A Little of the Old In and Out



(image via Davduf.net)

In: This Newscorp Moment. Jesus Christ Newscorp is fuckingmonster huge. How huge? Twentieth Century Fox's Star Wars 3 is set to make $200 million in box office after only one week, and that's not including Memorial Day. Rumor has it the televisions in The West Wing are all set to Fox News. The Sun's (And the NYPost's) Saddam-in-his-knickers pictures were the staple of Chattering Class cocktail party conversation last week. And, according to Variety (link via Iwantmedia), Rupert Murdoch "was paid $17 million in 2004, up about 42% from the previous year. Son Lachlan also got a raise."

They deserve it, quite frankly, whether you are a fan or not, based purely on the numbers. First, Fox is number one, beating even Les Moonves' CBS in the key demographic. Now, last night, American Idol actually beat Lost, which to The Corsair, who is the biggest Lost fan in the world, is inconceivable. Inconceivable!

The Corsair bets that even Matt Drudgie Poo is smacking himself with his cheap fedora for having torched all of his bridges under the Ailes regime at Fox News. According to Drudge:

"'IDOL' FINALE 19.0 RATING/27 SHARE [ABC 'LOST' 13.6/20]... 'IDOL' 32 SHARE MAX NYC, 26 L.A., 29 CHICAGO, 30 PHILLY, 33 SAN FRAN... DEVELOPING..."

Finally, the Fox Reality Channel will air via DirectTV.

Out: Nicky Hilton. Being the smarter half of the Hilton sisters duo is ... still operating under a vast intellectual deficit. This interview with Fashionweekdaily at last night's Entourage party makes clear that being the smart Hilton is still a state of being that's unusually dim:

"Nicky Hilton, was in a sparkly black Calvin Klein dress. She proudly announced that she always has an entourage with her. 'They're all my friends though. They're not like, handlers or anything,' she clarified. 'But in Japan I have a huge entourage, bigger than Puffy's entourage. Japanese publicists, my handbag people, my sister. I can�?t understand them, because I don't speak Japanese.'"

But her sister, apparently, enjoys "speaking Japanese."

"'(Nicky) Hilton told us that she is opening a store on Madison Avenue, with Samantha Thavasa, the company that produces her handbags. She also said she is wary of psychics. 'I feel like they're going to tell me scary things, so I don't go to them,' she explained with a shiver."

The Hilton's being allergic to knowledge of ny species.

In: The event Formerly Called Live Aid II. Although we are not supposed to call it Live Aid II, we shall, at least until Sir Bob Geldof comes up with something with more sassy. Apparently even the Spice Girls are reforming for the event, though we are not quite sure what effect that will have on war torn Darfur.

Out: The Bolton Mess. Outstrategized by former Naval captain Senator John McCain, Majority Leader Darth Frist quixoticaltrackedt-traked Senate Confirmation on the Bolton nomination for UN Ambassador. The goodwill between Democrats and Republicans over the dismantling of the nuclear option promptly evaporated. According to TheHill:

"Senate Democrats are holding up John Bolton�?s nomination as U.S. ambassador to the United Nations to protest the Bush administration�?s refusal to answer their demands for sensitive information, threatening to erode the spirit of bipartisanship that has suffused the upper chamber in the wake of an agreement on judicial nominees.

"Democrats said as recently as Tuesday that they would not object to an up-or-down vote on Bolton�?s nomination. But the administration�?s continuing refusal to provide information related to congressional testimony Bolton intended to deliver on Syria and to his handling of intelligence intercepts, Democrats say, is the reason for their current stance.

"The administration has declined to share the information for six weeks, Democrats say."

Update: Something called The Salt Lake Tribune is oddly predicting John Bolton will be confirmed today. Fat chance.



