In the NY Post today. Yes, she really is that scary. And I knew her before she was famous. And did I mention that she sorta fired me — or at least, had someone else do it for her? One of the proudest accomplishments of my life.
[sorry, lame pee-wee herman joke]
So today we went to San Simeon to visit Hearst Castle, former home of publishing magnate William Randolph Hearst. This was the inspiration for Xanadu in Citizen Kane. The place was quite mobbed with tourists from around the world, which surprised me. I don’t understand the attraction. It’s a huge estate and the main house is certainly grand, but by British or European standards, it’s just a big ol’ house built by a rich egomaniac with money to burn. But then perhaps I’m just bitter.
When I lived in New York, I worked for Hearst Corporation at what was then a start-up magazine (but what is now a huge success and cash cow). It was definitely the worst publisher I’ve ever worked for in my life, run by greedy, stingy bastards (aka the Hearst family). Imagine being a young, starving editorial assistant and having to buy your own office supplies, having your desk in a narrow hallway because they refused to rent a big enough office, and lots of other nasty stuff I can’t blab about because of confidentiality reasons. So I was quite excited to visit the manse today, just so I could put a pox on the entire Hearst family.
End of rant. A few photos…
Hearst Castle viewed from the car park (visitors must take a bus up to the property):
Foggy main house:
Outdoor pool surrounded by early-morning fog:
Library:
View from upstairs bedroom:
I usually read the news online, but today for the first time in ages I bought a real newspaper. Of course, I only bought it because I needed something to wrap my dishes in, but that’s as good a reason as any. And for the record, I bought the Guardian. I refuse to wrap my dishes in a tabloid.
Big Boobs Aren’t the Key to Happiness? Shocker!
Yet another study shows that women with cosmetic breast implants are more likely to commit suicide because of depression and low self-esteem.
Is This Progress?
From the Guardian: “Fleur Adcock has been awarded the 2006 Queen’s Gold Medal for Poetry, becoming only the seventh female poet to receive the award in 73 years.” Disgraceful.
Visiting London on a Budget?
Not possible. Only Tokyo and Osaka are more expensive. New York is ranked #13! The NYT has some travel tips for the London-bound traveler who wishes to avoid bankruptcy. (If you need a password for the NYT, visit Bug Me Not)
US Army Suicide Rate
According to an AP report, it is at the highest level since 1993.
Oprah to the Rescue
After Julia Roberts’s disastrous Broadway debut, in which it was finally confirmed to any doubters that she possesses not one shred of acting ability, Oprah ran right over to comfort her. Thank goodness.
Apparently, the new Indonesian version of Playboy is not going over too well. Though the bimbos who fill the pages of the
magazine’s first issue are fully clothed, Playboy’s offices have been attacked and the staff has gone into hiding.
From the AP: “This is all part of a conspiracy aimed at destroying Islam through the moral corruption of its younger generation,” said Mohamad Jamil, a protest organizer. “Therefore, there is no other choice than to destroy Playboy.”
Let’s just hope they don’t open a Victoria’s Secret at the Jakarta Mall.
Once in a while I buy the weekly magazine Closer, which is filled with paparazzi shots of drunken celebrities throwing up in gutters and the likes of Kate Moss covered in zits. And really, who doesn’t like to look at that kind of stuff? The ragazine is also filled with the worst kind of real-life horror stories you can imagine, but the headlines are just hilarious. Here is a sampling of the most recent issue I read:
Best celebrity gossip:
“Look at Charl’s Ga-Vain Boyo!”
Charlotte Church’s boyfriend, rugby star Gavin Henson, describes how he prepares for a game: “It takes me two hours to get ready – hot bath, shave my legs and face, moisturise, put fake tan on and do my hair.”
Poor Charlotte. She doesn’t realize she’s dating a drag queen.
These are real headlines:
“I Bought a New Vagina for My Husband”
“My Head Blew Up and My Skin Fell Off”
“My Fiancé Booked Me in for a Boob Op!”
“The Family From Hell: Leanne, 14, Drink Drives and Her Mum Moons in Public”
And the award for the most dramatic sub-head goes to:
Doctors at the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists have said that infants born under 25 weeks should be allowed to die, to avoid “blocking” intensive care cots. If they had their way, Lizzie’s son Edward might not have lived. [insert evil laugh]
And here are two headlines from the next issue:
“Tranny Nanny Stole Our Kids”
“Forced to Eat Dog Food by Evil Mum”
Can you believe this magazine only costs £1?
