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wtf
Why Cipriani's Victory Is A Disaster For Us All
This is Joshua David Stein. I'm back briefly not to discuss Project Runway, which I haven't watched and which Richard and MisterHippity have done quite well already, (consensus: it sucks!) but to discuss the case of Cipriani. It's a topic of abiding interest for me. I wrote a large article on Cipriani for Page Six magazine a couple of weeks ago in which I predicted that empire's demise. Two days ago, however, Jeanique Green, the newest member of the State Liquor Authority which is responsible for deciding who shall and shall not serve liquor in New York State voted to accept a settlement on behalf of Cipriani of $500,000 rather than revoking the liquor licenses of its New York locations. Basically, Cipriani got into the weeds by failing to list Arrigo Cipriani, a felon, on their liquor licenses. Though Cipriani gets to live another day, I argue, Ms. Green's deciding vote may be the pollice verso for a legal and vibrant New York nightlife. More »
revivals
Tina Brown To Release The Beast
Tina Brown has worked in the US for more than two decades, since taking the helm of Vanity Fair in 1984; and she's now attempting to reinvent herself for the internet. But Lady Evans, as the 55-year-old former magazine editor is also entitled to call herself, remains at heart a Brit of an earlier generation, pickled in ink and arch wit. Her forthcoming news site, backed by old patron Barry Diller of IAC, is to be dubbed The Daily Beast, after the shameless tabloid of Evelyn Waugh's 1938 novel Scoop. The Digg kiddies will be so confused. More »
Sex Wars
"What it is like to date Tucker Max"
You, the public, recently got to preview portions of the horrific (currently in production!) movie script for I Hope They Serve Beer In Hell, written by "Dude, I did 12 shots of Jamesons and totally puked on that chick's tits" bro-blogger Tucker Max. The primary question that arose afterwards was, "What kind of girl would go out with this asshole?" Well, ladies and gentlemen, we (purportedly) have an answer—with all of the "whores," bad sex, emotional manipulation, fried chicken, drunk driving, and, uh, other bad things that you would have imagined: More »
recaps
Project Runway Bumbles On the Uneven Bars, Gets a '0' From the US Judges
Hey guys. Your usual Project Runway reviewer Joshua David Stein is out today, because he's a dirty hipster who doesn't have cable television and was unable to watch last night's episode. So you're stuck with me and I feel a bit like Eeyore, because I have nothing good to say. Yeah, that's right. I think this season of Project Runway stinks and I'm going to tell you why. It's actually pretty simple: the designers are annoying and, compared to last season's crop, depressingly untalented. I'm mad at everyone. More »
the cinema
Edwards Mistress As Explained In American Psycho
Rielle Hunter lived a rich second life as a character in literary fiction before allegedly luring Democratic politician John Edwards into a rich second life as father to her love child. You'll recall the actress was the inspiration for the pivotal bad girl, Alison Poole, in a novel by Jay McInerney. And that McInerney's friend Bret Eason Ellis extended Poole's highly sexual run in two of his own novels, Glamorama and American Psycho. As luck would have it, the 2000 movie adaptation of the latter book, starring Christian Bale, retains some discussion of Poole. As this video excerpt makes clear, Rielle Hunter — sorry, Alison Poole — had a reputation that preceded her. Click the icon to watch.
tv
A Golden Age For Cable
Time Warner yesterday announced some weak quarterly financials, with earnings off 26 percent. But there was a big bright spot, the media conglomerate's cable networks like HBO and CNN, where profits were up 18 percent, led by advertising gains. There's a similar situation at NBC Universal, where ratings gains at Bravo (Runway, Top Chef), MSNBC (Keith Olbermann, Chris Matthews) and even the USA Network have formed a thick silver lining around the storm cloud that is the flagship broadcast network. The business-side gains add a financial dimension to the cable industry's creative golden age, described by the Times' David Carr in June and obvious to anyone with a smartly programmed DVR or Netflix queue. Cable is the swaggering golden child of television, and it's only going to get more confident, because the advertising model that's fueling all its fun happens to be perfect for a recession. More »
celebrity forensics
Mary-Kate Olsen Beats Coppers -- Again
Mary-Kate Olsen WINS. Twice law-enforcement authorities have tried pressuring the dopey lil' actress into telling what she knows about the death of close personal friend Heath Ledger, and twice now she has successfully beaten them back — the only person connected to Ledger to successfully do so. Federal sources told first the Daily News and now the Post that U.S. prosecutors have withdrawn their investigation into the death of actor Ledger, forcing the Drug Enforcement Administration to drop demands to interview Olsen. That's a fairly humiliating retreat for an agency that just two days ago implied it would use a Grand Jury subpoena to force Olsen to tell what she knows after word leaked of frustration in its offices over Olsen's demands for immunity. Especially because the feds really did have a subpoena. Reports the News: More »
fuckups
How New York Burned Its Plastic-Surgery Source
Anonymous sources can usually put some faith in the journalistic principle, that the anonymity of a source is a sacred thing, to be protected even at the risk of jail. But they should have less faith in a reporter's competence. Last week, a New York Times reporter withheld the name of a critic of the Chinese government but gave him away accidentally by mentioning the restaurant he owned. And there's an equally moronic slip in this week's cover story on plastic surgery in New York magazine. More »
advice
Gawker's Complete Guide To Covering The Olympics
It goes without saying that we will not be in Beijing to cover the Olympics. Furthermore, we've never been to Beijing, and our Olympic experience is limited to one pair of first-round tickets to see the Dream Team crush Kyrgyzstan or somebody in Atlanta in 1996. None of this precludes us from rounding up all of the information on the Internet in order to tell the media that actually is covering the Olympics in Beijing how to do its job. So listen up! Don't be just another sap writing about Michael Phelps while being beaten by Chinese police. After the jump, the only guide to covering the wondrous 2008 Olympics you will ever need: More »
journalismism
Hooray! The National Enquirer has published photos of former political person John Edwards with a baby. The baby is almost certainly made up in part of DNA he left in a woman named Rielle Hunter, a former Edwards staffer who now spends her time cashing checks and hiding in hotels and denying everything to the media (until Good Morning America finally books her!). So now would be a perfect time for, like, established print media to cover this story, right? Anyone? Ha, no, they are all too embarrassed. Once again, it's up to the internet!
