Madonna says she could have gone all-out for charity like her nemesis, the younger, prettier more fertile Angelina Jolie, but instead she decided to just go to an impoverished nation for a couple of weeks, set up orphanage fronts for her cult religion and go home with a baby with a family. That way, she could maximize her publicity potential instead of wasting all that time like Angelina does:

In the interview [in Time] on newsstands Monday, the reporter asked Madonna about the perception that she’s “jumping on a bandwagon” by adopting an African orphan. The singer replied, “Look, I could have joined the U.N. and become an ambassador and visited various countries and just kind of showed up and smiled and looked concerned. But that’s not getting to the root of the problem – and by the way, neither is building orphan care centers and giving people food and medicine.”

Hmmm…which U.N. ambassador who is famous for visiting various countries and building orphan centres could Madge possibly be referring to? As if we needed further proof that she was setting her sights on Jolie, Madonna added, “I’m not interested in going in there like a dilettante and being an idiot and going ‘Ok, I’m going to build 10 orphanages and I’ll see you guys later!’”

Me-ow! We sense a ‘my orphan is cuter than your orphan’ battle in the near future.

Madonna said on Oprah that she hadn’t even met Angelina when she was questioned about whether she was following Angelina’s adoption lead.

Angelina is currently visiting refugees in India and speaking with government officials instead of doing the exhaustive talk show circuit, which is like so more charitable, right Madonna? On Saturday Angelina visited refugee camps in Dehli and on Sunday she met with the Indian Minister of State for External Affairs Anand Sharma in Hyderabad. Brad Pitt is currently in Los Angeles for the premiere of “Babel.”

Thanks to DListed for the Madonna story and some pictures and Mollygood for the high res versions of Angelina at the refugee camp.

A Cambodian charity says that Angelina Jolie owes them over $1 million in promised funding after abruptly stopping donations last December. Instead of giving the $1.5 million in funds to the forest conservation group she was helping, she decided to start her own agency to oversee the work without telling them first:

In 2003, Cambodia approved a forest conservation project funded by Jolie, for which she promised up to $1.5 million for community-based work over five years in remote areas of northwestern Cambodia.

The project was to be implemented in partnership with the Cambodian non-profit group Cambodian Vision in Development, or CVD.

The group’s director, Mounh Sarath, on Monday accused the Hollywood actress of cheating after she stopped providing money to his group without explanation.

But Sam Borana, Jolie’s attorney in Cambodia, said she was merely exercising her right to oversee the work, and was establishing a separate organization in Cambodia to which she would provide the funds.

The money for Jolie’s project — dubbed the “Maddox Jolie Project” in honor of the son she adopted from Cambodia — is to create programs for villagers dwelling in the forest, so they can rely less on logging to make a living…

“I am accusing her of violating the agreement under which she agreed to provide funds to CVD,” Mounh Sarath said. “The more than $1 million she has promised has never arrived.”

He said Jolie cut off funding and ended cooperation with his group in December last year without explanation. He and his staff have also been barred from using the project’s facilities, which Jolie’s lawyers have claimed is her private property, he said.

Since he had not received an explanation of such actions, he decided to go public with his complaints, he added.

He said Jolie’s action was unfair since he helped arrange for her to be honored for her aid by being awarded Cambodian citizenship last year.

Jolie’s lawyer, Sam Borana, confirmed that that the actress has stopped providing funds to CVD, and said the project will become an independent non-governmental organization.

He said the controversy was the result of a misunderstanding on the part of Mounh Sarath.

“This is not about violation of the agreement. Ms Angelina Jolie just exercised her right to decide to stop giving the money,” he said.

This sounds like there’s some politics involved and that someone probably made some decisions that she did not agree with. It’s hard to tell what happened, but it seems like the work will still get done, just not by this charity group. If it’s true that they never got an explanation and were kicked out of their offices that’s pretty harsh.

There was a report less than a month ago that most of the charities in Namibia Angelina and Brad had promised funds had still not received them.

I’m just reporting on the news, I don’t make it.

Here are pictures of Angelina and Brad arriving in Pune on 10/29 after a weekend trip. [via]

Those awe-inspiring photos of Brad Pitt posing as a super-hot laborer for Habitat for Humanity were taken in the span of fifteen minutes. Pitt spent just fifteen minutes on the job site in Malavli where a home was being constructed for a deserving Indian family. 82 year-old Jimmy Carter and his wife worked all day, only taking a break for lunch.

MALAVLI: After dodging the media in Pune and Jaipur for close to a month, Hollywood star Brad Pitt made a sudden appearance at Malavli village near Lonavla on Monday, where he joined former US President Jimmy Carter to construct houses for the poor.

For the 2,000-plus foreign and Indian volunteers engaged in constructing 100 houses in a week, it was an amazing sight to observe the 82-year-old Nobel laureate laying bricks and cement alongside the muscular Pitt. His appearance at the site, 56 km from Pune, around Monday noon took everybody off guard. The hunky actor — sporting a grey hat and dark jeans — surrounded by private security went to house number 73, where Carter and his wife Rosalynn were working.

