1. If you’ve ever been curious about who would win in a potato sack race between Michelle Obama and Jimmy Fallon — well, now you know. The hilarious bit was part of the First Lady’s effort to promote her Let’s Move campaign.

2. Nicki Minaj will be performing her new song “Roman Holiday” at the Grammys this Sunday night before officially releasing her latest Pink Friday: Roman Reloaded single, “Starships,” the following morning on Ryan Seacrest‘s radio show. [via MTV News]

3. Hot on the heels of the Redbox/Verizon deal, Amazon has announced its own plans to partner with Viacom to bring TV shows from all of its networks to the Prime streaming service. [via Slashfilm]

4. Tina Fey is in talks to help filmmaker Shawn Levy (Night at the Museum, Real Steel) bring an adaptation of the popular children’s series Fancy Nancy to the big screen. While it’s not exactly the followup to Mean Girls that we were hoping for, this is excellent news for little girls everywhere. [via EW]

5. An “ambitious plan” by the design firm OLIN will transform the plaza in front of the Metropolitan Museum of Art into “a more efficient, pleasing and environmentally friendly space, with new fountains, tree-shaded allées, seating areas, museum-run kiosks and softer, energy-efficient nighttime lighting.” [via NYT]

Bonus Buzz: Gun-Slingin’ Kristen Wiig Appears On ‘Portlandia’

Soon after the news broke, in June of last year, that Tracy Morgan had launched into a homophobic rant during a stand-up performance, it occurred to us that the incident might turn up in the next season of 30 Rock. Over the years, the show has often addressed real-life controversies involving its cast — a great episode last year, for instance, tackled a dizzying array issues related to women in comedy, from the double-edged sword of Jezebel (known in the episode as “Joan of Snark”) to female comedians who infantilize themselves and use their sexuality to get ahead.

So we weren’t surprised when, earlier this month, we learned that Morgan’s outburst would indeed be worked into the 30 Rock plot. “They’ve incorporated [Morgan's rant] into the Tracy Jordan storyline,” MSNBC anchor Thomas Roberts, who is gay, told The Huffington Post. “Liz Lemon writes Tracy’s apology on the show and says he’s not a homophobe, he’s an idiot. That offends idiots, so while NBC is being picketed by the LBGT community, now it’s also being picketed by idiots led by Denise Richards. She’s the leader of the idiots.” That’s a fairly accurate summary of what happened on 30 Rock last night, but to be honest, the episode sounded far more satisfying when I first read Roberts’ description than it actually turned out to be.

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Last night, NBC honored Golden Girl Betty White with a 90-minute birthday-palooza before the debut of her Punk’d-but-with-old-people candid camera show, Betty White’s Off Their Rockers (just what the world has been waiting for!). The ever-charming White blew kisses to the celebrity presenters, like Amy Poehler and Mary Tyler Moore, who toasted and roasted her with various degrees of success (“I call her a pioneer,” said Poehler, “because 90 years ago she literally arrived to California on stage coach.”) While most cracked wise about her age, some questioned her stance on nude photography, and others just went straight for the make-out session. We’ve filtered through the whole birthday party, from Carl Reiner’s heartfelt birthday note to Jennifer Love Hewitt’s dewy-eyed fan letter, and here are the highlights of the night.

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Let’s face it: We all tuned in to tonight’s Golden Globe Awards to watch Ricky Gervais rip into celebrities. Unfortunately for those of us hoping to indulge in some Hollywood schadenfreude, aside from a few delicious digs in his opening monologue, Gervais didn’t really have his spear sharpened. But that doesn’t mean the entire evening was without its memorable, unexpected moments. Although you never can tell exactly what comes from the script and what’s spontaneous on an awards show, we’ve pointed out a few highlights we’re pretty sure weren’t planned, from Tina Fey photobombing Amy Poehler to Michelle Williams’ touching acceptance speech.

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An eight-month hiatus can be difficult for any primetime, network TV show to overcome. Fans may have changed their viewing habits or lost their place in the story line or simply forgotten that the series was coming back. It’s hard to know how the break will affect 30 Rock, which has a couple million deeply loyal viewers yet is always struggling to maintain its humble ratings. But one thing is sure: Despite some promising preview clips, Tina Fey’s wonderful sitcom will be faced with a few unusual obstacles when it returns January 12th.

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This holiday season, Patrón Tequila came up with a great way to give something to your friends without emptying your wallet. With the “If” Tag app, you can select from a variety of hypothetical scenarios (such as, “If aliens invade, zombies attack, or the robots rise up, you’d be the John Connor to my Kyle Reese), and then select a friend who gets the honor of being your first choice for the gig. You can add a personal message, and then post the whole award right to your friend’s Facebook wall. We were having so much fun with it, in fact, that we decided to take it one step further and pick our top celebrity choices for a number of the “If” scenarios. Click through to see who came out on top for our editors, and why each pop-culture pick made the grade. And if you want to play too, just choose a scenario yourself and tell us who you want in on it in the comments.

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More and more memoirs seem to come out every year — a product, perhaps, in our unslakable interest in the human condition — but as far as we’re concerned, 2011 was a particularly great one. We had actually wonderful celebrity memoirs, unusual and experimental prose, and particular standouts in the traditional memoir fields of family history and tragedy. Click through to read about our favorite memoirs of the year, and since we can’t possibly have read all the great ones out there, be sure to chime in with your own picks in the comments. One note: the last entry on the list — a really fantastic book — may be slightly NSFW. Proceed with caution.

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1. José Angel Santana, a 58-year-old former professor at NYU, says that he lost his job after giving James Franco a D in “Directing the Actor II,” and is now suing the university. Apparently the bad grade was attendance related; Franco only showed up for two of the fourteen classes. [via Vulture]

2. Now that Grinderman is “over,” Jim Sclavunos reports that Nick Cave And The Bad Seeds could be releasing a follow up to their 2008 album Dig, Lazarus, Dig!!! as early as next year. [via NME]

3. Maya Angelou, who recently collaborated with Common on a track that appears on his forthcoming album, The Dreamer, The Believer, was “surprised and disappointed” to find out that the song “used the ‘N’ word numerous times.” His response? “I told her what ‘The Dreamer’ was about and what I wanted to get across to people. I wanted young people to hear this and feel like they could really accomplish their dreams.” [via ArtsBeat]

4. This weekend’s Jimmy Fallon-hosted installment of Saturday Night Live scored the show’s highest ratings of the season so far. No doubt appearances by former castmembers — including Tina Fey, Amy Poehler, Tracy Morgan, and Rachel Dratch — as well as a Jude Law cameo (who seemed to be channeling Michael Stipe in that hat), helped out. [via Deadline]

5. Pulling in a respectable $40 million, Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows topped the weekend box office, followed by Alvin and the Chipmunks: Chipwrecked ($23.5 million), and Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol ($13 million). When you consider that Mission: Impossible was only playing at around 425 IMAX theaters, that number seems a lot more impressive. [via Digital Spy]

Bonus Buzz: 8 Tyrannical Dictators Still Alive And In Power

The ’90s were back for a whole hour last night on Saturday Night Live — in a good way. Hosted by Jimmy Fallon for the first time since he was a cast member, the holiday-themed episode featured cameos from such legendary favorites as Rachel Dratch, Amy Poehler, Horatio Sanz, Chris Kattan, Tracy Morgan, and Tina Fey — not to mention an appearance by Jude Law just to keep things somewhat grounded in the present day. All in all, Fallon’s ease with the sketches and obvious, overwhelming glee to be back on the show made the evening a warm, fuzzy, holiday delight. Click through to watch our favorite (and least favorite) skits of the night, and let us know whether you were taken in by the magic of the moment or thought the whole thing was rather ho-ho-hum in the comments.

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We’ve got good news and bad news. The bad news is that our “Liz Lemon is pregnant” prediction seems somewhat less likely after seeing NBC’s new five-minute 30 Rock promo. But the good news is that NBC released a five-minute 30 Rock promo, packed with wonderful moments. It looks like Kelsey Grammer, Denise Richards, and Will Arnett will all pop up in Season 6. Then there’s James Marsden, who’s on board as Liz Lemon’s new slacker boyfriend. Meanwhile, it seems we’ll be getting plenty of updates on Avery, who’s still being held captive in North Korea (hopefully this means more Margaret Cho as Kim Jong-il). Most exciting to us, though, is the introduction of new cast member (!) Kristen Schaal’s character, “Hazel Whatshername,” a TGS page who idolizes Liz Lemon. Treat yourself to five minutes of preview hilarity below.

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