Veteran actor and director Sydney Pollack has died. The 73-year-old Oscar winner died today in his home in the Pacific Palisades, and representatives are saying the cause was cancer. Pollack was born in 1934 in Indiana. He studied acting under Sanford Meisner in New York and began his career on the stage. According to the New York Times, Mr. Pollack’s career defined an era in which big stars (Robert Redford, Barbra Streisand, Warren Beatty) and......

Photo by miss patricia via the LAist Featured Photos pool on Flickr. PARTY Popular magazine URB is having a release party for their upcoming issue tonight. DJ ?uestlove shows off his talents after completing the new Roots album. 10 p.m. // The Roxy Theater // 9009 Sunset Blvd. Hollywood // $18 STAGE Tonight, Emergency, a performance piece by Daniel Beaty, ends it’s run at the Geffen Playhouse. Beaty becomes all of the forty characters......

- All five of the Oscar-nominees for Best Supporting Actress have appeared topless, here are their lady parts, and analysis - Defamer - UCLA only admitted 100 African-American freshman last fall. This year they got applications from 2,444 blacks. LAist will be keeping an eye on how many of those are admitted to Taser U. - LA Times - iTunes illegal in Norway - 901am - Almost two months after shaking hands, JD Drew......

What can I say about a film where images of Shirley Temple are juxtaposed with swastikas? Where Fairuza Balk's voice comes wailing through a snail? Where there's a scene of a naked man with cerebral palsy lying in a giant clam as he appears to be masturbated by a woman who's wearing a rubber monkey mask while a racist folk song plays on an old record player? I'm not totally sure I didn't hallucinate......

Writers, directors and artists of all stripes are often told, "Write what you know," but few filmmakers accomplish this as successfully as Andrew Bujalski. At age 29 the Boston-based filmmaker has directed two well-received feature films, both of which are set in a post-college, indie rock milieu that he seems to know intimately. Describing his own post-college experience Bujalski says, "Since college I've basically been pursuing these loony little independent movies." Funny Ha Ha......