ACTUALLY, WE WERE SEEKING TO PROVIDE THE SENSORY EQUIVALENT OF ONE OF OUR JAMS …
While crossing the Kinzie Street Bridge in August, the Dave Matthews Band’s bus allegedly dumped about 800 pounds of raw sewage onto a Chicago River architecture-tour boat carrying 120 passengers, several of whom were taken to the hospital after getting the human waste in places you just don’t want that stuff to go. Without accepting responsibility, the band donated $50,000 to the Park District and a non-profit group that protects the river.
THIS JUST IN: PRESIDENT BUSH ALSO STEPPING DOWN IN 2009!
In the “How can we miss you if we’ll be sipping dinner out of a straw by the time you leave?” category, Disney CEO Michael Eisner announced his retirement, effective late 2006, Chicago Symphony Orchestra music director Daniel Barenboim announced he’ll leave his post in 2006, and “Tonight Show” host Jay Leno gave word that he’ll step down in 2009.
WE’RE DISTURBED BY THAT BIT ABOUT “THE FALAFEL THING” AS WELL
Bill O’Reilly (above), the Fox News talk-show host/Puritanical scold/children’s book author/married man, forked over a settlement (thought to be in the millions) to former producer Andrea Mackris who sued him for sexual harassment. The suit recounted his lurid, self-pleasuring fantasies in such nauseating detail that … well, let’s just say we’ll never look at a loofah mitt in quite the same way.
WE PREFER YOUR DUMB SISTER
Ashlee Simpson spoke out against lip-syncing in a magazine interview, subsequently got caught lip-syncing and did a bizarre hoedown on “Saturday Night Live.” Afterward she blamed her band, her dad and acid reflux. This lovely message, purportedly written by Ashlee, was also posted on her Web site in response to postings ripping her: “Once i can get in contact with the web-master, everythings[sic] getting deleted. It doesn’t matter anyway, there’s too many important people behind my career to stop it now.” Ashlee, we saw your maniacally self-involved opening set for sis Jessica over the summer. You’re destined for “The Surreal Life.”
AND BY THE WAY, YOUR DAD IS REALLY CREEPY
Joe Simpson, his daughters’ manager, offered this fatherly assessment to GQ:
‘Jessica never tries to be sexy. She just is sexy. If you put her in a T-shirt or you put her in a bustier, she’s sexy in both. She’s got double D’s! You can’t cover those suckers up!’
WEAPONS OF MASS CULTURAL DESTRUCTION
Janet Jackson’s boob, Nicolette Sheridan’s back.
NEXT YEAR’S EMCEE: JERRY SPRINGER
As hip-hop producer Dr. Dre was about to receive his lifetime achievement award at the Vibe Awards in November, rapper Jimmy James Johnson fed him a knuckle sandwich, sparking a chair-throwing, punches-flying melee in which John-son was stabbed, allegedly by fellow rapper Young Buck. The “disruption,” as organizers called it, was edited out of the UPN broadcast of the event.
BUREAUCRACY IS HOT
San Antonio’s City Council approved a measure requiring strippers to apply for business licenses that they must wear — and not peel off and twirl around their fingers and fling toward some drooling man — while performing.
SOUNDS LIKE THE PLOT OF “OCEAN’S THIRTEEN”
An “Ocean’s Twelve” promotion went awry when a $350,000 diamond was embedded on the nose of a Formula One racing car for the Monaco Grand Prix — and the car crashed into a guardrail. The diamond never was recovered.
STOP HIM BEFORE HE FILMS AGAIN
Ben Stiller (above) used to be a name synonymous with laugh-out-loud comedies (“Flirting With Disaster,” “There’s Something About Mary,” “Meet the Parents”), but he has squandered all goodwill with the 2004 cinematic assault that was “Along Came Polly,” “Starsky & Hutch,” “Envy,” “Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story,” “Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy” (unfunny cameo) and “Meet the Fockers.”
HIS CAREER IS AS OVER AS THE EGGS FLIPPED OFF THE GRIDDLE AT GORDY’S KENTUCKY BACKROADS DINER
“CBS Evening News” anchorman Dan Rather announced his retirement months after airing a report questioning President Bush’s National Guard service based on unsubstantiated — and apparently bogus — documents.
BECAUSE SHOWING AMERICANS THE HARSH REALITIES OF WAR WOULD BE INDECENT
Sixty-six ABC affiliates, covering 30 percent of the country and including stations in Dallas and Atlanta, declined to air the network’s Veterans Day showing of Steven Spielberg’s “Saving Private Ryan” for fear of reprisals by the newly aggressive Federal Communications Commission — even though the network aired the movie uncut in 2001 and 2002 with no problem.
NO BOBBLEHEADS, THOUGH
George Lucas has nothing on Mel Gibson in the merchandising game, as “The Passion of the Christ” spun off such nifty product tie-ins as “Passion Nail” pendants and key rings.
“THE ALAMO” AND “KING ARTHUR” WERE BOMBS TOO
Michael Eisner’s beleaguered Disney company barred Miramax from distributing Michael Moore’s Bush-bashing documentary “Fahrenheit 9/11” and dumped it off to a “fellowship” comprising Lions Gate, IFC Films and Miramax’s Weinstein brothers. “Fahrenheit 9/11” grossed $119 million domestically and $219 million worldwide. “America’s Heart and Soul,” the flag-waving documentary that Disney chose to open on the 4th of July weekend, grossed a total of $314,000.
WHERE’S THE FCC WHEN YOU ACTUALLY NEED IT?
The Sinclair Broadcast Group thought it was appropriate to direct its 62 television stations to run a John Kerry-bashing documentary on the public airwaves just days before the presidential election. This is the same company that prohibited its ABC affiliates from airing Ted Koppel’s reading of the names of Iraq’s U.S. soldier casualties on “Nightline.” Protests led Sinclair to run a watered-down version of the Kerry special.
R. KELLY’S TURN TO GET P.O.’D
Naysayers said egomaniacs R. Kelly (below, right) and Jay-Z (below, left) could never co-exist on a joint tour — and they were right. The Best of Both Worlds Tour ended abruptly after a Madison Square Garden performance in which Kelly was pepper-sprayed by a member of Jay-Z’s entourage after he stopped the show so audience members could be searched for guns. Kelly sued Jay-Z for $75 million for “sabotaging” the tour. Jay-Z’s camp blamed the scuttling of the tour’s final shows on Kelly’s “lack of professionalism and unpredictable behavior.”
PLEASE, PLEASE, INCLUDE THIS AS A NUTTY OUTTAKE ON “THE SEA INSIDE” DVD
Javier Bardem, much lauded for his performance as a bedridden quadriplegic determined to die in “The Sea Inside,” celebrated at the movie’s premiere party by dancing so wildly that he head-butted and broke the nose of E! Entertainment correspondent/former model Jill Marshall.
BECAUSE THOSE LIBERAL PBS FOLKS ACTUALLY THINK IT’S STILL THE 1950s
Fearing viewer complaints, New York City public television station WNET yanked an ad — oh, excuse us, an “enhanced underwriting spot” — for the movie “Kinsey,” which depicts how Alfred Kinsey’s now-mainstream findings about sexuality were greeted with hysteria in their time.
NEVER MIND SHOOTING THE PIANO PLAYER. WAKE THE GUY UP!
Communing with himself on a dimly lit stage in a darkened auditorium, emitting distracting hissing noises when the going got fast and furious, pianist Ivo Pogore-lich appeared to regard the audience attending his Nov. 21 Orchestra Hall recital as if he wished we weren’t there. If this guy gets any stranger, he could give eccentricity a bad name.
THE MOVIE SOMEHOW MANAGED TO GET THE WORD OUT, ANYWAY
Major League Baseball announced and then canceled a widely criticized promotional plan in which the bases and on-deck circle would have been decorated with “Spider-Man 2” webbed logos for a weekend of interleague play.
HER PREROGATIVE
Britney Spears got that starter marriage out of the way quickly, marrying high school buddy Jason Alexander for all of 55 hours in a well-lubricated New Year’s Eve ceremony in Las Vegas.
OOPS! SHE DID IT AGAIN
Having learned that true love isn’t something to rush into, Spears waited until September to embark upon her second starter marriage, to dancer Kevin Federline (above).
OH, SO THAT’S THE SECRET OF HER NEW FRAGRANCE
On a recent flight from Los Angeles to New York, a flight attendant had to ask Spears to put her shoes back on because fellow passengers were complaining about her stinky feet.
SO WHO’S THE REAL DOPE?
Despite releasing a lame greatest-hits package and giving every sign that she’s washed up, Spears managed to stay in the headlines all year. Good thing there’s been nothing more important to report on.
JUST TO PROVE THE POINT THAT “CROSSFIRE” INSPIRES JUVENILE BICKERING
We were vastly entertained by Jon Stewart (above) calling CNN’s “Crossfire” co-host Tucker Carlson the nickname for Richard, but, gosh, maybe there are more effective ways to argue for raising the level of civility and integrity in debate.
Illustration by Hanoch Piven
CULTURAL OUTREACH, THE CHICAGO WAY
What if you threw a party and kicked everyone out halfway through? That’s what the city did with its Flamenco 2004 concert series when police officers and fire marshals abruptly halted the second-ever North American performance by the acclaimed Spanish nuevo flamenco group Ojos de Brujo at the North Side club Martyrs’. The shutdown came after a disgruntled customer, who had complained about the show’s delayed starting time, apparently called the police and fire de-partments, who determined that the well-behaved crowd exceeded the club’s capacity.
NAMING A BABY IS ONE OF THE MOST PERSONAL THINGS IN THE WORLD, AND RIDICULING PARENTS’ CHOICES IS RUDE AND UNSEEMLY
Now that we got that out of the way … Phinnaeus and Hazel? Apple???
HEY, WE HAD THIS CYNICAL, SCUMSUCKING IDEA FIRST!
Creators of the ABC show “Wife Swap” sued the Fox Network for its “copycat” reality series “Trading Spouses.” No word on whether Maury Povich, the premier bottom-feeder in exploitative questionable-paternity entertainment, plans to sue Fox for this week’s debut of “Who’s Your Daddy,” in which an adopted woman gets $100,000 if she can pick out her biological father from a lineup of impostors. An imposter wins the cash if the woman falls for his ruse and picks him as her pop.
