At last night's sold-out, tranny-filled Kathy Griffin stand-up show at Madison Square Garden, Kath slayed the audience with a brand-new act that leaned heavily on Scientology skewering material. You see, one of Kathy's best friends was a Sex and the City writer/producer named Judy Toll, who died in 2002 from complications of melanoma. Toll joined Scientology in an attempt to network with bigwigs in the entertainment industry, but then swiftly realized that she needed to get out as fast as she could. Only prob? Anyone seeking an exit sign from Tom Cruise's House of Horrors needs, according to Griffin, "a lawyer who specializes in getting people out of cults."

Kathy Griffin, comedienne and (paid) friend of the gays, has been re-banned from The View by old lady mumbles Barbara Walters. Griffin, who occasionally pokes some fun at Babs, was apparently too mean about the famous question-asker on her last comedy special. And yet Joy Behar's clunkers continue to go unpunished. [PageSix]

Comedienne, Radar honoree, and, most importantly, queer icon Kathy Griffin's Bravo reality show My Life On The D-List has been renewed for another season. This is pretty exciting for the many gays who adore her and her comedy, which is basically recapping several months worth of celebrity gossip blogs. (But in a funny conversational way!) Now they can enjoy even more of her odd orange glow from the comfort of their own plush, be-teeny-tiny-dogged apartments. [B&C]

Demigod to the Gays Kathy Griffin, having only just recovered from her triumphant CNN New Year's Eve coverage, already has her next gig lined up, and it's about 10,000 times more fabulous than the International Insurance Adjusters Convention gigs she usually has to take to keep up with mortgage payments on her Hollywood Hills compound. Our pals at Towleroad report that Griffin has been appointed official hostess of Air New Zealand's Pink Flight—a journey via Boeing 777 from San Francisco to Sydney for their Gay & Lesbian Mardi Gras celebration that's almost guaranteed to go down in flames. In a good way:

[Kathy Griffin arriving at the Adam Carolla Show, without make-up!, Jan 9; image via L.A. Rag Mag]

We honestly don't know who at CNN had the brass cojones to sign off on the pairing of Kathy Griffin and Anderson Cooper to host their 2008 countdown festivities, but if this seven-minute clip is any indication, we just may have witnessed the birth of a New Year's Eve tradition. Like a glass-closeted Dean Martin and fag-hag Jerry Lewis, Griffin & Cooper elevated the art of ball-drop-anticipatory comedic banter to new heights. (Kathy: "My balls are freezing." Anderson: "We have some eggnog in the truck." Kathy: "Well I've got to watch my figure— I'm not like you." Anderson: "Don't worry, I'm not watching your figure either." *Gay rimshot!*)

If you found yourselves camped in front of the TV last night watching Kathy Griffin's latest stand-up special, Straight to Hell, and wondering what it is about the comedian that sends her loyal, mostly gay audiences into hyperventilating fits of laughter over an act comprised of mostly warmed-over showbiz insider gossip, perhaps the above video will help:

As the writers strike creeps into double digits (we wish we had a photo of the WGA Ring Girl defiantly holding up a DAY 10 sign, but we suppose one of Kathy Griffin with a dick joke will do for now), here's today's morning round-up of news:

PrivacyWatch celebrity sightings are submitted by our readers, and are the greatest single contribution you will make in this lifetime, so send them in often! Submit yours to tips[AT]defamer.com (please put "sighting" or "PrivacyWatch" in the subject line so we don't lose them) and tell everyone about the time you saw Vanessa Minnillo dressed exactly as you'd imagine a Vanessa Minnillo might dress.

We have to admit that we're disappointed in Griffin's admission—we'd secretly hoped that we were witnessing a genuine conversion experience as the comedian publicly prostrated herself before that graven Creative Arts idol and flipped off the Messiah as a pledge of allegiance to her gilded new God, and not just a cynical attempt at seeing how many Tennesseean theater groups she could induce to bankrupt themselves by buying full-page USA Today ads decrying her blasphemy.

We're still (pretty unsuccessfully) trying to shake off our Emmys hangover—drinking was really the only way to make it through all three-plus hours of last night's telecast without going insane from boredom—but we're now lucid enough to tackle the "mystery" of that trio of perplexing cuts (compiled in the above clip) from Ray Romano, Katherine "If You Call Me Hi-Jel I Will Fucking Cut You" Heigl, and Sally Field to the giant, profanity-erasing Sphere of Censorship hanging in the rafters of the Shrine.

