'Skyfall' launches back to top spot with $10.8M

LOS ANGELES (AP) — The James Bond blockbuster "Skyfall" has risen back to the No. 1 spot at the weekend box office, taking in $10.8 million.

That brought its domestic total to $261.4 million and its worldwide haul to a franchise record of $918 million.

The top 20 movies at U.S. and Canadian theaters Friday through Sunday, followed by distribution studio, gross, number of theater locations, average receipts per location, total gross and number of weeks in release, as compiled Monday by Hollywood.com are:

1. "Skyfall," Sony, $10,780,201, 3,401 locations, $3,170 average, $261,400,281, five weeks.

2. "Rise of the Guardians," Paramount, $10,400,618, 3,639 locations, $2,858 average, $61,774,192, three weeks.

3. "The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn — Part 2," Summit, $9,156,265, 3,646 locations, $2,511 average, $268,691,029, four weeks.

4. "Lincoln," $8,916,813, 2,014 locations, $4,427 average, $97,137,447, five weeks.

5. "Life of Pi," Fox, $8,330,764, 2,946 locations, $2,828 average, $60,948,293, three weeks.

6. "Playing For Keeps," FilmDistrict, $5,750,288, 2,837 locations, $2,027 average, $5,750,288, one week.

7. "Wreck-It Ralph," Disney, $4,859,368, 2,746 locations, $1,770 average, $164,402,934, six weeks.

8. "Red Dawn," FilmDistrict, $4,236,105, 2,754 locations, $1,538 average, $37,240,920, three weeks.

9. "Flight," Paramount, $3,130,305, 2,431 locations, $1,288 average, $86,202,541, six weeks.

10. "Killing Them Softly," Weinstein Co., $2,806,901, 2,424 locations, $1,158 average, $11,830,638, two weeks.

11. "Silver Linings Playbook," Weinstein Co., $2,171,665, 371 locations, $5,854 average, $13,964,405, four weeks.

12. "Anna Karenina," Focus, $1,544,859, 422 locations, $3,661 average, $6,603,042, four weeks.

13. "The Collection," LD Entertainment, $1,487,655, 1,403 locations, $1,060 average, $5,455,328, two weeks.

14. "Argo," Warner Bros., $1,482,346, 944 locations, $1,570 average, $103,160,015, nine weeks.

15. "End of Watch," Open Road Films, $751,623, 1,259 locations, $597 average, $39,989,766, 12 weeks.

16. "Hitchcock," Fox Searchlight, $712,544, 181 locations, $3,937 average, $1,661,670, three weeks.

17. "Talaash," Reliance Big Pictures, $449,195, 161 locations, $2,790 average, $2,397,909, two weeks.

18. "Taken 2," Fox, $387,227, 430 locations, $901 average, $137,700,304, 10 weeks.

19. "Pitch Perfect," Universal, $305,765, 387 locations, $790 average, $63,517,408, 11 weeks.

20. "The Sessions," Fox, $218,973, 197 locations, $1,112 average, $4,948,342, eight weeks.

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Online:

http://www.hollywood.com

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Universal and Focus are owned by NBC Universal, a unit of Comcast Corp.; Sony, Columbia, Sony Screen Gems and Sony Pictures Classics are units of Sony Corp.; Paramount is owned by Viacom Inc.; Disney, Pixar and Marvel are owned by The Walt Disney Co.; Miramax is owned by Filmyard Holdings LLC; 20th Century Fox and Fox Searchlight are owned by News Corp.; Warner Bros. and New Line are units of Time Warner Inc.; MGM is owned by a group of former creditors including Highland Capital, Anchorage Advisors and Carl Icahn; Lionsgate is owned by Lions Gate Entertainment Corp.; IFC is owned by AMC Networks Inc.; Rogue is owned by Relativity Media LLC.

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Vital Signs: Smoking Tied to Less Dense Bones for Girls

Smoking in teenage girls is associated with slower development of bone mineral density, a new study reports.

