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canada goose coats at 2013/09/01 06:22 AM

<p>Butler is best known for starring in the cult TV show Witchblade and appearing in action movies such as Drop Zone. She is repped by Don Buchwald &amp; Associates/Fortitude and Framework Entertainment.</p>?["entry_id":"1947488","entry_url":"http:\/\/www.huffingtonpost.com\/2012\/10\/08\/the-amazing-race-twins-dead-fish-video_n_1947488.html","content_type":"image","image_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/235502\/slide_235502_1154783_small.jpg","thumbnail_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/235502\/slide_235502_1154783_small.jpg","title":"CBS Shows","slideshow_id":"235502","vertical":"tv","entry_id":"1945217","entry_url":"http:\/\/www.huffingtonpost.com\/katherine-patke\/30-rock-final-season-premiere-recap_b_1945217.html","content_type":"image","image_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/223025\/slide_223025_1576901_small.jpg","thumbnail_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/223025\/slide_223025_1576901_small.jpg","title":"30 Rock","slideshow_id":"223025","vertical":"tv","entry_id":"1947424","entry_url":"http:\/\/www.huffingtonpost.com\/2012\/10\/08\/simpsons-treehouse-of-horror-paranormal-activity-video_n_1947424.html","content_type":"image","image_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/251866\/slide_251866_1547691_small.jpg","thumbnail_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/251866\/slide_251866_1547691_small.jpg","title":"The Simpsons Season 24","slideshow_id":"251866","vertical":"tv","entry_id":"1947240","entry_url":"http:\/\/www.huffingtonpost.com\/2012\/10\/08\/rehab-with-dr-drew-miscarriage-video_n_1947240.html","content_type":"image","image_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/246482\/slide_246482_1420753_small.jpg","thumbnail_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/246482\/slide_246482_1420753_small.jpg","title":"Where We Left Off And What&#039;s Ahead For Your Favorite Shows","slideshow_id":"246482","vertical":"tv","entry_id":"1945278","entry_url":"http:\/\/www.huffingtonpost.com\/nick-antonelli\/americas-next-top-model-recap_b_1945278.html","content_type":"image","image_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/241994\/slide_241994_1307647_small.jpg","thumbnail_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/241994\/slide_241994_1307647_small.jpg","title":"America&#039;s Next Top Model","slideshow_id":"241994","vertical":"tv","entry_id":"1943737","entry_url":"http:\/\/www.huffingtonpost.com\/2012\/10\/05\/rachael-taylor-666-park-avenue_n_1943737.html","content_type":"image","image_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/226524\/slide_226524_977878_small.jpg","thumbnail_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/226524\/slide_226524_977878_small.jpg","title":"New ABC Series","slideshow_id":"226524","vertical":"tv","entry_id":"1944909","entry_url":"http:\/\/www.huffingtonpost.com\/2012\/10\/06\/celebrity-diving-show_n_1944909.html","content_type":"image","image_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/241358\/slide_241358_1290807_small.jpg","thumbnail_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/241358\/slide_241358_1290807_small.jpg","title":"&quot;Dancing With The Stars: All-Stars&quot; Cast","slideshow_id":"241358","vertical":"tv","entry_id":"1943945","entry_url":"http:\/\/www.huffingtonpost.com\/2012\/10\/05\/nicki-minaj-mariah-carey-american-idol-feud-fake_n_1943945.html","content_type":"image","image_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/214224\/slide_214224_781591_small.jpg","thumbnail_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/214224\/slide_214224_781591_small.jpg","title":"Celebrity Feuds","slideshow_id":"214224","vertical":"tv","entry_id":"1943768","entry_url":"http:\/\/www.huffingtonpost.com\/2012\/10\/05\/the-good-wife-maura-tierney-and-the-law-won-preview_n_1943768.html","content_type":"image","image_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/243947\/slide_243947_1534342_small.jpg","thumbnail_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/243947\/slide_243947_1534342_small.jpg","title":"The Good Wife Season 4","slideshow_id":"243947","vertical":"tv","entry_id":"1943506","entry_url":"http:\/\/www.huffingtonpost.com\/2012\/10\/05\/american-horror-story-asylum-plot_n_1943506.html","content_type":"image","image_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/248638\/slide_248638_1474521_small.jpg","thumbnail_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/248638\/slide_248638_1474521_small.jpg","title":"American Horror Story: Asylum Photos","slideshow_id":"248638","vertical":"tv","entry_id":"1943888","entry_url":"http:\/\/www.huffingtonpost.com\/2012\/10\/05\/smash-producers-new-musical-drama_n_1943888.html","content_type":"image","image_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/210883\/slide_210883_719756_small.jpg","thumbnail_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/210883\/slide_210883_719756_small.jpg","title":"2012 Renewal Index: Canceled, Safe and on the Bubble Shows","slideshow_id":"210883","vertical":"tv","entry_id":"1945061","entry_url":"http:\/\/www.huffingtonpost.com\/2012\/10\/06\/chace-crawford-gossip-girl_n_1945061.html","content_type":"image","image_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/252911\/slide_252911_1569845_small.jpg","thumbnail_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/252911\/slide_252911_1569845_small.jpg","title":"'Gossip Girl' Season 6","slideshow_id":"252911","vertical":"tv"]?