Originally published December 22, 2007 at 12:00 AM | Page modified December 22, 2007 at 12:24 AM

Odds and Ends

Bertinelli divorce is final

Celebrity gossip, famous birthdays and other tidbits, compiled from Seattle Times news services.

People

After seven years of separation, Eddie Van Halen, 52, and actress Valerie Bertinelli, 47, have completed an amicable divorce. The Los Angeles Superior Court judgment Thursday didn't provide details about a custody arrangement for their son, Wolfgang, 16. The bass player is with his father on a Van Halen reunion tour. Bertinelli cited irreconcilable differences when she filed for divorce in December 2005. The couple married in 1981.

Jeweler sues Klum

Luxury jeweler Van Cleef & Arpels sued German supermodel and television star Heidi Klum's company Friday, claiming she copied a vintage clover jewelry design. The suit, filed in Manhattan federal court, seeks more than $25,000 in damages from Klum's company Heidi Klum GmbH and Mouawad USA, another company for which she has designed jewelry. Van Cleef & Arpels is owned by luxury-goods group Richemont.

Suit over Norris "facts"

Tough-guy actor and martial-arts expert Chuck Norris, real name Carlos Ray Norris, sued publisher Penguin on Friday over a book he claims unfairly exploits his famous name, based on a satirical Internet list of "mythical facts" about him. Penguin published "The Truth About Chuck Norris: 400 facts about the World's Greatest Human" in November. Author Ian Spector and two Web sites he runs to promote the book are also named in the suit. Among the "mythical facts": "Chuck Norris' tears cure cancer. Too bad he has never cried" and "Chuck Norris can charge a cellphone by rubbing it against his beard." The suit, filed in Manhattan federal court, seeks unspecified monetary damages for trademark infringement, unjust enrichment and privacy rights.

Passages

Gar Campbell, 64, an actor and director who for the past 40 years was a linchpin of two of Los Angeles' most respected small stage companies, Company Theater and the Pacific Resident Theatre, died Thursday at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center after a three-year battle with cancer.

Arabella Spencer-Churchill, 58, the unconventional granddaughter of Britain's wartime Prime Minister Winston Churchill and a founder of the Glastonbury rock festival, died of pancreatic cancer in Glastonbury, southwestern England, on Thursday. On the same day, her son, Nicholas Jake Barton, was sentenced to three years in prison in Australia for his part in an Ecstasy drug racket.

Today in History

1894: French army officer Alfred Dreyfus was convicted of treason in a court-martial that triggered worldwide charges of anti-Semitism. (Dreyfus was eventually vindicated.)

1944: During the World War II Battle of the Bulge, U.S. Brig. Gen. Anthony C. McAuliffe rejected the Germans' demand that the Americans surrender, writing "Nuts!" in his official reply.

1984: New York City resident Bernhard Goetz shot and wounded four youths on a Manhattan subway, claiming they were about to rob him.

2001: Richard Reid, a passenger on an American Airlines flight from Paris to Miami, tried to ignite explosives in his shoes but was subdued by flight attendants and other passengers. (He is serving a life sentence in federal prison.)

Today's Birthdays

Former House Speaker Jim Wright, 85. Actor Hector Elizondo, 71. ABC News correspondent Diane Sawyer, 62. Singer Robin Gibb, 58. Rapper Luther Campbell, 47. Actor Ralph Fiennes, 45. Actress Lauralee Bell, 39. Country singer Lori McKenna, 39. Actress Dina Meyer, 39. Actress Heather Donahue, 33. Singer Jordin Sparks ("American Idol"), 18.