The scientists studied 262 healthy girls ages 11 to 19, using questionnaires and interviews to assess their smoking habits. The researchers also measured the girls’ bone density at the hip and lumbar spine three times at one-year intervals.

Smokers entered adolescence with the same lumbar and hip bone density as nonsmokers, but by age 19, they were about a year behind on average. After adjusting for other factors that affect bone health — height, weight, hormonal contraceptive use and more — the researchers found that even relatively low or irregular rates of smoking were independently associated with lower bone density.

The study, published last week in The Journal of Adolescent Health, used a sample that fell below national averages for calcium intake and physical activity, so the results may not be generalizable to wider populations.

The lead author, Lorah D. Dorn, a professor of pediatrics at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital, pointed out that this is only one study and that more research is needed. Still, she said, “It tells me that for care providers — clinicians and parents — this needs to be something they’re vigilant about.”

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Airline fees sap the joy out of flying

Remember when you liked to fly? Bill Knauer does.

Knauer, 76, of Laguna Niguel, spent his career in the food industry. He hopscotched all over the country peddling his wares.

Fun fact: Knauer says he was the young Swanson executive who introduced TV dinners to Los Angeles in 1959.

"I had to fly all the time back then," he told me. "It was very enjoyable."

Not anymore.

What follows won't be a news flash to today's air travelers. But Knauer's recent experience with US Airways struck me as a fairly typical example of how a struggling industry has gone out of its way to treat its customers like litter-box leavings.

And passengers take the abuse because, well, what choice do we have?

Airlines are expected to pocket more than $36 billion in revenue from fees this year, according to the Amadeus Worldwide Estimate of Ancillary Revenue, an annual industry report. This is 11.3% more than last year.

Quiz: The year in business

For the last decade, Knauer and his four brothers, ranging in age from 73 to 87, have convened each year in Minnesota for a family get-together. As Knauer observes, none of them are getting any younger.

For this year's September reunion, he bought a nonrefundable, round-trip coach ticket for $443 with US Airways in March. Knauer knew such an early booking was risky, but he figured, as someone living on a fixed income, this would be the best way to hedge against rising fuel prices.

It looked like a prudent bet. The International Air Transport Assn. estimates that fuel now accounts for about a third of carriers' costs worldwide. This percentage is only expected to grow as increasing demand pushes oil prices higher amid a gradual economic recovery.

When I priced a ticket with US Airways the other day for the same trip Knauer booked, the cost was $562.

Unfortunately, Knauer bet wrong. The wife of his brother in Minnesota contracted Lyme's disease in August, and the annual reunion had to be called off. So Knauer got in touch with the airline to see about rescheduling.

Sure, it was possible, but US Airways said he'd have to pay a $150 "change fee."

"That seemed pretty excessive," Knauer said, noting that discount carrier Frontier Airlines had dinged one of his other brothers with a fee of just $75 to reschedule his flight.

Tough, US Airways replied. You want to change with us? That'll be $150.

And he could consider himself lucky. If he'd been booked on an international flight, the airline's change fee would have been a whopping $250.

Don't you love how airlines reserve the right to bump you from the plane if they overbook a flight, which they routinely do, yet insist that if you have to make a change, it's this major hassle requiring a hefty penalty?

Anyway, Knauer agreed to the change fee but then had another curveball thrown his way. For his $150, he'd purchased the right to book another flight at any time during the next year.

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Jenni Rivera, Mexican American music star, feared dead in plane crash

Mexican American singer Jenni Rivera, a popular recording artist and reality television star, is feared dead after a small plane crashed early Sunday in northern Mexico. 

Mexico's Ministry of Transportation and Communications said the Learjet carrying seven people, including Rivera, was found in mountainous terrain near Nuevo Leon, just south of Monterrey. There were no survivors, authorities said.

The plane left Monterrey around 3:30 a.m., following a concert that she had given, according to the Associated Press. The U.S.-registered Learjet 25 was headed to Toluca, near Mexico City.

