AP - First comes the bearer of bad news that a loved one has died in combat. Then comes the bearer of the loved one the military escort who brings the fallen home.
AP - First comes the bearer of bad news that a loved one has died in combat. Then comes the bearer of the loved one the military escort who brings the fallen home.
AFP - A Los Angeles court dismissed a bid by fugitive director Roman Polanski to quash a decades-old rape conviction, but said the case may be heard if he returned to the United States.
Props used by 1950s television comedian Ernie Kovacs, including a pair of eyeglasses with images of eyes on the lenses, are being sold this weekend by a Dallas collectibles auctioneer. ... Source: RSS feed - channel BNewsEnter | 18 Feb 2009 | 11:47 am
A judge has refused to dismiss a 31-year-old sex case against Roman Polanski because he's a fugitive but signaled that he would reconsider if the film director returns to the United States... Source: RSS feed - channel BNewsEnter | 18 Feb 2009 | 11:45 am
What kind of person goes coatless on a frigid February night? Victoria Beckham, that's who. Beckham, fashionista and wife of David Beckham, sacrificed warmth for glamour while posing... Source: RSS feed - channel BNewsEnter | 18 Feb 2009 | 11:43 am
AP - Danny Gokey was proclaimed the "Hero" of "American Idol." Three of the show's four judges heaped praise on the 28-year-old church music director from Milwaukee on Tuesday, following his rendition of the Mariah Carey tune "Hero" at the end of the Fox singing competition's first performance show of season eight.
AP - Danny Gokey was proclaimed the "Hero" of "American Idol." Three of the show's four judges heaped praise on the 28-year-old church music director from Milwaukee on Tuesday, following his rendition of the Mariah Carey tune "Hero" at the end of the Fox singing competition's first performance show of season eight.
Reuters - Sudanese novelist Tayeb Salih, who won fame with his 1966 novel Season of Migration to the North, died in London Wednesday at the age of about 80, a friend and associate said. Source: Yahoo! News: Entertainment News | 18 Feb 2009 | 11:20 am
Reuters - The surprising success of "Crash" seems to have encouraged other filmmakers who yearn to make socially conscious ensemble movies. Whereas "Crash" wove together stories that focused on racial tensions in Los Angeles, "Crossing Over" brings the same kaleidoscopic technique to the hot-button issue of immigration. Source: Yahoo! News: Entertainment Reviews | 18 Feb 2009 | 7:14 am
LOS ANGELES (Hollywood Reporter) - Actor Pierce Brosnan's production company is developing a story about famed Hungarian photojournalist Robert Capa. Source: RSS feed - channel BNewsEnter | 18 Feb 2009 | 6:43 am
LOS ANGELES (Hollywood Reporter) - MC Hammer, the hitmaking 1990s rapper, will star in a reality series on the A&E cable network. Source: RSS feed - channel BNewsEnter | 18 Feb 2009 | 6:35 am
From rock bottom to the red carpet: win or lose on Oscar night, Mickey Rourke (pictured) and Robert Downey Jr. are the undisputed comeback kids of the 81st Academy Awards. Rourke's self-destructive streak... Source: RSS feed - channel BNImagesEnter | 18 Feb 2009 | 6:27 am
From rock bottom to the red carpet: win or lose on Oscar night, Mickey Rourke and Robert Downey Jr. (pictured) are the undisputed comeback kids of the 81st Academy Awards. Rourke's self-destructive streak... Source: RSS feed - channel BNImagesEnter | 18 Feb 2009 | 6:27 am
From rock bottom to the red carpet: win or lose on Oscar night, Mickey Rourke and Robert Downey Jr. are the undisputed comeback kids of the 81st Academy Awards. Both actors appeared to... Source: RSS feed - channel BNewsEnter | 18 Feb 2009 | 6:27 am
Go nuts with Max Silvestri as he stimulates your TV needs from American Idol and the season 2 premiere of The Real Housewives of New York City! It's the Best night Ever.
We caught up with Kanye West outside the backstage W Lounge after the Narciso Rodriguez show, where we finally got a chance to talk about his assertion that he dresses better than lots of gay people. Actually, he says, we were the first to ask him about that comment. “But there’s a lot of gay people that dress better than me, too,” he admitted. “No, I just think it’s a stereotype that all gay people dress good, and then it’s also a stereotype that if you dress good, you’re gay,” West explained.
Right. So does Kanye consider himself better dressed than most people in hip-hop? “Yeah, mostly,” he said. But when we pressed him for specific examples, Kanye would only say who he thinks out-dresses him. “I don’t think I dress better than Michael Jackson, so I think I got a long way to go. That’s what I’m thinking about. I’m thinking about Michael Jackson, Stefano Pilati, Ralph Lauren himself, like, and until I’m on that level, you know.”
But perhaps it won't be long until Kanye IS on that level? After all, Elle's Joe Zee told us that Kanye was his ideal intern. Alas, Kan's not interested. “I don’t know if I want to intern at a magazine. I want to make clothes.”
We're beginning to think Kanye West might be the Superman of Fashion Week. We were sitting in the Tent on Tuesday night waiting for Narciso Rodriguez to start, wondering if anyone other than the usual suspects would show, when he swept in to save the day. What, after all, is more heroic than entertaining the masses by wearing a bow tie and sunglasses in the middle of the night, while escorting a woman in red plastic pants whose own specs resemble the front of snorkeling goggles? Thank you, Kanye. Without your intervention, we might have been tempted to weigh in on the conversation going on behind us: A woman announced she wanted to lose twenty pounds. Her companion told her he thought she should either only lose five, or gain forty. It's for the best that we didn't get involved.
As for the regulars, most of them came out to play. Newly engaged Claire Danes arrived without fiancé Hugh Dancy, but she looked the happiest we've ever seen her, and very pretty in a black and green dress. Considering that she traditionally looks like she'd rather be digging her own grave with a spoon than deal with the press, we think her upcoming nuptials are doing her some good. To her left perched Jessica Seinfeldsans Jerry (we hope there's not trouble in paradise), but she seemed to be having a blast even without his constant witticisms, and gave Narciso an incredibly enthusiastic standing ovation at the end of the evening. Juliana Margulies also beamed widely, but wouldn't you be jolly, too, if you were (a) totally gorgeous, (b) wearing a crazy-hot black Narcisco cocktail dress, and (c) accompanied by an extremely cute husband? A husband who not only joins you out on the town during Fashion Week, but who appears interested in the clothes and in which ones you like? Dreamy. The ladies spent much of the show chatting, and burst into what almost looked like a choreographed chorus of laughter when models came down the runway wearing bucket hats pulled low over the forehead, with holes for eyes cut out, like some kind of hilarious hat/mask combo. They were surprisingly charming for something that looked like what Batgirl might wear to rob a bank in the dead of winter. We can't wait to see Kanye wearing that tomorrow. Hopefully he'll appear out of thin air in one next time we get bored.
As always, some blossomed and some disappointed beyond belief as American Idol kicked off the viewers' choice portion of the competition.
Unfortunately for those who tanked, only...
