Multiple sources within 4 Times Square report that Kim France, the editor-in-chief of Lucky, the Conde Nast shopping magazine, just triumphantly announced that Hearst is closing Shop Etc., the rival mag company's rival shopping magazine. "She's ecstatic," says one tipster.
It's no secret they were coming, and now, apparently, they're here. This email just in from the Time & Life Building:
From The Hollywood Reporter just moments ago:
When news broke in the Times last week that the Second Avenue Deli was shuttered, at least temporarily and perhaps more permanently, in a rent dispute, it seemed partially tragic but also partially perhaps just a particularly intense game of real-estate chicken between the hondlers who own the deli and the hondlers who own the building. The latter option seemed increasingly likely when the second-day story revealed that the rent increase sought by the building's new owners was in fact built into the existing lease, negotiated 15 years ago.
'Member back to September 2004? When Martha Stewart decided she wanted to go to prison right away, rather than waiting to see how an appeal would go? When she said she just wanted "to put this nightmare behind me," though of course she was sure she'd be vindicated on appeal?
It's the most beautiful NYTimes.com headline we've ever seen.
We take no pleasure at all in reporting this: Radar magazine has folded. The staff was informed at a meeting just moments ago. It was an interesting and increasingly excellent magazine; it was a game and noble foil; and it was a well-paying gig for any number of friends. RIP, Radar, and our deepest condolences to Maer and his prodigiously talented staff.
Us Weekly — which lately has been on a scoopy roll when it comes faltering celebrity love — breaks some truly sad news this afternoon: Nicole Richie has broken up with her fianc , Adam "D.J. AM" Goldstein.
To the great surprise of no one, Daily News editor-in-chief Michael Cooke, who arrived at the tab less than a year ago from the Chicago Sun-Times, is returning whence he came.
This just in:
And, lo, it is written:
Something — don't know what, or when, or why — just blew up on the 59th Street Bridge. A publicist pal sends along this photo, shot at about 1:15 p.m.:
All over Manhattan, celebrity weekly editors are losing their shit: Us Weekly wins the Federletus Cup, reporting that Britney Spears gave birth at 12:15 today to a healthy baby boy. Sadly, the pop star and her houseboy husband have not decided to name the child Federletus, but are reportedly leaning towards dubbing the seedling Preston Michael Spears Federline. Because names like Preston help to gloss over the hard reality of a baby born wearing a wifebeater.
OMGOMGOMGOMG — could it be true?! Right now, in a cheetos-filled room at Cedars-Sinai, the Federletus is quite possibly rearing its ghetto head from a hastily-carved opening in Britney Spears' womb. We'll keep you updated as soon as we know more, but right now we have to go retrieve hubby Kevin Federline from Starbucks before he misses this beautiful moment.
• New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin on local radio: "After 9/11 we gave the president unprecedented powers to take care of New York and those other places.... You mean to tell me that a place where thousands of people and thousands more people are dying, we can't figure out [how to get them help]?" We'd be pissed he's appropriating our disaster, but the thing is: The dude's completely right.
The latest on Condoleezza Rice's Manhattan vacation, courtesy of a reader:
According to Drudge, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has recently enjoyed a little Broadway entertainment. And Page Six reports that she's also working on her backhand with Monica Seles. So the Gulf Coast has gone all Mad Max, women are being raped in the Superdome, and Rice is enjoying a brief vacation in New York. We wish we were surprised.
