Media-Whore D'Oeuvres



"Last week, Page Six published one of their infamous blind items in the 'Just Asking' column about a successful actor who will be taking time off from movie making to get a handle on his habits as opposed to working on his marriage, as he is reporting. The Blind Item was….WHICH actor is on hiatus due to a drug relapse? He claimed he needed time off because of the heartbreak of his public split, but he’s actually headed to rehab. From the chatter on the web and rumors in Hollywood, it seemed that the only likely actor to fit the bill was Sean Penn, who had been separated from his wife, Robin Wright Penn at the time. He was also fodder for the tabloids and gossip sites with his late night paling around with young actresses and bizarre behavior at clubs. And yesterday, EW.com reported that Penn has pulled out of the upcoming drama 'Cartel'. Its also been reported that Penn will most likely drop out of the biopic of 'The Three Stooges', which was set for an August production start date. And on top of that we are hearing a slew of 'sources close to Penn' being quoted throughout the blogosphere that the actor is really trying hard to work out things with his wife. For a man who usually has a distaste for the media, specifically that celebrating celebrity, its weird that we would all of a sudden hear so much about the struggle of his marriage." (Spielster)



(image via hbo)

"Farah Diba Pahlavi, the former queen of Iran, remembers all too well the last time Iranian youths poured into the streets of Tehran, chanting, throwing rocks, and demanding change: It was the start of the revolution against her husband, the shah of Iran, which ultimately forced the royal couple into exile in 1979 and plunged her life into chaos. Thirty years later, Pahlavi, who now lives in Paris, feels a new optimism as YouTube and Twitter bring news of the uprising in Tehran’s streets. She’s hopeful that that she is watching the beginning of the end of Iran’s theocracy—and the three decades of repressive Islamic rule that followed her husband’s departure .. But a new HBO documentary has forced Pahlavi to come to terms with some of the grievances against her husband’s rule. The Queen and I, which airs on Wednesday, is the work of Nahid Persson Sarvestani, an Iranian revolutionary who wanted to reconcile her glamorous childhood image of Farah Diba with the monarch who caused so much pain and suffering for their people. She sought out Pahlavi, who agreed to participate. In a Q&A with The Daily Beast's Tina Brown .. Pahlavi talks about .. Why she bristles at comparisons between the repression under the shah’s rule and the current crackdown: 'There is no comparison between what this regime has done in the last 30 years and the way the shah was.'" (TinaBrown/TheDailyBeast)



"While the Council of Fashion Designers of America kept it relatively classy for their 2009 Awards ceremony, the afterparties got a little dirtier. At the Calvin Klein Collection’s 'First Party on the High Line,' most attendees decided to shed a few layers of clothing and get down with their fashionably bad selves." (Guestofaguest)

"They're saying the reason Sean Penn-Robin Wright's on-again, off-again marriage is on again is because his shot with Natalie Portman went off again." (CindyAdams)



"Two years after The Sopranos left the air, it looks as though HBO finally has a worthy successor. The second-season premiere of True Blood, the premium cable network’s vampire drama, drew 3.7 million total viewers Sunday, the biggest audience for a scripted series on the network since Sopranos ended. That was more than double the 1.4 million who tuned in for the season one premiere last year, and it was up 51 percent over the show’s first-season finale. It was the most-watched show on HBO since Sopranos drew nearly 12 million two years ago. Even the show that premiered after Sopranos, the short-lived John From Cincinnati, managed only 3.4 million viewers. It ends a long dry spell for HBO, which has struggled to program another show with even half the buzz of its early-2000s hits Sopranos, Sex and the City and Six Feet Under.” (Medialifemagazine)



"For NBC Universal, the analog buck and the digital dime both stop at the desk of Jeff Zucker. From that desk on the 52nd floor of 30 Rock, the NBCU CEO can see a wall full of flat-screen monitors, an expansive view of Manhattan and, on a Tuesday in June, a vase of hot pink peonies in full bloom ... If 2009 stays on track, Zucker says the company will make more than $1 billion from all of its digital assets (including mobile, VOD, DVD sales, etc.); based on 2008 revenues, that would be a little more than 6 percent. He won’t get more detailed than that, but, based on other conversations I’ve had within the company, if you zeroed in on how much NBCU makes directly from selling online advertising, it probably would be half that. It needs to be much more if it’s going to come close to replacing the money leaking away from TV because of digital and other shifts in the marketplace." (Paidcontent)



"By midnight last night, the awards had been given, cases of champagne had been abused, and even Calvin Klein's gorgeous party on the High Line was slowly winding down--but the after-after fête, hosted by Opening Ceremony and Black Frame, was just heating up. Party-hoppers like Tim Hamilton, Justin Giunta, Julie Gilhart (sporting seriously sexy thigh-high stockings!), Andy Samberg, Rodarte date Kirsten Dunst, Jessica Stam, Daphne Guinness, Richard Chai, Thakoon Panichgul and more headed just a few blocks downtown to The Jane to christen the brand-new Ballroom along with hosts Kate and Laura Mulleavy, Alexander Wang, and Scott Sternberg--winners, all ... It may have been past little Tallulah Willis' bedtime (the 'guest' of Bazaar is only 15, after all), but the daughter of Bruce and Demi made it from the High Line to The Jane--complete with a costume change between stops." (Fashionweekdaily)



