From today's release:

The show is a bilingual, modern day Romeo & Juliet that will, for the first time, give audience members the ability to vote and decide on the direction the characters and story lines will take. MTV and Electus will partner and utilize digital platforms including Facebook, Twitter and other social networking sites (in both English and Spanish), allowing viewers to actively participate in the show’s outcome.

Sounds to us a bit like a modern-day "Choose Your Own Adventure."

From the get-go, Mr. Silverman promised that IAC's Electus would tweak the traditional development model by involving sponsors and advertisers in new projects from the ground floor. To wit: Pedro & Maria will be co-produced by the consumers goods behemoth Procter & Gamble.

From the release:

Procter & Gamble Productions will serve as a co-producer with MTV and Electus for “Pedro & Maria,” creating original commercials and unique, branded entertainment opportunities for several of P&G’s beauty and health brands in and around the show and across multiple media platforms, including television and digital.

"Electus is at the forefront of the evolution of content and by partnering with them for a project like ‘Pedro & Maria’ we can truly explore innovative and creative branded entertainment opportunities for a multicultural audience,” said Rich DelCore, Director of Branded Entertainment at P&G. “Ben has played a critical role in transforming the traditional advertising model and creating unique links and unprecedented collaboration between content production, advertising, and marketing across the board and we are thrilled to be working with him on this project.”

Among the things Sarah Palin doesn't know: who Oliver Stone is. [R&M, second item]

Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes have been buying up a bunch of separate apartments in a building in the East Village, where Tom is friendly to the neighbors and Katie "keeps her head down." [P6]

Guy Ritchie has been "crying over" photos of his son Rocco in a Yankees shirt, which crazy Madonna probably orchestrated to remind everyone of her affair with Alex Rodriguez. [NYDN]

Gossip Girl's Taylor Momsen was hospitalized for a "potentially life-threatening" throat infection. [People]

Socialite and creative marketer Kate Schelter on her Halloween costume: "Jane Fonda meets Olivia Newton John 'Let's Get Physical.' Hot pink, fuchsia, leotard, spandex pants, Gucci headband, metallic belt, high heels, leg warmers. Fuchsia nails out to here...I think that women should dress that way every day. Why wait for one day a year? Although, disclaimer — I wait to be Jane Fonda one day a year. It's more like an alter ego. It's not like I'm waiting to wear a miniskirt or something...I wear a miniskirt every day — who cares?" [The Cut]

Just as her co-star, America Ferrera, was hardly a household name before Ugly Betty, Ms. Lively was relatively unknown before the CW network made her famous—a fact not lost on her Sisterhood co-stars.

“I think they’re milking this whole Gossip Girl craze,” said Michael Rady, who plays former Gilmore Girls star Alexis Bledel’s love interest in the original Sisterhood and the sequel. “I saw a Sisterhood promo the other day and it said ‘The Gossip is …’

“It’s pretty shameless!”

On the red carpet, the rest of the film’s supporting cast had to field questions from the press about Ms. Lively’s personal life.

Did she bring her dog onto the set? Yes, sometimes. Did she bring her boyfriend and Gossip Girl co-star Penn Badgley? No, she was dating someone else during the filming of Sisterhood. What’s she like? “Wonderful,” “funny,” “down to earth,” “lovely” and “lively like her name.” Someone get this girl a gold star!

Ms. Lively arrived in a bright tangerine maxi-dress with her father, actor Ernie Lively, who also plays her dad in the film. Joining her on the red carpet were Gossip Girl’s Chace Crawford, Ed Westwick, Leighton Meester and Matthew Settle (a.k.a. emo-hunk dad Rufus Humphrey), though Mr. Badgley took the back entrance.

“The only thing that has changed is that Blake and I are always working and we never get to see each other even if we’re filming around the corner from each other,” Ms. Ferrera told the Transom. “So we’re just busier, that’s all.”

“One day the girls were on mopeds and they collided, and I think Blake hurt her ankle,” said Rebekah Aramini, who plays Ms. Bledel’s mother. “And there was this donkey that basically carried her up the mountain to the next scene. She’s a celebrity, but I saw her riding a donkey up a hill!” Oh no you di-in’t!

ialeksander@observer.com

Beyond all the jiggles and giggles, the nougat at the core of this promo clip—a sewing-circle interview of Hillary Clinton conducted by Traveling Pants sister Amber Tamblyn, Ugly Betty star America Ferrera and the inside of her mouth (Chelsea Clinton is apparently there, too)—is d’lish.

After an obligatory joke about Ms. Ferrera’s first name, Ms. Tamblyn—who, fittingly here, is the daughter of Twin Peaks actor Russ Tamblyn—starts the “question-and-answer thing” by launching a hardball query: “What would you say to people who feel peer pressure to vote for Barack Obama, because he’s portrayed as a revolutionary candidate?”

To this, the senator from New York says something quasi-flattering about Mr. Obama before ditching the lamb suit. After all, déjà vu is a dish best served cold. “We need someone who actually has the experience to bring about the change,” Ms. Clinton says.

Next up: Ms. Ferrera gives Katie Couric a run for her money. No, really. “Senator Clinton, my question for you is less about policy and more about your upbringing. What advice did your mother give you that you never forgot? That was the best advice to get you through all of the difficult times when you’ve put yourself in the line of fire?” she asks.

It doesn’t take Ms. Clinton long to recall her mother’s words of advice. And here’s why: “From the moment I was just a really little girl, she said, ‘You have to believe in yourself. You have to know that you’re the only person who can get up every morning and decide how you feel about yourself and how you feel about the world. And you have to really respect what you can do in life. And what you care about and what you do may not be what your friends care about or do, and at the end of the day, do you want to be the lead actor in your own life, or do you want to play a bit part in somebody else’s life?’”

Curiously prophetic, long-winded and even a little hip, right? “She actually said that!” Ms. Clinton insists, dispersing the awkward cloud, if momentarily.

While discussing the pressure on women to lose weight, Ms. Clinton remembers to mention her recent appearance on a talk show hosted by America’s most prolific maker of top models, Tyra Banks, who, the politico says, “is being picked at and criticized.” But that can be solved, she adds, by telling “‘em all to go jump in the lake.” (‘Em, as everyone knows, hates water. Like a cat.)

But the clip’s pièce de résistence is yet to come. For Ms. Ferrera hasn't even shown off her “Hillary Dance”—an impressive concert of movements, it involves raising the arms to a 90-degree angle, hopping, shrieking and turning around in a circle. This is apparently repeated until exhaustion sets in or Mr. Obama gets the nomination. Only time will tell.