People magazine is reporting something everyone knew but no one wanted to say: Michael Douglas and Catherine Zeta Jones have split after 13 years together. The magazine does not have an official statement which is odd for People. They just went with quotes from “friends.” People notes the Douglas’s cancer and Zeta Jones’s problems with bi-polar disorder as causes of strain. But there were problems a long time before that.

Also, and not mentioned in the People story, is the situation with Douglas’s son Cameron, who’s in prison for drug dealing and drug abuse. Cameron has spent a huge amount of time in solitary confinement. He can’t have visitors and won’t get out of prison until 2018. The severity of the term is shocking. That pressure, looming over Douglas, has probably been worse than anything else…

The last time I saw the couple together was at producer Marty Richards’ 80th birthday party and send off. (He has since passed away.) That was last January. Douglas was on his own in Cannes for “Behind the Candelabra” while Zeta Jones was being treated for her condition. They were once a very together couple, so it’s sad to see the end, especially with two kids…

I can tell you exclusively that Douglas is currently in Cap d’Antibes staying with professional host Johnny Pigozzi, friend of celebrities around the world. Then he heads to Deauville to open the film festival with “Candelabra”…

…Meantime the New York Times website is still down after being hacked yesterday. The Times has been hacked before and gotten right back up. But this time the damage must be pretty bad. Looking forward to seeing them back asap…

“Let’s say fuck it before we kick the bucket.” Eminem is back! I actually missed him. Here’s the audio for his new single “Berzerk.” For the record, Khloe Kardashian is the only one of those horrible people I ever kind of liked. “Berzerk” is just a taste of what’s to come, I hope.

Lyrics:
Now this crib’s about to kick off, this party looks wack
Let’s take it back to straight hip-hop and start it from scratch
I’m ’bout to bloody this track up, everybody get back
That’s why my pen needs a pad cause my rhymes on the ra-hag
Just like I did with addiction I’m ’bout to kick it
Like I’m a magician I turn critics to crickets
Got ‘em still on the fence ready to pick it
But quick get impaled when I tell ‘em stick it
So sick I’m looking pale, wait that’s my pigment
I’m going ham ya bish, shout out to Kendrick
Let’s bring it back to that thing that’s slim, bitch!
The art of the MCing mixed with da Vinci and MC Ren
And I don’t mean Stimpy’s friend, bitch
Been Public Enemy since you thought PE was gym, bitch

[Bridge]
Take your shoes off, let your hair down and (go berserk), all night long
Grow your beard out, just weird out and (go berserk), all night long

[Hook]
We’re gonna rock this house until we knock it down
So turn the volume loud, cause it’s mayhem ’til the a.m.
So crank the bass up like crazy and let yourself go, let yourself go
Say fuck it before we kick the bucket
Life’s too short to not go for broke
So everybody, everybody go berserk

[Verse 2: Eminem]
Guess it’s just the way that I’m dressed, ain’t it?
Khakis pressed, Nike shoes just being fresh laced
So I guess it ain’t
Dead after shave of cologne that made him just faint
Plus I just showed up with a coat fresher than wet paint
Sweet love is a chess game, check mate
But girl your body’s banging, jump me in, bang bang
Yes sir, we ball, I was thinking the same thing
So come get on this kid drop, bop with the bop, gang gang
P-p-p-pow pow chicka wow wow
Catch a cab, I wanna go down, br-bow-bow
Slow it down, throw in the towel, t-t-towel towel
Low it down, I don’t know how, how, how, how
At least I know that I don’t know
Question is are you bozos smart enough to feel stupid
Hope so, now ho

[Hook]

[Verse 3: Eminem]
They say that love is powerful as cough syrup and Styrofoam
All I know is I fell asleep and woke up in that Monte Carlo
With the ugly Kardashian
Lamar, oh sorry we done both set the bar low
Bars hard, drugs hard thought that’s the past
But I done did enough codeine to knock Future into tomorrow
And girl I ain’t got no money to borrow
But I am tryin’ to find a way to get you alone, car note!
Oh, Marshall Mathers shouldn’t everybody know
Get the bar soap lathered, kangols and Carhartt, these Cargos
Girl you’re fixin’ to get your heart broke, don’t be absurd man
You bird brained baby I ain’t called anybody baby since Birdman
Unless you’re a swallow
Word, w-word man you heard, but don’t be discouraged girl
This is your jam, unless you got toe jam

So maybe there is a god. Oprah Winfrey’s audience was more interested in her talk with Tina Turner than the one with Lindsay Lohan. Just when you think the culture is dead, it comes back and surprises you, doesn’t it? The Tina Turner interview scored 1 million viewers, vs. 893,000 for Lohan. Even the demo was higher for Tina vs. Lindsay — .71 vs. .66. (Lindsay had a total of 1.8 mil viewers but that was over several rebroadcasts.)

