This article is from the archive of our partner .
Welcome to the Smart Set. Every morning we bring you the day's gossip coverage, filtered. Today: Chris Brown uncorks a truly awful pick-up line, Larry King and CNN are kaput after 27 years, and Oprah is considering a big-screen return.
Chris Brown -- who pleaded guilty to beating the hell out of then-girlfriend Rihanna in 2009 -- apparently approached "an attractive brunette" at a hair salon last Friday and said. "Can I get your number? I promise I won't beat you!" The woman says the singer's entourage started to laugh, with one explaining, "'That's his new line!" Brown's rep responds, none-too-convincingly: "I'd be surprised if Chris said something that stupid." And yet, here we are. [Us Weekly]
Larry King and CNN have "mutually agreed" to part ways after 27 years. Since the end of Larry King Live last January, King had been hosting a series of quarterly specials for the network, one of which, Brian Stelter of The New York Times (today's Media Dieter) notes, was "[a] dinner party with a number of celebrity guests." According to sources, the decision to end King's quarterly pop-ins comes with time still left on his contract. Last month, word leaked that King and richest-man-in-the-world Carlos Slim were plotting a "huge" and vague online venture. Huge! [Media Decoder]