Despite the devastating murders of her mother, brother and nephew, Jennifer Hudson is “doing very, very well,” friend and style mentor Andre Leon Talley of Vogue tells usmagazine.com. “She’s very strong.”
The “Dreamgirls” star has been “staying close to her family” since the horrific incident, but has been in e-mail contact with Talley.
But of course, her pain is far from healed. Jennifer can’t bring herself to enter the family home where her mother, Darnell Donerson, and brother, Jason Hudson, were killed.
“I believe she went back just once, to the gate, but didn’t go inside,” Andre tells the New York Daily News. “Right now she’s at an undisclosed location.”
“I think that she has such strength,” Andre tells usmagazine.com of the Oscar winner. “There’s so much strength within her that she’s going to be OK. The message that she sent to me is that she appreciates all the messages of love that come from all the fans.”
Good to hear. Fans, keep those supportive messages coming.
Patching up Amy
It seems like just last week that we were making a joke about Amy Winehouse leaving the hospital and re-entering the next day.
Wait, that’s because it was.
And sure enough, after a week spent battling a chest infection at the London Clinic, the troubled songbird checked out Friday, only to check back in Monday. You can’t make this stuff up, people.
“She had a chest infection [last week] and underwent some tests to make sure nothing else was wrong,” a source explained to People of the repeat appearance.
So, has this 6,000th wake-up call persuaded Amy to take better care of herself?
“She has been told to give up smoking and was initially struggling with that — she was covered in nicotine patches at one point,” the source said. “But she is making an effort.”
Great. Now if only they made patches for crack.
Joaquin on thin ice?
Is everything OK with Joaquin Phoenix? The New York Post reports that pals are worried about the “Walk the Line” star, who, according to an observer, seemed “out of it” at last week’s star-studded Paul Newman tribute in San Francisco.
Also troubling: Joaquin declared to “Extra” that he was giving up acting to concentrate on music. Then he confirmed the news by showing up at Saturday’s premiere of his movie “Two Lovers” with “GOOD BYE!” inked across his knuckles.
“I think it’s just moving on. It’s rediscovering something else,” he explained (sort of) to the Associated Press. “It’s like greener pastures, you know what I mean?” No. No, we don’t.
“He’s fine,” a rep for the actor insisted to the Post. “He just wants to focus on music … and he’s directed a number of music videos over the past couple of years.”
Fine, but the world has enough music video directors, and not enough actors of Joaquin’s caliber.
Kitty Raymond is an entertainment writer and astrologer. She welcomes feedback at [email protected].