PHOTOS: Jenni Rivera missing

The 43-year-old Long Beach native, known to fans as "la diva de la banda," was best known for her interpretations of regional Mexican music, norteno and banda. She was one of NBCUniversal's biggest bilingual television stars, with a hugely popular reality show, "I Love Jenni," on cable channel Mun2. 

She also had a syndicated weekly radio program and clothing and cosmetics lines -- all designed to appeal to U.S. Latinas. The ABC television network was developing a sitcom starring Rivera, tentatively titled "Jenni," about a strong-willed Latina single mother.

According to Nielsen SoundScan, Rivera has sold 1.2 million albums and 349,000 digital tracks in the United States.

Rivera belonged to one of the most important dynasties in contemporary U.S.-based Mexican music. Her father, Pedro Rivera, launched the independent label Cintas Acuario in 1987; it grew out of a booth at an area swap meet. Her four brothers were also involved in music, and her younger brother Lupillo also is a wildly popular Mexican regional singer.

According to her Telemundo biography, Rivera didn't plan on joining the family's musical dynasty. But after an early marriage ended in divorce, she obtained a college degree in business administration and worked in real estate before going to work for her father's record label.

Her debut, "Chacalosa" (slang for "party girl"), was her introduction to the music scene. She eventually signed with Fonovisa, one of the most prominent labels in regional Mexican music, and began releasing bestselling Latin music CDs.

More than 16,000 people attended a concert that she headlined last year at Staples Center in Los Angeles. She was scheduled to appear next March at L.A.'s Gibson Amphitheatre.

So many fans flocked to a record-signing event in Riverside last year that police reportedly were called to help disperse the massive crowd.

Her tumultuous life included an early marriage and pregnancy, domestic abuse and divorce. She wove some of those themes into her songs and was an advocate for social responsibility. She founded a charitable organization, the Jenni Rivera Love Foundation, offering support to single mothers and victims of domestic abuse in the United States. 

Rivera had five children and a grandchild. Celebrity magazines said she was seeking a divorce from her second husband, former Major League Baseball player Esteban Loaiza.

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Jenni Rivera aboard plane missing in Mexico

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Amazon’s Android Appstore explodes, downloads increase 500% over last year

Amazon’s (AMZN) Appstore is on fire. While the marketplace may not boost as many apps as Google’s (GOOG) Play Store, it has seen substantial growth in the past year. In fact, the company announced on Thursday that its Appstore has seen downloads increase more than 500% since last year. Amazon also revealed that the number of developers utilizing in-app purchasing doubled in the third quarter and that 23 of the top 25 grossing apps now incorporate the technology.

“Amazon offers the best end-to-end solution for app and game developers,” said Aaron Rubenson, Director of Amazon Appstore for Android. “Developers can use Amazon Web Services’ building blocks as the infrastructure for their games. To enhance customer engagement, they can add features like GameCircle’s Leaderboards, Achievements, Friends, and Whispersync. Amazon’s In-App Purchasing allows developers to generate additional income. Finally, since discovery can be a major challenge for app developers, we’re providing more and more ways to help developers reach customers on Amazon, Kindle Fire devices, and in our Appstore. We’re working hard to make lives easier for developers, and to give them more ways to grow their business.”

The success of Amazon’s Appstore is directly related to the success of its Kindle Fire line of tablets. Unlike most Android devices, the Kindle Fire does not include access to Google Play and instead must rely solely on Amazon’s offering for content and applications.

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Plane believed to be singer's found in Mexico

MONTERREY, Mexico (AP) — The wreckage of a small plane believed to be carrying Mexican-American music superstar Jenni Rivera was found in northern Mexico on Sunday and there are no apparent survivors, authorities said.

Transportation and Communications Minister Gerardo Ruiz Esparza said "everything points toward" it being the U.S.-registered Learjet 25 carrying Rivera and six other people to Toluca, outside Mexico City, from Monterrey. The plane had gone missing shortly after takeoff early Sunday.

"There is nothing recognizable, neither material nor human" in the wreckage found in the state of Nuevo Leon, Ruiz Esparza told the Televisa network. The impact was so powerful that the remains of the plane "are scattered over an area of 250 to 300 meters. It is almost unrecognizable."

