Adolf Hitler is coming back to Berlin. More than six decades after the Nazi dictator killed himself in his Berlin bunker, a character parodying Hitler will feature in the first production in Germany of the award-winning Broadway musical comedy by Mel Brooks, The Producers.
Berlin's Admiralspalast theatre - just blocks to the north of the dictator's infamous bunker - will stage The Producers - Fruehling fuer Hitler (Springtime for Hitler) from May 17.
It is the eagerly awaited German rendition of Mr Brooks's record-setting musical about two men trying to create a Broadway flop that ran for six years with more than 2,500 performances. It grossed $300 million in New York and $1 billion worldwide.
Hitler was himself a patron of the same 1,700-seat Admiralspalast theatre and had his own luxury "Fuehrerloge" box. (Reuters)
Designer masks against flu
If a flu pandemic is coming, but you have to get out and about, there is now a creative way to express fear.
That seems to be the approach at Digo, the New York ad agency behind a line of humorous designer masks that will allow people to stand out from the crowd as they attempt to fend off the swine flu virus.
"When we saw swine flu panic taking hold, we felt that re-envisioning the face mask, this icon of fear, into a canvas for more creative, playful sentiments was a way to say we have nothing to fear but fear itself," said Mark DiMassimo, Digo's CEO and chief creative officer.
"Life goes on, enjoy yourself, express yourself. If you want to be careful, don't make that all that life is about," said Mr DiMassimo, who envisions an initial run of 25,000 masks for $100 each along with a certificate authenticating them as part of the first printing. (Reuters)
Modern-day female Goldfinger
A New York woman has been charged with stealing as much as $12 million in gold bullion and jewellery over a period of six years, lifting the ill-gotten booty from her employer by concealing the stash in the lining of her pocketbook.
The district attorney for New York City's borough of Queens said Teresa Tambunting, 50, was arraigned on charges of first-degree grand larceny and first-degree criminal possession of stolen property from Jacmel Jewelry Inc.
"The defendant is accused of establishing a virtual mining operation... which siphoned off millions of dollars worth of the precious metal from her employer," Queens District Attorney Richard Brown said in a statement.
In January, an inventory audit conducted at Jacmel revealed that nearly 386 kilos of gold merchandise worth about $12 million was unaccounted for.
After an investigation was initiated, Tambunting returned to Jacmel a suitcase containing 30 kilos of gold. On February 13, an additional 204 kilos of gold was recovered from Ms Tambunting's residence. (Reuters)
Steel workers to grow potatoes
Steel workers in Russia's industrial heartland are returning to the land to dig themselves out of an economic crisis that has pushed national unemployment rates to an eight-year high.
Magnitogorsk Iron and Steel Works is offering 1,000 plots of land around Russia's biggest steel plant on which its employees can grow potatoes free of charge.
"Sowing will begin next week, weather permitting," Alexander Derunov, chairman of the steel plant's trade union committee, was quoted as saying in Magnitogorsk's newspaper.
Ten per cent of the Russian workforce, or 7.5 million people, were unemployed in March as the country headed into its first recession in a decade. Another 1.2 million were on unpaid leave or forced holiday.
Steel makers and associated industries, such as the automotive and machine-building sectors, are most at risk from a further round of job cuts that the ministry expects will affect more than a third of all Russian companies. (Reuters)
Masked men steal Dali painting
Masked men held up staff of a Dutch museum yesterday and robbed them of two valuable paintings, one by Spanish surrealist painter Salvador Dali police said.
Three or four men in masks entered the Scheringa Museum of Realist Art in the northern town of Spanbroek around noon and threatened staff with a gun, said police spokesman Menno Hartenberg. "They put the paintings in a car and drove off," he said. "It was all over in two minutes." (AFP)
Star's arrest inspires 'naked' T-shirts
What's wrong with being naked? That's what a Japanese TV star asked police who arrested him for public indecency when he was found drunk, naked and screaming in a Tokyo park in the early hours of the morning last week.
His words struck a chord with the public and have now become the slogan on a new range of T-shirts sold by online retailer ClubT.
Tsuyoshi Kusanagi, 34, who shot to fame 20 years ago as a member of boy band SMAP, resisted arrest and was bundled into a police vehicle wrapped in a blanket, media reports said. (Reuters)