First bangs, then Baby Phat: Clearly, Tinsley Mortimer is going through some kind of mid-life-crisis-style reinvention. In the days of yore, with her sweetly curled hair and Mary Janes and poofy cocktail dresses, we'd have said all she had in common with Kimora Lee Simmons's blingy-yet-minimalist aesthetic was the fact that they both employed fabric to cover some body parts. So the sight of Tinsley in Baby Phat's front row on Tuesday night — complete with that facial fringe, heavy eye makeup and hot-pink enamel nail polish that matched her dress — must either signal the coming of the apocalypse, or the birth of her edgier alter-ego, The Notorious T.I.N.Z. We can't wait until she pierces something scandalous.
Other than Tinz's unexpected attendance, the crowd at Baby Phat was almost as notable for who didn't appear as for who did. Santogold never filled the seat earmarked for her, and neither did Joy Bryant, Maggie Grace, Busta Rhymes, Fat Joe, Nia Long, Michelle Williams (of Destiny's Child, not Dawson's Creek), nor Andre Leon Talley. We're particularly crushed about ALT's absence, because he's eluded us thus far and surely one of the cape-hat combos he's favored this season would have included a little Kimora-friendly gold lamé. Alas. We did, however, get an eyeful of Mario sauntering in wearing white jeans, perching next to fellow one-named performer Monica ૼ sporting a curious Kelis-style short 'do with pink streaks — and posing for pictures with aspiring rapper/former My Super Sweet Sixteen star Teyana Taylor, who wore a strange little headpiece that had a twig poking out the top. Hopefully if she nurtures and waters that thing, she'll have a mighty fir sprouting up there by next Christmas.
Mr. Kimora Lee The First, Russell Simmons, sat near Kimora's Djimon Honsou, whom her daughters eagerly ran up to and kissed when they did the finale walk with her. Ex-Danity Kane singer and semi-professional cleavage-spiller Aubrey O'Day wriggled into the venue in a tight animal-print number that, unexpectedly, kept about 50 percent of her bits covered (if you're keeping score, that's at least 30 percent more modest than what she wore to William Rast). In fact, on the boobage front, she was wholly outshone by ANTM's lone plus-sized winner (or indeed, "plus-sized" "winner") Whitney Thompson. Her tiny black minidress leaked chest flesh in just about every direction; however, concealed as it was for most of the night by her third-row seat, the display was all for naught unless she was hoping to seduce the chair in front of her and show it a jolly time. Aubrey initially fared little better, having been allotted a second-row spot. This thrilled us to the core — karmic payback for painting her absent puppy pink? — but of course Aubrey convinced The Powers That Be to move her to the front. She landed next to Nole Marin, and since Nole famously toted his pooch Empress Mimi to the ANTM set and sat her on a satin pillow, presumably they discussed at length the benefits of dragging your dog all over town.
Kimora cracked recently that the recession led her to cut costs by skimping on butt fabric this season, yet to be honest, we weren't sure how much more of it she could afford to ditch. That plus the eerily prescient carvings on the Gotham Hall walls about "economizing what you have" had us wondering if the entire show would just be swatches of material held together by string. Instead, a surprising number of long dresses, jumpsuits, and jeans came down the runway. Fortunately, Kimora is still the same national treasure of wackitude we've come to cherish, and thus there were still at least two dresses so short you could tell whether the models were ovulating; one of said frocks stretched transparently thin over the buttocks. Damn that economy. Interestingly, it was at around this point that we noticed Pat Field's crimson locks nodding merrily at what she saw. This can only mean one thing: Betty Suarez, like Tinsley, is about to undergo a serious metamorphosis, and there will be spandex and camel-toe involved. Good luck with that, ladies.
You can't really fathom how amazing it is that Marc Jacobs showed 60-odd looks on 60-odd different models — the sheer quantity of girls was mind-boggling. Thankfully, artist Jeremy Kost is roaming the tents for us, and he captured the parade of superior beings filing through for the finale. Click to watch (spoiler: it's a lot of models).
Chris Brown might not want Terrence Howard in his peanut gallery.
Police and court records show that the Hustle & Flow star, who backtracked last week on initially supportive remarks...
Host Hugh Jackman won't be the only star singing and dancing at Sunday's Academy Awards.
Several sources say that the Aussie hunk will be joined on stage by Beyoncé, High...
Kodak Theatre, venue for the Oscars, is pictured on February 16, in Los Angeles. Oscars organizers promised a bold new approach to this year's Academy Awards, after years of declining viewing figures that... Source: RSS feed - channel BNImagesEnter | 18 Feb 2009 | 3:46 am
A veil of secrecy has been thrown over preparations for this year's Oscars, with organizers hoping a sweeping revamp of the ceremony can help the show bounce back from record low ratings. AMPAS president... Source: RSS feed - channel BNImagesEnter | 18 Feb 2009 | 3:46 am
Like the inevitable passing of the seasons, now is the time for the changing of the Housewives.
As this season of Real Housewives of Orange County fades into the sunset with a dazzing...
(AP)
AP - Even if you're a devoted fan of "Project Runway" or, maybe especially if you are one you'll find "Eleven Minutes," the documentary about first-season winner Jay McCarroll seriously lacking.
Front Page: Director, Dimension reteam on 'Nerverackers' -- Robert Rodriguez is set to reteam with Dimension for his next film, the futuristic thriller "Nerverackers."
Front Page: Director in talks with Fox 2000 to adapt novel -- Ang Lee is in talks to direct "Life of Pi," the Fox 2000 adaptation of Yann Martel's coming-of-age survival tale.
Front Page: Duo may costar with Witherspoon in comedy -- Owen Wilson and Paul Rudd are in talks to star opposite Reese Witherspoon in James L. Brooks' untitled romantic comedy for Columbia Pictures.
Fiery stuff falls from the sky. Things explode. Traffic jams up like you wouldn't believe.
The new trailer for Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen promises everything the first film...
Front Page: Number of awards reduced in telecast -- With Oscar producers promising a rethink of this year's kudocast, execs at the Emmys are mulling their own primetime shake-up.
In the latest Video Look Book from Bryant Park, we catch up with a Vogue Nippon editor who manages to make her vintage Prada turban work with her J.Crew men's chinos and Miu Miu sandals. Click to see how she pulls it all together.
Reuters - Designer Christian Siriano gained national fame as the youngest winner of the "Project Runway," television show, but that was no guarantee he could break into the tight world of fashion -- or even get past security at New York's Fashion Week.
Alicia Keys, Joy Bryant, and Rachel Bilson. Joy's facial expression is directly connected to Rachel's dress.
Whenever anyone asks us whose wardrobe we actually LIKE, we frequently laud Rachel Bilson's, because by and large she finds ways to look both cute and interesting at the same time. Unfortunately, given that, our Fashion Week sighting of her was underwhelming at best; the actress arrived at Max Azria on Tuesday night in a gnarled ponytail that looked as if it hadn't met a friendly brush in a month, plus a rust-colored (or so it seemed in the lighting) one-sleeve shift that felt like little more than a caftan-toga hybrid. And while we long for the day that someone throws a toga-party-style fashion show, that time has not yet come.
But at least her lingerie wasn't showing. Keisha Whitaker's brown dress and Aisha Tyler's yellow one had plunging backs that exposed all their bra hooks and, in Tyler's case, both straps. (Guess she shouldn't have ditched her jacket.) We're torn between applauding their respect for gravity and lamenting that no one helped them find a better way to fight it.
Bryant Park staples Joy Bryant and Alison Brie joined singer Alicia Keys, Coco Rocha, Rob Thomas (posing for fan pics) and his wife Marisol, and Leigh Lezark in fleshing out Celebrity Row. Ugly Betty's Mark Indelicato wandered up to the fourth row with an escort, as if he were stuck with us in the peanut gallery, but we're not sure if he stayed there or if someone found him a better berth. Surely the latter, or else the Fashion Week pecking order has crumbled like the economy, and the end really IS nigh.
Speaking of pecking orders, we thought socialite queen bee Tinsley Mortimer had skipped out on the whole affair, until we realized her kicky new bangs make her look like a completely different person — especially when her stick-straight hair is slicked back in a quasi-topknot. Okay, she still kind of resembles a Barbie — it's not like she showed up in leather leggings — but she's certainly looking like a slightly edgier one. Indeed, when a model walked past in black leather gloves that ran almost all the way up her arms (creating essentially a giant sleeve with fingers), Tinz murmured her approval. Maybe all this rumored marital strife is morphing her from girlish to grown-up. Hey, everything's got a silver lining.
Slumdog Millionaire or The Reader? Kate Winslet or Meryl Streep? Mickey Rourke or Sean Penn? Heath Ledger or Heath Ledger?
The truth is out there.
The 5,810 voting...
On a day the Dow dropped 300 points, could there be a more inappropriate activity than looking at $20,000 to $50,000 coats? Hell, PETA hardly has anything to worry about! With the socials missing, hard-core fur coats were scarce. Though we saw a fur collar here and there, we counted only two full-length furs — on men. Fur is the bling of clothing, and as Karl Lagerfeld asserted, bling is out.
So what is a fur designer to do in these times, when the things you've created for decades — and we say this not in deference to animal-rights activists — go against all sense of propriety? Turn a blind eye to the Dow, credit default swaps, unemployment rates, mortgage-backed securities, and design on. "I put all the economy, Depression out of my brain and decided to create a collection that would be desirable, that people would want, that women would want to feel good in," Basso told us after the show. "I think if you kept the economy in your brain, it might be a little blah and not so exciting." But Basso isn't blissfully ignorant. "I think if you were to say business is spectacular — anyone who’s saying that is putting something in their Wheaties that we don’t know about."
He's avoided layoffs by "cutting back on extravagances." Rather than having a seated dinner for 300 people after his show, he's only going out with ten friends this evening. Rather than filling his Madison Avenue store with $1,000 worth of orchids each week, he's using ivy plants. And most important, Basso is bringing his furs to his customers (as we mentioned, they certainly aren't coming to him). He recently courted customers in Dallas and Houston. Tomorrow he flies to St. Moritz in Switzerland to open a pop-up shop in the middle of the Palace hotel. You know, where the economic crisis only exists outside.
Actress America Olivo arrives at the premiere of Warner Bros.' "Friday the 13th" at the Chinese Theater on February 9, 2009 in Los Angeles, California. A remake of cult 1980 horror movie "Friday the 13th"... Source: RSS feed - channel BNImagesEnter | 18 Feb 2009 | 12:26 am
Do you think the Octomom will really stay famous and get a book deal and a TV show?
—Octofever, Kansas
A TV show? Less likely every minute. Sure, one Emmy-winning...
What caught Style File's eye at yesterday's Organic presentation? "Cookies! Fresh bread! Locally produced Camembert! These were the wonders laid out at Organic’s Fall ‘09 presentation..." [Style File/Style.com]
WHEN YOU WISH UPON A VOLCANO: Suri Cruise was spotted with mom Katie Holmes meeting Micky and Minnie Mouse at Disneyworld. Things ran smoothly until Tom confused Goofy with a Thetan and threw him in the lake. (Daily Mail)
TROUBLE IN LINDSAYTOWN?: Lindsay Lohan was spotted heading over to Chace Crawford's apartment at 6 am. The two claim they did nothing wrong, and just got together to do some cocaine and have wild, illicit sex. (OK Magazine)
NIP SLIP: Solange Knowles knows how to get her name on the gossip blogs. All it takes is a quick slip of the ol' eggplant prunes. (DListed)
J*ZZ IN THE CITY: Justin Timberlake is moving to New York City! No word yet if he's joining the cast of SNL or not, but let's just say Horatio Sanz is changing the sheets on his pull-out couch. (OK Magazine)
HEADLINE: "OctoMom: I Don't Need Salma's Boob Milk" We'll leave you with that. (TMZ)
Front Page: Guild renews protest against 'American' -- The Writers Guild of America West is resuming its battle against FremantleMedia North America over its allegedly unfair treatment of "American Idol" writers and other workers.
Here is the video for the Kanye West single "Welcome to Heartbreak." And if you've ever tried to watch scrambled porn (not that we have... trust me, we haven't!... though we were a little disappointed when we discovered that penises did not, in fact, glow lime green...) then the video might look a little familiar. The good news is you'll either get a little turned on by this, or throw your computer out of the window in a blue-balled rage.
From the minute nerds first laid eyes on the first trailer for Zack Snyder's faithful-seeming movie adaptation of Alan Moore's Watchmen comic, its status as 2009's most geek-anticipated event movie has gone practically unchallenged. And endless early marketing, along with Fox's stakes-upping copyright lawsuit, only added to the frenzy. But no matter how perfect and successful a movie is, comic-book fans always find something to complain about — so what will they hate about this one? What will be Watchmen's growly Batman voice? We speculate, after the jump.
Malin Ackerman's acting: Today, for the first time, Warner Bros. released a clip of a full scene from the movie. Sadly, it's one featuring the dead-fish thespianism of Ackerman as Silk Spectre II. Based on all available evidence, we think it's totally possible she could be reading from cue cards.
The changed ending: At the end of Alan Moore's original comic — SPOILER! — Manhattan is wiped out by a giant exploding squid. In the movie, New York and other world cities are blown up by a series of atom-bomb-like explosions that have absolutely nothing to do with squids. Some, including us, like Snyder's altered finale better, at least in theory (also, Watchmen illustrator Dave Gibbons has endorsed it) — but maybe it'll still feel like sacrilege.
"The visionary director of 300": Even fans wowed by Watchmen's first trailer back in July rolled their eyes at the tagline. In today's Times, Brook Barnes notes that it looks even sillier when blown up on a billboard. So what if all of Snyder's "visionary" (and probably unnecessary) slow-motion fight scenes turn out to be distracting? What if it's all style over substance, as one new review seems to imply. How many critics will quote this hilarious slogan in their negative reviews?
Speaking of the marketing: On our short walk from the subway to work today, we saw no fewer than six different Watchmen ads, on pay phones, buses, bus stops, and billboards. Is any of this even necessary? Nerds are already completely aware that it's being released on March 6, but how much of an effect does all this advertising have on the public at large, who've probably never heard of the original comic? Also, we were already annoyed weeks ago by all the viral online advertising. At what point will people with no previous interest in Watchmen start to get sick of it?
Nipples: If all of the things above somehow fail to start a backlash, but some imperceptible thing about Watchmen still feels off, we can always blame it on these.
The Bad News: The Dow Jones slid 297.81 points today to 7552.60. The Good News: That's still a hair above its November low!
The Bad News: The S&P 500 dropped 4.6 percent. The Good News: The dollar strengthened against the euro and the yen!
The Bad News: “Nobody believes it’s going to get better yet,” Howard Silverblatt, senior S&P analyst told the Times. “Do you see that light at the end of the tunnel? Any kind of light? Right now, it’s not there yet.” The Good News: "How do we address these economic times in a franchise that has a lot to do with luxury and labels?" Sarah Jessica Parker asked Access Hollywood. "I think we want this one to be a romp," she said. "The last one, we got to tell a really mature sophisticated story that had real heartbreak in it, and this time, I think we want a romp. We want our audience to have a massive romp."
Today Mayor Bloomberg announced that joining former Clinton communications czar Howard Wolfson on his reelection team will be Jill Hazelbaker, who held the corresponding role in John McCain's campaign. Hazelbaker is joining a largely (though not completely) Democratic team. [City Room/NYT]
With a show like last night's William Rast fashion event, it's no wonder Justin Timberlake topped GQ's Most Stylish Men in America list.
The crooner, along with partners...
• One publication that's not dying: Politico, a (sort of) post-print venture where hustling staffers aim to "win the morning, win the afternoon" with discussion-worthy "scooplets." Perhaps they're motivated by internal memos like this: "We are not the AP or the Times. ... If we ONLY do what those two great organizations do, WE WILL NOT SURVIVE AND WE WON'T HAVE JOBS." [TNR]
• The awards ceremonies continue: The Times' David Barstow won a George P. Polk Award for national reporting (for "Message Machine"). More winners here. [E&P]
• Alfred A. Knopf, influential publisher, died while we were on vacation. [NYT]
• At a lecture on "The Art of the Interview," Barbara Walters offered this insight: "I think the only programs that will still be there as they are now in 10 years are the morning shows. Everything else you can TiVo and watch later or read about on the internet." [Portfolio]
• This year's Sports Illustrated swimsuit edition, featuring Bar Refaeli, set an all-time high-traffic record for the Sports Illustrated website. Similarly, Lindsay Lohan's nude spread is still in our most viewed. [Time Warner]
• The Tribune Co. has implemented a salary freeze for 2009. [BrowardPB]
• According to Time.com, Perez Hilton, Gawker, and TechCrunch are overrated, while Lifehacker, The Daily Dish, and Deadspin pwn the Internet. More picks here. [Time].
G.I. Joe action figures are seen at the 2003 Hasbro International G.I. Joe Collectors' Convention in Burlingame, California. Classic soldier doll G.I. Joe is reporting for duty in videogame consoles and... Source: RSS feed - channel BNImagesEnter | 17 Feb 2009 | 10:57 pm
Front Page: Musicals lead box office bounce -- Presidents Day weekend brought a box office boost to Broadway last week, with total sales rising almost $2 million to $14.4 million for 23 shows on the boards.
On the left, a killer chimp named Travis who, before getting shot by police, spent his days drinking wine, wiping himself, logging onto computers (one assumes, to read bwe.tv), and clawing human faces off. On the right, Marlon Brando, whose man teets are now at the Smithsonian. Pour a little out of your bacon-and-cheddar-tini to remember him by.
Related: MARLON BRANDO FACTS: The Godfather of Binge Eating Source: Best Week Ever | 17 Feb 2009 | 10:36 pm
Where did it all go wrong for Carson Daly? After all, the guy was Ryan Seacrest before Ryan Seacrest was Ryan Seacrest. He served his time in Los Angeles radio, he did his stint on reality television and, heck, everyone thought he was on his way to becoming the next Dick Clark. He managed to scratch and claw his way into the stable of NBC's late-night fraternity back in 2002, serving as the host of Last Call with Carson Daly and effectively becoming the third banana on NBC's late-night totem pole (behind Jay Leno and Conan O'Brien). But despite playing the role of all-around team player — his New Year's Eve show on NBC is making steady inroads against the competition (damn you, Seacrest!), the Last Call audience has grown 4 percent this year — Daly was passed over by NBC in favor of Jimmy Fallon for the Late Night gig. Adding insult to injury, the recent news that Jay Leno will be moving to 10 p.m. in the fall has NBC trying to decide exactly whether or not their late-night future includes Carson Daly.
Well, according an article published in this week's TV Week, NBC has begun negotiating with Daly in advance of his August contract-expiration date. Rick Ludwin, NBC’s executive V.P. for late-night and prime-time series, has gone on the record saying that his network is interested in keeping Daly on the team — for a price. “We’re going through the budgetary process with all of our shows.” Mr. Ludwin told TV Week. “There are new budgetary realities. … It’s tough. We want to keep [Carson] going as long as we can make the budget work."
While we won't pretend to know what decision is best for Daly or his career, there is one thing that we're certain of: In today's wintry economic climate, it's far better to have a job than it is to be looking for one. That said, if Carson is looking to turn that frown upside-down, he doesn't have to look far: Jennifer Love-Hewitt is single again!
We don't know about you, but we've been looking forward to the new season of the Real Housewives of New York, which starts tonight. Not because we found the social-climbing machinations of this bunch of ragtag cougars that fascinating last time around, but because, with the Greatest Depression having rolled into New York, things could get genuinely exciting.
Will Bobby Zarin have to give up his private jet? Will Ramona's McMansion be foreclosed upon? Will Bethenny Bakes have to file for Chapter 11? Will the count be revealed to be one of the principals in a European feeder fund to Bernie Madoff and lose everything, forcing the countess and the children to roast the puppy they got last season over the charred embers of their Southampton estate? Really, this could be Real Housewives' chance to be something important, not just a crass reality show about rich ladies fighting, but something that reflects the socioeconomic reality of the early 21st century, the vehicle to tell the story of the fall of the bourgeoisie and the rise of the middle classes! It could be like Greatest Depression's The Cherry Orchard. Or, at the very least, some seriously Tom Wolfe–ian shit!
Alas, no.
New York reporter Nina Mandell went to last week's premiere party, where she asked if the recession would play into the show at all. "It puts a damper on things, I've got to be honest," said Ramona. "But I'm still spending money." For instance, there was her birthday present. "Bobby bought me a B bag, a very expensive bag that are custom-made crocodile — it's a sick bag. It's my guilty pleasure; everybody will hate me."
Ditto social-climbing hotel manager Simon Van Kempen and his wife, Alex McCord, whose names currently appear under the "premiere circle sponsors" (donations of $10,000 or more!) of the Met Opera program. "If we can still spend money, it's incumbent on those who can to spend," Van Kempen opined. "Going back to FDR," he continued, "'the greatest fear is fear itself,' so if we're all scared about our jobs and not spending any money, we're not going to have jobs and no one will have any money. But it's not as if we're going out splurging," he added. Although: "There is episode one, where we go out and spend $8,000 on a shopping trip."
Did anyone else think Alex Rodriguez was going a litttttle far our of his way to seem likable at his 'steroids' press conference Tuesday afternoon? We found at least seven telltale signs of A-Rod's defensiveness in the following thoroughly undoctored ESPN screencap:
1. American Flag Pin
2. Barry Bonds 756* Poster
3. Kobe Bryant's Daughters join him at podium
4. Statline From Decent 2004 ALCS
5. My Cousin Vinny DVD
6. The Charity Award
7. Chesley Sullenberger Source: Best Week Ever | 17 Feb 2009 | 10:12 pm
"A couple of seasons ago, there was an over-the-top character who was white that we could have cast, but we sacrificed that for a Latino. That's how important that is." Let's all give Dave Broome, executive producer of NBC's The Biggest Loser, a round of applause for putting racial diversity ahead of casting a second-rate Puck on his show. [LAT]
Once a week, Daily Intel takes a peek behind doors left slightly ajar. This week, we bring you the Laid-Off, Cuckolded Boyfriend With Anger Problems: 29, male, suburban Connecticut, straight, laid-off.
DAY ONE Midnight: At an art event while my ex is on a Craigsdate. It feels so good to finally be alone after seven years with a woman six years older. Then she texts: She's been stood up. I rush home. 1 a.m.: We still live together in Connecticut, where I moved to support her until she finishes graduate school in May. I ended the relationship a week ago out of sexual frustration — the last two years were celibate, due to her thyroid condition. We have both begun dating again, but are co-dependent until our lease is out in May. I still have intense feelings for her.
4 a.m.: She's waiting with pizza. Never wants to see her suitor again. 10 a.m.: We still share a bed. Upon waking, she's fuming over being stood up. Attempt to initiate sex. She cringes when I touch her. She began hormone therapy a few months ago, but has shown no interest in sex (with me). It's a source of resentment disproportionate to the act itself. 11 a.m.: Her suitor e-mails to apologize. I tell her not to respond. She does. Check my e-mail. Nothing. Jealous. 11:30 a.m.: Make breakfast in bed for her. Admittedly, I am trying to seduce her. I don’t believe she has no interest in sex. I feel taken advantage of. I never would have moved here if I thought we wouldn’t one day have a normal relationship. I still want to be with her. Noon: We discuss relationship. Takeaways: We will love each other always, we cannot move forward in life without one another, but we are broken up, she needs to talk to Craigsguy, promises not to sleep with him. 5 p.m.: Walk her to school. Come home. Begin heated e-mail exchange with her. She tells me my e-mails were romantic and passionate, and she hadn't realized how much she missed having romance in her life. That’s what I was missing too, I say. 7 p.m.: Take shower; masturbate, thinking of her. 8 p.m.: She forwards me an e-mail from her suitor, asking me for clarification. Please don't torture me, I say. I have to do this, she says. 8:50 p.m.: She comes home to change before her date. She's stunning: tall, redheaded, and dramatic, my ideal of female beauty. Sit stewing. 9 p.m.: Why is she going out if she loves me? "We're just talking," she says. "I didn't do this before your date." So it is a date then? "Shouting at me before I go see him is a bad idea," she says on the way out. 10:30 p.m.: Check online-dating site. Lone message is from a cheap clone of the ex. Pour myself a dry martini. Tomorrow is a big day, tryout for a potential job that would get me out of here for a year. 2 a.m.: She sends a text describing an improbable, romantic-comedy-like moment between her and her new beau. Doesn't reply to my follow-up text. 3 a.m.: Send a series of frantic and increasingly angry texts and voicemails.
DAY TWO 9 a.m.: She texts saying she slept on couch. Haven’t slept at all. Noon: She arrives home, likely thinking I was already gone. Admits to kissing the guy on the lips. I insist on kissing her. Awkward, we hug for minutes at a time afterwards; I can smell something unfamiliar on her. His dog, she says. Trust is utterly gone. Leave for job interview. 3 p.m.: Back in New York City. Check into hotel. Glib texts with the ex. 10 p.m.: Flirt with bartender who looks like Drew Barrymore. She tells me to meet at another bar afterwards. I go. 11 p.m.: Shower, shave, "safety jerk." Midnight: Cute bartender is buying me drinks and nuzzling. I invite her back to my hotel, but she balks, and gives me her e-mail. Pick up an Israeli girl who’s been staring at me. 5 a.m.: Raunchy hotel sex, first intercourse in two-and-a-half years, first blow job in seven. My ex always claimed my breath was terrible and my penis was drippy and disgusting. Ask about this, girl says everything seems normal. Afterward she wants to talk about Gaza, sigh, and says she wants to be a journalist, double sigh.
DAY THREE 11 a.m.: Feel bad chasing the Israel girl out before checkout. Run into her on the street afterwards. Giddy, but also uncomfortable because it wasn’t someone I cared about. 5 p.m.: Back in Connecticut, walking home, chatting with stunning brunette I met on the bus ride home. Forget to ask for surname. 5:30 p.m.: Home. Ex avoids me, is holed up with her computer, smoking furiously, penning some massive missive to the guy. Message from a very cute girl I'd been on a date with the week before. 7 p.m.: She's still wrapped up in her computer. Realize I could care less. 10 p.m.: She leaves for work. I tell her I know she's lying and she more or less ignores the question, saying she isn't used to dealing with these situations. Ugh, am sneezy, snotty, and obviously coming down with something. Hope I didn't give it to that poor Israeli girl. Or did she give it to me? Pour myself a drink. Haven't slept in two days. 11 p.m.: Drunk and sick.
DAY FOUR 10 a.m.: Very sick. Wake up to a cat kneading my pillow. 11 a.m.: Argument with ex after she refuses to stop smoking in the same room. 11:30 a.m.: Polite rejection from dream job. Shout at cat, who scratches me. 2 p.m.: Fight with ex over whether I am invited to a club in two days. She says she doesn't want me to hit on girls or get drunk and embarrass her. Reasonable. 6 p.m.: Drag myself out for an art opening with ex. 8 p.m.: Friend of ex invites me to stop by anytime. Not sure how to take it. Ex is visibly irritated, explains why aforementioned co-worker would never have anything to do with me, how she only dates real men with real incomes. 9 p.m.: Ex says she might see her beau tonight, "for the last time," and leaves. Last week's date leaves a few flirty Facebook messages on my profile. Am so sick. Pour myself a drink. E-mail ex; she's either gone or ignoring me. Don't really care.
