With news that a Berkeley watchdog group has discovered an abandoned Pentagon plan to develop a "hormone bomb" that would turn enemy soldiers into lusty, same-sex-craving flesh addicts, producers--whose antennae are always attuned to a juicy, plucked-from-the-headlines story--instantly went into a Gay Bomb movie pitching frenzy. Studio executives were soon inundated with varying takes on the basic Manhattan Project-meets-The Birdcage premise. ("Ours is a musical!" "Ours is from the Gay Bomb's point of view!" "Ours dares to keep the cameras trained upon steamy displays of insurgent-on-insurgent action!") Ultimately, it was the little-known indie team who envisioned a Dr. Strangelove update, featuring Jake Gyllenhaal in full cowboy regalia bareback riding the Gay Bomb out the bay doors of a mirror-tiled B-52, that won Hollywood over for its bold, fabulous vision.

• Pentagon Confirms It Sought To Build A 'Gay Bomb' [CBS5.com]

· Music round-up: LCD Soundsystem at the El Rey; The Pipettes and Smoosh at the Troubadour; Burning Brides at the Echo.
· The Largo draws an all-star lineup of recent Paris Hilton MTV Movie Awards tormentor Sarah Silverman, Doug "The Human Interruption" Benson, Jim Gaffigan, and Greg Fitzsimmons for its Monday night show.
· The Arclight screens the mob comedy You Kill Me, with star Tea Leoni introducing the film and director John Dahl doing the Q&A; thing afterwards.

If NBC or Warner Bros. recently ponied up for a For Your Consideration ad for Matthew Perry's fine Studio 60 work (if nothing else, he showed consummate professionalism in not walking out when Aaron Sorkin forced that "hallucinating a drug-addled staff writer alter ego" storyline on him), we completely missed it, but we were heartened to see that TNT wasn't too cheap to pimp its drama The Ron Clark Story in today's trades. Unfortunately for Perry, TNT didn't quit while it was ahead on the "captivating performance" pullquote, instead diminishing his chances by including blurbs damning him with faint "solid!" and "likeable, kind of!" praise. And, of course, things always could be worse, had the network dug up a review describing their original movie with the words, "By its third act, no longer a 'made-for-basic-cable drama about Matthew Perry playing a teacher,' this story evolves into one about Matthew Perry playing a person."

[Image: Digital Variety]

• The Ron Clark Story [TNT.tv]
• Previously: For Your Consideration: 'L Word' Downgraded To Merely Bi-Curious [Defamer]

Having already blown untold millions of promotional dollars into 300-foot-long, building-sheathing Transformers prophylactics and custom-built Lamborghini-bots that will assist director Michael Bay in his premiere night groupie-acquisition plans, DreamWorks has apparently run through most of its advertising budget, and must now settle for more modest local campaigns for its upcoming blockbuster. While forking over some petty cash to slap some decals bearing Bay's unofficial catch-phrase on an economy sedan (would it have bankrupted them to buy the car new hubcap?) obviously lacks the sizzle of the aforementioned, flashier efforts, the strategy nevertheless did successfully raise the release-date awareness of at least one cameraphone-carrying Defamer operative passing through the parking lot of the Burbank Staples where it was parked earlier today.

After the jump, a photo of the car's equally stunning rear bumper:

Barbara Walters brought the world a glimmer of hope this morning, repositioning fallen debutante Paris Hilton as newly reinvigorated with the gifts of spiritual clarity. But even as she passes long, hard hours behind bars sketching the preliminary floor plans for the Paris Hilton Living Doll House Pediatric Recovery Center--featuring real play-servants sick children can dress up and order around as they please!--there still appears to be no shortage of judgmental commentary on the Hilton affair, and the greater question of What It All Means For Our Society. A round-up from around the web:
· Jamie Lee Curtis--who, having once swapped bodies with Lindsay Lohan, has first hand knowledge of what it means to walk a mile in a Hollywood party whorelet's shoes--places the blame for Paris's predicament on bad parenting.That means you, Kathy Hilton: She thinks you're a terrible mother. [HuffPo]

· Preliminary overnight ratings reveal that The Sopranos finale delivered a big number, stealing viewers from both the Tonys and the NBA finals. [Variety]
· Spring Awakening and The Coast of Utopia clean up at the little-watched (see above!) Tonys, winning eight and seven trophies, respectively. [THR]
· Apparently, cutting out "more than half" of Hong Kong superstar Chow Yun Fat's scenes in Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End makes the movie safer for Chinese audiences, who will finally get an opportunity to see it on Tuesday. More bad news: the deletions make the movie even more difficult to follow than its unedited version. [Variety]
· Pirates 3 holds off Ocean's 13 at the international box office, pulling in another (yawn) $51.3 million. [THR]
· "Respected" outlets try to justify their contributions to the Paris Hilton clusterfuck by offering meta commentary on the ongoing "media circus" or with analysis of how the justice system treats the rich and famous. [Variety]

[Warning: This post will contain spoilers. If you chose to ignore the most significant moment in the history of pop culture by time-shifting last night's Sopranos finale, we recommend that you smash your monitor with a rock and save yourself the anguish of having your life ruined. --Ed.]

Whether you believe that David Chase's choice to end The Sopranos on an open-ended freeze frame so intentionally abrupt that it would trick millions of outraged viewers into believing that their cable boxes and DVRs had malfunctioned--robbing them of the "real" ending where Tony is floating face-down in his pool, his brain splattered upon a flock of peacefully paddling ducks by the escaped Russian from "Pine Barrens"--represents an uncompromising artistic triumph or the worst kind of blue-balling narrative cop-out, we can all agree on one thing: Meadow is a profoundly shitty parallel parker.

The ex-con who had once plotted to kidnap David Letterman's infant son while working as a painter on the talk show host's Montana ranch has succeeded in executing yet another jaw-dropping maneuver straight out of the Depression-Era Crime Movie Playbook: He escaped with another inmate from the Montana State Prison where he was being held, and, four days later, the two are still on the run:

Offers of help came the New York Police Department and the U.S. Department of Homeland Security as officials continued searching for two missing, Montana State Prison inmates, one accused of bilking television personality David Letterman.

Demonstrating the same admirable commitment to bravely seeking out publicity in the face of unspeakable personal tragedy she exhibited in choosing to spend her final night of freedom with 4,000 of her best friends at the MTV Movie Awards, a newly re-jailed Paris Hilton yesterday expended one of her precious phone calls to reach out to the only person she felt she could trust to deliver a message of hope to her millions of fans: Barbara Walters. In a brief conversation with The View's den mother, Hilton reveals that her brief stay in prison has caused the Swarovski crystal-encrusted scales to fall from her eyes: she's now found God, is ready to drop the dumb girl "act," and wants to build a giant dollhouse in which sick children can simulate her own charmed, carefree upbringing. Truly, the L.A. County justice system's short-sighted desire to topple an icon of privilege has backfired, as Hilton will soon emerge from her incarceration as the Celebutard Nelson Mandela.

A clip from Walters' heart-to-heart with the heiress is above. You will be moved.

• EXCLUSIVE: Hilton Calls Barbara Walters From Jail -- 'God Has Released Me' [ABC News]
• Previously: Breaking: Judge Orders Paris Back To Jail, Immediate Halt Of All Cupcake Deliveries [Defamer]

Temporarily put aside the existential despair of your post-Sopranos existence by self-medicating with the weekend box office numbers. It's what Dr. Melfi would want.

1. Ocean's Thirteen--$37.080 million
One might have expected that a movie featuring The King of Hollywood, Angelina Jolie's Pretty Boy Partner, and Al Pacino spray-tanned to the exact hue of an expertly basted turkey could have scared up $50 million during a season in which the much-unclamored-for Shrek the Third put up a nine-figure opening. Unfortunately, the moviegoing public chose to punish George Clooney and Brad Pitt for the entertainment industry's blockbuster-recycling sins, perhaps not realizing that withholding their box office dollars could negatively impact the do-gooding pair's ability to conduct their many charitable activities. If a Vietnamese orphan goes unapopted into a high-powered Hollywood family because of a shortfall in Pitt's profit participation, blame yourselves, America. You should have waited for the new Fantastic Four movie to send your message of frustration to the greedy studios.

· The Lynwood Hilton: The surrender. The terror cell. The first day. The search. The reprieve. The condition. The collision. The cupcakes. The reversal. The return. The arrival. The reckoning. The Gayor.
· T.R. 1, Isaiah 0
· CAA Death Star heat rays boil their neighbors alive. Don't eat the ice cream! It's a trap!
· A Canadian writer who invented the concept of a man unexpectedly getting a woman pregnant sues the makers of Knocked Up.
· A Moment with Ben: NBC's new rock star definitely meaning to catch the network's new pilots, just as soon as he's done slamming these Jäger Bombs! Yeeeeah!!!
· Jericho fans' salt-roasted voices are heard, and the series gets seven more hour-long gasps of radioactive air.
· Hey Paula! Paula? No seriously--Paula? Does anyone have a hand mirror? She might not be breathing.
· Thursday work distractions: Kyle KY's skywriting extravaganza. The Miracle Mile bomb scare.
· Cuba Gooding Jr.: Hero, chicken lover.
· Rob Lowe: Golfer, goldfinch hater.
· Hostel Part 2 director Eli Roth shows off his veiny brontosaurus meat.
· Brad Pitt and George Clooney are trailed to their Grauman's wet cement ceremony by posse of curiously muscular and well-groomed cocktail activists.
· Connery pashes on Indy 4.
· Lindsay Lohan will cut you--if Vanessa Minnillo doesn't get there first.