<p>UPDATE: The trailer isn't quite ready yet, so it and the photos have been removed.</p><p>PREVIOUSLY: <br>Julianne Moore has a teary makeout scene with Amanda Seyfried in the upcoming thriller "Chloe." Seyfried, last seen on "Big Love" and kissing Megan Fox in the flop "Jennifer's Body" plays a temptress hired by Julianne Moore's character to try and seduce Moore's husband Liam Neeson, to see if he would cheat.</p><p>The French-subtitled version of the trailer has leaked online and is below, which includes Seyfried walking naked, Moore ripping open Seyfried's blouse and the aforementioned makeout scene.</p><p>"Chloe" is the movie Neeson was filming when his wife Natasha Richardson passed away last year.<br></p> <br>?<p>Chloe Sevigny is reportedly in final negotiations to appear in Season 2 of "American Horror Story." </p><p>, Sevigny would play Shelly, a nymphomaniac who is one of Jessica Lange's character's mortal enemies. </p><p>The former "Big Love" star isn't the only new cast member headed to the FX drama. . </p><p>"It's going to be fun and I told [creator Ryan Murphy] I didn't really know what i was doing, but he didn't seem to care," Levine said in an interview with Ryan Seacrest. "So, I'm going to go and just try to be acting. I think I'm going to be playing myself, so hopefully it will be easy."</p><p>Sevigny, if she signs on, and Levine join confirmed returning cast members Jessica Lange, Sarah Paulson, Zachary Quinto, Evan Peters and Lily Rabe. But in Season 2, these "American Horror Story" vets since the sophomore season will be drastically different from its first season, including an East Coast setting in another era.</p><p>"[Season 2] has nothing to do with Season 1; there's not a mention of Season 1," . "The second season is set in a completely different time period." </p><p>Since the end of "Big Love," Sevigny has continued to appear on the small screen: </p><p>What do you think of Chloe Sevigny appearing in Season 2 of "American Horror Story"? Let us know in the comments. </p><p>Related on HuffPost:</p> <br>?Community Notice:We've made some changes to our badge program, including the addition<br>of our newest badge: Community Curator.?<p>The ice-age of no dialogue between minds, hearts and spirits has begun. The only escape route leads downwards, into dreams, for some into the graveyard. -- Playwright Heiner Muller, accepting the Kleist Prize in 1990, quoted in Berlin And Its Culture: A Historical Portrait, by Ronald Taylor (Yale University Press, 1997)</p><p>Few cities have as many layers of history reflected in their streets, recreational places, monuments, plazas, shopping areas, parks, museums, and other public spaces as Berlin. Key arena for the unfolding of the Reformation, Enlightenment, Romanticism, Prussian nationalism, industrialism, Weimar modernism, Nazism, and finally the East-West split between the communist and capitalist zones that ended as recently as 1989, Berlin contains every kind of contradiction for the tourist to hit on, as much as for the historian. For every impulse, there is an antidote to be found. </p><p>What can be the role of the flaneur in a city as visibly constructed by its altering historical statuses? If history is neither denied nor repressed, can there be serendipitous discovery? Is this proposition, first of all, true? Can a city escape its past(s) to reemerge as a new entity, to conform with the demands of new eras in socioeconomic arrangements? The present world crisis was set off, arguably, by the fall of the Berlin Wall, creating a chaos that has yet to find a resting point. A city supposedly merged, to become whole again, while the globe is still reeling from the wars and genocides that have ensued in its wake, as the global balance-of-power has gone off-kilter. </p><p>Chloe Aridjis is the daughter of a famous Mexican diplomat and writer, and was born in New York but grew up in Mexico City and the Netherlands. In (Black Cat, Grove/Atlantic), she has written a deceptively simple novel, which undertakes the almost impossible task of merging the binaries to make the project of history invisible again, to remove it again to the barriers of marginality and haze (this is not necessarily the project of her protagonist Tatiana's mentor, Weiss, however, as we shall soon see). </p><p>For Aridjis, this seems to be the only way we can make historical meaning central again: by admitting its mystical, unknowable, genetic aspects, not treating it as a matter of complete(d) knowledge.