The wreckage was found near the town of Iturbide in Mexico's Sierra Madre Oriental amid very rough terrain. Authorities have not said why the plane crashed.

Local media in Mexico sent condolences to family of Rivera, who has sold more than 15 million records, but authorities still had not confirmed that Rivera was aboard the plane and said there will be an investigation to identify the remains found.

"My friend! Why? There is no consolation. God help me!" said Mexican songstress Paulina Rubio on her official Twitter account. Singer star Lucero wrote on her Twitter account: "My deepest sympathies for her family and friends. Luz."

Jorge Domene, spokesman for Nuevo Leon's government, said the plane left Monterrey about 3:30 a.m. after Rivera gave a concert there and aviation authorities lost contact with the craft about 10 minutes later. It had been scheduled to arrive in Toluca about an hour later.

Also aboard the plane were her publicist, Arturo Rivera, her lawyer, makeup artist and the flight crew.

The 43-year-old Rivera who was born and raised in Long Beach, California, is one of the biggest stars of the Mexican regional style known as grupero music, which is influenced by the norteno, cumbia and ranchero styles.

The so-called "La Diva de la Banda" was beloved by fans on both sides of the border for songs such as "De Contrabando" and "La Gran Senora."

She recently won two Billboard Mexican Music Awards: Female Artist of the Year and Banda Album of the Year for "Joyas prestadas: Banda." She has also been nominated various times for Latin Grammys.

The singer, businesswoman and actress appeared in the indie film Filly Brown, which appeared at the Sundance Film Festival, as the incarcerated mother of Filly Brown. She has her own reality shows including "I Love Jenni" and "Jenni Rivera Presents: Chiquis and Raq-C" and her daughter's "Chiquis 'n Control."

Rivera had given a concert before thousands of fans in Monterrey on Saturday night. After the concert she gave a press conference during which she spoke of her emotional state following her recent divorce from former Major League Baseball pitcher Esteban Loaiza, who played for teams including the New York Yankees and Los Angeles Dodgers.

"I can't get caught up in the negative because that destroys you. Perhaps trying to move away from my problems and focus on the positive is the best I can do. I am a woman like any other and ugly things happen to me like any other woman," she said Saturday night. "The number of times I have fallen down is the number of times I have gotten up."

The mother of five children and grandmother of two had announced in October that she was divorcing Loaiza after two years of marriage. It was her third marriage.

She was proud to present herself as a Latina woman struggling to give a good life to her children and her songs often reflected her troubles with love and disgust with men.

"I am the same as the public, as my fans," she told The Associated Press in an interview last March.

Rivera is the sister of Mexican singer Lupillo Rivera. Patricia Chavez of Lupillo Rivera's office in the United States told The AP that "for now we don't have any information that would be useful."

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Associated Press Writer Galia Garcia-Palafox contributed to this report from Mexico City.

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A Breakthrough Against Leukemia Using Altered T-Cells

PHILIPSBURG, Pa. — Emma Whitehead has been bounding around the house lately, practicing somersaults and rugby-style tumbles that make her parents wince.

It is hard to believe, but last spring Emma, then 6, was near death from leukemia. She had relapsed twice after chemotherapy, and doctors had run out of options.

Desperate to save her, her parents sought an experimental treatment at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, one that had never before been tried in a child, or in anyone with the type of leukemia Emma had. The experiment, in April, used a disabled form of the AIDS virus to reprogram Emma’s immune system genetically to kill cancer cells.

The treatment very nearly killed her. But she emerged from it cancer-free, and seven months later is still in complete remission. She is the first child and one of the first humans ever in whom new techniques have achieved a long-sought goal — giving a patient’s own immune system the lasting ability to fight cancer.

Emma had been ill with acute lymphoblastic leukemia since 2010, when she was 5, her parents, Kari and Tom, said. She is their only child.

She is among just a dozen patients with advanced leukemia to have received the experimental treatment, which was developed at the University of Pennsylvania. Similar approaches are also being tried at other centers, including the National Cancer Institute and Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York.

