AfterElton Briefs: "Israeli Idol"'s gay judge, Sean Penn campaigns for Harvey, and more!

Boys keep swinging: Britney Spears performs her new hit "wheeeee!" (Pic: Getty)

Following this assortment of carefully-selected news items, interested readers can find a refreshing pic of a hot man in underwear after the jump. Yes, we're serious.

• Britney Spears kicked off her "Circus" tour in New Orleans last night. Judging from the pics that have filtered out, the theme seems to be "Cirque de Madonna's Erotica video".

• Forbidden Love star Jo Weil joined reFRESH magazine as a columnist earlier this year, and this month's issue features his first editorial piece. I don't know what the topic is, but I hope it's "ugly sweater vests".

• Blabbermouth.net has excerpts from an interview with "black metal" star King ov Hell of the group Gorgoroth. Mr. Hell's bandmate Gaahl recently came out (which is a first in the black metal community) , and he offered his own support: "I do however support individuals walking their own path without caring at all what the flock would think of the path chosen; the flock being represented by Christians or a homophobic black metal scene. They are both insignificant factors which will be crushed if any harm intended."

Sean Penn and Mark Leno

• Newly Oscarfied Sean Penn joined out Senator Mark Leno at a press conference in San Francisco to announce legislation to create a Harvey Milk Day in California.

• Israeli Idol is holding auditions for Americans and ex-Israelis living in America to appear on the show's seventh season (but be prepared to sing in Hebrew). One of the judges is out producer/writer Gal Uchovsky (Walk on Water, Yossi & Jagger).

• Finally, one more reminder to join us tonight for our liveblog of the season premiere of Make Me A Supermodel, and join 365gay.com tomorrow for liveblog coverage of the California Prop 8 Supreme Court hearings. And cross your fingers.

And today's Briefs are brought to you by...

This guy!

Mike Radon