Lenny

Relief workers fanned out across the eastern Caribbean to assess damage from Lenny, a hurricane that killed at least 12 people. Lenny, downgraded to a tropical storm as it drifted east toward the open Atlantic, rampaged across a region encompassing at least 16 islands. Coast Guard crews recovered the body of Carl Wake, 43, of Bradenton, Fla., about four miles west of the island of Saba. The search for his companion, Steve Righby, 54, of New York City, was continuing.

Valerie Perrine may be the only former Las Vegas showgirl to win the best actress award at the Cannes Film Festival. Just a few years after she had hung up her glitzy showgirl costume, Perrine was the toast of the town as Lenny Bruce's stripper/showgirl wife Honey Harlow in Bob Fosse's acclaimed 1974 biopic "Lenny," with Dustin Hoffman as the groundbreaking comedian. After eight years working at the Desert Inn and the Lido, which was a topless revue, Perrine was visiting a friend in Los Angeles looking for career opportunities.

"Reuniting the Rubins" takes a time-tested concept — the dysfunctional family reunion movie — then sucks out the charm, wit, warmth and, for good measure, logic. What's left is a frantic, badly constructed, slightly offensive muddle that doesn't so much end as run out of things on a checklist. Timothy Spall, the snaggletoothed veteran of the "Harry Potter" series and the Mike Leigh oeuvre, plays Lenny, a vacation-bound lawyer guilt-tripped by his elderly mother (Honor Blackman)

Former New York Mets and Philadelphia Phillies star Lenny Dykstra was sentenced to 6½ months in prison in Los Angeles on Monday for hiding memorabilia from his playing days that were supposed to be part of his bankruptcy filing. Dykstra, already serving a three-year sentence for auto theft, also has to complete 500 hours of community service and pay $200,000 in restitution for his conviction on bankruptcy fraud. Dykstra, 49, apologized for his actions and promised to turn his life around.

The stories in this first collection by Elizabeth Tippens are like half-fledged birds. Awkwardness and a fleck of shell are still on them, but also more than a promise of flight; and the reassurance that in writing, as in nature, spring comes regularly around with old songs in a refreshment of new voices. The nine jump-cut segments of "Winging It" present Faith: successively 27, 28, 29 and 30, single in the big city, and struggling to be an actress. She is variously involved with rich, sexy, middle-aged Lenny who will never marry her; poor, loving, poetical Sandy who desperately wants to; and cheerfully appreciative James, who will.

One issue that doesn't get in the way of watching Sean Michael Rice's "Rounds" at the Cast Theatre is whether or not a white playwright like Rice should write about black characters and black concerns. Of course he should, especially if he has something fresh to say. "Rounds," alas, is fairly stale stuff. To be sure, Rice's instinct for balance in tone and attitude, to give all four of his men a fair shake, is the sign of a humane mind--too often an endangered species on today's stage.

I am sitting in the office of Don Baroda, who sells personalized business gifts from his store in Burbank. The office, in fact, is part of the store, a squat white building with his name in large black letters over the top. Baroda, a curly-haired man of 49, is on the phone. He is talking to someone he calls Lenny-baby, as in, "Hey, how you doin', Lenny-baby!"

SACRAMENTO - California's $8-an-hour minimum wage needs to go up, says Watsonville Democratic Assemblyman Luis Alejo. And he may be getting the votes he needs to make it happen. But don't count on it; Alejo has tried this before. Alejo is the author of AB 10, which would give the Golden State its first minimum wage increase since 2008. The bill would raise it 25 cents an hour next year, 50 cents in 2015 and an additional 50 cents to $9.25 an hour in 2016. In 2017 and annually thereafter, hourly pay would be adjusted upward automatically, based on the state's inflation rate.

Roxie Roker, the elegant and beautiful actress best known for her role as Helen Willis on the long-running hit CBS television series "The Jeffersons," has died. She was 66. Roker died Saturday in Los Angeles, her publicist, Cynthia Snyder, said this week. The cause of death was not revealed. The actress, also known for her community work, had moved to Hollywood in 1975 when Norman Lear cast her in "The Jeffersons" as part of the upstairs interracial couple.

Bob Fosse's dark-hued, terrific 1974 film biography of iconoclastic nightclub comedian Lenny Bruce stars a brilliant Dustin Hoffman (pictured) in the title role and a memorable Valerie Perrine as his stripper wife. Shot in moody black-and-white by Bruce Surtees, it is one of the key American films of the '70s (TNT Monday at 10:30 p.m.). Other four-star films airing this week: The Devil and Daniel Webster / Bravo, Sunday, 11 a.m. and Monday, 8 a.m.

