Sheila Nevins, HBO documentary films president and overall entertainment industry big shot, was very mad she couldn't watch Obama's inauguration live from her first class airplane seat. But were the cops and lawyers necessary?
Real estate mogul and Daily News publisher Mort Zuckerman had a rep as quite the ladies' man when he was younger. His conquests over the years have included Nora Ephron, Diane von Furstenberg, Gloria Steinem, Arianna Huffington, and Patricia Duff. (And just because he's 71 doesn't mean he's slowing down any; he welcomed a daughter into the world in late December, although he didn't disclose who the mother is.) But it's safe to say that his many paramours haven't been drawn to him for his sense of style. Click here for a look back at a few of Zuckerman's most unfortunate fashion moments over the past three decades.
What better time than the worst media battering in generations to launch a new Hollywood quasi-trade publication? That's mostly rhetorical, but if you do have a better answer than "today," don't tell Sharon Waxman.
• Armin Amiri's Socialista is closing for good, and Giuseppe Cipriani, of course, is partly to blame. [Page Six]
• Everything you missed at yesterday's porkfest, Cochon 555. [Eater, TFB]
• Masa Matsushita has returned to Matsugen for the next three months. [JGV]
• Tim Zagat chats with the Post about Restaurant Week. [NYP]
• Adam Platt gives two stars apiece to 10 Downing and West Branch. [NYM]
• Wass Stevens has landed himself a role in a BlackBerry commercial. [GS]
• More bad news for chef Gordon Ramsay: His empire is supposedly "crumbling," and he's also been banned from Mario Batali's restaurants for calling him "fanta pants." [NYP, Guardian]
Add Gov. David Paterson to the list of people skipping the World Economic Forum in Davos. Paterson, who said he planned to attend the mogulfest to drum up business for the state, and who reiterated just yesterday that he planned to go ahead with the trip, changed course today: "Perhaps it would be a better idea to go at another time, send a couple of assistants and stay right here with the leaders of the Legislature and work on the budget," he told reporters. Good call. Frankly, the idea of the New York's famously indecisive, blind governor zooming down the slopes had us a bit concerned anyway. [NYP]
In your sobering Monday media column: Publishers Weekly editor laid off, scrounging for dollars and cougars, former New York Times Hollywood reporter Sharon Waxman's web site cometh, and more!
Apparently, Colorado just appointed a new Senator, and they did it without any 24 news coverage, tabloid leaks, media wars, or Justice Department probes!
Though Mickey Rourke has long insisted he is his struggling, over-the-hill character in The Wrestler, we didn't think he'd attempt to make a second career out of it.
Ailing Apple CEO Steve Jobs checked into Stanford Hospital over the weekend and was scheduled for surgery this morning, we hear.
1/25 — RYAN KWANTEN from True Blood at the Wokcano in Santa Monica, which is also apparently a dance club (horrors). He crashed some girl's private party to stand on the elevated balcony (all the better to look down on everyone else) and then proceeded to dance with and chat up girls, even after introducing them to his wife. Um, ick? Also, his IMDb says he is 5'10'' - lies.
Violating an unspoken Hollywood rule of engagement—no matter how undeserving or mink-clad you might deem them to be, you never, ever scribble indelible unpleasantries on a celebrity's Walk of Fame star—an unseen hand has written "FUR HAGS" beneath the names of Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen. An Olsen fan site attributes the defacing to PETA, who've pulled a similar stunt in the past on Sharon Stone's star—but word on the street has it that local hot-headed reactionary Chewbacca was spotted fleeing the scene with a Sharpie clenched in one paw, shouting, "MRrraaawwwwahhwwgrrrraah," which translates to, "You have the blood of a thousand Wookies on your hands, you unfeeling, stole-wrapped, two-headed Olsen monster!"
Obsessive parents no longer have to worry about sending their kids to an expensive private school where, despite the hefty tuition, they still don't get to handpick every teacher and student their child comes into contact with, personally select the school uniform, or dictate the lunch menu in the cafeteria. They can now homeschool their little ones—and they don't even have to join a religious cult in Montana to do it! Melissa Meyer and Teri Flemal are the founders of QED (or "Quality Education by Design). For $30,000 a year, they'll dispatch teachers to your house so your kids will never be forced to leave the safe cocoon of your $20 million home and risk catching a cold from some kid whose parents weren't considerate enough to bathe their youngster in anti-bacterial body wash. Plus, if you suddenly decide you want to, say, schedule a last minute field trip to the Louvre in Paris, Melissa and Teri will be more than happy to accommodate your request.
It's hard to think of a worse time to get into the home-loan business. But, according to upset finance staffers, Yahoo backed a senior executive's mortgage to move into a neighborhood of $3 million houses.
