澳洲新闻 (ABC新闻快递) 2011-08-03（在线收听）

It was a supercalifragilisticexpialidocious evening at the Helpmann Awards in Sydney’s Opera House last night. Mary Poppins scored a record eight awards from 12 nominations including best musical and best male and female actors in the musical. It also won best direction and choreography of a musical, best sound design and best music direction. Oscar winners Cate Blanchett and Geoffrey Rush were also honoured with best actor awards.

The final instalment of the Harry Potter series has reached a milestone at the worldwide box office. Warner Bros says “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows-Part 2” has earned more than $1 billion. That’s US, that’s almost 1.5 billion Aussie dollars. It’s become the highest earning movie in the eight-part wizard series. The 2009 epic Avatar holds the record for the biggest global haul, earning almost three times that.

Kings of Leon have cancelled the rest of their US tour after the band failed to finish a concert in Dallas. Frontman Caleb Followill left the stage on the weekend with three songs remaining. The official reason: heat exhaustion and dehydration were causing his vocal cords to seize. But that appears to be only part of the story. Later, bassist Jared Followill twittered: “There are problems in our band, bigger than not drinking enough Gatorade.”