Heartless personality Jonathan Nail interrogates helpless patrons during opening weekend of Iron Man. | Video courtesy of Just Us Films No one doubted that Iron Man would easily top the box office this weekend, but the scale of its success is virtually unprecedented. The latest entry from Marvel's deep stable of superheroes blasted early estimates of $60-70M by raking in a mammoth $104.3M since Thursday night's late showings. It was the second-largest, non-sequel debut......

Repulsors fire! | Photo courtesy of Paramount What else can I say about Iron Man that I didn't say in my rave yesterday? According to the great Nikki Finke, it looks like it's going to be a monster hit so I guess I don't need to encourage you to go see it. I'll actually be seeing it again this weekend because I failed to stay through the entire end credit roll and see the......

The Bent Festival kicks off tonight with a concert. / Photo by PPDigital via flickr. FOOD TALK Los Angeles Times food critic and historian Charles Perry discusses all things food with other chefs and critics during the museum’s “Los Angeles and California: A Fusion of Tastes” series. Tonight’s subject is “Los Angeles Landmarks.” Sample dishes will be prepared by the Autry’s chef Carolyn Baer. 7 pm // Autry National Museum // 4700 Western Heritage......

Here's the good news of the day: It's almost Friday! Go out and celebrate tonight with these happenings about town: FILM The 2000 film Peppermint Candy opens with the suicide of its protagonist: a middle-aged, South Korean businessman. The film then flashes back 20 years — from student uprisings of the early '80s to the Asian financial crisis of the late '90s. "Lee's breakthrough debut unfolds a stirring story of regret, first love and letdowns."......

"You see this watch? You see this watch? That watch cost more than your car. I made $970,000 last year. How much you make? You see, pal, that's who I am. And you're nothing. Nice guy? I don't give a shit. Good father? Fuck you -- go home and play with your kids! You wanna work here? Close! You think this is abuse? You think this is abuse, you cocksucker? You can't take this......

700 extra hours -- yes, you read that correctly -- from David Lynch's Inland Empire have been culled into a documentary about David Lynch that is titled Lynch and is being pimped to international buyers at Cannes by Lynch himself. -Cinematical Comic book author/graphic novelist Frank Miller will write and direct the live-action feature film adaptation of the Will Eisner comic book series "The Spirit" about a man who fakes his own death so he......

While we would never comment on a stranger's parenting techniques, we, along with many, bristled at hearing Alec Baldwin call his young daughter a pig in this day and age of girls and women obsessing over their bodies, etc., sometimes to fatal conclusions. And even though most of the tirade was a victim rant about how she had injured him somehow by not being available to take his phone call, we do applaud him......

There’s a reason why we haven’t heard much about David Mamet’s 1974 one-act Squirrels. While it has its comic moments, the play doesn’t pack the literary punch of Mamet’s better known work like Oleanna, Glengarry Glen Ross or Sexual Perversity in Chicago. (Some die-hard Mamet fans might even make a case for The Unit on CBS, which Mamet created.) In a nutshell, Squirrels focuses on Arthur’s (Oscar Don Smith) writer’s block, and his attempt......

Monday Allen Rucker presents The Best Seat in the House 7pm @ Vroman’s David Mamet & Howard Norton sign their new books 7pm @ Dutton’s Brentwood Tuesday Sam Sheridan presents A Fighter’s Heart 7pm @ Book Soup Bich Minh Nguyen presents Stealing Buddha's Dinner 7pm @ Vroman’s Rafe Esquith discusses Teaching Shakespeare 7pm @ Central Library Wednesday John M. Wieskopf presents The Ascendancy 7:30pm @ Barnes & Noble Third Street Promenade Kate Jacobs signs......

Monday P.J. O’Rourke signs On the Wealth of Nations 7pm @ Book Soup Adam Gopnick reads Through the Children's Gate 7:30pm @ Skirball Cultural Center Tuesday David Mamet signs Bambi vs. Godzilla 7pm @ Book Soup Edward Humes signs Monkey Girl 7pm @ Vroman’s Norman Mailer discusses Castle in the Forest with David Ulin 7:30pm @ Writers Guild Theater Daveed Gartenstein-Ross presents My Year in Radical Islam 7:30pm @ Barnes & Noble Santa Monica......

Yes folks it that time of year again when people make lists of the top whatevers that did something, didn't do something, inspired them, made them laugh, cry, sick or any number of other things. For better or worse, I'm no different and am caught up in the whole list thing. So, I will be providing a list of my own for your enjoyment, distraction, derision or otherwise perusal. My list is the top-ten......

Pet Shop Boys @ Wiltern The Doors @ The Whiskey DJ AM @ LAX Raul Malo @ The Roxy Marisa Monte @ Royce Hall Aterciopelados, Los Abandoned @ Henry Fonda The UVs, Hollywood Harlots, Bastard @ Dragonfly Ass Pocket of Whiskey @ Harvelle's Sia, The Bird & the Bee, Greg Laswell @ Avalon Republic of Loose, Gran Ronde, Box Violet @ The Troubadour From Satellite, Verona Grove, Supercreep, The Robins @ Viper Room Sam......

Staggering in the footsteps of several other celebrities who found themselves in similar situations after consuming too much and saying or doing inappropriate things (Rush Limbaugh, Martin Lawrence, Courtney Love, Charlie Sheen, Kelsey Grammer, Andy Dick, and of course Robert Downey Jr.,) today Mel Gibson entered rehab for his drinking problem. David Mamet, yes that David Mamet, makes a funny at Mad Max's plight. In other bad news, Beck's new video and song is......

Coming to a Close: Sexuality “Dan has met the girl he wants to marry… There's just one small item he needs to tell her. When he lived in San Francisco he had a couple of gay experiences. Well, more like three years living as a gay man in a gay man's world.” RegretroSexual is coming to a close in two weeks on March 29th at the Lounge Theater. The show is only on Wednesdays,......

LA Observed reports this morning about the huge blog v. blog argument currently going on between LA Weekly columnist Marc Cooper and Weekly freelancer Nikki Finke in regards to her recent attack on Arianna Huffington's brand new celebrity/political-centric blog, Huffington Post. As the hits have just been tallied up and around 8 million for the Huffington Post's first day, the question isn't whether or not Finke's goal in slapping Arianna on her first day......

• Tonight at UCLA Live, Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright David Mamet will be speaking at 8 PM. Tickets range from $25-35, or $15 for UCLA students. • At 7 PM, the Hammer Museum, author Marilynne Robinson will be reading. Her novel Gilead was one of the top 10 books of 2004 according to the New York Times. • MOCA Pacific Design Center hosts Royal Art Lodge artist Jonathan Pylypchuk for a free art talk at......