Gawker: Defamer

Harry Potter's PR Strategy: Charm The Kids

Foster Kamer — Sun, 12 Jul 2009 17:00:04 EDT

Are the young Harry Potter actors not the best? They are, because they're not ridiculous celebrity assholes, instead choosing acting in Broadway shows, going to Ivy League schools, and throwing down the charm offensive on young 11 year-old reporters. Seriously:

New York's Jada Yuan reported seeing the following interaction at Friday's NYC premiere of the new Harry Potter movie. Harry Potter (muggle name: Daniel Radcliffe) was doing red carpet interviews, charming people along the way. A gaggle of reporters gets in his face. One of them is an 11 year-old cutie from Scholastic.

Radcliffe (to other reporters): "One moment, one moment. I will come back to you. [Locks eyes with Scholastic News girl] Hello!"

Girl: "Hey. I'm Danielle from Scholastic News."

Radcliffe: "Hello, Danielle! Pleasure to meet you."

Danielle: "This is an HONOR to interview you."

Radcliffe: "Oh, thank you. You're very sweet. Thank you."

Danielle: "I've seen the first and second movies and read the first and second book and they are SO good. Especially the movies. I loved them, the movies!"

Radcliffe: "Thank you very much. You're very, very kind. They get even better than that, though, so when you get time or when your parents think you're old enough, you must watch the rest. They're very cool."

And then:

Other reporter: "Daniel, how…"

Radcliffe: "One moment, one moment."

Other reporter: "They told us to group together."

Radcliffe: "It will happen. One second, sorry." [re-focuses on Danielle]

Danielle: "How did Harry change from the first movie to the second? I mean, the sixth?"

Radcliffe: "To the sixth? Well, he grew marginally taller. The films have gotten a lot darker since that first film, so I think he has had to get a lot tougher since then. Thank you very much."

Danielle [holding breath, then nearly dropping mike]: "Oh. My. God. Oh. My. God. That was soooo cool!"

There's a little more where that came from. Why can't all movie stars be like the Harry Potter kids? Maybe they'll start to be. Even though Harry Potter reaps its millions of successes (read: dollars) on the strength of the actual franchise property, it surely can't hurt that parents can find something to enjoy in letting their kids be influenced by its key players. Even Radcliffe didn't have his parent-approval rating hurt by letting his cock hang out on the West End and Broadway in Equus. Who'd of thought? Young, million-dollar movie stars as role models to kids. Magic!

Bruno's First Big Lawsuit Dropping Assault And Battery Claims

Foster Kamer — Sat, 11 Jul 2009 14:29:23 EDT

During the release of Borat, Sacha Baron Cohen and Fox faced a bunch of lawsuits, most of them claiming the film's irreversible damage to reputations, none of which were even moderately successful. Now, Bruno's first litigation failures have arrived.

Richelle Olson's scene (which was apparently cut, per the comments) has her hosting a charity bingo game with a mostly elderly audience when "Bruno" starts to call out the numbers with "vulgarities." Olson, her husband, and their lawyer Kyle Madison originally alleged that Baron Cohen and her camera crew assaulted her, which caused her to run off stage crying hysterically, falling unconscious, and hitting her head on a concrete slab, which caused two brain bleeds and now has her "confined to a wheelchair."

Universal then released that it was actually Olson assaulting Baron Cohen, and showed the footage of it to Madison. He's since amended the lawsuit to drop the charges of assault and battery. But they're still pressing on:

"The amendment to the original complaint does not change the cause of the injuries plead in the original complaint," Madison says. "Mrs. Olson's brain injuries were never alleged to have been derived from an assault or battery. She suffered two brain bleeds after the confrontation ensued with Mr. Baron Cohen. According to California case law, any injuries deriving from intentional infliction of emotional distress are recoverable. Mr. Baron Cohen and those associated with the production of 'Bruno,' are accountable for inflicting serious emotional distress and the resulting injuries to Mrs. Olson."

The movie is currently wiping the box office competition all over the place; they're slated for the third-highest comedy opening in Australia, and the film's now projected by the studio to make $35.8M in the weekend wrap, which, according to Nikki Finke, would make it one of the five highest R-rated comedy openings ever.

Again, if Borat's record shows anything, it's that Baron Cohen and his respective studios set up enough legal shields to protect themselves from almost any kind of liability, anywhere. Ambulance chasers and their clients are always more than suspect; they bring to mind a particularly bad episode of The People's Court. That being said, how fair is it of Baron Cohen and his team to descend on otherwise non public-figures and film scenes with them that can potentially change the way they live their lives thereafter? Maybe not at all; many of the people got in front of the camera under somewhat false pretenses. Then again, they're in front of the camera. There's always that.

'Bruno' bingo victim drops assault and battery claims [THR, Esq.]
'BRUNO' IST BIG: $14.2M Friday Opening; Sacha Too Shocking For $40M Weekend [DHD]

Would Brüno Be Possible Without Borat?

Richard Lawson — Fri, 10 Jul 2009 16:57:23 EDT

Finally Brüno comes out today, earning only middling praise from Borat-chuffed critics. And it makes us wonder: What if Brüno had come out first? Would Sacha Baron Cohen exist in the same way he does now?

Both characters were from Baron Cohen's wildly funny Da Ali G Show, so either could have been made into a movie at any time. But we're just not sure that Brüno would be feasible as a market-ready comedy character had Borat not come and paved the pseudo-real, envelope-pushing path for him. Borat is awful—a misogynistic, racist, antisemitic boor—but, sadly, he's more palatable to a broad American audience than a gay Austrian fashion maven who exists solely to point out one of the country's most dearly-held prejudices: that most gays are just silly mockeries of themselves.

Borat certainly made fun of American xenophobia and jingoism, but those are things that people can't recognize in themselves as easily as a tetchy, and heartily defended, aversion to the gays. Borat was loud and political, whereas Brüno is an out, loud, and proud creation of a more immediate social hysteria, of an issue that's been at the forefront of the American culture wars these past few years. He teases at something far more tangible and taboo and unsettling to the popcorn-scarfing masses than Borat's buckshot blast at Stupid Americans that certainly aren't us. So had oh fashion friend come first... Well, Borat might not have been possible. Because Brüno is unlikely to catch the popular wave as easily, it's already been deemed a bit too dangerous and too outsider (plus aren't we all so sick of it already? We saw this one coming a mile away). And though Borat had its fights with the demands of decency (male nudity!), Brüno is all about those strictures.

And nobody likes to be taught a lesson, especially about themselves.

10 Things You May Have Missed On TV This Week

Tracie — Fri, 10 Jul 2009 15:00:00 EDT

Many weeks, we come across stupid stuff on TV that might fall through the cracks. In Mixed Bag, we collect those odds and ends, for a multimedia compilation of pop culture crap.

1.) Debbie Rowe
Love her.

LOVE. HER.

You can see her wild side in her ear lobes.

And her T-shirts.

When I saw this shirt over the weekend, it immediately made me think of Aileen Wuornos' dream job of raising "she-wolves" on a farm with her girlfriend, as revealed in Nick Broomfield's doc.

2.) "What makes you think you're Paris Hilton or some damn body?"
Last night's 16 and Pregnant featured a teen and her mom, both of whom are pregnant (out of wedlock). They — and their boyfriends and pets — all live in the grandmother's two-bedroom home. Looking for a place to store her clothes in the cramped house, the teen began emptying out a junk drawer in Meemaw's room, where she found a mug with a penis as the handle. But it turns out the mug was not Meemaw's. It was Meemaw's mother's — the teen's great grandma.

3.) She's Totally "The Other Paris" Now

Or at least for this week.

Also: Why does a guy who is too straight for high heels even wanna be Paris' BFF?

3.) Gay in the Face
Katherine Jackson subscribes to the "gay face" theory, as evidenced by this old ass interview Entertainment Tonight dug up.

4.) Five Fun Facts Dr. Arnold Klein
He was Michael's dermatologist.
He is responsible for Debbie Rowe in our lives.
He is friends with Carrie Fisher.
He has no problem going on television and claiming that he jerked off in a doctor's office to donate sperm just for the hell of it.
CBS News finds his clothing incriminating.

5.) What We All Missed On TV This Week
Judge Judy was preempted on Tuesday because MJ's funeral ran way over. I was upset about it because I had been looking forward to the case after I saw this preview for it and learned that it involved a girl urinating on her roommate's sneakers in retaliation for something.

But I ~~seen~~ saw this:

6.) This Guy:

7.) Motorized Wheelchair Commercial Lady
She makes getting older look easy…and dizzy.

8.) Big Brother 11
Big Brother returned this week. Part of "the twist" of this one is that a cast member from a previous season was allowed to enter the house. It was Jesse, from season 10. I'm pretty happy with this decision. He says "sweet beans" instead of "cool beans."

9.) The "No Shit" Award Goes To…
Nikki was on Intervention this week. She's addicted to Methadone and Anti-anxiety medication, among other downers. Needless to say, she is chilllllllled.

Her sister has a personal opinion as to why Nikki likes drugs.

10.) Katie's Sign Off

Harry Potter Does Not Get Its Romantic Ideals from Twilight, Thank You Very Much

Richard Lawson — Fri, 10 Jul 2009 13:08:04 EDT

Supernatural-obsessed youngsters are delicate creatures to cater to. Just ask the producers of Harry Potter and Twilight. The juggernauts often square off in ideological combat, but when it comes to their movies, they mostly stay far away from each other.

The Wall Street Journal does a little comparative study of the two franchises' marketing strategies, focusing mainly on the about-to-drop (squee!) Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince. See, there's a little romance in that book, and Twilight is all about romance, so is that vampire story's mega success responsible for the HP posters that front-and-center tout hot, hot teen wizard love? The producers say no!

"With all due respect to "Twilight," the longevity and world-wide success of the Harry Potter franchise speaks for itself," a studio representative said.

Ha. As it should be. Twilight is a blip on the cultural radar compared to the Harry Potter phenomenon—the provenance of chastely horny teenage girls and lonely, approaching middle age hobby LARPers, whereas Harry and Co. have the mass and broad appeal of a Da Vinci Code (only they're much, much better.) Though, if we're honest with our Potter-obsessed selves, it's hard to believe that the smoldering and yearning of Twilight—such catnip!—had nothing to do with the smoldering and yearning poster shown here.

The Twilight producers, for their part, are respectably cognizant of their big brother's long shadow:

"It's the only franchise that we ever pay attention to," says Rob Friedman, chief executive and co-chairman of Summit Entertainment. "We are very cognizant of where they are, and we've always been wary of being in too close proximity to ‘Harry Potter' because we know our fans cross over so much, and we definitely don't want to compete with ‘Harry' for attention."

Damn right. Wizard beats vampire, every time.

