LBN-INVESTIGATES: It’s common advice to avoid using social media when driving, operating heavy machinery or engaged in other delicate tasks. Now we can add to that list; don’t tweet when handing out the world’s most prestigious movie awards. For the biggest disaster in the history of the Oscars went down when a starstruck accountant’s mind could have been taken off the job after he spent the minutes before the Moonlight / La La Land mix-up tweeting pictures of celebrities from his personal account. And Brian Cullinan, 57, the LA-based, Cornell-educated partner at PwC who was responsible for handing out the Best Picture award envelope, “feels very, very terrible and horrible” about the mistake, his boss has said. The Wall Street Journal reports this morning on the existence of a now-deleted tweet bearing a photo of Emma Stone taken and sent by Cullinan, a mere three minutes before he made the biggest goof in Oscar history and gave Warren Beatty the wrong envelope on Sunday night. “Best Actress Emma Stone Backstage!” Cullinan tweeted at 9:05 p.m. PST, according to the Wall Street Journal. The newspaper obtained a copy of the post, along with multiple other tweets that he apparently sent out during the show, which suggest that the humble bean counter was not fully focused on the less-than-glamorous job of envelope-monitoring.

President Trump on Tuesday morning blamed former PresidentObama for leaks of classified information from the White House and for protests in the wake of a controversial executive order halting immigration from seven predominantly-Muslim countries to the U.S. Trump made the comments in an interview with Fox and Friends, during which he gave no evidence for his claims. “I think he is behind it,” Trump said. “I also think it’s just politics. That’s just the way it is.” He continued, “You never know what’s exactly happening behind the scenes … I think that President Obama’s behind it because his people are certainly behind it.” He added, “Some of the leaks possibly come from that group. You know, some of the leaks—which are really very serious leaks because they’re very bad in terms of national security—but I also understand that’s politics and it will probably continue.”

An Australian man was arrested for allegedly helping ISIS develop a missile program, officials said. “Police will allege that the man arrested has sought to advise ISIL on how to develop high-tech weapons capability,” Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull said on Tuesday. The man, Haisem Zahab, was arrested near the country’s capital, Canberra, following an 18-month investigation. Officials have so far concluded that Zahab was not planning an attack on Australian soil. His charges of foreign incursion could result in a life sentence.

LBN-INVESTIGATES: If you think that chicken sandwich you ordered at Subway did not fully taste like fowl, you may have been right. According to a Canadian study, a DNA test showed only half of Subway’s oven-roasted patty is made with real chicken. Subway was among five fast-food restaurants whose chicken the Canadian Broadcast Corporation had tested. The results showed the Oven Roasted Chicken patties averaged 53.6 percent chicken DNA while the Sweet Onion Chicken Teriyaki strips came in at 42.8 percent.

BREAK OUT OF PRISON – READ LBN:

Samsung’s acting chief Lee Jae-yong was indicted on Tuesday on charges of bribery and embezzlement surrounding South Korea’s recently impeached president, Park Geun-hye. Samsung is accused of seeking special treatment from the government in exchange for donating to charities run by a close confidant of Park, who was impeached in December. Four other Samsung executives are expected to face similar charges. Lee is also accused of having lied to Parliament when testifying on the matter. Samsung has not commented publicly on the charges.

LBN-WHERE THE ELITE AND UNDERDOGS MEET:

LBN-HEALTH WATCH:   ***Cancers of the colon and rectum have been declining in older adults in recent decades and have always been considered rare in young people. But scientists are reporting a sharp rise in colorectal cancers in adults as young as their 20s and 30s, an ominous trend. The vast majority of colorectal cancers are still found in older people, with nearly 90 percent of all cases diagnosed in people over 50. But a new study from the American Cancer Society that analyzed cancer incidence by birth year found that colorectal cancer rates, which had dropped steadily for people born between 1890 and 1950, have been increasing for every generation born since 1950. Experts aren’t sure why. Rectal cancers are rising particularly sharply, far faster than cancers in other parts of the large intestine or colon. The American Cancer Society estimates about 13,500 new cases of colon and rectal cancers will be diagnosed in Americans under 50 this year, with more than 95,500 cases of colon cancer and nearly 40,000 cases of rectal cancer in all age groups.

