Friday, February 29, 2008

Boy George Doesn’t Really Want To Hurt You, Or Gay Prostitutes, For That Matter

3:42PM Clem Bastow | Remember when that male escort (who we now know is called Audun Carlsen) accused Boy George (aka George O’Dowd) of chaining him to a wall and leaving him there? Well, George has just had the first of his days in court, and has pleaded ‘not guilty‘ to the charge of false imprisonment and assault. The 46-year-old, who shot to fame in the 1980s with Culture Club, stood outside the court and smoked a cigarette before entering the building. Dressed in black and wearing dark glasses, the singer was listed in court under his real name George O’Dowd. During the 20-minute hearing, he spoke only to confirm his name, state his not guilty plea and say he understood the terms of his bail. Poor old Georgie boy, he’s really not had the best run of luck when it comes to the law, has he? Perhaps he can write a smash hit musical about it all when it draws to a close. More »

Prince Harry Death-Marked Update: Embargos Make New Idea Cry

11:32AM Clem Bastow | We told you this morning that Prince Harry’s deployment was now in question thanks to loose-lipped media outlets breaking the embargo the British Army had requested. Well, it looks like the British Army, Lleyton Hewitt and Terri Irwin are not the only “fans” of New Idea out there – we wonder what point the News.com.au team are trying to convey here: New Idea’s response to their part in the fiasco essentially entails, “Enburgo, wat’s dat? We dun no bout dis fings!” They’ve said they were not advised of the embargo; however something tells us had the clowns at New Idea, you know, contacted the Palace press department, or perhaps the Army’s PR team, they may have wised up. Heaven forbid they actually research a story before running with it! Rumours Queen Elizabeth was planning to have the entire staff of New Idea kicked out of the Commonwealth could not be confirmed at time of press. More »

Gary Busey’s Crazy Train Keeps On Chugging

11:18AM Mark Graham | By now, you’ve likely seen the viral video in which the suddenly omnipresent Gary Busey castigates a child reporter on the red carpet for failing to speak loudly enough to penetrate the hardened layer of ear wax that he has built up over the years. But what you probably haven’t seen is the response of said child reporter Gracie Stagg, who is milking the moment for all it’s worth, just like a miniature Martin Bashir. WATCH VIDEO More »

Uh Oh, Tiger Lily (Maybe) Set To Become Child Actor

11:05AM Clem Bastow | This could well constitute “troubling news”: Tiger Lily, daughter of Michael Hutchence and Paula Yates and adopted daughter of Sir Bob Geldof, has apparently made a shortlist of young actresses in line to star in the latest cinematic adaptation of the popular Eloise books. Even though being a child actor isn’t necessarily the curse it once was, here’s hoping Tiger Lily is from the Frances Bean Cobain school rather than the Drew Barrymore-aged-8-to-16 school, and has only inherited her parents’ looks rather than their party MO. Tiger Lily and 10 other young actresses were shortlisted after the movie’s producers scoured schools in Britain, the US and Canada. Hollywood actress Uma Thurman has already been cast to play the nanny in the film. “Eloise has to be sassy, streetwise and extremely lovable, although she has a naughty side,” an unnamed source close to the film told the Daily Mail newspaper. Final auditions for the starring role will be held next week, the paper added. Eloise in Paris is based on the famous 50s children’s books by Kay Thompson. Casting Tiger Lily in the role would be an improvement on the dreadful existing film and TV versions of the character, but we’ll believe all this when we actually see proper quotes rather than just “sources”. In any case, we can’t see Sir Bob letting Tiger Lily hit Studio 54 for her 12th birthday – if his other daughters are any indication, that sort of shit is strictly for those aged 15 and above. More »

Buy Kylie’s Holiday House And You, Too, Can Eat Pies With Sauce!

