Nia Vardalos, Demi Moore intervene after Florida teen's suicide threat

Actress Nia Vardalos says she was one of the people who, after seeing a suicide threat retweeted on Demi Moore's Twitter feed, called a prevention hot line early Friday morning and alerted authorities to an 18-year-old in distress.

Florida police intervened, and the teen was taken into protective custody for psychiatric evaluation, the Orlando Sentinel reports.

After creating his Twitter account Thursday, the teen sent his first message: "I have messed up my life bad. I'm thinking about killing myself." His other three tweets were directed at Demi Moore, whose @mrskutcher account has almost 2.6 million followers; Moore responded to the first message, "R U rlly asking 4 help?"

Because of how she formatted her reply, the message was visible to all her followers.

Vardalos then directed a message at the teen: "[P]lease call 1 800 SUICIDE. I'm on the phone with them right now. They are waiting to talk to you." A caller who identified herself as Nia told a dispatcher that she'd seen the threat on Moore's feed. The "My Big Fat Greek Wedding" actress, with more than 33,000 followers on @niavardalos, later urged people not to pull hoaxes on this sort of thing.

According to the police report, the teen was found sitting at his computer desk crying; he admitted sending the messages and said he "did not know what to do with himself without help." His mother told police he'd been "very emotional" lately.

He was taken into protective custody for psychiatric evaluation.

-- Christie D'Zurilla

Photo: Nia Vardalos on the "Today" show Nov. 18, 2009. Credit:  Peter Kramer / Associated Press.

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PREACH IT! C'mon, you already knew that Tiger cheated

The Tiger Woods story continues to swell into the gossip gift that keeps on givin’ -- and happy holidays to you too, Mom Nordegren! Hope you’re feeling better! -- but with every story a new question emerges.

The question that clucking hausfraus seem, at least to me, to be conveying at this hour: Given how many affairs there were, why were we the last to know?

Tiger’s prowling was apparently a huge open secret in Hollywood -- at least, it certainly seems that way after what Jillian Michaels had to say this week. In fact, "The Biggest Loser" trainer revealed that she’d known for years that Tiger truly was an animal.

So how did his indiscretions remain airtight for so long? Are there no rats in Tiger’s nest at all? Seriously?

Allow me to explain. There are two reasons why most locals decline to call out a famous serial cheater when they see one.

(And there are more serial cheaters than you might think, especially in the secretly-into-the-same-gender department.)

Dr. Drew Pinsky really is a superhero

He doesn't just play one on TV -- Drew Pinsky is a real medical doctor. And thank goodness.

Our crush on Dr. Drew shows no signs of flagging as we learn, courtesy of the L.A. Now blog, that the veteran of KROQ's "Love Line" and star of "Celebrity Rehab" came to the rescue of Jackson Allen, a Pasadena Poly football player seriously injured in a high school game last weekend against Chadwick School.

School officials and Jackson's parents expressed their gratitude in a release that included details of what happened at the game, as well as Jackson's status after treatment at Harbor UCLA Medical Center.

Pinsky, a Pasadena native who's been married to his wife, Susan, since 1991, is a Poly grad and now a Poly parent -- the father of triplets, all of whom now have driver's licenses (that last bit is no doubt a mind-bending concept for some of Drew's longtime fans).

-- Christie D'Zurilla

Photo: Summoning the kinds of powerful thoughts that can be thought only by someone as smart and on-the-ball as he is, Dr. Drew Pinsky solves world hunger, ends addiction and finds homes for all the rescue puppies in the world, all in a single morning. OK, maybe he was just posing for a publicity shot last year at Westwood One studios in Culver City, but we like our version better. Credit: Damian Dovarganes / Associated Press

More sporty dispatches from the Ministry of Gossip:

What should Kim Kardashian and Reggie Bush be for Halloween?

Jay-Z and Alicia Keys: Rock me out to the ballgame

'This Is It' for Michael Jackson's brothers -- and the Lakers and Clippers

Khloe Kardashian and Lamar Odom: Stop us if this sounds familiar