LBN-BUSINESS INSIDER:   ***At least four automakers knew for years that Takata’s airbags were dangerous and could rupture violently but continued to use those airbags in their vehicles to save on costs, lawyers representing victims of the defect asserted in a court document filed on Monday. The Justice Department’s criminal investigation into Takata’s rupture-prone airbags has so far painted automakers as unwitting victims duped by a rogue supplier that manipulated safety data to hide a deadly defect, linked to at least 11 deaths and over 100 injuries in the United States. But the fresh allegations against Ford, Honda, Nissan and Toyota, made as part of a class-action lawsuit in Florida and based on company documents, point to a far deeper involvement by automakers that used Takata’s defective airbags for years.   ***In rational response to government intervention in deciding what’s “fair”, the blowback from minimum wage demanding fast food workers has struck again. Wendy’s plans to install self-ordering kiosks in 1,000 of its stores – 16% of its locations nationwide.

LBN-R.I.P.:   ***Ward Chamberlin Jr., a leading architect of the nation’s public broadcasting system who revitalized PBS stations in New York and Washington and nurtured the career of the documentarian Ken Burns, died on Thursday in Bedford, Mass. He was 95. The cause was complications of dementia, his daughter Carolyn Chamberlinsaid.

LBN-INVESTIGATES: The Raramuri people of Northern Mexico make their sleeping arrangements so that they can wake during the night to discuss their dreams with one another.

LBN-HOLLYWOOD INSIDER:   ***Comedy Central wants to move stand-up comedy out of the clubs and into the realm occupied by massive outdoor events like Bonaroo or Lollapalooza. The Viacom-owned cable network plans to launch the “Colossal Clusterfest,” a three-day event that will feature comedy showcases, music, podcast recordings andcollaborations by the artists attending, all held at San Francisco’s Civic Center Plaza and Bill Graham Civic Auditorium from Friday, June 2 to Sunday June 4. Comedy Central plans to air a 90-minute live special from the event on June 4. Jerry Seinfeld, Kevin Hart and Bill Burr will headline the event, which will also feature Sarah Silverman, Ice Cube, Hannibal Buress, Tig Notaro, Pete Davidson, Fred Armisen, Natasha Leggero, Tegan andSara, Chromeo,  Abbi Jacobson and Ilana Glazer from the Comedy Central series “Broad City,” Bob Odenkirk, Vince Staples, Chris Hardwick, Reggie Watts, Preservation Hall Jazz Band, Princess featuring Maya Rudolph and Gretchen Lieberum.

LBN-NOTICED:   ***Hollywood recluse Johnny Depp was a surprise guest at Madonna’s ultra-exclusive after-party. Sources tell us Depp — who has been lying low after his bruising divorce from Amber Heard followed by his headline-making legal battle with his business managers — showed up at Madonna’s party, thrown with her manager Guy Oseary at his Hollywood home.

LBN-COMMENTARY by Erin Gloria Ryan: At a little after midnight eastern time last night, I was scrubbing the stubborn stains of a meatloaf pan with a heavy-duty dish brush. The television was on in the living room, a window from mundanity into a night of Hollywood glamour. La La Land was winning the Oscar for Best Picture.  That’s predictable. I thought.  “Wait!” shouted my Oscars-viewing companion from the couch. “They made a mistake! It’s Moonlight!” I wiped the greasy water from my puckering hands and walked to the television in time to see the high-glitz bedlam unfold. Concerned people with headsets and spiking blood pressure paced the stage. Warren Beatty had the wrong envelope. And he announced the wrong winner. He was very sorry. Everybody was very sorry. The stage was crowded with the wrong people. Emma Stone’s mouth was a sideways capital D. The winner of Best Picture wasn’t her film, the frontrunner, the shiny Hooray For Everything film Hollywood has been historically wont to shower with praise. It was the scrappy underdog that had actually won. Nobody could believe it.  That’s predictable. I thought.

