CHICAGO – Talk about a hard-knock life: She has been jailed in North Korea, kidnapped repeatedly, accused of murder, trapped in a cave, roughed up by gangsters. And she’s just a kid — more precisely, a red-haired girl named Annie.

Over 86 years, the spunky (and forever young) orphan has endured hundreds of curly hair-raising adventures, not to mention homelessness, poverty and other Dickensian hardships. She’s even survived the death of the man whose pen and imagination turned her into a comic-strip heroine.

Additional Photos

Comic-strip character Annie and her dog, Sandy, from the “Annie” comic strip, were drawn by Leonard Starr, who succeeded Harold Gray as cartoonist upon Gray’s death in 1968. The Associated Press/Tribune Media Services

Caleb Followill of the band Kings of Leon performs at Bonnaroo. The Associated Press

Annie, the character, may be indomitable. But Annie, the comic strip, is not.

Facing a shifting media landscape — the closing or shrinking of newspapers, a dwindling audience for comic adventures and an explosion of new forms of entertainment — Tribune Media Services has determined there will be no more newspaper tomorrows for Annie.

After today’s strip, Annie, her father figure and frequent rescuer, Daddy Warbucks, and her beloved pooch, Sandy, will disappear from the funny pages. They will have a future, but for now, where that will be is unknown.

“Annie is not dying, she’s moving into new channels,” said Steve Tippie, vice president of licensing and new markets development at Tribune Media, which owns the license to the character. Annie, he said, has “huge awareness” and possibilities include graphic novels, film, TV, games — maybe even a home on a mobile phone.

No matter where she lands, it’s clear there’s still gold in that red mop of hair and those white, pupil-less orbs. Tribune Media continues to collect revenues from various productions of “Annie,” the sunny musical that charmed Broadway more than 30 years ago — and is expected to return to the Great White Way in 2012.

“Annie is one of those iconic characters in American culture,” Tippie said. “If you stop 10 people on the street, nine of them will drop down on one knee and start singing ‘Tomorrow.’ “

It was, in fact, the popularity of the musical that gave the strip a second life. Tribune Media revived the comic after the death of its creator, Harold Gray, who had used Annie as a megaphone for his conservative political views.

From its opposition to the New Deal in the ’30s to its hard line in the war on terror, the comic strip has never shied away from its beliefs. “I always like to think of Annie as the Fox News Channel of the funny papers,” said Jay Maeder, Annie’s most recent writer. “It was a very political strip.”

Travolta, Preston give to fund

JOHANNESBURG — John Travolta and his wife, Kelly Preston, donated about $10,000 to the Nelson Mandela Children’s Fund on Saturday during their visit to South Africa, and spent some time singing and dancing with children the foundation has supported.

The children treated the “Hairspray” star, Preston and their daughter Ella to a drum concert and serenaded them with a poem titled “Eyes in the sky, foot on the ground.” Travolta later did a few dance steps with the children.

“Children keep you humble,” Travolta said. “Children keep you grounded.”

Heat bakes Bonnaroo crowd

MANCHESTER, Tenn. — A slightly groggy, sun-drenched Bonnaroo crowd was readying itself for the music festival’s big day-two acts: Jay-Z and Stevie Wonder.

Both were to take Bonnaroo’s main stage Saturday evening in succession, with headliner Jay-Z following Wonder.

The day’s acts also included Weezer, Jack White’s the Dead Weather, Norah Jones and a middle-of-the-night set by the jam band Disco Biscuits.

Excessive heat in the high 90s has been a constant at this year’s Bonnaroo, the ninth annual. Thunder clouds loomed late Saturday afternoon, threatening to further muddy the grounds, which took heavy rain Wednesday.

Conan O’Brien performed his “Legally Prohibited from Being Funny on Television” comedy show for a second time Saturday.

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