Joe Jackson Eyes Paris & Blanket's Potential As Performers

Margaret — Fri, 10 Jul 2009 12:00:00 EDT

On Good Morning America, Joe Jackson said he and his wife should get custody of Michael Jackson's kids, but moments later he presented the best evidence against his involvement in their lives. Clip at left.

Mel Gibson Hoping You'll Pay $12 to Watch Him Have Conversations with a Puppet

Richard Lawson — Fri, 10 Jul 2009 10:39:00 EDT

The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.Mel Gibson announces his next big movie role, and it's a strange one. The Green Lantern movie narrows its potential leads down to three curious choices, and little beaver Jon Heder has landed a TV show on cable.

Hm. Noted crazy Mel Gibson will star in the film The Beaver for noted lesbian Jodie Foster, who will direct and co-star. The film, once thought to be a project for Steve Carell, is about a man who finds comfort in a beaver hand puppet. So it'll be a cheapish quirky indie type affair, although it will star one of the most vociferously strange movie stars of the past twenty years. Could be great! Could be awful. [Variety]

The Green Lantern is nearing the end of its major casting process, mulling over three actors for the lead role of a hotshot Air Force pilot who meets a dying alien and gets deputized into a space police department. (That is an actual plot of a movie. And a comic book!) Warner Brothers is trying to decide between Bradley Cooper, Ryan Reynolds, and Justin Timberlake, of all people, but is apparently having some trouble reconciling their favorite with the director's. So we'll either get a kind of boring Green Lanternt, a wise-cracking kind of annoying Green Lantern, or a singin' dancin' Green Lantern. None of which sound terribly thrilling. [THR]

The Minnie Driver/Uma Thurman comedy Motherhood, which premiered at Sundance this year, has set an October release date. The movie is about a crazed mommy trying to plan a birthday party for her daughter while the crazy city world provides obstacles along the way. Obstacles like Isn't This Basically the Plot of Jingle All the Way and Uma Thurman Is Never Funny. [Variety]

Quirky comedy queen Zooey Deschanel has signed on to play James Franco's love interest in the David Gordon Green comedy Your Highness, about a lazy prince (Danny McBride) who must go on a quest to save his kingdom. Other than the fact that Natalie Portman plays McBride's wildly disproportionate love interest, this film is weird because it looks as though Gordon Green really is going down this broad comedy route. Will we ever get a George Washington, All the Real Girls, or Snow Angels again? [THR]

Nicole Kidman will star in and produce a movie version of the book Little Bee, about a wealthy British couple who has an encounter with a Nigerian orphan while on an African vacation. No word yet on whether Jerry Seinfeld will voice the orphan character. [Variety]

Everwood surly teen Gregory Smith has joined the cast of that Canadian Grey's Anatomy-with-badges police drama Copper that will air on ABC in the States. Treat Williams is wondering if maybe there's a part for a tough-but-principled chief or something. [THR]

Ugh. Shoulda-been-gone-by-now Napoleon Dynamite star Jon Heder has landed a Comedy Central sitcom. It's about a laid-off IT worker who leaves his urban life to return home to the small town where he grew up. Which has been the idea for basically everything these days. In a nifty little distribution deal, if the sitcom's first batch of episodes do well, an automatic 90 more will be ordered. Yeesh. [Variety]

Which Weird Actor Will Compliment You On Your Pants In the Hopes of Getting In Them?

Richard Lawson — Fri, 10 Jul 2009 09:24:00 EDT

The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.Today we have an actor who's not very good at hitting on women, another actor who is not very good at getting movie work apparently, and a third actor who seems nice but is secretly a cheat.

1) "Which freaky actor - who currently has a girlfriend - hit on a wardrobe consultant on the set of his latest film with the line, 'I like those jeans. Can I have your number?'" [NYDN]

2 "What former Golden Globe Best Actor nominee has fallen so far down the acting ladder that earlier this week he was forced to audition against 50 other actors for a fast food commercial?" [CDaN]

3) "This actor is part of the ensemble cast of a current television show. You don't usually see him in the tabloids because he has a wife and kid/s and is quite low-key in his personal life. However, if those tabloids knew what he was really up to, they might start following him 24/7. He has been having an extra-marital affair with a barely legal actress who appeared on his show. You wouldn't recognize her name, but you would definitely know his. This bad boy should watch his step before his wife finds out." [BlindGossip]

Looks Like Those Considerable 'Numchuck' Skills Paid Off

The Cajun Boy — Fri, 10 Jul 2009 04:26:57 EDT

Napoleon Dynamite star Jon Heder is getting his own scripted show on Comedy Central.

Aaron Sorkin Rides in on a White Horse to Save Moneyball

The Cajun Boy — Fri, 10 Jul 2009 01:53:03 EDT

The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.Aaron Sorkin, noted scribe, addict and boner of Maureen Dowd and Kristen Chenoweth, has been hired to write a new draft of Moneyball, the film based on Michael Lewis' bestselling book. But are Steven Soderbergh and Brad Pitt still involved?

Reports the Hollywood Reporter:

The writer has been brought on to do a draft of the baseball drama, drawing on Steve Zaillian's earlier take. The studio wants to move forward quickly with the new iteration, with Sorkin set to turn in his version as soon as next month.

Brad Pitt remains on board to star, but Steven Soderbergh no longer will write or direct and is not involved in the film.

Soderbergh, you may recall, fought with the studio over the creative direction of film, leading to production being killed by the studio just days before shooting was set to begin last June

Now, we like Sorkin's work (especially Sports Night!) so we're confident that if anyone can make an adaptation of the book work, it's him, but we still can't figure out how it would be worth a crap on the big screen. However, if it does work out, and we seriously doubt that it will, we do look forward to a scene in which Billy Beane and Jason Giambi walk down a long corridor, pause in front of the door to the locker room and turn to face each other so Beane can yell "You can't handle a curveball!" at Giambi. It'll be grand!

Aaron Sorkin Game for Moneyball [Hollywood Reporter]

'Bruno' Bestows His Top Ten Upon America

The Cajun Boy — Thu, 09 Jul 2009 22:04:23 EDT

Earlier in the week Sacha Baron Cohen shockingly appeared out of character on Letterman's show. Tonight he returned in character as "Bruno" to read the Top Ten—"Top Ten Reasons to See The New Movie Brüno."

(UPDATE: The complete Top Ten has been embedded below.)

CBS posted the rather hilarious preview onto YouTube earlier and we'll post the full Top Ten here later after the show has aired and it's available online, but it looks pretty funny.

One last thing re: Bruno/Sacha Baron Cohen. We were chatting with a show business "insider" earlier today who offered an interesting tidbit as to why Cohen appeared on Letterman out of character earlier in the week—Word is that Bruno isn't tracking well in middle America where "viewers might not exactly be in on the joke," or, more likely, stricken with homophobia, so the studio may have been thinking that giving these people a chance to see that the star of the movie isn't actually gay may make them more willing to see the film. We'll see soon enough.

The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.

Perez Hilton, Brüno, And "The Gay-Panic Offense"

Anna N. — Thu, 09 Jul 2009 18:30:00 EDT

Perez Hilton is getting a storm of publicity after calling someone a faggot, and Brüno, a movie that Dennis Lim calls a "big gay joke," is advertising everywhere. What does this mean for gay stereotypes in the media?

In an Entertainment Weekly profile by Tim Stack, Hilton says of his altercation with will.i.am,

I realize I said the most hurtful word. I don't believe being gay is bad. I'm not homophobic. I couldn't be any gayer and I couldn't be any prouder. I've got rainbow flags shooting out of my eyes.

Stack calls him "surprisingly chastened," but he doesn't really sound all that sorry in The Advocate, where he says, "I thought about calling him the n word, but I thought the f word was even worse." He goes on to say, "I reacted in the worst way possible," but the fact remains that Hilton basically wants, as Richard Lawson says, "to have us congratulate him for not saying the racist thing he was thinking." Or that he thinks gays are more marginalized than blacks? Or that homophobic slurs are worse than racial slurs? Or that the word faggot from the mouth of a gay man is worse than the n-word from the mouth of a non-black person? The mind reels.

It seems pretty likely that Hilton doesn't "believe being gay is bad." And he seems to understand that he shouldn't have said what he said. But what is the moral status of a homophobic slur spoken by a gay person to a straight person, presumed hurtful because said straight person is presumed to be homophobic? And is this homophobia ouroboros similar to the one created by Sacha Baron Cohen, a straight person playing a gay person who is (maybe) supposed to make fun of homophobic stereotypes?

Slate's Dennis Lim basically comes down on the pro-Brüno side. He writes that Hollywood has been offering up "square-jawed," humorless portrayals of gays for so long that it's refreshing and even subversive for Baron Cohen to portray a funny, no-holds-barred "sissy" — and an oversexed one at that. He writes,

Is any viewer really going to think that this hyperbolically crass and ridiculous narcissist-who wears mesh tops and eye-searing lederhosen, refers to his adopted African baby as a "dick magnet," and drops faux-Teutonic vulgarities about his waxed arschenhaller-represents "the mainstream of the gay community," as one troubled Hollywood "gay insider" put it? And are the gays who anxiously anticipate the mocking, hostile reactions of the unenlightened really that blind to Brüno's obvious counteroffensive strategy, which is to make that mocking, hostile idiocy the subject of his film? The beauty-and perhaps even the moral logic-of Baron Cohen's method is that those who're not in on his joke are invariably the butts of the joke.

And he calls the climax of the movie, in which Brüno makes out with his opponent during a wrestling match, "a brilliant tactic against homophobia: the gay-panic offense." The idea that an over-the-top joke based on stereotypes — whether racist or homophobic — is actually a joke on people who believe the stereotypes is hardly new. It's the basis of Sarah Silverman's whole career. And while Baron Cohen offers a twist on this by actually eliciting homophobic reactions and inviting viewers to make fun of those, it's hard to accept that a straight comic is totally on the gay community's side in making fun of obnoxious straight people. It's especially hard when a lot of his act revolves around talking funny and walking funny and wearing silly clothes. The idea that viewers aren't going to be laughing at these aspects of the film — or that they will be laughing at simply an exaggerated character rather than an exaggerated gay character — is a bit naive.

A homophobic slur spoken by a gay person — especially with the intent to hurt — is still a slur, and gay stereotypes are still gay stereotypes, even if they're meant to be meta. Ultimately, though, none of these things likely matter much to Perez Hilton or Sasha Baron Cohen. Hilton tells Tim Stack, "I don't care if you like me, I just care if you read my website." And Baron Cohen probably doesn't care if people like him, as long as they see his movie. Ultimately, Brüno isn't about challenging stereotypes are breaking down barriers — it's about getting laughs and selling tickets. And Perez Hilton is all about publicity — the love that loves to speak its name.

