Cityfile: New York's Most Notable and Influential

♦  Although her life looks like it's finally back on track, a new documentary suggests Britney Spears thinks her new life is like prison and lacks "excitement" or "passion." Hopefully she'll be in a better mood in two weeks when she makes an appearance at the Rockefeller Center tree lighting ceremony. [The Sun, OK!]
♦  Could Anna Wintour be planning to retire? Page Six says the Vogue editor is thinking about leaving the mag once her contract is up, and she's even been recommending possible replacements to Si Newhouse. [P6]
♦  Kiefer Sutherland may be planning to move to NYC so he can be closer to his girlfriend, Allure style director Siobhan Bonnouvrier. [Daily Star]
♦  Madonna is reportedly making $10 million to appear in her new Louis Vuitton ad campaign. [P6]More

♦  Is Kate Hudson trying to steal Alex Rodriguez away from Madonna? She was spotted with her "arms completely wrapped around" him at a party in Miami this weekend. But she might just be trying to steal Jason Statham away from his girlfriend, since the two were seen downing dirty martinis together. [NYDN, P6]
♦  A PETA activist pelted Lindsay Lohan with a bag of flour at an event in Paris on Saturday. Sam Ronson responded by dissing the activist on MySpace: "My dog is far more civilized than that person." [People]
♦  Kanye West was arrested in London on Friday after an altercation with a photographer. Now he's suggesting the entire episode was "bogus," and has upset some Brits by comparing himself to Princess Di. [People, The Sun]
♦  Sarah Palin may collect a $7 million advance if she writes a book. [MSNBC]
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♦  Remember last month when Gwyneth Paltrow said she was trying to be supportive of her good friend Madonna during her divorce? It seems Madge was less than moved by the gesture and now she's warning Gwyneth to keep her mouth shut and "say nothing about me or my divorce." [National Enquirer]
♦  Meanwhile, Madonna has supposedly been telling a "close pal" that Alex Rodriguez sends her poetry and "has the heart of a poet trapped inside an insanely gorgeous body." [P6]
♦  Lindsay Lohan and Samantha Ronson are supposedly planning to "officially get engaged" while they're in Paris this week. [The Sun]
♦  Now that she's back from London (where she reportedly brought 20 pieces of luggage on a three-day trip), Mariah Carey is supposedly organizing her holiday vacation to Aspen, where her plans include rolling around in the snow in a red bikini and decorating her bedroom to look like the North Pole. [MSNBC, The Sun, P6] 
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♦  Jennifer Aniston is finally speaking out about her breakup with Brad Pitt. In the December issue of Vogue, she says what Angelina Jolie did was "really uncool," and that she had no idea that Brad had cheated on her until she read about it afterwards. [MSNBC, NYP]
♦  The security guard who roughed-up Brad Pitt at the premiere of his own movie on Monday night says he was only trying to protect Brad by helping him get away from a pack of aggressive photographers. [ET, NYP]
♦  Madonna is supposedly considering a career as a movie director so she can "rival" her ex, Guy Ritchie, at least according to her nutty brother Christopher Ciccone. She should have more time to pursue a directing career if she chooses to: Officials in Malawi have said she can "forget" about adopting another baby as long as she plans to bring it into a "broken home." [The Sun, MSNBC]
♦  Billy Ray Cyrus says he is trying to get Malia and Sasha Obama to appear in an episode of Hannah Montana. [NYDN]More

♦  At yesterday's Fashion Group International panel on fashion retail, Simon Doonan chatted with Sally Singer, Bloomingdale's fashion director Stephanie Solomon, and InStyle's beauty director Amy Synnott about the pervasive doom and gloom in the retail industry. Doonan's take: "It's really terrifying. But I think my job is to sustain the idea that fashion is exciting and glamorous. We really need to do our best even if sales are plunging." [WWD]
♦  When deciding who should front its next campaign, did Louis Vuitton go for someone fresh, edgy, and exciting? Nope, it's supposedly Madonna. [stylefile]
♦  Because now every article on Michelle Obama's person must be identified, priced, and judged: She wore Maria Pinto to the White House, and those dangly earrings she wore on election night? White gold with diamonds, priced at $11,000, and designed by Loree Rodkin. [WSJ, The Cut]More

