Free Republic

Sotheby's famed auction room was filled with gasps followed by shocked silence after an iconic statue priced far too ambitiously failed to sell at auction. Billionaires descended on the New York City event on Tuesday in the hope of snagging a masterpiece created by the likes of Picasso, Monet or Matisse. But it was Alberto Giacometti's 1955 bronze bust, called Grand tête mince, that was billed as the auction's centerpiece by experts who gave it a $70 million guide price.

The spike in interest in all things related to Matthew Perry includes a nearly five-minute excerpt of an interview with Bill Maher where the deceased actor talks about a near-death experience, his belief in God and the "math" that was involved to feed his drug habit. "I believe there is a higher power. I believe I have a very close relationship with him that's helped me a lot," Perry said on Real Time with Bill Maher in November 2022 while promoting his book, Friends, Lovers, and the Big Terrible Thing. "A lot of people did have you in the 'dead...

A helicopter crash in Nepal, near Mount Everest, has left six people dead, according to Nepal's Civil Aviation Authority. File Photo by Narendra Shrestha/EPA-EFE July 11 (UPI) -- A helicopter crash in Nepal, near Mount Everest, has left six people dead. Five of the victims were Mexican citizens on a sightseeing tour, while the sixth was a Nepalese pilot. The passengers, who have been identified as Maria Jose Sifuentes, Fernando Sifuentes, Abric Gonzalez, Ismael Rincon and Olacio Luz Gonzalez, were all from the same family. The pilot was identified as Nepalese citizen Chet B. Gurung, according to the Civil Aviation...

The Bay Area’s Millennium Tower has only continued to tilt further and sink deeper west in spite of architects’ best efforts to steady the ritzy building. The multimillion-dollar-per-unit tower is now leaning more than 29 inches at the corner of Fremont and Mission streets — a slant over half an inch deeper than previously revealed, according to monitoring data reviewed by NBC Bay Area’s Investigative Unit. The half-inch tilt was reportedly gained while engineers dug beneath the sinking condominium earlier this year to support the weight of the tower — which was built atop a former landfill — along its...

The building is now tilting 25 inches to the northwest, towards the heavily-traveled corner of Mission and Fremont streets. In an exclusive interview, we spoke to one former condo owner who says he’s glad he got out. “What they said was, this was not a big problem,” said Faulk. Later, Faulk’s husband Frank Jernigan rolled a marble on the floor of their $4 million, 50th-floor condo that confirmed for them that the problem was all too real. “The marble turns around and picks up speed as it heads in the direction that the building was leaning. We were surprised, and...

Comedian Kevin Hart and his driver suffered "major back injuries" in a car crash in the Malibu Hills late Saturday night, a report said. Police sources told TMZ a Plymouth Barracuda belonging to Hart, 40, veered off the road on the Mulholland Highway. The vehicle turned up in a ditch about 10 feet off the side of the winding road after it smashed through a wooden fence. Hart was not driving at the time and his driver was not drinking, the report said. The roof of the Barracuda was almost completely crushed in the crash.

A rapper’s lunch at a Cracker Barrel in sleepy Fairburn on Thursday ended with a broken SUV window and nearly half-a-million-dollars worth of belongings stolen, police say. Fairburn police’s Deputy Chief Anthony Bazydlo confirmed to The Atlanta Journal-Constitution that Young Dolph, a 33-year-old Memphis rapper, had two chains valued at $84,000 and a $230,000 watch along with a gun stolen out of a vehicle.

Starbucks is installing boxes for safe disposal of syringes in the bathrooms of certain locations, following workers' reports of discarded needles and sometimes concerning conditions. The coffee giant is exploring remedies after employees expressed fears about being pricked by uncapped needles and experiencing related health risks. Starbucks is testing solutions, including installing sharps-disposal boxes, using heavier-duty trash bags to prevent needle pokes, and removing trash cans from certain bathrooms. "These societal issues affect us all and can sometimes place our partners (employees) in scary situations, which is why we have protocols and resources in place to ensure our partners are...

Howard Stern might have a new bone to pick now that he’s moved his risque show to Sirius Satellite Radio. And this time it isn’t with the Federal Communications Commission. The King of All Media is fighting some feisty subjects who don’t want to pay to hear the popular shock jock. Sirius and Stern’s production company, One Twelve Inc., fired off a cease-and-desist letter to at least one Web site that was rebroadcasting the radio host’s show — billed the “Show” — as an audio stream. The letter, which was e-mailed to the administrators of www.hearhoward.org and www.hearhoward100.com, called the...