There would be no dancing on The Ellen DeGeneres Show today, not when the preternaturally upbeat talk show host offered a rare glimpse inside her tortured, pet-lover's soul: Through deep sobs, she relayed the shocking and sad story of Iggy, a Brussels Griffon mix she adopted from an unnamed local shelter (news reports later revealed it to be the Moms & Mutts rescue in Pasadena).
The on-again-off-again magazine Radar recently put out an issue. Surprising, we know! But there was more. The cover featured Rudy Giuliani, Hilary Clinton and Barack Obama au natural in an homage to Vanity Fair's Tom Ford cover. Some of the ladies on 'The View' were offended. Others weren't. At one point Ms. Behar appeared to read from Sherri Shepherd's cue card. "Rudy looks like a pimp, Hillary looks like a ho and Barack is on the DL," she said, looking as if she had learned the line phonetically. A more accurate limn might be that Rudy is the well-dressed gay one, Hillary has the ability to rebound from clunkers (Domino, Healthcare plan) and Barack is the ingenue. But, of course, that would rob Behar of the Judith Butlerian thrill of appropriating the patois of sexual and racial minorities. That is fierce!
With nothing but snips of hearsay to cling to until Project Runway returns to Bravo next month, we were pleasantly surprised to learn through Reality Blurred that Canada already has a version of the model-trafficking reality TV sensation on the air. Premiered recently on Slice (the #1 cable network for Canadian women!), Project Runway Canada adheres closely to the original's pattern—only in place of Tim Gunn is some other guy with a hockey 'stache, and in place of host Heidi Klum is the regal Queen Bowie herself, Iman.
Last night on Conan O'Brien, beloved silver-haired hurricane foe Anderson Cooper told a charming story about a defining moment in every young boy's life: Getting cosmetic surgery with your legendary socialite mom. Don't worry, Anderson's still real. He kept the "fatty deposit" under his eye (it adds character!). The whole thing is alarming, though. Does America really want to see Anderson's every flaw? Will HD ruin the magic? Can't they smear a little Vaseline on the lens and film him like a 30s movie starlet until we're all ready to deal with his imperfections?
As Oprah bores us with Jerry Seinfeld's wife and her devious methods of burying creamed broccoli inside a powdered donut, Tyra manages to bring Americans news they can use: Ladies, the next time your dinner date spends an inordinate amount of time quoting Kathy Griffin and apologizing for his shameful lack of abs, use this simple finger-measuring technique to determine whether or not he may in fact be a Friend of O'Malley. And if you want a second opinion, there's always the hair whorl test.
Sort-of reality show "The Hills" is still keeping MTV alive! And its evil semi-star Spencer Pratt may be a prat but he is one smart cookie. When Heidi Montag, his inamorata, returns from lunch with Jenny, Spencer is sitting on the couch reading The Intelligent Investor: A Book of Practical Counsel, Benjamin Graham's classic 1949 guide to value investing. There's even a foreword by Warren Buffett! Anyway, according to Heidi, "Jen [Bunney] was telling me [Heidi Montag] that Lauren [Conrad] was saying Brody [Jenner] says that it was all Spencer [Pratt] who was spreading the sex tape rumors." (That would be the famed sex tape of Lauren Conrad and her once-and-current boyfriend Jason Wahler.) Pratt was once Brody Jenner's "manager-slash-publicist-slash-agent- slash-stylist! Deflection time! "He's such a little bitch!" says Pratt. Sure. Did Pratt fuel speculation about Conrad's sex tape? Almost certainly! But more importantly, was it a sound investment?
Avowed bisexual Tila Tequila, who rose to fame for being the hub through which every strain of MySpace-proliferated STD has passed at least once, is currently hunting for the man or woman of her dreams on MTV reality show A Shot at Love with Tila Tequila. While we're certain Tila's emotional fulfillment was first and foremost on the minds of the show's producers, doubling the number of contestants also cleverly doubled the chances of capturing an always entertaining bitch-choking, weave-yanking smackdown.
Everything after the final notes of its familiar theme, from the playing out of a highly suspect "perfect game," to the friendly sign-off reminder to "help control the sex-worker population: Have a hooker spayed or neutered today," suggested a new era has dawned at The Price is Right. Gone is Bob Barker's well-calibrated "atmosphere of terror." In its place is new host Drew Carey's atmosphere of congeniality, where every contestant is referred to as "buddy" or "man," and where new cars are given away with a frequency that would make Oprah blush.
We dispatched Defamer videographer Molly McAleer to the 2007 High Times Stony Awards (congratulations to Stoner of the Year Seth Rogen!), where she enticed munchies-afflicted celebrities strolling down the green carpet with homemade snickerdoodles and an inviting smile. It was a potent combination, that got Tommy Chong to open up about the "unauthorized" Cheech n' Chong biography he's writing, and Lindsay Lohan's main Mean Girls homegay, Daniel Franzese, to employ an arm-breaking metaphor in discussing her recent cokepanted troubles.
Exhibit 23 for our prosecution's theory that there's a rise of dirty in New York City: Last night's screening of "Caligula" on the site of one of the city's oldest gay sex clubs. The inaugural weekly Sunday salon series, hosted by Daniel Nardicio, had more than just the flick giving it filthy cred. Nude life-drawing of porn star and escort Dimitri Santiago [NSFW!], booths available for the sex, and a crowd that included Shortbus' P J Deboy did their part. Daniel and some of the event's other guests took some time in the bathroom with me and videoboy Alex Goldberg to assess the ups and downs of the last 20 years of sleeeeze.
For all the industry analysis and hullabaloo over Fox Business Network's debut today (The market strategy! The innovation! The jargon-free-zone!), fact is? With this cast of Benetton hotties reading the news, ratings can't be too far behind, no matter what kind of news-network-as-revolution shtick their marketing team is putting out there. We found all these ladies in just five minutes of airtime. For those of you not interested in the Victoria's Secret Network, FBN offers you the spectacle of watching a 60-year-old anchor introduce a segment by welcoming his viewers thusly: "Glad you could join us on this, our first day. [To which Cheryl Casone pumps fist and actually says "Woohoo!"] Hopefully you'll come back and visit us over and over as we become this, like, family." Like, totally, Tom Sullivan. Woohoo!
· "Listen, Jane Seymour: Do you want that Dancing with the Stars disco ball trophy? Or do you want to whine about your dead mother? Exactly, so shut up and start foxtrotting."
· More Sex and the City movie spoilers: Mr. Big marries the evil witch from Sleeping Beauty! Poor Carrie. Always the bridesmaid.
· This all-Korean Jamiroquai cover-band is way better than they have any right to be. [via FunFriends]
· What's important isn't that you have an iPhone. What's important is that they think you have an iPhone.
· The guy who wrote Little Shop of Horrors is now pushing up Audrey IIs.
The most engaging part of Howard Kurtz's appearance on The Daily Show last night was Jon Stewart's introduction of the Washington Post media critic: "My guest tonight, Howard Kurtz, known of course... as the inventor of the curtsy." Heh. Kurtz was on the show promoting his new book about the protracted and bloody conflict that has occupied the hearts and minds of the American people for the last four years: The deadly battle for network news ratings. He made his first mistake by saying, without a hint of the irony required to survive on-camera with Stewart, "Well, you've heard of Katie, Brian and Charlie." Stewart, we think, thought Kurtz was a Big Three suck-up whose book didn't so much analyze the networks as adulate them. You can see Kurtz reinforce that impression in this clip, where he extols the bravery, the responsibility, dammit, the independent thinkers, of network news journalists. Stewart, for his part, dealt Kurtz his special brand of passive-aggressive napalm by calling his book "interesting." Twice.
With Friday finally here, your booze-infused weekend a mere nine call-rolling hours away, we thought we'd celebrate with a Triumph the Insult Comic Dog segment aired on Late Night with Conan O'Brien last night, in which 80's-hair-rock-titan turned middle-aged-lesbian Jon Bon Jovi revisited his encounter with the horny and vicious Rottweiler. We won't give away some of Triumph's best lines, except to say there's one involving Richie Sambora and a potentially damaging use of a curling iron that made our day.
The Y Combinator guys may be acting starstruck, but maybe its MC Hammer who's playing the fanboy here. Y Combinator's coterie of entrpreneurs could easily return the favor by providing the rapper with real video services. Everyone, including MC Hammer, knows they can. Why would the startuppers reduce the Hammer to begging for volunteers — if not to subtly put him in his place?
