Pace cautiously promotes movie

Los Angeles – Near as Lee Pace can tell, the best way to scare audiences away is to tell them how good something is.

“I think people are really cautious about important movies,” said Pace, who stars in “The Fall,” which opened Friday. “If you’re told, ‘There’s an important movie coming out,’ people would rather chew glass than go see it.”

Tall, dark, with piercing eyes and brows so thick they just may be able to shelter a small family in a blizzard – Pace looks like he should be in the movies. So, of course, he is best known as a TV star, in a show he also believes has suffered from too-precious reviews.

“I had the same thing on my show, ‘Pushing Daisies.’ There’s this kind of ‘very special TV show’ that people should go see,” he told AP Television late last month. “And there is kind of a backlash to it. People are not interested in seeing something that they’re told is good.”

While better known as the leading man with the magic touch on “Daisies,” Pace is now building a reputation for big-screen work, with three 2008 theatrical releases: Besides “The Fall,” this spring saw the release of the comedy “Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day,” with Frances McDormand and Amy Adams. This autumn, it’s the comedic thriller “Possession” with Sarah Michelle Gellar.

Wrestler’s son sent to jail for 8 months

Clearwater, Fla. – A judge in Florida says the 17-year-old son of wrestler Hulk Hogan should serve eight months in jail for reckless driving.

Nick Bollea was led off to begin his sentence immediately after Friday’s ruling. He will be on five years’ probation and lose his driving privileges for three years.

Authorities say Bollea was racing a friend in his father’s sports car when he clipped a curb, spun out of control and slammed into a palm tree in downtown Clearwater, Fla., last August.

The impact left his friend critically injured and in need of lifetime medical care.

Bollea pleaded no contest to the reckless driving charge.

Blige starts foundation to help women

Yonkers, N.Y. – The queen of hip-hop soul is establishing a foundation to help women develop careers and gain self-confidence.

Mary J. Blige and Steve Stoute, who founded a youth-oriented brand consulting firm, say they’re setting up the Foundation for the Advancement of Women Now.

The foundation will concentrate first on the Yonkers, New York, area where the 37-year-old Blige grew up. The charity will fund scholarships, grants and programs that help women gain confidence and skills to succeed in their careers.

Blige and Stoute say they expect to expand to the New York metropolitan area and then the nation.

Toni Braxton’s show to remain dark until June

Las Vegas – Toni Braxton’s return to the stage on the Las Vegas strip has been pushed back for at least another month.

A spokeswoman for Harrah’s Entertainment says the target date to resume “Toni Braxton: Revealed” at the Flamingo Las Vegas hotel is now June 6th.

Braxton’s show has been dark since the singer was hospitalized overnight for chest pain on April 7.

The spokeswoman says she can’t comment about Braxton’s medical condition. The 40-year-old entertainer has been treated in the past for pericarditis, a viral inflammation of the heart.

Rapper pleads guilty to menacing neighbor

New York – Rapper Foxy Brown has pleaded guilty to menacing a neighbor with her cell phone last year. She avoided jail based on time already served.

Brown and neighbor Arlene Raymond got into a fight last July over Brown blasting her car stereo outside their Brooklyn apartment building.

As part of the plea deal, the 28-year-old rapper wrote a letter apologizing to Raymond. Brown presented the letter to Justice John Walsh in a Brooklyn court on Thursday.

The judge extended Raymond’s order of protection.

Brown, whose real name is Inga Marchand, spent seven months in jail for a Manhattan case involving a fight she had with manicurists in a nail salon. She was released last month.

Adkins records opening song for series

Nashville, Tenn. – Trace Adkins, a former oil roughneck, has written and recorded a song called “Black Gold” that will open an upcoming truTV series of the same name.

The show, which premieres 9 p.m. June 18, follows three drilling crews in their quest for oil in West Texas.

Before he was a country star, Adkins, 46, of Sarepta, La., worked as a roughneck and derrickman on offshore drilling rigs in the Gulf of Mexico.

Adkins has kept a high-profile in recent months. He was runner-up on NBC’s “Celebrity Apprentice,” appeared in CBS’ “The Young and the Restless” and won best male video for “I Got My Game On” at the Country Music Television awards.