Believe it or not, Andy Samberg accepting an award for a song about putting his engorged junk in a box wasn't the most controversial break from the tedium of this year's Creative Arts Emmys—a typically staid ceremony one commenter in attendance referred to as "a mind-numbing four and a half hour below-the-line awards show." That honor would go to Kathy Griffin's acceptance speech, and the Savior-sucking sentiments therein:

Apple co-founder and three-time divorcee Steve "The Woz" Wozniak is reportedly dating Hollywood D-lister and comedienne Kathy Griffin. [Contactmusic.com]

Kathy Griffin is turning into Brian Eno. [parenthetical remarks]

We're amazed that TMZ's war-zone-quality Star Catcher cameraman has not previously come under gunfire in the course of documenting every B-lister who passes through the entrances and hidden egresses of the city's most dangerous Hollywood hotspots, as the lawless streets between Teddy's and Hyde are littered with the bodies of paparazzi who angered the wrong Glock-packing One Tree Hill star. But while staking out the Roosevelt Hotel last night, the TMZ crew found itself in the middle of a brief firefight between an unknown assailant rolling by in a car and the hotel's wall, an eruption of violence that left one civilian injured by ricocheting debris. Mercifully, exiting Teddy's VIP Kathy Griffin was left unscathed, but police are investigating "promising" leads suggesting that either the rival, Bravo-affiliated Hey Paula Locos or the Ex-Hubby Bloods might have been behind the shooting.

While fans of comedian Kathy Griffin may be disappointed to hear rumors that she was passed over in favor of Whoopi Goldberg for a regular slot on The View, they can still keep tabs on their favorite Spielberg Shit-List Topper on her Bravo reality show, My Life on the D-List—now in its third, gripping season of chronicling her every celebrity-alienating exploit. The juicy backstory that dominated the first two seasons—regular-guy husband Matt Moline allegedly swipes $72,000 from her, a betrayal that ends in divorce and a surfeit of new material for her act—is still very much a topic of conversation, with a weepy Griffin telling cameras in the season premiere, "I thought he was a nice guy who loved me. Now, I don't think he ever loved me." Moline responds on his blog:

Watchers of Kathy Griffin: My Life on the D-List know that the annoying comic's marriage to her ineffectual, alfalfa-male husband Matt Moline has been on the rocks for a while now. Griffin often mentions that the two are "working things out," which invariably gets a huge response from her adoring audiences, composed mostly of gay men who will laugh at anything if it's said loudly enough. According to an interview she recently gave to Larry King (which has yet to air), however, things aren't looking good:

· FishbowlLA reports that Reese Witherspoon has taken a moment's break from vigorously loofahing any residual Kirsten Dunst cells off her body to sign with Endeavor.
· Accorded to Us Weekly, it was Ryan Seacrest himself who got Kathy Griffin booted from E!. Add that to her growing shit list resume.
· Asked to comment on the "Seinfeld Curse," Julia Louis-Dreyfus provides a master class in how to respond to obnoxious entertainment reporter questions: "My short answer is I have no worries about that because I'm on a heavy dose of antibiotics right now."
· Before we get all carried away in the Sundance hoopla (bon voyage, Mark!), the LAT would like to remind us that many Sundance winners are still miserable, broke schmos like the rest of us.
· We've all heard the jokes. But Defamer slutty sister site Fleshbot delivers the goods. Ladies and gentlemen: Bareback Mountain, the gay porn.
· Ever wonder how tall you stood in relation to celebrities and famous historical figures? No? Well here's the link anyway. [via b3ta]
· "You are getting very sleepy, my subservient rabbit friend."

With the War of the Worlds publicity tour's instant transformation into the Tom, Katie, and L. Ron Roadshow, we quickly forgot that eerily precocious master thespian Dakota Fanning was even in the film. This morning, however, Page Six cites a W magazine interview in which former E! red carpet attack dog Kathy Griffin reveals that WoTW director Steven Spielberg threatened Griffin with inclusion on his official, career-devouring shit list if she refused to apologize for a joke she made on the Golden Globes carpet about the A-list moppet going to rehab. Griffin, realizing that she was in far greater danger of losing the opportunity to dust Spielberg's antiques than one to star in his movies, laughed off the strong-arm tactic: