According to Janet Jackson's rep, the singer "got suddenly ill during the sound check" before a concert last night in Montreal, resulting in a trip to the hospital:
Seven hundred years later, the matter of Janet Jackson's Super Bowl nipple may finally be put to rest. And CBS won't be paying for it. A federal appeals court has shot down the FCC's $550,000 fine against the network for its part in Nipplegate, when, during the 2004 football halftime show, Justin Timberlake revealed to 90 million people that Jackson has at least one of something that everybody has two of. The three-judge panel declared the FCC "deviated from its nearly 30-year practice of fining indecent broadcast programming only when it was so 'pervasive as to amount to "shock treatment" for the audience.'" Also: That nine-sixteenths of one second of bare breast, despite being TiVo-able and replayed endlessly by horny 13-year-olds, wasn't such a big deal.
God bless the New York Post's magazine round up, which, like Mediapost's Magazine Rack and Slate's Other Magazines, saves us from having to actually flip through the two dozen glossies that get messengered over every week. (But don't stop sending them! We read them for the … ads.)
And since we will only pick up Paper for the photos, it's great to know their current issue features "64 More Beautiful People," which is a follow up to every single issue they've ever published. Interview scores a Madonna interview, that barely passes journalistic muster, but, well, it is Interview. In Zink, the "embarrassingly bad design and poor production values" get in the way of the "decent fashion spreads in the back of the magazine, but they are so much better than the stuff in the front that they appear to be from another publication. Unfortunately, the stories aren't much better." And in BlackBook, "the photos of [Janet] Jackson trussed up in latex and headgear are supposed to be provocative, but the S&M spread comes across as silly playacting, and the interview with the pop star falls flat." Good to know. We'll wait for that Us Weekly.
As the Daily Mail reminds us, the album-promoting Janet Jackson is suddenly very svelte again, which means it might be time for Us Weekly's Janice Min to look back to June 2007 and resurrect one of the tabloid's best selling issues ever.
So, um, this is awkward. When Janet Jackson visited Larry King last night to hawk her album to the septuagenarian set, she also tried to teach him a few of the dance moves from her video for "Feedback," a song with the lyrics, "Something heavy like a first day period." If anything positive can be said for King's choreography, well, he didn't fart. (As he does in the video after the jump.)
COINCIDENCES Even though she's swore off marriage after two failed ones, Janet Jackson is suddenly rumored to be shopping for wedding dresses. Also, her album drops on Tuesday! The timely bit of promotional gossip wouldn't be the work of Jana Fleishman and her team at Def Jam, would it?
FUCK THE FCC In response to the long lasting, detrimental effects of America’s children seeing fully exposed buttocks on NYPD Blue, the FCC’s fines on the 90s drama will stick. Forty ABC affiliates have two days to pay $27,500. We can’t think of a good kicker right now; we’re still traumatized by Janet Jackson’s nipple. [B&C]
• Janet Jackson's future-husband refuses to forgive Justin Timberlake for leaving JJ high and dry in the aftermath of that whole totally spontaneous "wardrobe malfunction."
• Random House is voted the best publishing house to work for, which must be extremely reassuring for those first-year editorial assistants who are (barely) subsiding on ramen noodles, raw ambition and under $25K/year.
• Always on the frontlines of rising social trends, Sunday Styles reveals that going to weddings solo can be either incredibly lonely or a great place to pick up men.
• Raging wildfires blaze towards the coast in Southern California. Fortunately, the San Diego Zoo's Wild Animal Park has been closed and animals are being moved. Still in danger: Everybody else.
• What's more depressing: that people want to keep their hunting gun by their bed or that some couples can't share and are ordering two of these shot gun racks?
• We didn't mean to mock Rebecca Romijn twice in one day, but she looks so much like a certain drag queen we couldn't resist.
This is Jossip publisher David Hauslaib getting bleary-eyed with Post media scribe Keith Kelly. (Yes, that is one thumb way up.)
Keith had just returned from the bar with a Ketel One and soda for David, and a proper beer for himself. You see, when Keith arrived at In Touch's fifth anniversary party, he had been handed some sort of raspberry-and-pommegranite beer concoction. He did not like it. We're sure of that.
What we're unsure of it whether he enjoyed Kanye West's performance, because we were too busy noting how many feet apart a Post columnist and a New York Daily News columnist (in this case, Ben Widdicombe) should keep between them.
Eyeballing it, we guessed at least six or seven. CONTINUED »
Perhaps inspired by Britney, Michael Jackson is in talks for a new album and an international tour for late 2008 or early 2009. Since his siblings don’t have much going on, they’ll likely contribute. There’s even talk of a Michael and Janet tour, which would have been really exciting in the mid 90s.
But if “Scream” is any indication, at least their comeback will have better dancing than Britney’s.
"A federal appeals court on Tuesday will consider whether a notorious "wardrobe malfunction" that bared singer Janet Jackson's breast during a televised 2004 Super Bowl halftime show was indecent, or merely a fleeting and accidental glitch that shouldn't be punished." They will politely refrain from considering the fact that it's BEEN OVER THREE YEARS and half the country is still up in arms over a millisecond of errant nipple.
[AP via LAT]
• Eva Longoria is officially a desperate housewife.
• Ever wonder how many summer cocktails you can comfortable fit on Janet Jackson's rump? Well, turns out it's only three. Crazy, we know. We had eleven in our office pool.
• Drew Barrymore to become the newest Gucci girl. Upcoming: Barrymore to tarnish Gucci's fashion-forward reputation by making out with awkward hipster Zach Braff.
• Eva Mendes reminds us that is still possible to look hot in a bikini without being grossly underweight.
• Meanwhile, is it sad that we're super jealous of Kerri Russell's post-baby weight?
• Why it really, really sucks to have a baby in early July.
• Lance Bass, doing what he does best: sucking.
• From Stereohyped: "Neverland has 3,000 acres - [Michael Jackson] likes privacy. You can’t find as many properties like that on the West Coast.” Which is weird, actually, cause we thought there were a ton of crazy effeminate millionaires who owned village-sized estates complete with giant roller coasters.
• Robbie Williams takes a break from inhaling java to leak an excerpt of a new crazy religious track.
• Janet Jackson loses her battle with losing weight.
• Hugh Grant personally subsidized Divine Brown's children's college education.
We've always loved Madonna. From the controversial "black Jesus" video to the fledgling movie career to the middle aged love affair with her obviously gay trainer yoga, Madge has always been chock full of surprises.
Like the time she managed to dance up a storm with Shakira and Demi Moore and ignore Janet Jackson while simultaneously heading home before midnight with Jackson in tow.
We were, quite honestly, willing to let Janice Min's fourth straight week of fingering the competition's errors get a pass this week.
After all, if the Us Weekly EIC (fueled by the rage of Jann Wenner) is intent on making the other tabs look bad while ignoring her own mistakes week after week, who are we to stop the self-humiliation?
It was all fun and games in the beginning. Nobody was getting hurt, except maybe the Bauer tabs.
But in the issue that's been sitting on newsstands for the better part of a week, Janice insisted on not just slamming her rivals at In Touch and Life & Style (and obvious punching bag OK!), but Star as well. (It's worth noting, however, that the Star cover she chose was last week's — helmed by new EIC Candace Trunzo, and not her former mentor Bonnie Fuller.)
And still, we thought, "Just let the lady rage!" That was, until, we read Howie Kurtz's piece this morning. CONTINUED »
No sooner do we get done passing along rumors of massive upheaval at Def Jam – executives fleeing, 40 people laid off – than Jermaine Dupri, who runs the Island label under Def, announces he's signing girlfriend Janet Jackson away from rival Virgin. Certainly that'll help squash rumors that the label has become a playground for its executives who are throwing cash around. (Janet's latest, 20 Y.O, has moved just 650,000 copies domestically and is widely considered a bomb.)
And of course, over at Warner Music, they're laying off 400. Good! Times!
• Was it even a question what the front page of today's NYDN would look like?
• More O.J. Simpson book and special cancelation fall out, but let's just call it what it is: News Corp. lost its balls.
• The children of murdered NYT reporter David Rosenbaum file a $20 million lawsuit against the hospital that allegedly ignored the gunshot victim until it was too late.
• CBS finally grows a pair and defends Janet Jackson's nip slip in court.
• Sumner Redstone faces mutiny in the family, with a lawsuit from nephew Michael on charges the media titan stole from a trust.
• Simon Dumenco gives thanks to all those who gave him something to gripe about.
• Heather Mills McCartney may or may not have once been available for four-figures a night.
• Though it's yet to be seen if Michael Jackson will actually make it to the World Music Awards, sister Janet is nearly certain a no show. Something about the $400,000 it would cost to invite her.
• Gayle King claims she left her husband because he cheated on her. Not because of her "special relationship" with Oprah.
• Roger Friedman continues his TomKat wedding scoopaganza with news that Penelope Cruz, among others in Tom Cruise's past, will not be welcome at the nuptials.
• It isn't Jude's turn to cry this time around. He's the one who dumped Sienna Miller, for partying too hard while he tries so hard to, ahem, be a doting dad.
• Tom Ford wanted to spread his man crotch scent beyond the cover of VF.
With Anna Wintour taking Editor of the Year and More magazine winning Magazine of the Year at AdAge's A-List awards ceremony at the American Magazine Conference late last month, perhaps all that hype overshadowed one interesting development: Gone from any of AdAge's spots was Us Weekly, the tabloid that landed Bonnie Fuller the Editor of the Year award in 2004. Last year, Us Weekly was given the No. 3 spot (People took No. 1). And this year? While People remains on the list at No. 6, Us Weekly is noticeably absent — but one of its competitors is not. Coming in at No. 10 is In Touch, the surprise hit from Bauer that's exceeded circulation expections quarter after quarter. (Us is also AWOL from Ad Week's line up.)
Meanwhile, we're hearing word that Janice Min's supposed best-selling issue ever – Janet Jackson's "How I Got Thin" from June 5, when Min was actually on maternity leave – is having its revenue grab questioned. Initially pegged to have pulled in $1.4 million in sales, that number has dropped to $1.3m, and then again to $1.2m. And its circ numbers from that issue, yet to be audited, may be revealed to be relatively flat compared to other issues' numbers. Naturally, Wenner Media's talking heads will deny as much.
Editorial Director
