Quick Takes: No KISS at Michael Jackson tribute concert

Organizers of a Michael Jackson tribute concert dropped KISS from the lineup after receiving widespread criticism for booking the band despite critical comments toward the late pop singer by bassist Gene Simmons.

The announcement Tuesday came a day after Global Live Events announced KISS would join the show planned for Oct. 8 in Cardiff, Wales. Fans, media and the singer’s estate quickly noted that Simmons has said in recent years that he was convinced Jackson molested children. Some of the critical comments came within days of Jackson’s June 2009 death.

Jackson was acquitted of molestation charges after a 2005 trial in California.

Global Events Live Chief Executive Chris Hunt accepted blame, calling KISS’ booking an “oversight.”

—Associated Press

Kindle club adds more bestsellers

Kathryn Stockett, author of “The Help,” and Janet Evanovich, known for her popular mystery series, have both joined the Kindle million-seller club, Amazon said Tuesday.

The Kindle million-seller club are those authors whose books have sold more than 1 million Kindle ebook copies.

So far, it’s a pretty small club. Steig Larsson was the first to cross the 1-million Kindle ebook mark, followed by thriller-writer James Patterson and romance maven Nora Roberts. Then came Charlaine Harris, author of the Sookie Stackhouse books, which are the basis for the HBO vampire series “True Blood.” Lee Child, Suzanne Collins and Michael Connelly are also million-sellers. Independent author John Locke was the first to make it without the support of a major publisher.

For Stockett, joining the club means just one thing: “The Help” has sold that many Kindle ebooks. It’s her only book.

—Carolyn Kellogg

Burt Reynolds faces foreclosure

Veteran actor Burt Reynolds is facing foreclosure on his longtime southeast Florida home, according to a lawsuit filed by a mortgage firm.

The 75-year-old performer is known for starring roles in such films as “Deliverance” and “Smokey and the Bandit” from the 1970s. He also won a Golden Globe for his role as a porn king in the 1997 film “Boogie Nights.”

The mortgage on the house in Hobe Sound that is facing foreclosure was taken out in 1994, a year after Reynolds’ widely publicized divorce from actress Loni Anderson.

Reynolds, who had heart bypass surgery last year, stopped making the mortgage payments a year ago and owes Merrill Lynch Credit Corp. nearly $1.2 million, according to the lawsuit filed Aug. 9 in Martin County.

Neither the actor nor his manager could be reached for comment.

—Reuters

Warriors coming back to Bowers

The Terra Cotta Warriors set an attendance record by drawing 210,000 visitors to Santa Ana’s Bowers Museum in 2008; now the Bowers is going back to the same well — actually it’s a huge burial pit — for “Warriors, Tombs and Temples,” opening Oct. 1.

The exhibition will feature four more of the charismatic, life-size clay figures created to attend Qin, China’s first emperor, in the afterlife (the 2008 show had 17, the most ever sent to the United States). The new exhibition includes nearly 200 works besides the warriors, taken from ancient Chinese tombs and monasteries.

While “Terra Cotta Warriors: Guardians of China’s First Emperor” focused solely on Qin, who ruled from 221 to 206 BC, this show will range more widely, with artifacts from the Western Han Dynasty (206 BC to AD 8) and the Tang Dynasty (AD 618 to 907).

—Mike Boehm

Finally

Director stamp: Famed director John Huston will be honored on a U.S. postage stamp next year, along with a scene from his 1941 film “The Maltese Falcon,” showing Humphrey Bogart and the black bird.