</p><p>The novel's first-person narrator, Tatiana, has settled in contemporary Berlin for five years, having left behind her observant Jewish family, who keep a kosher deli in Mexico. She has mastered enough German to find a job as transcriber for the aged, eminent historian Friedrich Weiss, an expert in the various mythologies Berlin has chosen to embody over time. </p><p>Tatiana exemplifies the early twenty-first century "cool" feminist, intellectual to the core, unable and unwilling to fall for any of the traditional verities of love, family, and intimacy. Weiss may be old, but Tatiana is older than her years. Berlin for her is a place of self-chosen exile, the city where dreams have gone to become not necessarily nightmares, but wispy illusions of diligence and rectitude she must forever keep chasing. </p><p>We have here the concept of the nineteenth-century dandyish flanuer, as first conceptualized by Baudelaire--bourgeois, idle, wealthy--reversed in each of its key elements. The city seems as much in search of Tatiana--to reveal its naked orientation to multiple layers of history--as the other way around. Weiss and Tatiana's project, in one respect, is really one and the same: to pin down the history of the city before it emerges into full-blown chaos. </p><p>The most fruitful field for all of nineteenth and twentieth-century literature has been the modern city's anomalous visibilities in competition with the individual's search for wholeness (which gives rise to an intense realism of the object). Tatiana knows, with the weight of past literary endeavor, it is impossible to find the true Berlin, but try she must.</p><p>The short novel opens with one of the most disorienting scenes in recent fiction: it is 1986, and Tatiana is on a brief earlier visit to Berlin, along with her parents and siblings. On the U-Bahn, packed with anti-Wall demonstrators, she is sure she sees Hitler--dressed as a woman, ancient yet virile, with his unmistakable features. Much later, when she will relate this to Weiss, they will figure his age then to have been ninety-seven--if, in fact, she saw Hitler, on the probability of which Weiss remains mute. Tatiana tries to call her family's attention to Hitler, and the 'gray buzzards"--SS men carefully guarding the Fuhrer--but is unable to do so in the crowd; as always, the sensitive agonist is condemned to loneliness.</p><p>Many years later Tatiana is back in Berlin, yearning to be part of the culture of the city, yet too diffident and detached to fall for its seductions. The tall television tower becomes her frame of reference in terms of the spatial coordinates; she lives very near it. One day she finds a Xolo outside a cafe, apparently stray, and longs to own it, but by the time she makes up her mind, the dog is gone. The dog turns out to belong to Professor Weiss. Does he still publish? There are tons of journals with articles by him, but they seem to cease in the seventies. Then why does he keep dictating so many lectures and notes, why does he still keep writing? </p><p>Noting her intelligence, Weiss soon gives her greater responsibilities: he starts sending her on interviews, related to what different residents remember about their experience of Berlin at discrete points in history. </p><p>The first interview, with Jonas Krantz, a freelance meteorologist who lives in a rundown part of the city, dominated by newfangled Nazis, goes really well, and Tatiana is sent on other interviews. Once she forgets to bring Weiss's questions to an important bureaucrat. Another time she picks her own interview subject, the "Simpleton"--an innocent-looking blonde woman who perpetually stands with a smile at a certain corner on Alexanderplatz; but the Simpleton turns out to speak in a demonic gibberish, which Tatiana, however, faithfully transcribes. Weiss is disappointed; this is not the kind of remembrance he is after. </p><p>Tatiana briefly gives in to Jonas's romantic overtures, and on their first date, to a party which promises underground pleasures, occurs the second key mystical event in Tatiana's Berlin experience.</p><p>Some of the partiers at the abandoned old post office in Mitte where Tatiana and Jonas are drinking and dancing decide to pay a short visit to an underground bowling alley, used by either the Gestapo or the (East German) Stasi, where the bowling scores still remain intact in chalk. Jonas decides not to go, but Tatiana does, experiencing powerful emotions as she imagines the victors of Berlins of the past--whatever secret police it really was--reveling in the underground. </p><p>As the group starts leaving, she has the unvanquishable impulse to erase the chalk scores. While she attempts to do so, she is left behind by the group, unable to find her way back to them in the complete darkness. Within minutes she is hallucinating about gray figures arriving to put an end to her life, although it only turns out to be the group leader who has noticed her absence. (For a contrast, think of the underground scene in Fellini's Roma, where the murals painted on the walls in some ancient time involuntarily get erased, through the sheer fact of exposure to sunlight after eons of darkness.) </p><p>In this memorable scene in the middle of the book, just as in the Hitler one at the beginning, Aridjis shows how the present is an illusion that can escape in a minute, if we don't watch out. </p><p>Darkness closes in within a brief space of time, if we give in to the urge to erase, to eradicate, which follows from the urge to explore. (Is Weiss the wise one then, for removing all