10:07AM Clem Bastow | “Our” Kylie might not spend very much time here at all, but she’s still “Our” Kylie, if by birth certificate only – so we do get a little worried when the few tenuous ties we still have to the singing budgie are cut. So it was that we’re sure all Australians wailed in the streets when it was announced “Our” Kylie is selling her Victorian holiday house. However, no one is more disappointed at the news than the residents of French Island themselves, who will have to make do with misty watercolour memories of Kylie scoffing meat pies with sauce while holidaying on the Island. General store owner, postmaster and cafe owner Maurice Ralph said Kylie was well liked by the locals. “She’d come in here and get one of our King Island beef pies with our homemade tomato sauce,” he boasted. “They’re more weekenders than locals, but they’ve helped out in the community while they’ve been here. “They’ve donated money to the fire brigade and given a few people work on the property.” Bless; perhaps we are too harsh when it comes to “Our” Kylie’s Australian credentials, after all? Incidentally, if any Defamer Australia readers have a spare “$1.8 to $2 million” to splash and would like to buy us a new holiday house, you can view the property listing here. More »

If Prince Harry Gets Taken Out By A Taliban Sniper, Blame New Idea

9:55AM Clem Bastow | You may recall that early last year, Prince Harry cracked the sooks because there was talk the British Army wouldn’t let him go to the front line, fearing his “fame” would make him a target for a kidnapping or murder; his response at the time was the very princely, “There’s no way I’m going to put myself through Sandhurst and then sit on my arse back home while my boys are out fighting for their country.” Well, it turns out he did get his wish, but those clowns at New Idea thought they’d join forces with a gaggle of other questionable news portals and break the embargo agreed upon by the Army and the press, letting all and sundry know where Harry is, and what he’s doing there. Prince Harry has been fighting the Taliban on the front line in Afghanistan, the defence ministry in London said overnight. The 23-year-old prince, an officer in the Household Cavalry regiment, has spent the past 10 weeks secretly serving in the volatile southern province of Helmand, where most of Britain’s troops are based. His deployment makes him the first British royal to be sent on active military service in nearly 26 years, when his uncle, Prince Andrew, flew Royal Navy helicopters during the Falklands War with Argentina in 1982. The Ministry of Defence (MoD) had kept the young royal’s deployment secret under a news blackout agreed by British media to prevent details reaching insurgents and endangering the prince and his comrades. But the arrangement broke down after news was leaked out on the US website, the Drudge Report, which said that the Australian magazine New Idea and the German tabloid Bild were the first to break a world embargo. So, assuming high-ranking Taliban operatives are all New Idea subscribers (and let’s face it, what insurgents of questionable moral fibre aren’t), then when Harry comes home in a box we know who to blame. At least Terri Irwin and Lleyton Hewitt will go in fighting for his honour – they, too, hate New Idea! More »

Idol’s Rocker Nurse Mutilates A ’70s Classic

9:30AM Seth | We should probably preface this by saying that we have nothing against Joplinian (Janis, not Scott) American Idol contestant Amanda Overmeyer. For starters, she’s like this bull-dykey, hog-riding, hard-rocking nurse. That’s kind of awesome. When she was told she made it to the final 24, she did not dissolve into a weepy puddle of gratitude. Her “thing America doesn’t know about me” is that she enjoys the activity of reading (i.e., not communicating with the other mongoloid contestants). And she chose a freaking Kansas song for last night’s top ten girls’ competition. Watching this performance, however, we couldn’t help thinking that Overmeyer was one of those Angel of Death nurses, the song was the patient, and her interpretation was the fatal amount of morphine slipped surreptitiously into an I.V. when no one is looking. R.I.P., “Carry On Wayward Son.” More »

9:11AM Seth | Having just returned from a trip to Iraq, Angelina Jolie has penned an opinion piece for The Washington Post, in which she assessed her findings on how the war has devastated the people of that region: “More than 2 million people are refugees inside their own country — without homes, jobs and, to a terrible degree, without medicine, food or clean water. Ethnic cleansing and other acts of unspeakable violence have driven them into a vast and very dangerous no-man’s land. Many of the survivors huddle in mosques, in abandoned buildings with no electricity, in tents or in one-room huts made of straw and mud.” By way of fairness, the paper has opened up their op/ed section to Jennifer Aniston too, whose own column, “Whole Foods: Why Can’t They Stay Open Until 11?” should appear early next week. [WashPo] More »