DAY FIVE 11:30 a.m.: Ex texts to say she's coming home. Claims she spent the night at her work studio. Too sick to care. 2:30 p.m.: We leave for our monthly shopping trip in a rented car. She gets very angry at me when I tell her I want her to start paying utilities. I call her a whore. Afterward we ignore each other. 6 p.m.: Ask her to apologize for leading me on for two years. Call her a whore again. 7 p.m.: Home. She goes into the other room, smoking, frantically e-mailing her man. I check mine. Start drinking bourbon. 11 p.m.: Notice the rental car is parked illegally. Ex asks me to move it in the morning at 8 a.m. I refuse, saying I'm sick and she doesn't get special privileges from me if she's with someone else. She's angry but moves the car.
DAY SIX 11:45 a.m.: Up. Not as sick as before. Ex has left many cat chores for me to take care of. 1:30 p.m.: Parents call encouraging me to move out. Psychologically, this is my best option. It would also hurt her the most, and I don't want to do that. She would literally have to drop out in her last semester. 3:30 p.m.: She calls, says she's having a hard day and is about to break it off for good with the guy. Please don’t tell me about this. 7 p.m.: She comes home. She’s crying over him. I pour her some of my bourbon. She admits to sleeping with the guy and gives me lurid detail that "it was like losing my virginity again; it wouldn’t go in, we had to try and try." I tell her my hotel story. At first it feels cathartic, but then we're both really mad at each other. 10:30 p.m.: We go out to a club together. I keep drinking. I lose her in the club. Last thing I remember is bumming a cigarette (my first in nine years) off someone and storming home to confront her.
DAY SEVEN 1:30 a.m.: Storm into house, kick down bedroom door, and corner her against the wall, screaming at her until the police arrive. I'm hauled away. Handcuffs, no glasses. Blind. Paddy wagon. She tells the police not to take me, but given my condition they have to. It’s the first time I have ever been arrested. We have had bad arguments before, but never like this. 5 a.m.: Why are people masturbating in the cells next to mine? Furious with her. Police are nice to me. Bologna sandwiches for breakfast aren’t as bad as you’d think. 9 a.m.: Use my phone call to call her. She tells me she tried to get the police to leave me, but they had to take me away. Sobering up, realize how awful what I've done is. Shackled to other prisoners in an absolutely dark van. Spooky. 11:30 a.m.: Arraignment. Charged with two misdemeanors. Court date. Limited restraining order. Mandatory alcohol counseling. She's been calling on my behalf and I would have been in much more serious trouble if she hadn't. 12:30 p.m.: Home. Am shocked to see how wrecked the house is. She’s obviously in pain. We both apologize. Realize just how fucked up of a person I am. 1 p.m.: She tells me she must call her guy to break it off. She's on the phone with him for hours. Why is she more upset about her breakup with this guy than me? 5:30 p.m.: We lie together in the dark, reeling from the whole thing. In some ways it's like nothing ever changed. Want to be away from her but don't. Just need to find a job first. We're still stuck together until May. Fall asleep together listening to music.
TOTALS: One act of hotel sex with stranger; two acts of masturbation fantasizing about ex; one act of domestic violence leading to two misdemeanor charges.
If paying $99 for a Smash-Me Bernie doll is out of reach of your post-Ponzi budget, Sleazeballs has come up with a more price-appropriate — more appropriate in general, considering Bern's demographic — toy on which to take out your rage: Bernie Madoff golf balls. They'll be a hit at the Palm Beach Country Club! For those who can still afford dues, anyway. [Sleazeballs]
Vulture has been feeling Jimmy Fallon's online-charm offensive, and we remain steadfast in our commitment to take a wait-and-see approach to his new show. But we do have questions, like, was the daily web diary on Fallon's website his idea? "No! Not my idea. Lorne’s idea," Fallon said when we talked to him outside Paul Simon's show at the Beacon Theatre on Friday night. Indeed, Fallon had been super-nervous about how much personal stuff he’d have to reveal in order to keep the webisodes interesting but eventually gave in. “At one point when my eyeball was hanging out of my head — I had Lasik surgery on the web — that’s when I realized, ‘Wow. I’m kinda doing it all. I want this to work so bad.’”
Now, Fallon says, he actually likes doing the things. “It’s helping me out, making me more comfortable with the camera, and also making me work with the writers a little more. Even though these are unwritten pieces.” And he’s been reading your comments. “We had, like, two shows of people hating it and then they gave up and now we get really nice comments.” But, he adds, he takes it personally when you don’t like what he’s doing. “It’s my own sick brain, but every time you get a bad review or a hit, that sticks in your head and you don’t really hear the good stuff so much.”
Fallon says regular webisode viewers likely know everything there is to know about him (except for perhaps how he and wife Nancy Juvonen are slumming it in a rental while they await renovations on their Gramercy Park apartment). The latest update, not yet aired, but sure to any moment now? “The set is almost 90 percent there. I tried out chairs today and I sat behind my desk. It’s all getting so real!” In addition, he’s gone over intro music and the music for coming in and out of commercials with the Roots. And he’s sleep-deprived enough that he rhymes involuntarily. “Days are getting longer and I’m getting stronger,” he said, without really realizing. “ I really hope it all goes well because I’ve got the best of everything around me and the only person that can screw it up is me. And I’m just really worried that I’m gonna screw it up.”
Fallon says that the atmosphere of his set is supposed to be fun, so he’s going to be very lenient with backstage riders. “Green M&Ms, whatever you want, you’ve got it.” And unlike Daily Intel’s favorite show, he’s not going to enforce strict anti-liquor rules. “It’s not going to be like Sober House. We’re not going to check your pockets. So if you smuggle in booze to my show, go ahead.”
He’s not allowed to reveal the name of his first guest, but he says that it will be someone who’s not a close friend. “I also don’t want anyone I know,” he said. “I’d rather talk to people I don’t know that well so I can work on my skills, and when my friends come on I can treat them like guests as opposed to just reminiscing about fun stories.” So how long does he think he can last as a brand-new late-night-show host before calling in a favor to a friend? “Second show,” he said. “Unless I only make it through half of the first show. One half of the first show will be friends, and then all of the second show. And then the first week’s done, and I’m in trouble.”
Front Page: Director offered chance to fight sex charges -- Roman Polanski will have to return to the United States and face a judge before his 1977 child sex case can be dismissed.
Indie soft-rocker (that’s not pejorative, we like her!) and Ravi Shankar daughter Norah Jones has closed on a nearly $5 million brownstone in Cobble Hill. The price is said to be pretty steep, unless she also bought the parking lot next door. [Brownstoner]
The cast of Broadway's Shrek: The Musical swung by The View this morning, and out of all the songs they could've chosen to perform for the View's audience of fiftysomething females, they decided to do a good ol' Shrek and Fiona fart-and-burp montage. Which, actually, seems strangely applicable.
Also, I'm pretty sure this scene is in Meet the Spartans, fartbatim:
E! Online - Kanye West is on another magazine cover (this time with a sure-to-be-appreciated gray-free beard) and as usual the rapper turned auto-tune singer turned fashion designer is full of Kanye-isms. To name a few:
Front Page: Report finds higher advanced ticket sales -- International ticket sales for Broadway shows dipped slightly last season, but advance purchases rose.