apparent traces of emotion from his archival research? Is dispassionate historical analysis, rigorous but well after the fact and in a sense cognizant of its ultimate impotence, the best we can hope for?) </p><p>Following this nightmarish experience, Weiss tells Tatiana, "Buildings retain their energy." Weiss wants to send her there again, perhaps to take pictures, but Tatiana says she'll never go back there, that she "will try to avoid underground spaces as much as possible." </p><p>But Weiss responds that "Spaces above harbor a similar energy. It's not just spaces below.... A building's memory resides just as much in its upper space as in its lower ones." </p><p>Tatiana tells him about inscrutable noises she hears from the apartment above hers, upon which Weiss instructs her, "You should go investigate. Go upstairs and see what you find." Weiss is always the dispassionate investigator, whereas Tatiana is haunted by anxiety about what she will find, if she looks close enough. </p><p>A point to think about here is that the first precondition of exile, internal or external, is the ability to overcome anxiety, that generalized dread so typical of the intelligent person inhabiting the modern city, by integrating its elements as the core of one's being. Weiss, in many ways, is the true exile, Tatiana only a faint approximation to his paradigmatic condition. The novel revolves around this oscillation. </p><p>It is near this time that on the train, at night, Tatiana sees an old man in a red cape, a transvestite, who she feels certain must be Weiss. So the old historian leads a scandalous double life after all? She wants badly to tap him on the shoulder to confirm her suspicion, but is unable to do so. </p><p>Is this Weiss's underground life? Can the historian (the artist or intellectual in general) lead this kind of second life, vulnerable to critique by traditional moralizers--as long as it doesn't interfere with his dispassionate researches aboveground, so to speak? </p><p>But according to Weiss's theories, the different realms are inseparable, they infect each other. Who is the real man? Where is the real city? At what disconcerting points do they meet (and clash) and can the artist be present at those illuminating moments of merger? Is the merger always a separation (like the child issuing from the womb, permanently altering the original condition, yet inescapably rooted in it)?</p><p>The final mystical moment of the book occurs at the end when Weiss and Tatiana take up Jonas on his invitation for them to visit his apartment, to let Weiss talk to him more about his memories of the Wall as he experienced it as a child. </p><p>Following the visit, Jonas offers to walk them back to the main street, but Weiss is insistent on doing without Jonas's help, since he is supposed to know Berlin's streets and alleys like the back of his hand (he hasn't been to this neighborhood, Marzahn, in many years, in reality). They quickly get lost, and two muggers assail the lost explorer-historians. Weiss is thrown to the ground and badly injured. </p><p>One of the assailants seizes "the Mexican with the warm crotch," perhaps to rape her, when a blinding fog descends, so thick that the whole city is unable to see anything, and our would-be killers and rapists are disabled. Tatiana walks back toward the city, where people are groping in blindness, to get the help of the police. Later, after visiting Weiss in the hospital, it is not clear whether the assailants had been in turn mobbed by more ferocious Nazis. Had there even been clouds in the first place, or was it Tatiana's imagination? Aridjis more or less ends on this intriguing note. </p><p>What is the nature of the deep fog that prevents true consummations--both sexual/orgiastic/fulfilling, and their opposite, murderous/rapist/erasive--from taking place in the city? Or is it that we need certain degrees of fog, overwhelming at times, simply to function in any great modern city with its various burdens of history?</p><p>The reader will answer for herself the various meanings in Book of Clouds of the aboveground/underground relations, the meaning of the clouds themselves, the nature of the intelligent soul as reflected in the Tatiana/Weiss dichotomy, but it is clear that this is only a preliminary investigation, for the twenty-first century (twenty-two years removed now from the declared "end of history") of the city as live organism, in touch with all its various pasts regardless of developers' and builders' intentions to erase whatever they find objectionable, the cracks and fissures both terrifying and tranquilizing for the artist to contemplate. </p><p>Oh, and by the way, Tatiana returns to Mexico (to a presumably duller life), having had her fill of Berlin after the mugging experience. Her "papers" may always have been in order, but papers alone don't determine how long a person chooses to make a city her own. </p><p>The fog cannot necessarily envelop individualist chaos. There is, perhaps, something more durable than the domineering modernist city, after all--though we don't yet know what it is. <br> <br>This review appears in the current issue of .</p><p> has just finished a novel, Karachi Raj. His other books are (May 2012), (2012), (2011), and (2009). </p>?