Katy Perry Opens Up About Amy Winehouse's Death, Husband Russell Brand and New 'Smurfs' Movie

Singer Katy Perry attends the premiere of "The Smurfs" at the Ziegfeld Theatre

Katy Perry's star is on a meteoric rise.More than 20 million digital songs from her last album, "Teenage Dream," have been sold, including the hits "California Gurls," "E.T." and "Teenage Dream."Perry has several new projects in the works, including a foray into the world of movies.

She'll be the voice of the character Smurfette in the new animated movie, "The Smurfs." The new role will match her new look: she's now a blonde.The 26-year-old singer said the role brought her the opportunity to "test the waters in the film world."She may be venturing out into film, but her first love remains music – and it seems like the world of music loves her back.

The singer is in the middle of a hot streak. She's had 2 multiplatinum albums in 3 years and worldwide tour that's selling out arenas. She's also been nominated for a record 9 MTV Video Music Awards.No one is underestimating the star who shot to fame with the song, "I Kissed a Girl." When the song came out, some people viewed her as a bubblegum pop star, but since then, she's been reinventing herself, musically.

"I have to keep myself interested. And I am all over the place, and I always have been …," she told "Good Morning America."Perry had a very strict upbringing - her parents are evangelical Christians -- and much of the music she performs today would probably have been forbidden to her when she was growing up.

"I'm sure there was a subliminal part inside of me that was like, 'Well, now I'm going to try this 'cause I can," you know? But even today, I'm bringing my whole family to "Smurfs", which is exciting. Come very full circle," she said, laughing. "I wasn't allowed to watch it growing up, but now we're all showing up to the "The Smurfs" premiere. I think that people change, and I encourage change. I think it's an evolution and it's good for you. And I think with my family and my parents-- they've grown up as well, just like we have."With so much going on in her professional life, it's hard to imagine how she finds private time with husband Russell Brand, a British actor, comedian and television personality.

"Privacy is really important, especially in my personal life with my husband and I. And we just cherish it so much, and we go to great lengths, whether it means we have to ride in the back of a laundry truck to get out of a place unnoticed, we'll go for it. I just gave that away, I don't know why. Laundry trucks everywhere, we're in them," she said, laughing.As private as Perry is, she and her husband took to the Internet this weekend to talk about the death of the troubled and talented singer Amy Winehouse.

She told "GMA" how she felt about Winehouse's tragic death."My heart felt really sad," she said. "My husband, who's been clean and sober for almost nine years, you know, I -- I see him working a program and working on himself every single day. And I see how much work it takes to be clean and sober when you have, you know, addiction on your hands. So … it gave me a real -- a gratefulness for my husband, who got clean when he was 27. And I feel really sad and I just hope she finds peace."

Dealing with addiction is hard enough without adding the glare of the paparazzi."Everything is magnified in this world," she said. "It's very magnified. I mean, whether you're dealing with addiction, or you're just trying to date someone, it's magnified 100 times. So you have to really be prepared and you really have to find your footing."

source:abcnews

Singer Amy Winehouse found dead at home!

Amy Winehouse, the Grammy Award-winning pop singer-songwriter whose sultry and profane compositions reflected - and ultimately were overshadowed by - a turbulent personal life and struggles with alcoholism and drug addiction, was found dead Saturday at her apartment in London. She was 27.Police sources confirmed her death, but the cause was not immediately available.

The British-born performer's train-wreck-style public behavior often threatened to eclipse her talent. Although she received high-profile engagements, such as Nelson Mandela's 90th-birthday concert at London's Hyde Park in 2008, she routinely canceled or missed performances, whether from bad health or bad manners.
In June, Ms. Winehouse canceled a tour after she shouted "Hello, Athens!" to an audience of 20,000 in the Serbian capital of Belgrade. She appeared to be so inebriated that backup singers had to sing her songs when she proved incapable. She was ultimately booed off the stage.

Ms. Winehouse said living dangerously generated her creativity, and she was often photographed half-dressed, wild-eyed and disheveled."It sounds like such a wank thing to say," Ms. Winehouse once said, "but I need to get some headaches goin' to write about."Her reckless life often called to mind the doomed pop stars of earlier generations, including Janis Joplin, Jimi Hendrix, Jim Morrison and Kurt Cobain - all of whom also died at the age of 27.

She had a fondness for jazz-inflected vocals and 1960s pop, but she roughed up the style to include hip-hop slang and an infusion of profanity. Her music often focused on drinking, drug-taking and chronic infidelity.
Her song "Rehab" mirrored her life through its defiant lyrics: "They tried to make me go to rehab/I said no, no, no." The bouncy song, styled after the early Motown sound and 1960s girl groups, became a ubiquitous hit in 2007.

