Top Stories for 08/03/06

Hell hath no fury like Star Jones scorned – especially if you question the sanctity of her marriage.

The fired "View" superdiva is fighting back after reports that she and husband Al Reynolds are on the verge of divorce, and she says she's knows who might be spreading the vicious rumors.

A report in yesterday's New York Post by reporter Braden Keil suggested that Star was telling friends that her marriage was on the rocks. According to one of Keil's anonymous sources, "Reality has finally caught up with them," and another friend said that Star was "heartbroken over the turn of events...She really wanted it to work, and she thought it just might work, but in the end, it just wasn't going to happen."

Now, Jones has taken the offensive, issuing a statement that calls the reports "categorically false" and that they're being "generated by someone for vindictive reasons alone." Jones and Reynolds say their lawyers are "investigating" the source and that they are "very close to exposing the individual who has perpetrated them."

It should be a very interesting August hiatus month for "View"-watchers, with the Star situation, Elisabeth's little tantrum yesterday, the impending arrival of Rosie, and the oddsmaking on Star's replacement.

Sheryl Meets Potential Suitors – In Produce Aisle?

Rocker Sheryl Crow is dating again, and she says that if someone wanted to meet her, they're free to ask her out at the supermarket.

According to a source cited by People, Crow is seeing someone at the moment – an LA film director whom she was set up with by pal Courteney Cox – but she still finds the dating scene "terrifying." She admits to Larry King in an interview yet to be aired that her new thing "is good news, you know."

She's been with her current guy for "a few months now" but it isn't serious yet. When asked how a guy might actually meet her, Crow says, "Well, I go to the supermarket like everybody else." And as for being able to move on and get married after her dis-engagement from Lance Armstrong in February, Crow says, "I would love to be married. My parents have been married 51 years and they're great people and happy and they enjoy each other, so ideally, yes, I would love to be married."

Crow, 44, is also comfortable with adopting a child, if need be. "I could love a child that came through somebody else's womb as easily as I could my own."

Yet Another Setback for Kat

Could Katharine McPhee's health luck get any worse? Just after coming back to the "American Idol" tour following a bout with laryngitis and bronchitis, the "Idol" runner-up fractured her left foot after tripping backstage at Bobcats Arena in Charlotte, NC.

Kat gamely performed anyway, reports the New York Post's Michael Starr, singing two songs while wearing slippers, but was taken to a hospital after the incident, where X-rays confirmed that she suffered a hairline fracture.

"She's in discomfort, but she's fine," says an RCA rep. "She will continue on the tour and is not defaulting."

Next "Die Hard" Title To Be Most Awesome Yet

Though it doesn't have the raw punch of "Die Hard 2: Die Harder" or the steely, colon-aided determination of "Die Hard: With A Vengeance," the title for the fourth installment in the Bruce Willis-against-the-world action series might be the greatest of all.

20th Century Fox announced yesterday that it will release – drumroll, please – "Live Free or Die Hard" in theaters next summer, over the July 4 weekend. In the film, an attack on our country's computer infrastructure cripples us, but the perpetrator of this cyber-terrorism, as Variety puts it today, "never expected an old-fashioned cop to mess up his plans."

New Hampshirites all over the world will rejoice over the title's reference to their state motto, and even though it's been ten years since the last "Die Hard," Fox says a whole new generation of fans has come to love the franchise through video games.

Meanwhile, Bruce Willis is himself dealing with someone trying to mess up his own life, as TMZ reported yesterday, filing a lawsuit against a former childhood friend who he says is shaking him down.

Les Ugly Americains in St. Tropez

All the Americans tromping around the beaches of their beloved St. Tropez has irritated the locals, according to Page Six. Varsity socialite Denise Rich had her theatrically elaborate party shut down before she intended at 2:30 am yesterday when someone complained about the noise.

Before the fun ended, guests were treated to cocktails aboard Rich's boat "Lady Joy," and then moved to the old port, where a real, working merry-go-round had, as the Post puts it, been "de-horsed" to make it into a rotating dance floor surrounded by girls dancing in cages. Diddy, whose rented yacht the RM Elegant had earlier been asked to leave port because guests were pitching too much garbage overboard, took the mike at the party and rapped with the Godfather of Soul himself, James Brown.

Goodie Bag: Couric's New Theme Music, Yamin Not Signing With "19"

Katie Couric's CBS newscast will have a new theme song, and it was written by "Titanic" composer James Horner. We'll hear it for the first time on September 5, and the executive producer of the newscast says it's "memorable when you hear it, and it feels like it fits us". . . "Idol" third-place finisher Elliott Yamin – heretofore unsigned by a record label – tells EW.com that he's not going to be involved with 19 Productions, the producing entity behind the show, after the current "Idols" tour ends, unlike most of the other finalists who have gotten record deals. He says that he's "close to signing a deal" with one of two labels, which he won't name.