<p>While she made a name for herself as the effortlessly beautiful lead in "Gossip Girl," Blake Lively has been known to switch it up from time to time.</p><p>She played a weathered mother in a push-up bra in Ben Affleck's "The Town" and now we get to see Lively play a down-home Southern girl in "Hick."</p><p>Starring alongside Chloe Moretz, Eddie Redmayne, Juliette Lewis and Alec Baldwin, the movie is an adaptation of Andrea Portes's novel. The story follows a 13-year-old Nebraska girl who runs away to Las Vegas only to find herself in sticky, often troubling situations.</p><p>In the clip below Moretz and the actress/Chanel model whisper over a chiseled-featured boy in a cowboy hat who is, allegedly, following them. </p><p>Regardless how the film is received, I think we can agree no matter what Lively does, she always seems to look good doing it. </p><p>WATCH:<br></p> <br>?eGHZmFyID44mYu00M5dZQr%2BjdVtc6mbKKwyhi9exWxVPnmmfTCGgRFKlVEsUD4JFQsfXJ2dtLuzmVP8q1zOe6cFjXCBrfIccAcD2%2BZCj1ofCLNdb4PAUq1BGtDmh45514kIuB5Ua5hfpX3jCUjpesONZAp5v%2FZYto0CpL2BNQDbLKBQntDL%2BG0SOtgBpYqpM?<p>From superhero to pig blood prop? </p><p>According to Vulture, as is actress Haley Bennett.</p><p>Bennett and Moretz are just the latest in a series of frontrunners for the anticipated "Carrie" reboot. Stars who've been previously considered for the lead include Dakota Fanning, Lily Collins and Emily Browning. </p><p>The original "Carrie," based on the Stephen King novel, starred Sissy Spacek as the haunted high-school teen. The movie, directed by Brian De Palma, is considered a horror classic. </p><p>As Deadline.com reported in January, . The film currently has no release date.</p><p>To find out more about casting for the new "Carrie," .</p><p>[via ]</p> <br>?<p>No one's gonna laugh at Chloe Moretz after this one. Deadline.com reports that which Kimberly Peirce is directing for MGM.</p><p>The new film is not considered a remake of the 1976 Brian De Palma classic, but a new adaptation of Stephen King's source thriller. The 1974 novel is about a young and tormented high schooler who uses her telekinetic powers to take revenge on the bullies at her school.</p><p>Moretz -- who co-starred in Best Picture nominee "Hugo" and has appeared most recently as a guest star on "30 Rock" -- was in competition with a . In fact, Vulture previously reported that the 24-year-old Bennett -- who will next be seen in Terrence Malick's "Lawless" -- was Moretz's top competition for the role.</p><p>While Moretz is still unsigned, the actress is already tweeting her excitement about the new job. "Never been so happy in my life!" . "Thank you Kim Peirce and thank u MGM for the chance of a lifetime i will never forget!"</p><p>Peirce is probably best know for directing "Boys Don't Cry," which earned Hilary Swank her first Oscar win. Sissy Spacek earned a Best Actress nomination for playing Carrie in De Palma's 1976 film.</p><p>[via ]</p><p>Also on HuffPost:</p>?<p>No one is laughing at , especially her .</p><p>Speaking with E! Online at the Dannijo and Tucker Tea event in Los Angeles on Thursday night, Greer -- best known as Kitty on "Arrested Development" -- said that Moretz's portrayal of the telekinetic-powered title teen in "Carrie" is heartbreaking.</p><p>"Chloe's performance -- and this is literal -- has brought me to tears on set," . "She's made me cry because I find her performance to be incredibly moving. I'm feeling a lot of compassion for her."</p><p>Moretz was cast in Kimberly Peirce's remake of "Carrie" back in March. Before being hired, she was in competition with a .</p><p>"Never been so happy in my life!" . "Thank you Kim Peirce and thank [you] MGM for the chance of a lifetime I will never forget!"</p><p>In addition to Greer and Moretz, "Carrie" stars Julianne Moore and Portia Doubleday. The film is another adaptation of Stephen King's famed horror novel; Brian De Palma directed the first big-screen version with Sissy Spacek in the lead role.</p><p>For more about "Carrie," .</p><p>[via ]</p><p></p><p>Also on HuffPost:</p>?Chloe Angyal is a blogger and freelance writer from Sydney, Australia. A graduate of Princeton University, Chloe founded , the University's first feminist publication. Chloe's writing has been published in The Christian Science Monitor and Skirt! Magazine. She lives in New York City and blogs at alongside leading young feminist thinkers like Courtney E. Martin and Jessica Valenti.?<p>A 9-year-old Tennessee girl heading to New York City to spend Christmas with her grandparents was left stranded in the Baltimore airport for five hours.</p><p>Chloe Boyce, of Clarksville, was , Elena Kerr, on Tuesday, to New York's LaGuardia airport with scheduled stops in Columbus and Baltimore, Nashville's WKRN reports.