Overall, OWN had its biggest month ever in August thanks to those interviews, and the Tyler Perry shows “Love thy Neighbor” and “The Haves and the Have Nots.” But the best news was the Tina Turner report. Even though she dropped her US citizenship and got married in Switzerland, Tina is still an All-American hit!

This is exciting news if you are older or wiser: famed playwright Moss Hart’s beloved memoir, “Act One,” is being turned into a play. And that play is coming to Lincoln Center next spring thanks to the great James Lapine. He’s adapted the book and will direct the production.

Trust me, this story will get three hits among readers younger than 50. But Moss Hart and George S. Kaufman wrote the most wonderful plays ever including “You Can’t Take it With You” and “The Man Who Came to Dinner.” He and Kaufman also wrote the screenplays for “A Star is Born” (with Judy Garland), “Gentleman’s Agreement,” “Hans Christian Anderson,” and “Winged Victory.” You know, real movies.

Moss Hart was married to the late Kitty Carlisle Hart, who became a New York icon in her own right and carried on his legacy for years and years after he died in 1961 at the much too young age of 57.

Lapine and casting director Daniel Swee are looking for someone great to play Moss, a guy in his mid 20s with a New York Jewish sensibility.

The show comes off a two performance workshop tryout last month on Martha’s Vineyard featuring Tony Shalhoub, Debra Monk, Chuck Cooper and David Turner.

Anyway, the weird thing is I recently found a first edition of “Act One” and put it away for safekeeping. Now I’m going to dust it off for a re-read ASAP.

The Beatles. The Rolling Stones’ classic hits. Motown. Stax. Doo-wop. “Bridge Over Troubled Water.” Jimi Hendix. The Doors. Guess what? Sirius XM satellite radio doesn’t pay any royalties on this music. They refuse, claiming they don’t have to. I didn’t know that, but now I do. And now you do. The satellite radio home of Howard Stern claims it’s protected under a federal statutory license.

Yesterday, SoundExchange, which collects digital royalties the way BMI and ASCAP do for everything else, sued SiriusXM in U.S. District court in Washington DC. They claim that Sirius XM simply pretends for tax purposes and anything else that all the years of rock and roll before 1971 don’t exist. Sound Exchange claims that Sirius XM doesn’t include the money they make from that music  in their “Gross revenues.”

(The cut off is actually February 15, 1972 and is referred to in the lawsuit as “pre-1972.” Those last six weeks include a lot of famous releases, coincidentally, including Neil Young’s “Harvest,” Allman Bros.’s “Eat a Peach,” Al Green’s “Let’s Stay Together,” and Michael Jackson’s “Got to Be There.”)

The lawsuit is basically claiming that subscribers who pay to listen to Sirius for their 50s and 60s music, for oldies stations and for Soul Town, my favorite station, aren’t counted. Don’t forget, SiriusXM unlike your normal radio station, knows what you’re listening to because they are digital.  They know you’re not listening to polka music. Or if you are. They know I am always on Soul Town and not on Heavy Metal.

SoundExchange is asking for $50 to $100 million in back royalties  from 2007 to 2012.

“Getting paid by Sirius would be life changing money for the pre-72 legacy artists,”  said Heather Sauber, Director of The Soul Arts and Music Foundation, Inc. that’s been organized with the goal of helping the legacy American recordings artists recover their rights and property.

And legacy artists don’t mean just the big stars as I mentioned above but little guys with one off hits that are played on SiriusXM around the clock, from “96 Tears” to “Sweet Soul Music” to “Spirit in the Sky” and “I Only Have Eyes for You.”

It also means all of the classic recordings by Frank Sinatra, Ella Fitzgerald, Louis Fitzgerald all the big band and jazz music.