The Golden Globe nominations were announced today and they are such a mishmash of television and film and drama and comedy that it's usually best to just wait for the inevitable stories that come out of the awards show (Jan. 25) when people get drunk and say and do great things they'd never show at the Oscars. This morning the only surprises were when Alicia Silverstone announced a nomination for Uma Thurman and said the film's name backwards ("Bill Kill") and when Scarlett Johansson got two nominations (for "Lost in Translation" and "Girl with a Pearl Earring"). The fact that this morning's host Dick Clark looked exactly the same as when I watched him on "American Bandstand" in the 1960s was no surprise at all. (Reuters)
Nicole Kidman got to say something to Diane Sawyer that many people probably have wanted to say. It came during one of those touchy-feely interviews Diane does in her attempt to push Barbara Walters off her throne as interview queen. When Di asked Nic about her relationship with Lenny Kravitz Kidman said "I don't mean to be impolite." Sawyer said "Go for it" so Nicole let 'er rip, saying "Oh, all right. Shove off!" (ABC News)
Since we're on the subject of Diane, her interview with President George W. Bush right after the capture of Saddam Hussein was out-watched by about a million viewers who decided it was more important (or perhaps less grueling) to watch Fox's reality series "The Simple Life" starring Paris Hilton. But wasn't it just a choice between different forms of the same thing? To paraphrase former Texas Governor Ann Richards, they were both born on third and think they hit a triple. (Washington Post)
"Lord of the Rings" star Orlando Bloom says "Basically, I'm acting because of the women. I don't care much about the money. Frankly, if I get the chance to kiss someone in a film, they wouldn't need to pay me at all." And if he's got points in the trilogy the 26-year-old heartthrob can really hold to that promise. (Ananova)
I never thought there would be reason to put the honorable Madeleine Albright in a Fix column, but today she makes it in with the likes of Paris and Orlando. Seems she was in make-up at the Fox News studios, getting ready to go on air and she said to Morton Kondracke, "Do you suppose that the Bush administration has Osama bin Laden hidden away somewhere and will bring him out before the election?" Morton says he took it as a serious comment.
When asked about it, Albright said "Last night, in the makeup room at Fox News I made a tongue-in-cheek comment to Mort Kondracke concerning Osama bin Laden. To my amazement, Mr. Kondracke immediately went on the air to repeat this comment, which was made to a person I thought was a friend and smart enough to know the difference between a serious statement and one that was not." She added, "My only regret is that the powder puffs were on Mort's face and not in his ears." (Washington Times)
Michael Jackson has transformed himself again -- and this time it has nothing to do with his face. Jackson -- against whom child molestation charges are expected to be filed today -- converted to the Nation of Islam last night, according to the New York Post. Yesterday, Fox News Online reported that Jackson's brother Jermaine, a longtime member of the NOI community, worked hard to bring Michael into the fold and even arranged to have Louis Farrakhan's chief of staff, Leonard F. Muhammad, step in as Michael's bodyguard. Will the conversion stick? Who nose?
In other news ... Sean "Puffy/P.Diddy" Combs may not know much about a dream deferred, but that's not stopping the producers of the upcoming Broadway revival of Lorraine Hansbury's "A Raisin in the Sun" from casting him in a lead role. "We were all incredibly impressed" with his audition, producer David Binder told the Associated Press. "He's focused on the work."
Money Quote
Is that a Gwyneth dis? Ben Affleck weighing past relationships of the Paltrow and Puffy persuasion: "We're much more similar, including our upbringing, than people imagine ... If you juxtapose our relationship to the ones we had earlier, you'd see that I was really much more different from Gwyneth, this blond, upper-class, private-school girl from the Upper East Side, and Jen from Puffy, who was this Horatio Alger kind of black guy who raised himself up the way he did." (N.Y. Daily News)
Best of the Rest
Page Six: Hollywood types speculating about real-life inspiration behind Tinseltown characters in Peter Bart's new short story collection; celeb lawyer Mark Geragos declines to list Winona Ryder among his clients on his Christmas party invite this year; Jessica Simpson accuses Rolling Stone writer of "stabbing" her "in the back" in profile, fumes, "She also said my house was puny ... My house isn't puny!"; Tara Reid parties a little too hard, stumbles at Atlantic City club; talk at "Cold Mountain" premiere was about Nicole Kidman's too-perfect makeup and coiffure; Jack White and former protigi Jason Stollsteimer get in rollicking bar brawl with each other in Detroit, file police complaints against each other.
Rush and Molloy: Widow and children fight over estate of late financier and horse breeder Henry de Kiatkowski's estate; Bobby Brown sued for child support nonpayment by mother of his two children; Brad Pitt turns 40 today, poses for sexy photo spread for Italian fashion mag; wives of Spike Lee and Greg Anthony write novel billed as a "peek into the world of super-rich, super-connected African-Americans"; Dr. Hunter S. Thompson slips on bathroom floor in Hawaii, breaks leg; Neil Bush proposes to girlfriend Maria Andrews; Busta Rhymes taunts man in wheelchair for not standing up at concert, apologizes; former "Different World" star Darryl M. Bell denies that he's dead; James Gandolfini's ex-wife, Marci, loses 40 pounds and makes herself over.
--Amy Reiter
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