hActress Halle Berry wins Lansing Leadership Award

hActress Halle Berry wins Lansing Leadership Award

LOS ANGELES — Halle Berry has something else in common with fellow Oscar winners Meryl Streep and Jodie Foster: The Sherry Lansing Leadership Award. The Hollywood Reporter says Berry will receive the honor next month at the paper’s 18th annual Power 100: Women in Entertainment breakfast.

The award recognizes groundbreaking contributions to the entertainment industry. Besides Streep and Foster, past recipients include Barbara Walters, Glenn Close and Lansing herself. Hilary Swank will give the keynote address at the Power 100 breakfast, Dec. 4 at the Beverly Hills Hotel.

Rock singer Carney to portray Spider-Man

NEW YORK — Broadway has found its Spider-Man — rock singer Reeve Carney.

Carney will portray celebrated web-slinger Peter Parker in “Spider-Man Turn Off the Dark,” producer Michael Cohl announced Friday.

The lavish musical is still scheduled to open sometime in 2010 at the Hilton Theatre. Dates will be announced. The show has had a troubled history, with work on the musical stopped last summer because of financial difficulties. New financing is expected to be in place shortly, according to its producers, and then full production on the musical, which reportedly has a budget of upward of $40 million, will begin.

The Hilton, one of Broadway’s largest theaters, has undergone extensive renovation to accommodate “Spider-Man,” which will be directed by Julie Taymor and features a score by Bono and The Edge of U2.

Carney, 26, is lead singer of the rock band Carney, which has just released its first full-length album, “Mr. Green.”

Vince Lombardi story coming to Broadway stage

NEW YORK — OK, Cheeseheads. Get ready to visit Broadway. “Lombardi,” a play about legendary Green Bay Packers coach Vince Lombardi, is planned for New York next season. Producers Tony Ponturo and Fran Krimser say the play by Eric Simonson will open during the fall of 2010. The cast, director and opening date have yet to be announced. Simonson’s play is based on David Maraniss’ best-selling book “When Pride Mattered.” Lombardi coached the Packers from 1959-67, winning five league championships in nine years.

He died in 1970 at the age of 57.

Denzel Washington returning to Broadway

NEW YORK — Get ready for another big name on Broadway. Denzel Washington plans to return to the New York stage next spring in a revival of August Wilson’s “Fences.” Producers Carole Shorenstein Hays and Scott Rudin say the play will open in April at a theater to be announced. The production will be directed by Kenny Leon, who directed Wilson’s “Radio Golf” and “Gem of the Ocean” on Broadway.

No other casting was announced. The original 1987 production starred James Earl Jones as patriarch Troy Maxson, Mary Alice as his wife and Courtney B. Vance as his son. It won both the Tony Award for best play and the Pulitzer Prize for drama. Washington was last on Broadway in 2005 in a revival of “Julius Caesar” in which he played Brutus.

Today’s birthdays

“People’s Court” judge Joseph Wapner is 90. Actor Ed Asner is 80. Comedian Jack Burns of Burns and Schreiber is 76. Actress Joanna Barnes (“Spartacus,” “The Parent Trap”) is 75. Actor Yaphet Kotto (“Homicide: Life On The Street”) is 70. Actor Sam Waterston (“Law and Order”) is 69. Singer Anni-Frid Lyngstad of ABBA is 64. Actor James Widdoes (“Animal House”) is 56. News correspondent John Roberts is 53. Bandleader Kevin Eubanks (“The Jay Leno Show”) is 52. Rapper E-40 is 42. Country singer Jack Ingram is 39. Drummer David Carr of Third Day is 35. Singer Chad Kroeger of Nickelback is 35. Drummer Jesse Sandoval of The Shins is 35.