Today's LAT looks at the New York Television Festival, a showcase of independent TV projects currently being circled by a predictably hit-hungry swarm of Hollywood vultures. But despite the obvious comparison to the entertainment industry's annual orgy at Robert Redford's resort, NBC's Kevin Reilly says that the fest's not exactly Sundance:
Will & Grace kicked off its final season last night by tap-dancing on that unexploded landmine of tired television stunts, the live show. Unfortunately, we didn't get to see it (our TiVo is set to deliver a paralyzing electric shock to our genitals if we mistakenly flip to NBC on Thursday night before The Donald comes on), but the AP reports that both live telecasts (one for each coast) went off without incident:
Tragically powerless to prevent her every thought from gushing forth in the presence of a tape recorder, Tara Reid, Hollywood's own Job in a clingy cocktail dress and stripper heels, falls to her knees, tears at her dark roots, and wails her discontent to the cruel Gods of Fame. Steppin' Out magazine hears Reid's existential meltdown (via Page Six, who quite mercifully ran this excerpt under the headline "Tubby Tara In Flip-Out Mode"):
· Riddle us this: Is there any part of Lindsay Lohan's body that hasn't been tagged by a B-list actor?
· After recent, turbulent periods of sexual experimentation and drug trafficking, the Teletubbies are finally ready for their own True Hollywood Story. Tinky Winky's definitely hit rock bottom.
· Just because some naked people have tattoos and piercings doesn't mean that they don't have regular naked people problems.
· The hilarious Amy Sedaris does make a fine talking penis.
· After this family's done with The Amazing Race, maybe they can sign up for The Simple Life.
· The You Don't Deserve A Night Of Music This Good Round-Up: The New Pornographers at the Henry Fonda; Supergrass does an in-store (free, yeah, you know it) at Amoeba; The Fiery Furnaces at the Troubadour; The Dilettantes at Spaceland.
· Writer/director David Cronenberg screens Fellini’s La Dolce Vita at the Skirball Center. For reasons completely unrelated to the movie, Cronenberg will demonstrate proper lovemaking technique with his wife. Hey, sometimes it's just nice to show off.
· David "No, Not That One, the OTHER Funny, Gay Essayist David" Rakoff reads from and signs his new book, Don’t Get Too Comfortable, at Book Soup.
It's time again for you to pull the cheap rubber mask off the head of Ted Casablanca's blind item villain and reveal his true identity. He would've gotten away with it if it weren't for you meddling kids! But first, reunite with One Fake-Ass Blind Vice:
No matter how many times an exasperated Jennifer Love Hewitt demonstrated how her character on The Ghost Whisperer adjusts the orientation of her breasts to tune in messages from the dead, Tyra Banks could not establish a reliable connection to the spirit world.
Not content to attempt the trashy fission of traditional nuclear families (both black and white), producers of The Simple Life are extending their offer of refreshingly progressive exploitation to same-sex partners looking for a quick payday and the opportunity to watch their love die in prime-time. A Defamer operative forwards us this (slightly edited) casting call e-mail:
We hate to be the last kid in the bounce castle, but we're getting so much e-mail about this re-cut trailer for The Shining, in which the paranoid horror classic becomes the jaunty family comedy Shining, that we're obligated to be the umpteenth blog to pass along the link. The moment when "Solsbury Hill" kicks is so inspired that we feel like getting up from the computer and finding a family to murder (cheerily!) with an ax.
Hollywood PrivacyWatch celebrity sightings are sent in and authored by our eagle-eyed readers; send yours to tips[AT]defamer.com (please put "sighting" or "PrivacyWatch" in the subject line. lest your gawky blurbs be lost ) and let the world know about your awkward encounter with Blossom.
· Sony Pictures Classics unofficially begins the Oscar season by sending out screeners of Junebug five months before the awards ceremony, ensuring that their little film will be forgotten long before any ballots are mailed. Meanwhile, no one seems to want to use Cinea's magic antipiracy DVD players. [Variety]
· NBC wins a bidding war with ABC over Victor Fresco's high-concept sitcom "centering on a twentysomething average Joe whose world is turned upside down when he realizes that his life is being driven by supernatural forces representing good and evil." Sounds considerably more interesting than Life on a Stick, Fresco's last show, which was high-concept only in that it seemed designed to invite immediate cancellation. But a new, lucrative deal always takes the sting out of a quick hook, doesn't it? [THR]
· Renee Zellweger, taking a break from the exhausting work of entering into and quickly annulling marriages with gay-seeming country music stars, is in talks to crinkle up her face in Miss Potter, the story of writer Beatrix Potter. [Variety]
· Fox and NBC get nutty with early series pick-ups, ordering more episodes of Prison Break, American Dad, and The Office. [THR]
· HBO gives a script commitment to the Owen "The Butterscotch Stallion" Wilson, Larry Charles, and Rick Rubin (Rick Rubin? Wha?) comedy project Bert & Dickie, about an "odd-couple standup comedy team that can't ever manage to come out on top — personally or professionally." Nice to see The Stallion finally conquer the small screen, even if he's just writing. [Variety]
· Kate Winslet is in final negotiations to give Cameron Diaz some much-needed acting lessons. [THR]
Wherein we invite our readers to spend some quality time in the bamboo tiger cage of humpy E! banana republic gossip dictator Ted Casablanca, and in the interminable minutes between the force-feedings of fire ants, ponder the identity of his weekly blind item. This week's subject? We'll give you two guesses, and the first one about how much actresses love the narcotic effects of cocaine doesn't count. Cram into the closet with One Fake-Ass Blind Vice:
· Paul Walker, unwittingly predicting what critics will be doing once Into the Blue premieres on Friday, begs his friends to urinate on him. Golden shower anecdotes are so C-list.
· The Fug Girls have invaded the Wall Street Journal...but where are your woodcuts, you hilarious bitches?
· To commemorate Anna Nicole upcoming, historic Supreme Court case, the WOW Report digs out some old footage of Smith's white trash cousin vomiting. Good times, y'all.
· Cinemocracy discovers that there is virtually no way to review Commander in Chief without invoking The West Wing.
· Lara Flynn Boyle, unexpected truth-teller: "It's not a craft, we're not slicing DNA. It's a great gig. We're all a bunch of beautiful, self-indulgent people."
· ALOUD presents a screening and discussion of Art and Life: Finding the Thread: L.A. Diary with Peter Sellars with the film's director, Marina Goldovskaya, at the Central Library’s Mark Taper Auditorium.
· AFI's never met a list it didn't like, and tonight screens Psycho (incidentally, the movie that made us afraid of showering, a fear that goes hand-in-hand with blogging) for its "100 Years...100 Heroes and Villains" presentation at the ArcLight.
· Your live Hump Night soundtrack: Dungen at the El Rey; Portastatic at Spaceland; for those not terrified of astronomical gas prices, Billy Idol at the Ventura Theater. (Why does he look so angry with his fist? Arthritis?)
A reader recounts a tense moment yesterday at the world-famous Mickey Fine pharmacy in Beverly Hills (motto: "Sedating Hollywood's Biggest Stars Since 1928"), when a frazzled assistant was confronted with the possibility that his employer's drug-store needs might go unfulfilled:
