celebrities

The Case Against Raffaello Follieri

Hamilton Nolan · 06/24/08 11:31AM

The Smoking Gun has the entire criminal complaint against Anne Hathaway's ex-boyfriend Raffaello Follieri, the hustling con artist charged with fraud and money laundering earlier today. Much of the information came out in previous stories and investigations, but it's still pretty stunning to see the extent of the guy's fraud laid out all at once. Payoffs, luxury, deception, and a crooked reporter—all in there. And you can understand why Hathaway stayed with him so long; if your boyfriend had an unlimited pot of (other people's) money to fly you around the world with, you'd like him too:

"Our descendants may look at us and say, 'God, these were the most gullible people who ever lived.'"

Hamilton Nolan · 06/23/08 08:37AM

Celebrities: they're in ads! That's because celebrities tend to sell stuff to people, according to the New York Times, which broke this story wide open with an epic piece in yesterday's paper. There are three clear points that you, the educated consumer, must understand: Companies are run by starry-eyed celebrity hound white guys who will pay any price to hang out with a cool rapper or have their umbrella endorsed by Rihanna; many celebrities are themselves sheep, convinced that their endorsement deal is a meaningful attempt by a corporation to plumb the depths of their soul (it's really not! surprisingly); and finally, all of this is the fault of dirty gossip websites just like this one!

A Superflack Scorned

Hamilton Nolan · 06/20/08 03:22PM

Earlier this week we gave you a brief history of Rob Shuter, the shameless former celebrity flack whose various transgressions have reduced him to editing OK! Magazine. That post brought back some memories for Michael Lucas, famous gay porn performer and impresario (pictured, on the left). According to Lucas, he once snubbed Shuter's request for love, which sparked a neverending campaign by the uberflack to exact his revenge! Worst of all, Lucas says, Shuter even used poor supermodel Naomi Campbell for his own nefarious ends. Lucas' full, telling letter is below.

Martha Stewart Barred From UK; English Cutesy Merchants May Suffer

Hamilton Nolan · 06/20/08 08:25AM

The UK does not want Martha Stewart no matter how many lines of crockery she's designed for Wedgwood! The UK Border Agency has barred the felonious lifestyle queen from entering the country, presumably because of her criminal ways here in America. It's admirable consistency for the agency-famous star criminals must be kept out along with the common scum. But it may turn out to be a crippling blow for England's Toad-in-the-hole industry:

Girl-On-Girl Magazine Covers: Shameless, Popular As Ever

Hamilton Nolan · 06/19/08 04:34PM

The new issue of W is a fine example of a shameless girl-on-girl magazine cover: to this day, one of the surest ways to guarantee sales on the news stand, regardless how vapid the interior editorial content may be. Whether you loathe it (exploitation!) or love it (exploitation is hot!), it's a design trope almost as common as the between-the-legs A-frame photo. Below, five more famous examples from the recent past. The only way to fight the enemy is to know the enemy.

Kanye West Angers Hippies

Hamilton Nolan · 06/18/08 04:41PM

Kanye West was scheduled to play at the hippie-infested Bonnaroo music festival in Tennessee last weekend at 8:15 p.m. Then he pushed it back to 2:45 a.m. to better take advantage of his fresh-ass neon stage set. Then he didn't show up until 4:30 a.m. This angered the assembled hippies, who took to booing, scrawling anti-Kanye graffiti, and waving signs protesting his insensitivity for hippie time management. One, he's a jerk. Two, why would anyone stay up all night waiting to see a Kanye West show? Three, every hip hop show starts two hours late. Get used to it, hippies. [via Animal NY]

The Creepy Brit Who's Destroying The Honorable Craft Of Celebrity Journalism

Hamilton Nolan · 06/18/08 10:31AM

OK! is the celebrity magazine that is the most willingly manipulated by celebrity flacks, which is really saying something. So it's perfectly appropriate that the magazine just promoted sleazy former celebrity uberflack Rob Shuter to its executive editor position. That's because Shuter is skilled at doing the two things that OK! is most famous for: lying on behalf of celebrities, and losing other people's money. Even he, the great fabulist, couldn't write a more sickening script than this.

Stealing Celebrity Images For Fun And Profit

Hamilton Nolan · 06/17/08 02:45PM

Street art, culture jamming, anti-corporate activism, celebrity loathing, celebrity worship-it's all mixed up into a vast cultural stew these days, making the individual messages of many artists hard to parse. When in doubt just assume the message is, "I'm trying to get famous." British artist James Cauty has taken a pop art style, combined it with an advertising-remix motif, and sprinkled in a little blatant fame whoring to cap it all off. He's just commandeering billboards with pieces about celebrities saying how much they love him, and you have to admit that really crystallizes pop culture circa 2008. Plenty of people with day jobs in advertising dream about having the balls to do this (illegally). Pictured, Cauty's image and billboard theft starring Kate Moss; below, another one with celebrity chef Nigella Lawson.

A Brief Field Guide To Raffaello Follieri, Dumped Swindler

Hamilton Nolan · 06/17/08 12:00PM

Just last week we asked when button-cute actress Anne Hathaway would break up with her troublesome, scandal-plagued boyfriend of four years, Raffaello Follieri. She's reportedly "devastated," about it but hey, about time. He was a pretty sleazy character. After the jump, a field guide to the dumped Italian playboy:

Beyond The Velvet Rope: Just Another Crappy Bar

Hamilton Nolan · 06/16/08 02:43PM

Whenever you think you've truly gained access to an exclusive club of some sort-particularly in New York-think again, fool. There is always another inner sanctum far too exclusive to admit the likes of you. That was a great piece of wisdom passed down by Graydon Carter long ago, and confirmed in former Gawker-er Josh Stein's new article in Page Six Magazine, which takes a peek "Beyond the Velvet Rope" at the hottest spots in the hottest city where the hottest people go. And you want to know the even bigger secret? The most exclusive places in the city are just as boring as everywhere else you've ever been:

Is Celebrity Gossip Really Dead This Time?

Michael Weiss · 06/16/08 02:09PM

According to one editor of a celebrity weekly, it's the "last trip to the buffet table," as Britney Spears' gurney-bound trip to the hospital signaled the end of dish. If that seems a bit ominous, it may be because there is a discernible lull in glossy-packaged brain candy. "There's nothing going on in celebrity land. There's no news, no gossip, no scandal," whined a TV producer to Liz Smith a few months back. "The Oscars showed how dull things are. People are only interested in politics." It's true. Reliable pop tarts no longer yield Google results like they once did (at left, Paris Hilton's trend chart, which shows a baseline traffic drop of about two-thirds). Here are a handful of theories about what's happened:

'Snowman' Rapper Unsurprisingly Implicated In Cocaine Ring

Hamilton Nolan · 06/13/08 03:35PM

Might as well go for a music star crime news two-fer this afternoon: Atlanta rap star Young Jeezy has been implicated in a major cocaine-dealing trial. A witness testifying in a case against members of Black Mafia Family—a massive Atlanta drug gang that moved hundreds of millions of dollars' worth of coke across the country—said that Jeezy bought several kilos of coke from BMF. Well, duh. Jeezy's nickname is "Snowman":

R. Kelly Acquitted: Jury Says It Wasn't Him In Sex Video

Hamilton Nolan · 06/13/08 02:39PM

R&B singer R. Kelly has been acquitted of everything. Specifically, the 14 counts of child pornography that he's been on trial for in Chicago for the last month, stemming from a video allegedly showing him having sex with a 13-year-old girl. The jury repeatedly viewed the video during their deliberations, and have now let him walk. Everybody else in the world thought he was guilty. The entire case may have hinged on a single mole:

Russian Billionaires Are Buying All The Pop Stars

Hamilton Nolan · 06/13/08 12:39PM

Russian billionaires: they're powerful, they're flush with profits from semi-monopolized industrial concerns, and they're ready to party. So they think nothing of paying outrageous sums to international pop stars to come play private parties for them and their closest friends. The most recent example is poor drug-addled soul singer Amy Winehouse, who will be pocketing a cool $2 million to play a show for the girlfriend of billionaire politician and businessman Roman Abramovich. All $2 million of which will surely be spent to further Winehouse's ongoing demise. The point is, she's not the only superstar who's been seduced by a gig like this. Soon you won't be able to see anyone from Madonna to Rihanna without a plane ticket to Moscow and tight connections to the vestiges of the Kremlin's power structure. It's a trend!

Diamonds: Nice And Cheap, Or Big And Evil?

Hamilton Nolan · 06/13/08 10:23AM

Hip hop mogul Russell Simmons reportedly had a suitcase full of his jewelry stolen from a downtown apartment yesterday. Considering the fact that the case contained "three diamond rings, a pendant, three sets of earrings and two bracelets," from Simmons' own jewelry company, the reported total value—$15,000—is pretty meager. That's partly because Simmons is involved a much-derided effort to improve the reputation of the diamond industry, which somehow trickles down to his own company in the form of cheap jewelry that gives a cut of its (relatively small) profits to charity. Which is better: Charitable, uglier, cheaper jewelry, or much shinier jewelry that embraces nothing but out-and-out materialism? These questions are important to moguls. To help you decide, there's a collection after the jump; Simmons' company's jewelry versus some pieces from Jacob the Jeweler—hip hop's gaudiest diamond guy. Each is terrible in its own way:

Tom Cruise Will Pay To Be On Your Blog

Hamilton Nolan · 06/12/08 02:30PM

It's not like Tom Cruise can just sit back relaxing, sipping secret anti-aging formula and reading L. Ron Hubbard books and waiting for the world to stumble onto his awesome new website. So he's out there working with Google AdSense to direct your attention to his important site, chock-full of Tom Cruise-approved Tom Cruise information! Click to enlarge this screengrab of the wacky star's internet marketing plan in action.

Wendy Williams Still Making Everybody Mad

Hamilton Nolan · 06/12/08 12:08PM

You can look at Wendy Williams, the loud queen of hip hop talk radio, in two ways: she is popular, in the sense that her show is still one of the biggest things on the radio dial; but she's also not popular, in the sense that her crazy husband runs around her studio hiring hitmen, sexually harassing the female employees, and generally acting like a gangster, according to a new lawsuit from a traumatized publicist. Williams denies it all, including the claim that her husband slammed her up against the wall because she failed to stop smoking. But one thing she can't deny: she is mean. In 2006 she told everybody on air about how Wu-Tang rapper Method Man's wife had cancer—which was private. Method Man responded with one of the most sincere anti-gossip rants in recent history:

The Future Of The Music Industry Is 15 Pop Bands

Hamilton Nolan · 06/12/08 11:00AM

Because the music industry is an even worse place to invest your money than the newspaper industry at the moment, everyone is looking for the next big thing. The closest they've come is "360 deals," where artists get a huge check in return for a big cut of all their different revenue streams. First, Madonna signed a contract like this with Live Nation for $120 million. Then Jay-Z signed a contract with Live Nation for $150 million. Live Nation wants to sign 15 more artists to contracts like this. Then everybody else in music can quietly retire. Hope you like the Jonas Brothers a lot!

Mike Sitrick, Ninja Master Of The Dark Art Of Spin

Hamilton Nolan · 06/09/08 01:13PM

A lawyer named Jeremy Pitcock got fired last year, and his firm put a fine point on his dismissal: they issued a press release attributing his firing to "extremely inappropriate personal conduct." That's, uh, not considered a good thing to have on your resume in the legal world. Turns out that the law firm crafted the release with the help of Sitrick & Co., the super high-powered PR firm run by shadowy, high-priced crisis guru Mike Sitrick. Now Pitcock is suing Sitrick and his old firm for $90 million, charging them with ruining his reputation over what he says was simply a misguided and consensual kiss after a drunken night at a bar. The bigger question is, doesn't Sitrick have more important things to do than get embroiled in a petty sexual harassment dismissal? Answer: not really!