On The Offensive [Slate]
Perez Hilton Won't Shut Up [Entertainment Weekly]

Real World Cancun: At Least You Weren't Adopted!

Richard Lawson — Thu, 09 Jul 2009 15:18:00 EDT

The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.This week was the Cleaning episode. It was also the Blowdown episode. And it was the Let's Watch the Roommate Who Won an Online Contest to Be Here Alienate Herself and Yell At Everyone episode. So many episodes in one!

The problem was with Ayiiiiiiia. How do you solve a problem like Ayiiiia? How do you catch a frown and ask it to leave the house? No one knows.

This episode was one of those ones that's edited to such a weird degree that you can't really tell what's what or when's when. As the vomit-splattered curtain was drawn back on the scene last night, Emily and Ayiiiia and Shabazzle were getting along famously. They were riding pennyfarthing bicycles down by the arcade. They were flying kites and going to kissing booths and eating cotton candy and doing this and doing all of this stuff and it was summertime every minute of every day, just breezes and balms. Everyone was so happy!

Except Johnnay. Johnnay wasn't happy because she was sitting up on the deck, her black hair matted in nest-like snarls atop her little round marble head, staring down at the three frolicking ladies and seething. But she didn't care, she didn't care that they were having the best time of their lives, that they were becoming Sistahs with a capital SISTAHS, because she had the boys. She had tumble-topped Binky with his suspicious accent, creepy-faced Bronne with his bleary creeper features, that gay one, and Melody, the tattooed rocker hunk with chestnutty good looks and a badass attitude. She has all of them! So she doesn't need Ayiiiia or Emily or Mafarffle. And they don't need her.

So the house was divided and everyone was drunk so they couldn't stand. While at the club one night, Ayiiiia decided to up and leave and everyone got worried because this is downtown Mexico where the national pastime is gringo abduction and the official currency is crumpled twenties covered in blood. After 45 minutes of looking and yelling her name for a while ("Ayiiiia! Ayiiiiiiiia!" it sounded like Japanese soldiers dying in comic books from World War II), they finally found her standing on the street. Now if your roommates had been looking for you and had been worried that you were going to wind up mostly dead in the back of a rusted-out El Camino, you'd naturally do what Ayiiiiia did, I think. Which was yell at them. She got mad that they'd been worried and looking for her. Because... that makes complete sense I guess. So we started to see some cracks in the Ayiiiia veneer there.

This didn't stop the three girlyfriends from hanging out though. Mad that Johnnay had gone to lunch with the boys one day, they decided to go out club dancing without her. Just Ayiiiia and Emily and Verdell. So they went and drank fizzy drinks and the lights swirled and Emily saw Ayiiiia there across the way, grinding her hips into the air, her horsey bucks and thrusts hypnotic in their crassness. So when the ladies got home, sprawling down the stairs in their pointy boots and pointier features, Ayiiiiia and Emily left Gargamel twirling in the kitchen and went to bed. They went to bed, not to sleep. If you catch my meaning. If you're picking up what I'm laying down. What I mean to say is... I'm pretty sure that Emily and Ayiiia from The Real World: Cancun had sexual relations with each other after their girls' night out. So.

Sistahs were totally bonded! Everything was peachy keen! Except nothing was peachy keen. See while the three weird sisters were friendies, Johnnay was still hulking off in the perimeter, like Sirius Black in dog form. And as she stewed in her lonely juices, she riled up the dumb boys, who were just off in a corner hooting and throwing their feces around and drinking and annoying Emily. Dark clouds began to form in Em's eyes and the Earth began to tremble ever so slightly. But no one noticed, not yet. But soon they would.

Because they are nice or vain or probably both, the straight boys Binky and Bronne agreed to escort Derek to a gay bar for gay people. The gay bar in Cancun was basically like any other bar in Cancun except it was full of mens and only a scattered handful of women—those that just wanted to dance and not be bothered, those that needed the reassuring touch of a man but couldn't find it in Straightville. Bronne had asked Derek to "gay him up as hard as he could," which I half-chuckled at and thought That could make a could joke but really it's just too flat and boring. Gay me up real hard. Hardee hard hard. Bronne. Bronne was that guy you knew in college who was always just trying a little too hard. Wanted to be the party animal and the ladykiller and brah's brah and all that but was never quite sure how to do it, and you could tell that he was wildly reinventing himself from some nerdy obscurity he toiled in in high school and you sorta felt bad for him so you tolerated him and let him hang around but the more and more he pushed and pushed and pushed the more you got angry at him and eventually you just ditched him forever because oh holy God it was worth being an asshole and losing karma points because now he's gone and won't bother you and ahh blessed relief. Remember that dude? That is Bronne. It's sad.

ANYWAY. Nothing remarkable happened at the gay nightclub for gay people except that on the way back Derek got caught by a groundskeeper for peeing in the bushes and the small fellow tried to take him to apologize to the manager but Derek deftly eluded him by saying "No, I was just vomiting" and then making throw-up noises and motions. Blehhh Blehhhh! he went. And I felt bad for the teeny tiny Mexican man who was just trying to do his job, but really, son? Peeing in the bushes merits an awkward sitdown with the manager? This is Can-motherhumpin'-cun, friendo! The bushes must be practically made of pee at this point. Let it slide, dude. Just let it slide.

So the boys were supes drunks that night and when they woke up at 8 am, for a very important Student City business conference that involved ziplines and seal kissing, they were still drunk. Melody really wanted to be on time so he started bellowing the time to everyone and Bronne just acted cray-zay (it was just so exhausting to watch) and Emily started clawing at the walls and eventually she exploded into a furious ball of boy hating and screaming. The boys were not scared of her rage, just bemused by it, so they kept egging her on and she got madder and madder and when they finally got to the Student City Sitting In a Hammock Leadership Conference, she refused to participate in any of their reindeer games. She was mad at her roommates so she decided to punish herself with no fun zipline rides. I don't get it.

ANYWAY. Emily was also kinda mad at her once beloved Ayiiiia, because when the shit hit the fan with the boys, only brave Mulligatawny was woman enough to stand at her side and fight. Ayiiiia, on the other hand, just disappeared into an occluding smoke and mist of mutters and bleeped swears, carrying on some fight with herself and maybe other people, it was hard to tell. Whatever it was, Emily felt it was a Reason Why Not to like Ayiiiiia anymore. So being a mature individual, she decided to just not talk to her anymore. Like, really, she just blatantly ignored direct questions. She and Bilbao finally made friends with the boys and Johnnay again, and Emily apologized for being a bitchy bitch because it's not nice to be that way when you live with people for a TV show.

Ayiiiia sat alone in a hammock, sticking pins into little Melody-shaped dolls.

Back at the ranch, Ayiiia was stomping around and starting fights with people. She shoved Binky down a flight of stairs for no good reason. Derek came up and tried to give her a hug, so Ayiiiia ran him through with a curtain rod. He slumped over dead. Melody came walking by, singing a song, and she based a priceless Ming vase over his head. Ker-thunk. Johnnay was in another room entirely, doing her knitting, but Ayiiiiia closed her eyes really really tight and focused really really hard and suddenly Johnnay felt a pain in her head and then fell over, perished. Suffices to say, Ayiiiiia was in a bad mood. But then she made a critical error. She started some shit with Schlimazel. Their fight went like this:

AYIIIIA: Let's get in a fight, but don't be attitudey.

SCHLIMAZEL: Attitude? Who's got attitude?

AYIIIIA: You've got attitude.

SCHLIMAZEL: Attitude? I've got attitude?

AYIIIIA: Attitude: You've got it.

SCHLIMAZEL: Attitude?

AYIIIIA: Attitude.

SCHLIMAZEL: Attitude.

That was a verbatim transcription. They just said the word attitude back and forth for ten minutes and then both stormed away. Later Shlomo was bitching to Emily about their newfound Enemy and said Enemy was caught lurking behind curtains, listening. It was like that movie The Lives of Others except in this case instead of a conflicted East German Stasi officer listening in on a playwright, it was a stupid girl named Ayiiiia who won an online contest to be on a reality show standing behind a curtain in Cancun. But they're close relatives!

Finally the two lovers, dim Emily and rabid Ayiiiiiia, got in the spat to end all spats, shrieking and caterwauling while the other roommates milled about the living room like Sims that you don't control, they're part of some other person's game, and finally Ayiiiia said "At least I wasn't fucking adopted!!!" and ... oh dear, Ayiiiiiia. Just oh dear.

So that was basically the end of Ayiiiiia. All the other roommates were happy as clams, and decided to play kings. When they got to 9 Bust a Rhyme, Crickets or Fallujah or Jasmine or Attitudes or whatever her name is said both "cat" and "hat" which is really annoying because she took two words when she only needed one.

ANYWAY. Ayiiiiia went to go drink wine on the porch by herself. Which, all things being equal, is not a bad way to spend an evening. Watching the Mexican waves roll in while sipping wine and not having to go to work or pay bills or do anything unpleasant tomorrow. But when you're roommates are inside doing waterfalls and 2 For Yous and hating you, I guess it's a sad thing to be doing. So I guess Ayiiiia might go home. Pity.

What is it, though, about these contest winners? They never work out! Remember that fool from the Hollywood season a couple years back? Man that guy was a DISASTER. I mean, Ayiiiia sorta worked for a little while—she even did a lady!—but I guess it had to come to this. Yelling for no reason and then lonely porch drinking. Maybe the end came in the beginning, when she started bitching about dishes. It's never a good idea to bitch about dishes on this show. It just never works out well.

ANYWAY.

Here:

The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.

If Will Smith Won't Come to Manhattan, Manhattan Will Come to Will Smith

Richard Lawson — Thu, 09 Jul 2009 11:41:00 EDT

The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.Today there is news of: Will Smith and a new awful-sounding sappy movie, New Line's new lady policy, a Steppenwolf legend going to TV, and Michael Moore has made a big fat new movie about fat cats.

