This is the best news I’ve heard all day!

Lucy Liu will be back on ABC next season no matter what.

Liu is in negotiations to join the cast of the network’s freshman drama “Dirty Sexy Money,” which has been renewed for a second season. She most recently starred in another ABC freshman drama, “Cashmere Mafia.”

The casting on “Sexy,” where she would be a regular, is formally in second position to “Mafia,” whose chances for renewal are not very good following a low-rated midseason run.

On the ABC Studios-produced show — a primetime soap revolving around the wealthy Darling clan and their spoiled offspring — Liu would join Peter Krause, Donald Sutherland, William Baldwin, Natalie Zea, Glenn Fitzgerald, Blair Underwood, Seth Gabel, Zoe McLellan and Jill Clayburgh. Samaire Armstrong, who was a regular during the first season, won’t continue on the show full time.

Liu would play an attorney. It’s not clear whether her character will be associated with Krause’s Nick George, the Darlings’ family lawyer.

Liu has been a fixture on ABC in the past year. In addition to “Mafia,” she also did an arc on the network’s “Ugly Betty.”

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Lucy Liu has a strange plan for her body after she dies – she wants to be frozen so she can wake-up in a wardrobe.

The Charlie’s Angels star wants to be cryogenically frozen when she passes away, and hopes to defrost herself in the closet of legendary U.S. socialite Nan Kempner. The 39-year-old beauty is so taken with the late fashion guru’s style, she would love to get the chance to try on some of her couture gowns – even if it means being reborn for the honor.

She says, “When I die, I wish to be cryogenically frozen in Nan Kempner’s closet. And when I wake up I can choose from her incredible collection. That would be wonderful.”

WENN

Kill Bill star Lucy Liu is calling on Americans to pay $1 for tap water in restaurants to help save children’s lives in Africa.

Liu, a United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) ambassador, has just returned from Cote d’Ivoire in Africa, where she witnessed the threat to child survival caused by a lack of clean drinking water. And now the actress is encouraging people to pay for the tap water they’d normally get for free during World Water Week this week – to help raise $1 million to provide African children with purified water.

Liu says, “If you go to a restaurant and they’d give you tap water for free, they’re asking you to donate a dollar for the tap water. “One dollar will provide water for 40 children for one day, which is incredible. It’s kind of great – you get to go out and enjoy food with people and you get to give back in such a small and simple way.”

More than 2,000 restaurants across the U.S. have signed up to participate in World Water Week.

WENN

Check out those shoes!

Celebrities turned out for A Night to Benefit Raising Malawi and UNICEF at the United Nations in New York City, yesterday. The stars included Brooke Shields, Cynthia Nixon, Debra Messing, Kimora Lee Simmons, Salma Hayek, Gwyneth Paltrow, Rachel Zoe, Tom Cruise & Katie Holmes, Ali Larter, Drew Barrymore & Justin Long, Molly Sims, Lucy Lui, Chris Ivery & Ellen Pompeo, Rihanna, Demi Moore, Madonna & Lourdes, Jessica & Jerry Seinfeld, and Jennifer Lopez & Marc Anthony.

Madonna hosted the star-studded fundraiser for Malawi orphans, last night.

The legendary singer, who has a two-year-old adopted son David from the African country, threw the New York bash for her Raising Malawi Foundation, United Nations children’s organization UNICEF and to celebrate the opening of a new Gucci store.

Madonna, who dismissed rumors the event was raising money for Kabbalah, said: “I am grateful that Gucci has underwritten this event, that’s all that matters to me – their generosity. There’s always controversy surrounding anything that involves change.

“I want to put Raising Malawi on the map. I want credibility as a philanthropic organization. I want to inspire people. I don’t want them to just write me a check – I want them to give me a piece of their heart.”

WENN

Lucy Liu leaving the Valentino fashion show during Paris Fashion Week Spring-Summer 2008, January 23.  Don’t ask me what I think, I’m still trying to figure out what the crap it is.  It looks like a jellyfish is attacking her.  I have to admit, I really want to touch it.

The Insider’s Lara Spencer sat down with Lucy Liu on the set of her new TV series Cashmere Mafia in an interview to air Wednesday, January 2nd. Liu says she prefers living in New York where she was born and raised, “My favorite thing about New York is that it never sleeps. You can go out and you see all different kinds of people. People in Los Angeles are beautiful. People in New York might not look as perfect, but that is what makes them sexy. They’re flawed, they look different, but there is something about them that’s charming. If somebody is perfect, its almost like you can’t communicate with them.”

Liu tells THE INSIDER she puts 100% into everything she does, “If you go for something you have to really go for it. I want to give myself and commit to it completely, and if it fails I want to totally scrape my face off. I want to fall hard and be great with that. That is the only way you can know you gave yourself completely to it.”

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