♦  Guy Ritchie met up with sons David and Rocco in London yesterday for the first time since October, but only after agreeing to follow a list of rules issued by Madonna, which included no new friends, no fast food, no newspapers, and no TV. [Us, Mirror]
♦  Back in the US, Madonna supposedly threw an "intimate dinner party" at her apartment so she could introduce Alex Rodriguez to a group of her friends. [Mirror]
♦  One week after Tim Robbins experienced a few problems trying to cast his vote in the presidential election, officials now say they pinpointed the issue: Robbins turned up at the wrong polling location, which he might have known if he'd bothered to vote in the mid-term elections. [NYDN, P6]More

♦  Madonna's neighbors in her Central Park West building aren't happy that she has turned her seventh-floor apartment into a music studio. (It was originally supposed to be an office for Guy Ritchie.) Now she stays up all night blaring music and practicing for her shows. [NYDN]
♦  Alex Rodriguez is thinking of following Madonna on tour next month when she plans to make stops in Brazil, Chile, and Argentina. [R&M]
♦  Is Jennifer Aniston secretly leaking pregnancy and marriage rumors about herself to the tabloids as a way to steal attention away from Brangelina? [MSNBC]
♦  Friends of Padma Lakshmi want everyone to know she is not a gold digger. She's a "hard-working, self-made woman" who just happens to only date extremely wealthy, older men. [P6]
♦  Peaches Geldof and Max Drummey's 97-day-old marriage may already be on the rocks. [The Sun]More

♦  Kim Cattrall and Sarah Jessica Parker are apparently incapable of getting along: A day after Kim confirmed that there will be Sex and the City sequel, Parker told fans "not to get their hopes up" and that "Kim is excited, but all the deals are not yet done." [Daily Star, People]
♦  It looks like spending time in court, soup kitchens, and sanitation departments hasn't helped Naomi Campbell much. She infuriated passengers on her flight back from London on Tuesday by cutting in line while going through customs at JFK. She swears it wasn't her fault because it was the airline that offered her an escort. [R&M]
♦  Ian Schrager is getting married next Saturday. The bride-to-be is a ballerina named Tania Wahlstedt. [P6]More

♦  Now that she doesn't have Guy Ritchie to boss around, Madonna is finding more time to control everyone else: She's supposedly been "begging" Gwyneth Paltrow to leave her London home so they can spend more time together in New York. She's also busy orchestrating a reunion between Justin Timberlake and Britney Spears: All three will be performing together at Madge's concert in LA tonight. [The Sun, E!]
♦  Padma Lakshmi is apparently on a "man-search" for a filthy rich boyfriend now that her flings with Ted Forstmann and Russell Simmons are over. [P6]
♦  Now that the election is over, Tina Fey says she will be officially retiring her Sarah Palin impression. [Extra]More

♦  A long list of celebs have been involved in a last-minute effort to get out the vote for Obama, including Oprah, Diddy, Sarah Jessica Parker, Matthew Broderick, Edie Falco, John McEnroe, Mary J. Blige, Russell Simmons, Beyonce, and Jay-Z. In the elderly celebrity writer department, Vanity Fair's Dominick Dunne says he postponed surgery so he could vote today. [R&M, Politico]
♦  Ivana Trump has been calling Marius Rusovici, the 23-year-old Belgian she's been hanging out with, "her boyfriend," although it may just be a plot to make Rossano Rubicondi jealous. Or stir up some press. Or both. [NYDN]
♦  David Duchovny and Tea Leoni were spotted holding hands while their kids went trick-or-treating on the Upper East Side last Friday, which may or may not mean they're getting back together. [P6]
♦  Sumner Redstone's ex-wife, Paula Fortunato, is still living in his Beverly Hills mansion. But he may have already reunited with his ex-girlfriend, Manuela Herzer. [P6] More