Quiet indie actor Will Smith will reteam with his I Am Legend director Francis Lawrence for a movie about this: "a father and daughter living on opposite sides of the ocean whose love is so strong that it causes Manhattan to split off and float across the Atlantic." Which, I'm sorry, sounds so fucking lame I want to scream. [Variety]

New Line, long the house that murderous dream janitors and questing lover trolls built, is now Febrezing out its delicates and pushing the pizza boxes under the sofa and becoming a lady-friendly zone. After the success of He's Just Not That Into Horrible People Who Screech and Worry All The Time, Please for the Love of God Just Be a Person, the studio has been ushering in a new host of girl movies, like What Was I Thinking with Leslie Mann and Elizabeth Banks and Valemtimes Day, a movie about Jennifer Aniston being lonely again. [THR]

Want to watch a romantic comedy starring brothers? Oh, you nasty. No they're not in love with each other! They play friends and stuff. Oh, the brothers are Chris and Danny Masterson, one of whom is from Malcolm in the Yelling and the other from That 70s Shit. The movie is called Made for Each Other. [Variety]

Stalwart theatre guy Terry Kinney (he's the dude what had been Julia Stiles' dad in Save the Last Dance) has landed a plum role on popular sophomore drama The Mentalist. He'll play a cop who seems dumb but really isn't! [THR]

Michael Moore has announced the title of his new movie. It's a study of the economy and how it fell down the stairs that one time, and it'll be called Capitalism: A Love Story. I hope he's paying Isaac Bashevis Singer some royalties or some shizz. [Variety]

The new season of Project Runway will feature guest spots by Lindsay Lohan and Christina Aguilera. So, it's 2003 again! Also, four of the contestants are weirdo foreigners. Plus the season's in LA. And it's on Lifetime. Who, exactly, is going to watch this show in August? [THR]

Warner Brothers has picked up the rights to an Argentinian movie comedy called A Boyfriend for My Wife, about a dude who tries to get his wife to fall for someone else so he can dump her and not feel bad about it. Which sounds cute! It will be less cute when it's in English and stars Vince Vaughn and Katherine Heigl. [Variety]

Which Movie Star Was Caught Getting a Beej from a He?

Richard Lawson — Thu, 09 Jul 2009 09:58:00 EDT

Today we have a skittish bride who's also on TV, a terribly manly movie star who likes to get blowjobs... from men, and an actress who loves her smokes.

1) "Which television star called off her wedding the night before the nuptials? She changed her mind after having a sexy fling with the best man." [NYDN]

2) "What barely hanging onto A list married movie actor who is always Mr. Macho was seen, umm, how can I put this, getting serviced by a male assistant director on his latest movie. The trailer for the actor was unlocked and a production assistant walked in and now everyone knows. I was shocked when I heard it because I had never heard a peep that he leaned that way. Ever." [CDaN]

3) "We were out hiking on a remote section of popular hiking trail last week when we turned a corner and ran into the female star of a well-known TV drama. Having had some business dealings in the past, we stopped to exchange a few words. While we were standing there chatting, the celeb lit up a cigarette. My friend asked her if she usually smoked while exercising. Without hesitation, she responded that if smoking was bad for her heart and walking was good for her heart, she figured that if she did the two simultaneously that they would cancel each other out and she would be healthy. It's tough to argue with that kind of logic." [BlindGossip]

James Franco's Rejected UCLA Speech: 'Who Doesn't F-ing Fall Asleep in Class?!'

The Cajun Boy — Thu, 09 Jul 2009 05:39:25 EDT

The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.Last month James Franco was supposed to deliver UCLA's commencement address, but he screwed the grads by backing out so he could go to a party—we thought. Now we know the real reason he didn't deliver the address.

Well, actually we don't know the real reason, other than Franco's claims of having to work on a film or something, but this video from The Harvard Lampoon, "James Franco's Rejected UCLA Commencement Speech," which actually stars James Franco, is pretty funny, so we thought we'd share it with you since we chronicled this whole saga last month. Enjoy, brah.

This Week In Tabloids: Michael's Drug & eBay Addiction; Twilight Star Put In Box

Dodai — Wed, 08 Jul 2009 14:20:00 EDT

Welcome back to Midweek Madness, where instead of Duck Duck Goose, it's Michael, Michael, Michael, Michael, Twilight. Margaret assists in the deconstruction of Star, Us, In Touch, Life & Style and Ok!, after the jump.

OK!
"$100 Million Or The Kids!" This is an eight page story, but the only "news" we learned is that IF Debbie Rowe doesn't try to get custody of Michael Jackson's kids, she COULD get $100 million. But! IF she does seek custody, she COULD get $50-$100 million to keep the kids in the style to which they are accustomed. Moving on: Just so you know, this is the "Summer Of K-Rod." Meaning Kate Hudson and Alex Rodriguez. Robert Pattinson is so stressed out by stalkery fans that he has "retreated into his own private world." This means the crew of Remember Me has "essentially stuck Rob in a box, constructing a seven-foot high enclosure from material screens where the actor retreats between takes." Lastly, Jennifer Aniston has a "high school crush" on Bradley Cooper. She's not worried by the fact that he recently went on a date with Renée Zellweger — a pal says: "It looks like Needy Edie is throwing herself all over him. We joke about how Renée's face stopped moving a few years ago. I doubt Jennifer will see her as competition."
Grade: F (bombed building full of rubble)

Life & Style
"It's Over!" If you believed that Robert Pattinson and Kristen Stewart were actually dating, then you may believe that he has dumped her for Emilie de Ravin. Though a Remember Me insider says: "I haven't seen any overt flirting between Robert and Emilie on the set." Yawn. The story titled "Britney's Revenge" has the subhead: "The singer's in the best shape of her life, while ex Kevin has packed on weight." "Michael's Worst Nightmare" is that the kids will have exposure to Joe Jackson. Except in the same damn paragraph, it says, "He's always been allowed to see his grandchildren." So the only cause for concern would be Joe exploiting the kids for financial gain, not that there's any evidence of that. Some "prominent" citizens of the city — including two Tulane professors — want Brad Pitt to be the new mayor of New Orleans. Will he run? Twelve days after going on a dinner date with Jennifer Aniston, Bradley Cooper went to dinner with Renée Zellweger (with whom he's working on a movie). There was no "Dr. Rey's Casebook" this week. Lastly, Rihanna tattooed her tattoo artist! The singer inked a tiny umbrella with an R on the handle for him and two other guys at the tattoo shop (Fig. 1).
Grade: D- (burned, charred house)

In Touch
"Explosive Tell-All Book" So. Ian Halperin, who's been writing an unauthorized biography of Michael Jackson for a while, is leaking all kinds of crap from his book. The book alleges that Michael liked having sex with men — not boys — and once picked up a construction worker in Las Vegas. There are also some weird pictures of Neverland— taken in 1993 — in which there are male mannequins posed in a room like they are talking to each other. Moving on: "Who Looks Better For Their Age?" Has John Mayer, Kristin Davis and Ellen Page as winners (Fig. 2). Did you know that Lourdes Got braces? (Fig. 3) Oh, look, our LEAST FAVORITE KIND OF STORY: "Cellulite Hits Stars Younger Than Ever!" Over six pages, the mag tries to shame Lauren Conrad, Hilary Duff, Jamie Lynn Spears and Mischa Barton for having dimples on their thighs. The mag talks to docs who blame cellulite on partying, having a baby, genetics and being thin (!!). Though one doctor says: "The thighs, butt and hips are genetically programmed to store fat." Groundbreaking. Angelina is "escaping" to France, where she will stay with the kids while Brad Pitt travels to Indonesia and Brazil for film projects. The mag spins this story as though Angie needs to spend time alone, instead of "Brad has work to do." Lastly: "Who Wore It Better? Kids' Special!" Seriously, they've got children competing for best dressed. And naturally, Suri Cruise wins her category (Fig. 4).
Grade: D (flooded home)

Star
"Inside Their Shattered World." This is by far, the sleaziest of the rags, with cover lines like "Who Will Be Our Mom?" and "Coroner: Michael Wanted To Die." A family friend says that the kids' isolated life has left them socially awkward, and they don't know how to act around anyone who is not family, a nanny or a bodyguard. Sometimes they even revert to infantile behavior like thumb-sucking or clinging to security blankets. A psychologist who does not treat them says, now that their father has died, "The kids could become very anxious and depressed." OBVIOUSLY. An eyewitness who was in the emergency room when Michael was brought in says that she overheard a female official from the coroner's office tell a cop: "The Jackson family strongly believes that Michael wanted to die. The family said he was very depressed for a long time, and they wanted to know what he used to kill himself." Ugh. Ugh! Then there's a quote from a "source" close to Michael, who says: "He wrote suicide notes, and then tore them up. He even kept one with him." His past as an abused child and his depression were what he discussed in the note. Allegedly. Moving on: Madonna and Guy Ritchie have reconnected over his support of her adoption of Mercy. "Flirt Alert!" Lance Bass and Dustin Lance Black — screenwriter of Milk — met in a VIP section of an NYC club. They talked! They danced! Dustin left at midnight; Lance "slipped out ten minutes later." Johnny Depp has a whole room in his London house devoted vampires, which he uses to relax, meditate and be alone. Oh snap: Miley Cyrus's best friend Mandy Jiroux is hooking up with Miley's ex Justin Gaston. Brad Pitt got an ultimatum from Angelina Jolie! An insider says that after his Moneyball shoot was canceled, "Angelina sat him down at the kitchen table and sternly told him, 'You must be with me this summer — it's not an option.'" She threatened to leave him if he said no, but Brad had an ultimatum of his own! He wants to settle down in one place, and can't stand the constant globe-trotting. Whatevs. Kate Gosselin wants her twins, Cara and Mady, to be the next Mary-Kate and Ashley. A rep for the Gosselins contacted a record label to talk about the possibility of the twins making a children's album. Kate wants them to have toys, clothing and TV shows. Did Anna Paquin and True Blood's Stephen Moyer hook up before he'd broken up with his girlfriend of seven years — who is also the mother of his child? He says he and Anna had chemistry from the start, and that they tried to keep things professional as long as they could, but it was "unstoppable." Lastly: Continuing with the sleaze, there's a story about a fight at Farrah Fawcett's funeral — Griffin O'Neal, who was banned from the ceremony, showed up anyway.
Grade: D+ (structure infiltrated by toxic mold)

Us
"Truth About His Kids." A friend of dermatologist Arnold Klein visited Michael and the kids Christmas 2008 — along with Arnold Klein and Carrie Fisher. The mag has the pictures to prove it! Arnold Klein and Carrie Fisher are friends, and Michael's kids love Star Wars, so Michael introduced her to his children as "Princess Leia." And she did the "help me Obi-Wan" speech for them! This magazine also claims that Debbie Rowe once admitted that Michael Jackson was not the biological father of his children — and didn't want to have biological kids — because he was afraid of giving them vitiligo. And Debbie Rowe said she married MJ "to prevent the taboo of having a child out of wedlock." A source says that Rowe knew MJ was a drug addict, but didn't care, as long as it didn't hurt the kids — but did want the nanny to be present 24 hours a day. There's also some weird stuff about the Nation of Islam and Michael Jackson's secret Nazi memorabilia. And! Another source says Michael was "as addicted to eBay as he was to drugs." He'd get high and stay up all night buying things. WHO DOESN'T? By the by, Debbie Rowe claims she slept with Brad Pitt before he was famous. And Michael Jackson was angry with Justin Timberlake because in 2001, they were staying at the same hotel, and JT was having "really loud sex" with then-girlfriend Britney Spears. Michael sent a security team to make them go quiet down. Diana Ross was "shocked" when she found out that she's named as back-up guardian in the will, because she thinks her kid-raising days are behind her. Sigh. Moving on: Lindsay Lohan turned down a role in The Hangover because she thought the script had "no potential." Or maybe she didn't want play a stripper. Again. Lastly: If you love sparkle vamp Robert Pattinson, you'll love these outtakes from a Rolling Stone shoot that never got published. A sampling? Sure! (Fig. 5)
Grade: C (termites in foundation)

Fig. 1

Fig. 2

Fig. 3

Fig. 4

Fig. 5

Why Wasn't Sacha Baron Cohen In Character on Letterman Last Night?

