Quick Takes - Feb. 18, 2010

Mummies invade L.A.

“Mummies of the World,” a new traveling exhibition featuring more than 150 preserved objects, will kick off its U.S. tour in Los Angeles at the California Science Center on July 1.

Organizers of the show said the collection includes ancient mummies and artifacts from Asia, Oceania, South America and Europe -- as well as ancient Egypt. In addition, the exhibition features both accidental mummies -- those that were preserved via natural events such as ice -- and those that were intentionally preserved.

The display will include a gallery devoted to Egyptian antiquity containing specimens that date as far back as 6,500 BC. The show will also feature the Capuchin monk mummies, which are on loan from the Museum of The Catacombs of Palermo, Italy.

-- David Ng TLC settles with Gosselin

TLC has settled a breach of contract lawsuit against reality TV star Jon Gosselin, the network said Wednesday.

TLC sued Gosselin in October, claiming he failed to meet his obligations as an exclusive employee of the network while appearing on rival networks’ programs for pay and making unauthorized public disclosures about the show.

Gosselin filed a countersuit, claiming TLC violated Pennsylvania’s child labor laws in filming “Jon & Kate Plus 8.” The show followed Gosselin, his wife, Kate, and their eight children -- twins and sextuplets -- at their home in Wernersville, Pa. They became tabloid fixtures when their marriage dissolved, and the show ended last year.

TLC spokeswoman Laurie Goldberg said Wednesday that all terms of the settlement are confidential.

Goldberg said the whole Gosselin family remains under contract with the network, but that doesn’t necessarily mean they’ll all turn up on the air again.

“We have announced that we’re working on a show with Kate,” she said. “That’s all that’s in the works at this time.”

-- associated press ‘Idol’ outdoes the Olympics

Fox’s “American Idol” took home the gold Tuesday night, easily beating NBC’s coverage of the Winter Olympics in viewers and key demographics.

According to Nielsen, “American Idol” averaged 23.6 million viewers. NBC’s Olympic coverage going head to head against “American Idol” from 8 to 10 p.m. averaged 19.7 million viewers.

For history buffs, on the same night four years ago when “American Idol” squared off with the Winter Games in Turin, “American Idol” averaged 27 million viewers versus 18.4 million viewers for NBC.

-- Joe Flint Sade soldiers to the No. 1 spot

With its first album of new material in a decade, Sade’s “Soldier of Love” marched to the top of the U.S. sales charts Wednesday. With 502,000 copies sold, according to Nielsen SoundScan, Sade’s minimalist, slow-burning soul scored the young year’s top debut.

“Soldier of Love” is Sade’s first album of new material since “Lover’s Rock” was released during the holiday season of 2000. That album debuted at No. 3 and sold 370,000 copies in its first week, according to the Billboard archives. The trade publication said that “Soldier of Love” is Sade’s best sales tally on the charts, although some of the act’s biggest hits were released before SoundScan began tracking data in 1991.

Meanwhile, after making its debut during the Olympics’ opening ceremony Friday night, the re-recorded version of “We Are the World” was the week’s bestselling digital single.

Available on iTunes, “We Are the World: 25 for Haiti” sold 267,000 downloads in just three days.

-- Todd Martens Designer death investigated

Alexander McQueen hanged himself in his apartment on the eve of his mother’s funeral after leaving behind a note, a coroner’s inquest in London said Wednesday in the first confirmation of details of the fashion designer’s death.

The inquest -- which has yet to formally rule McQueen’s death a suicide -- opened as London Fashion Week prepared to mark the passing of one of British fashion’s brightest stars.

Coroner’s official Lynda Martindill told the inquest at Westminster Coroners Court that 40-year-old McQueen died from asphyxiation and hanging.

Days before his body was found on Thursday, McQueen had left several messages on the social networking site Twitter revealing his grief at the death of his mother days earlier.

After a five-minute hearing, coroner Paul Knapman adjourned the inquest until April 28. McQueen’s family is now free to hold the designer’s funeral.

McQueen’s death has cast a shadow over London Fashion Week, which opens Friday. A spokeswoman said the event would feature a tribute to the designer, whose attention-grabbing designs helped re-energize British fashion after a fallow period following the punk explosion in the 1970s.

-- associated press