The trio exchanged greetings and talked for a few minutes, before Pitt joined the former US first couple in voluntary physical labour, involving laying of concrete blocks and cement at the house.

After spending about quarter of an hour with the couple, the actor went to the restricted zone at the back of the site and made his departure unnoticed.

The Carters, in jeans and sports shoes, worked for long hours on Monday at the site undertaking all tasks related with masonry and only took a lunch break. Jimmy Carter’s advanced age failed to dampen his enthusiasm as he climbed ladders and lifted huge concrete castings with ease.

At least Pitt put in an appearance to help publicize the charity, but it seems like he could have contributed a couple of hours at least. He got all the credit without having to do much work. He has a bunch of kids so he has an excuse I guess.

Thanks to Gossip Rocks for linking this story.

Here are a bunch of recent pictures taken in Pune of Brad and Angelina, along with Pitt working at the job site. Thanks to JJB Faded Youth and Just Jared for these pics. Angelina is too freaking thin. She needs to eat more.

The Wordpress software says this is our 2,000 post! (It’s probably like 20-30 less than that due to drafts and rewrites, but still that’s pretty awesome.) We launched at the end of February, 2006 so that’s pretty decent. Thanks for helping us grow.

There’s a report that Angelina wants to adopt an Indian baby that she plans on naming - get this - India. There were stories when Angelina was pregnant that she was going to have a boy and name him “Africa,” because that’s where she was at the time. Someone’s making up a story that Angelina plans to adopt a baby now, which isn’t much of a stretch considering that both she and Brad have admitted to wanting a soccer team full of kids.

Sources say the big-hearted actress and partner Brad Pitt have already applied to adopt a tot from an Indian orphanage. An insider said: “They hope to be able to bring the child home by Christmas.

“Brad would prefer a boy no older than 18 months to even out the sexes but Angie has told him she can’t guarantee she won’t fall in love with a little girl.”

The source told US magazine Globe: “Whichever they end up with, they’d like to name the child India to honour its homeland.” The pair are rumoured to have visited the Priva Darshini orphanage in the last month.

This is not true, because these two are stalked wherever they go and if they were at an orphanage we would have heard about it. I could be surprised, though, because I thought the story that they were going to leave Paris so that Angelina could give birth in Africa was total bullshit. I mean, who would believe that before it actually happened?

If Angelina does adopt an Indian baby then we can all move on from worrying about the plight of little Davie Banda-Ritchie. He’s sure to be a hellraiser in his teens, but he’ll be a snotty British emo kid instead of a disaffected indifferent American like Maddox, I mean India. (Or was that Africa? I forget.)

Ever-reliable The Globe reports that Brad and Angelina are being tracked in India by Al Quaeda, who are incensed by the film adaptation Mariane Pearl’s book, “A Mighty Heart.” Members of the notorious terrorist group are said to be outraged that Brad and Angelina are making this film, which depicts journalist Daniel Pearl’s torture and demise at the hands of Al Quaeda operatives.

What’s more, one of the men who murdered Pearl is now awaiting execution and is considered a terrorist hero.

British security experts have been called in to protect Brad and Angelina, as it is feared that they are being targeted for their high profile status as well as the content of their movie in production:

This is said to be the real reason they switched production of the film to India at the last minute:

Top British security experts rushed to the city of Pune, India after warnings from neighboring Pakistan that Hollywood’s golden couple could be in danger, say sources.

“These former Special Air Service (SAS) men arrived to aid American bodyguards already watching over the superstars and their three children,” says a source…

“That’s why they made a last-minute switch from the authentic Karachi location of their movie to Pune, which has some similar scenery.”

At first it was decided that Brad and Angelina and their children would be quartered in a 20-room villa on the outskirts of Pune, according to the source.

“But Indian intelligence had been informed by Pakistani agents that they could still be targeted,” the source says.

“It was recommended that they beef up their security and move into Le Meridian Hotel,” which would be safer.

[From The Globe October 30, 2006 print edition]

The article goes on to use this terrorist threat as a sort of justification for the brutality of Angelina’s security force. Recent incidents involving an AP photographer being threatened with a gun and another British photographer getting strangled by the head of Angelina’s security force could be due to fear of a targeted attack, The Globe suggests.

This could be true, but it doesn’t justify such extreme force against photographers who just want to get a money shot. It also makes it seem like Brad and Angelina might have a much rougher go of it than simply getting mobbed whenever they go out. If there are threats against their lives, it’s understandable that they would be scared and defensive.

Globe article [via] Pictures of Brad in the movie “Babel” with Cate Blanchett [via]

Angelina Jolie fainted three times in three days while in India recently. She supposedly collapsed while filming a pivotal scene in “A Mighty Heart,” and another time while in a rickshaw with Brad. Is she too thin, overworked, or a bit of both?

