Mind Soup

Meryl Streep  is the new queen of the Golden Globes as her win for best actress in a comedy or musical for "Julie & Julia" gives her seven statuettes to the half dozen owned by  Jack Nicholson  and  Angela Lansbury . Streep set the record for most nominations last year when her double lead actress nods for "Doubt" (drama) and "Mamma Mia!" (comedy/musical) gave her 23 in total, breaking the tie with  Jack Lemmon  who racked up 22 lead nods and 4 wins (movie drama — 0/6; movie comedy — 3/10; and TV movie/mini — 1/6) over 40 years beginning in 1960. She lost both those races -- drama to  Kate Winslet  ("Revolutionary Road") and comedy/musical to  Sally Hawkins  ("Happy-Go-Lucky"). This year, she was also a double nominee -- bringing her total tally to 25 -- competing against herself in the comedy-musical actress with a bid for "It's Complicated" as well. From her 21 movie nominations, Streep had won five Golden Globes ...

When she is your mother. Just ask Jack Nicholson. While preparing a story on the star of Chinatown, which was just being released, a Time reporter called him in June of 1974 to confirm some family facts. Was it true that his sister June, was in fact his mother? And that his father lived in New Jersey? Nicholson was stunned. The 37-year old actor had grown up thinking that June, 17 years his senior, was his sister. She was actually his mother, and Jack was the illegitimate child she had as a teenager. His grandparents raised him as their own, and neither his birth mother, nor his grandparents/parents, gave away her secret, even on their deathbeds. The truth was verified the same year, by his aunt Lorraine, June's sister. He's not the only star to discover a re-arrangement of the family tree. Singer Bobby Darin, who at 32-years of age in 1968 was considering a career in politics, got a similar shock when his sister confessed that she was in fact, his mother. Knowing that politi...