Fresh from winning six Grammy awards barely a week ago, soul diva Adele could sweep up more prizes at Tuesday's Brit awards.

Londoner Adele, who has been out of action since October for throat surgery, is in the running for best British Single for "Someone Like You," British Female Solo Artist and Mastercard British Album of the Year for "21."

The Simpsons, the long-running U.S. television animated comedy show, reached its landmark 500th episode Sunday, with an appearance from controversial WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange.

America's most famous dysfunctional cartoon family have played out their lives before a worldwide audience for over two decades since the distinctive yellow characters Homer, Maggie and children Bart, Lisa and baby Maggie first burst onto American TVin 1989.

English speakers got their moment in the Carnival sun on Monday as a wild, Beatles-themed street party let them shake it up, baby, with a samba swing to "Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da."

"Sargento Pimenta," Portuguese for "Sergeant Pepper," is one of more than 400 raucous street parties that spring up throughout Rio de Janeiro during Carnival season. Hundreds of thousands of people turn out for the largest of the "blocos," packed, sweaty open-air dance parties where the crowd sings along to a repetitive medley of Carnival songs — usually in Portuguese, of course.

Sarah Burton, creative director of the Alexander McQueen fashion house, tried Monday to create an enchanted forest in the center of London for the debut offering of the McQ line, aimed at younger, less affluent buyers.

The catwalk was covered with fallen leaves, and a realistic forest was created at one end of the hall at the Old Sorting Office in central London.

Chris Brown and Rihanna are back together, musically speaking.

Two songs featuring the singers hit the Internet on Monday. Brown sings on the remix of Rihanna's sexually charged song "Birthday Cake," and she's on the remix of his upbeat tune "Turn Up the Music."

A black velvet dress that belonged to Whitney Houston and a pair of earrings she wore in "The Bodyguard" will be sold to the highest bidder next month.

Celebrity auctioneer Darren Julien said Sunday the pieces and other Houston items became available after the singer's unexpected death on Feb. 11 and will be included among a long-planned sale of Hollywood memorabilia such as Charlie Chaplin's cane, Clark Gable's jacket from "Gone With the Wind" and Charlton Heston's staff from "The Ten Commandments."

Stella McCartney used a flash mob, Issa relied on colorful floral prints, and Alice Temperley turned to 18th Century paintings for inspiration as London Fashion Week moved into high gear Saturday.

It was a day of elegant, sexy dresses, raucous performances, and beautiful detailing as London designers showed what makes their fashion approach unique.

Silent movie "The Artist" won the Best European Film prize at theSpanish cinema awards, the Goyas, while Spanish police flick "No habra paz para los malvados" ('No rest for the wicked') collected six gongs.

The Goya adds to a growing trophy haul for the "The Artist" which has 10 Oscar nominations, including best actor for French star Jean Dujardin and best director for Michel Hazanavicius.

Hollywood Boulevard is still open to traffic, but not for long: sometime this week, the Oscars mega-circus will start to pitch its tent, for the climax of Tinseltown's annual awards season.

With only seven days to go before next Sunday's extravaganza, everyone knows the frontrunners: Martin Scorsese's visually lavish adventure "Hugo" and French-directed silent movie "The Artist," starring a cute canine called Uggie.

Argentinians are flocking to see "The Iron Lady", intrigued not just by the tale of the nation's arch-nemesis Margaret Thatcher but also her uncanny incarnation as played by Meryl Streep.

It was Thatcher, the then British prime minister, who ordered troops into war after the Argentine junta invaded the Falklands Islands in 1982, sparking a brief but bloody war over the remote South Atlantic archipelago.