Above: Haskell and Mark Wexler in "Tell Them Who You Are"

In: Tell Them Who You Are. Imagine a famous, perfectionistic cinematographer as a father. Now, imagine the son of said perfectionist becoming a cinematographer, aoutshininger outsining his famous father. Got it? In an interesting turn, the son has made a documentary of the history of this competition with his father. The Corsair hasn't seen the meta-documentary "Tell Them Who You Are," but this review in Indiewire makes a strong case for us all to check it out:

"Mark Wexler has made one of the most bizarrely entertaining, yet frustrating, documentaries of the year. The subject is his 82-year-old dad, Haskell Wexler, who besides directing 'Medium Cool,' was the cinematographer for Elia Kazan's 'America, America,' Mike Nichol's 'Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?,' Milos Forman's 'One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest,' and John Sayle's 'The Secret of Roan Inish' among many others.

"According to those in the field, Haskell the Senior is brilliant but contentious. Innovative but ball busting. Hire him as a cinematographer, and you get a man who really wants to direct your film.

"Well, Wexler the Junior interviews the folks who worked with his dad plus his compatriots including Peter Bart, Verna Bloom, Michael Douglas, Julia Roberts, George Lucas, and Albert Maysles, but instead of concentrating on a great cinematographer's craft, the documentary is about what a bad daddy Haskell was throughout the decades.

"Yes, this is a deliciously self-indulgent, at times witty, often moving 95-minute whine by a son who's damnedesthis damndest to get out from under his father's shadow, but who winds up instead getting over-shadowed once again."

We're so there.



Above: Pete Doherty at the Ivor Novello awards, rocking the "magic-marker-scribbles-on-the-face" look.

Out: Pete Doherty. Does an Ex-junkie in a C-List band make for a "good catch"? Troubled supermodel Kate Moss allegedly thinks so. But according to ThisisLondon:

"The Babyshambles and former Libertines front man made a typically shambolic arrival at the awards, wearing a straw hat and with black marker pen scrawled over his face.

"He told of his fears that he is being kept under 24-hour surveillance.'I found a bug, a hidden camera, in my house,' he claimed. 'I don't want to talk about, it's being investigated.'

"Doherty - who claims he has been free of heroin for the past three months after having an implant fitted - added: 'I'm a bit paranoid.'"

"He turned up alone because Moss is working today. 'I'm bang in love with Kate,' he said. 'She's the one for me.'"



In: Giselle Bundchen. Granted, it is, of course, cliche to say, "Giselle Bundchen is yummy," QED. That having been said, the new photos of her in Hello!Magazine are truly fetching. Even for Giselle Bundchen, who never takes a bad photo, this is some hott stuff. Leonardo DiCaprio is clearly one lucky goddam bastard. C'est tout.



(image via CindyandJazzy)

Out: Cindy Adams, Travel Whore. You thought the fetid, rotting corpse of her lapdog, Jazzy, would be enough to stifle Cindy Adams. But you would be wrong. Omigod, Cindy Adams is at it again, whoring -- at her age, for shame! -- for the travel industries of the latest dubious dictatorship in need of her "services." Even a 'ho's gotta eat, eh sister? On rickety knees and with trembling hands, Adams clutches at the phallus of the latest semi-tyranny du jour, tucking in with great gusto. In for a penny, in for a pound.

This time, destination: Peru, last time it was some louche Dubai hotel. God, Cindy's such an enthusiastic "trick."

Cindy Adams' acts of journalistic prostitution here veer between merely spitting out line-by-line the motherjazz distributed by Peru's tourism flacks, and her "original" contibution to the procedings, namely -- a Catskills sense of bravado, circa 1958 (Averted Gaze); here, have a taste of vintage Cindy:

"Mansions along the broad boulevards date to the colonial period when servants weren't just something employed by Prince Charles to squeeze his toothpaste.

"Now a guide tells you: 'We have either poor people or very rich. Our politicians, they are very rich.' However, unlike in our country, the lawyers, they are very poor. They're driving cabs. For some reason, there's no business like sue business in downtown Peru.'"

The Corsair gives Cindy Adams, picklehead, the gassface ...