This is shaping to be another of those weeks — years? — not to look at the Dow, unless your livelihood depends on it (in which case we suggest you get a new livelihood). We recommend pretending you live in L.A., where months go by without anyone mentioning the stock market. Or reading only the Downturnaround, which continues to contend that beneath the pounding waves of bad news, you can still feel undertow of recovery and vitality. To wit, we'll borrow a phrase we read in the comments section of Barry Ritholtz's blog, the Big Picture: "Hopelessness may be fun to write about, but it's not hard wired into the human brain."
Some of the reasons to keep it all together this week are: Airfares are ridiculously cheap, there is evidence that our bankers may be less dumb than other bankers (!), and both the German people and the beleaguered Noel family are showing sturdy resilience that we can all take as an example.
• Overheard yesterday outside the Bryant Park fashion tents: "I know the world is coming to an end, but I have friends — well-connected people who grew up on Park Avenue — whose kids did not get into kindergarten." We know, cry me a river, but we consider it a positive economic indicator that there remains a surplus of parents willing to pay 30K-plus per year to send their kids to private school.
• People's Express is back, except now it's called JetBlue. Whoa, are the fares low! Unfortunately, a lot of them are to places that not even the Downturnaround has an interest in visiting (Syracuse, Rochester), but we also saw a $49 one-way fare to Burlington, Vermont (ahh, the slopes of Stowe!), and just $89 to Fort Lauderdale, which is an especially good deal, considering one could probably save on hotels by shacking up in a foreclosed McMansion! [JetBlue]
• In the midst of one of those economic analyses that makes your blood run cold, financial expert John Mauldin throws the Downturnaround a bone: "This Monday I fly out to Colorado Springs to look at a very intriguing high-tech start-up. As gloomy as this letter was, there are so many cool opportunities to get involved with new companies with truly world-changing technologies. Maybe it is just serendipitous, but I am seeing more exciting possibilities than I ever have." [Big Picture]
• For those who take comfort in believing that American bankers aren't the stupidest people on earth, consider that at least they didn't recklessly shovel our deposits into Eastern Europe and the former Soviet bloc countries, where the economies are seriously sucking wind. [Bloomberg]
• One valuable function of recessions is that they purge the economy of useless rituals like corporate gatherings where they the give the guy who wrote Good to Great (which included bankrupt Circuit City in its list of "great companies," by the way) $75K to give a talk he's done so many times he can recite it in his sleep. [NYT]
• Germany's economy isn't quite as crappy as ours, but they've got problems: They've resorted to paying people to scrap their old cars, to spur the sales of new ones. Plus, they're in a monetary union with totally busted economies like Ireland and Greece, the sovereign equivalents of GM and AIG. But Germans aren't dragging their asses around. They're gaining confidence. Let's steal some of their steely resolve. [Bloomberg]
• Hey hey hey, the economy is not slipping into the toilet quite as it was before. [NYT]
• Sure, the Japanese bank Nomura has lost billions and laid off staff worldwide, all the usual stuff banks are up to these days. But in New York, they're doing something very strange, according to the Economist: Nomura's on a "hiring binge" in New York. Now those are two words we haven't seen strung together in a while. [Economist]
• All right, if the Noels — that once-fabulous Greenwich clan that served essentially as Madoff's chief marketing officers — can continue to hit the social circuit and dine out at Swifty's even as they face a lifetime of being hounded by lawsuits, a liquidation of most if not all of their precious assets, and a reputation that makes Ivan Boesky look like a candidate for sainthood by comparison, well, what reason do you have for letting the recession get you down? [NYP]
We weren’t quite sure how serious Yeah Yeah Yeahs’ Nick Zinner was when he told Spin last week that the group’s upcoming album It’s a Blitz! was recorded under a strict, Karen O–mandated “no guitars for Nick!” directive. But the album’s first track, “Zero,” swaps in tons of synths for Zinner’s stellar axwork. And, while it may play out differently over the course of Blitz’s ten tracks, initial results are strong: Karen O’s pitch-escalating vocals and kiss-off lyrics are right-on for the dance-floor-flirting track. It’s uncharted territory for the Yeah Yeah Yeahs but still feels comfortable, and should just about tide us over until Blitz! drops on April 14.
The historic, $787 billion stimulus bill is now law. Prior to signing the bill (with ten different pens and some weird purple box) at a ceremony in Denver, Obama took a tour of the Denver Museum of Nature and Science. All in all, a nice little Tuesday. [CNN]
There were lots of bad things that followed in the wake of the tremendous success of Ferris Bueller's Day Off back in 1986: the terrible ska band Save Ferris, the terrible NBC TV show of the same name, the terrible career of Mia Sara. However, the fledgling Fox network's televised Bueller clone, Parker Lewis Can't Lose, managed to buck this trend of terribleness. Or, at least, that's how we remember it. All of which leads us to this: We're equal parts excited and nervous for the show to be finally released on DVD on June 30. After all, what if our fond memories end up failing us? [TV Shows on DVD via Thighs Wide Shut]
The New York Times website unsurprisingly sits atop the Nieman Journalism Lab's list of top fifteen newspaper websites released earlier today. At an average of 19 million unique visitors a month, it clobbers the next contender, USAToday.com, by 9 million. But you'll be pleased that sites for every major New York paper, including Newsday, make the list. Take that, Topeka. [NiemanLab via Romenesko]
Fashion Wire Daily - It was back to the Eighties on Monday night, Feb. 16, where the Marc Jacobs show reeked of rock-n-roll nights at CBGB in Manhattan.
When Joaquin Phoenix showed up in a possibly altered state on David Letterman's show last Wednesday night, most of the early reaction was that his weirdo performance-art schtick was either "disastrous" or "career-ending." Vulture's assessment didn't go down that track; we were actually more pissed that he didn't do a better job of promoting his latest film. However, in a funny twist, it just might turn out that all of us were wrong. What would you say if we told you that Two Lovers was Joaquin's most successful opening weekend since he starred alongside Mel Gibson in Signs?
While that statement is true, there is one caveat we'd like to explain. The film managed to rack up some $120,000 over the four-day holiday weekend, which is actually pretty decent considering the film opened in very limited release on seven screens in New York and Los Angeles. So, if you break down the gross on a per-screen basis, it grossed an estimated $17,143 per screen, which would make it Phoenix's best opening since Signs pulled in $18,418 per screen back in 2002. Granted, that film did some $60 million that weekend, but the point that we're trying to illustrate is that Phoenix's near-mute turn on Letterman definitely amped up the curiosity factor, driving people to see a performance by Phoenix that our own David Edelstein described as being "stupendous in a way he has never been before."
While this gambit appears like it may end up paying some dividends for Phoenix's acting career, we would like to strongly discourage other actors from misguidedly pursuing careers in the music industry. After all, the last thing anyone needs to see when Tyler Perry hits the talk-show circuit this week to push Madea Goes to Jail is him threatening to go on tour with Animal Collective.
Anything beats another pros-and-cons story about the stimulus package, but that being said, I'm not sure what to make of today's CNN.com homepage:
Are these just two isolated incidents, or are the animals finally fighting back like the Battlestar Cylons, only more adorable and resulting in funnier headlines? Perhaps Grizzly Man was an early warning... Source: Best Week Ever | 17 Feb 2009 | 7:40 pm
Two weeks ago, we analyzed Kanye West's response to the internet claim that he wants to star in a bisexual porn by pointing out 5 Signs That Kanye West Does Want To Star In A Bisexual Porn.
Today, we'd like to add a sixth: Kanye appearing on the cover of I Do In Fact Want To Star In A Bisexual Porn Monthly:
And if you search the cover closely, you can even find the hidden title of Kanye's potential hit bisexual porn (after the jump):
With ratings for the current season of Lost plummeting with every passing week, the executives over at Fox are clearly looking to execute a Mortal Kombat–style finishing move on one of the jewels of ABC's crown. THR's James Hibberd is reporting that Fox is moving the Wednesday-night edition of its American Idol juggernaut back one hour to 9 p.m. beginning on March 11, where it will air directly against Lost. We've asked this question before, but we'll ask it again: How much longer can ABC wait to move the show back to its rightful place on Thursday nights? [Live Feed/THR]
Joann Killeen is president of the Killeen Furtney Group, the Los Angeles, California-based public relations firm that represented octuplet mom Nadya Suleman.
Fashion Wire Daily - With thoughts of better times the overarching theme this season, it was also the case for the inspiration behind the Zero + Maria Cornejo Fall 2009 collection, shown Monday, Feb. 16 at the Robert Miller Gallery in New York.
"I am her biggest fan and I can't get enough of her. But wearing my fashion hat, I want to say to Meryl Streep, 'You need to accept responsibility for what you are wearing. I don't know that you do.' She is so smart, so stunning, and she has a great figure. Sometimes she gets it right, but more often she doesn't. The message she's sending is, I'm too smart for this and it doesn't matter to me what I'm wearing. I want to say to her that it should matter to you." —Tim Gunn on wanting to take Meryl Streep shopping [E! Online]
“oh kittens! It’s two pseudo famous people sitting next to each other ... doesn’t mean we were bumping uglies!” —Katy Perryon not going to home base with Paris Hilton's ex, Benji Madden [katyperryblog]
"I'm one of the most hip-hop people on earth because I say and do exactly what the f— I wanna do and say, regardless of what type of backlash I get. The whole baggy jeans versus tight jeans thing — Run DMC, Fat Boys, they wore tight jeans with gyms shoes and that was hip-hop. Then people started wearing big jeans and that was supposed to be hip-hop. When I first did big jeans, people said that was 'skater.' Now you think 'skater' and that's super tight jeans. ... They keep trying to label me but the labels won't stick." —Kanye West on how his fashion has nothing to do with how hip-hop he is [MTV]
"I’m actually dating Blake [Lively]. We decided it would be a good cover for a while, but we’re ready now,” Trachtenberg joked to us at Monday’s Jill Stuart show. “No, I’m just kidding. I think whatever [the rest of the cast] gets up to on their own time is all good.” —Michelle Trachtenbergon not dating Blake Lively [NYDN]
"every munny is hand-drawn by me, rosie odonnell (star of the flintstones); i do these obsessively; i cant stop myself; i love them; now it is getting absurd; really; like ocd out of control." —Rosie O'Donnellblogging about making Munny dolls, now that her personal blog has expired [Etsy]
"Look at it this way: here's Steven Soderbergh, Laura Bickford, and myself; we travel to Cuba, and we go, 'we wanna tell a story about one of your heroes. We want you to trust us, Americans from Hollywood, so that we can tell the story about one of your biggest heroes. Trust us, yes, we come from the enemy." —Benicio del Toroon extracting information from Cubans to make Che [Guardian UK]
"One critic compared watching Anne [Hathaway] in our film to experiencing a two-hour colonoscopy." —Jonathan Demme on the haters of Rachel Getting Married [Guardian UK]
AP - In the movies, the horror genre covers a surprisingly wide range of moods. At one extreme, you have all-out splatterfests like "Friday the 13th" and "My Bloody Valentine," which revel gleefully in creative ways to dismember the human body. At the other end, you have subtle shockers like "The Others" and "The Orphanage," in which emotional trauma is more troubling than physical pain.
Even with momentum growing for Blitzen Trapper's "Furr" in the wake of strong year-end poll mentions, the Portland group's fifth album is "well underway."
Tyler Perry wants to take his character Madea to Europe, but he's been told that audiences there won't relate to his stories about African-American lives. The challenge to conquer Europe has "sat in my spirit," Perry wrote in a newsletter to his fans.
The reunited original lineup of Jane's Addiction will play its first major show at the eighth Sasquatch! Music Festival, to be held May 23-25 at the Gorge in Quincy, Wash. The group has played a handful of small L.A. club shows in the past few months, including last night (Feb. 16).
A varied list of artists, from veteran to newcomers, dominates the finalists for the 11th annual Billboard Latin Music Awards, taking place April 23 in Miami. Flex leads the field as a finalist in a whopping 13 categories.
As a fiction writer, I struggle to tell useful truths by telling the lie that I am someone other than myself. I'm a fat girl trying to survive rape in my first novel, the resentful brother of a mentally ill twin in my second. In my third novel, which I'm close to finishing, I'm the husband of a drug-addicted nurse lost in a maze of her failures and fear.
Kate Moss isnt sweating a little weight-gain these days, especially since the few extra pounds she admits to gaining have all gone 'in the right place.'
'Roman Polanski: Wanted and Desired' aired new information about actions by the now-deceased judge who presided over his case, a scenario which his lawyers say amounted to misconduct.
Award shows often mean free loot for celebrities. But with the economy tanking, this Academy Awards season could see some subtle changes in the giveaway culture, industry insiders say.
As always, some blossomed and some disappointed beyond belief as American Idol kicked off the viewers' choice portion of the competition.
Unfortunately for those who tanked, only...
Chris Brown might not want Terrence Howard in his peanut gallery.
Police and court records show that the Hustle & Flow star, who backtracked last week on initially supportive remarks...
Host Hugh Jackman won't be the only star singing and dancing at Sunday's Academy Awards.
Several sources say that the Aussie hunk will be joined on stage by Beyoncé, High...
Like the inevitable passing of the seasons, now is the time for the changing of the Housewives.
As this season of Real Housewives of Orange County fades into the sunset with a dazzing...
Fiery stuff falls from the sky. Things explode. Traffic jams up like you wouldn't believe.
The new trailer for Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen promises everything the first film...
Slumdog Millionaire or The Reader? Kate Winslet or Meryl Streep? Mickey Rourke or Sean Penn? Heath Ledger or Heath Ledger?
The truth is out there.
The 5,810 voting...
Do you think the Octomom will really stay famous and get a book deal and a TV show?
—Octofever, Kansas
A TV show? Less likely every minute. Sure, one Emmy-winning...
With a show like last night's William Rast fashion event, it's no wonder Justin Timberlake topped GQ's Most Stylish Men in America list.
The crooner, along with partners...