Amid the chaos and turmoil of her personal life, Ms. Winehouse won five Grammy Awards in 2008, including best new artist.In May 2007, Ms. Winehouse flew to Miami and secretly married her boyfriend, Blake Fielder-Civil, an acknowledged heroin and crack user. As her records jumped up the charts that year, her professional success gave way to a series of personal drug- and alcohol-related mishaps, many also involving her new husband, that were covered relentlessly in the British press.Most explosively, the London Sun newspaper posted a grainy video on its website in January 2008, about a month before she received her Grammy Awards, allegedly showing Ms. Winehouse smoking a crack pipe and talking about taking ecstasy and valium.

Bizarre performance by Amy Winehouse puts tour in doubt

The five-time Grammy Award winner, whose battles with alcohol and drug abuse have long overshadowed her music career, had a very public meltdown on stage Saturday night in Belgrade, the first stop of her European concert tour.The disastrous performance shattered the whole goal of the troubled singer's comeback tour: A renewed focus on her musical ability, not her substance abuse problems. It also raised serious doubts about whether she is well enough to perform before an audience.

Winehouse was jeered and booed as she stumbled around the stage unable to remember the lyrics to her own songs. At times she could barely stand up. She was not able to carry a tune, appearing disoriented and unaware of her surroundings. At one point she dragged over a backup singer to take the mike and sing.

The crowd at Belgrade's Kalemegdan Park was often unable to decipher even what song Winehouse was performing – a startling problem for a singer who is popular in Serbia. Many of the 20,000 fans walked out in protest, angry that they paid steep ticket prices for such a spectacle.

Serbian media called the concert a “scandal,” with the Blic daily labelling it “the worst in the history of Belgrade.”Instead of continuing to Istanbul on Monday and Athens on Wednesday for long-scheduled concerts, Winehouse cancelled those concerts and returned to her London home. She is now holding talks that are expected to lead to further cancellations of her 12-date European tour.

The next scheduled concert is July 8 in Bilbao, Spain, but it is likely to be cancelled. The tour was to end in Bucharest, Romania, on Aug. 15.The demanding schedule was supposed to be an important test of Winehouse's ability to stand up to the rigours of live performing.

Amy Winehouse booed and jeered by Serbian crowd as she slurs and stumbles her way through Belgrade concert 

Winehouse, 27, has been hospitalized twice for injuries suffered after fainting and falling at home, and her father said she has health problems stemming from smoking cigarettes and crack cocaine.Her recording career has also been put on hold. There have long been plans for a follow up to her two successful albums – including the breakthrough Back to Black released in 2006 – but new material has not been released.

It has been a dramatic fall for Winehouse, whose grasp of pop and soul – along with her trademark beehive hairdo and her raunchy stage act – brought her worldwide fame and substantial sales.Her first album Frank, released in 2003, was heavily influenced by contemporary jazz and earned her critical acclaim. Back to Black arrived three years later and was an overwhelming success with its unusual fusion of jazz, pop and soul with a heavy debt to the girl groups of the early, pre-Beatles 1960s.

It was edgy as well, with the song Rehab dealing with the health issues that were soon to sidetrack her musical career.“They tried to make me go to rehab,” Winehouse sang on the hit. “I said ‘No, no, no.“’Winehouse has sought rehab therapy in the past after her widely publicized battles with alcohol and drugs.

Singer Amy Winehouse back to rehab!

Amy Winehouse has been keeping a relatively low profile lately, but she’s back in the news today as her rep confirmed that the troubled singer has re-entered a rehabilitation clinic, reports People.

"[Amy] has embarked on a treatment program at the Priory Clinic. She wants to be ready for performances in Europe this summer and decided to seek an assessment. She will remain at the Priory on doctors' advice," said Winehouse’s rep in a statement. "Her dad sat her down and said 'I think you're drinking too much again.' So she agreed to go [to] an assessment to stop it becoming a bigger problem."

In true Winehouse style, however, the “Rehab” singer went out with a bang, or rather a shot… of vodka. The Sun reports that on her way to The Priory, Winehouse stopped at a London shop to buy a miniature bottle of Smirnoff Vodka, which witnesses said she drank immediately."She seemed out of it. She was stumbling about, slurring her words,” one onlooker told The Sun. "I was shocked to see her buy vodka so early in the day, and even more shocked to see her knock it straight back."

The U.K. paper also alleged that 27-year-old Winehouse stumbled into a hair salon, demanding to use their washroom. Upon exiting, she told the owners, “I just puked all over your bathroom.”Said one customer: "I felt really sorry for the staff. I think they were too scared to say anything." (Winehouse’s rep denied that any puking took place, dismissing the singer’s comment as a joke.)

Winehouse’s struggles with drugs and alcohol have been well publicized since she achieved mainstream success with the 2006 album Back to Black, but in October 2010, she told the U.K. version of Glamour that she had been drug-free for three years.“I literally woke up one day and was like, ‘I don’t want to do this any more,’” she said.