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40 years after firing, Doors play Whisky

WEST HOLLYWOOD, California (AP) -- The Doors last played the Sunset Strip's Whisky a Go Go on August 21, 1966, and lead singer Jim Morrison's rebellious, shamanistic shouts burned memories into the audience.

The group, whose sound helped define the 1960s, was fired by the famous club that night -- Morrison, keyboardist Ray Manzarek, drummer John Densmore, and guitarist Robby Krieger. They never played the Whisky again ... until now.

On Wednesday night, the rock band's remaining three members -- all gray-haired and in their 60s -- hosted a cacophony of events on the Strip to celebrate the group's 40th anniversary, including a thunderous performance at the Whisky by Manzarek, Krieger and guest musicians. The repertoire included such Doors anthems as "L.A. Woman" and "Light My Fire."

Densmore, estranged from his former mates after a lawsuit over use of the group's name, showed up at the club, but didn't play. A judge last year issued a permanent injunction banning Krieger and Manzarek from calling themselves The Doors and using any likeness of the late Morrison to promote a renewed version of the band.

Earlier in the night, the 61-year-old Densmore expertly beat hand drums and joyfully read snippets of Morrison's darkly sexual and quasi-political poetry down the street at Book Soup. The bookstore fills the site of Morrison's old stomping ground, Cinematique 60.

All three Doors members signed copies of the newly released coffee-table book "The Doors by The Doors."

"To honor whatever creative muse came to us, gifted to us, I do these things. Ray and Robby, whether we're having a rift right now, are musical brothers. I thought if we lasted 10 years, that would be something. Forty? Really? Jeez," Densmore told The Associated Press in a recent phone interview.

Hundreds of fans, from parents toting kids to starry-eyed 21-year-olds and aging rockers, were ecstatic at meeting their idols, even without the larger-than-life presence of Morrison, who died of heart failure in 1971 at age 27 after years of hard living.

"I miss Jim as a friend. Artistically, he was a great poet," Manzarek said over the phone. "That's why we put the band together in the first place, to marry poetry and rock `n' roll, like the beatniks married poetry and jazz."

Morrison's image, of course, will forever remain that of a hip, young voice of a generation. While impossible to know how the ensuing years might have changed that, Krieger, in a phone interview, offered his thoughts.

"Jim Morrison was not the kind of guy who would get old gracefully," Krieger posited. "He would kind of be a mess. I wish he was still here, and I wish we were still making music."

Get an Oscar -- and a Globe

BEVERLY HILLS, California (AP) -- Next month, someone might do what no celebrity has: take home an Oscar and a Golden Globe on the same day.

A 1949 Academy Award and 1980 Golden Globe trophy are among the items available at an auction that begins online Friday and concludes Dec. 16 at the Beverly Hilton Hotel.

The Oscar, a best-picture prize awarded to Robert Rossen Productions for "All the King's Men," is expected to go for more than $30,000, said Darren Julien, president of Julien's Auctions. The Golden Globe, for "Shogun" as the best television-series drama, is likely to ring up at least $2,000.

Other items to be sold at the auction include the Lone Ranger's leather mask, a book inscribed by Amelia Earhart to Mary Pickford and Douglas Fairbanks, unpublished photos of Marilyn Monroe and a lyric sheet for "Backstreets" handwritten by Bruce Springsteen.

Man wins Gold Rush's $1 million

LOS ANGELES, California (AP) -- It didn't take a rocket scientist to win the online pop-culture game Gold Rush, but the Tennessee man who claimed the grand prize of $1 million in gold comes close.

Michael Kearney, 22, of Nashville, with a resume that includes a college degree before he became a teenager and two master's degrees by age 18, emerged as the winner Thursday after 18 finalists were brought to Los Angeles to compete face-to-face.

"Life has always been weird for me," Kearney said in a statement. "I graduated college at 10, so I was always the weird kid. Now I'm the weird kid with money."

Twelve players, including Kearney, won $100,000 in early rounds that led them to gold bars. Six wild-card players joined in the final rounds.

Kearney, who is pursuing a doctorate in chemistry at Middle Tennessee State University, participated in a media experiment: Gold Rush, created by reality TV king Mark Burnett ("Survivor") and AOL, is part of the quest to meld the Internet and television.

The game required players to answer questions about music, movies and other elements of popular culture using clues scattered throughout CBS programming, as well as in magazines, radio and on AOL.com.

The Gold Rush finale taped Tuesday was to air Thursday on "Entertainment Tonight" and be shown on the Gold Rush site throughout November. The game that started in September was hosted by "Entertainment Tonight" co-anchor Mark Steines.

"We broke new territory by bringing a fast-paced, multimedia reality game to the masses and now someone just got rich," Burnett said in a statement. "We look forward to launching another exciting season of Gold Rush next year and make yet another lucky person a millionaire."

More than 11 million people spent an average of more then 16 minutes on visits to Gold Rush, significantly longer than on other sites, said Kevin Conroy, executive vice president of AOL, who lauded it as a "new kind of experience."

AOL is a unit of Time Warner, as is CNN.