• Madonna gave a 30-minute speech at her 50th birthday party. And frankly she was kind of sad that mainly nobodies showed up and not her celebrity friends. Also, the singer may not be able to get the Malawian "orphan" of her choosing. Madonna consoled herself by going to a strip club.
• Here some pictures from inside Portia de Rossi and Ellen DeGeneres' DeWedding. [Mirror]
• Jennifer Aniston and John Mayer's breakup officially reached the trash-talking phase. Apparently John was cheap and leached off Jen's Hollywood money. He also leached off her celebrity by chatting up the paparazzi. The dirt on Aniston should be out in the next news cycle. [Scoop]
• Patrick Swayze, who has pancreatic cancer, is reportedly still smoking. [Sun]
• There's a sad celebrity shortage at the big Republican convention for some strange reason. Even Arnold Schwarzenegger isn't confirmed, and he's an elected Republican politician. [R&M]
• Tyra Banks doesn't care how long you've been waiting for her show to start. [P6]

"Beast, from Sony, centers on an unorthodox but effective FBI veteran (Swayze) who trains a new partner ([Travis] Fimmel) in his hard-edged and psychologically clever style of agenting while being pursued by a secret Internal Affairs team.

"In a statement, Swayze did not address his health, but network execs confirmed that his doctors have cleared him to resume work."

"'I have searched for quite a long time to find a character that is this mutilayered, unpredictable and downright entertaining as well as a project this current and cutting-edged,' he said." [The Hollywood Reporter]

Lynch, Swayze's co-star in Road House, talked to People about the 55-year-old actor's illness on a red-carpet line at Sunday's premiere for the new Rolling Stones concert film at New York's Ziegfeld Theater. "If anyone can get through this, it's him," said Lynch. She described Swayze as "the most determined, positive, forward-thinking person I've ever met."

One isn't supposed to say this, because the truth is depressing: Lynch's belief is without any scientific foundation. The latest studies confirm the medical conventional wisdom: an upbeat attitude has no measurable effect on patients' lifespans, or response to treatment. What's so wrong about a bit of optimism? It implies that the failure of a round of chemotherapy is the fault of the patient, rather than the result of an unpredictable genetic lottery, and that trope is even more distressing for terminally ill patients.

"The idea that we can control illness and death with our minds appeals to our deepest yearnings, but it just isn't so," says Jimmie Holland, a psychiatrist at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center who's argued against the tyranny of positive thinking. "It is so sad that cancer patients are made to believe that if they aren't doing well it is somehow their own fault because they aren't positive enough."

• You're making a music video for Britney Spears, who has been committed to a psychiatric ward twice in the last two months. How to best open your video and grab the viewer's attention? Depict Spears jumping off a building! [YouTube]
• That crazy guy who called 911 and said Heather Locklear was maybe about to commit suicide, even though Locklear later said everything was fine and the police left her alone? A doctor. And friend of Locklear's. [People]
• A woman named Billy Jean is still claiming to be Michael Jackson's lover. She climbed over a fence to try to get into his house and was arrested. Breaking my heart, babe.
• Paris Hilton attended her sister Nicky's fashion show, undermines her with reddest, most distracting lipstick in the world. [LA Times]
• ER wants George Clooney back. Well, of course it does, and of course he hasn't committed. Noah Wyle signed on, though! [EW]
• What? Rosie O'Donnell said on her blog, of Spitzer hooker Ashley Youmans, "I know her / I get it." She "knows her" knows her, or was O'Donnell just rying to make her poem rhyme? [Ask Ro]
• O'Donnell also called Geraldino Ferraro, "Wonder Woman" and agreed she was a "BRILLIANT WOMAN" in the wake of Ferraro's comments that Barack Obama unfairly benefits from the cushy life of a black man in America.
• Michael Jackson's brothers are somehow under the under the impression that heavily indebted Michael is going to help everyone acquire a country home in the English countryside. Yes. Tito is involved. [Sun]
• Patrick Swayze is undergoing chemotherapy plus a new experimental drug, but can't quit smoking, even though smoking is linked to his type of cancer. [Sun]

• Singer Britney Spears, said to be worth around $50 million, has become steadily more sane since her father was placed in control of her finances and other affairs several weeks ago. She parted ways with hanger-on ex-paparazzo Adnan Ghalib and earned the right to see her children more often. Apparently her father is compensated at $2,500 per week for his oversight, and the many tabloids that make money off Spears insanity are incredulous. So is comedian Rosie O'Donnell, who wrote in her Web Q&A forum that Spears' dad's high pay has become "the problem." Apparently these people have never priced rehab, or done some simple math on the scale of Spears' image problem.
• Singer John Mayer wrote the sweetest song while at the airport. It starts, "Dear Ex Lover, Perhaps you didn't understand the last time I told you to stop contacting me, so I'll do my best to spell it out for you." It just gets even more tender from there, if you can imagine that. [Mayer blog via Perez]
• Jerry Seinfeld's pitch for his new network show: "Just like Curb Your Enthusiasm, but with Jerry, instead of Larry [David]." Curb Your Enthusiasm, of course, was like a slightly more improvised version of Seinfeld, but with Larry David instead of Jerry Seinfeld. Just admit you want your old show back, Jerry. [P6]
• American Idol Season One star Nikki McKibbin had a Feb. 21 breakdown in the wake of weak album sales, her mother's August death and abuse of migraine medicine. [Star]
• Posh Spice at last gets her Vogue cover, but notice only after the Spice Girls finally promised to finally just stop existing.
• Irish actor Colin Farrell told off by boyfriend of model Meghan Lowther at the Rose Bar in Gramercy Park Hotel. "You tried. Now get out of here." [P6]
• Sad: Harvey Weinstein wants a meeting with novelist Linda Fairstein, so she makes swanky reservations at a Midtown restaurant and alets the maitre d' about exactly who is coming. Turns out, it is Harvey Weinstein all right — the "octogenarian tuxedo manufacturer" who just loves her books. [P6]
• Another girl got between Heidi Montag and Spencer Pratt of "the Hills." Shocker! [Us]
• Kelly Rowan of "The O.C." is being kept hidden away by a reclusive Canadian billionaire, who doesn't like media attention. If you read between the lines in this item, it's like she's sending coded messages just begging some brave paparazzo to come rescue her. [P6]
• Actor Will Smith is hosting world icon Nelson Mandela's 90th birthday party in London. [Sun]
• Actor Patrick Swayze maybe not really going back to work, because he dropped out of a gay role in this one comedy flick. [OK!]
• Actress Natalie Portman on Hillary Clinton: "A lot of the stuff people say about her, I hear it and my stomach falls because it's so sexist... You ask people why they don't like her and it's because her husband cheated on her! That was obviously not her choice." [Us]

Dirty Dancing, 1987

Road House, 1989

Ghost, 1990

Saturday Night Live (host), 1990

Point Break, 1991

Donnie Darko, 2001

Earlier: Two Stripes = International Ethnic Cred, Living Embodiment of Caucasianess Keepin' It Real

Dirty Dancing star Patrick Swayze has defended actor Mel Gibson following his recent drink-drive arrest, during which he made derogatory remarks about Jews.

At this point there isn't much to be said about Mel "You Would Make a Beautiful Lampshade, Juden" Gibson. Will he ever recover from this? Does he represent an unspoken increase in anti-Jewish sentiment in America? Could it really be a harmless drunken rant from an otherwise nice guy whose father just happens to be a prominent and vocal Holocaust denier? WHO CARES?! There are much more important questions to answer here, like Who was asking Patrick Swayze anything about anything? And what is up with his monster face?