“Our goal is to have a cure, but we can’t say that word,” said Dr. Carl June, who leads the research team at the University of Pennsylvania. He hopes the new treatment will eventually replace bone-marrow transplantation, an even more arduous, risky and expensive procedure that is now the last hope when other treatments fail in leukemia and related diseases.

Three adults with chronic leukemia treated at the University of Pennsylvania have also had complete remissions, with no signs of disease; two of them have been well for more than two years, said Dr. David Porter. Four adults improved but did not have full remissions, and one was treated too recently to evaluate. A child improved and then relapsed. In two adults, the treatment did not work at all. The Pennsylvania researchers are presenting their results on Sunday and Monday in Atlanta at a meeting of the American Society of Hematology.

Despite the mixed results, cancer experts not involved with the research say it has tremendous promise, because even in this early phase of testing it has worked in seemingly hopeless cases.

“I think this is a major breakthrough,” said Dr. Ivan Borrello, a cancer expert and associate professor of medicine at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine.

Dr. John Wagner, director of pediatric blood and marrow transplantation at the University of Minnesota, called the Pennsylvania results “phenomenal,” and said they were “what we’ve all been working and hoping for but not seeing to this extent.”

A major drug company, Novartis, is betting on the Penn team, and has committed $20 million to building a research center on the Penn campus to bring the treatment to market.

Hervé Hoppenot, president of Novartis Oncology, called the research “fantastic” and said it had the potential — if the early results hold up — to revolutionize the treatment of leukemia and related blood cancers. Researchers say the same approach, reprogramming the patient’s immune system, may also be used eventually against tumors like breast and prostate cancer.

To perform the treatment, doctors remove millions of the patient’s T-cells — a type of white blood cell — and insert new genes that enable the T-cells to kill cancer cells. The new genes program the T-cells to attack B-cells, a normal part of the immune system that turns malignant in leukemia.

The altered T-cells — called chimeric antigen receptor cells — are then dripped back into the patient’s veins, and if all goes well they multiply like crazy and start destroying the cancer.

The T-cells home in on a protein called CD-19 that is found on the surface of most B-cells, whether they are healthy or malignant.

A sign that the treatment is working is that the patient becomes terribly ill, with raging fevers and chills — a reaction that oncologists call “shake and bake,” Dr. June said. Its medical name is cytokine-release syndrome, or cytokine storm, referring to the natural chemicals that pour out of cells in the immune system as they are being activated, causing fevers and other symptoms. The storm can also flood the lungs and cause perilous drops in blood pressure — effects that nearly killed Emma.

Steroids sometimes ease the reaction, but did not help Emma. Her temperature hit 105. She wound up on a ventilator, unconscious and swollen almost beyond recognition, surrounded by friends and family who had come to say goodbye.

But at the eleventh hour, a battery of blood tests gave the researchers a clue as to what might help save Emma: Her level of one of the cytokines, interleukin-6 or IL-6, had shot up a thousandfold. Doctors had never seen such a spike before and thought it might be what was making her so sick. Dr. June knew that a drug could lower IL-6 — his daughter takes it, for rheumatoid arthritis. It had never been used for a crisis like Emma’s, but there was little to lose. Her oncologist, Dr. Stephan A. Grupp, ordered the drug. The response, he said, was “amazing.”

Within hours, Emma began to stabilize. She woke up a week later, on May 2, the day she turned 7; the intensive-care staff sang “Happy Birthday.”

Since then, the research team has used the same drug, tocilizumab, in several other patients.

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Jenni Rivera aboard plane missing in Mexico

CAPTIONS

Jenni Rivera performs at the Latin Billboard Awards
Jenni Rivera performs during the Latin Billboard Awards in Coral Gables, Fla. Authorities in Mexico say the wreckage of a small plane believed to be carrying Rivera has been found and there are no apparent survivors. (Lynne Sladky / Associated Press /April 26, 2012)

By Meg James

December 9, 2012, 1:05 p.m.

