Pete Wentz Envelops ‘Real World’ Kids in Warm Emo EmbraceBars in Brooklyn have shunned the cast members, so he lets them shoot at his East Village hangout. Plus, Meryl wants to do a Broadway show and Daniel Day-Lewis annoys. In Monday’s gossip roundup!
There May Be a Day When Port Authority Is Nice to Look AtWe know, we know — dare to dream, right? But there are proposals to build above it, and the renderings look lovely. Plus, news from the finance, law, real estate and media industries, in our daily roundup.
gossipmonger
‘Page Six’ Manages to Not Revel in Sarah Jessica Parker’s Failure Sarah Jessica Parker is not confident that her unreleased movie, Spinning Into Butter, will ever see the light of day. Barack Obama and his wife are slated to attend the opening of Cat on a Hot Tin Roof with Oprah on Thursday. Cosmetics heir Olivia Chantecaille got engaged to banker boyfriend Ren Grady. Gossip Girl’s Blake Lively took a bunch of friends shopping to Armani Exchange on Fifth Avenue. Shake Shack is opening a location on the Upper West Side! Sting, Diddy, and Josh Hartnett all hung out at Half Nelson producer Charlie Corwin’s birthday at Socialista, which is now back open after the hepatitis scare. Michael Musto will appear on the cover of The Village Voice spoofing this magazine’s Lindsay Lohan shoot.
company town
William Kristol Has the Gray Lady’s Knickers in a TwistMEDIA
• Both Times public editor Clark Hoyt and former Times conservative standby William Safire have panned Arthur “Pinch” Sulzberger’s decision to foist William Kristol on the editorial page. Among the other conservatives considered and passed over: Charles Krauthammer, Ross Douthat, Max Boot, and a bunch of other Weekly Standard stalwarts. But at least Judith Miller approves: “[I]t’s an appointment that’s a long time coming. The page needed balance.… [But] an unabashed neocon without remorse is unacceptable to Times people.… He’s not kosher in that sense.” [New Republic]
• New York Observer president Robert Sommer nailed his MSNBC interview: “We like to view our readers as some of the smartest, most insensitive — most… Some of the most brightest readers in the country and especially New York.” [NYO]
• David Blum goes through his fifth sex columnist in little more than a year, firing his latest hire at the New York Press after she stole questions from Dan Savage. Some might call that slutty! [NYO]
gossipmonger
Heath and Michelle: Everything’s Wrong!Michelle Williams may be leaving Boerum Hill because the brownstone she lives in is too big for just her and the baby. A pregnant Nicole Richie smoked a cigarette outside Da Silvano. Ed Westwick, a.k.a. Chuck Bass on Gossip Girl, likes playing the bad boy. (Also, he’s British!) Ryan Gosling shopped for flannel shirts at the Urban Outfitters on West 14th and also set off the store alarm. Jennifer Hudson canoodled with New York Jets free safety Kerri Rhodes at Cipriani. Joan Rivers claims her apartment was once haunted by a Jewish ghost from Larchmont. Natalie Portman couldn’t flirt her way to a table at LES restaurant Apizz. The launch party of the Supper Club at the National Arts Club was way too hot.
company town
Is Kate Beckinsale Too Hot to Play Judy Miller?MEDIA
• Matt Drudge cracked open The New Republic’s Iraq fabulist controversy once again. Did the mag’s Baghdad diarist really make up details about mass graves and troops ridiculing a disfigured female soldier? Franklin Foer complains that Drudge’s docs could only have come from the Army. [Slate, NYO]
• Chris Jones, the managing editor of Portfolio.com, announced his departure from the mag after giving notice over a month ago. High-level rumors also indicate Joanne Lipman may soon be relieved from command — but only for the Website. [WWD]
• The Judith Miller movie is now filming in Memphis, and let’s just say that Kate Beckinsale is way too hot to be a reporter. On the other hand, the Valerie Plame CIA character, played by Vera Farmiga, looks just about right. [WP]
Scooter Libby Will Not See the Aspens Turn
Is it gauche that seeing this headline just made us smile a bit? Is it even gaucher that we started wondering (hoping?) which Bushie might next go to jail? Also: Do you think Judy Miller will visit him in prison?
