19th April 2008 | Category: News, Showbiz
It must be a slow day at CNN. Their reporters are now making headlines instead of just reporting them. Richard Quest, a familiar face on CNN, got arrested in the early hours on Friday inside central park with meth.
Quest, a 46 year old British reporter, is the host of CNN Business Traveler and his namesake program Quest. Over the years, Quest with his strange voice and overactive style has made his mark on CNN’s international channel. On Friday 3:40 am, he was arrested for being inside central park - the park was under curfew from 1 am to 6 am. During their routine search, police discovered the plastic bag of meth in his pocket. He was given six month counseling for possession of a controlled substance.
I guess the news of primaries, pope visit, and the raid at the Texas ranch was not exciting enough. CNN needed more personalized breaking news. And it makes one wonder, what quest led him to the central park in the wee hours with drug in his pocket?
16th April 2008 | Category: News, Showbiz, Who Knew?
You might think so after watching the YouTube video where 50 year old Tricia Walsh-Smith lashes out against her 75 year old husband Philip Smith. Close to 150 thousand people have watched Tricia’s six minute rants about her upcoming divorce.
Why the anger? Well, her husband Philip, the president of the largest theater owner on Broadway, is rich and has decided to leave his fortune with his two daughters. The prenuptial agreement she signed does not leave her much room for a fight. So she took her case to the court of public opinion on YouTube. The poor, vulnerable Tricia, as she calls herself, dishes out all the dirt she can find about Philip and his family. She confides her secrets: they never had sex. She shares her discovery of stash of Viagra, condoms, and porn. She shows her wedding album and classifies the family members as evil, nasty, or bad for our benefit. As for her, she is a good egg.
So is this act going to help her in real court? No one except her lawyer thinks so. It might actually damage her case since judges do not like this kind of shenanigans, and there is the possibility of defamation lawsuit. Her lawyer explains her YouTube performance as revolution by the powerless people. As for cleaning dirty linen in public, he says “There’s no such thing as a private life anymore.”
Show me more » »
14th April 2008 | Category: News, Showbiz
The NY city businessman who bought it says it is all out of respect. We cannot help but wonder. Yes, we are talking about a 50 year old 15-min sex tape of Marilyn Monroe that was recently sold for $1.5 million.
Who had the tape? It turns out it was in the possession of an FBI informant whose son sold the tape. The footage itself is from 1950’s, and a decade later, then FBI director Edger Hoover spent weeks to prove that the man in the footage was either JFK or RFK. But he was not successful. Even Joe DiMaggio was interested in obtaining the tape. The man who brokered the deal said:
“The gentleman who bought it said out of respect for Marilyn he’s not going to make a joke of it and put it on the Internet and try to exploit her.”
In the age of YouTube, when the public appetite for celebrity sex tapes are at epic high, and given all the mystery surrounding the tape, it makes one wonder if respect really covers all the motivation behind such highly published purchase.
It would be naive to think the tape is really out of the public domain, and this is the last time we hear about it.
13th April 2008 | Category: News, Showbiz
Yes, you bet. Dr. Phil could not help but butted in and bailed out Mercades Nichols, the leader of the gang of eight teens who brutally beat up 16 year old Victoria Lindsay.
This is not the first time Dr. Phil tried to get some publicity off high profile case for boosting his TV show rating. Remember his uninvited trip to UCLA Medical Center to meet troubled Britney and the subsequent apology. Either he is really a slow learner or he is rating addict. Either case it did not take him long before he did it again. This time it was one of teens who brutally attacked another teen over some comments on MySpace. People from his show posted $33,000 bond and bailed out Mercades Nichols from jail. As they were leaving with the teen and her family, they told reporters to stop filming since they had exclusive right to the story.
When the story got out, the show as usual issued a statement blaming some of the staff members:
“We have helped guests and potential guests in the past when they need financial assistance to come on the show - assisting with clothing allowance, lost wages, accommodations, travel and necessities. In this case, certain staff members went beyond our guidelines. These staff members have been spoken to and our policies reiterated. In addition, we have decided not to go forward with the story as our guidelines have been compromised.”
Show me more » »
12th April 2008 | Category: News, Showbiz
Yes, according to the Australian Fashion Week (AFW) organizers. After their initial reluctance that followed public outcry, they finally adopted a minimum age of 16 for the show and dropped 14-year old Polish model Monika Jagaciak.
Until now there was no age limit for models in Australia. Only last year, there was a protest when Gold Coast Fashion Week featured a 12 year old model, and the show adopted 16 as the minimum age. The London Fashion Week also adopted the same minimum age for their show last year. However, the AFW founder Simon Lock initially rejected the idea that the 14 year old Monika Jagaciak was too young and said:
“There’s been criticism of the industry in the past for promoting the Lolita syndrome, but that’s something we will not stand for. The designers love these models as coat hangers for their clothes. They don’t want to exploit their sexuality in any way whatsoever.”
Show me more » »