More »
The Edwards Love-Child Old Media Doesn't Want You to See
Hooray! The National Enquirer has published photos of former political person John Edwards with a baby. The baby is almost certainly made up in part of DNA he left in a woman named Rielle Hunter, a former Edwards staffer who now spends her time cashing checks and hiding in hotels and denying everything to the media (until Good Morning America finally books her!). So now would be a perfect time for, like, established print media to cover this story, right? Anyone? Ha, no, they are all too embarrassed. Once again, it's up to the internet!
More »
things we actually like
Paris Hilton Calls McCain, Obama 'Bitches'
Remember how John McCain mocked Barack Obama by comparing the Democratic presidential candidate to Paris Hilton, implying both of them were vapid celebrities and royally pissing off Hilton's McCain-bankrolling family? It turns out Paris has a sense of humor about the whole thing, and made an actually-pretty-funny video about it for Will Ferrell's Funny Or Die. It's after the jump. And it's funny because Hilton implies she has a sophisticated knowledge of an important geopolitical issue LOL! Also, protocelebrities take note: This is a example of how you take some mildly negative PR and spin it so masterfully your image ends up better polished than ever. More »
politics
What Politicians' Family Portraits Say About Them
The Obama family is featured on the September cover of Essence. The family portrait is an important part of a politician's campaign—it's where they can send subliminal messages while showing you, the voter, what an all-American guy they really are. (And what's more all-American than color-coordinating your family's outfits red, white, and blue?) What do recent presidential candidates' family photos say about them? More »
Embarrassments
Tucker Max's Movie Script
Yesterday we put out a call for the viciously panned script of I Hope They Serve Beer In Hell, the upcoming film written by I-totally-fucked-that-chick blogger Tucker Max. We immediately received about a dozen copies of the script, which is apparently being forwarded around Hollywood like a list of bad lawyer jokes. I also could have said "like herpes," and I could also follow up by joking that the script is about as funny as a bad lawyer with herpes, haha. Friends, it opens with Tucker Max fucking a deaf girl and screaming "DON'T TAZE ME, BRO!." It is that bad. After the jump, three of the most terrible moments from the film's first half. Jesus, bro: More »
Gangsters
Junior Gotti Arrested On Mob-Related Charges, Shockingly
John "Junior" Gotti—son of the late Gambino family crime boss John Sr. and brother to Growing Up Gotti star Victoria—was arrested this morning on murder conspiracy charges, reportedly "in connection with a drug smuggling ring and 3 prior mob-hits." Gotti was tried twice before for the 1992 attempted murder of talk show host Curtis Sliwa, but got off both times, and had seemed to be poised for a quiet retirement in his Long Island home. Junior's only previous stint in prison—from 1999 to 2005—came after he was convicted of shaking down Scores, the favorite strip club of New York's celebrity and media elite: More »
scandal
Cuckold's Internet Revenge Against Top Banker
If you've visited sites like those run by New York magazine and the Observer over the past couple of months, you may have noticed, in the comments section, repeated instances of a message that begins, "Steve Ratner [sic]... has paid my wife $500,000.00 to leave me." If you saw these comments, you probably wondered what the hell was going on. Well, the Times this morning sheds precious little light on the situation because, get this, there is a Steven Rattner, he did sleep with that guy's wife and now, as a result of the angry ex-husband's smear campaign, he has vacated his job atop the private equity division of Credit Suisse. The lesson, as relayed by the Times' hotshot finance writer Andrew Ross Sorkin, is that the internet renders "helpless" ordinary plutocrats who just want to hush up stories about how they allegedly taunted and harassed the husbands of the high-class escorts they procured on trips abroad. Wait, what? More »
celebrity forensics
Deepening Mary-Kate Olsen Immunity Mystery
The Associated Press now has its own law-enforcement source stating that Mary-Kate Olsen is demanding immunity before she will talk with federal agents investigating the January death of actor Heath Ledger, as the Post reported this morning. The immunity request is now all but confirmed. Olsen's attorney didn't bother to deny it in a statement addressing a number of other questions raised by the Post story, such as whether Olsen helped Ledger procure OxyContin: More »
superstition
