Quick Takes: Singer Al Jarreau takes ill

Grammy-award winning singer Al Jarreau was in intensive care in a French hospital Friday after suffering breathing problems in the Alps, forcing him to cancel four concerts.

Jarreau’s manager, Joe Gordon, said the 70-year-old singer “is awake and he’s concerned” about missing concerts. When he said he wanted to eat, the doctors did a little dance, Gordon said.

“He’s only canceled one concert [due] to his health in his entire career,” Gordon said. But he also said, “It was life threatening” and “he’s doing well, considering.”

He said Jarreau hoped to perform Thursday in Nuremberg, Germany.

—Associated Press

Maazel prospers as Phil falters

Lorin Maazel earned nearly $3.3 million in his final season as music director of the New York Philharmonic, according to tax returns the orchestra recently released for the year that ended in August 2009.

That was a $514,038 raise from a year earlier. The Philharmonic itself didn’t do so well: During the same period, it incurred an operating deficit of $4.6 million.

“It’s outrageous,” said Alan Gordon, the head of the American Guild of Musical Artists, a union that represents singers, dancers and production staff and doesn’t do business with the Philharmonic. “While symphonies, dance and opera companies are having financial difficulties, for the Philharmonic to pay that kind of money to anyone is outrageous.”

A Philharmonic spokeswoman declined to comment.

—Bloomberg News

‘Animal Farm: The Musical’

Lee Hall, who teamed with Elton John to write the score for the musical “Billy Elliot,” told the London Daily Mail that the pair are now working on a musical adaptation of “Animal Farm,” George Orwell’s classic 1945 satiric novel about totalitarianism.

“I’m deep into it, writing songs for pigs and other four-legged friends,” Hall said in an interview with the news outlet.

But it’s still a long way off, he cautioned, explaining that John hadn’t even begun composing yet and there are no producers involved so far.

—A Times staff writer

‘OddParents’ to go live-action

After more than a decade in cartoon form, “The Fairly OddParents” is going live-action in the form of a TV movie that will star Drake Bell of “Drake & Josh” as Timmy Turner, now 23 instead of the 10-year-old version that viewers are used to seeing. Nickelodeon, which unveiled the project Friday, said it would air “A Fairly Odd Movie: Grow Up, Timmy Turner!” next year.

“It’s so much fun to see our animated characters come to life,” said Marjorie Cohn, president of original programming and development at Nickelodeon. “And who better to bring grown up Timmy Turner to life than Drake Bell, who himself grew up on our air and still remains one of our most popular Nick stars ever.”

The premise of the movie has Timmy still living at home and attending fifth grade so that he can hang on to his fairy godparents (to be played by Jason Alexander and Cheryl Hines).

—Lee Margulies

‘Saw’ makes way for ‘Activity’

In the battle of the horror giants, Jigsaw has blinked: Lionsgate has pushed back the release date of “Saw 3D” from Oct. 22 to Oct. 29.

The move avoids a looming standoff on Oct. 22, when Paramount was scheduled to open “Paranormal Activity 2” against the seventh entry in the annual “Saw” series.

All of the “Saw” movies since 2004’s original have opened on the weekend before Halloween and Lionsgate had the same plan for this year’s installment.

Last October, “Saw VI” opened on the same weekend that “Paranormal Activity” played in a nationwide release for the first time and grossed a disappointing $14.1 million, compared with $21.1 million for “Paranormal.”

Executives at Lionsgate apparently decided they would rather concede the Oct. 22 date than repeat the same experience.

—Ben Fritz

Autry museum buys guitar

The Autry National Center has purchased Roy Rogers’ first guitar and will add the instrument to its Roy Rogers and Dale Evans archive.

The archive contents are being cataloged and digitally recorded, but some artifacts are now on display in the Imagination Gallery and lobby of the Museum of the American West in Griffith Park, including a plastic saddle that cushioned Rogers as he rode his horse Trigger in the 1952 Tournament of Roses Parade.

The Autry did not disclose how much it paid for the guitar, which was auctioned last week with other memorabilia from the now-closed Roy Rogers and Dale Evans Museum in Missouri.

—Daina Beth Solomon