Today I bring you the second instalment of my analysis of British Vogue, focusing on the interview with December cover girl Gwyneth Paltrow. (Who else?)
Gwyneth Paltrow
Gwynnie is a favourite target of mine but I’ll try to restrain my impulses. (Incidentally, I saw Chris Martin, GP’s better half, on Jonathan Ross’s talk show the other night. He seems so sweet and down-to-earth and normal. Why he married the vapid creature from Hollywood is beyond me.)
The interview takes place in a restaurant in TriBeCa, NYC. Gwyneth meets the hack Vogue writer in a restaurant and anyone who has ever read a women’s magazine will know what comes next: The writer marvels that the starlet before him actually eats – a lot!!! Gwyneth orders a tuna sandwich and a large plate of fries, followed by dessert. “Fears of Gwyneth Paltrow’s imminent death-by-macrobiotic diet can be safely laid aside,” he writes. As if she would order her usual celery stick and grape when she knows every morsel of food she consumes will be reported in a national magazine.
Why is Ms. P no longer on a macrobiotic diet? From Vogue: “‘It’s a different stomach now, a different compartment,’ says Paltrow, patting her midriff.” Of course she is referring to the birth of her daughter, Apple Brown Betty Martin. She also seems to think that fetuses grow in the stomach, but then we can’t expect her to be smart and beautiful. Like Saint Angelina (see earlier post), motherhood has transformed our Gwyneth in glorious ways. Now she can eat French fries!
Continuing on the mother theme, here is Gwyneth on life with Chris Martin: “He’s the daddy. He works. I’m the mummy. I’m at home trying to look after everybody.” And thank goodness Chris landed that gig with Coldplay, otherwise Gwynnie and Apple would be living in the projects.
Okay, I could go on. And on. And on. But I’ve had my fun for the day.
Anglofille’s Verdict: It’s cold outside. Buy a copy of Vogue and throw it on the fire.
Let’s take a look at the December issue of British Vogue. The cover, featuring my personal style icon Gwyneth Paltrow, boasts the giant coverline “The Superwomen Issue: Inspirational and Individual.” The “superwomen” to which they refer include the aforementioned Paltrow and fashion designer Alice Temperley. Attention women’s studies professors: You can just rip this section right out of the magazine and photocopy it for your students!
The Beauty of Melancholia
This article in the Style section heralds this season’s new “gothic” look – dark clothes, dark hair, pale skin, the mildly feverish aura of a Victorian. Essentially, it’s “in” to be white.
The high-end labels are leading the “sombre-chic” trend. According to make-up artist Kay Montano, “‘It’s all about how wealthy women want to look now. Tans have become a bit chavvy [lower class]…Pale now means rare and precious.’” Montano goes on to relate an anecdote about doing Nicole Kidman’s make-up once and not being able to find a shade of foundation light enough.
Assuming that everyone in northern Europe is Caucasian, make-up artist Peter Philips tells Vogue, “‘I think north European countries can express the melancholy spirit more naturally because of the way we’ve grown up with so much old culture. Nostalgia is melancholic.’” He says the grey northern light is also important. “‘You could take that make-up and put it in LA or Brazil, and it just wouldn’t look the same because the light is different, the people are different. Melancholy is about certain places and cultures. Not everyone can have it.’”
The author of the piece points out that melancholy is just a pose. No one actually wants to feel bummed out or terminally ill. The Victorians “didn’t actually want to get tuberculosis, just the huge, dark-ringed eyes.”
Anglofille’s Verdict: I applaud Vogue for having the courage to run this piece. I mean, why not just come right out and say that they think gaunt white people are more attractive? It’s the theme of every issue anyway.
Tomorrow, Part II…
Christmas has come early for the London media. The editor of The Sun newspaper was arrested early this morning for domestic violence. And before you jump to conclusions, the editor is a woman and the husband she assaulted is EastEnders tough guy Ross Kemp. You just can’t make this stuff up!
Rebekah Wade is the first female editor of The Sun, the hugely successful Rupert Murdoch-owned rag. During her tenure as editor, Wade has campaigned vigorously against domestic violence. Ahem. Lest she be confused with an actual feminist, however, Wade has continued to publish topless pics of women on page three, a time-honoured Sun tradition.
Before being punched in the face, Kemp joined his wife and the disgraced David Blunkett (see previous post) for dinner last night. Due to the subsequent Wade-Kemp smackdown, Blunkett has been booted off the front pages. Rebekah Wade was released from custody today without being charged, though her future as editor is in question.
In a spectacularly bizarre twist, the actor who plays Ross Kemp’s brother on EastEnders, Steve McFadden, was also assaulted today by his ex-girlfriend, who was arrested. Is there something about EastEnders’ men that drives women to violence? Did the two on-screen brothers engage together in a nasty business that set their lady companions afire? I don’t know, but the London tabs are going to have a rollicking good time trying to figure this one out.
I moved across the Atlantic but apparently it wasn’t far enough to escape news of Atoosa (rhymes-with-Medusa) Rubenstein. My friend W e-mailed me this article from yesterday’s New York Observer. Um, thanks. I worked for Atoosa about six years ago. I’m over it now, but only because of some therapy and a hefty dose of psychotropic drugs.
The New York media gives Atoosa a lot of ink because, well, if they don’t cover stories that are completely irrelevant, how will we ever find out about them? It seems that Atoosa, editor of Seventeen and founding editor of CosmoGIRL!, now has her own reality show on MTV wherein the contestants vie to be on the magazine’s cover or some such crap.
The interesting part of the story is that Atoosa, the wild-haired Iranian-American Republican from Long Island, the human wrecking ball of teenage self-esteem, has finally gone over a cliff of megalomania and delusion from which there may be no return. Next stop, Bellevue?
From the Observer:
At age 19, she visited a psychic, who predicted that young Atoosa would have a big media career. “I do feel like it’s my destiny,” Ms. Rubenstein said.
(Was this the same psychic who told George Bush to invade Iraq? Oh wait, that was God. Nevermind.)
In the article, a former colleague muses:
“The magazine is really a cause for her,” said a former employee. “If you are not completely committed and enveloped in the same cause, it’s very difficult to survive.”
In the same queen-of-the-world vein, Atoosa started a campaign when she was at CosmoGIRL! to put one of her readers in the White House by 2024. I guess if that happens, it’ll be the president wearing thong underwear, not just the interns.
To be fair, Atoosa’s new show, Miss Seventeen, does have feminist overtones. The Observer describes it thus:
A trailer showed 17 nymphs comically squealing and brawling in a Manhattan loft apartment. “I hate girls who dress like sluts,” declared one. “You’re the fakest person here!” screamed another.
Though the show centers on a group of whippet-thin bimbettes fighting to be on the cover of a fashion magazine, it’s about soooo much more than that:
Ms. Rubenstein wanted to make clear that Miss Seventeen is not all fun and froth, that increasing the awareness of social causes among her readers is a major priority of hers. “My process, no matter what I work on, has the same end result and vision,” she said. “And that end result and vision is to bring truth to young women in their lives.”
You know, this would be hilarious if Atoosa wasn’t dead serious. Instead it’s just frightening. And sad. And did I mention frightening?
Atoosa, my sista, I know you were ordained by God to lead teenage girls into a zit-free Promised Land, where no one has body hair and Jessica Simpson is on the currency. I’m totally convinced of it, I swear. But you know, I think you need to get some help pdq. Soon it will be too late. Not too long from now you could find yourself the leader of a tiny rogue nation, surrounded by a chic Cosmogirl army aiming their pastel-colored nuclear warheads at the non-believers. Then you’d have the U.N. breathing down your neck, not just evil feminists like me. Is this the kind of future your psychic predicted? No, I don’t think so.
I wanted to ignore this story, but the tabloid papers and newscasts here have their knickers in a twist over coke-head Kate. It’s impossible to walk by a newsagent in London without seeing lame headlines like “Kate’s Blown It.” It appears the stickpin supermodel has now been dumped by H&M, Burberry and Chanel. The head of London’s Metropolitan Police has personally ordered an investigation into her Class-A drug use, and now she might lose custody of her daughter. What do I have to say about this? Good!
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