Richard Lawson — Wed, 08 Jul 2009 13:41:31 EDT

Not that we minded, because the real guy is pretty charming and a great raconteur, but it was just curious because in the past the comedian, currently promoting Brüno, has been so committed to in-character appearances.

Though he'd previously done his shtick for Conan O'Brien and arrived at the show as Bruno, Cohen trotted out to the couches as himself. Maybe the story he told—about meeting a real-life terrorist while preening as the outrageously gay Austrian fashion reporter Bruno—was just too good and could only be told in person. It's also possible that after years of his masked shtick, the real Baron Cohen wants some notice for being himself.

Or maybe the character is just a bit too outrageous? Not that Dave Letterman would mind either way, obviously, but it is possible that he's been asked by ominous Powers That Be to scale back the hard sell. Borat was a funny guy because he was a weird foreigner Muslim. Bruno is funny because he's a weird foreigner but he's also, you know, gay and that's just so tetchy these days, best to leave it alone.

Ah well. No matter what, it's a great story.

Michael's Dermatologist: "To The Best Of My Knowledge, I'm Not The Father"

Tracie — Wed, 08 Jul 2009 12:00:00 EDT

This morning, GMA aired an interview with Dr. Arnold Klein, Michael Jackson's dermatologist (for whom Debbie Rowe once worked). He told Diane Sawyer, "To the best of my knowledge, I'm not the father" of Prince and Paris.

Since Jackson's death, it's been rumored that Dr. Klein — sort of a cross between Larry Flynt and Harvey Pekar — was the sperm donor for his two oldest children. It was a strange way to phrase a denial of those rumors. Klein also told Sawyer that he'd been aware of some of the drugs that Michael was taking, but not to the extent that was later discovered. Klein, who treated Jackson for Lupus and Vitiligo, also remarked on how unhappy he was with plastic surgeons who continued to work on Jackson's face and didn't know when to stop

Which Harry Potter Star Prefers Broomstick to Snitch?

Richard Lawson — Wed, 08 Jul 2009 09:15:00 EDT

Today we have a singing celebrity who puts on lip gloss, a "magical actor" who we're assuming to be from Harry Potter who's into boys, a thing about B+/minus people and the C+ people they love, and Michael Jackson.

1) "Which musically inclined young celeb has been dubbed - behind his back, of course - 'Lip Gloss' because he always puts it on before hitting a red carpet?" [NYDN] [Oh, Effwinkle.]

2) "Which magical actor is a hit with the ladies but keeps joking that they're wasting his time as his wand swings the other way?" [Mirror]

3) "This B-/C+ movie actor is married to a B-/B+ television actress. Over the past few months there have been some rumors swirling that their marriage is in trouble. The husband even had to spend several nights away from the family home when his wife kicked him out because she thought he was cheating. This has been a huge shock because everyone has thought they would stay together forever. Not just the public, but their friends and family as well.

Well it turns out that the husband wasn't cheating at all and that the couple were being played by a D list movie actress (you will never guess her) who is in the husband's latest movie and a few of her pap friends. The D list actress wanted some publicity and started telling everyone she could think of that she was sleeping with the husband when she wasn't. Then the paps got into the act by spreading the rumor and it got back to the wife who told the husband to not come home for a few days because even she believed it.

At some point the wife called one of her close friends who is frequently stalked by paps. A few questions were asked and the next thing you know the wife discovers none of it was true and she and the husband make up. The problem is the rumors will not go away and are spreading and multiplying. The only good news is that the D lister has not got the publicity she has wanted." [CDaN]

"This music celebrity is well past their prime, yet still seems intent on ingratiating themselves into the Michael Jackson story. They managed to score a ticket to the Michael Jackson Memorial Service. While there, they started grabbing every camera crew in sight, introducing themselves, and claimed that Michael Jackson was practically a son to them, and they were practically a parent to him.

Even more fantastically, they also claimed to have discovered Michael Jackson and the Jackson 5, and to have personally coached Michael in his unique singing and dance style. It's hard to believe that a person so close and important to the Jacksons was not invited to any of the gatherings involving the close friends and family. Perhaps it's because they invented the story to make themselves feel important. No, it's not Diana Ross." [BlindGossip]

Modern Porn Shunning Compelling Narratives, Shockingly

The Cajun Boy — Wed, 08 Jul 2009 02:49:16 EDT

The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.We don't know about you, but we're pretty fed up with porn that insults our freaking intelligence! You just can't get epic storylines in jerk-films anymore. Where are the three-dimensional characters? The witty zingers? The New York Times investigates!

Seriously, the writing in adult films has gone to hell. Where have all the great porn screenwriters of yesteryear gone? What scourge against humanity, against everything that is righteous and good, could possibly compel humans to alter their porn consumption habits to the point that it becomes more viable economically for porn production companies to skip the dialogue and get straight to the boinking? Anyone have any guesses?

The actress known as Savanna Samson once relished preparing for a role. "I couldn't wait to get my next script," she said.

There's no reason to look at them anymore, she said, because her movies now call almost exclusively for action. Specifically, sex.

The pornographic movie industry has long had only a casual interest in plot and dialogue. But moviemakers are focusing even less on narrative arcs these days. Instead, they are filming more short scenes that can be easily uploaded to Web sites and sold in several-minute chunks.

"On the Internet, the average attention span is three to five minutes," said Steven Hirsch, co-chairman of Vivid Entertainment. "We have to cater to that."

Ahhhh, the internet, of course! Damn you stupid internet—You ruin everything!

Lights, Camera, Lots of Action. Forget the Script [New York Times]
pic of Sasha Gray and Belladonna via Fleshbot

Facebook Movie Turns Sean Parker Into Rock Star

Ryan Tate — Tue, 07 Jul 2009 20:16:24 EDT

The blog ScriptShadow got hold of the first draft of Aaron Sorkin's Facebook movie. The verdict? The movie reads oddly mesmerizing, and has an unexpected hero: Sean Parker, an early investor in the social network.

As the co-founder of Napster, Parker (pictured) was overshadowed by Sean Fanning, who actually wrote the wildly-popular music-sharing software. Sorkin reportedly brings Parker to the fore, giving him credit for lighting a fire under Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg and accelerating the company's growth.

ScriptShadow's Carson Reeves:

And don't get me started on Sean Parker - a character that can become
iconic if the film is made. The brash techy rock star revels in his own
ego, and is a key player in why Facebook is on our computers today
(Parker ended up selling his portion of the company for - I believe - a
couple hundred million dollars).

Zuckerberg, meanwhile, looks comparatively pathetic. In what Reeves calls a "heartbreaking scene," he sits alone ("not one true friend") in a dark room and "friends" the girl who dumped him right before he started Facebook. The movie nevertheless bops along as something of a comedy, thanks to Sorkin's "crazy unknown voodoo screenwriting tricks" and, apparently, jokes involving Facebook use.

Zuckerberg, whose flacks have been trashing the unreleased book on which Sorkin's script is based, may yet discover there are worse things than being depicted having sex in bathroom stalls.

(Pic: Sean Parker, by Andrew Mager)

Internet Somehow Survives Michael Jackson Funeral

Ryan Tate — Tue, 07 Jul 2009 17:10:18 EDT

Sure, the Department of Defense designed it to be military-grade rugged, but no one really knew if the internet could handle a memorial service webcast of a pop megastar. Oh, it was brutal. From a network engineering perspective.

Michael Jackson's service drew, at its peak, about 2.8 million video and audio streams through the network of content middleman Akamai, versus around 350,000 on a normal day. It was almost entirely Americans watching; apparently the rest of the world was more interested in nuclear disarmament or mass ethnic uprising or whatever.

Back in the U.S., Facebook reported it was handling 6,000 status updates per minute, fueled by more than 300,000 viewers on a joint CNN/Facebook video console. Jackson chatter dominated and slowed Twitter.

In unrelated news, underemployment just pushed the average U.S. workweek to a record low of 33 hours while the jobless rate reached 9.5 percent.

The Ten Most Important Moments of the Michael Jackson Memorial Mess

Richard Lawson — Tue, 07 Jul 2009 16:18:41 EDT

Well, that was both horrifying and depressing. The Michael Jackson Public Memorial has lurched to a close and, to paraphrase a commenter, we feel like we've been underwater for hours. Messy and strange, let's remember the remembrance.

The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.The creepy gold casket was wheeled in and the oddness began.

The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.Old pal Stevie Wonder sang a sad, fitting song.

Legendary producer Berry Gordy, who helped work young Michael to the bone when he was hoofing it in the Jackson 5, called Jackson the "greatest entertainer that's ever lived." Hm.

The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.Al Sharpton stirringly, if inaccurately, told Jackson's children that there "wun't nothing strange about your daddy." Sigh.

The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.Jackson's childhood pal Brooke Shields tearfully recounted their shared bond over being children in the spotlight. Though, unfortunately, her constant mentioning of kids and little princes struck an awkward chord.

The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.A crazy congresslady from Texas wandered up on stage and said that she wished she was a Jackson and that Michael was totally innocent of all those creepy charges.

The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.Magic Johnson came up and told a few stories. But mostly he just plugged Kentucky Fried Chicken.

The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.R&B singer Urrrsher won the award for Most Classless of the day, by wearing sunglasses and pretending to cry. Usher, you were never a good actor, so why try and finally go for the teary clip reel at a funeral of all places?

Toward the end, a bunch of escaped mental patients were brought on to sing a "Heal the World"/"We Are the World" World Medley that left everyone looking awkward and ashamed, except for a few of Jackson's grasping brothers, who just seemed thrilled to be on stage.

In a chilling final moment, Jackson's rarely-seen daughter Paris tearfully said she loved her father and that he was great. In a haunting evocation of a cycle continuing to grind on, her aunt Janet fixed her hair and dotingly but firmly told her "Speak up, honey. Speak up." It was pretty much devastating.

So, that was that. An odd mess of a thing—part exciting, part sad, but mostly confusing. Fitting, then, for a life lived bizarrely and publicly, a life that needed a new word for famous, a life that, in many ways, really ended and disappeared many years ago. This whole event just felt perfunctory, as if no one could imagine MJ going out without a bang, but weren't really sure how to make the appropriate gesture. So it was just a mash of things, of different tones and styles.

And then it ended, abruptly and strangely, leaving us all to ponder what it was exactly that we'd just seen.

Image via Getty

The Crowdsourced Celebrity Gay List

Ryan Tate — Tue, 07 Jul 2009 15:46:46 EDT

Crowds may be wise, but they're not necessarily savvy. Witness this online poll, where the first 2,500 respondents have deemed Mario Lopez flamingly gay, while Kevin Spacey and Vin Diesel get loads of votes as straight.

Lopez might act in a Broadway musical and take off his shirt a lot, but that doesn't make him gay. At least they got Zachary Quinto, who doesn't keep his personal life much of a secret, correct. How about a do-over with just the people who got Spacey right? Or you can just have at it in the comments.

(Chart by Julia Schweizer and Nick Denton.)

There Is No Way to Describe How Much the Michael Jackson Memorial Matters

Gabriel Snyder — Tue, 07 Jul 2009 14:27:18 EDT

Yes, the Michael Jackson memorial — going on now! — is being watched everywhere right now. But the only question if you happened to have been on TV filling time was "How big is this?"

Well, simple say TV talking heads: just imagine if there was an Olympic sport in which Elvis, Frank Sinatra, the Beatles and Mozart duked it out with nuclear weapons. Maybe that would be a bigger deal than what's going on at the Staples Center.

Liveblogging the Michael Jackson Memorial

Richard Lawson — Tue, 07 Jul 2009 12:00:00 EDT

Michael Jackson died. And today is the huge, public memorial clusterfuck. On this post we'll be sharing, in the comments, our reactions to the event as it unfolds on every television network ever. Join us!

The memorial itself starts at 1 p.m., and, oh, just because we're watching ABC doesn't mean you shouldn't watch other networks. We like the sick joke of ABC being owned by Disney, but there might be other, better, more-over-the-top coverage. Let us know in the comments!

So keep it R-rated and have fun and we'll see you out there.

The Michael Jackson Memorial Clusterfuck

Hamilton Nolan — Tue, 07 Jul 2009 10:40:36 EDT

Michael Jackson's memorial service happens in LA today. Is it a media circus out there? Check out the elephants! Eh? Seriously, it sounds like the media equivalent of the Superdome after Katrina. A brief rundown of the clusterfuckery:

The event starts at 10 a.m., L.A. time. Who will be carrying it live? Everybody! Specifically, "All the major networks and a host of cable news and entertainment channels, including CNN, MSNBC, E! Entertainment, TV Guide Network and TV One."
"More than 1.6 million people registered over the weekend for a chance at one of 17,500 free tickets to the service."
To make things a little more lively, MJ's dead body will be in attendance! Appearing alongside the corpse: "Mariah Carey, Usher, John Mayer, Jennifer Hudson as well as a delegation from Motown, the label that nurtured Mr. Jackson as the child star of the Jackson 5. There are also figures from sports (Magic Johnson, Kobe Bryant), politics (Al Sharpton, Martin Luther King III), movies and television (Brooke Shields) and the church (the Andrae Crouch Choir)."
The presence of Michael himself is, of course, driving the TV anchors wild with hyperbole. As well as anyone speaking to the TV anchors. Said Ken Sunshine, PR man for the event: "Michael Jackson is the biggest figure emitting love ever." HEH.
According to vague "experts" and "analysts," one billion people will watch this thing. Christ. Let's hope not.
And through all of this madness, reporters won't even be given any food that they can't pay for themselves. Or phones! Sounds nice. From the official media advisory:

See you in hell.
[Pic: Getty]

Baywatch Boobs On the Big Screen!

Richard Lawson — Tue, 07 Jul 2009 10:29:00 EDT

The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.News from the internet as it relates to TV, a rising comedy star ponders his many options, a new HBO show could be a disaster or could be great, and a Baywatch movie makes us cranky.

Aha! ABC has finally debuted on web TV outlet Hulu, loading on some episodes of ratty old Grey's Anatomy. Eventually we'll get other delightful ABC fare like Ugly Betty, the newly-acquired Scrubs, and Desperate Housewives. [Variety]

Now that he's in a huge summer movie and is a bigtime movie star, The Hangover star Zach Galifianakis just isn't sure what to do with himself. Should he do Todd Phillips' funnily-named Man-Witch, or Todd Phillips' blandly-named Due Date? Or what about Say Uncle (in which, we're guessing, he stars as something of a modern-day, more Dadaist Uncle Buck)? Look, as long as "Between Two Ferns" comes back here and there, we'll be happy. [THR]

Hmm... Rita Wilson, the wife of struggling actor Tom Hanks, will executive produce a developing HBO series based on Jeffrey Eugenides' beautiful novel Middlesex. So it'll be, what, a hermaphrodite coming-of-age story set in 60s and 70s era Detroit? We would probably watch that. Playwright Donald Margulies is involved as well. Hmmmmm. [Variety]

Everyone put in your earplugs, the screeching is about to begin. Current trash-talking comedy lady Kathy Griffin will soon be roasting old-timey trash-talking comedy lady Joan Rivers for that dreadful and needlessly profane Comedy Central Roast series. So much yelling and boob jokery. [THR]

Oh, good. Some guy named Jeremy Garelick (some sort of dairy heir, perhaps?), who did an uncredited rewrite on The Hangover, is writing a "funny" movie script based on that already funny without even trying series Baywatch. Because, you know, our minds have become lazy and fattened and it's too much work to infer the joke from the original, completely ridiculous Baywatch. No, we need it fed to us in comestible comedy format. With lots of boob jokery. Though, oh what the hell, it could be funny anyway. [Variety]

The set for Jay Leno's new 10pm daily talker will be made large enough to accommodate a car, as Jay might drive one of his precious automobiles on stage at the top of the show. But will it be made large enough to accommodate his chin?? (See! It's not that hard to write Jay Leno-style jokes!) [THR]

Virginia Madsen has joined the cast of that indie Kevin Spacey comedy The Father of Invention. She'll play his bitchy ex-wife. Slow and steady, Ginny. Slow and steady. [Variety]

Which A-List Actress Had to Be Pulled Off a Party Guest After He Insulted Her?

Richard Lawson — Tue, 07 Jul 2009 09:16:00 EDT

Today we have a secretly drunken actor, a coked-out famous guy, an actress who just about up and hit a dude, and an actress with, like, a really really bad sunburn. No joke.

1) "Damage control! Which hard-partying actor rushed back to his local AA chapter when he was caught drinking, but is actually still on the sauce?" [NYDN]

2) "Which star summoned staff to get him something to powder his nose with at a recent festival? The bloke didn't care who saw him as he indulged in his habit." [Mirror]

3) "I guess she would be considered an A list actress. So few actresses are given the opportunity to open movies, but she has. Almost always movies. Rarely television. It needs to be special. Anyway, over the weekend she had a little bit to drink and there was a guy at the party who had a little bit to drink and he made a comment about her anatomy. She didn't hit the guy, but only because two people stepped in between them when she lunged at him." [CDaN]

4) "Don't expect to see any new photos of this paparazzi favorite this week. She will be in hiding for several days and is not expected to give a public statement with the reason. While some may report that she is having cosmetic surgery - or spending several days holed up with her acting co-star - the real reason is much more down-to-earth. She got a bad sunburn this past weekend, and no amount of makeup can make her look photo-friendly. She will emerge from hiding when she no longer looks like a lobster in drag." [BlindGossip]

Put Some Damn Pants On Already!

The Cajun Boy — Tue, 07 Jul 2009 01:55:11 EDT

We haven't done one of these alumni reports in a while, so why not? Today we have Defamer's former founding editor scoring a new gig and a former Gawker editor imploring her freelancing colleagues to put some pants on.

First off we have Defamer founder Mark Lisanti, pictured at left in his annual Nikke Finke Halloween garb, who yesterday kicked off a new gig writing a thrice-weekly column for Movieline, the Hollywood site staffed by just about everyone who ever toiled at Defamer. Mark's inaugural piece, an always welcome evisceration of Michael Bay, can be read here.

Next we have former Gawker editor Sheila McClear doing her part to start a movement to boost the self-esteem of freelancers everywhere.

If you're freelance, unemployed, or underemployed, you probably work at home and don't always wear pants either. (Gentleman–no, those ratty "writing shorts" do not count.)

This Friday, July 10th, let's all make an effort to all put on pants. Fridays are often a time for a more relaxed dress code in offices. But not for the jobless. This Friday, take a shower in the morning, fix your hair, and put on some nice clothes even if you won't be leaving the house. Nice shorts and skirts OK too, but NO boxers or pajamas–you must wear clothes that you could actually go to a job in. (Send in pics if you want!)

Too often, un- and under-employment causes people to fall into a rut. This will give everyone an extra shot of self-esteem and aura of respectability as we continue our job hunting. It'll make us all feel better.

We should add that there's a picture of a pantless young woman who may or may not be Sheila accompanying her ASSME post on this. Just saying.

Irate Michael Bay Blasts Paramount Over Unacceptable Tie With Ice Age 3 [Movieline]
Movieline Welcomes Defamer Founder Mark Lisanti to the Family [Movieline]
July 10th is the First Annual Freelancers Put On Your Pants Day [ASSME]
pic via Movieline

Jennifer's Body: Another Diablo Cody Horror Movie

Richard Lawson — Mon, 06 Jul 2009 12:35:33 EDT

The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.Oooh, look! It's Diablo Cody's follow-up to her Academy Award-winning (shoot me) Juno. The redband (NSFW?) trailer for Jennifer's Body, a snarky horror movie about Megan Fox being a righteous man-eating demon, has been released and we're... oddly intrigued.

Because it looks like it could be funny? Look, we're not fans of Cody's snappy, reference-laden "writing" any more now than we were when Juno came out or United States of Tara (a show that got better only after Cody stopped writing episodes) debuted. But couldn't that jerky dialogue and look-Ma-no-hands kind of sardonic bravado acquit itself nicely in a silly/scary horror comedy? The Girl Gets Revenge trope worked fairly well in Teeth, and we all remember the nerdy Blockbuster clerk's wet dream that was Scream. Smoosh those two things together and you just might get Jennifer's Body. Something so head-poundingly annoying it's oddly entertaining. Y'know?

[via ShockTilYouDrop]

Ari Gold to Rep Vince Chase's Blonde South African Lady Friend

Richard Lawson — Mon, 06 Jul 2009 12:09:00 EDT

Lots of casting news today, from Charlie Murphy to Clifton Collins Jr. Plus Charlize Theron employs the best person in the business to yell at people for her.

