‘Lost’ creator signs contracts with Paramount, Warner Bros.

Los Angeles – J.J. Abrams, the co-creator of “Lost” and director of “Mission: Impossible 3,” signed a five-year deal with Paramount Pictures and a six-year contract with Warner Bros., together worth more than $55 million, it was reported Saturday.

The two deals, completed early Friday, made the 40-year-old writer-producer one of the industry’s highest-paid directors, the Los Angeles Times reported.

Abrams has been at Walt Disney Co.’s Touchstone Television studio, where he based his production company and created several ABC series.

“An opportunity presented itself, and we went for it,” Peter Roth, president of Warner Bros. Television, told the newspaper. “J.J. is such a unique and extraordinary talent, someone whom I’ve admired from a distance for years.”

An e-mail message left for Paramount and a phone call left for Warner Bros. weren’t immediately returned Saturday.

Roth declined to discuss financial details, but two sources told the newspaper that Abrams would get at least $4 million a year for six years and overhead costs that would average about $2 million a year for his production label.

Spike Lee offers his take on Hurricane Katrina

Pasadena, Calif. – Spike Lee was at the Venice Film Festival in Italy watching on television as Hurricane Katrina tore through New Orleans in August.

“I was just really mad and sad,” he said. “I said, ‘This is going to be a major moment in American history, and I want to do something about it.”‘

The result is a four-hour documentary called “When the Levees Broke: A Requiem in Four Acts” airing Aug. 21-22 on HBO. It shows how New Orleans survived Katrina against a backdrop of performances by Wynton Marsalis and Terence Blanchard at the Superdome, the French Quarter and the levees.

Brad Pitt visits New Orleans, hopes to rebuild the city green

New Orleans – After two days of getting his first up-close look at post-Katrina New Orleans, Brad Pitt said Friday he was shocked at the devastation that remains almost a year later.

“I was not prepared,” the actor said, describing how he drove for miles and saw street after street of devastation.

Pitt was in New Orleans to give an update on a project he’s promoting – a competition to choose ecologically sound designs for rebuilding neighborhoods.

Global Green USA, a national environmental organization, is working with Pitt on the design project. Pitt leads a jury of architects, city residents and others who decided Friday on the top five environmentally friendly designs out of more than 100 entries. The designs were submitted by individuals and architect firms.

Date with Jessica Biel to raise funds for injured teen

Denver – A date with Jessica Biel will be up for bid next week to help raise money for a teenager who lost her leg in a prom night limousine accident, Denver newspapers reported.

The event, dubbed “Mollypalooza” to help Molly Bloom’s family with medical expenses, is scheduled for Tuesday at the Rock Island Club, organizers told The Denver Post and Rocky Mountain News. The News described the date as a lunch date.

In an audio message posted on the Internet, Esquire’s “The Sexiest Woman Alive” urges listeners to support the event and says, “I intend to submit a very special auction item as my contribution to the evening.”

“Come on, it’s Jessica Biel. What guy wouldn’t want to win a date with her?” said Dmitri Lee Natali, 19, a friend and former classmate of Bloom, 18, who lost a leg in the May 13 accident. “My mom happened to be able to contact (Biel’s) parents, and they had heard about Molly’s tragedy. They said. ‘Yeah, I bet she’ll do that.”‘

Biel, a Boulder native who is on location filming the movie “Next,” won’t be at the fundraiser Tuesday.

Bloom was run over and dragged about 38 feet by a Hummer stretch limousine, police said. Limousine driver Stanley D. Sample, 38, faces a misdemeanor charge of careless driving resulting in serious bodily injury.

Bloom is undergoing rehabilitation at Denver Children’s Hospital.

Mel Gibson donating money to build houses in Mexico

Veracruz, Mexico – Mel Gibson, about to wrap up the filming of his Mayan epic, “Apocalypto,” in the jungles of Mexico’s Veracruz state, is donating money to build houses for poor people in the region.

The 50-year-old director-actor will donate the money through the Rotary Club and Mexico’s family welfare agency, government officials announced Thursday.

Officials said the donation will be used to construct homes for poor residents of the port city of Veracruz and the city of San Andres Tuxtla.

Gibson began filming “Apocalypto,” which follows the journey of a Mayan hero on the run through the rain forests of pre-Columbian Mexico, last fall.

Like his 2004 religious blockbuster, “The Passion of the Christ,” which was shot in Aramaic and Latin, “Apocalypto” is being done in an ancient tongue, Yucatec Maya. The action adventure is set for release Dec. 8.

This is not Gibson’s first demonstration of generosity in Mexico. In October, he met with President Vicente Fox to announce that he would donate $1 million to help Mexico recover from Hurricane Stan.

Hurricane Stan and related storms left more than 1,500 people dead or missing in Central America and Mexico.

Gibson won a best-director Oscar for 1995’s “Braveheart.”

He has starred in the “Lethal Weapon” and “Mad Max” films, “What Women Want” and “The Man Without a Face,” among other movies.