· Add "corpses" to the list of fun things the Sunset Tan people will bronze, right below "grade-school girls with crazy moms." (And in an amusing side note, our tipster found this clip while searching YouTube for clips of "hot blondes" doing stuff.)
· Mayor Villaraigosa is separating from his wife. Our knee-jerk reaction to this news is the blame this photo of him posing with Paris Hilton.
·A South Park promo puts an unnamed network's "balls policy" to the test.
·Brad Whitford has made peace with Studio 60's demise. We just hope that Tom Jeter's brother gets out of Iraq alive.

Friday
· Music round-up: Morrissey at the Hollywood Bowl; The Raveonettes at the Echo; The Shys at Spaceland.
· Guy Maddin's new silent film, Brand Upon the Brain!, is playing at the Egyptian complete with accompanying "live" orchestra, "live" foley effects, and just for shits and giggles, a "live" castrato. Should be interesting?
· Pulitzer-laden WaPo journalist Bob Woodward speaks about his new book, State of Denial, at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion.
Saturday
· It's time once again to Fight With Words! (two words enter, one word leaves!) at the Thought Bunker at Betalevel. Note to aspiring combatants: It's a *right* turn at the dumpster. Don't fuck it up this time, or there will be consequences.
· More music: John Mayer and Ben Folds at the Hollywood Bowl; The Airborne Toxic Event at the Troubadour; Jon Brion at Largo.
Sunday
· Music? Yes, more please: LCD Soundsystem at the El Rey; The Phonemes at Spaceland;Raveonettes at Little Radio.
· Local gameshow hosting legend J. Keith van Straaten premieres the new season of What's My Line? Live On Stage at the Acme, with guests Elaine Hendrix, Beth Littleford, Eric Millegan, and Gary Anthony Williams, daring you to TiVo The Sopranos and ignore the pride parade in favor of his show.

Isaiah Washington's 12-word response to his firing--"I'm mad as hell, and I'm not going to take it anymore!"--hinted ominously that the newly downsized actor had retaliatory measures in mind. In one of a number of disturbing scenarios, we imagine the actor silently stalking the halls of ABC, picking off random receptionists, assistants, and executives with the most bigoted, spittle-flecked invectives he could muster, before ultimately turning the slurs onto himself. Howard Bragman, the actor's publicist, tries to explain Washington's seething rage at having lost his job after submitting to every demeaning stipulation ordered by his superiors:

"If they wanted to fire him," Bragman asks, "why didn't they fire him when [the incident] happened? Why did they say, 'Here's what you need to do if you want to come back... ' and then, when he did everything that was asked of him, he still gets fired. Why do you treat somebody like that?"

Earlier today, sensing that the residents of his sleepy municipality might have been startled by the locust-like swarm of helicopters suddenly darkening the morning sky, West Hollywood Mayor Pro Tempore Jeff Prang issued a statement to his constituents aimed at soothing nerves frayed by the arrival of the noisy, airborne interlopers:

Dear Neighbors:

I have received an enormous number of calls and e-mails today about the helicopters hovering over the City. As you may know, Paris Hilton lives in Los Angeles, just off the Sunset Strip and immediately adjacent to West Hollywood. Given the publicity and controversy surrounding her recent incarceration and re-assignment to house arrest, the media has converged on our community, including a flock of helicopters.

While things should be quieter in the aftermath of today's mob-pleasing decision, there's nothing he can do about the media's whirlybird armada should Paris Hilton's announced appeal go through and she returns to her house to finish the monthlong home-imprisonment clusterfuck she tried to kick off yesterday. But on the bright side, if she's re-released from Century, the economic boost to the local luxury baked goods sector should help offset any quality-of-life hit the city might experience.

The full e-mail follows after the jump:

PrivacyWatch celebrity sightings are submitted by our readers, and are posted several times a week, so them in often. Submit yours to tips[AT]defamer.com (please put "sighting" or "PrivacyWatch" in the subject line) and tell everyone about the time you spotted the cutie-pie accidental teen-killer of your dreams eating Chinese food one table away from you.

In today's episode: Robin Williams; Judd Apatow, Leslie Mann, Iris and Maude Apatow; Lane Garrison and Joe Simpson; Bradley Cooper; Jenna Elfman and Ted Raimi; Alyssa Milano; Madeleine Stowe; Ed Helms; Angela Kinsey, Kate Flannery, and Melora Hardin; Michael Rosenbaum; Delilah Andre; Mira Furlan and Eric Wareheim.