Yesterday's Page Six offered up another poor review of ICM's new Century City headquarters, claiming that the agency's underwhelmed, Fiji-water-and-natural-light deprived staffers are quietly bitching about their cramped facilities, with their CAA Death Star envy becoming so acute that "embarrassed" agents have supposedly taken to conducting their dealings away from the office:
This just in from a brave operative who may already be dead by the time you read these words:
· Universal signs up Robert De Niro's Tribeca Prods. for two more years, allowing them to go forward with Little Fockers, the third Meet the Parents movie. They're planning to bring back all the main cast members from the previous installments—even Teri Polo, admirably choosing loyalty over the cynical temptation to replace her with a cheaper, middle-tier CBS sitcom wife. So far. [Variety]
· George Clooney and Cate Blanchett are in "negotiations" and "talks," respectively (don't mix them up or someone loses his job!), to voice characters in Wes Anderson's stop-motion animation adaptation of Roald Dahl story The Fantastic Mr. Fox. [THR]
· According to someone in attendance at Hillary Clinton's trip to the CAA Death Star yesterday, the senator was "incredibly well-received," especially after promising that if they use their evil influence to deliver her the Hollywood endorsement, she'd publicly support the Creative Artists Infant-Consuming Decriminalization Act the agency's partners have had trouble pushing through Congress. [Variety]
· Desperate producers hope that having Idol winner Fantasia Barrino announce she's taking over the lead in the the struggling Broadway version of The Color Purple while making an AI appearance last night might help sell some more tickets. [Variety]
· The unthinkable has happened: American Idol was not the most-watched show on television last night. Though they didn't directly compete, Grey's Anatomy actually pulled in the more viewers. Please immediately head for your place of worship and pray for salvation, as the end of days is surely nigh. [THR]
By now, everyone's aware of the shocking attacks DreamWorks mogul and Democratic primary fixer David Geffen made yesterday on Hillary Clinton, her intern-despoiling husband, the White House's substandard lodgings for billionaire rainmakers, and all that is good and holy about civilized political campaigning in an attempt to demonstrate that all of Hollywood has fallen prone at the feet of Barack Obama, ready to do the Chosen One's bidding. Now that most of the factually inaccurate, post-attack bickering has been dispensed with, Team Hillary is regrouping today, ready to launch a Hollywood counteroffensive that includes trips to fundraisers hosted by her own stable of local billionaires, and, ominously, a trip to the CAA Death Star. Says Var:
While CAA's drones are still contentedly breathing in the New Death Star Smell still suffusing their fully operational (and newly non-exploding) Century City headquarters, an operative within ICM tells us that not even a heartfelt office-warming gift from their evil neighbors can help the staff shake the feeling that their home in The CC isn't quite as nice as the Creative Artists stronghold:
We realize that it's never a good idea for a Hollywood couple's less successful half to abandon the security that comes with a life of being married to an A-list earner, but are things already so bad for Ryan Phillippe that he's open to taking party hosting gigs? This limited time opportunity landed in our inbox as part of personal appearance booking agency Esterman Entertainment's e-mail update on the talent they offer (among other performers featured: Webster, C.C. DeVille, Ron Jeremy) for all of your mall-opening and wet-t-shirt-contest-emceeing needs. While we'd never begrudge a guy the chance to pick up some easy money in between movies (he's even on Ellen today plugging his new film), he should enter this world knowing that seemingly innocent hosting jobs are a proven gateway to the pure celebsploitation of the Australian horse auction circuit.
Even though we are generally inclined only to note agency assistant hires involving people throwing away promising reality TV and legal careers to pursue the sacred vocation of taking ten percent of someone else's dream, we nonetheless feel compelled to pass along a rumor from a tipster alerting us about the newest drone staffing the CAA Death Star:
Following up on yesterday's shocking news that Reese Witherspoon was leaving rebound agency Endeavor for the welcoming, evil embrace of longtime suitor CAA after just a year as a lusciously bankable bride in Ari Emannuel's talent-harem, the LA Weekly's Nikki Finke fills in the backstory on how the representational three-way between Witherspoon and the competing chop shops resolved itself:
· Want to read more about the Dixie Chicks' big night at the Grammys? Of course you do. [Variety, THR]
·Reese Witherspoon unexpectedly ditches Endeavor (her home for just a year) for CAA after being promised that if she signed with the evil agenting monolith, the committed mother's young children would never be featured as lunch specials at their new headquarters. Rumors that the agency's pitch also included an ominous pledge to "take care" of ex-husband Ryan Phillippe should he ever "become a problem" are unconfirmed. [Variety]
· The Grammys recover nicely from last year's humiliating buggering at the hands of American Idol, as seeking refuge on an Idol-free Sunday night leads to an 18 percent boost over 2006's all-time low ratings. [THR]
· MTV Networks announces a "sweeping round" of layoffs in a variety of divisions, with the death toll expected to reach 250 staff positions. Happy Monday! [Variety]
· In today's WTF? casting news (but really, doesn't each new Cage gig announcement elicit that kind of reaction?), Nicholas Cage is attached to star in Disney's live-action adaptation of The Sorcerer's Apprentice. Luckily, he'll play the sorcerer, not an off-puttingly intense dancing broom. [THR]
With its baby-preparation facilities crippled by last week's kitchen explosion (quickly: do you remember exactly where you were when the Creative Artists Death Star nearly blew up?), nearby Century City eateries find themselves increasingly responsible for the feeding of swarms of hungry agents unwilling to gobble down their brown-bagged infants while sitting at their desks. The Knife looks at Century City bistro La Cachette, which has seen a healthy increase in business since CAA moved to the neighborhood:
While the industry held its collective breath in the immediate aftermath of yesterday's explosion at CAA's new Century City headquarters, waiting to see which Wilshire Boulevard rival would step forward to claim responsibility for a suicide bombing striking out at the evil agenting monolith's Hollywood hegemony, it exhaled in relief when it was revealed that blast was a maintenance mishap and no one was more seriously injured than they might be in a typical day's work at the agency. But with the momentary chaos produced by a gas-induced diaspora that temporarily flooded their neighborhood with Armani-clad refugees, tenants of nearby buildings needed some reassurance that everything was OK. Last night, that reassurance finally came in a memo from the company that manages CAA's building:
Reports are flooding in about a possible explosion within CAA that's resulted in a flood of Armani-clad refugees being evacuated to the sidewalks of Century City. A few accounts we've received:
While we've recently devoted considerable energy to speculating about the evil wonders contained within CAA's new Century City headquarters (our latest fantasy involves a Rube Goldbergian baby-delivering device that uses a series of pulleys, catapults, children's sandbox buckets, conveyor belts, trampolines, a three-floor domino-waterfall, and a ball-gobbling mini-golf clown's mouth to transfer fresh infants from the food-prep area to the partners' conference room table) and offering helpful suggestions about how rival agencies might bring down the Creative Artists Death Star before its doomsday particle cannon could be deployed to incinerate their competitors, turning their former Wilshire Boulevard neighborhood into a Guernica-esque tableau of massacred tenpercenters, we didn't had any firsthand reports of what the building is really like. Luckily, the Defamer Special Correspondent on Agency Architecture attended last night's open house, offering his thoughts on the CAA stronghold's design:
Today's WSJ chronicles how CAA has undertaken the daunting task of resuscitating the career of onetime actress and stay-at-home war bride Katie Holmes, whose last memorable role was that of "Glassy-Eyed Woman Clutching A Baby in the Window While Pondering a Series of Poorly Thought-Through Life Decisions" in the Bracciano production Tom N' Katie's Italian Wedding Spectacular, a much buzzed-about, but critically derided, foray into experimental theater. With Batman Returns follow-up The Dark Knight now officially out of the picture (both the Holmes camp and Warner Bros. seem to have their no-fault, "timing"-related story straight about why she won't be back to reprise her performance as Gotham City's most doe-eyed assistant D.A.), the agency is hoping that smaller, budget-conscious productions might throw their out-of-work client a lower-paid bone:
Because we know that your curiosity about the structures in which CAA's phalanx of Armani-clad stormtroopers plan their ongoing takeover of the industry knows no bounds, we direct your attention to today's piece in Slate about the disposition of the agency's recently abandoned, I.M. Pei-designed HQ now that all of its soul-acquiring operations have been shifted to the new Century City location, which ponders why the Evil Zen Temple That Michael Ovitz Built remains without a tenant:
In just a few minutes, those invited to the first installment of CAA's two-day open house for its new Century City stronghold will self-park their cars, submit to a brief body-cavity search checking for explosives supplied by rival tenpercenteries (Paradigm's suicide bombers are particularly sneaky, as they really have nothing to lose), and then commence their tour of the evil agenting monolith's state-of-the-art facilities, gaping in wonder at their gleaming new Soul Containment Unit or enjoying a freshly blended refreshment from the cafeteria's dedicated baby-smoothie bar. But first, according to a tipster, all underlings must be driven from the building and onto the abandoned streets of The CC:
A Defamer operative, perhaps a little miffed that the two-day open house that CAA is holding later this week to show off the Wonkaesque inner workings of their intimidating new Century City Evil Factory might not feature valet service, slipped us these meticulously rendered self-parking instructions for its guests. (They're better off without the valets, anyway—they'd just force some junior agents into red coats for the event, who'd just ransack visitors' SUVs in a fruitless search for any concealed, delicious babies, then swipe all the loose change from their ashtrays.) But by making available such a detailed schematic, the agency has inadvertently exposed crucial vulnerabilities in their otherwise impenetrable stronghold; as you can clearly see in the above diagram, conspicuous yellow stars denote weak points in the structure's perimeter defenses, which determined teams of rebel forces from rival agencies may be able to exploit while CAA is distracted with the intake of legitimate invitees, destroying the Creative Artists Death Star from within before its roof-mounted doomsday laser is fully operational.
Guests lists at industry parties are a tricky matter, and their convoluted politics become even more complex when one's throwing an exclusive post-awards show orgy, as hosts try to balance the ratio of talent to the behind-the-scenes types hoping to fellate them: invite too many famous faces and they might end up wandering the party looking vaguely lost, frustrated as seemingly every eager reveler is already engaged in the act of servicing someone else; invite too few, and guests will mob the talent, greedily clawing at the overattended VIPs for some celebrity-pampering time. Things become more tangled still when personal histories are involved, and the defiant uninvited show up, determined to test the superhuman power of fame over velvet rope and clipboard, as demonstrated by today's Page Six item about an alleged confrontation between Sean "Still Diddy This Month" Combs and the CAA gatekeepers trying to keep the boldface interloper out of their post-Globes party at the Sunset Tower:
· The second night of American Idol is only slightly less huge than the first, pulling in 36.9 million viewers between 8-10 p.m. This thing's ready to burn out any second now, we can feel it. [Variety]
· Actor Matt Dillon is assimilated by the CAA agent-Borg, voluntarily entering their blood-draining embrace after being dazzled by their shiny new Century City headquarters. [THR]
· CBS picks up the 15th and 16th editions of Survivor, which will both air in the 07-08 season. Publicity-attracting concepts for the planned installments haven't yet been announced, but insiders expect a new, human sacrifice element to be added to the tribal council segment during one of the upcoming cycles. [Variety]
· Kyra Sedgwick signs a new deal with TNT that will keep her on The Closer through its seventh season, grant her a producer title, and pay her a reported $250,000-300,000 per episode. For a basic cable show? Really? [THR]
· In news as surprising as American Idol's ratings, Apple sold a lot of iPods over the holidays, solidifying the music player as the leading gift for those who couldn't be bothered to think of something original to give their loved ones. [Variety]