Libby Gets 30 Months in Prison in CIA Leak Case [NYT]
in other news
Did Judy Use ‘Journal’ to Settle a Score?
Leonard Levitt writes a weekly muckraking column about life and issues within the NYPD. In this week’s offering, he connects some interesting dots about Judith Miller’s recent Wall Street Journal op-ed defending police brass after revelations that the department spied on peaceful protesters before and during the 2004 Republican convention. The spying program was revealed in March by New York Times reporter Jim Dwyer. Miller’s piece mentioned Dwyer by name and questioned his reporting: “The material this reporter read,” Miller wrote, “does not show that the police monitored such peaceful groups and individuals because they opposed their political views.” What Levitt is the first to note: “Defectors’ Reports on Iraq Arms Were Embellished, Exile Asserts,” one of the numerous stories to eventually debunk Miller’s prewar WMD work, was written by Jim Dwyer. Merely a coincidence, right? —Ben Mathis-Lilley
The NYPD and Judith Miller [NYPD Confidential]
company town
Miller, Safire Go Silent on MoyersMEDIA
• Who’s afraid of Bill Moyers? Apparently Judith Miller, William Safire, and Charles Krauthammer all of whom refused to be interviewed for tonight’s PBS show Buying the War. [WP]
• The Pulitzer Prize the Daily News received for coverage of the health of 9/11 first responders was the same story the paper downplayed in 2001. [VV]
• Stick with fluff: The In Touch Virginia Tech cover was a flop. [NYP]
gossipmonger
Picking On Little ArthurIn his new memoir, former Time Inc. editor-in-chief Norm Pearlstine accuses New York Times publisher Arthur Sulzberger of being more concerned with publicity than with the law during the Judith Miller saga. (Of course, Pearlstine was concerned with neither, happily capitulating to the prosecutor!) Tom Brady and Gisele went to Easter Mass in Little Italy. Disgraced former Miss USA Tara Conner has left New York for L.A. Scarlett Johansson and Ryan Reynolds now seem to be an item. Socialite Dori Cooperman was arrested and charged after she allegedly stole and cashed a $4,300 check. A Gawker editor had a tough time handling Jimmy Kimmel’s questions on Larry King Live. Giada De Laurentiis may be one of Tiki Barber’s co-hosts on the Today show.
in other news
Witness for the Prosecution, for Now
The logistics of Plamegate have been making our heads hurt for three years now, so why should today be any different? Behold: Judith Miller, the ex-Times writer famously jailed for three months for refusing to name her Plame source, on the stand testifying for the same prosecutor who jailed her. The source was Scooter Libby, currently on trial for disclosing Valerie Plame’s identity, and Miller’s testifying against him because Libby “released” her from their confidentiality agreement, thus allowing her to become the prosecution’s star witness. Sound like legal suicide? Well, yes. Unless Libby’s side also wants Miller to say who else she had talked to — and, in fact, the biggest courtroom dustup yesterday was over the prosecution’s right to ask that exact question. Even more bizarre: Meantime, the same prosecutor from whom Miller is now testifying, Patrick J. Fitzgerald, also happens to be investigating her in an unrelated case, that one about Islamic charities. Oh, for the days of wine and blow jobs.
Reporter Who Was Jailed Testifies in Libby Case [NYT]
gossipmonger
Norm!Norman Mailer still hates Michiko Kakutani, dislikes Janet Maslin, too, and did an interview with Martha Stewart for her TV show. CNN execs went on a corporate retreat to the Bahamas, and “Page Six,” presumably on behalf of Fox News, mocks them for it. If you complain at Nobu, Drew Nieporent might blacklist you. Peter Cook, Christie Brinkley’s soon-to-be ex-husband, went grocery shopping. (Cindy Adams, meantime, dubs Brinkley Professor Emeritus in How to Handle El Piggo, which she actually means as a compliment.) Retired Ford Models vet Neil Hamil to run Elite Models. There’s a reality show being shopped in which ten virgin men compete to lose it to “a celeb.”
