Merry Christmas Eve, everyone! As today is something of a news wasteland, expect lots of electronic stocking stuffers, blog regifting, and other forms of Defamer elfin magic.
It looks like Robert "Bob" Jaffe, the Palm Beach social fixture and Bernard Madoff middleman now under investigation by the FBI, could use a couple of bucks. Palm Beach Post gossip columnist Jose Lambiet reports that Jaffe recently turned up at a consignment shop in town with some of his jackets. "We're selling Mr. Jaffe's things right now," says the store manager. "We've got some nice Kiton jackets and sportcoats that belong to him. New, they're about $5,000. I've got one on sale for $895." From Jaffe's skeleton-filled closet straight to you!
As our Arrested Development Film Tracker™ continues to fill up with "yes" balloons, one very prominent "no" remains as Ann as the nose on plain's face. But could Michael Cera single-handedly delay the movie?
Björk, the quirky Icelandic singer, is investing her very emotions in a fund for startups, in the hopes of turning her near-bankrupt country into a green paradise. Sort of!
• Katie Couric is still in third place, but her ratings are up considerably. [AP]
• CBS is the only network that has seen viewership rise this season. [Reuters]
• Portfolio's attempt to juice sales with a new cover strategy was a dud. [NYO]
• Ad revenue at the NYT fell 20% last month compared to a year ago. [AP]
• The Times has teamed with Riverhead to publish Obama: The Historic Journey, a book of with photos and essays, in February 2009. [Politico]
Bernie Madoff is facing a long stretch in prison for bilking investors out of $50 billion, and plenty of theories have been batted around as to what might have motivated Madoff to carry out his devious scheme. Was it just about the money? Did he feel any sense of shame as he ripped off hundreds of investors and non-profits? And will there be any sort of redemption for Madoff at the end of the day? To get a little perspective on what it's like to carry out a massive financial fraud, keep the scam going undetected for years, eventually get caught, and then account for the wrongdoing, we turned to someone who's been through all that (and more): Sam Antar, who, along with his cousin Eddie Antar, built Crazy Eddie into a electronics powerhouse in the '70s and '80s until the company came crashing down and the Antars were indicted on a variety of charges.
Welcome back to Defamer Attractions, your regular guide to everything new, noteworthy and/or mortifying at the movies. This week: Hollywood gets stuck in your chimney delivering Benjamin Button and four other holiday blockbuster hopefuls.
It's the holidays and the end of a horrible year, so that can only mean one thing: Everyone is consuming their body weight in alcohol! As if you needed any enticement, bars are reviving whiskey and cognac-heavy cocktails from Prohibition and the Great Depression like the Sidecar, the Old Fashioned, and the Manhattan, while Stolichnaya is going for gallows humor by promoting new drinks called Rejected Resume, Battered Bull and Welfare Punch.
Isn't socialism fun? The government now owns four-fifths of AIG, the insurance giant whose foray into complex financial contracts required a $150 billion bailout. And we may be stuck with it for years!
Stephanie Seymour playing with her daughter on the beach in St. Barts ... Woody Allen and Soon-Yi Previn leaving the Ritz in Paris ... Hilary Swank standing outside a ski lodge in Aspen ... Mariah Carey and Nick Cannon walking around Aspen in ski gear ... Naomi Watts and Liev Schreiber packing up their SUV with son Alexander and baby Samuel ... Alicia Keys laying by the pool in Australia ... and Gwyneth Paltrow going out for the night with Stella McCartney and Madonna in London.
These are the funniest, or timeliest, or wittiest comments we could find this year. There was a long, long list to cull from, so really you should all consider yourself winners. Especially ten of you.
We can't be certain it's the real Olivia Palermo who set up a YouTube account recently under the name "OliviaPalermo." But we're also not sure there's anyone else who would have gone to the trouble of creating a "highlight reel" of the young socialite's appearances on The City (which doesn't even debut until December 29th), along with pics of her posing for photographers and showing off the pretty dresses she's worn to various events over the past year—all set to the tune of Lady GaGa's "Beautiful Dirty Rich." The more likely scenario: Palermo's just getting ready to capitalize on the media attention that will inevitably follow when the show debuts on MTV next week. The video was uploaded yesterday and it's Palermo's first production, but we're looking forward to many more self-promotional vids in the coming weeks. Maybe it'll even land her top billing on a show of her own in the near future! The video is after the jump.
There will be no Christmas miracle for Project Runway fans who have been hoping that season six, which has been in reality TV limbo due to an unseemly tussle between The Weinstein Company, NBC Universal, and Lifetime, will soon grace our screens. Yesterday a judge rejected as "untimely" Lifetime's attempt to move the fight from New York state court to federal court, a small victory for NBC, which is claiming producer Harvey Weinstein had no right to sell the show to Lifetime. If only the judge had exercised the power and wisdom of King Solomon, we'd know who truly deserved to own this particular multi-headed, campy, and colorful baby. [Variety]
We didn't have much success last week getting one of our operatives past Bernie Madoff's doorman, and we really didn't have any interest in trekking to Greenwich to pay a visit to our second favorite villain in the saga, Walter Noel. But could we at least get Walter or his wife Monica on the phone? Ask and ye shall receive. After calling half a dozen numbers and getting nowhere at Walter's office (voicemail), his house in Greenwich (the maid picked up), the Noel home in Southampton (was it one of his infamous daughters who picked up?), and the Noel's apartment on Park Avenue, we finally got a hold of Mrs. Noel herself. You can view the video above to see how it went down. But we're guessing you're going to come to the same conclusion we did: Monica does not sound like a very happy woman these days.
It wouldn't be Christmas Eve without fighting: Alec Baldwin supposedly slammed Tina Fey's body; Paris Hilton's uncle got attacked and robbed in his home and Nicole Kidman was haunted by Katie Holmes.
