On this morning's Yo on E! show, DJs Graham Funke and Stone Rokk, frequent masters of record-spinning ceremonies at celebrity-infested local establishments like Area and Les Deux, are induced into talking some smack about the famous clientele to whom the clubs' buzz-craving owners slavishly cater in hopes of keeping their venues from falling out of favor with Hollywood's incredibly fickle starfucking crowd.
Though reports had been circulating about a mysterious FBI raid of the heavily fortified Las Vegas warehouse where celebrity necromancer David Copperfield houses the contract with Satan documenting the exchange of his mortal soul for the infernal magickal powers he regularly displays in network television specials, the purpose of the probe had remained unclear. But now Fox News is reporting that the investigation is connected to a rape claim made against Copperfield by a Seattle woman:
While trying to capture an image of Britney Spears following an apparent lip-collagen injection so over-the-top that it could make an aging Beverly Hills trophy wife faint dead away in horror, one of TMZ's fearless photographers bravely sacrificed a pristine tube sock in the commission of his noble duty.
· No, it's not Martha Stewart sharing the story of a friend who went "into the wild" and never returned. Nor is it Joey Pants discussing suicide and clinical depression. But the above clip of The View co-host Sherri Shepherd (who, we're discovering, may have something of an anal/genital fixation) and Martha snip-snipping away at parallel Halloween costume while saying the word "crotch" with alarming frequency makes us uncomfortable in a new and exciting way. Are we getting a little weirdly obsessed with this show and Stewart's uncanny recent ability to produce moments that give us the willies? Maybe so. But? Crotch. Crotchcrotchcrotch.
· Good news: Jon Stewart's signed on for another two more years of Daily Show duty.
· For those who feel the Teri Hatcher mask might be too creative a Halloween choice, here are some safer, less imaginative costume alternatives.
· Now Ashton Kutcher knows why he's had unexpected sexual feelings while watching The Osbournes.
· Someone should probably tell the people trying to drop pounds as quickly as The Biggest Loser contestants that all the weight loss on the show is done with CGI and creative editing.
Thanks to Defamer commenter el smrtmnky for pointing out that the Michael Jackson Halloween mask we linked to this morning bears an uncanny resemblance to Teri Hatcher. It's a fortunate bit of happenstance for the manufacturer, who can now double their profits by re-releasing the item as part of their Stars of Desperate Housewives Do Their Own Makeup collection, which could also include the slightly pricier Nicollette Sheridan/Gollum model.
· Music round-up: Say Hi To Your Mom at the Troubadour; The Parson Red Heads at Spaceland; Electric Six and Gore Gore Girls at the Key Club.
· Screenwriter Blake Snyder signs his new instructional book Save the Cat! Goes to the Movies: The Screenwriter's Guide to Every Story Ever Told at the Writers Store, where you can pick up tips on writing the screenplay you won't be able to sell until after the strike drama is resolved.
· UCLA's Freud Playhouse hosts the West Coast premiere of Erik Sanko's Fortune Teller, a twisted puppet show about the Seven Deadly Sins visiting the estate of a deceased millionaire, and featuring a score by Sanko and Danny Elfman. [via Flavorpill]
In this post-Jericho era, any network executive or TV producer who's just signed off on a potentially unpopular change now expects to spend their next day at the office buried underneath an avalanche of foodstuffs delivered by protesting viewers who now believe that even the most stubborn of minds can be changed with a metric ton of peanuts. Discussing the announcement of Jorja Fox's (officially voluntary) departure from CSI with TVGuide.com, executive producer Carol Mendelsohn marvels at how disappointed fans have escalated things since the now quaint-seeming NUTS to CBS! campaign:
Keeping true to her word that she wouldn't speak out again on the Iggy matter (a 48 Hours-style summation above courtesy of Access Hollywood) until the rescue was returned to what she deemed to be its rightful owners, Ellen DeGeneres opted to cancel today's taping entirely—a vivid indication of just how distraught she is over this national rat-dog tragedy.