Likable workhorse actor Clifton Collins Jr. has joined the cast of that weirdos doing experiments movie The Experiment. He'll star with other weirdos Forest Whitaker, Elijah Wood, and Adrien Brody. They'll be doing experiments. [Variety]

Gosh, Adam Sandler is so nice. He just keeps casting his old friends. The latest is the beleaguered Tim Meadows, who is joining the reunion comedy Grown Ups. Also in the flick? Once-wases like Norm Macdonald, Colin Quinn, Rob Schneider, and David Spade. Somewhere, Ellen Cleghorne extends a weary hand and plaintively whispers "Me too...?" [THR]

Charlize Theron has signed on with the big boy. She's switched over to the mega-agency poised to take over the world, William Morris Endeavor, where she'll be repped by none other than the golden cussing boy himself Ari Emanuel. What does Vince think about this? [Variety]

Because that Tim Roth show Lie to Me has inexplicably high ratings, they're bringing back two popular guest stars from last season for longer arcs. Once budding movie star turned TV stalwart Mekhi Phifer will be back, as will, well... once budding movie star turned TV stalwart Jennifer Beals. Mekhi is going to be a cast member, whereas Beals will just be that nebulous thing known as a recurring. [THR]

Nimrod Atal, the unfortunately-named director of the way-better-than-decent horror/thriller Vacancy, will helm the upcoming fifth installment in the Predator series. Predators will be about the Predator monster, only there will be plural of them. [Variety]

Very funny regular guy Jason Sudeikis has been quietly racking up a bunch of work. He's slated to next appear in the Justin Long/Drew Barrymore romancer Going the Distance. Sudeikis will play a character named Box. Heh. See? Already funny! [THR]

Whee! Charlie Murphy will be in a new movie, the bizarrely cast comedy Family Wedding. He's joining Forest Whitaker, America Ferrara, and Carlos Mencia. Charlie, we wish we could tell you we're going to see this, but, uh... [Variety]

Unfrozen Dinosaurs and Manic, Raging Robots Broker Tentative Peace Accord

Richard Lawson — Mon, 06 Jul 2009 10:47:00 EDT

We have a tie! For now. The actuals will come out soon and one film will beat the other. But now! Ambivalence or equality or peace or something. How perfect, as we stand in the smoky ashes of Freedom's birthday.

1) Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs AND Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen — $42.5 million
Apparently people wanted animated anachronisms just as much as they wanted animated inanity this weekend, as the film about dinosaurs returning because of secret caves many years after they'd gone extinct tied with the film about evil robots returning just a few years after they'd been defeated in street-destroying battle. In the five-day weekend release, Ice Age nabbed over $67 million, just a little bit more than Transformers earned in its first day alone. So while the dinos were able to co-rule the Earth this weekend, they'd have been crushed like so many Decepticon skulls had they tried these shenanigans last week. Plus Ice Age doesn't have a writhing, be-Daisy Duke'd mini-Jolie in it, does it? That'd be weird if it did.

3) Public Enemies — $26.2 million
Some grownups and curious skinny-panted budding young film nerds went to the movies too this weekend, helping the major studio art-house gangsta picture rob some $41 million from America's wallets. Unfortunately for the film's word-of-mouth prospects, it only earned a B from CinemaScore audience polling, meaning those grownups might not, in mid wine bottle opening, stop and say "Hank, what's the name of that movie we saw, with the pirate guy? About the mobsters?" [from another room] "Public Enemies!" "Right, right. Well, Susan, it was pretty exciting. Steve would love it I bet. Honey??? Wouldn't Steve love it???" [from another room] "Yeah, he would!" And those budding film geeks? They'll sit at Denny's at 1am and light a Camel Light and tousle their hair in faux deep thought and say "It's one of Mann's lesser films." And Dawn and Patrick will smirk and Allison will quietly swoon and then the waitress will come and they'll just order more coffee and man, this summer feels like forever.

4) The Proposal — $12.8 million
What do you think it's like to be a movie star going to the ATM? Like, you're walking down the street and want to go to lunch and figure you'll need some cash so you go to the nearest vestibule. And you type in your PIN and the thing asks you "This is going to cost $2, is that OK?" and you don't even think about it, press Yes, and then you take out $100 or something and it spits out your receipt or displays your balance on screen and it reads "$15,785,232." That's your checking account. I mean, that must be so fucking nuts. Well, anyway, Sandra Bullock and Ryan Reynolds are probably experiencing that right now, as their film chugs to the brink of the $100 million mark, and they're guaranteed at least another six weeks of stardom. People love Sandy Bullock, which we've known. People also love Ryan Reynolds, which we're just finally figuring out. Snarky sincerity, for the win.

5) The Hangover — $10.4 million
Yeah, I've had a $200 million hangover before too. I mean, that's how it felt. I didn't actually make two hundred million dollars off it. I didn't actually make any money. The grilled cheese delivery guy maybe gave me the wrong change and I made a buck or something. But, that's it. Sigh.

6) Up — $6.6 million
This is now the second highest grossing Pixar film ever. Finding Nemo still holds the top spot, because that was just a phenomenon. It was huge! Remember when that damn thing came out? Everybody was talking about the Nemo. "Where is he? Has he been found? Where do you think he went? Is he under this rock? Check your shoes, is he in there? What about the junk drawer? Allison, honey, before you meet your friends at the Denny's, look in the back of your closet. We gotta find this Nemo. Oh, and Steve, Hank and Linda called, they want to get together for dinner this week. Nemo? Nemo??? Where are you??" That was what it was like. Whereas in this case, Up is just balloon-buoyed by really expensive 3D tickets, I suspect.

Image via Getty

Which Celebrity Chef Uses Laxatives to Stay Skinny, Rather Than Her Healthy Food?

Richard Lawson — Mon, 06 Jul 2009 09:16:00 EDT

The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.Today we have a cranky author who wants Page Six to write about him more, a celebrity chef who's only skinny because she poops a lot, and a reformed drinker who's very cautious about relapsing.

1) "Which self-important, philandering writer who was dumped recently by his long-suffering wife is complaining that his jerky behavior is no longer covered on Page Six, moaning, 'You start getting used to it. And then you pick up the paper and you're not there and you think, "Well, what am I, chopped liver?" ' " [NYP]

2) "Which unnaturally thin celebrity chef credits her bony frame to good eating habits, but really is addicted to laxatives?" [NYP]

3) "Which actor may have transformed himself from the drinker he once was, but still travels with his sponsor to avoid a slipup?" [NYDN]

4) "This annual party has lost its exclusive edge over the years, but since its for charity, we'll be kind. Despite his recent relationship troubles, this controversial young guy spent a lot of time at the party with a girl who appeared to be his date. She is known in her genre, but isn't quite as mainstream as the girl from whom controversial guy is currently estranged. She must have partied harder than observed, because once out in the parking lot, she opened the car door to heave out the side, and then slammed the door and drove away. It's a pity that she couldn't enjoy the party sober." [BlindGossip]

Oh, and! The guy at Crazy Days and Nights is revealing the identities of a ton of items. Freedom!

Are TV Networks Screwing Themselves By Putting Their Shows Online?

The Cajun Boy — Mon, 06 Jul 2009 01:34:47 EDT

The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.The Times' Brian Stelter notes today that thanks to television networks placing shows on the internet, more people are watching video on the web for longer periods of time, leading to an explosion of original content created outside of Hollywood.

In a piece on how web users are spending increasing amounts of time watching video on the web, Stelter credits Hollywood for the change in our viewing habits:

TV networks get much of the credit for the longer-length viewing behavior. In the past two TV seasons, nearly every broadcast show has been streamed free on the Internet, making users accustomed to watching TV online for 20-plus minutes at a time. By some estimates, one in four Internet customers now uses Hulu, an online home for NBC and Fox shows, every month. "Dancing With the Stars," the popular ABC reality show, draws almost two million viewers on ABC.com, according to Nielsen.

Stelter goes on to theorize that this Hollywood-inspired increase in time spent watching video on the web has led to much of the new scripted content on the web is being created independently, outside of the traditional, soul-sucking Hollywood development system.

The viral videos of YouTube 1.0 - dog-on-skateboard and cat-on-keyboard - are being supplemented by a new, more vibrant generation of online video. Production companies are now creating 10- and 20-minute shows for the Internet and writing story arcs for their characters - essentially acting more like television producers, while operating far outside the boundaries of a network schedule.

Much of the video innovation is coming from people who - empowered by inexpensive editing equipment and virtually no distribution costs - are creating content specifically for an online audience.

"On the Web, producers have this delicious freedom to produce content as long as it should be. They're starting to take advantage of that," (Blip.tv co-founder Dina) Kaplan said.

Though we agree with much of what Stelter says, one point we'd like to expand on that isn't addressed in Stelter's piece, something we addressed previously in a post titled "The End of Television as We Know It" back in May, is that we believe eventually someone will independently shoot and distribute an episodic series online that will become a cultural phenomenon, something people discuss around the proverbial water-cooler on a regular basis, and that will be the moment when the scale is officially tipped and the television networks run the risk of becoming little more than relics of a bygone era. How far off into the future is something like that happening is anyone's guess, but it certainly seems as though we're getting closer and closer with each passing day.

Rise of Web Video, Beyond Two-Minute Clips [New York Times]

Real World Cancun: Please Don't Spit In My Taco

Richard Lawson — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 14:01:00 EDT

The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.Oh, Mexico. Land of sand and ruins. Place of history and blood. Of vines and mountains. Mexico: where you can get drunk at a laser lightshow nightclub and then spit in your roommate's taco and no one bats an eyelash.

Yes, the Real World: Cancun had its first obligatory The Roommates Who Hate Each Other/The Roommates Who Fuck Each Other episode last night, and it just sort of farted into existence, all quiet and smelly, as if MTV was splayed out on the neighboring bed, our hotel room ruined, that cruel beach sun slanting in through the curtains, reminding us that day has arrived but our hangovers have not left. These kids are just sort of dull, the half-baked sorta people you'd see on a show like Fear Factor where personality doesn't matter. You just have to be trashy and scrappy and thoughtless. And these kids have that in spades!

