Zach Galifianakis skips Sugarloaf Mountain press conference over fear of heights

THE HANGOVER star ZACH GALIFIANAKIS pulled out of a press conference in Brazil after he found out the event would take place at a venue on the ascent to the country's famous Sugarloaf Mountain.

The funnyman was due to join his castmates, including Bradley Cooper and Ed Helms, for a junket to promote the third installment in the comedy franchise in Rio de Janeiro this week (beg27May13).

However, Galifianakis decided to skip the event after he found out the Morro da Urca site, where the press conference was held, is 220 metres (722 feet) above ground on the ascent to Sugarloaf Mountain and can only be reached by cable car.

Mermaids do not exist, U.S. government agency confirms

(CNN) - One of John Athanson's earliest memories is seeing mermaids at Weeki Wachee Springs, the "City of Live Mermaids."

Today, the 47-year-old is the public relations manager for Weeki Wachee Springs State Park, and has been for 10 years.

The park north of Tampa, Florida, hosts shows year-round involving women dressed as mermaids. It bills itself as "a magical entrance into a mysterious blue underwater world of mermaids, manatees, turtles and bubbles."

"If you ask me, (mermaids) do exist," Athanson said Thursday. "They exist, and they exist right here in Weeki Wachee."

He was responding to the U.S. government's fresh announcement to the contrary.

Liz Hurley and Gérard Depardieu's Chechnya adventure: the story so far

To a news report concerning Gerard Depardieu's views on the alleged Boston bombers, and a statement so appallingly controversial that Lost in Showbiz can still scarcely believe it. "Speaking in the southern Russian province of Chechnya, where he is shooting a movie with British actress Elizabeth Hurley, Depardieu said: 'I agree with [Chechen president] Ramzan Kadyrov who said that the Tsarnaev brothers have a Chechen last name, but their upbringing is American.'"

I'm sorry, but WHAT? Tell me I didn't just read that. And yet, there it is in black and white: "where he is shooting a movie with British actress Elizabeth Hurley".

TAYLOR SWIFT SLAPS AMY POEHLER

Taylor Swift, still angry about the Golden Globes, slapped Amy Poehler in a Hollywood restaurant.

Sources say that Taylor Swift is at war with Amy Poehler and Tina Fey. She is lashing out at them for joking about her at the Golden Globes earlier this year. At the show, the two women joked that boy-crazy Swift should “stay away from Michael J. Fox’s son,” who was a trophy boy at the ceremony.

The audience thought it was hilarious … Taylor didn’t.