“Even before she died in 1971, Chanel had to witness her life turned into a Broadway musical. At first, she was thrilled that Hepburn would star in ‘Coco.’ When she learned it was Katharine and not Audrey, she was horrified.”Heh. We were wondering why Coco Chanel is so high on our Who Popular? list this weekend.
“Wallace is to literature what Robin Williams or perhaps Jim Carrey is to live comedy: a creator so maniacally energetic and amused with himself that he often follows his riffs out into the stratosphere, where he orbits all alone.”David Foster Wallace, author of Infinite Jest, apparently hanged himself on Friday night.
Tina Fey made an encore performance on Saturday Night Live last night, spoofing Alaska Governor Sarah Palin.The likeness was uncanny. The Chicago Tribune has details.
‘Gapper’ is our term for famous people whom we probably should have profiled long ago.Here’s a great one: John Maynard Keynes. Editor Paul Hehn, at the English economics desk, has just whipped up a nifty profile of Keynes, whose “notion that governments should intervene in times of market distress” seems awfully timely these days.
Boy, Bill and Jerry — we’re trying to go with the flow here, but we’re just not feeling it.Ballyhooed Microsoft ad number one had Gates and Seinfeld shopping at Shoe Circus alongside the “clowns” of the mall-going public.Now ad number two has them eating scalloped potatoes and sharing toothpaste with a working-class family who also seem to be clowns. Very unpleasant clowns at that.
“Dubbed the Walrus of Love, he enjoyed a virtual monopoly on pillow talk disco… His singularly deep voice caused his mother to scream with fright when it first broke at the age of 14.”So said the BBC about Barry White in its 2003 obituary. His voice was so seductive it could help sharks mate.
Cincinnati Bengal Chad Ocho Cinco may have a few old jerseys around soon.The NFL says that before the former Chad Johnson can wear a jersey with his new name, he has to buy out the entire nationwide stock of NFL-approved “C. Johnson” jerseys now in stores. At $48 each.
First there were reports of a stroke. Now the Associated Press says that Kim Jong-il may be paralyzed.
Speaking of James Bond… here’s the new longer trailer for Quantum of Solace, due out October 31st in the UK. (November 14th in the States.)
So we missed this back in May, on the 100th birthday of Ian Fleming.The Times (London-style) dished up a very slick feature called 100 Years of Bond. It mixes odd notes from Fleming’s life (f’rinstance, Winston Churchill wrote the Times obituary for Fleming’s dad in 1917) with his love affairs and then the release dates of the various James Bond novels and movies.
The Guardian speculates on the fate of Kim Jong-il.The operative question: “If he was dead, how could we tell?”
Good heavens. Colin Firth, also known as Mr. Darcy in the iconic 1995 BBC production of Pride and Prejudice, turns 48 today.Which gives us the chance to scratch our head publicly over one of the most famous moments from that film: the lake scene. We’ve heard many, many times about the moment in which Firth strips down to take a swim. The scene is supposed to have the power to make strong women go woozy, and make weaker women swoon outright.
And you thought American politics was getting a little weird.
Rock ‘n roll butterfly Pamela Des Barres turns 60 today.
Sometimes the comic strip Pearls Before Swine just cracks me up.But yesterday’s strip was a double whammy. As editor Paul Hehn points out, Cuba’s Raul Castro actually did make an appearance, however oblique, in ‘Hi and Lois’ on the same day.
Update: Tom Brady is out for the season.
Tom Brady’s season may be over. The New England quarterback went down with a knee injury on Sunday.Before the game, The Boston Globe ran a retrospective that made Brady sound oddly like a missing antelope species which may no longer actually exist.
Richard I of England — Richard Lionheart to you and me — turns 851 today.He’s also called Richard the Lionhearted by some, and Coeur de Lion by the French.Earlier this year, the Daily Telegraph ran an odd little item about a night Richard spent in bed with Phillip II of France.
We’ve finally just seen Raiders of the Lost Ark: The Adaptation. And what a laugh it was.We first read about the movie in a Vanity Fair article in 2004. The backstory, in brief: in 1981, after Harrison Ford wowed the world as Indiana Jones, a 10-year-old Mississippi kid named Chris Strompolos talked two friends into filming their own shot-by-shot version of Raiders of the Lost Ark.
“The spectacle of… watching the two eternally boyish, care-free retired zillionaires try on shoes leaves a bad aftertaste.”Harsh reviews for the new Bill Gates / Jerry Seinfeld ad for Microsoft.It’s a headscratcher, true enough.