QUOTE OF THE DAY: "I'm lucky. I could have been dead. I could have been [confined] to a wheelchair, but I'm not. I'm gonna make a full recovery. The force is with me," ex-Jedi Liam Neeson to Access Hollywood on his recovery from a near-fatal July motorcycle accident.
NELLY COUNTRY: Nelly's Country Grammar held on to the top slot on the pop album charts for a fifth straight week. Meanwhile, C-Murder's Trapped in Crime was the week's highest debut at number nine.
CULTURE COPS: A day after a government study attacked Hollywood for marketing violent films to children, the Walt Disney Co. announcing it's pledging to keep R-rated movie advertisements off its ABC television network during prime-time.
CULTURE COPS, TAKE II: Meanwhile, Congress holding hearings today addressing the issue of violence in entertainment and the marketing of violence to kids, as delineated in this week's FTC report.
RAPPED: Bone Thugs-N-Harmony rapper Stanley Howse, aka Flesh-N-Bone, pleaded no contest Wednesday to gun charges. He's now facing jail time at his October 24 sentencing.
WHEELIN' & DEALIN': MP3.com Inc. still trying to negotiate a deal with Universal Music Group despite a federal judge last week ruling the online music provider intentionally violated copyright and might have to up to $250 million in damages.
WE'RE GLAD HE DIDN'T! Academy Award winner Al Pacino telling a packed audience at the Toronto Film Festival that he once came very close to changing his name to Sonny Scott. Pacino is in Toronto for the premiere of his second directing effort, Chinese Coffee, costarring Jerry Orbach.
SCENT OF A BABY! Meanwhile, the New York Daily News reporting that Pacino and girlfriend Beverly D'Angelo are expecting twins. These would be the Vacation mom's first children.
INVISIBLE TOUCH: Former Genesis singer Phil Collins, 49, announcing he'll be a father again as his third wife, Orianne, 28, is expecting the couple's first child next year. Collins' has three children from his previous marriages.
THERE'S NO PLACE LIKE HOME? A Los Angeles judge granting a request by the motion picture Academy to bar Judy Garland's former husband from selling her honorary Oscar for The Wizard of Oz without first settling their dispute.
BACK TO SCHOOL: Supermodel Tyra Banks joining the cast of Felicity, playing a "serious" college student who might hook up with Noel, according to TV Guide Online.
LEFT IN THE COLD: Scholastic Books extending the deadline for the Harry Potter essay contest by one week after irate complaints that the publisher left out young fans in Alaska and Hawaii. The contest asks for kids' essays on how the J.K. Rowling series has changed their lives.
REMEMBERED: Jazz great Stanley Turrentine, one of the most influential saxophonists of his generation, whose hit "Sugar" put him on the map, died Tuesday in New York after suffering a stroke. He was 66.
THE PRESIDENT & THE INTERN: HBO buying the rights to Jeffrey Tobin's book, A Vast Conspiracy: The Real Story of the Sex Scandal that Nearly Brought Down a President, a behind-the-scenes detailed account of the Clinton-Lewinsky scandal that will be told as a movie.
GUNNING FOR REAL: Dick Wolf enlisting large numbers of real police officers, FBI Agents and DEA Agents to play themselves for free in re-enactments for his new syndicated reality series, Arrest & Trial, premiering October 2.
THAT'S WHAT FRIENDS ARE FOR: Friends of the late Gov't Mule bassist Allen Woody playing a one-off benefit show at the Roseland Ballroom in New York City September 21 to celebrate his life and raise money for his family. The Allman Brothers Band, the Black Crowes, and Phil Lesh and Friends are scheduled to play.