakh history:

· Music round-up: Pink Spiders at the El Rey; The Parson Red Heads at the Echo; Jay Bennett at Silverlake Lounge.
· The Office's B.J. Novak steps out of your television set and onto Largo's comedy stage with a handful of his friends, and perhaps answer fans' questions (OK, probably not, he's there to do stand-up) about whether Pam and Jim finally wind up together.
· Hurry on over to Vroman's in Pasadena, where security personnel will wand your naughty parts as they clear you to have your copy of Palestine: Peace not Apartheid signed by its author, former President Jimmy Carter.

We'd never recommend that a comedy club patron, no matter how offended he felt over a comic's reflexive response to his poor audience etiquette, take to the stage to settle a grievance; as we've all learned from the last few weeks in Michael Richards news, a club is a peaceful place where people come together to celebrate their differences through the art of stand-up without confrontations of any kind. But over the weekend in Odessa, TX, a man displeased with Biodome superstar Pauly Shore's attempts to quiet some hecklers so that he could continue on with his comedic insights into the human condition without further interruption shattered the peace with a right hook to Shore's face. In the above video of the incident, apparently captured by another patron at the club, it's hard to tell if the comedian got in a shot of his own, other than the "Fuck all you fuckin' white trash [unintelligible]" he offered as he followed the police officer subduing his attacker off-stage. Normally, we'd send you off with an exhortation to enjoy the clip, but given the circumstances, we'd rather you quietly lament the blow this regrettable incident has dealt to audience/comedian relations as you squint through repeated viewings, trying to discern the exact moment of impact in the murky footage.

As Nicole Richie (mugshot pictured, though far too flattering to warrant anything more than a thumbnail) embarked upon her wrong way joyride up the exit ramp of the 134, wondering in her narcotic-induced stupor why all the brake lights of the cars up ahead had turned white and were quickly increasing in size, two passing motorists had enough wits about them to dial 911 and describe the dangerous, bizarre circumstances to an operator. Celebutard scandal completionists TMZ have obtained the calls made by the baffled and deeply concerned citizens, who surely never imagined that their good deed would ultimately net the authorities 85 drug-addled pounds of troubled reality TV sidekick.

While less dedicated, world-famous child stars would be content to fritter away the last moments of their pre-teen earning years by playing with solid-gold Barbie dolls or by getting a head start on a lifelong substance abuse problem, the preternaturally ambitious Dakota Fanning is already thinking several steps ahead in her already impressive career:

We mentioned earlier how critics' list deliberations are often contentious and complicated affairs, where the dominant members of the pack have been known to stalk and surround its weaker members, savagely cannibalizing whichever lone voice might have found Helen Mirren's The Queen performance to be "nuanced and accomplished, yes, but hardly the year's best, you bunch of shit-for-brains!" The ScreenGrab blog claims to have had an all-access insider present at this year's powwow, and they share several interesting anecdotes, including one about how Observer critic Andrew Sarris literally flushed away his vote for best animated film:

We enjoy little more than the hilarious mismatch of news headline and illustrating photo, especially one that misidentifies, however briefly, an eighty-five-pound reality TV star as a rippling-torsoed Mayan high priest. The LAT quickly fixed the error (screen-captured above by an alert reader), by replacing it with Nicole Richie's actual, far inferior mugshot, but not before we imagined the notoriously frail star, still in the throes of a Vicodin-and-THC-induced high, threatening to cut out her booking officer's heart and show the still-beating organ to the entire Glendale Police Department, promising that the affront of a DUI arrest would spell their doom at the hands of Kinich Ahau, the Sun God.

Once a year, our nation's most esteemed movie critics lock themselves inside smokey, windowless rooms, and heatedly debate, Twelve Angry Men-style, the relative merits of what they have seen over the previous twelve months. It can often escalate into full-on violence—at the New York Film Critics Circle deliberations this year, for example, The New Yorker's David Denby reportedly had The Observer's octogenarian critic-in-residence Andrew Sarris in a half nelson in a dispute over Ryan Gosling's performance in the film of the same name—but inevitably, a consensus is reached, giving obsessive Oscar prognosticators key pieces of evidence to jot down on index cards and affix in perfectly aligned columns to their bedroom walls. A round-up of the results of four major critics' lists:

Prince will headline the Super Bowl halftime show; broadcaster CBS has pledged to take every precaution necessary to ensure that the rocker will not try and top Janet Jackson's infamous nipple-display by having one of his background singers yank off his codpiece, revealing that his penis is barely covered by purple junk-armor. [Variety]
Columbia Pictures acquires the rights to 1930's pulp hero The Shadow for Sam Raimi to produce, hoping that by the time a film is eventually released, people will have completely forgotten about the disastrous 1994 version starring Alec Baldwin. [THR]
Steven Spielberg is actively developing two drama series at Fox via his DreamWorks TV label, including one set in the world of fashion written by Ed Burns and wife Christy Turlington. Given Turlington's experience in that industry, it's unclear how the duo will split up the scripting and "just sitting there and looking pretty" duties. [Variety]
· CAA, obviously still disoriented from the recent, baffling defections of Kate Hudson and Hugh Grant, agrees to take on Christian Slater as a client. [THR]
· Unlike other Europeans, Spaniards haven't fallen in love with Sacha Baron Cohen, rejecting both Borat and Da Ali G show. [Variety]

On her blog, the LA Weekly's Nikki Finke unloads both barrels on the Weinsteins and MGM for their decision to open Yuletide-themed horror movie Black Christmas on Christmas Day, a crass attempt to corrupt the purity of the holiday by luring teenagers away from their families and into the multiplex, where Hollywood expects them to celebrate the miracle of Jesus' birth by watching the evisceration of nubile sorority girls instead of unwrapping next-generation video game consoles. Says Finke:

When Rosie O'Donnell was describing on a recent installment of The View how Danny DeVito's adorably soused appearance on the show had made international news, she shared her rather ill-chosen impression of a Chinese newscaster who spoke almost entirely in "chings" and "chongs." (Our Gotham sibling site Gawker posted the clip, punctuated by a gong sound effect that is being hilariously misreported as being added by The View producers themselves.) The bit has not surprisingly escalated into a full-fledged controversy: The Asian American Journalists Association released an official statement, condemning what they perceive as "a mockery of the Chinese language and, in effect, a perpetration of stereotypes of Asian Americans as foreigners or second-class citizens."

While lesser celebutards rack up utterly mundane DUIs by swerving away from the Hyde valet stand after a long night of washing down plates of delicious chocolate chip cookies with entire bottles of Grey Goose, skeletal, discarded Hilton sidekick Nicole Richie shows the amateurs how a substance-abusing pro earns a traffic stop: according to TMZ, Richie was popped very early this morning for driving the wrong way on the 134 in Burbank after two motorists, understandably alarmed by the sight of an SUV piloted by what seemed to be an eleven-year-old girl traveling against the flow of traffic, called 911. Richie further distinguished herself from the Single Margarita crowd by passing a Breathalyzer but telling cops that she'd taken Vicodin and pot, a chemical cocktail not known for enhancing one's ability to read the signs that would direct them into freeway lanes less likely to result in head-on collisions. With a listed weight of just 85 lbs, Richie's attorneys can probably claim that her client didn't willingly ingest the illicit substances, as her innocent handling of a prescription pain medication bottle was enough to impart the pills' mind-altering effects to an individual with such a dangerously low body mass; failing that, they can adopt the preliminary, vehicular-malfunction-based defense tactics seen in the Lane Garrison case, blaming her directional misadventures on a renegade GPS system that seized control of her car and steered it into oncoming traffic.

Pour yourself a steaming cup of the weekend box office numbers, still the only reliable cure for an office holiday party hangover:

· Behold, Apocalypto: The Jewish elders debate Mel's Oscar chances. Mayans rethink their moment. The cast and crew screening. Apparently, it may contain a small amount of violence.
· Sony's Amy Pascal named Most Powerful Person In Hollywood, Except For All The Men Who Own Everything.
· Lane Garrison's 15-year-old-girl and Grey Goose binging spree answers the age old question, "What's the worst that can happen?" Garrison's fan site takes an exhaustion break.
· "Merry 'Fuck You!' CBS staffers!"
· Christmas Agency Gift Guide: CAA back to chocolate bars. ICM's time is not valuable.
· Lindsay Lohan makes a clean, fully adequite break with reality.
· While Britney comes back from the panty-free brink. (Brought to you by Victoria's Secret.)
· Even a bad day ain't so bad at The Grill.
· Yahoo! and Lloyd Braun mix like oil and a Hollywood-type jerkwad.
· McG knows hurt. McG lives hurt.
· Ripped Torn.
· Gwyneth Paltrow wishes her Spanish were better, but what she meant to say was that Americans aren't worse, just different.
· Fire Inspector Robert Gladden will get you into the Oscars, ladies, but first you better put his fire out, if you catch our backdrift.
· Vince Vaughn and Jennifer Aniston's tie-in love has served its purpose. The rebound girl has—omg!—a blog and long e-mail cc list of chatty sorority sisters! LOL!
· George Clooney, lost in pig grief, gets tricked into agreeing to star in a Bollywood movie.
· The Next Big Gay Thing is ensnared by the S-word.
· JHRTS: Kinda like "Muppet Hollywood Babies," but drunk and horny.
· Gigi Grazer's Jesus-as-IKEA-worker romcom project is sold to mystery buyer!