So the two couples were:

Those That Hate
Swoony rockerbilly Joey likes to antagonize girls because he's a little pissant punk-wannabe with that kind of sitting-at-the-back-of-the-class bravado that's, oh you know, catnip to some of us. The girl he most likes to antagonize, because she is ridiculous, is Ayiiiiiia. They fight about basically everything. She walks around like she owns the place, he has mysterious herpes on his lip, he says mean sarcastic things to her, she yells about cigarettes, and then he spits in her taco. Yes m'am JoJo done up and spit in that girl's damn taco when they had been out there after the club tryin' to get theyselves some food. This was in retaliation for Ayiiiiiia running down the street and shrieking "Herpes on your lip! Herpes on your lip! You've got herpes on your lip!" It actually turned into a little song and I ran to the kitchen and grabbed a pot and a wooden spoon and paraded around the house banging them together, as if Ramona Quimby were a sad lonely 26-year-old in Brooklyn, sing-chanting "Herpes on your lip! Herpes on your lip! Everybody's got herpes on their lip!" It was a fun song, and a fun moment, until my roommate came up and spit in my taco. Well, I actually didn't have a taco and she didn't spit, but she did give me a withering look that seemed to say Only one more month..., but on the show Joey did, in fact, spit in the lady's taco. So that started a whole clusterkaduddle and everybody was yelling and Fuckface from UMass got involved and started getting upset.

So the girls were out on the balcony complaining about Joey and eating the tacos that had not been spit on. Those bitches really wanted some tacos. I mean, that's commitment. Inside the other roommates were just unsure what to do. Hilariously, the girl from Cadillac Stevens' Foodhut, Jonna, was sitting on a couch-bed eating rolls of ham of cheese. Like taking deli-sliced meats and deli-sliced cheeses and rolling them up into little cylinders and eating them. It was very funny because we've all been there, or at least I have. Points to you, Jonna. So everyone was confused and eating ham and cheese and Joey still wasn't done being in attack mode so he strode out onto the veranda playing a song called "Nobody Cares About Your Spit Taco" and the girls got so mad that they threw water at him and some of the water went into his guitar. His thousand-dollar guitar that is partly electric and now it's ruined. So Joey went to another balcony and cried and Derek the Gay tried valiantly to take advantage of him in his time of need (someday, Derek! believe in yourself!) and everyone was sad. Well, the girls didn't care. Ayiiiiia thought it was funny. Because Ayiiiiiia is annoying. I think I hear Joe Rogan calling, m'dear. Go be on that show.

Anyway, eventually the next day or whatever Joey apologized to Fuckface and she was all "Aw, I love everyone," and then later he took a walk with Ayiiiiiia and they brokered a tentative peace accord. Derek unzipped his fly and unleashed the doves from his pants and there they fluttered and flapped, into the silver-streaked azure sky, looking like souls should look, dancing. Then they decided it would be funny to pretend for the other roommates that they'd just gotten in another fight and she'd hit him so they ran back home and put on a show where Joey raged and Ayiiiiia threw things and all the other roommates were like "Ohhh, she's going home" and hilariously no one seemed to be unhappy about that but then oh ha ha, Ayiiiia and JoJo gave each other a hug and the roommates said "Aww, we're friends again!" and Derek unzipped his pants and instead of releasing more doves he just looked plaintively and expectantly at Joey, though he looked in vain. Everyone just sort of cleared their throats and said, OK, yeah, and slowly walked out of the room and Derek stood there alone, bare feet on the cold marble, a clock ticking off in some other room.

Those That Mate
Binky and Jonna are in love. Binky and Jonna are in love but there's nothing they can do about it because Jonna has a boyfriend back home in Sunstain, AZ and she's so loyal to him. She's so loyal to him that when she's grind dancing and spooning in a hammock and gratuitously hugging and talking about making out with Binky, all her thoughts are on her boyfriend. Every one of them. Every thought other than Man I want to fuck this roommate, every single other one, is about the boyfriend. Binky is upset because he broke up with his lady, and c'mon it's Can-fuckin'-cun, let's partay down. Invested in this whole lovers' duet more than more than the actual lovers is creepy Bronne. Creepy Bronne looooves to call Binky "the Heartthrob" and he's always smirking and leering while Binky and Jonna dance or flirt or dry hump in a vestibule, staring right at them, with intense bleary eyes. He's a creeper. At one point when Binks and Jinx were spooning in the hammock Bronne walked out wearing a wig and tapped out Jinkies and got next to Binky and Binks, thinking it was Jinx, pulled him in close and said "Mmmm..." You'd think that would be one of the stupid things I make up to entertain myself while writing these things, but it's not! It actually happened! Bronne walked out wearing a Jonna wig and spooned with Binky. He will murder someone. And he will murder them hard.

Anyway, at the clurrrb Binky tried to kiss Jonna on the mouth-hole and she was all "Nunh unh!" and later she called her boyfriend and said "Why would you think that I want to be with anyone else?" while her foot massaged Binky's crotch and she sat there naked drawing an arrow on her tummy that pointed down to her unmentionables.

So, they're totally gonna do it.

All Those Other Things That They've Done
Oh, and, they got their jobs! Yeah yeah yeah! They'll be working for Student City, an underground luxury travel agency for sex tourists and date rapists. They met their boss, the dimwitted Christina, and she told them the rules. And the Rules, my friends? The Rules are pretty goddamned strict. The Rules are:

- No drinking in front of clients.
- No sexing the clients.
- No smoking near clients.
- If you murder a client, make sure you dispose of the body in a manner befitting Student City's new Go Greeen! initiative.
- If a client murders someone, give them the $700 cash you have in your emergency pouch and point them towards El Salvador.
- Fridays are casual.

Now the whole murdering thing ey'body was aight with, but not that DRINKING RULE. Holy fuck, if I want to go out in Cancun and get shitfaced, that is my right as an American abroad on a television station's dime. That is my RIGHT. Ayiiiiia was especially adamant about this and it was truly beautiful to watch. It was like watching Harvey Milk come speechmaking out of his mother's womb. Like seeing Malcom X first clench his fist. Like stumbling by accident on Susan B. Anthony in the bathroom and her swatting her hand at you or at the door you can't quite tell and yelling "Hey, get outta here!" It was truly something. She brought a little soapbox with her to the Student City interview process, where the kids had to talk to Christina about what they wanted to do for the sex tourists and semi-professional Roofie-appliers. Christina just shook her melony head and said "Sorry, babe, no can do. We can't have anything reflect badly on the company." Which was... wait, what? On the company that organizes low-rent trips for horrid sunburned assholes from Ohio to get drunk and sloppily fuck and do horrible things they'll forever regret? That company? What, exactly, could possibly reflect badly on that company? Accidentally decapitating an old Real World cast member while just trying to get them to shut the hell up? Oh Paula, we hardly knew ye.

So that's gonna cause a problem and everyone will get drunk and several will die. At one point during the Christina Interviews, Fuckface said "I'm a leader." Fuckface works at Hooters. If that doesn't spell leadership, I don't know what does.

I don't know how to end this. So, here:

The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.

HAPPY INDEPENDENCE DAY, MEXICO.

Pathologist Rules Out Suicide in David Carradine's Death

John Cook — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 12:34:33 EDT

The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.Coroner-to-the-stars Michael Baden says David Carradine's death was not a suicide, and was caused by asphyxiation. You don't say?

Baden was hired by Carradine's family to conduct an independent autopsy, which is all the rage in Hollywood these days. He told Reuters that while his complete report won't be available for a week, he'd determined that Carradine did not deliberately kill himself:

"The cause of death was asphyxiation, an inability to breathe, now why that happened is still what we're working on," Baden told Reuters.

[snip]

"He didn't die of natural causes, and he didn't die of suicidal causes from the nature of the ligatures around the body, so that leaves some kind of accidental death," he said.

Well, we guess that rules out ninjas, right? Any other ideas?

The media has suggested Carradine could have died from accidental autoerotic asphyxiation. In response to a question on that topic, Baden did not rule out that possibility, but he also did not say autoerotic asphyxiation was the cause.

Baden also confirmed what was obvious to anyone who saw the photo of Carradine's body after he died—his hands were tied above his head. Which raises a question as to how one autoerotically asphyxiates oneself with one's hands bound out of reach of one's nether parts. He told Reuters that he is waiting for Thai authorities to provide him with "pass keys for the hotel where Carradine died, and security video to ensure no one was in the room with him at the time."

But if no one was in the room with him at the time, what the hell was he doing?

[Via ArtsBeat.]

What Could Be Better Than an Asteroids Movie?

Richard Lawson — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 11:42:00 EDT

The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.Actresses make a lot of money. As do movie studios who adapt video games into terrible movies. A great actor died, a promising actress takes wing, and new reality shows make us want to do terrorism.

Adam Sandler's hilarious-sounding new comedy Grown Ups has been moved from March of 2010 to a plum June slot. It's pushed out Seth Rogen's sure-to-be laugh riot and action packed thrill ride The Green Hornet, which has been moved to July 9th. Man, studios just keep making such great movies. [Variety]

Feeling bad about your salary? Prepare to feel worse. Angelika Jorlemon, the wife-ish of actor Bradley Jane Pitt, earned some $27 million last year, making her the grossingest of all Hollywood actresses. Awkwardly, Jennifer Aniston, Bradley's ruined and Havisham-esque ex-wife, came in at number two. She made $25 million. Third was none other than oldie but greaty Meryl Streep, who pulled in a cool $24 million due to her Mamma Mia! success. Sigh. [THR]

ABC wants to see comedians, often a fat and inactive bunch, run. They're going ahead on The Fast and the Funniest, about comedians racing across the county in a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World-style competition. Actually, I like to think it's more like Wacky Races. [Variety]

Apparently four different studios were fighting over Asteroids. Yeah, Asteroids. Like, the Atari video game that's basically one pixel firing mini-pixels at another pixel. I can't wait for the movie, which Universal will make. Shia LaBeouf better star. I hope Shia LaBeouf stars in everything for the rest of forever. I hope Shia LaBeouf marries me. [THR]

Watch out, terrorists. NBC is looking for you. On July 20th they'll role out the first hour of a potential new series called The Wanted, which is a docu sorta thing about finding international blower uppers of things. The original title, Everyone Hates Muslims, was deemed too flat. [Variety]

Oh, sad. Harve Presnell, who played Jean Lundegaard's dad in Fargo, has died at age 75. The Broadway singer suffered from pancreatic cancer and passed away in Santa Monica. [THR]

Ha ha hm... We're not getting sick of him or anything, we swears. Neil Patrick Harris is in talks to host the Emmy Awards this fall. Because he's charming! And a gay person! And maybe he'll sing! But he's also so... overdone at this point, isn't he? Isn't he? [Variety]

You can't fight the moonlight and you evidently can't fight Piper Perabo. The Coyote Ugly actress has been cast as a whip-smart CIA operative in USA's developing series Covert Affairs. So she'll be a tough/smart babe like Mary McCormack in In Plain Sight but a spy like Not Guy Pearce in Burn Notice. Consolidation, USA! And synergy! Always with the synergy! Good for you, though, Pipes. I saw you in reasons to be pretty on the off-Broadway and you did pretty good, kid. [THR]

Oh, and Hilary Duff is gonna be on Gossiping Girls. Playing a movie star. Who lives with Vanessa. I just fell down. [EW]