Spears stuff in a sec, but first: As stars like Ben Affleck and Diane Lane hit the carpet for the premiere of Hollywoodland last week, I got to thinking about scandals. Things in Hell-Ay are comparatively tamer today...Couples cheating on each other is practically expected, for gawd's sake. Picture it (if you must):
We press types were waiting to do interviews when a svelte-looking Jennifer Garner sashayed up the Academy stairs, sans Ben, after takin' a few pics together. "There's trouble in paradise!" crowed a writer from a certain celeb weekly. "Now I've got my story."
Uh, get real.
Ben was busy doing the masturbatory media line, and I'm positive that Jen-doll just wanted to let him have the limelight on his big comeback night. I thought it was actually kinda sweet (from a gal who's not exactly known for her pinkie-poo heart, trust me), as there are so many spotlight-hungry hogs in this damn town. I mean, come on, I love drama as much--or more--than anyone else, but I like the semi-real dirt...not sensationalized hype.
That said, seems sniffing cocaine and coming out of the closet are really the only "scandals" makin' headlines these boring days. I know, I know, I shouldn't exactly knock it, otherwise, my Blind Vice kitchen would be sorely without spicy ingredients.
So, I asked someone who truly knows about juicy scuttlebutt, Jackie Collins, if she thought T-town was runnin' outta tawdry to-do?
"Are you kidding me? Are you watching the headlines?" Jackie replied, in her lovely but hoarsey British clipped job, which is sorta barmaid meets throne-room type. "I mean, Mel Gibson, Paris, this one and that one, the marriages, the divorces, the people breaking up--it's like musical beds! Everybody's sleeping with everybody else."
"Bed-hopping in slutty H'wood? You don't say," I said, mockingly. Still claim it's a little snore pie-with-lubricant sauce.
"I hear Lindsay just got her handbag stolen at London Airport with a million dollars worth of jewelry in it," Jackie offered, albeit somewhat desperately.
"Hey, Lindsay, gotta hold on to that bag when you got that jewelry in it!" J.C. advised.
Oh, Jackie, really. Everybody knows the baubles ain't the pocketbook stuff Ms. L. watches so closely.
See, while Miz Collins certainly is on top of her tab news, one T-town heavy-hitter told me he just ain't interested. "God, I don't give a s--t," blurted Ed Harris, when I asked what it takes to shock him currently.
"I don't pay any attention, so I dunno. And when I do, it's just, like, who gives a damn, really?" Ed-babe, you mean you're not dyin' to know who Paris is diddlin' these days?
"Achieving 'celebrity' is the worst thing that can happen for an actor," proffered E.H., "because then, when you're on the screen or on a stage, all people see is this notion of celebrity and then you can't do a character."
Eddie-doll, who's still strangely doable, can't quite exactly say how, continued, addin' to the celebrity backlash bites that Josh Hartnett espoused to me last week: "Forty years ago, you didn't have all this," said Ed, referring to the carpet chaos of tons o' media types packin' the Academy theater on Wilshire. "It was just several big news stations and whatever their publicists wanted to let out. Now, you can't take a crap without somebody knowing about it."
Now, I tried to get a little dish from the film's Adrien Brody, and he gabbed here and there. But it really wasn't worth repeating, and I simply never say that. Ed H. is a huge, potty-mouth-empowered thruster of the de-lish sound-byte when compared to Mr. B., who's as shy in press gatherings as he is not in women's boudoirs and private parts. Is that saying too much on my part?
Britney Spears didn't pop out her second kiddo last Friday at Cedars like we thought she might. Doctors at the celeb hospital--not the janitorial staff, I assure you--were nevertheless screaming such scuttlebutt. Bummer.
But it's sure no downer that Ms. S. just had her second boy, 'course. I think last week the docs over at Cedars musta been in mouthy overdrive to me about would-be B.S. checking in for her planned C-section. Obviously, it was mere hours away. The important thing, obviously, is that tot number two (for Brit) is safe, sound 'n' ready to ride, buckled down, natch, to Taco Bell ASAP.
And look, such a divinely happy time may not be exactly the right time to make a little Spears goss announcement of my own, but I feel it's just too apropos not to: See, Inside Britster campers (who chew a helluva lotta gum themselves) tell me Missus K-Fed is being aggressively told by her handlers to start keeping her mouth shut a bit more. Hey, shouldn't this puss intervention be going on over at Camp Lohan? Nevermind.I'm also told Missus Federline was recently repeatedly shushed while grabbin' goodies from Benefit Cosmetics. "I love that!" exclaimed the preggers pop tart about a particular product. "I've been using it for years!"
Lip-glossed sources tell yours truly that the Britster's handlers kept tryin' to shut her up every time she opened her mouth to chat or say how much she liked a pricy product.
What, do Brit's reps think somebody with a camera in her cleavage is gonna record said unofficial endorsement like it's some kinda Colin Farrell sex tape, or somethin'?
Oh, and speakin' of such hefty goss, who, just who, I ask, told ya more nekkid nights of recorded raunch were gonna be released from the de facto porn star? Yep. This full-time pisser. And it's an email-ful, to be sure
Oh, and as to Brit, uh, can we say too little, too late? Brit needed clap-trap control during her interview with Matt Lauer, where no reps were present, not when she's out waddling around T-town lookin' for swag.
Give the gal a damn break (and I don't say that too often).
Jon Voight flyin' the Texas coop. J.V. was spotted at Houston International dressed in a dark gray suit, waitin' for his flight back to Hell-Ay. A superexcited tour group stopped to ask for a pic, and Jonny-boy obliged. Post-pic, he settled in to wait patiently and read a book. I personally think Mr. V. should have been readin' the tabs and practicing how to pronounce his grandkiddies' names, but who asked moi? Far more conspicuous was...
Fabio, gettin' his lift on. Gold's Gym in Hollywood on Sunday. The former beefcake seems to have gone slightly soft, as his arms were less than perf in his bright-red tank top. His mane, however, remains unchanged: still shoulder-length with blond highlights. No one bothered the F-ster while he hit the weights, and he seemed a tad disappointed, I daresay. Raising manicured eyebrows elsewhere was...
Janice Combs, aka P. Diddy's mama, at Kimora Lee's Baby Phat fashion show. Bryant Park tents in New Yawk City. P.'s mom-unit was right next to the runway, clad in all white and rockin' a platinum wig. But Janice wasn't seated on her chair; she was sitting in a twentysomething male model's lap, who she canoodled with during the entire show. Wonder what other audience members like Jamie-Lynn Sigler and 50 Cent thought of the frisky PDA?