Like all reasonable people, we're totally excited about the upcoming Kanye album (also, we just found out about his Twitter feed). But after reading Fader's account of 808s & Heartbreak's apparently bonkers listening party, well… we're not exactly sure what to think. Held in an L.A. art gallery last night, it featured flashing lights, Mos Def, and "approximately forty nude women … wearing face-obscuring masks seemingly made of faux lamb's wool." Of course. What about the music? Apparently, "Love Lockdown" was no one-off experiment — Kanye barely raps, opting instead to sing through the Auto-Tune for nearly the entire album. And if 808s is a disaster, don't worry too much — he's promised another new album in June!

Vanessa Beecroft & Kanye West's 808s & Heartbreak Listening Event [Fader via Prefix]

Twenty-eight-year-old actor Jason Ritter is in the midst of his own one-man October surprise. This Friday, he hits theaters in two vastly different roles: In the low-budget indie Good Dick, he stars opposite longtime real-life girlfriend Marianna Palka, also the film's writer-director, as a Los Angeles video-store clerk who draws an emotionally deadened young woman out of a claustrophobic cocoon of hostility and sexual antipathy. In Oliver Stone’s W., Ritter — who, as the son of the late John Ritter, knows a thing about family legacies — portrays Jeb Bush. Ritter spoke with Vulture about Oliver Stone, playing Jeb Bush, and his relationship with Palka.

Amid shocking charges that Beyoncé pilfered dance moves in her new video comes more bad news today: She's releasing an album by her alter ego! Her upcoming I Am will be a two-disc set, with one CD, I Am Beyoncé, featuring ballads and the other, I Am Sasha, containing upbeat tracks. Sasha is apparently short for Sasha Fierce, a persona Mrs. Jay-Z's been working on for at least the past three years (in a 2005 Vanity Fair interview, she blamed Fierce for her performance at the Grammys that year). To promote the album, she's launched a Website asking the question "Who Is Sasha Fierce?" Our guess? Someone who's never heard of T.I.P. or Chris Gaines.

Beyonce Vs. Her Alter-Ego Sasha: Videos From Two-Part “I Am” Album Hit the Net [Rolling Stone]
Great Moments In Pop Videos Ripping Off Other People's Choreography [Idolator]

"There's heavy gun play and major explosions but not a lot of blood, and we really were careful of the language. There were some takes where I admit I let loose a few bad words but you won't see them. Actually, I'm glad we didn't drop the 'F-bomb' in every scene." —Mark Wahlberg on Max Payne [Parade]

"Here's my favorite thing: My favorite thing is turning on YouTube and seeing William Shatner talk to me. When did that become my life? How did that occur?" —J.J. Abrams doesn't understand why William Shatner is still stalking him about Star Trek [MTV ]

"It must have been stunned by the lights or something because it just froze and I thought it was a toy. I just put it in my mouth. Then its wings started flapping and I got such a shock. I tried to pull it out too quickly and its head came off. It tasted all crunchy and warm … like a Ronald MCDonald's."—Ozzy Osbourne on bat biting [Classic Rock via Contact Music ]

Following last week's exciting announcement of Seth Rogen's in-development cancer comedy, Elton John tells GQ he's currently writing a film musical about AIDS: "It's about a guy on Broadway who is gay, has HIV and AIDS, and has to go back and face his wife and his kids that he left," he says. "It's very funny. The premise doesn't sound funny, but it is." The movie will apparently star Ben Stiller and be the second terrible-sounding project announced this week with his name attached. Also, now would be a good time to call your agent about that bird-flu sitcom pilot you wrote.

Sir Elton John's Weird Third Act [GQ]

We were a little surprised to read in Michael Riedel's column this morning of an upcoming Broadway production of Samuel Beckett's Waiting for Godot, possibly starring Nathan Lane (as Estragon) and Bill Irwin (as Vladimir). "The revival will slip in just under the wire of the April 30 Tony Award cutoff date, setting the stage for what could be a fiercely contested race for Best Actor in a Play," Riedel explains. Makes sense, we guess, but just yesterday Playbill reported a cancellation of the pre-Broadway run of Godot in Seattle, with a spokesman for the Seattle Repertory Theatre saying that a commercial partner "decided not to go forward with a New York production of Godot and with the loss of this co-producer, plans for a Seattle to Broadway transfer were abandoned."

"You can't be serious ... Walter does what?"

This episode prominently featured “Can’t Fight This Feeling,” the REO Speedwagon megahit of the mid-eighties. We're betting the choice was ironic — ever since Paul Thomas Anderson whipped out “Sister Christian” in Boogie Nights, it’s become de rigueur to juxtapose a dramatic narrative moment with cheesy arena rock. But Fringe and “Can’t Fight This Feeling” actually have a lot in common: They’re kinda lame and forgettable, but totally tolerable.

In the wake of our devastating renunciation of Entourage on Monday, HBO has been dealt another crushing blow: Colin Callender, the executive in charge of the network's original movies and mini-series — seemingly the only thing they're still good at these days — has resigned to start his own entertainment company. Callender is a twenty-year veteran at HBO and responsible for 84 Emmys, including 13 this year for John Adams alone. His duties will be shared between current subordinates Kary Antholis, who'll lead HBO Miniseries, and Len Amato, who'll become president of HBO Films. His departure wasn't totally unexpected; he lost some of his power after HBO chairman Chris Albrecht was forced to step down last year and has apparently been looking for other work since. Vulture buddy Nikki Finke eulogizes him thusly: "Maybe more people would be sympathetic to Callender's plight if only he hadn't been such an arrogant prick prone to hissy fits all those years."

HBO shakeup continues: Colin Callender steps down [Entertainment News & Buzz/LAT]
TOLDJA! Colin Callender Exits HBO; Amato And Antholis Promoted [Deadline Hollywood Daily]

Indian author Aravind Adiga has been given the 2008 Man Booker prize for The White Tiger, his first-ever novel. A former writer for Time magazine, Adiga, 33, is the second-youngest author ever to win the award, a distinction made even more poignant by his premature baldness. Tiger, about a young chauffeur who rails against India's social hierarchy by murdering his employer, won "because the judges felt that it shocked and entertained in equal measure," according to the chairman of the selection committee. Accepting the award, which carries an $86,000 cash prize, Adiga said, "The first thing I am going to do is to find a bank that I can actually put it in."

De Niro Asks, "Are You Makin' a Pilot With Me?": CBS has made a three-pilot deal with Robert De Niro's Tribeca Productions, with the amazing promise that one of the three projects will definitely go to series. Their first pilot is a drama set in New York City, written by The Departed's William Monahan, which should fit right into Tribeca's slate next to Little Fockers. [Variety]

Adams Looks Before She Leaps: Amy Adams is in negotiations to topline Leap Year, Spyglass's romantic comedy from Made of Honor's Harry Elfont and Deb Kaplan. Adams will play an uptight woman who travels to Dublin so she can propose to her boyfriend on leap day, which according to Irish tradition means he must say yes. And then according to Irish tradition, they get married, become alcoholics, and fight every day but Sunday. [HR]

Happytime for Hensons: Mark your calendars, folks, because today is the day that awesomeness officially returned to Hollywood. The Jim Henson Company is developing a film-noir puppet comedy called Happytime Murders, about a puppet detective trying to figure out who's killing off the cast of a popular children's show. Brian Henson will direct from a script by Todd Berger (Kung Fu Panda: Secrets of the Furious Five). It kind of makes us wish every movie had puppets: "In Leap Year, Amy Adams travels to Dublin to propose to her husband, a chicken voiced by Frank Oz." [Variety]

The RIAA is celebrating — for once! — after President Bush's signing of a controversial bill yesterday that will institute harsher monetary penalties for music downloaders and create a hilarious new, probably ineffectual federal-level position — an "intellectual-property czar," who will report directly to the president on matters related to copyright (the post will most likely not be filled before the end of the Bush administration).

1. Rihanna, "Sexuality"
This is just a short, not particularly exciting clip of an unreleased track by Rihanna, but if Prince's lawyers ever hear it, you can probably expect a "controversy." [Autumn Jones]

2. Tunde Adebimpe, "Unknown Legend" (Neil Young cover)
Adebimpe does Scarlett Johanssen one better by singing and acting at the same time, covering this Neil Young track in Rachel Getting Married. [Stereogum]

3. Radiohead, "The Gloaming (DJ Shadow Remix)"
Shadow peppers this Hail to the Thief track with audio of George Bush stuttering his way through two dozen "nuculars." [Pretty Much Amazing]

In keeping with Hollywood's recent campaign to spoil all of our fun, Terry Rossio, who co-wrote the three Pirates of the Caribbean movies, says all those crazy rumors swirling around upcoming fourth film are false, "including the so-called record 50 million dollar payday for Depp." (Other debunked gossip includes Tim Burton signing on as director and Sacha Baron Cohen joining the cast.) According to Rossio, "studios are way too protective of their franchises for that sort of thing." Also, according to us, studios are way too lame for that sort of thing.

Original 'Pirates' Scribe Says Pirates 4' Rumors Are Bunk [Playlist]

A press release from the Weinstein Company today apparently (jokingly?) confirms that the title of Quentin Tarantino's forthcoming Nazi-scalping adventure movie will indeed be spelled the way it was on the typo-congested screenplay: Inglourious Basterds. Also, casting is complete (Cloris Leachman is in it!), and principal photography started last week in Germany, which means Tarantino's insane assurances that this thing would be ready in time for next May's Cannes Film Festival might not have been total bullshit!

Inglourious Basterds Commences Principal Photography [ComingSoon]

Roberto Saviano, the Italian author of Gomorrah, a hit book exposing the behind-the-scenes machinations of the Camorra (the mob), has been under 24-hour police watch for the past two years. But with the movie version of Gomorrah now also a hit, Saviano is facing more heat than ever — Naples' anti-Mafia squad is investigating a claim that the Camorra plan to have the author and his bodyguards killed by Christmas. It's pretty much as ridiculously cinematic as it sounds: The information came from an informant close to Francesco Schiavone, the imprisoned Camorra godfather known as Sandokan; apparently, the Casalesi sub-clan has moved its assassination plans into the "operative" phase.