LBN-COMMENTARY by David Brooks: Being around a college classroom can really expand your perspective. For example, last week we were finishing off a seminar in grand strategy when one of my Yale colleagues, Charles Hill, drew a diagram on the board that put today’s events in a sweeping historical perspective. Running through the center of the diagram was the long line of Enlightenment thought. The Enlightenment included thinkers like John Locke and Immanuel Kant who argued that people should stop deferring blindly to authority for how to live. Instead, they should think things through from the ground up, respect facts and skeptically re-examine their own assumptions and convictions. Enlightenment thinkers turned their skeptical ideas into skeptical institutions, notably the U.S. Constitution. America’s founders didn’t trust the people or themselves, so they built a system of rules, providing checks and balances to pit interest against interest. De Tocqueville came along and said that if a rules-based democratic government was going to work anywhere it was going to be the United States. America became the test case for the entire Enlightenment project. With his distrust of mob rule and his reverence for law, Abraham Lincoln was a classic Enlightenment man. His success in the Civil War seemed to vindicate faith in democracy and the entire Enlightenment cause.

LBN-COMMENTARY by Doug Glanville: Major League Baseball and the Players Association agreed last week to change the intentional walk protocol so that the pitcher will no longer actually have to throw the four pitches that had been required. The reason? After some progress in speeding up the “pace of play,” baseball experienced a regression in 2016, as the average length of a game increased by four minutes. Under this new rule, the manager of the pitching team will simply point and the umpire will then award first base to the hitter. No mess.The purists, and even the semi-purists, are grumbling about this change. For them, the idea of awarding a base to a hitter without a pitch even being thrown is at a minimum blasphemy, and at worst apocalyptic. We are putting the spiritual sanctity of the game at risk, maybe even tempting the end of days from a fiery comet etched in speedup rules.

LBN-COMMENTARY by Kim Masters: Unlikely as it is, I find myself rising to defend Warren Beatty. It’s unlikely because the truth is that, while Beatty can be very charming, I have found him to be rather challenging in some of our past interactions. He is more or less incapable of uttering a simple declarative sentence. Ask him a question and he has a tendency to launch into a meandering response, often without ever getting to an answer. I used to have a rule: Never get on the phone with Beatty unless you’ve gone to the bathroom first. Once, in the middle of a four-hour conversation while I was researching my book, Hit & Run, I developed a blinding headache and fought the urge to say, “Whatever I learn in the course of this conversation will not have been worth it!” Another time, I told a studio chief that I had just had a five-hour lunch with Beatty, and without missing a beat he said, “Oh — you only had hors d’oeuvres?”

LBN-A DIFFERENT VIEW:

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Global accounting firm PriceWaterhouseCoopers has issued amea culpa for the epic fail at the Oscars in which “La La Land” was mistakenly declared best picture.“We sincerely apologize to ‘Moonlight,’ ‘La La Land,’ Warren Beatty, Faye Dunaway, and Oscar viewers for the error that was made during the award announcement for best picture,” said PwC, which has overseen the Academy’s ballot-counting for 83 years.“The presenters had mistakenly been given the wrong category envelope and when discovered, was immediately corrected. We are currently investigating how this could have happened, and deeply regret that this occurred. We appreciate the grace with which the nominees, the Academy, ABC, and Jimmy Kimmel handled the situation,” the statement said.

President Donald Trump’s pick for Navy secretary announced Sunday that he’s withdrawing from consideration for the post over privacy concerns and his business interests. Businessman Philip Bilden has thus become the second Trump nominee to step aside as a result of conflict of interest rules. In a statement released Sunday announcing his decision, Bilden said that “after an extensive review process, I have determined that I will not be able to satisfy the Office of Government Ethics requirements without undue disruption and materially adverse divestment of my family’s private financial interests.” The move leaves Trump and Defense Secretary Jim Mattis with empty posts at the head of both the Army and Navy. Vincent Viola, tapped by Trump to serve as secretary of the Army, withdrew earlier this month. Mattis said he would recommend a new nominee “in the coming days,” for a “leader who can guide our Navy and Marine Corps team as we execute the president’s vision to rebuild our military.”

North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un obliterated five of his most senior aides with anti-aircraft guns after they allegedly turned in false reports on security matters, CBS News said Monday. The deranged despot allegedly went ballistic when he learned about the falsified reports — and immediately executed the five officials from North Korea’s beleaguered state security department, CBS reported. The department’s minister of state security, Kim Won Hong, was removed from power in mid-January, but has not been executed by Jong Un – yet. Hong had allegedly been involved in some type of corruption and abuse of power.

A Jewish cemetery in Philadelphia was vandalized less than a week after a similar incident in Missouri. More than 100 headstones were damaged at the Mount Carmel cemetery, police said Sunday. The destruction was reported by a man who arrived at the cemetery and found his relatives’ tombstones damaged. Philadelphia Mayor Jim Kenneyreleased a statement saying authorities would do everything possible to find the perpetrators. “My heart breaks for the families who found their loved ones’ headstones toppled,” he said, adding that “hate is not permissible in Philadelphia.” The incident also caught the attention of Israeli Foreign MinisterEmmanuel Nahshon, who said it was “shocking and a source of worry” to hear about the vandalism, the Associated Press reported. Last week, more than 150 tombstones were damaged at a St. Louis cemetery in an attack that raised fears about a rise in anti-Semitism. In light of the latest incident, the Anti-Defamation League, with support from the Mizel Family Foundation, is offering a $10,000 reward for information leading to the arrest of the vandals.

LIVE LIFE ON THE EDGE – READ LBN:

Jordan Peele‘s hotly-anticipated horror and socialcommentary Get Out reigned supreme at the box office this weekend, translating its stunning critical reception into a $30.5 million debut weekend. The movie, which stars Daniel Kaluuyaand Allison Williams, opened in 2,781 theaters, taking in a $10,976 per-screen average. Two other new films—Rock Dog and Collide—didn’t even crack the top 10 earnings. Get Out, meanwhile, knocked The LEGO Batman Movie out of first place in its third weekend. The LEGO movie spin-off brought in another $19 million this week, forming a domestic total of $130 million.

LBN-BUSINESS INSIDER:   ***Poof: $100 billion disappeared. That’s the figure that Warren E. Buffett recently calculated that pension funds, endowments and wealthy individuals have lost over the last decade to hedge funds and other money managers that charge sky-high fees. “I believe my calculation of the aggregate shortfall is conservative,” Mr. Buffett wrote in his annual letter, released on Saturday to the shareholders of his conglomerate, Berkshire Hathaway. The letter, which ricocheted around Wall Street to the consternation of some and the applause of others, was Mr. Buffett’s most damning assessment of the hedge fund industry to date, and it came amid a growing debate about whether professional money managers are capable of outperforming the stock market on even a semiregular basis.

LBN-INVESTIGATES: Americans eat more popcorn than any other country. Most of the popcorn eaten around the world is grown in the United States.

MY REVIEW: “I am inspired by the intriguing photos in LBN.”—– Randy T., an LBN reader from Dallas, Texas.

LBN-NOTICED:   ***The morning of the Oscars, moguls were filling up for a long day and night ahead of party-hopping and awards. Producer and Giants co-owner Steve Tisch was having breakfast with Patriots owner Robert Kraft at Beverly Hills deli Nate ’n Al. The two were in deep conversation at a booth by the door. Across the packed room, MediaLink branding guru Michael Kassan chatted with Showtime chairman Matt Blank.   ***After recently splitting from ex- N.Y. Yankees slugger Alex Rodriguez, Silicon Valley CEO Anne Wojcicki was spotted on the town in LA Saturday night before the Oscars. We hear that A-Rod is also expected to be in LA for Academy Awards celebrations. But it was Wojcicki who sat at a power table at Harvey Weinstein’s pre-Oscars bash for “Lion,” near Jay Z and Beyoncé.   ***After it was revealed that iconic A-list Hollywood haunt the Sunset Tower Hotel could be up for sale for $100 million, its buzzy restaurant, the Tower Bar, was busier than ever. On Friday night, diners included Andy Cohenwith John Mayer at a cozy table, Chris Pine and Zachary Quinto, NBC’s Bob Greenblatt with Gwyneth Paltrow, while also in the room were Ryan Murphy, Seth MacFarlane, Viggo Mortensen and Tatum O’Neal.   ***An endless procession of top celebs and moguls — from Leo DiCaprio to Jeff Bezos — arrived at WME head Ari Emanuel’s new home on Friday night to celebrate the Oscars. But some of the stars were on the walls in the form of the agent’s art collection. Guests were greeted by a mural outside the house that was created for Emanuel by Brazilian street artists Os Gêmeos, and completed just before the Oscars bash.

LBN-R.I.P.:   ***Joseph A. Wapner, a California judge who became a widely recognized symbol of tough but fair-minded American jurisprudence during the 12 years he sat on the bench of the syndicated television show “The People’s Court,” died on Sunday at his home in Los Angeles. He was 97. His son David confirmed the death, The Associated Press said.   ***Amy Dawes, the Los Angeles entertainment journalist who was the author of “Sunset Boulevard: Cruising The Heart of Los Angeles,” died of cancer on Friday at Cedars-Sinai. She was 56 years old and is survived by her husband, Billy Vasquez.

LBN-VIDEO LINK: Emma Stone reacts to Oscar’s blunder – Full backstage Interview  – 

LBN-COMMENTARY by President George W. Bush: I think power can be very addictive, and it can be corrosive, and it’s important for the media to call to account people who abuse their power, whether it be here or elsewhere.

LBN-COMMENTARY by Michael Levine ( Media expert and author – ): Content Marketing is a type of marketing that involves the creation and sharing of online material (such as videos, blogs, and social media posts) that does not explicitly promote a brand but is intended to stimulate interest in its products or services. To deny it’s power in today’s media world is like being a proud member of the “Flat Earth Society”.

LBN-SPOTLIGHT: One Line Movie Reviews (Oscar Edition)  – 

LBN-COMMENTARY by Andy Parker: The unholy trinity. At the right hand of Trump sitteth the minister of propaganda, Steve Bannon. At the left hand sitteth National Rifle Association executive vice president Wayne LaPierre, whose$30 million donation to the Trump campaign bought him a seat next to the throne. A year ago I opined that Trump had Hitleresque qualities. Some thought that sentiment might be a tad over the top. However, this troika has the look and the menace of 1930s Germany and is picking up steam with each passing day. With the blessing from on high, Bannon is ramping up his efforts to undermine the First Amendment, control the media and feed the American people only what he wants them to know. He now has a powerful ally in LaPierre, leader of the NRA, who has gone even further off the deep end. Apocalyptic rhetoric, attacks on the media other than Fox News and the usual bogus claims that Democrats and “libtards” are out to confiscate Americans’ guns are standard fare for LaPierre.

LBN-A DIFFERENT VIEW:….

LBN-OVERHEARD:   ***Aside from the most epic Oscars flub in the award show’s history, Nicole Kidman’s peculiar clapping may have been the most talked-about topic of the star-studded evening. The 49-year-old Australian movie star was roasted on social media after she was caught on camera — twice — during the Academy Awards showing off her unusual form of applause. Clips of the “Lion” actress clapping using only her palms without any of her fingers touching quickly went viral and completely bewildered social media users.

LBN-INVESTIGATES: A report by the New York-based Conference Board predicted that dog walkers will be more in demand than elementary-school teachers in the next decade — presumably because millennials are more interested in having dogs than babies. “The pet market has been transformed by humanization of pets,” David Sprinkle, the research director at MarketResearch.com, told the New York Times recently. “The term ‘pet parent’ has increasingly replaced ‘pet owner.’ ”

At least 28 people were injured when a man drove a truck into the crowd at a Mardi Gras Parade in New Orleans on Saturday night. The driver of the truck, who is in custody, hit two cars before ramming into the crowd and is believed to have been highly intoxicated, Police Chief Michael Harrison said. None of the injuries are life-threatening, but five people were seriously hurt. Harrison added that there is no evidence yet that the incident amounted to terrorism.

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un’s half-brother, Kim Jong Nam, died within 20 minutes of coming in contact with a nerve agent that was smothered on his face earlier this month at the airport in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia’s health minister said on Sunday. Kim Jong Nam died on Feb. 13 after two women allegedly rubbed VX nerve agent on his face. “VX only requires 10 milligrams to be absorbed into the system to be lethal, so I presume that the amount of dose that went in is more than that,” Subramaniam Sathasivam said at a news conference. “The doses were so high and it did it so fast and all over the body, so it would have affected his heart, it would have affected his lungs, it would have affected everything.” South Korea has blamed the killing on the north, which has denied involvement. Malaysian officials believe four North Korean men who left Malaysia the day Kim Jong Nam was killed provided the two women with the nerve agent, a banned substance under international law. One of the two women, an Indonesian, previously said she thought she was participating in a TV prank. She also said she was given $90 before rubbing the nerve agent on Kim Jong Nam’s face.

LBN-INTEL FOR INFLUENCERS:

When we think of Adolf Hitler, we tend to imagine him as theraging, crowd-inciting dictator. But “Blitzed: Drugs in the Third Reich” paints a very different picture, one of a full-on junkie who could barely show up for military meetings without his regular injections of cocaine, methamphetamine and opiates. In one of the book’s most harrowing scenes, author Norman Ohlerdescribes how “Hitler’s veins were so wrecked” by late 1944 that even his personal physician “could hardly penetrate them.”When he finally did manage to break the skin, “it actually made a crunching noise.” Some of the best stories read like scenes from a stoner movie comedy. When Hitler visits his vacation mountain home in Obersalzberg — “his frozen cloud-cuckoo-land,” writes Ohler — he spends his free time watching ravens and performing “his wearing impersonations of the sounds made by different machine guns used in the Second World War.” Ohler just lets that visual scene play out in your head and then offers, “Whether he did so high or not, we cannot tell.”

DID YOU KNOW? Did you know that LBN is read daily for the Mayors of: ***Orlando, Florida   ***San Francisco, California   ***Denver, Colorado   ***Montreal, Canada   ***Atlanta, Georgia   ***Pearle City, Hawaii.   ***Fairbanks, Alaska.   ***Stamford, Connecticut.   ***Las Vegas, Nevada   ***Scottsdale, Arizona   ***Paris, France

Actor Bill Paxton died on Saturday, according to TMZ, aftercomplications from surgery. The Emmy Award-winner was 61. “It is with heavy hearts we share the news that Bill Paxton has passed away due to complications from surgery,” his family said in a statement. “Bill’s passion for the arts was felt by all who knew him, and his warmth and tireless energy were undeniable.” Paxton starred in films including Titanic, Twister, Apollo 13, and The Terminator. Paxton leaves behind a wife and two children.

MY REVIEW: “As a news and info junkie, what I most respect about LBN is its fearless independence. I am tired of simply listening to either liberal or conservative zombies!”

The U.S. is reportedly considering dropping off of the United Nations Human Rights Council over alleged anti-Israel bias. Aformer State Department official told Politico that the administration is also questioning the council’s “usefulness overall,” due to the fact that some countries with subpar human rights records are allowed on the council. Politico reports that a final decision on whether to pull out of the body would involve President Trump, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, and UN Ambassador Nikki Haley. When asked about the possibility of dropping off, State Department spokesman Mark Toner only said the U.S. delegation “will be fully involved in the work of the HRC session which starts Monday.”

LBN-BUSINESS INSIDER:    ***The “Best of Los Angeles Award” community, started three (3) years ago to spotlight the best people, places and things in L.A., has surpassed 3,000 member over the weekend.

LBN-NOTICED:   ***Nanci Ryder — the Hollywood publicist who was diagnosed with ALS in 2014 — was honored at the annual Publicists Guild Awards on Friday before the Oscars. “This is going to be some of the best acting I’ve ever done and it’s for you,” said Renée Zellweger as she fought back tears while presenting Ryder with the President’s Award. “Can I borrow a napkin?” she asked from the stage at the Beverly Hilton.

LBN-SPOTLIGHT: Are YOU a Brand? —– 

LBN-R.I.P.:   ***Patty Freedman, an actress who became a publicist, died in her New York home on Feb. 17. The 64-year-old had been battling breast cancer. Born in Detroit but raised in Southfield, Mich., Freedman started performing early at Cass Tech, Detroit’s performing arts high school, before attending Interlochen Arts Camp and University of Michigan, from which she graduated with honors and musical theater degree.

LBN-SPOTLIGHT: “Without Notes”, TV’s most revealing interview. Episode # 2 featuring the world most famous dominatrix Isabella Sinclaire. She tells a shocking story of her being stalking by a criminal. 

LBN-COMMENTARY by Maureen Dowd: Much has been made of Melania Trump’s absence from the capital. But our new president’s most intense, primal, torrid relationship is in full “The War of the Roses” bloom here. And it is not with his beautiful, reserved wife. It’s with the press, the mirror for the First Narcissus. President Trump thinks that the mirror is cracked and the coverage is “fake.” And many in the press, spanning the ideological spectrum, think that he is cracked and that a lot of his pronouncements are fake. Can this strange, symbiotic relationship be saved? Probably not. It is too inflamed and enmeshed, too full of passionate accusations. It’s going to end like all those plays and movies — from “Othello” to “Endless Love” — where the mutual attraction is so powerful, it’s toxic.

LBN-A DIFFERENT VIEW:….

LBN-OVERHEARD:   ***Natalie Portman will not be rocking maternity styles on the red carpet at the 2017 Oscars or the 2017 Film Independent Spirit Awards this weekend. The 35-year-old star is unable to attend either ceremony due to her pregnancy. Portman is expecting her second child with husband Benjamin Millepied and is in her third trimester. The baby will join big brother Aleph, 5.   ***Meryl Streep isn’t holding back when it comes to addressing Karl Lagerfeld head on. Two days after WWD published an interview with the Chanel creative director in which he accused the Florence Foster Jenkins star of enlisting another designer to create her 2017 Oscars look because she wished to receive financial compensation for wearing it, the actress has responded in a statement. “In reference to Mr. Lagerfeld’s ‘statement,’ there is no ‘controversy’: Karl Lagerfeld, a prominent designer, defamed me, my stylist, and the illustrious designer whose dress I chose to wear, in an important industry publication,” Meryl’s statement reads.   ***Former Yankees slugger Alex Rodriguez and his girlfriend, Silicon Valley CEO Anne Wojcicki, have broken up after dating for just under a year, sources confirm. Rodriguez — who is in Los Angeles this weekend and will be attending Oscar parties, including the Vanity Fair bash, solo — and Wojcicki, the ex-wife of Google co-founder Sergey Brin, quietly separated a few months ago we’re told.