Is Bassica in Trouble?Ed Westwick ditches a party hosted by girlfriend Jessica Szohr, fueling rumors of a tiff. That, and more celebrity innuendo, in today’s gossip roundup.
Is Hudstrong Already Over?Have Kate Hudson and Lance Armstrong split before even getting a nickname? Does Jeffrey Epstein really send valentines from prison? Did Janice Dickinson really flash a pilot? That’s what New York gossips are saying! Read all about it in our daily roundup.
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JPMorgan Chase Profits Fall 53 PercentBut they did better than analysts predicted. That, plus the latest on Hamptons real-estate prices, Condé Nast’s upper echelons, and the “You go girl!” spinner, in our daily industry roundup.
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Alex P. Keaton May Have Made a Sex TapeWeird wiretapper Anthony Pellicano says he knows what Michael J. Fox did back in 1990. Plus, Ashlee Simpson pregnancy rumors persist, Adrian Grenier gets a girlfriend, and more in our daily squeeze of the juice from New York gossip columns.
company town
‘Us Weekly’: Keeping ‘OK!’ HonestMEDIA
• NBC golden boy Ben Silverman sells his production company, Reveille, to
Rupert Murdoch’s daughter, Elizabeth. [LAT]
• CNN producer Chez Pazienza is forced to pack his bags after blogging for the Huffington Post. [TVNewser/Mediabistro]
• Us Weekly reports that OK! magazine “sensationalized” Grey’s Anatomy star Eric Dane’s battle with cancer in a cover story. (Actually, he only had some malignant cells on his lip frozen off in a doctor’s office.) “This isn’t the first time OK! has been wrong,” they note. But is Us really crusading against yellow journalism? Or are they just annoyed they didn’t get the scoop? [Us Weekly]
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Padma Leaves a Bad Taste in Fiamma’s MouthManhattan Moms, an East Coast equivalent of Bravo’s The Real Housewives of Orange County, will premiere early next year. A lot of the city’s foremost graffiti artists congregated for a book party at Auto in the meatpacking district. Billy Joel is in talks with the Mets to perform a bunch of gigs at Shea Stadium. George Steinbrenner will have a high school named after him in Tampa. Padma Lakshmi was rude to the staff at Soho eatery Fiamma, but Martha Stewart overtipped and was nice. CNN gave out an award to someone for forcing “one of the world’s largest oil corporations to pay more than $6 billion to clean up toxic waste in the Amazon rain forest,” but didn’t name Chevron as the company because they are an advertiser.
company town
Lies and the Lying Arabs Who Tell ThemMEDIA
• The New Republic pulled back on its long-embattled “Baghdad Diarist” series, admitting they could no longer stand behind the author, an army private serving in Iraq. Meanwhile, The National Review suffered its own Middle Eastern credibility scandal and struck back in a novel way: “As one of our sources put it: ‘The Arab tendency to lie and exaggerate about enemies is alive and well among pro-American Lebanese Christians as much as it is with the likes of Hamas.’” Yikes. [NYT Mixed Media/Portfolio]
• Big layoffs ahead at NBC News? “There are going to be firings very soon — everybody is terrified,” according to a “former network insider,” who claims tens of millions in cuts will happen in the next two weeks. [Jossip]
• New NBC programming honcho Ben Silverman is looking to clear up a conflict of interest and cash in on his old production company, which Elisabeth Murdoch, daughter to Rupe, is buying for around $200 million. Not bad for a guy who built his career on stealing foreign shows like The Office and Ugly Betty and then repackaging them for the U.S.[NYP]
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Ann Coulter Preys on Andrew SteinMiss Universe Riyo Mori was ushered through security at JFK by flashing her sash in lieu of a real form of I.D. Mick Jagger had lunch with his youngest kid, 8-year-old Lucas, at Nello’s. Rudy Giuliani said that he’d make Joe Torre a member of his cabinet if he’s fired by the Yankees (assuming Giuliani is elected, of course). Former city-council president and lifelong Democrat Andrew Stein made out with Ann Coulter at Soho House. Patricia Yeo left Monkey Bar, the second eatery she’s left in two months, after getting bad reviews. Cameron Diaz and Bradley Cooper ate at Cuba in the West Village. Kyra Sedgwick and Vanessa Redgrave, among others, will help Dems in Albany push for legalized gay marriage tomorrow on National Coming Out Day.
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Judith Regan Says Murdoch’s Wife Smacks Him AroundA diner at the Waverly Inn overheard Judith Regan claiming that Rupert Murdoch is regularly hit by wife Wendi. Marilyn Manson may or may not have been asking for coke and Adderall in the bathroom of Bette last week. Helena Christensen’s 7-year-old son, Mingus, is a chess genius. Howard Stern thinks Beth Ostrosky has invited too many people to their wedding. Lance Armstrong chatted with Blackstone’s Pete Peterson at the Four Seasons. Cindy Adams claims that Colin Powell told friends that he sympathizes with General Petraeus but that he’s “digging his own foxhole” (or some approximation thereof).
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Britney, Lindsay, Paris, You’re Fired!Donald Trump is trying to get Britney Spears, Lindsay Lohan, and Paris Hilton to appear on his upcoming Celebrity Apprentice. Justin Timberlake hung out with a brunette at the Tribeca Grand. (Others say he hung out with six girls.) NBC co-chairman Ben Silverman is catching flack for not returning agents’ phone calls and for passing out fake NBC tattoos at a company retreat, but he doesn’t care about either. New York Giants co-owner Jonathan Tisch put up his Fifth Avenue bachelor pad for sale and will be renting a $75,000-a-month condo at Trump Park Avenue. Authorities are cracking down on the St. Tropez party scene and have recently broken up a cocaine and prostitution ring.
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High TimesDuring his Van Halen days, David Lee Roth used to pay staffers to bring him girls backstage. Pete Doherty writes in his new memoir that he and Kate Moss will get married if he stays away from the drugs. Newly minted NBC chief and notorious party boy Ben Silverman finally took, and passed, his company drug test. Not one of the Republicans Michael Moore invited to the D.C. premiere of Sicko showed up.