We had no idea that former presidential candidate John Kerry offers a movie recommendation service, but a subscriber who's already ponying up the $9.95 monthly fee to receive the Senator's film picks has let us know that he's somewhat predictably followed previous selections of blockbuster eco-thrillers An Inconvenient Truth and the Eleventh Hour with another politically minded feature, the Paul Haggis Iraq war drama In The Valley of Elah. (Would it have killed him to go with Michael Clayton? Clooney could really use the help.) After the jump, the e-mail describing how the writer/director grabbed Kerry's heartstrings with his Oscar-winning heavy hands from the opening scene and wouldn't let go until the final credits stopped rolling:
Last surviving Rat Packer Joey Bishop, and Deborah Kerr, From Here to Eternity's sand-resistant love interest, have both passed on, at ages 89 and 86 respectively. We'd roll out our Rule of Threes shtick, but Teresa Brewer, a 1950s singer we've never heard of, has died too, meaning Mickey Rooney, Andy Dick, and the rest of the death pool favorites can sleep a little easier tonight. [sun-herald.com]
· Finding The View to be an unacceptably highbrow discussion of topics of concern to the modern woman with the free time to watch TV during the day, Debi Mazar, Aida Turturro, and Karen Duffy are shopping around a "New Jersey take" on the format. [THR]
· As fleetingly exciting as it was when the studios dropped that residual-rollback proposal they never would have followed through on, the threat of a strike remains "high." Keep stockpiling those canned goods, everyone! [Variety]
· The CW's Online Nation earns the distinction of being the first new Fall show to be canceled. Somewhere, a trio of underachieving, modern-day Neanderthals breathe a sigh of relief that they've survived the initial round of network executions. [THR]
Who could ever forget the final scene of Ang Lee's tragic Brokeback Mountain, in which Heath Ledger's Ennis Del Mar [spoiler alert if you've been meaning to Netflix it!] clutches a shirt belonging to the gay-sheepboy love of his life, as if touching him for the very last time? As shattering as that moment was, however, something called for a coda—perhaps just a brief shot of a smiling Ennis, finally at peace serving daiquiris to vacationing tourists at the Key West bed n' breakfast he opened after Jack Twist's death. We may not have to rely on our imaginations for that kind of closure, however, as OK! Magazine reports that a Brokeback sequel is on the way:
Considering your Leatherface costume ceased to be scary about eleven Halloweens ago, isn't it time to upgrade to something a little more terrifying? This Michael Jackson mask, unearthed by our friends at Boing Boing, should do the trick, inducing convincing screams from the neighborhood kids as the Kid Nation Koresh grabs his crotch in the doorway and shrieks, "HEEE-hee!," then proceeds to use the same palm to dole out handfuls of bulk Reese's Pieces. A word to the wise, however: inviting just the boy trick-or-treaters inside for an apple-bobbing contest, while true to character, might end up getting you arrested.
Perhaps realizing that airing the footage of Kid Nation's controversial field-trip reward we previewed yesterday might again open up the show to the child-endangerment accusations it has largely left behind since its premiere, the network ultimately decided to edit all Michael Jackson-related moments from last night's episode, even though the "unexpected loss of innocence at the bleached hands of a ghoulish former pop-star" clause in the production's exhaustive waiver technically indemnified them from any legal claims stemming from the children's Neverland Ranch sleepover.
Apparently failing once again to comply with the easy-to-follow custody guidelines the court helpfully laid out for her earlier this month, Britney Spears has had her visitation rights temporarily suspended. Additionally, Los Angeles Superior Court Commissioner Scott M. Gordon has decreed that Spears won't be able to see her children until she figures out why, "I dunno, I'll give one of the little brats to my hairdresser?" isn't an acceptable answer to the question of how she might resolve a conflict between Sean Preston and her other, still-unnamed offspring, a learning process that might take several session with a court-appointed parenting coach to complete. [CBS2.com]
In learning to live without the little narcotic helpers that had landed her in rehab an impressive three times before her 22nd birthday during her prolonged stay at Cirque Lodge, Lindsay Lohan was encouraged to seek out different, potentially less self-destructive ways to temporarily blunt the pain and alienation that comes with worldwide celebrity. According to the ex-fiancee of the fellow addict with whom Lohan most closely bonded at the facility, the troubled actress made great strides in her recovery by availing herself of Cirque's innovative Fucking in Stairwells Therapy:
