In other antipodean news: Australia's own Barry Humphries has been causing a bit of a stir down under.

At the end of April, Humphries was due to appear at a charity event in Melbourne in aid of the Variety Children's Charity. When there, he was to unveil a $75,000 bronze statue of the self-proclaimed First Lady of Australia (and one of his many alter egos) Dame Edna Everage.

However, after seeing photos of the larger than life sculpture prior to the event he demanded that it not go on show and wished to discuss changes with the sculptor, himself, Peter Corlett. Apparently Humphries thought the finished piece was too racy and wants it to show less leg.

Corlett is, understandably, a bit upset and said, "We want to try to resolve this happily for everyone, particularly for Variety."

More recently, Humphries was accused of - and later admitted to - punching a press photographer as he left a cafe in Sydney. Malcolm Ladd was very shocked by the assault and was not sure whether he was going to press charges or not and said, "It's the first time I've been attacked and I've photographed just about everyone before … He just punched me in the face. It knocked my glasses off. It was a good punch."

More shocked was Humphries' publicist, Suzie Howie, who stated, "There must have been something more to it because I've never even heard Barry swear, let alone throw a punch … He must have been greatly goaded."

72 year old Humphries initially released a statement saying, "If anyone's looking for me, tell them I'm having sparring lessons with Anthony Mundine."

Then Dame Edna, herself, came to the rescue saying, "Luckily I wasn't there, but I'm told he didn't deliberately hit the poor photographer but was pushing the camera away and his knuckles accidentally grazed the poor chap's cheeks."

"I'm sending Barry off for counselling. He is a rageaholic and a tragic attention seeker."