I don't like writing about Jennifer Aniston, Brad Pitt, or Angelina Jolie any more than the majority of you like reading about them. But you have to admit, it is an interesting phenomena that so long after the divorce we're still supposed to care what Jennifer thinks of Angelina, and vice-versa. How is that news still? In five years from now they will make a movie together where they share .3 seconds of screen time and it will still be considered the biggest thing ever. They will both win Academy Awards for not killing each other. Acting!
But in the meantime Jennifer Aniston is on the cover of Vogue, saying that what Angelina did approximately a billion years ago was "not cool."
Oh, Jennifer Aniston, no. No no no. Why, after four years, would you even think about opening your mouth to a national publication about the rumored feud between you and Angelina Jolie? This just reeks of desperation and lends entirely too much credibility to the naysayers who claim you're bitter and resentful.
All of this nonsense is the result of Jen "icily" telling the newest issue of Vogue: "What Angelina did was very uncool." This, in light of Angie's recent revelation that she and Jen's ex-husband, Brad Pitt, fell in love during the making of Mr. and Mrs. Smith, contrary to earlier reports that the romance started only after filming.
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, indeed: during last night's screening of Brad Pitt's newest film, a security guy got a little grabby with the star in attempt to save him from all those non-famous people trying to take his picture.
And of course Brad, suave as ever, just sort of brushed the incident aside:
"Though they were exceptionally more aggressive than usual," Pitt describes the paparazzi to PEOPLE, "breaking through a security barrier and into a private holding area, ultimately [it was] just another day in the life…"
Ah yes, just another day in the life of Brad Pitt, poor guy. Always getting treated like a piece of meat with 10 or so adopted children and the most bangin' girlfriend in the world.
Angelina refused to squash rumors that she and Brad Pitt were considering adopting so soon after the birth of her twins, saying:
"We have so many children that they're not really stunned anymore when kids come home. They're all at that great age that they are not threatened. They're independent. They don't need Mommy and Daddy all the time."
Um, none of the kids are over the age of seven, right? Yeah, they are totes independent. You might as well send them all back to their country of origin and let them fend for themselves.
Remember when movie people had to exert even a minimum amount of effort and money for the opportunity to become multi-millionaires playing pretend? Well choke on it, taxpayer, because now film crews on the path to get rich don't have to do shit but show up, videotape a dog in a necklace running around California and cash their large checks, and all on your dime! Whaddya mean financial crisis?
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This week, Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt entered New York's orbit at the same time as Britney Spears, setting off everybody's e-meter and forcing the Catholic church to issue a statement that, no, the apocalypse was not before us. But what Ms. Jolie did allow, for the first time in many weeks, is to walk a red carpet (at the Changeling premiere) and have every tabloid pounce. Indeed, the five weeklies that hit newsstands every Wednesday all feature Jolie in some manner. But two in particular took wildly different approaches to the actress' lack of post-twins baby weight. CONTINUED »
In early 2005, the nation was shocked by the official revelation, after months of tabloid covers suggesting it, that Jennifer Aniston and Brad Pitt were splitting up. Of course, the official announcement came long after the couple made the decision to break up — and, stupidly, after the Christmas holiday when nobody cares about the news — but just in time for beacon of journalism Us Weekly to sic reporters Mara Reinstein and Joey Bartolomeo on the couple and, in five days, spit out a 40,000-word (large type) print book. An amazing feat of (ripped off?) reporting and celebrity news spin, to be sure.
And now, People is ready to carry on the tradition of rush publishing. CONTINUED »
Is it October already? Only asking because it seems like only days ago Angelina Jolie was selling her twin baby pictures to the highest bidder (People, fyi) and the rumors are already swirling that the couple are looking into acquiring more assets. Baby ass-ets:
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Right on the heels of the news that Candace Bushnell thinks she's the new Jane Austen and is in the process of writing a book of Carrie's teenage years we have news of a possible SATC sequel? (Although some overseas sources claim SJP nixed the idea.)
Down girl! Our collective cultural estrogen levels can't handle the pressure:
Getty photographer Brent Stirton just won the 2008 Visa d'Or Award for Feature photography for his acclaimed project on the slaughter of gorillas in the Democratic Republic of Congo. Maybe you've seen those photos, maybe you haven't. (We say: Make the effort.)
But there's another set of photos you've certainly spied: the People magazine pictures of Brangelina and their kids. Having shot Shiloh in 2006 and Knox and Vivienne this year (though uncredited), Stirton may have raised more cash ($20-plus million) and awareness for charity with his celebrity puff projects than the serious photojournalism he's made a career out of. CONTINUED »
Throw in another hundred thousand copies, and you end up with 2.6 million newsstand copies sold — up from the original 2.5m estimate — of People's cover of Brangelina babies Knox and Vivienne. Originally labeled a "disappointment" by some, the issue is actually the best-selling edition of People in seven years, and its fourth-best newsstand performer in the mag's 35-year history — "behind the Sept. 11 issue (4.1 million single copies), the issue covering Princess Diana’s death (3 million) and the one covering the death of John F. Kennedy Jr. (2.8 million)."
Though the issue sold 1.1m copies more than the 1.5 million People usually does at the newsstand, there's zero chance the tabloid recouped its share of the $14 million photo payment. Helping the situation, though, is the extended amount of time the issue was on newsstands (it was released two days early and will stay on newsstands for an eventual three weeks); the 50-cent jacked up cover price of $4.49; and your stupid willingness to pay to see babies that are not your own.
Remember when Janice Min used to dedicate entire spreads to calling out her competitors for their factual mistakes? Us Weekly's "Faux News" provided us with endless fodder. Often, Min aimed her ire at Bauer's In Touch and Life & Style for their Brangelina baby news. Worth mentioning, then, that In Touch is calling out none other than Us Weekly for its (supposedly) inaccurate Brangelina baby news: "Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt are setting the record straight about their newborn babies, Knox and Vivienne. Angelina denies US Weekly's recent report that she underwent fertility treatments. 'If they had been conceived though IVF, we would have been happy to discuss it,' she tells People magazine about the twins, who were born on July 12. 'But we have been fortunate never to have had fertility problems,' she adds."
When People teamed up with Britain's Hello! to offer a joint bid on Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie's baby twins, splitting the $14 million fee (that's $3.5m per twin per mag), the U.S. tabloid secured North American rights to the pics, while Hello! would get to print the photos in the rest of the world. One might've thought this would be an even deal, with shots from last week's photo shoot spread evenly between the tabloids. That wasn't the case, according to Jolie Expert and LAT blogger Elizabeth Snead: "Hello's cover shot is even cuter, more intimate and personal than People's." Did Larry Hackett got robbed?
Rushing to put its Bragenlina twins cover on the newsstands, People has come up with this: An exhausted Angelina Jolie in her grandmother's nightie; a middle-aged Brad Pitt sporting a salt-and-pepper beard and crow's feet; biological daughter and pristine human being Shiloh holding new sister Vivienne; a tucked-away newborn Vivienne; a shielded view of son Knox; and not a peep from those adopted kids — that's what the inside pages are for. [People]
In case you need a break from Dateline's episode about the U.S. Customs and Border Protection office, point your browser at People.com on Sunday at 7pm for an Internet hug.
The first public photos of Knox and Vivienne Jolie-Pitt have already been taken! And, despite our suggestion to nobody in particular that Brad and Angelina split their newborn twins into two separate photo shoots to really maximize profit potential, the babies were photographed together.
But the babies will be split up in one sense: People magazine has secured North American rights to the photos, while British tabloid Hello!, which sports numerous international editions, will have other worldwide rights.
Sound familiar? That's because People and Hello! teamed up in 2006 to publish Brangelina's other baby, Shiloh.
In the end, the price is pegged somewhere between $11 and $15 million, though that could be off by as much as a multiple of two. And while the price is certainly one for the record books (for now), keep in mind that the price includes two babies; so really, we're talking bargain.
Not that it's any consolation to OK! publisher Richard Desmond. CONTINUED »
Congratulations, People! You've been fingered as the winner in the bidding for Brad Pitt and Angelina's baby twin photos. And while OK!'s Richard Desmond opened up his checkbook to secure the photos, everyone sort of expected you to nab the pictures, since The World's Most Famous Couple has a soft spot for ya. Now that you've been chosen to pay some $15 million (plus or minus $7 million) to the charity of Brangelina's choice, the big remaining industry question is: Will Getty Images "photojournalist" Brent Stirton — who shot Shiloh Jolie-Pitt for People in 2006 — get the Knox and Vivienne assignment? It's the boring question that shows we, just like a tabloid, we can drag out a single storyline forever!
Brad Pitt's loudmouthed attorneys at Lavely & Singer are, preemptively, trying to clamp down on a series of photos that "were surreptitiously taken of Mr. Pitt and his family as they engaged in familial activities on private property, namely, in the privacy of the estate in which they are presently residing in France and where they had a reasonable expectation of privacy." Not content with issuing a cease and desist letter after the pictures' publication, L&S want to make sure these photos never make it into the public eye. (Too late, as you'll see.)
Supposedly, the publication of these photos — showing Pitt and wife Angelina Jolie with the kids — infringe not just on Pitt's privacy rights in the State of California, but also in France!
Except, according to one understanding of the law, this is wrong. Oh, and also? In Touch already published the pics. CONTINUED »
Look, it's Brad and Angelina! And their kids! Just not the new ones! [B-G]
Angelina Jolie is today expected to leave the hospital in Nice, France — where she gave birth to twins Knox and Vivienne — via helicopter. The same way she arrived.
Enterprising photographers have already chartered their own choppers to snap shots of her mid-flight, while legally responsible photographers will understand France's privacy laws might get them in trouble for that sort of thing.
There's also the possibility Jolie has already left the hospital, or is leaving another day, and will send look-a-like assistant Holly Goline aboard a helicopter to throw off the press. We quite like believing in these conspiracy theories.
Editorial Director