</p><p>She was supposed to be picked up by her aunt and cousin at the airport, but when Boyce didn't deplane when the flight arrived at LaGuardia, her frantic aunt called Kerr, asking, "Were you going to call and tell me she was going to be late?" </p><p>Kerr than describes "the worst day of her life" while she waited for an hour for Southwest to locate her daughter, Kerr told MSNBC. Southwest did not notify Kerr nor her sister that the flight had stopped in Cleveland due to weather and that Boyce was rescheduled on another flight to New York once she arrived in Baltimore. </p><p>Kerr and was rebooked. "Someone took her off the plane...probably because she's a child and she's not going to say, 'No, you can't rebook me.' She doesn't know any better," Kerr told the station. </p><p>While at the Baltimore airport, a "walked her to Hudson News to get her a drink and some snacks and the pilot bought her dinner,” Kerr told MSNBC. “But while she was there no could tell us where she was," she added.</p><p>Southwest, for their part, has of Boyce's ticket (ABC2 reports that the family has also been .). In a statement to MSNBC, the airline said, "Our unaccompanied minor policy aims to minimize these kinds of situations ... by only ticketing them on itineraries that don't require an aircraft change. In this case, the unscheduled change of planes resulted in the connection, a delay and distress for the family which we certainly regret and have apologized for in our conversation with the family of our customer.”</p><p>As for Boyce, her mother says that she won't be flying home alone post-Christmas. "I'm going to be driving the 17 hours to New York to get her," she told MSNBC.</p> <br>?<p>It has come to my attention that Tess Daly is the latest celebrity to join the ridiculous milk campaign. As I waited for the red to turn green by the kerb I was brought face to face with the ad, my first thoughts were that Nuts had done a bloody good job to get ad placement on the side of the 333 bus that passes a number of public houses, betting shops and snooker clubs en route. The team over at IPC Media MUST have done their research. </p><p>But alas, as I rubbed my eyes and came to it became apparent that this was well, what I guess we could term loosely as a 'serious' ad campaign. Now you can't tell me that the guy (and I have not a doubt in my mind that it is) who created this idea did not realise the obvious connotations present. It is fairly laughable that celebrities are actually willing not only to associate themselves with the campaign but to allow a thick WHITE line of yes; yes it is obviously MILK to be placed across their top lip. Now I don't know how much Tess Daly's fees are these days for PR or appearances but I hope the price was right (I bet Forsythe LOVES this ad). </p><p>What I am failing to understand here is when drinking milk became such a cause for concern? Has there been an epidemic of small children dying suddenly of calcium deficiency that I have failed to read up on? I am fairly sure that there are more pressing issues within our society that need funding other than the drinking of milk. Never fear, I have an idea of how we can turn this around. You remember when the millennium dome was first erected? It was largely reported as an eyesore and did not quite meet the architectural magnificence we all hoped for. Blair was berated for his poor spending of the national budget (AGAIN) and after we all went to see it we to came to the realisation it was just a convex shaped museum of pointless crap. HOWEVER after someone came up with the clever idea of auctioning it as a entertainment venue and those that brought us the tagline 'We're better, connected' claimed it, things were looking up.</p><p>Though a slightly odd comparison, bear with me, I think we can turn this sticky (sorry) situation into one that could prove rather fruitful to the nation. So as it stands we have an absurd amount of collateral that includes Tess Daly and (I REALLY should have mentioned this earlier) The Wanted to work with. </p><p>Now I'm no art guru but I hear on the grapevine that the Tate Modern commissions some fairly weird pieces that fetch a fair old whack . I for one would go to see a short film that showed all the boys from The Wanted dipping their faces in a large bowl of milk to create said moustache. I mean the possibilities are endless, Tracey Emin could come and host, giving her interpretation of what milk means to the nation and perhaps give the lads a few tips on how it is best removed. We could even have a live cow being milked as to educate the little kiddly winks on the source of their much needed calcium, I've gone too far I think. </p><p>The point being that not only does this campaign raise a huge question about the celebrities fronting it but who exactly it is they think the audience are. If it is genuinely about young children drinking more milk I think Peppa Pig would have looked great with facial hair and logistically as a pig she probably has way more access to cattle than Tess and The Wanted right? Just a thought.</p><p>Follow Chloe Cardon on Twitter:</p>?I currently work as Promotions Assistant for radio and also support production of the shows (which so far involves a lot of me waving frantically at presenters through the glass to cue them in). My passions for writing and music led me here and I will no doubt be caught talking the ear off all the presenters about the tracks on their latest playlist. <br><br>I also do freelance PR as an Account Executive on various projects which entails the creation of many a beloved press release and annoying numerous journalists. As of the New Year I will also be heading out to review gigs for a number of event organisers and will be sure to report back my humble opinion on the latest artist or group. As a blogger I enjoy musing on my general observations of life and offering up a fairly honest take on an array of topics which usually include a large element of sarcasm.?eGHZmFyID44mYu00M5dZQr%2BjdVtc6mbKKwyhi9exWxVPnmmfTCGgRFKlVEsUD4JFQsfXJ2dtLuzmVP8q1zOe6cFjXCBrfIccAcD2%2BZCj1ofCLNdb4PAUq1BGtDmh45514kIuB5Ua5hfpX3jCUjpesONZAp5v%2FZYto0CpL2BNQDbLKBQntDL%2BG0SOtgBpYqpM?