There must be a lot of stress on Angelina to look after three children while playing a controversial role. She doesn’t seem to be fairing well under all that pressure.

The last time Angelina fainted in public she was at the airport and in the early stages of her pregnancy with Shiloh.

Pictures of Angelina and Shiloh are from angelinaweb.org

Brad, Angelina, and their children were on the set of “A Mighty Heart” at the airport in Goa. (Thanks Irish.) Angelina was seen escorting her son, Maddox, while Brad looked hot and fatherly carrying little Zahara and shielding her head from the cameras. They seem to be entering the enclosed bungalow in a gated community that has been decorated to resemble the area in Karachi, Pakistan where Marianne and Daniel Pearl stayed.

All is not well with the Brangelina family and the media storm that surrounds them in India.

Angelina’s convey was involved in a possible hit and run accident with a motorcycle driver last week.

Angelina’s notorious bodyguard, one-time murder suspect Mickey Brett, was photographed and videotaped threatening and choking a British photographer, and now it’s said that another security guard threatened an Associated Press photographer with a gun, and that a different member of Angelina’s security force punched the photographer out:

While the mean mofo that heads Angelina’s security force might not be responsible for this latest incident, he was said to have looked on without intervening. The photgrapher only gave Angelina a business card, is that an offense worth threatening his life for?

Considering this incident along with the stories of photographers getting beat to a pulp and threatened in Naimibia, it’s easy to conclude that Angelina’s security force condones such unacceptable behavior, and thrives on a culture of violence.

The longer it takes Angelina to fire Mickey Brett and send people the message that violence is unacceptable the more her public image is going to justifiably suffer.

Thanks to AngelinaWeb for these photos.

There is still some confusion over who hit whom in the car-motobike crash involving Angelina’s convoy and whether there were one or two motorcyclists involved. Some reports say it was a couple hit by the paparrazi, others say it was just one 19 year-old guy hit by Angelina’s driver. Both claim that no one was seriously hurt.

It is even being called a hit and run because Jolie’s car, which by most reports was the one which ran a red light and caused the crash, supposedly drove off immediately afterwards. If this is true Angelina’s driver could be charged with a crime under Indian law.

There’s even a story that Angelina’s driver was in a second collision with a motorcycle, but this story seems to be based on confusion over the conflicting reports of the single incident.

Indian police have increased security for Jolie as a result of all the craziness surrounding the actress. Let’s hope their guys are kinder and gentler than the mofo she has running her security force now, although basically anyone would be nicer than that guy.

Here are more pictures of Angelina reading “Crimes of War” calmly in the back of her speeding vehicle. Commentor Marines all the Way, who is an actual Marine serving in Iraq, says that the book sucks and does not portray war accurately in his experience. Pictures [via]

The Angelina convoy ran into a snafu while squiring her heiness from her hotel in Pune, India to the set to film “A Mighty Heart.” According to who you believe, either Angelina’s car or an over-zealous papparazo hit a motorcyle with two people on it.

No one was seriously harmed, and the most likely explanation is that a photographer did it, since there were far more of them, and that’s what an Indian newspaper is reporting.

The Mumbai Mirror says that there was a car chase of sorts, and that a bunch of donkeys blocked the road, at which point an eager photographer raced ahead, colliding with a motorcycle:

The only pictures we have of Angelina are of her inside the car trying to read with sunglasses on, and that hardly seems worth all the trouble. When the paparrazi swarm so thickly around her that there’s a turf war and a car accident, it’s easy to see why she holed up in a luxury fortress in Africa to have her baby.

Meanwhile The Times of India is reporting that Brad and Angelina took a second rickshaw ride on Sunday to try and ease the demand for photographs. They rode around the city for 20 minutes on the photo-op, trying to give the paparrazi plenty of pictures to go home with. They thought it was a successful strategy, and it did reduce the number of people harassing them at the hotel. That seems to have only been a temporary fix considering the latest incident.

Update NBC News tells the story as if Angelina’s driver swerved to avoid the paparrazi and hit the motorcyclist. It is unknown what actually happened, and with so many different accounts it’s hard to tell.

A picture of Angelina Jolie playing murdered journalist Daniel Pearl’s wife in “A Mighty Heart” has come out. Seeing her in character makes it all the more obvious why African-American groups decried the casting of a caucasian actress in the role of a woman who is half Cuban and appears biracial. Angelina’s skin has been darkened for the role and she looks nothing like herself.

Mariane Pearl was “delighted” that Angelina was picked to play her, but many people are not pleased:

In case you were wondering how Angelina landed the part of a biracial woman, you need look no further than Brad Pitt. He’s a producer of the film and made sure to hire her in the lead role.

I’m not touching this one, but it’s easy to make the decision to report on it since Brangelina is getting on my last nerve lately.

Update: This is contentious topic. Check out the discussion thread on Concrete Loop for more opinions. Most of the people who commented are kind of neutral about it.

Picture from Empire Online via JJB.