Hundreds attend party for Smith’s daughter

Hundreds attend party
for Smith’s daughter

LOUISVILLE, Ky. — It was a party fit for a princess, complete with a castle and white carriage. Hundreds of guests bearing gifts attended the first birthday party Saturday for Anna Nicole Smith’s daughter, Dannielynn. Pink balloons decorated the iron gates in front of socialite Tricia Barnstable Brown’s home, where Smith and Dannielynn’s father, Louisville native Larry Birkhead, met at a party on the eve of the 2003 Kentucky Derby.

Invited guests had to surrender their cell phones before entering and sign a release form promising not to take any pictures. Dozens of children attended the party with their parents. Some guests arrived in limousines and stretch humvees, bearing large stuffed animals and other gifts. One guest was seen carrying a large pencil drawing of Dannielynn, whose actual birthday was Friday.

A hot-air balloon shaped as a birthday cake adorned the front yard. Yellow police tape stretched around the yard in the posh Louisville neighborhood, and about a half-dozen off-duty police officers guarded the property. One guest, Tina Showalter of Louisville, said she had known Birkhead most of his life. Showalter said she left the party about 15 minutes after arriving mainly because it was so crowded.

Smith, a former Playboy Playmate, gave birth to Dannielynn a few days before the death of her son, Daniel, 20, in the Bahamas. Smith died of an accidental drug overdose in Florida in February at age 39. Howard K. Stern, her lawyer and companion, initially claimed to be Dannielynn’s father, but Smith’s ex-boyfriend Birkhead eventually proved that he was the father.

Crowe, Di Caprio co-star
in ‘Body of Lies’

ANNAPOLIS, Md. — Russell Crowe is spending much of September in the Baltimore-Washington region filming scenes for a a new thriller, “Body of Lies.” The movie is Crowe’s fourth collaboration with director Ridley Scott. They teamed up for the Oscar-winning “Gladiator,” 2006’s “A Good Year” and “American Gangster,” costarring Denzel Washington, which is scheduled for release this fall.

On Friday, Crowe was in Annapolis, shooting two scenes at St. Andrew’s United Methodist Day School, and the head of the school, Leslie A. Redwine, said she met Crowe and shook his hand. “He was courtly, cordial and charming,” she told The (Baltimore) Sun.

Scott is using locations in Baltimore to stand in for Manchester, England, and Munich, Germany. The production will later move to Morocco. “Body of Lies,” based on a novel by Washington Post columnist David Ignatius, co-stars Leonardo DiCaprio, who has not yet arrived in the area.

Today’s birthdays

Golfer Arnold Palmer is 78. Actor Philip Baker Hall is 76. Country singer Tommy Overstreet is 70. Jazz vibraphonist Roy Ayers is 67. Singer Danny Hutton (Three Dog Night) is 65. Singer Jose Feliciano is 62. Rock musician Joe Perry (Aerosmith) is 57. Actress Amy Irving is 54. Country singer Rosie Flores is 51. Actress Kate Burton is 50. Movie director Chris Columbus is 49. Actor Colin Firth is 47. Rock singer-musician David Lowery (Cracker) is 47Rapper Big Daddy Kane is 39. Movie director Guy Ritchie is 39. Actor Ryan Phillippe is 33.