<p>One of my Toronto Fashion Week highlights was the Greta Constantine show last Friday night at the Arcadian Loft. I've always loved how their jersey fabrics drape in a way that works for all body types and sizes. Clothing you can wear and still enjoy a burger... with cheese!</p>?<p>A promise by two employers to begin reporting diversity figures might not sound like earth-shattering news, but last week's that Goldman Sachs and MetLife will begin doing just that could have enormous implications for people of color, women and the broader corporate community.</p><p>Information is power, and transparency around diversity data is the first, most crucial step toward improving diversity. When business leaders in Chicago, for instance, decided to collect data about diversity on the city's corporate boards, they found that a year after the data was published, diversity figures began to improve. When individual companies are no longer allowed to hide behind the aggregated data of their industry and are forced to own their actual track record, it's amazing how much incentive there is to improve.</p><p>The corporate sector will also benefit. As the old adage goes, what gets measured gets managed. When diversity figures are accurately tracked and reported, the business case for diversity is further reinforced. Numerous studies have found that firms with senior management and board diversity outperform their competitors for a variety of reasons. A cited, among other reasons, that diversity of background, perspective, skills and life experiences can broaden a company's strategic plan and outlook and, in the war for talent, companies will have a leg up when they recruit the best people outside of traditional pools of leadership. The National Association for Law Placement has been publishing diversity data on the top legal employers in the country for years, and today, a firm's record on diversity is a significant factor in attorney recruiting, associate satisfaction and overall firm rankings. When more companies track and report their figures, the case will be all the more compelling. </p><p>Goldman and MetLife, two of the largest and most highly regarded figures in the business, should be congratulated for taking the lead and setting an example. In an industry in which diversity figures are available only in the aggregate, and much reported data is anecdotal, we hope that Goldman and MetLife's transparency will pave the way for other firms to follow suit, spur healthy competition for diversity, and, ultimately, increase diversity at decision-making tables.</p><p>We certainly need it. Despite years of corporate commitment to diversity and inclusion, the numbers continue to paint a dismal picture. In the Fortune 500, there are only 6 African-American CEOs, 9 Asian American, 6 Latino and 18 women. And, since 2004, executives of color and women actually lost ground in America's corporate boardrooms. According to a 2010 by the Alliance for Board Diversity, Fortune 500 company boards are currently made up of just 2.7 percent African-American males, 2.3 percent Hispanic males, 1.8 percent Asian Pacific Islander males, 1.9 percent African-American women 0.7 percent Hispanic women and 0.3 percent Asian Pacific Islander females. </p><p>Thanks to the actions of New York City Comptroller John Liu and New York City's pension funds, the catalysts behind the announcements, a clear message has been sent to employers that diversity matters to its large institutional investors, and improving diversity should be an important part of the corporate agenda.</p><p>But let's be clear: reporting on current numbers is only the first step. Once the data has been gathered, the next step is to examine the results more closely to determine what is and is not working in the areas of retention, leadership training and success planning. Reporting, as it has in other sectors such as law, will create a climate of accountability, but we also need to spur the development of more effective and targeted programs and trainings that really enable the development of a more diverse and representative workforce -- at the highest levels. Only then will we see true impact on corporate diversity.</p><p>We invite other firms in the financial sector as well as other industries to share their data so that we can create a culture of accountability and truly work together to make a difference.</p>?<p>At a breakout session during the Council of Urban Professional's recent Women's Leadership Forum, managing directors, law partners and senior media executives broke into small groups to ask one another for help and to offer resources -- an "ask" and an "offering."