The one-time home of ex-New York Mets star Lenny Dykstra is back on the market in Thousand Oaks, reduced to $14.995 million from the $18.75 million it was listed for in June. Hockey great Wayne Gretzky sold the 6.5-acre compound to the former World Series champ in 2007 for $18.5 million, according to the Multiple Listing Service. As the housing bust took hold and his financial problems deepened, Dykstra unsuccessfully tried to sell the mansion, ultimately losing it to foreclosure two years ago on the steps of the Ventura County courthouse during bankruptcy proceedings.

Lenny Kravitz has been tapped to star as soul singer Marvin Gaye in an upcoming biopic, according to reports. The film is the first lead role for Kravitz, who has played supporting roles in "The Hunger Games," “Precious” and the forthcoming White House drama “The Butler.” According to Deadline , the biopic will focus on the early 1980s when the Motown legend was in Europe attempting to curb his addictions and reignite his career...

Former New York Mets star and self-styled financial guru Lenny Dykstra, already sentenced to three years in state prison for a car scam, has agreed to a plea deal on federal bankruptcy fraud charges after allegedly  looting his mansion of valuables as he struggled to battle numerous creditors. Dykstra, who helped the New York Mets win the 1986 World Series and later became a celebrity stock picker before his finances dissolved in chaos in 2009, has racked up a score of charges in recent years.

Former star center fielder Lenny Dykstra will not be allowed to post or solicit on social networking or e-commerce sites over the next three years as part of a plea deal with city prosecutors, authorities said. Dykstra pleaded no contest Wednesday to misdemeanor charges of lewd conduct and assault with a deadly weapon involving women who responded to housekeeping ads he placed on Craigslist, authorities said Wednesday. Prosecutors said he would receive nine months in jail. Under the plea deal, Dykstra also was placed on three years' probation, including provisions to prevent him from misusing the Internet, which he used to lure women who traveled long distances and were desperate for work in the bad economy.

"Reuniting the Rubins" takes a time-tested concept — the dysfunctional family reunion movie — then sucks out the charm, wit, warmth and, for good measure, logic. What's left is a frantic, badly constructed, slightly offensive muddle that doesn't so much end as run out of things on a checklist. Timothy Spall, the snaggletoothed veteran of the "Harry Potter" series and the Mike Leigh oeuvre, plays Lenny, a vacation-bound lawyer guilt-tripped by his elderly mother (Honor Blackman)

Lenny Dykstra had already filed for bankruptcy and was fighting to somehow keep the $17.4-million mansion he had purchased from hockey legend Wayne Gretzky when he was interviewed by The Times' Alejandro Lazo back in October 2010 . Back then, a defiant Dykstra was confident he would once again make his way back to the top. "I have been fighting my whole life," Dykstra said. "That's why I have a new theme song, dude, and I am going to play it for you: "I want to be a billionaire, so … bad, buy all of the things I never had," he sang along, loudly and off-key, to the Travie McCoy song "Billionaire," as it blared from his Bose computer speakers.

In honor of John Wooden's 99th birthday, here are 99 things you may, or may not, know about the legendary former UCLA basketball coach: 1 . He was born in Martinsville, Ind., on Oct. 14, 1910. 2. Wooden led Martinsville High to the Indiana state title in 1927 and runner-up finishes in 1926 and 1928. 3. As a boy, one of his role models was Fuzzy Vandivier of the Franklin Wonder Five, a basketball team that dominated Indiana high school basketball from 1919 to 1922.

According to Lenny Kaye, the three great pop crooners of the early 1930s constitute a trinity. Bing Crosby, the affable domesticator of every idiom from light jazz to Hawaiian music, plays the universal dad. Randy, rambunctious Rudy Vallee enacts the misbehaving son. And, by default, Russ Columbo (1908-1934), the least known, the handsomest, the most vocally gifted and soulful, assumes the role of Holy Ghost.

Former New York Mets star and financial guru Lenny Dykstra was sentenced Monday to three years in state prison after a judge rejected a last-ditch effort to change his no contest plea and fight the charges. He had pleaded no contest to grand theft auto and filing a false financial statement in connection with a scheme to use somebody else's paperwork to steal or lease several new cars, according to court records. He was immediately taken into custody after the sentencing. Dykstra, who faced up to a four-year sentence, must serve his time in state prison.

Lenny Dykstra does not believe he's a criminal. But an L.A. County Superior Court judge decided otherwise Monday, sentencing the former New York Mets and Philadelphia Phillies center fielder to three years in state prison for his role in a grand theft auto case. According to prosecutors, Dykstra and two others tried to lease and then sell cars from several dealerships by claiming credit through a nonexistent business. After Judge Cynthia Ulfig rejected a last-ditch effort by Dykstra's lawyer to withdraw his no-contest plea, Dykstra addressed the court in a manner described by The Times' Andrew Blankstein as "rambling and repetitive.