SInger pleads guilty in fight

Detroit — White Stripes lead singer Jack White pleaded guilty to assault and battery Tuesday for a Dec. 13 fight with the lead singer of another band.

White was accused of repeatedly punching Von Bondies lead singer Jason Stollsteimer and originally was charged with misdemeanor aggravated assault. He could have faced up to a year in jail, but will avoid jail time under the plea deal.

White must pay a $500 fine, plus $250 in court fees, and Judge Paula G. Humphries ordered him to attend anger management classes. Humphries also told White not to contact Stollsteimer.

In court Tuesday, White gave his account of what led to the fight. He said he hadn’t seen Stollsteimer in a long time but had heard that he had made some allegations against him in the press and to mutual acquaintances.

“I went up to ask him to say it to me face to face,” White said.

He said Stollsteimer ignored him so White spit at him and they started fighting.

Oprah adds Vanity title

New York — Oprah Winfrey — talk show host, actress and magazine editor — has a new title to add to her resume: one of the world’s most fashionable women.

Winfrey appears for the first time on Vanity Fair’s 2004 International Best-Dressed List, which is being released today.

Also among the 10 women on the list are actress Cate Blanchett, “Lost in Translation” writer-director Sofia Coppola, model Kate Moss and Aerin Lauder Zinterhofer, Estee Lauder’s vice president for global advertising.

The pride of South Africa

Pretoria, South Africa — President Thabo Mbeki congratulated Charlize Theron on her recent Oscar win, telling the South African actress: “The whole country is very proud.”

“Very well done, Charlize. Excellent,” Mbeki told Theron when she met him Monday at a government guesthouse in Pretoria.

Theron, who grew up in the small South African town of Benoni, won the best-actress award for her role in “Monster.”

The 28-year-old received an ounce of gold ingrained in the rock in which it was formed. The gold came in a wooden box with the wording: “Presented to Charlize Theron, our South African star, by President Thabo Mbeki.”

Sailing on the airwaves

Charleston, W.Va. — Bob Denver, who starred in the ’60s sitcom “Gilligan’s Island,” is starting a radio station in his house.

Denver says he plans to promote West Virginia by creating the station downstairs in his Princeton home.

He wants to broadcast oldies music and radio dramas when he takes to the airwaves within a month. He says the station will reach 100,000 people in southern West Virginia.

On “Gilligan’s Island,” a small charter boat was caught in a storm and wrecked on the shore of an uncharted South Pacific island. Denver played the hapless deckhand Gilligan. The series ran from 1964-67.