Perrier

In the fall of 1979, Michael Jackson completes his "Off The Wall" album. It goes on to sell more than 5 million copies and establish him as the hardest thing for a child star to become: an adult star. In celebration, the kid who spent his childhood with his brothers, his family and the musicians of Motown decides to branch out. In 1980, he travels to New Hampshire to spend a month on the set of "On Golden Pond" with Katharine Hepburn, Jane Fonda and Henry Fonda. He was there to learn about acting.

L ILI TAYLOR says she went after "Future Weather" rather than the indie film going after her. Taylor, whose many credits include "Six Feet Under" and "Say Anything," was a juror on a Nantucket Film Festival screenplay contest and chose writer/director Jenny Deller 's script. "I met her at the festival and said I'd love to grab a coffee with you and talk to you, and it just worked out naturally," Taylor told us Friday. In the film, she plays a science teacher who develops a special relationship with a girl obsessed with global warming.

BETHLEHEM, Pa. - Sands Casino Resort - which in January eclipsed Parx as the leader in table-game revenue for the fourth time since July 2010's start of blackjack and poker in the state - marked the grand opening Thursday of the latest arrivals to its new shopping mall. The Shoppes at Sands, a high-end outlet mall, is the first in a Pennsylvania casino. A half-dozen stores opened Nov. 1, followed by staggered openings over the last 3 1/2 months. Four more shops were added Thursday: Coach Factory, Chico's, Peeps & Co., and Corningware Corelle & More.

WHEN GEORGES Perrier takes the stage at the Philadelphia International Festival of the Arts gala tonight at the Kimmel Center, the chef's 40 years of culinary achievements will command the spotlight. Before a crowd of 850 arts patrons, French chefs and Francophiles, Perrier will accept the Culinary Visionary Award for his contribution to the culture of Philadelphia and his accomplishments as a member of the esteemed Maîtres Cusiniers de France (Master Chefs of France). Accolades are nothing new for the Lyon, France-born chef.

The landlord came to Brasserie Perrier on New Year's Eve bearing a bottle of Champagne - and the sudden end of an era. The celebrated Brasserie, an 11-year fixture on Walnut Street and Georges Perrier's second restaurant, would close for good that night with little warning. The staff would not get official word until after more than 285 customers had been served their New Year's feast. But the deal, long in the works, had been sealed late that afternoon when landlord Dan Dilella of Vesper Group Properties arrived with the paperwork to release Brasserie early from its lease so it could be replaced with a more lucrative retail tenant.

Arrogance. It takes a certain brand of arrogance to advocate spending $823 billion in four years for the most massive peacetime military buildup in U.S. history, then to veto an $18 billion bill designed to help make this nation's water fit for human use over the next eight years. Arrogance is a kind way to describe President Reagan's veto of legislation that mandated controls on pollution-causing runoff, special efforts to clean up concentrations of hazardous chemicals in bodies of water, and tougher penalties against polluters.

Last week's bold decision by CBS-owned talk station WPHT-AM (1210) to revamp its lineup after New Year's - shifting Michael Smerconish from mornings to afternoons; hiring Chris Stigall from Kansas City, Mo., to do mornings; moving Dom Giordano to middays - leaves no room for syndicated hosts Glenn Beck and Sean Hannity . WPHT aims for more local programming. "Advertisers love the 'live read,' and there's more they can do with a local host," says Tom Taylor of Radio-Info.

Francesco Martorella, executive chef at Georges Perrier's Brasserie Perrier since its opening three years ago, served up his resignation Friday at the posh Walnut Street eatery, effective the end of next month. Martorella, 41, trained at the Culinary Institute of America, and worked at the Four Seasons, Ciboulette, and the Ritz-Carlton before joining Perrier at Le Bec-Fin in 1996. "I wish him well," said Perrier, who declined to identify Martorella's replacement. Martorella's departure comes as Perrier is empire-building; he recently announced that he would develop a third restaurant, in Wayne.

The water that bubbles up from Sasoonan Spring in northern Chester County is so pristine that, for four decades, the Great Bear Water Co. has been bottling it and selling it to the health-minded for its purity. The company was considered a good neighbor in rural South Coventry Township because it never took more water than what rose naturally into the spring. But Great Bear is considered a good neighbor no more. The company is facing intense opposition from area residents and politicians over its plan to drill a well at the spring and pump 95,000 gallons a day from the same supply that provides drinking water to the people who live here.