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She's 'Ashley' Simpson On Misspelled OK! Cover [Celebrity-industrial Complex]
Posted: November 26th, 2008, 5:33am CST by Ryan Tate
Tags: Celebrityindustrial complex
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Obama Crap Making Insane Millions For Media [Celebrity-industrial Complex]
Posted: November 23rd, 2008, 11:28pm CST by Ryan Tate
Tags: Celebrityindustrial complex
newVideoPlayer("/dailyshow_obamamerch_gawker.flv", 506, 423,"");
Amid pandemic media bloodletting and global financial meltdown, it's nice to finally find a silver lining: All those silly Barack Obama trinkets are making insane amounts of money for media companies and providing precious little stimulus to the economy. The Times estimated roughly $200 million sold so far, including more than $15 million in commemorative issues and books from People and Time, somewhere around $1.5 million for the online store set up by the New york Times Company and $700,000 for the Los Angeles Times. Commemorative plates and coins, meanwhile have become ubiquitous enough that Lewis Black ranted about them on the Daily Show (clip after the jump). The downside?Iconizing Obama is likely to harden some opposing voters against him, feeding the perception his supporters are blind cult worshippers and, perhaps, that the token-hawking media are complicit. But then someone will remember it's possible to create "Obama the secret muslim" dolls or somesuch, and actually do it, and we'll all finally rejoice that capitalism is working like it's supposed to again.
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Paris Hilton's Breakup Confirmed By Excited AP [Celebrity-industrial Complex]
Posted: November 19th, 2008, 9:14pm CST by Ryan Tate
Tags: Celebrityindustrial complex
Despite her repeated public pronouncements of devotion, it will come as no huge shock to anyone anywhere that Paris Hilton just broke up with her boyfriend of nine months, musician Benji Madden. Even if you weren't up to speed on the latest developments — she was spotted with her Greek, shipping-heir ex and rumored desperately flirty with British princes — you have to figure, well, it's Paris Hilton, whose thirst for attention requires not only the intimate affection of various men but also constant press coverage of how those affections fluctuate. But her breakup is worth noting because the mainstream media seems to buying into her psychodrama like never before!
Here's how things work now, in the celebrity media pipeline: About four hours ago, the news surfaced in The Sun , People and Us Weekly , attributed to anonymous sources (Us called theirs "a rep" but offered no names). "Overprotective and controlling" was the rap on Madden. Did it stop there? No! Because AP now has a special, well-funded unit dedicated to nailing these crucial stories down as quickly as possible. So after some no-doubt frantic reporting, the wire service became (apparently) the first with a named source to confirm everything:Paris Hilton and her boyfriend of nine months, Benji Madden, have broken up. Hilton publicist Alanna McCarthy said Wednesday that the two "remain very good friends." She wouldn't say more.
Quality journalism lives!
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Us Weekly Sides with McCain, Obamas Are 'The New Brangelina' [Celebrity-industrial Complex]
Posted: November 13th, 2008, 3:24pm CST by Richard
Tags: Celebrityindustrial complex
John McCain was right. So was Bonnie Fuller, and so were we! President Elect Barack Obama has totally become not just the great mixed-race hope for the nation, but he and his family have also evolved into tabloid-worthy celebrities. He and his wife Michelle are, in fact, "the new Brangelina." Well, that's according to Albert Lee, an editor for the bright Queen of all Glossies, Us Weekly.He recently explained to CNN that the Obamas are just what sells right now. The latest issue featuring the happy and now victorious couple smiling on the cover moved over one million copies. Because, he surmises, "everything else seems totally irrelevant right now." Which is true! But, what does this mean for American politics and, more importantly, American celebrity? We never quite got the thrust of those McCain ads that compared the senator from Illinois to Paris Hilton and Britney Spears. People actually seem to be kind of into that idea. There's something almost Main Streety about not just knowing the business of an administration's policies, but also knowing where they ate, what they wore, and what those adorable little girls are up to. Plus, the old, gross vanguard of hedonistic celebrities is dead anyway. And here, as the glorious new replacements, are some nice do-gooders to focus on. It's like the Kennedys all over again! Except, you know, hopefully with a different ending.
Hear Mr. Lee elaborate in his own words below.
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Paris Hilton Wears Backward Dress To Interview [Celebrity-industrial Complex]
Posted: November 13th, 2008, 6:20am CST by Ryan Tate
Tags: Celebrityindustrial complex
"I thought she should leave it on and start a whole new fashion phenom, but she dutifully reversed it." [Michael Musto]
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For Frugal OK!, No Posh Bonnie Fuller [Celebrity-industrial Complex]
Posted: October 23rd, 2008, 8:03pm CDT by Ryan Tate
Tags: Celebrityindustrial complex
Perhaps the recent rumors about editor-from-hell Bonnie Fuller helming celebrity weekly OK! were a clever way of ensuring a warm staff welcome for the real editor-in-chief and publisher, both set for announcement tomorrow. They are former Quick & Simple EIC Susan Toepfer and Niche Media senior VP Lori Burgess, respectively, the Post's Keith Kelly is reporting. Recently-installed general manager Kent Brownridge insisted his choice for editor "had never been Bonnie," but his passing on the pricey and profligate former Us Weekly chief is as good a sign as any that the economic meltdown will slam celebrity entertainment media as it has banking and real estate.Other signs: Brownridge is said to be slashing the budget for celebrity babies. The painful (if inevitable) result: "Very low" newstand sales. And the downward spiral begins.
Supposed grade-A celebrities just don't offer the return they once did. So it is that Wired, of all publications, looks like the smart innovator in celebrity media, moving copies with leggy-but-so-very-inexpensive Julia Allison on the cover.Remember, celeb investors, subprime holdings can be very profitable when you buy them cheap. One assumes the new OK! guys (also including incoming executive creative director Trey Speegle) will be fast studies in this regard.
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Ringo Starr Forbids You To Send Fan Mail [Celebrity-industrial Complex]
Posted: October 14th, 2008, 6:55am CDT by Ryan Tate
Tags: Celebrityindustrial complex
newVideoPlayer("/ringoNoMail.flv", 506, 423,"");
BREAKING: Ringo Starr gets fan mail! Oh but also, the Beatles drummer gets so much of it that after 45 years he won't accept any letters that are postmarked after October 20. The Associated Press has issued an advisory about this, to be sure everyone has the opportunity to tell Mr. Starkey how much Yellow Submarine changed their lives or whatever. Memo to other exhausted celebrities: While it's all well and good to use the Web to take control of your relationship with fans, you don't ever want to sound as vaguely bitchy and threatening as Starr does in the attached clip, originally posted to his website. Click the icon to watch.
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Minnie Driver: Baby Business Innovator [Celebrity-industrial Complex]
Posted: October 7th, 2008, 12:42pm CDT by Richard
Tags: Celebrityindustrial complex
Actress Minnie Driver recently gave birth to her son Henry last month, and in lieu of some splashy magazine cover (I mean, not that she's that big of a star to warrant that, but you know), she decided to just post a humble, makeup free, mom and baby photo on MySpace. It's a refreshingly un-self-indulgent photo that is heartening to see in this time of the splashy money-making, high gloss, celebrity baby industry. Maybe it represents a new era?Celebrities like Samantha Ronson and Lindsay Lohan have retreated to MySpace and blogs to issue PR statements, so maybe the baby business will become less of a controlled and manipulated cottage industry as well. The owners of OK! magazine, one of the biggest baby buyers, recently stopped the crazed spending the tabloid had enjoyed indiscriminately for some years. Maybe Driver's new, simpler way will help drive the baby market down and babies will just become babies again, rather than increasingly cynical magazine tentpoles.
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New Editor At Life & Style? [Celebrity-industrial Complex]
Posted: October 2nd, 2008, 8:46pm CDT by Ryan Tate
Tags: Celebrityindustrial complex
We're told Bauer Publishing chief Hubert Boehle has grown tired of the never-ending stream of outside editors atop his celebrity fashion title Life & Style. He finds them hapless. The solution: Boehle will bring in Dan Wakeford, executive editor of another Bauer celebrity mag, In Touch, as top editor. "He wasn't given any choice in the matter," our tipster said. With both the fashion industry and celebrity magazines socked by the economy, he's got his work cut out for him.
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Liz Smith So Over Gossip [Celebrity-industrial Complex]
Posted: September 29th, 2008, 5:21am CDT by Ryan Tate
Tags: Celebrityindustrial complex
Here's the thing about gossip doyenne Liz Smith: She's 85 and really, really tried of the gossip scene, despite being paid to write a column on the topic. Hey, fair enough, she's earned her disillusionment. But Smith can't stop with the complaining! "There are very few really big stars these days, and that makes everything truly dull," she wrote in March. And a few weeks later: "There is already an absolute plethora of bullshit, manufactured photography, and speculation passing for gossip, and it will probably increase." New York magazine caught up with Smith for its 40th anniversary issue, and if anything she's grown even more dismissive of the whole scene, and even some of her own older work:“In retrospect,” she says now, “[Ivana and Donald Trump coverage] was a story about rich people getting a divorce. It had absolutely no other significance or meaning whatsoever... can’t believe I took it all so seriously."
...There’s no more Wasp society. Just like the derision with which British royalty is held, it’s just gone steadily downhill... I think what’s different is that celebrities are different now. There are some big stars, but they are very few. And they’re totally unapproachable, for the most part, except by the people they’ve chosen.
But there are some gossip subjects Smith approves of:
Anna Wintour, she says, is “about as near as we come to a really mysterious, glamorous person, a woman whom either you don’t understand or you aspire to be like … She has become like Hillary Clinton or Madonna, people who just transcend criticism.” Also on the list are Oscar and Annette de la Renta, “elegant people with money who live very tastefully and try to stay out of the papers. There is a crowd … Barry Diller and Diane Von Furstenberg, Reinaldo and Carolina Herrera. These are all really nice people who are civilized, know how to act, have actually read a book. And the big thing is for them to go on boats. To go on Barry Diller’s or David Geffen’s yacht. They get away from the great unwashed and they can do as they please.”
Still, such a short list does not a gossip column make. Prediction: When Smith's contract with the Post is up, she switched to writing full-time for her WowOWow.com, where she can move beyond gossip to such preferred topics as sex after 80, sleeping naked and slamming cheesy memorials to British royalty.
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Panic Reaches Famous-Baby Picture Market [Celebrity-industrial Complex]
Posted: September 26th, 2008, 6:26am CDT by Ryan Tate
Tags: Celebrityindustrial complex
As if celebrity babies didn't face enough perils — paparazzi, feuding celebrity parents, ill-advised playdates with Michael Jackson — they now have to keep a weary little eye on the stock market. Because amid Wall Street meltdown and the worst advertising decline in seven years rumors are now swirling that the undisputed highroller in the market for pictures of famous infants, OK! magazine, is cutting off payments for exclusive shots of the little tykes. (Sure, the fees usually went to charity, but you can't put a price tag on adulation.) New general manager Kent Brownridge has allegedly said "no more picture buying, and to keep readers interested we will have to 'get creative,'" a disgruntled staffer told Page Six. Underlings are no doubt praying Brownridge doesn't confirm another rumor and squander the savings hiring boss-from-hell Bonnie Fuller to replace a departing Sarah Ivens. Reports the Post:Fuller insisted nothing was afoot. Via e-mail, she said, "I think Kent is terrific and I wish him all the best in his new position. I'm very happy working on my new venture, Bonnie Fuller Media."
Read: "As if Brownridge could meet my seven-figure demands."
We told you subprime protocelebs like Julia Allison and Emily Brill would eventually torpedo the AAAs!
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9021-Obama! Elitist Songstress Sings for Barry's Supper [Celebrity-industrial Complex]
Posted: September 17th, 2008, 10:06am CDT by Pareene
Tags: Celebrityindustrial complex
Last night Barack Obama had a fundraiser in Beverly Hills. It was terrible! He raised a zillion dollars from these out-of-touch movie stars while decent, hard-working Americans lost their jobs on Wall Street. Famous people were there, like Steven Spielberg and Will Farrell. And BARBRA STREISAND! The McCain blast email paints a portrait of Caligulan decadent excess:Hollywood’s rich & famous "snapped pictures with their cell phones and Blackberrys," "Ms. Streisand ran through bits of a few songs, but did not sing entire numbers," and celebrities dined on "salad with goat cheese, roasted potatoes, filet of beef and asparagus, apple crisp and chocolate lava cake" at last night’s Beverly Hills fundraiser for Barack Obama….
Roasted potatoes! Regular potatoes are good enough for the people of Ohio, Barack Obama!
Obama raised nine million dollars yesterday, setting a record for a single night's fundraising. Poor hardworking commoner John McCain was selflessly talking to real Americans at the time:
"Let me tell you, my friends, there's no place I'd rather be than here with the working men and women of Ohio," McCain said.
Oddly, while we have a detailed list of more than thirty famous people who attended the two Obama events, no one (as far as we know!) has yet reported the names of anyone who showed up to McCain's private fundraiser Monday night in Miami! At that event, McCain only managed to raise a paltry $5.1 million. It was probably all from firefighters. For some reason that private dinner is only worth a mention deep within A section stories on how Obama is beloved in Hollyweird!
(Though the Washington Post is reporting on some questionable McCain spending practices that everyone got all up in arms about when done by Kerry in 2004.)
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Bob Dylan's Poetry [Celebrity-industrial Complex]
Posted: September 15th, 2008, 2:02am CDT by Ryan Tate
Tags: Celebrityindustrial complex
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Us Weekly's Fashion Spinoff An Onion Article Come True [Celebrity-industrial Complex]
Posted: September 9th, 2008, 7:08am CDT by Ryan Tate
Tags: Celebrityindustrial complex
It was a little over three years ago that the Onion lampooned the idea of a highbrow quarterly spinoff of Us Weekly. Now, thanks to the American cult of celebrity, this "joke" has finally come true! The celebrity gossip rag is expanding, via an unnamed new publication, into the slightly more highbrow topic of celebrity fashion, the Wall Street Journal reports this morning. Us owner Jann Wenner is chasing the success of People's StyleWatch, which now publishes 10 times per year and circulates more widely than Vogue. Given the "fashion" choices of many celebrities, that's insane. It's also a singular accomplishment: Time Inc.'s In Style and American Media's Star both launched failed fashion spinoffs. Maybe Wenner thinks he can do better. Or maybe he's just trying to jack up the price he'll fetch when the magazine overlord finally sells off (as long rumored) the Us portion of his empire. Notes the Journal: To many industry watchers, US Weekly remains an intriguing prospect for a sale. Mr. Wenner is perceived to be less emotionally attached to it than to Rolling Stone, which he founded 41 years ago as an outlet for his interest in music, and with which he is as personally and professionally involved as ever.
...And while he periodically floats the idea of selling his magazines, friends and former colleagues say, Mr. Wenner himself says he would like to hand over the business to his sons.
Still, he won't exclude the possibility of a sale. "You always think about it," he said.And you always think about in such visible places!
[WSJ]
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OK! Trying To Make Baby Pics Finally Pay [Celebrity-industrial Complex]
Posted: September 3rd, 2008, 6:19am CDT by Ryan Tate
Tags: Celebrityindustrial complex
Kent Brownridge, former deputy to magazine mogul Jann Wenner and recent overlord to Maxim and Blender, is now general manager of the U.S. edition of free-spending celebrity weekly OK!. It seems that between billionaire owner Richard Desmond supplying famous-baby-photo cash and editors Sarah Ivens and the creepy Rob Shuter keeping sources fluffed, OK! needed someone to, like, sell some ads or something. Brownridge apparently didn't compile a stellar track record doing that for Maxim and company, which earlier this month squeezed him from his job, but as Shuter knows, OK! is fast becoming a miraculous land of second media-industry chances. [Post]
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Samantha Ronson's Blog Entry May Be the Future of PR [Celebrity-industrial Complex]
Posted: August 28th, 2008, 11:32am CDT by Richard
Tags: Celebrityindustrial complex
Oh look, the celebrity PR flack continues to die. Well, for some. Actress Lindsay Lohan's shiftless mook of a father recently lashed out at Linds' bff (or gf), deejay Samantha Ronson, who was rumored to be writing some kind of tell-all book. He called her fame hungry and accused her of using Lindsay and blah blah blah pot kettle blah blah. Both LiLo and SamRo publicly reacted to the news, pioneering into relatively uncharted territory.Lindsay ran squealing to gossip show Access Hollywood, calling her father "out of control" and just sorta, you know, defeating the purpose of telling someone else to rein it in. But later on, Lindsay decided to close the barn door herself and write a "sensible" and thorough blog post, perhaps not realizing that a whole Assateague Island's worth of horses had already escaped. Samantha demurely (as far as "demurely" goes in this festering hellhole of a world) circumvented all the conventional channels and went right to the people first. Via her MySpace blog of course! Lindsay and Sam are not the first people of note to do this, but they are embroiled in some pretty high profile antics, unlike other MySpace celebrity bloggers like the low-profile, dim and withered Courtney Love. Which is to say, right now these girls are pretty famous and wouldn't it be interesting to see someone huge like, say, Katie Holmes, respond to scandal with a humble blog entry?
While it's debatable just how modest and un-self-possessed a blog entry, aimed at the public, about oneself, really is, it's certainly less middlemany and corporate and hungry than going on a television show to air one's delicates. Plus you have control over your own words! (Though, you do run the risk of drunk-blogging.) It may seem suicidal, but it would be fascinating to watch the celebrity-to-civilian relationship develop into a one-on-one internet relationship, completely strangling the gossip industry, which would be forced to just repurpose blog entries that everyone had already read.
I mean cause that's totes not what we do already.
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Michael Kors's Paltry Project Runway Gains [Celebrity-industrial Complex]
Posted: August 28th, 2008, 7:32am CDT by Ryan Tate
Tags: Celebrityindustrial complex
Judging from the Times Style section profile of Michael Kors, the Project Runway judge can't go out in public without being recognized and accosted. But what's the financial upside on Kors' two-year association with the fantastically popular reality show? Kors' sales at Bergdorf Goodman in Manhattan are up 50 percent over three years, which is encouraging. But some of that success has to be credited to a 2003 capital infusion from two British jewelry investors and, allegedly, to Kors' dogged prowling of sales floors. When the Times finally buttonholed a Kors company executive into estimating the financial benefit from Runway specifically, the returns aren't so bright as the anecdotes suggest: An estimated mere 5 percent bump in gross sales thanks to Runway. The Times' Style writer doesn't say if this compounds each year or is a one-time increase, but a business reality show judge would be fast with a mean quip either way. [Times]
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Pregnant Man's Baby Photos: $300,000 [Celebrity-industrial Complex]
Posted: July 23rd, 2008, 8:19pm CDT by Ryan Tate
Tags: Celebrityindustrial complex
Female->male transsexual Thomas Beatie is featured in People magazine today with his new daughter Susan Juliette, born June 29 in Bend, Oregon without a c-section (which would make it a "natural birth," haters!). GaySocialites.com said the child will live a "confusing life" because of the father's love for the spotlight, adding that admirers of the pioneering birth should bear in mind that "you don't go on the cover of People magazine for free honey!" Actually, that's very true! According to a celebrity magazine insider we've been in touch with, Time Inc. paid Beatie $300,000 for People's rights to the exclusive baby pics.
No word on whether he's giving the money to charity, but doesn't Beatie kind of deserve to keep it? Bidding on Angelina Jolie's baby pictures approached $20 million, and even D-listers Nicole Richie and Jamie-Lynn Spears managed to net reported seven-figure deals for photos of their offspring. And not one of those people went to the trouble of changing her gender, retaining her reproductive organs or waddling around as the world's only pregnant man!
In fact, one wonders if Beatie couldn't have gotten a better deal. Sad! But only by the (also sad) metric of fameball skills. Beatie still looks like a very happy Dad, which is rumored to be worth quite a lot in and of itself (pish!).
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Jolie's Baby Born In May, Says Unretracted Story [Celebrity-industrial Complex]
Posted: July 14th, 2008, 10:50pm CDT by Ryan Tate
Tags: Celebrityindustrial complex
newVideoPlayer("/dailyshow_etjolie_gawker.flv", 506, 423,"");
Savvy media watchers are beginning to note that the birth of Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt's twins July 12 indicates they probably were not born in May, as Entertainment Tonight reported at the time. Amid intense scrutiny, the showbiz show in June yanked the story from its website, but its executive producer insisted "we are waiting to see how this plays out" before issuing a retraction. And now that everything has played out as expected, with ET looking stupid, the show has buried its admission of error on some blog, and will not issue a retraction or say anything on broadcast TV. “We have moved on and so have our viewers,” a show spokesman told the Times. Well, sure, but will any of us really trust ET for crucial celebrity baby news again? Not celebrity blogger (and Daily Show host) Jon Stewart, whose June 5 wrapup of the whole scandal is after the jump.
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Insane Courtney Love Mistakes Court For Oscars [Celebrity-industrial Complex]
Posted: July 9th, 2008, 2:27am CDT by Ryan Tate
Tags: Celebrityindustrial complex
The Times has a delightful story in this morning's paper on the ruses various celebrities use to evade reporters outside the main criminal courthouse in Manhattan. Actor Rip Torn, for example, once led paparazzi through a park and past a gaggle of chanting construction workers before jumping into the cab of an occupied 18-wheeler, jumping out again, and rolling underneath the truck. Kirk Jones snuck in a side entrance while his driver successfully impersonated the rapper to photographers, sultry actress Uma Thurman enlisted the help of court officers and producer Sean Combs has a mini secret-service brigade. But the most fascinating courthouse celebrity by far is criminally insane singer Courtney Love, who sashays in and out of the building as though surrounded by adoring fans:Courtney Love used the sidewalk like a red carpet, chatting and joking with reporters...
Sometimes celebrities do what they do best: bask in the attention. Ms. Love latched onto her lawyer, Scott B. Tulman, as they left the courthouse and gushed as if they were an item:
“Isn’t he handsome? Isn’t he beautiful?” Ms. Love then suggested she was pregnant with Mr. Tulman’s child.
“Are you out of your mind?” Mr. Tulman recalled telling her. “What are you doing?”
Another day outside the courthouse she finished off a partially smoked cigarette that she bummed from a passer-by.
“It’s like having a wild kid,” Mr. Tulman said. “After a while, you just shake your head.”
PR consultant Eric Dezenhall told the Times Love's antics are fine, since "anything that extends the half-life of her career is probably a net positive." Uh, sure. Maybe even get charged with more crimes like disorderly conduct and so forth and get spotted outside the glamorous criminal courthouse even more often, maybe!
[Times]
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'Atlantic's' Britney Cover Actually Noble Charitable Gesture [Celebrity-industrial Complex]
Posted: June 17th, 2008, 9:42am CDT by Pareene
Tags: Celebrityindustrial complex
When ancient and respected old magazine The Atlantic put Britney Spears on their cover for an utterly so-so story on the celebrity-industrial complex or whatever (it was OK but Rolling Stone's piece was better), everyone (i.e. us) mocked them for selling out and claimed it was a cynical ploy at boosting newsstand sales or something. Well. Mea culpa! Because if it was a cynical ploy at boosting newsstand sales, it failed miserably. "The magazine sold approximately 24,000 copies at the newsstand, some 21,000 less than March and nearly 30,000 less than its January/February issue." According to Atlantic Media president Justin Smith (the man who destroyed The Atlantic), they meant to do that."The irony is, we were doing this at our own peril, because most of our newsstand executives and circulation executives were saying ‘Don't put Britney on the cover! It's going to bomb on the newsstand!' So we put Britney on the cover despite some of our newsstand advisors."
Of course, when Rolling Stone did it, their website traffic doubled. But you know, The Atlantic is not exactly available by the register at the A&P so yeah maybe Smith is not even lying and they knew it would tank. Still, it was basically the only reason we talked about the magazine since we made fun of their web rebranding so hey, good on you guys. [Folio]
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Heath Ledger Dolls Selling Like Mad [Celebrity-industrial Complex]
Posted: May 6th, 2008, 5:59am CDT by Ryan Tate
Tags: Celebrityindustrial complex
So not only has Mattel released the world's most awkward figurine, depicting Heath Ledger's Joker in the forthcoming Batman sequel, The Dark Knight, but the creepy action figures are actually selling. Really, really well. Reports the Post: "Toy peddlers are laughing all the way to the bank with Heath Ledger's Joker doll selling out at New York stores. Droves of people lined up early at the Toys 'R' Us store in Times Square... 'There are none left in the warehouse, either.'" The $10 dolls are being re-sold on eBay. Get one for $55 with a Batman figurine! Put it in your morbid Heath Ledger apartment! [Post] (Joker image via Post)
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Scarlett Johansson Being Stalked By Everyone [Celebrity-industrial Complex]
Posted: April 30th, 2008, 9:58pm CDT by Ryan Tate
Tags: Celebrityindustrial complex
What's with the Scarlett Johansson sightings tonight? Her every movement is being tracked, apparently. Some kind of event for her Tom Waits cover album at Bowery Ballroom, maybe? Two recent stalkings after the jump. UPDATE: Make that three.
Scarlett Johansson - 450 W.15th St - I got into the elevator with ScarJo, but couldn't tell if it was her at first since she had sunglasses on. She got off on floor 2. When I left the building 15 minutes later, she got in the elevator again on the way down. This time, I heard her talk - it was 100% her signature voice. Looked normal and cute, but shorter than I would have imagined. She had darrrrk roots showing through her platinum blonde hair. Jogged to an SVU waiting outside, definitely in a hurry.
ScarJo at bowery ballroom taking in jessie baylins set. Standing to
the side, hair up and under a hat. No makeup, naturally gorgeous.
Oblivious to the all the stares.Scarlett Johansson at Bowery Ballroom - She was there this evening with a few friends watching singer Jessie Baylin's set. She's really quite striking, and more petite than I expected (and clearly not shy about standing right up front). She seemed very relaxed and looked like she was really enjoying herself.
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Hills Star Settles For B-List Presidential Event [Celebrity-industrial Complex]
Posted: April 28th, 2008, 4:45am CDT by Ryan Tate
Tags: Celebrityindustrial complex
Last week The Hills star Heidi Montag turned down an invitation to sit at MSNBC.com's table at the White House Correspondent's Dinner, reportedly because boyfriend/manager Spencer Pratt said the event, which includes top journalists and is attended by the president, wasn't "A-Listy enough." MSNBC awkwardly denied, then admitted that it had invited Montag. Well, it turns out Montag and Pratt condescended to come to the dinner (the picture at left was taken there), invited by the shameless celebrity panderers at Fortune magazine, according to Page Six:
...they managed to snag a last-minute seat at Fortune magazine's table.
And, of course, the fame-hungry duo from MTV's The Hills spent the night snaking their way through the DC after-parties. They hit the Bloomberg LP soirée at the embassy of Costa Rica, which was such a disaster, half the invitees couldn't get in.Fortune? Bloomberg LP? Wait, neither of you is talking to Rupert Murdoch's Fox Business or Wall Street Journal, right? Please tell me I'm right.
[Page Six]
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TMZ's Cheesy, Innuendo-Laden Headlines [Celebrity-industrial Complex]
Posted: April 18th, 2008, 6:47am CDT by Ryan Tate
Tags: Celebrityindustrial complex
In addition to making fun of your mother's death and mocking people for supposedly aging prematurely, Harvey Levin's TMZ loves to write oh-so-clever sex-pun headlines. The one pictured ran with a story about Britney Spears being ordered to pay hundreds of thousands of dollars in lawyer's fees. There are some more, just from the past couple of days, after the jump. Reading them well help you develop the vital skill of applying a dick joke to virtually any situation.
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In Prison, Reading Vogue And Harper's Bazaar Kind Of Makes You Everyone's Bitch [Creative Underclass]
Posted: April 17th, 2008, 3:22am CDT by Ryan Tate
Tags: Celebrityindustrial complex
Derek Khan is living the high life now in Dubai, having put his past as a jewelry-pinching celebrity stylist behind him. He has recaptured some of his past glory, now appearing as a "commentator and makeover specialist" on satellite TV and in magazines like OK! Middle East. But in between Khan's come-up and his comeback, between 2003 and 2005, he did time at Rikers Island and two upstate prisons. None of his famous clients visited him in jail, so Khan kept tabs on them by reading fashion magazines. You can guess how that went over in the clink:
Mr. Khan continued to follow their careers in the pages of Vogue and Harper’s Bazaar, and his reading selections — along with the awareness of his formerly pampered lifestyle — made him a target of other prisoners and also guards.
“I was given the worst things to do, like scrubbing the toilets,” he said, “even though I was capable of helping G.E.D. students.”Khan was deported to Trinidad at the end of his stint, with $10 to his name. An old friend eventually ran into him and ended up giving him $20,000 to get to Dubai. Now he "has been accepted into the society of wealthy expatriates and Saudi royalty" and is even designing his own jewelry line.
Dubai, Khan told the Times, is "a new Australia." Paging Margaret Seltzer...
[Times]
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Jealousy In Small Packages []
Posted: March 14th, 2008, 2:16pm CDT by Hamilton Nolan
Tags: Napoleon complex
Two new studies by SCIENTISTS appear to confirm the old "Napoleon Complex" theory. They found that shorter men in relationships are more jealous than tall men, both in general and when it comes to their girlfriends talking to other men. But tall women were found to be the most jealous, and women of average height, least jealous. This does not bode well for the imaginary Verne Troyer- Lisa Leslie relationship that always seemed like it would be so sweet. [Daily Mail]
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John Mayer's Artistic Process Misunderstood [Celebrity-industrial Complex]
Posted: March 7th, 2008, 1:16pm CST by Sheila
Tags: Celebrityindustrial complex
Large-headed, sensitive singer John Mayer is blogging again. Today, he gets a little meta ("I wouldn't traditionally take to a blog to explain a blog"), trying to explain the "Dear ex lover, please stop contacting me" post that has US Weekly conducting a poll about which famous ex he's talking about: Jessica Simpson? Cameron Diaz? Oh, it was a hypothetical letter, John explains.
The blog - copied from my lyric/idea journal, is all about the P.S. - it's a writing technique called "deceptive resolution"; you think the story is going one way, only to find that it twists around at the end, using all its momentum to swing in another direction. In this instance, the writer of the missive is saying in as many certain terms as possible that he does not want to see his ex anymore. At the end, the P.S. leaves that all too common contradiction in terms that makes love so messed up. I call it "I wish you were here so I could tell you to leave".
That makes it much clearer.This actually has some pretty far-reaching ramifications. How will I write an entire record of lyrics when one small blog passage incites so much curiosity? Can I write a song because of somebody but not about them?
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Art School's Julia Allison Training Program [Celebrity-industrial Complex]
Posted: February 27th, 2008, 6:18pm CST by Ryan Tate
Tags: Celebrityindustrial complex
Maybe you thought you were going to Parsons design school to take pictures like Annie Leibovitz or make paintings like Jackson Pollock or whatever, but the joke is on you, hipster, because when you get there and settle in to your first class all of a sudden everyone will be talking about making internet sex tapes or maybe their fake 90-day suicide plan or titillating their way to cable news punditry, and it will be all be part of the curriculum. In a crumbling America that can't actually make anything except narcissistic "reality" entertainment, Parsons has taken the ingenious step of launching a class where grades are determined by internet fame. Professor Jamie Wilkinson even created proprietary software to track attention by monitoring not just traffic but also Twitter and blog posts, response videos and friend requests (our boss is already salivating). When does Julia Allison get to move into her new Parsons wing and endowed chair? Aspiring Web hottie Sarah Meyers's video about the horrifying future of education, after the jump.
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Perez Hilton May Get A Record Label, Finish Off Recording Industry [Celebrity-industrial Complex]
Posted: February 26th, 2008, 5:00am CST by Ryan Tate
Tags: Celebrityindustrial complex
The record companies are total geniuses when it comes exploiting the internet, and one of them, Warner Brothers, has discovered an "Internet Blog" run by this fellow named Perez Hilton who is huge with the kids, apparently. He took two bands you had never heard of and used his "blog" to made them huge on iTunes and Myspace and now, well, you probably still haven't heard of them. But still, the probably giddy record execs are considering a deal that would give Perez "$100,000 a year as an advance against 50 percent of any profits generated by artists he discovers and releases through Warner Brothers." Sounds completely reasonable. After the jump, your new tastemaker has a supposed meltdown on MTV's Celebrity Rap Superstar.
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Jennifer Lopez Gives Birth To Twins, Six Million Dollars [Celebrity-industrial Complex]
Posted: February 22nd, 2008, 5:57am CST by Ryan Tate
Tags: Celebrityindustrial complex
Twelve minutes past midnight, Jennifer Lopez gave birth to a 5 lbs. 7 oz. baby girl, followed at 12:23 AM by 6 lbs. baby boy. The birth took place in a secure room of a Long Island hospital, hermetically sealed prior to J. Lo's arrival, guarded by security forces trained intensively in "pink drills" in recent weeks. The lockdown helps protect the $4 million to $6 million People magazine is paying for exclusive pictures of the kids, an exclusive that would be ruined by anyone lawfully and safely snapping a photo and sending it a competing media outlet, like say tips@gawker.com, which FOR A LIMITED TIME ONLY pays you $7.50 per 1000 views! Besides, J. Lo hardly needs the money, especially if she plans to practice the "tough love" she got from her own mom, as described in October to David Letterman:
newVideoPlayer("jlo_letterman_gawker.flv", 475, 376,"");
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UK Tabloids Win Big With US Trainwrecks [Media]
Posted: February 21st, 2008, 12:55pm CST by Pareene
Tags: Celebrityindustrial complex
UK tabloids are enjoying huge web traffic thanks to American celebrity scandals. Unfortunately for our trade deficit, we see none of that money. Even when the Daily Mail runs New York's NUDE LINDSAY LOHAN shots, without permission. (The photos, owned by Bert Stern, are under embargo—the Daily Mail just made up a little "nymag.com" watermark, slapped it on, and ran with them.) [FishbowlNY]
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How Much Is Your Baby Worth? [Exclusive]
Posted: January 30th, 2008, 2:20pm CST by Nick Denton
Tags: Celebrityindustrial complex
More than ever, that's the answer. Time Inc's People Magazine has secured the first pictures of Nicole Richie's baby, Harlow. The winning bid: $1m, according to someone who participated in the auction. Which is a useful sum for the anorexic former reality star, daughter of singer Lionel Richie. "This is probably Nicole Richie's only paycheck for all of 2008," says the source. Richie's take is impressive, but not as rich a price as that being offered for first photographic evidence of the baby boy born to Christina Aguilera, the singer, earlier this month. We hear that bidding between People and OK! Magazine, which bid $1m earlier this month, has now reached $1.5m. So what economic rationale can there be for such inflation in the cost of baby pictures?
First of all, the celebrity weeklies are minting stars who sell magazines, but can't sustain TV shows or pull audiences into movies. And the music stardom pays less than it did. So minor celebrities rely on paid exclusives for a growing share of their income.
But this is the more significant reason: celebrity weeklies represent one of the few growing magazine categories, and one of the most competitive. Never-seen-before pictures of the offspring of alpha celebrities are irresistible to female readers; they offer a guaranteed kick to sales. That's something embattled market leader, People Magazine, desperately needs. The Time Inc. title, under pressure from feistier competitors such as US Weekly, will report an 8% drop in circulation for the second half of 2007.
Not only is the former market leader trying to shore up circulation; it also now contends for "exclusives" with OK!, a UK import with no scruples about checkbook journalism. For instance, People used to buy preferential access to news from the Spears family; OK! paid $1m to poach the story of the pregnancy of younger sister, Jamie-Lynn, and future baby pictures.
You think that's premature? We're hearing that both People and OK! have put in bids for the story of Angelina Jolie's pregnancy. (The actress' first child by Brad Pitt, Shiloh, was the most valuable baby in celebrity media history, garnering donations worth $4m for US and international rights.) The difference this time: nobody even knows for sure whether the pouting Hollywood star is even expecting.
"The bidding wars going on between those two for these so-called exclusives is like nothing I've seen before," says a rival. "It's completely journalistically distasteful, but also fascinating to watch."