· If Katie Holmes had not appeared standing next to him in the pre-cropped version of every one of these Getty Images photos of the Pursuit of Happyness premiere, we would have suspected that a newly bloated Tom Cruise devoured her on his honeymoon.
· You know who's probably not getting married in South Africa this Christmas? Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie.
Perhaps the most surprising thing in this story about Dustin "Any References To The Character Screech In My Promotional Materials Must Be Rendered In A Smaller Typeface Than My Actual Name" Diamond's contract rider is that anyone was hiring him for promotional appearances a full two years before he put out that sex tape.
A reader pointed out that we overlooked this one in our earlier post about Apocalypto headlines, so we update with: Apocalypt-Ow! Mel's Messy Mayan Movie.
· Your new favorite blog: Cute Things Falling Asleep.

We're always amazed when a sexual harassment lawsuit is filed in Hollywood, as it's always been our understanding that all employer-employee relationships in the industry—if not contractually, then at least on a handshake basis—revolve around the exchange of intimate favors for the advancement of one's show business career. Still, every so often, a lone crusader files such a suit, the potential success of which threatens to plunge the industry into an anarchic state where hard work becomes more valuable than one's willingness to endure a little grab-assing from a handsy boss. The AP reports that the former personal assistant of Superman Returns producer Jon Peters is taking legal action against him, claiming that he harassed her in the following clumsy fashion:

Deep into Friday afternoon or not, it's never too late to burn a post share a video gem with our readers, such as the above mash-up of the trailers of The Last Kiss and Apocalypto into one, Zach-Braffian-fever-dream about a South American road trip we can only assume was cut short when a Mayan priest tore Braff's still-beating heart off his sleeve. To beef up the Braff-bashing hilarity, we're also including, free of charge, this Onion AV Club's list of "Awful Things Zach Braff Is (Probably) Responsible For," which, at three entries, seemed to us woefully underresearched, yet still managed to provoke some lively debate in the comments section over the relative awfulness of Scrubs. Enjoy.

Friday
· Damien Rice at the Orpheum Theater; Aquabats with The Lashes at the El Rey; and Hot One (featuring ex-members of Shudder To Think and Guided By Voices) at Spaceland.
· At the Egyptian, actor, filmmaker, and certified Hollywood Crazy Person Crispin Glover presents What Is It?, a movie we won't even attempt to describe in this space, especially the part about its cast being "largely comprised of actors with Down Syndrome." Afterwards, a Q&A, book signing, and other unscheduled weirdness.
Saturday
· Maverick Filmmaker Weekend continues with David Lynch's screening Inland Empire at LACMA, with muse Laura Dern joining him for a post-show discussion. We assume the cow won't be making an appearance.
· McSweeney's Presents The World, Explained at Barnsdall Art Park, a benefit reading/comedy show/concert/powerpoint extravaganza to raise money for 826LA. And something for the ladies: adorable Michael "George Michael of Arrested Development" Cera will be on hand to fulfill all your cheek-pinching fantasies.
Sunday
· Dave Eggers, a name that may be recognizable to those interested in the McSweeney's event posted above, will read from his new novel, What Is the What, at the UCLA Hammer Museum.
· Sunday night music: Starsailor at The Hotel Caf ; 400 Blows at The Scene; KROQ's Almost Acoustic Christmas continues (call your favorite scalper for tix) for a second night at the Gibson Amphitheatre.

A tipster just forwarded us an NBC Universal e-mail newsletter which included this preview of an exciting promotional feature they'll be rolling out on Sunday, giving their own staff a chance to be among the first to tap through a series of automated menus and send their loved ones a greeting from GE's Vice President of East Coast Television and Microwave Programming. Nothing says "I was bored at work during the holiday slowdown" like sending your mother a message in Alec Baldwin's voice saying, "You always struck me as a lesbian. And a lonely one at that. While everyone else is out making merry at Christmas parties you weren't invited to, why not gather up your six cats, spike some eggnog with cheap Scotch, and join your new best friends at 30 Rock, 9:30 pm Eastern Standard Time on NBC? See you then!"