After spending 28 years in a coma, heiress Sunny von Bülow, 76, has died, according to the NYT. She was first discovered unconscious on the floor of her Newport, R.I., mansion in 1980, and her husband Claus von Bulow was convicted, but later acquitted, of attempting to murder her with an insulin injection. With characters like "Prince Alexander von Auersperg" (Sunny's son who pushed for Claus' prosecution) and "Maria Schrallhammer" (Sunny's maid), the Dynasty-like tale generated a media frenzy and served as the basis for the Jeremy Irons-Glenn Close film Reversal of Fortune.
Though it's largely forgotten today, the case also served as something of a prequel for the O,J. Simpson legal-media collaboration of the 1990s. Alan Dershowitz (whose book served as the basis of the film) represented Claus in his appeal, while Dominick Dunne wrote extensively on the case, such as his 1985 Vanity Fair story, "Fatal Charm: The Social Web of Claus von Bülow." As for Claus, he's now 82 and living in London, according to a Daily News report last year, enjoying life: "I go to Covent Garden [an opera house], I go to music festivals, I go to Paris."
At the Las Vegas rally for Proposition 8 yesterday, comedian and Adventures of New Christine ingenue Wanda Sykes told a massive crowd of onlookers that she'd gotten married on October 25...to a woman. After divorcing her husband in 1998, many had hoped Sykes would break up Larry David's marriage and claim him for her own. While it looks like that hilarious coupling will never come to pass, we wish the brilliant Sykes all the happiness in the world. Here's what she told the crowd:
Estelle Getty, actress and adorable little old shrunken lady, 
Yesterday, real estate agent to the stars, former 
Madeleine L'Engle, beloved author of our first chapter book A Wrinkle In Time, among many many others, is dead at 88. Thank you, Madeleine L'Engle, for introducing us to the pleasure of the written word. And, later on, for all those hot sexual fantasies about twins Sandy and Dennys Murry. [
New York Times photog Bill Cunningham works the pit outside the funeral, which is set to start at 2:30 p.m., up at St. Thomas Church, Fifth Avenue and 53rd Street.