AP - A hot dog vending cart was wheeled back and forth. Cocktail waitress hurried past with trays full of beer. Vice President Joe Biden led New York Yankees great Yogi Berra by the arm.

AP - Calling her "a Lindsay Lohan wannabe," a judge fined "Jersey Shore" star Nicole "Snooki" Polizzi $500 on Wednesday and ordered her to perform community service after she pleaded guilty to disturbing others on a beach in July.

AP - British tabloid veteran Piers Morgan, hired by CNN to start as Larry King's replacement as a prime-time interviewer in January, promised that he "came here to win."

Reuters - Piers Morgan, finally confirmed Wednesday as veteran talk show host Larry King's replacement, spoke to THR after last month's Emmys and again Wednesday morning, along with CNN president Jonathan Klein.

AP - A Hong Kong fashion model was busted on felony drug charges at the Burning Man counterculture festival in Nevada and crashed her rented motor home into Reno's landmark arch the next day, authorities said Wednesday.

AP - John Kluge, once listed as the wealthiest man in America, who built an investment in a radio station into a broadcasting empire that was the forerunner to Fox Television, has died. He was 95.

AP - Former "The Hills" star Spencer Pratt is apologizing to his estranged wife, Heidi Montag, for acting out in their breakup.

AP - A judge on Wednesday doubled Don Johnson's jury award for profits from the TV series "Nash Bridges" to more than $51 million.

Reuters - British television host Piers Morgan is to replace veteran CNN talk show host Larry King in January, bringing what is expected to be a more acerbic tone to the long-running prime time U.S. interview show.

AP - The Emmys aren't the only big TV-honors game anymore.

Francesca Faridany, late of Broadway's The 39 Steps, plays the title role of an Elizabethan man who transforms into a woman in the Sept. 8 New York City premiere of Sarah Ruhl's Orlando for Classic Stage Company.

AP - "Saturday Night Live" veteran Molly Shannon will make her Broadway debut when she steps into the revival of "Promises, Promises" next month.

Reuters - Superstar Spaniard Alejandro Sanz and three other singer-songwriters from Mexico, Uruguay and the Dominican Republic led the field of contenders unveiled on Wednesday for the 11th annual Latin Grammys with four nominations each.

AP - Willem Dafoe says "A Woman," one of his latest projects, is the kind of "pure personal cinema" that he wants to keep on doing.

AP - There are music documentaries that are all about the music — concert films that focus solely on the artistry and thrill of live performance — and then there are juicy ones that are all about backstage ego and volatility.

AP - Hong Kong's action film master Tsui Hark returns to the big screen with "Detective Dee and the Mystery of Phantom Flame", a new cloak-and-dagger martial arts blockbuster set in the Tang dynasty.

AP - Ben Affleck brought Boston to Venice on Wednesday, presenting a reality-driven heist film "The Town" that is destined to draw comparisons to his other films also set in his Massachusetts hometown.

AFP - US film director Francis Ford Coppola will speak at an investment forum in Hong Kong, organisers said Wednesday, after actor Michael Douglas cancelled his appearance to undergo cancer treatment.

Reuters - Alt-metal rock band Disturbed claimed its fourth No. 1 album on the U.S. pop chart Wednesday despite a hefty drop in first-week sales.

Reuters - A film based on the true story of Saartjie Baartman, a woman brought from what is now South Africa to Europe in the early 1800s and paraded as a freak of nature thanks to her appearance, has impressed audiences in Venice.