The Fix

First Word

Britney runs from rehab: By the time you read this, Britney Spears may well have checked into a brand-new rehab facility, or had Anna Nicole Smith's sad-clown makeup tattooed on her face, or returned to her home planet. Wednesday, not long after we published the Fix, came the news that she checked out of the Promises center in Malibu, Calif., after less than 24 hours there. No real insight yet as to why she fled so quickly, but Kevin Federline isn't waiting to find out if she has gone absolutely nutso or if this is all an orchestrated P.R. bonanza created to fuel sales of her next album: He and his lawyer will appear early Thursday morning at an emergency hearing in family court in Los Angeles to discuss custody of the ex-couple's two children. (Associated Press)

Aniston boob suit: Blogger Perez Hilton has been hit with a copyright infringement complaint over his publication of a topless shot of Jennifer Aniston taken from footage of her recent film "The Break-Up." The topless shot wasn't in the final cut of the movie, and Universal City Studios is seeking an injunction to prevent Hilton from distributing the photo further and asks that a U.S. marshal seize the copyrighted photo from Hilton. The suit doesn't specify any monetary damages, but lawyers included a copy of the photograph, with the word "redacted" appearing over the actress's breasts. (The Smoking Gun)

White noise . . . Kim Kardashian, buddy of Paris Hilton and daughter of late O.J. Simpson attorney Robert Kardashian, is suing porn company Vivid Entertainment over its distribution of a leaked sex tape she made (but never made public) with ex-flame Willie "Ray J" Norwood -- she's now asking for unspecified damages and all profits from the sales of the tape. (People) ... "The 1/2 Hour News Hour," Fox's answer to "The Daily Show," drew nearly 1.5 million viewers in its debut on Sunday night. (TV Newser) ... Despite calling Robert Altman "the closest thing to my father and grandfather that I really do believe I've had in several years," Lindsay Lohan (right) missed the director's memorial service in Manhattan on Tuesday, and was seen partying in Los Angeles instead. (Page Six) ... Heather Mills, still in the midst of her divorce from Paul McCartney, will join the lineup of "Dancing With the Stars" when the new season starts next month. As the ABC Web site for the show notes, she'll be the first dancer with an artificial limb to compete on the show. (BBC News) ... Marcia Cross is a mom -- the "Desperate Housewives" actress gave birth to twin girls on Tuesday. (People)

Talkers

The restaurateur vs. the critic: Jeffrey Chodorow, the New York restaurateur perhaps best known in the rest of the country for his part in the disastrous reality TV show "The Restaurant" with Rocco DiSpirito, took out a full-page ad in yesterday's Dining section of the New York Times attacking Times critic Frank Bruni. Bruni recently reviewed Chodorow's most recent effort, a restaurant called Kobe Club, and gave it zero stars, saying "it presents too many insipid or insulting dishes at prices that draw blood from anyone without a trust fund or an expense account." The two of them have a past -- Bruni's review of Brasserio Caviar & Banana, the place Chodorow opened after the failure of the reality show, was full of scathing descriptions: "flavorlessness," "ignoble," "insipid," "horrific." Now Chodorow is vowing to fight back with ... a blog, which he says in inspired "partly out of my love for food ... and partly in response to an increasingly negative, downright nasty climate that has surfaced in the world of restaurant journalism." Keep checking back for (thrilling!) reviews of Bruni's future reviews. ("Jeffrey Chodorow Declares War on Frank Bruni," Gawker)

The Hollywood/fashion connection: Both the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal look at the symbiotic relationship between the red carpet and the fashion industry today. The Times story focuses on Marchesa, the start-up fashion line headed by designers Keren Craig and Georgina Chapman -- Chapman just happens to be "dating the movie mogul Harvey Weinstein, who produced films in which some of the actresses wearing Marchesa have starred, or may employ in the future." The designer duo are hoping a number of stars will sport their dresses at the Oscars on Sunday, but there's a certain amount of skepticism in the industry over their quick success -- some say it's largely due to Chapman's connection to Weinstein, a notion the mogul tries to dismiss: "The people who say things like that are just jealous." The Journal, meanwhile, looks at menswear designer Arnold Brant, who's pinning his hopes on best actor nominee Forest Whitaker's wearing one of his suits to the awards show, which could translate into big business. "Hollywood is an important element in the fashion food chain," writes the paper, "feeding expensive clothing to the masses with the help of magazines and television shows whose coverage of red-carpet events amounts to free advertising." (N.Y. Times, Wall Street Journal)

Buzz Index

• Most popular entertainment story on Digg: "George Takei Responds to Tim Hardaway," Influks.com
• Most viewed news story on Yahoo News: "Cities Can Make You Skinny," Live Science
• Most e-mailed story on BBC News: "NZ Fishermen Land Colossal Squid"
• Most linked to news story on Technorati: "Blair Announces Iraq Troops Cut," BBC News

; )

"Cop Who Ticketed Himself Reaps Praise" (Associated Press)

Judgment

David Lynch, artist of our time? On the occasion of "The Air Is on Fire," his solo show of never-before-seen "painting, photography, drawings, film, animation, installation and sound art from the 1960s to the present day," at a gallery in Paris (and the simultaneous European opening of "Inland Empire"), the March issue of Art Review pauses to reflect on the non-movie work of David Lynch: "He's a great filmmaker, but is David Lynch a great artist?" Admitting "it's difficult to look at much of the work without making connections with his movies," the answer appears to be no -- but that doesn't mean there's not a lot of greatness in both his films and his paintings. Lynch even offers sage advice to artists: "If you want to ... think in a different way, then visit the morgue, the city morgue, at midnight. It's really something." (Art Review, digital edition)

Numbers

Norah Jones' "Not Too Late" may have jumped from the No. 2 spot last week back to the top position on this week's album charts, but it was the artists who performed and/or won big at the Grammys who saw the biggest bump in sales. A breakdown:

(Billboard)

Turn On

It's the end of an era on Thursday night, as "The O.C." (Fox, 9 p.m. EST) bids the world a fond farewell in a sure to be over-the-top series finale. Elsewhere, Sundance rebroadcasts "Iconoclasts: Dave Chappelle and Maya Angelou" (9 p.m. EST), ABC presents "The Oprah Winfrey Oscar Special," and HBO airs Rory Kennedy's documentary "Ghosts of Abu Ghraib" (9:30 p.m. EST) -- read Heather Havrilesky's review here.

Talk

Fix contributors: Heather Havrilesky, Scott Lamb, Kerry Lauerman, David Marchese, Laura Miller, Andrew O'Hehir, Amy Reiter, Stephanie Zacharek

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