A small plane carrying Mexican American singer Jenni Rivera is missing and believed to have crashed in northern Mexico early Sunday.

The Associated Press reported the plane, a Learjet, left Monterrey about 3:30 a.m. after a concert by Rivera. The pilot lost contact with air traffic contollers about 10 minutes after its departure. It was scheduled to arrive in Toluca, near Mexico City, about an hour later.

An NBCUniversal spokeswoman confirmed that Rivera was aboard the plane. Seven people, including the pilots and crew, were believed to be on the plane.

PHOTOS: Jenni Rivera missing

The Long Beach native's career has been soaring. The 43-year-old singer is best known for her interpretations of regional Mexican music, norteno and banda. She also is one of NBCUniversal's brightest bilingual television stars.

Her reality show on the Telemundo cable channel, mun2, "I Love Jenni," has been one of the channel's highest rated shows. The program is in its second year.

ABC television network was reportedly considering casting Rivera as a star of a prime-time sitcom in development about a strong-willed single Latina mother.

The AP said that a search for the plane was launched early Sunday.

[Updated 3:37 p.m.: Mexican transportation officials have reported the wreckage of the plane believed to be carrying Rivera has been located and no one appears to have survived the crash.

Read more: Jenni Rivera, Mexican American music star, feared dead in plane crash]

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Surgeon infected patients during heart procedure, Cedars-Sinai admits

A heart surgeon at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center unwittingly infected five patients during valve replacement surgeries earlier this year, causing four of the patients to need a second operation.

The infections occurred after tiny tears in the latex surgical gloves routinely worn by the doctor allowed bacteria from a skin inflammation on his hand to pass into the patients' hearts, according to the hospital. The patients survived the second operation and are still recovering, hospital officials said.

The outbreak led to investigations by the hospital and both the L.A. County and California departments of public health. The federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention was also consulted.

Hospital officials called it a "very unusual occurrence" probably caused by an unfortunate confluence of events: the nature of the surgery, the microscopic rips in the gloves and the surgeon's skin condition. Valve replacement requires the surgeon to use thick sutures and tie more than 100 knots, which can cause extra stress on the gloves, they said.

Nevertheless, the hospital's goal is to have zero infections, said Harry Sax, vice chairman of the hospital's department of surgery. "Any hospital-acquired infection is unacceptable," he said.

The infections raise questions about what health conditions should prevent a surgeon from operating and how to get the best protection from surgical gloves. Surgeons with open sores or known infections aren't supposed to operate, but there is no national standard on what to do if they have skin inflammation, said Rekha Murthy, medical director of the hospital's epidemiology department. She added that there were also no national standards on types of gloves used, whether to wear double gloves or how many times surgeons should change those gloves during a procedure.

Healthcare-acquired infections are very common throughout the United States. Each year, infections cause 99,000 deaths in the country, including about 12,000 in California. Hospitals in the state are required to report certain infections to the California Department of Public Health. That reporting makes the public more aware of the quality of care provided at local hospitals and is an important tool for reducing infections, said Debby Rogers, deputy director of the department's Center for Health Care Quality.

Cedars-Sinai has low rates for hospital-acquired infections compared with the state and national average but has not performed as well on other surgical quality measures recently, according to the Leapfrog Group, an employer-backed nonprofit focused on healthcare quality. The organization gave the hospital a C rating last month on its national report card, down from an A in June, though it was not related to the infection outbreak.

"Clearly this hospital is making attempts to reduce infections, but they have more work to do," said Leah Binder, Leapfrog's chief executive.

Cedars-Sinai Medical Center conducts about 360 valve replacement surgeries each year and said infections occur in fewer than 1% of its cases — lower than the national average.

The hospital learned about the problem in June after three patients who had undergone valve replacement surgery showed signs of infection. Doctors diagnosed the patients with an infection called endocarditis. Concerned there might be a connection among the cases, epidemiologists analyzed the bacteria, staphylococcus epidermidis, and determined that it was an identical strain and therefore must have come from a single source. "It led to the question of gee, I wonder where it came from?" Murthy said.

