Media-Whore D'Oevres



"Matt Blank couldn't help himself. The CEO of Showtime Networks recently hosted a private screening of ‘Secret Diaries of a Call Girl.’ The series, which debuts on the cable channel on June 16, is about a high-priced prostitute - played by Billie Piper - who takes viewers behind the scenes of her profession. She even shares tips on how she pleases her well-heeled clients.Blank had to make a joke at the expense of his longtime rival, former HBO CEO Chris Albrecht, who resigned last April after he was arrested for allegedly roughing up his girlfriend in a Las Vegas parking lot. ‘I know it sounds like the secret diary of Chris Albrecht,’ said Showtime's CEO. ‘But it isn't!’Everybody at the screening at a private club in Manhattan laughed - including Albrecht. He was sitting right there with his coterie of publicists and the same girlfriend with whom he'd tussled in Vegas. (He was not prosecuted, and they are now engaged.) Albrecht enjoyed the moment as much as anybody. After all, he'd sold 'Secret Diaries' to Showtime.” (CNNMoney)

"Sadly, we here at PAPERMAG are stuck in New York and not frolicking around, eating really good Mexican food or seeing 875 concerts a day in Austin at South by Southwest. Luckily, the members of L.A. rock band du jour The Airborne Toxic Event are letting us live vicariously through them. The band, which is playing Austin for the first time, have agreed to blog for us, take photos and give us an inside look at the madness and insanity that is South by Southwest. Here's their first installment." (Papermag)

"It's my sixth consecutive SXSW, and each time it feels twice as big as the year before. As a publicist friend and I walked down the main drag in Austin last night, he took one look around and said, 'Oh my God, it's like Mardi Gras now.' And indeed, though I will not be showing my boobs for beads, there's enough beer, BBQ and music here to keep a city five times the size of New Orleans (and a whole lot bigger than Austin) busy and boozy for days.Wednesday used to be a sort of sleepy, ease-you-in deal to preview the long weekend, but last night nearly every venue on 6th Street was already spilling crowds onto the sidewalk. And there is music everywhere: Lone guys with guitars strumming for no one on the curb, acoustic duets in front of the Starbucks inside the Radisson hotel, piano Radiohead covers in the lobby of the Four Seasons (where, by the way, a grizzled Lou Reed was holding court, and Moby wandered helplessly by with shopping bags, looking, no doubt, for a lone vegan snack in the Land of Beef and Brisket)." (Popwatch)

"...so more than a few Capitol Hill reporters are pissed, because last night the House Sergeant-at-Arms office did a very rare thing indeed: close off the second floor to reporters surrounding the House chamber yesterday during the secret session.These secret sessions are incredibly rare (read: four since 1830). Before the late night session, there was a security sweep and only members were allowed in. They had to sign an oath of secrecy beforehand and check their cell phones and Blackberries at the door.Reporters weren't griping about being kicked out of the chamber, but rather that they were banned from the second floor altogether (likely they didn't want reporters to see who came and went and when)." (FishbowlDC)

"As if staring at each other across the front page of the newspaper, the 10-year-old boy bleeding from a Gaza rocket attack looked up into the controversial photo of the Illinois senator wrapped in a white turban. 'A Hillary Clinton Production,’ proclaimed the headline in the tabloid Yediot Ahronot, Israel’s top-selling daily paper. 'Obama, the Muslim.' The next day, however, Obama was back on the front page of Yediot, this time declaring, 'I’m a friend of Israel,' in an exclusive interview.The Democratic primary has captured the attention of the locally focused Israeli media, with Clinton-Obama coverage rivaling the daily violence of the Middle East conflict and a handful of political corruption scandals for airtime. For Israelis, the contest pits Clinton, almost a favorite-daughter candidate, against Obama, the political star whose Middle East positions are less well known and, therefore, more worrisome." (Observer)

"Bags--and the ladies who love them--were the name of the game at the fifth annual Bag Lunch benefiting P.S. Arts at Carla Sands' Brentwood home Tuesday, where a huge modern art collection (including a video from Jennifer Steinkampf) rivaled the bags on display and guests scrambled to cool off in the backyard next to the pool and underneath umbrella-covered tables. 'In 10 bags, there are golden compacts, and in one special bag, a gift certificate to our Paris boutique,' noted Lancôme's Kerry Diamond, whose beauty brand sponsored the event, raising over $200,000. The cosmetics company also provided an on-site makeup artist for celeb touch-ups, and loaded clear plastic columns on lunch tables filled with mascara, lip glosses, and eye cream, which were nearly empty a mere 40 minutes into the sold-out event ... Rose McGowan arrived near the end and started having a panic attack. 'I want a bag and all the good ones are gone!' she moaned." (Fashionweekdaily)

"The National Republican Congressional Committee said Thursday that its former treasurer, Christopher J. Ward, may have embezzled hundreds of thousands of dollars from the committee, but GOP sources said the total lost by the NRCC and other Republican committees could be as high as $1 million. The NRCC said that Ward made 'several hundred thousand dollars in unauthorized transfers of NRCC funds to outside committees whose bank accounts he had access to, including joint fundraising committees in which the NRCC participated. He also appears to have made subsequent transfers of several hundred thousand dollars in funds from those outside committees to what appear to be his personal and business bank accounts.'" (Politico)

"This past Tuesday at the American Museum of Natural History, they held the museum’s annual Winter Dance with more than 750 of the museum’s 'junior members' (many of the same you might have seen at The Frick last night, or the Museum of the City of New York, the night before). There was a seated dinner for 200 and then afterwards dancing in the Milstein Hall of Ocean Life. Honorary Chairs were Roberto and Eva Cavalli. Chairs were Fabiola Beracasa, Claire Bernard, Amanda Hearst, Tinsley Mortimer, Leelee Sobieski and Arden Wohl. Dancing Chairs were Danny Baker, Derek Blasberg, Jason Beckman and Simon Hammerstein ... In the crowd: David Lauren and Lauren Bush, Barbara Bush ... Vanessa and Donald Trump Jr ... Mary Guiliani ... Emmanuelle Chriqui." (NYSocialDiary)