Britney Spears (born December 2, 1981) is an American pop singer and entertainer. Born in Mississippi and raised in Louisiana, Spears first appeared on national television in 1992 as a contestant on the Star Search program. At age 12 she performed as a cast member in Disney Channel's television series The All New Mickey Mouse Club from 1993 to 1994. In 1997, Spears signed a recording contract with Jive, which would lead to the release of her debut album ...Baby One More Time in 1999.
Early life, The Mickey Mouse Club, career debut, and innosense
Spears was born in McComb, Mississippi and raised in Kentwood, Louisiana as a Southern Baptist. Her parents are Lynne Irene (née Bridges), a former elementary school teacher, and Jamie Parnell Spears, a former building contractor and chef. Spears is of English heritage through her maternal grandmother being born in London and distant Maltese descent, with her maternal 2nd great-grandfather Edward Portelli being born in Malta then moving to England where he settled. Spears has two siblings, Bryan and Jamie Lynn. Bryan Spears is married to Jamie-Lynn's manager, Graciella Rivera.
2010: Upcoming album and personal and professional relationships
There are plans for Spears to work with Tiësto, Darkchild, Lolita, Rosario and Carmen de Mairena on her seventh studio album. Britney's rep confirmed that she and Jason Trawick were in a relationship and that he had decided to end their professional relationship to focus on their personal relationship.
Thomas Cruise Mapother IV (born July 3, 1962), better known by his screen name of Tom Cruise, is an American actor and film producer. He has been nominated for three Academy Awards and won three Golden Globe Awards. His first leading role was the 1983 film Risky Business, which has been described as "A Generation X classic, and a career-maker" for the actor. After playing the role of a heroic naval pilot in the popular and financially successful 1986 film Top Gun, Cruise continued in this vein, playing a secret agent in a series of Mission: Impossible action films in the 1990s and 2000s. In addition to these heroic roles, he has starred in many other successful films such as Jerry Maguire (1996), Vanilla Sky (2001), Minority Report (2002), The Last Samurai (2003), Collateral (2004) and War of the Worlds (2005). Almost every film he has starred in has achieved blockbuster status, with box office revenues totaling $100-million or more in the U.S.
Family and early life
Cruise was born in Syracuse, New York, the son of Mary Lee (née Pfeiffer), a special education teacher, and Thomas Cruise Mapother III, an electrical engineer. Cruise's paternal great great grandfather, Welshman Dylan Henry Mapother, emigrated from Flint, north east Wales, to Louisville, Kentucky in 1850. Cruise's great grandfather, the first Thomas Cruise Mapother, was born in 1876. He also has German and English ancestry from his paternal great-grandparents, William Reibert and Charlotte Louise Voelker, and German ancestry through his mother. Tom Cruise's oldest sister, Lee Anne, was born in Louisville. His older sister Marian was born in Syracuse, as were Tom and his younger sister, Cass.
Tom Cruise's Career
1980 :
Cruise's first film role came in 1981, when he had a small role in Endless Love, a drama/romance film starring Brooke Shields. Later that same year he had a more substantial role in the military film Taps, appearing alongside George C. Scott, Timothy Hutton and Sean Penn. In 1983, he was one of many teenaged stars to appear in Francis Ford Coppola's The Outsiders. The cast for this film included Rob Lowe, Matt Dillon, Patrick Swayze, and Ralph Macchio. That same year Cruise appeared in the teen comedy Losin' It. Cruise's breakthrough came after Risky Business was released, which helped to propel Cruise to stardom.[citation needed] One sequence in the film, featuring Cruise lip-syncing Bob Seger's "Old Time Rock and Roll" in his underwear, has become an iconic moment in 1980s film.[citation needed] The film has been described as "A Generation-X classic, and a career-maker for Tom Cruise." A fourth film that was released in 1983 was the high-school football drama, All the Right Moves. Cruise's next film was the 1985 fantasy film Legend directed by Ridley Scott.
1990s
Cruise was welcomed with similar success the following year when he received Academy Award nominations for Oliver Stone's Born on the Fourth of July, which was based on the best selling autobiography of parapalegic veteran and anti-war activist Ron Kovic.[citation needed] In 1990, Cruise starred as hot-shot racecar driver "Cole Trickle" in Tony Scott's Days of Thunder. Cruise's next film was Ron Howard's Far and Away where he again was starring with Nicole Kidman. Afterwards' he starred in the military thriller A Few Good Men with Jack Nicholson and Demi Moore. This film was very well received and earned Cruise a Golden Globe and MTV nominations.[citation needed] The following year he starred in Sydney Pollack's The Firm along with Gene Hackman and Ed Harris. It was based on the best selling novel by John Grisham, and won Favorite Dramatic Motion Picture at the People's Choice Awards.
2000s
In 2000, Cruise returned as Ethan Hunt in the second installment of the Mission Impossible films, releasing Mission: Impossible II. The film was directed by Hong Kong director John Woo and branded with his Gun fu Style, and it continued the series' blockbuster success at the box office, taking in almost $547M in worldwide figures, like its predecessor, being the third highest grossing film of the year. Cruise received an MTV Movie Award as Best Male Performance for this film. His next five films were major critical and commercial successes. The following year Cruise starred in the remake of the Spanish film Abre Los Ojos, the romantic thriller Vanilla Sky (2001) with Cameron Diaz and Penelope Cruz. In 2002, Cruise starred in the dystopian science fiction thriller, Minority Report which was directed by Steven Spielberg and based on the science fiction short story by Philip K. Dick.
2010s
In March 2010, Cruise completed filming the action-comedy Knight and Day, in which he re-teams with former costar Cameron Diaz, scheduled for release on June 25, 2010. On February 9, 2010, Cruise confirmed that he will star in a third Mission:Impossible sequel, slated for release on Memorial Day weekend 2011.
Producing
Cruise partnered with his former talent agent Paula Wagner to form Cruise/Wagner Productions in 1993,[5] and the company has since co-produced several of Cruise's films,[32] the first being Mission: Impossible in 1996 which was also Cruise's first project as a producer. He won a Nova Award (shared with Paula Wagner) for Most Promising Producer in Theatrical Motion Pictures at the PGA Golden Laurel Awards in 1997 for his work as a producer for the film Mission: Impossible.
His next project as a producer was the 1998 film Without Limits about famous American runner Steve Prefontaine. Cruise returned to work as a producer in 2000, continuing work on the Mission Impossible sequel. He then served as an executive producer for The Others which starred Nicole Kidman, also that year, he again worked as actor/producer in Vanilla Sky. He subsequently worked on (but did not star in) Narc, Hitting It Hard and Shattered Glass. His next project, which he also starred in, was The Last Samurai, he was jointly nominated for the Motion Picture Producer of the Year Award at the 2004 PGA Golden Laurel Awards.[citation needed] He then worked on Suspect Zero, Elizabethtown and Ask the Dust.
Popularity
In 1990, 1991 and 1997, People magazine rated him among the 50 most beautiful people in the world. In 1995, Empire magazine ranked him among the 100 sexiest stars in film history. Two years later, it ranked him among the top 5 movie stars of all time. In 2002 and 2003, he was rated by Premiere among the top 20 in its annual Power 100 list.
In 2006, Premiere ranked Cruise as Hollywood's most powerful actor, as Cruise came in at number 13 on the magazine's 2006 Power List, being the highest ranked actor.
On June 16, 2006, Forbes magazine published 'The Celebrity 100', a list of the most powerful celebrities, which Cruise topped.[citation needed] The list was generated using a combination of income (between June 2005 and June 2006), web references by Google, press clips compiled by LexisNexis, television and radio mentions (by Factiva), and the number of times a celebrity appeared on the cover of 26 major consumer magazines.
Relationships and personal life
Cruise married Mimi Rogers on May 9, 1987; they divorced on February 4, 1990. Rogers is generally believed to have introduced Cruise to Scientology.
Cruise met Nicole Kidman on the set of their film Days of Thunder. The couple married on December 24, 1990. He and Kidman adopted two children, Isabella Jane (b. December 22, 1992) and Connor Antony (b. January 17, 1995).[1] They separated in February 2001 when Kidman was three months pregnant; she later miscarried.
Cruise was next romantically linked with Penélope Cruz, the lead actress in his film Vanilla Sky. After a three-year relationship, in March 2004, Cruise announced that their relationship had ended in January.
In April 2005, Cruise began dating actress Katie Holmes. Shortly after they began their highly publicized relationship, on June 17, 2005, Cruise announced he had proposed to her at the top of the Eiffel Tower in Paris.
Shakira Isabel Mebarak Ripoll (born February 2, 1977), known professionally as Shakira, is a Colombian singer-songwriter, musician, record producer, dancer, and philanthropist who emerged as a musical prodigy in the music scene of Latin America in the early 1990s. Born and raised in Barranquilla, Colombia, Shakira revealed many of her talents in school as a live performer, demonstrating her vocal ability with rock and roll, Latin and Middle Eastern influences with her own original twist on belly dancing. Shakira is a native Spanish speaker and also speaks fluent English, and Portuguese.
Shakira's Career
1990-1994: Magia and Peligro
Shakira's debut album, Magia, was recorded with Sony Music in 1990 when she was only thirteen years old. The songs are a collection penned by her since she was 8, mixed pop-rock ballads and disco with electronic accompaniment, however it was hampered by a lack of recording and production cohesion. The album was released in 1991 and featured Magia and three other singles. Though it fared well on Colombian radio and gave the young Shakira much exposure, the album did not fare well commercially: only 1,200 copies were sold. and the music video for Magia became first national pop video in Colombia. After the poor acclaim of Magia, Shakira's label urged her back into the studio to release a follow up with more hit songs, to give the album potential.
1995–1997: Pies Descalzos
Shakira originally recorded the song ¿Dónde Estás Corazón? (later released on her album Pies Descalzos) for the compilation album "Nuestro Rock" in 1995, released exclusively in Colombia. “Pies Descalzos” album brought her great popularity in Latin America by the hit singles "Estoy Aquí," "Pies Descalzos, Sueños Blancos" and "Dónde Estás Corazón." Shakira also recorded three tracks in Portuguese titled “Estou Aqui”, “Um Pouco de Amor”, and “Pés Descalços”.
1998–2000: ¿Dónde Están Los Ladrones?
Having received a World Music Award as the best selling Latin artist, Shakira already prepared some of new material of her second international record. She was chosen from dozens of Latin singers to grace the cover of Time magazine in the article titled Era of the Rockera.
2001–2004: Laundry Service
Upon the success of ¿Dónde Están Los Ladrones? and MTV Unplugged, Shakira began working on a crossover album to English. Thanks to other successful crossover acts, most notably that of Ricky Martin and Enrique Iglesias, the crossover of Spanish artists to the English market had a great surge of popularity in mainstream music and it was the next logical step in the singer’s career. Shakira worked for over a year on new material for the album.
2005-2007: Fixations Era
Shakira stayed out of the spotlight for over two years. Many possible dates of release were delayed and she announced the Oral Fixation project in early 2005 with Rick Rubin as the executive producer. Fijación Oral Vol. 1, the first album of the project, was released on June 3, 2005 in Ireland, on June 6, 2005 in Europe, and on June 7, 2005 in North America, Latin America and Australia. The lead single from the album, "La Tortura" (U.S. #23), which features the Spanish balladeer Alejandro Sanz, was released as a single in April and achieved large-scale success in different radio and chart formats. It spent a record of twenty-five weeks at number one on the Billboard Hot Latin Tracks chart.
Collaborations and other work
In 2003, Shakira wrote with musician Tim Mitchell a song called "Come Down Love" for the Hollywood movie The Italian Job starring South African actress Charlize Theron & Mark Wahlberg, but finally the song was not included on the soundtrack of the same.
In late 2006, Shakira and Alejandro Sanz worked together again in the duet "Te lo Agradezco, Pero No", which is featured on Sanz' album El Tren de los Momentos. The song was a top ten hit in Latin America, and topped Billboard Hot Latin Tracks chart.
Shakira worked with Miguel Bosé in the duet "Si Tú No Vuelves", which was released in Bosé's album Papito, which celebrates his 30-year career.
Shakira's Personal life
Shakira was raised Roman Catholic. Shakira currently lives in The Bahamas. In 2000, she started dating Antonio de la Rúa, the son of the then President of Argentina Fernando de la Rúa, a romance that made headline news throughout Latin America. In March 2001, he proposed to her. There have been many rumors regarding the couple over the years. In June 2007, Latin American media speculated that the couple had finally split up. On the previous days, Shakira and Antonio were seen in a restaurant in New York City, facing and denying the rumors one more time. Shakira's future mother-in-law Inés Pertiné claimed the wedding would take place in September 2007 in the mansion which Shakira owns in the Dominican Republic, but the wedding did not happen. She also said that Shakira has already ordered Argentine designer María Pryor to design her wedding dress. All this was denied by Shakira herself in Mexico.
Kaka (Ricardo Izecson dos Santos Leite) born 22 April 1982, commonly known as Kaká, is a Brazilian football midfielder who currently plays for Real Madrid C.F. and the Brazilian national team. He started his footballing career at the age of eight, when he began playing for a local club. By then, he also played tennis, and it was not until he moved on to São Paulo FC and signed his first professional contract with the club at the age of fifteen that he chose to focus on football. In 2003 he joined A.C. Milan for a fee of €8.5 million. While at Milan, Kaká won the Ballon d'Or and FIFA World Player of the Year awards in 2007. In addition to his contributions on the pitch, Kaká is known for his humanitarian work.
Club career
São Paulo
Kaka began his career with São Paulo at the age of eight. He signed a contract at fifteen and led the São Paulo youth squad to Copa de Juvenil glory. He made his senior side debut in January 2001 and scored 12 goals in 27 appearances, in addition to leading São Paulo to its first and only Torneio Rio-São Paulo championship, in which he scored two goals in two minutes as a substitute against Botafogo in the final, which São Paulo won 2–1.He scored 10 goals in 22 matches the following season, and by this time his performance was soon attracting attention from European clubs. Kaka made a total of 58 appearances for São Paulo, scoring 23 times.
On 3 June 2009, Football Italia reported that newly-elected Real Madrid president Florentino Pérez had offered Milan a ₤68.5 million deal for Kaká, two days after the player had left for international duty with Brazil. Milan vice president Adriano Galliani did not deny the reports, and confirmed that he and Kaká's father, Bosco Leite, had traveled to Mexico to meet with La Volpe. "We had lunch and spoke about Kaká. I don't deny it. Negotiations exist, but a deal has yet to be done." On 4 June, Galliani told Gazzetta dello Sport that financial reasons were his motive for the talks with La Volpe. "We cannot allow [Milan] to lose €70 million The reasons behind Kaká's departure would be economic." On 8 June, Milan and Real Madrid confirmed Kaká has moved to the Bernabéu on a six-year deal