Epidemiologists homed in on the surgeon with the skin inflammation. The bacteria matched, and then they made a surprising discovery: microscopic tears in the gloves typically worn by surgeons after performing valve replacement surgery. The surgeon, whose name was not released, was not allowed to operate again until he healed. He is still a member of the medical staff but no longer performs surgeries at the hospital.

The hospital soon found the same infection in two more patients. Officials also reached out to 67 patients who had heart valve replacements with the same surgeon but didn't find any other cases. One of the five infected patients was treated with antibiotics, and the other four had new valve replacement surgeries. Sax said the hospital apologized to the patients and has continued to monitor their health. The hospital has also covered the cost of their care, including follow-up treatment and all the related surgeries.

All surgeons doing valve replacements are now required to change gloves more frequently, officials said. Some surgeons are wearing double gloves during the operations, Sax said.

Following the outbreak, Cedars-Sinai did the proper follow-up to ensure the safety of their patients, said Dawn Terashita, a medical epidemiologist with L.A. County, who was notified in September. What occurred at Cedars-Sinai was an unintentional consequence of the surgery, she said.

"There is no way to keep a room entirely sterile and all the people in it sterile," she said. "You will always have risk of infection."

anna.gorman@latimes.com

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Rolling Stones hit NY for 50th anniversary gig

NEW YORK (AP) — "Time Waits for No One," the Rolling Stones sang in 1974, but lately it's seemed like that grizzled quartet does indeed have some sort of exemption from the ravages of time.

At an average age of 68-plus years, the British rockers are clearly in fighting form, sounding tight, focused and truly ready for the spotlight at a rapturously received pair of London concerts last month.

On Saturday, Mick Jagger, Keith Richards, Ronnie Wood and Charlie Watts hit New York for the first of three U.S. shows on their "50 and Counting" mini-tour, marking a mind-boggling half-century since the band first began playing its unique brand of blues-tinged rock.

And the three shows — Saturday's at the new Barclays Center in Brooklyn, then two in Newark, N.J., on Dec. 13 and 15 — aren't the only big dates on the agenda. Next week the Stones join a veritable who's who of British rock royalty and U.S. superstars at the blockbuster 12-12-12 Sandy benefit concert at Madison Square Garden. Also scheduled to perform: Paul McCartney, the Who, Eric Clapton, Bruce Springsteen & The E Street Band, Alicia Keys, Kanye West, Eddie Vedder, Billy Joel, Roger Waters and Chris Martin.

The Stones' three U.S. shows promise to have their own special guests, too. Mary J. Blige will be at the Brooklyn gig, as well as guitarist Gary Clark Jr., the band has announced. (Blige performed a searing "Gimme Shelter" with frontman Jagger in London.) Rumors are swirling of huge names at the Dec. 15 show, which also will be on pay-per-view.

In a flurry of anniversary activity, the band also released a hits compilation last month with two new songs, "Doom and Gloom" and "One More Shot," and HBO premiered a new documentary on their formative years, "Crossfire Hurricane."

The Stones formed in London in 1962 to play Chicago blues, led at the time by the late Brian Jones and pianist Ian Stewart, along with Jagger and Richards, who'd met on a train platform a year earlier. Bassist Bill Wyman and drummer Charlie Watts were quick additions.

Wyman, who left the band in 1992, was a guest at the London shows last month, as was Mick Taylor, the celebrated former Stones guitarist who left in 1974 — to be replaced by Wood, the newest Stone and the youngster at 65.

The inevitable questions have been swirling about the next step for the Stones: another huge global tour, on the scale of their last one, "A Bigger Bang," which earned more than $550 million between 2005 and 2007? Something a bit smaller? Or is this mini-tour, in the words of their new song, really "One Last Shot"?

The Stones won't say. But in an interview last month, they made clear they felt the 50th anniversary was something to be marked.

"I thought it would be kind of churlish not to do something," Jagger told The Associated Press. "Otherwise, the BBC would have done a rather dull film about the Rolling Stones."

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Associated Press writer David Bauder contributed to this report.

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