"The Obama administration says it has tried to avoid words or deeds that could be portrayed as American meddling in Iran’s presidential election and its tumultuous aftermath. Yet on Monday afternoon, a 27-year-old State Department official, Jared Cohen, e-mailed the social-networking site Twitter with an unusual request: delay scheduled maintenance of its global network, which would have cut off service while Iranians were using Twitter to swap information and inform the outside world about the mushrooming protests around Tehran. The request, made to a Twitter co-founder, Jack Dorsey, is yet another new-media milestone: the recognition by the United States government that an Internet blogging service that did not exist four years ago has the potential to change history in an ancient Islamic country. 'This was just a call to say: It appears Twitter is playing an important role at a crucial time in Iran. Could you keep it going?' said P.J. Crowley, the assistant secretary of state for public affairs. Twitter complied with the request, saying in a blog post on Monday that it put off the upgrade until late Tuesday afternoon — 1:30 a.m." (NYTimes)



"Anne Baldassari, the director of the Picasso Museum in Paris, has appealed for thieves to return a sketchbook by the artist that was stolen last week. 'It’s an interesting notebook from a scholarly standpoint, as documentation,' she said in an interview. 'On the market, it’s worth nothing, especially since it was stolen.' The book was taken out of a locked glass case using special tools. It follows other thefts where artworks have been removed from European museums, some of which have later been recovered, such as two versions of Edvard Munch’s 'The Scream.' Paris detectives are investigating the disappearance of the book of 33 pencil drawings, dated 1917-1924. It measured 16 centimeters by 24 centimeters (approximately 6 inches by 10 inches), with a shiny red cover bearing the word 'Album' written in gold. TV and newspaper reports estimated that the book was worth 8 million euros ($11.1 million), although Baldassari said this figure was too high." (Bloomberg)



"On the morning of Friday, June 12, in a makeshift tent on the flight deck of the U.S.S. Intrepid aircraft carrier, past a crowd of umbrella-toting tourists glistening in the misty morning rain, past a row of fighter planes facing a tug boat creeping up the Hudson River and past a stage outfitted with Lionel Richie’s piano, Zev Shalev looked at a clock. Seven minutes until airtime. He took a long gulp of water. A few hours earlier, long before dawn, Mr. Shalev, the 36-year-old executive producer of The Early Show on CBS, had woken up at his apartment in Chelsea and checked the weather. According to various Doppler radar screens, a green blob of precipitation was menacing Manhattan. Not good, thought Mr. Shalev. It was the first morning of CBS’s summer concert series, and Mr. Shalev had signed up Mr. Richie and Akon, fresh off a new hit single, to rock the kickoff. But at the last minute, Akon had backed out, citing, of all things, the recent passing of Omar Bongo, the president of Gabon. Sometimes running a morning show is like that." (Observer)

"Another one of those great overcast late Spring days in New York. The Sun came out but not for long. It had rained late late the night before; there were still puddles on the Promenade by the river. Last night I went over to the Café Carlyle with Rick Unterberg to see Debbie Reynolds who opened there last week and is playing through the 27th .. NYSD readers may know that a little more than twenty years ago I collaborated and ghost-wrote Debbie’s autobiography ('Debbie: My Life' William Morrow publishers) .. Before last night, I hadn’t seen her perform in about twenty years. By the time I met her in 1986, she’d been making a very good living for a very long time playing Vegas and Reno and clubs and affairs all over America. I learned very early on in our relationship that she’s a very industrious woman. She works. I mean 24/7." (NYSocialDiary)



" Not that long after some of the more hard-core revelers had found their way home following the CFDA Fashion Awards’ after parties, Diane von Furstenberg was already on to the next event by high noon Tuesday. The designer was honored at The Mission Society’s Champions for Children luncheon at the Mandarin Oriental Hotel. Before presenting her with the nonprofit’s Philanthropy Award, André Leon Talley recalled their nights gliding across the banquettes at Studio 54. But Talley was also more tender in describing his friend of more than 30 years. 'With all the success and fortune, underneath the veneer of glamour that we both share, there is a little girl who grew up in Belgium and wanted to see the big city lights. She thought with the heart that was always there with the glow and the warmth of the fires built at home,' he said." (WWD)



"Hollywood’s gay community is reacting with anxiety and suspicion to Sacha Baron Cohen’s upcoming satire, Bruno, saying that the film excluded gays from the filmmaking process and that when they were consulted, filmmakers did not address their concerns that the film was a distortion of homosexuality. The filmmaker conducted 'significant reshoots' to temper the troubled reaction of insiders from the Hollywood gay community, according to one person involved in the Bruno production who declined to be identified. Universal Pictures, which is opening the film on July 10, declined to confirm or deny the report. In a statement the studio said the 'overwhelming majority of the audience' would understand that the film seeks to lampoon homophobia." (TheWrap)