Authenticity

Los Angeles Police Chief Charlie Beck is proposing that the city require BB-gun replicas of actual firearms to be brightly colored so that police officers don't mistake them for real weapons. The proposal, which the Los Angeles Police Commission will consider Tuesday, comes after two shootings involving officers and people with replica weapons, including one in which a teenager was wounded. Under the new rule, all such toys sold inLos Angeles would have the "entire exterior surface of the device white, bright red, bright orange, bright yellow, bright green, bright blue, bright pink or bright purple.

In the brand-conscious world of networks, there's one cable outlet that needs a therapist — and maybe a referee, a lawyer and an urgent-care doctor. You don't need to consult the DSM-IV to learn that truTV exhibits a split personality. The more conventional side, the one that comes out during daylight hours, tends to be fairly straightforward and focuses mainly on live coverage of criminal and civil trials. But by late afternoon and into the dark hours of the night, the cable network notably transforms.

A college logic professor I once had liked to use a TV commercial for Country Time lemonade as a case study in the way savvy marketing people can create an illusion of authenticity with the right choice of words and images. The same idea, it turns out, can be applied to the musicians at the fifth annual Stagecoach country music festival over the weekend in Indio. In the ad, a white-haired grandpa in suspenders and a casual, open-collared shirt sat in his rocking chair on the back porch of an old house watching young children frolic on the lawn on a hot summer day. To the rescue comes a smiling mom holding a tray with glasses of ice-cold Country Time, a concoction of powdered chemicals and whatnot with little or no actual lemon juice.

There ought to be a law stipulating that well-meaning relatives may not touch the manuscripts left by their loved ones. It traumatizes a book to have its ending Disneyfied, its time period altered by 100 years, its nouns and adjectives translated back and forth across time and languages. This was the circuitous journey that Jules Verne's last great opus, "The Secret of Wilhem Storitz," took before landing on our shores, where it has been revived and returned to its authentic form by Peter Schulman and the University of Nebraska Press.

Walt Disney Co. Chief Executive Robert A. Iger was joined by Shanghai's Communist Party chief and the city's mayor Friday to officially commence construction of a long-awaited theme park that will give the Burbank company a critical beachhead in mainland China. In a carefully staged groundbreaking ceremony interspersed with singing and dancing, Iger said the new park would feature a blend of East and West and underscored the importance of the $3.7-billion project for Disney. "This is a defining moment in our company's history," Iger told the audience from an indoor stage set up across from the site of the planned resort, which he said would be "both authentically Disney and distinctly Chinese.

In the opening scene of the new film "Soul Surfer," young Bethany Hamilton (AnnaSophia Robb) finishes a morning session on the waves off the North Shore of Kauai, Hawaii, quickly throws on a modest sundress over her bikini and hurries to join her family at a beachside church service where the congregation sings a hymn called "Blessed Be Your Name. " The scene succinctly encapsulates the priorities of the film's protagonist, yet it's rare for a Hollywood production to so openly embrace any faith for fear of offending potential audience members who might believe differently.

When New Jersey teenager Alex Shaffer told his parents he wanted to audition for a part as a high school wrestler in Tom McCarthy's "Win Win," they said he couldn't go ? but not because they were against him becoming an actor. At first, Mike Shaffer recalled, "both my wife and I said the same thing. 'Sure, let's go.' And then, unfortunately, we realized Alex couldn't take the day off" because the teen had an actual high school wrestling meet the same day. Instead, the sophomore sent in a packet of wrestling press clips to the casting agent whose name appeared on an ad in a local paper.

Inviting Italians who live here to come out to an Italian restaurant can be a daunting prospect, at least when we're talking those who can cook, and cook well. They have very specific ideas about how things should be done and don't suffer indifferent or lazy food easily. Believe me, you don't want your guests complaining that they would have eaten better at home. So when I asked an Italian friend to try the new Hostaria del Piccolo in Santa Monica, I knew I was taking a chance.

Chirmole , a high-intensity soupy sauce as black as squid ink, is poured over tender poached chicken and holds a single hard-cooked egg. This classic Maya dish, dubbed "black dinner" in tiny Central American Belize, is based on darkly charred chiles, ground to a mud-colored paste with a litany of seasonings as complex as that of any Oaxacan mole. It's easy to go through several baskets of corn tortillas mopping up every trace of its toasty, hauntingly pungent liquid. Chirmole is a weekend indulgence at Flavors of Belize , one of the first new restaurants to offer this cuisine in a very long time.

As Jane Fonda strides across the marble entranceway of the 1940s hillside home she shares with her boyfriend, music producer Richard Perry, she's already explaining her most recent break with convention: their living situation. "I have an apartment over there," she says pointing out the window to a building in the distance, rising up from the neon blur of city lights below. "But I've never slept there. I never thought this is where I'd be at this point in my life ? 73, shacked up with somebody in the music business," she laughs.