Taking Names

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Loss of Life

Time Inc. said yesterday that it will stop publishing Life, the iconic photography magazine that has been featured as a weekly newspaper insert since 2004.

Although April 20 will be Life's last print issue, the brand name will be kept alive on the Internet, according to Time Inc., a unit of Time Warner Inc., Reuters news agency reports. It's the latest magazine to shut down, as more readers desert print publications for online news and photos.

"Growth requires taking risks, and the potential upside was huge, but unfortunately, the timing worked against us," said Time Inc. Chief Executive Ann Moore.

Life has had more than one life since Time started publishing it in 1936. It shut down in 1972 but came back in 1978 and then was shut down again in 2000. Time said it will make Life's collection of 10 million images available online, with "the most important collection of imagery covering the events and people of the 20th century" available for free for personal use.

More than 97 percent of the collection has never been seen by the public, Time said, and includes pictures by Alfred Eisenstaedt, Margaret Bourke-White and Gordon Parks.

Stars in the meadows

Wolf Trap yesterday announced its annual lineup of superstars for its upcoming summer season, with a few surprises on the list.

Among the highlights at the national performing arts park in Vienna: Tony Bennett (June 4), Steely Dan (June 7), Chicago (June 12), British neo-soul singer Joss Stone (with hip-hop artist Common and newcomer Ryan Shaw June 13), the Doobie Brothers (June 19), Cape Verdean folk singer Cesaria Evora with Seu Jorge (June 22), the musical quintet Celtic Woman (June 24), Bill Cosby (June 29), the Smothers Brothers and the Kingston Trio (June 30), Aretha Franklin (July 5), Hootie & the Blowfish (July 8), "Camelot" starring Michael York (July 10 through 15), jazz diva Diana Krall(July 16), classical pianist Lang Lang (with Long Yu conducting July 19), bluesman Robert Cray with James Hunter (July 17) and the Beach Boys for two performances on Aug. 19.

The season gets under way May 25 with "A Prairie Home Companion" with Garrison Keillor. (The live radio broadcast is scheduled for the following day, May 26.) Tickets for all performances go on sale Saturday, and additional shows will be announced April 9. A complete schedule is available online at www.wolftrap.org.

Penn at Penn

Kal Penn, star of the 2004 cult classic "Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle" and most recently "The Namesake," will be a guest instructor at the University of Pennsylvania during the spring 2008 semester, Associated Press reports. The actor, 29, will teach two undergraduate courses, tentatively titled Images of Asian Americans in the Media and Contemporary American Teen Films.

The root of bad vibes

Russell Simmons says being richer than rich doesn't make you happy, the New York Post reports. "If I know 15 billionaires, then I know 13 unhappy people," the hip-hop czar, who co-founded Def Jam Records, writes in his new memoir, "Do You!" just out from Gotham Books.

"These people's lives might be filled with mansions and yachts and private jets, but their medicine cabinets are also filled with antidepressants," Mr. Simmons says.