♦  Madonna and Alex Rodriguez were able to fly out to the Hamptons for a "quick and cozy rendezvous" without anyone knowing, but only because Jerry and Jessica Seinfeld picked the couple up (separately) from the East Hampton airport and let them hang out for several hours at their waterfront manse. [P6, The Sun]
♦  With her husband Rossano Rubicondi filming a reality show in Italy, Ivana Trump has been hanging out with a 23-year-old Belgian model named Marius Rusovici. [P6]
♦  Tina Brown and Cathie Black are enemies, apparently, since they "disagreed on just about everything" and "wouldn't even look at each other," at a conference this week. [R&M]
♦  Is John McCain making an Saturday Night Live appearance this weekend? Does anyone care? [MSNBC]More

♦  Don't get your hopes up, but supposedly Madonna and Guy Ritchie are hoping to settle their divorce by early next week. Until then, though, we'll be treated to lots more gossip about their wacky marriage, including the set of rules Madonna posted on the wall of their Central Park West apartment and how she wanted to fill up their Olympic-size swimming pool with Kabbalah water. [NYP, Daily Mail]
♦  You think your house is complete chaos? For their stay in Berlin, Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie have six full-time nannies and a fleet of 20 Volkswagens (provided to them by the car company gratis, of course). [NYDN]
♦  Elizabeth Edwards, the wife of former presidential contender John Edwards, was spotted without her wedding ring at an event Monday night. Now the talk is that the couple isn't living together anymore either. [P6]
♦  Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen are supposedly feuding because Ashley wants a boob job, but doesn't want to get one unless Mary-Kate goes under the knife at the same time. [Star]More

♦  Angelina Jolie is either "burning up with jealousy" over Brad Pitt's flirtatious relationship with co-star Diane Kruger, or she's completely happy and getting ready for her next adoption in the next few weeks, depending on which tabloid you pick up. [Star, OK!]
♦  Elisabeth Hasselbeck gets more death threats than any other host on the View, news that probably won't surprise you. [P6]
♦  Jennifer Aniston and John Mayer spent last weekend at a romantic spa in Arizona. [Star]
♦  Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen appeared at a book signing yesterday, but they did not permit fans to talk to them. [P6] 
♦  Page Six follows up on the news from three weeks ago and reports Ivanka Trump is converting to Judaism for Jared Kushner. She's attending synagogue regularly, too. [P6]
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♦  You didn't expect to hear that Lydia Hearst actually wrote that column in Page Six magazine by herself, did you? In response to Hearst's accusation that Page Six fabricated her latest column—the one in which she bashed her family's publishing company—the mag now says that Hearst's writing process involved being interviewed by a reporter who then "put her thoughts into cohesive paragraphs." And they have the emails to prove Lydia's trash talk. [P6]
♦  Madonna is reportedly under pressure from the leaders of Kabbalah to reach a divorce settlement quickly, lest the mess cast a negative light on their freaky cult. Guy Ritchie, however, isn't making it any easier now that he's apparently rejected Madge's latest £20 million offer. [Daily Mail, ThisIsLondon]
♦  Michael Phelps got paid $100,000 to swim around at a pool party thrown by a TV network chief's wife. [P6]
♦  It's a match made in heaven: Jamie-Lynn Sigler and Jerry Ferrara, who plays Turtle on Entourage, are dating. [R&M]More

Spotted | Hilary Duff attending a charity event at Roberto Clemente Elementary School on East 4th Street ... Jessica Simpson leaving her hotel with her dog Daisy ... Liev Schreiber and Naomi Watts walking on Lafayette Street with son Alexander ... Sarah Jessica Parker leaving an office building in Midtown ... Madonna leaving the Kabbalah Center with her kids ... Katie Holmes leaving her apartment in the East Village ... Tom Cruise leaving Matt Lauer's Friars Club roast at the Hilton in Midtown ... Pink walking in SoHo with her dad ... Access Hollywood's Nancy O'Dell leaving her hotel ... Taylor Momsen on the Gossip Girl set ... Keira Knightley on the set of her new film in SoHo ... and Tim Robbins playing roller hockey in the West Village.