</p><p>The idea behind this session was to take networking to the next level by creating circles of openness, trust and reciprocity in which women could help each other with an important introduction, access to capital, a board seat, advice about a career transition or other business need. </p><p>One thing that happened next should not be a surprise: All the women engaged and "offered" with gusto. They exchanged contact information. They talked about their current jobs and careers. And they lent advice and help. After the session, many followed up with one another in an effort to sustain these relationships. But there was one surprise in the small group discussions: What many of them couldn't, or wouldn't, do with ease was ask for help for themselves. </p><p>Senior level professional women at the top of their careers still felt uncomfortable asking for support from peers sitting across from them offering to give whatever assistance they could.<br>Studies show . Setting straight the stereotype that women undermine each other's progress, a recent study by Catalyst and a second by Harvard, NYU and the University of North Caroline show that, on the contrary, and help them advance. Women are more likely to offer help when they see the need. But women don't often ask for this help.</p><p>Economist Linda Babcock and writer Sara Laschever address this very issue in the groundbreaking book, Women Don't Ask: The High Cost of Avoiding Negotiation - and Positive Strategies for Change (Bantam, 2007). Men, they say, ask for what they want twice as often as women do and initiate negotiation four times more often.</p><p>Not only are women less likely to ask in the workplace, they are also less likely to ask friends, unlike men, who will say that they prefer to do business with friends. And as the recent Women's Leadership Forum breakout session exercise showed, women are uncomfortable asking even when they have been encouraged to do so as part of a group exercise.</p><p>The cultural, economic and institutional barriers to women's advancement are well documented. And there are an abundance of women's mentoring circles and affiliation organizations dedicated to breaking down these barriers and helping women advance. But few of these structures focus on helping women overcome their discomfort in asking for what they need and their reluctance to do business, or even talk about their work, with their friends.</p><p>So how do women make this change? Babcock and Laschever offer numerous ways that individual women can work to overcome their fears and learn to ask, to negotiate and to discuss professional needs with confidence. In other words, challenge our mental assumptions about "what is appropriate or suitable behavior."</p><p>But like Carnegie Hall, the way to get there is to practice, practice, practice. So one step women can take is to create circles of reciprocity -- that help participants flex this underused transactional muscle -- whose sole purpose is to prompt and facilitate asking and offering. Circles that meet or interact regularly, to which participants invite new members to grow the circle, refresh the thinking and expand the collective resources. These groups can be casual, like a book club, or structured like a networking group, with the single most important rule being that everyone must regularly ask for something.</p><p>According to Babcock and Laschever's research and findings, women are reluctant to ask for what they want in the workplace and feel they aren't entitled to ask. A good way to help women overcome this is to help them practice asking, repeatedly. Once women get more comfortable with asking and begin to experience the enormous benefits of a powerful circle of reciprocity, they'll ask for more and do so more often.</p>?Drew is executive director of The Council of Urban Professionals (CUP), a nonprofit, nonpartisan membership organization whose members are leading professionals of color and women from across the finance, law, business, real estate and media and entertainment and digital sectors. CUP’s mission is to connect, empower and mobilize the next generation of civic and business leaders. CUP recently announced the launch of the Leader Engagement and Development (LEAD) program, which provides participants with guidance and training from skilled experts, industry practitioners and leading academics in an effort to increase diversity among business leaders and executives. More information is available at .?<p>Jessie J has raised her Voice over allegations she is a 'secret lesbian', branding the report "another boring untrue story".An explosive unauthori...</p>?<p>This is one of those thrillers that relies on the unreliability of cell phones for suspense. It also layers on a testy relationship between a pair of divorced cops (Worthington and the ever-present Jessica Chastain) who are forced to work together.</p>?<p>'s Chloe Green has revealed she's banned her dad, Topshop mogul , from appearing on the show.</p><p>The 20-year-old said she was loving her time on the show - but wasn't expecting her father to join her on screen.</p><p>"I've kind of done it as my thing, so I've told him he can't be on it!" she revealed at the Captain Morgan's Spiced party in London.</p><p>Chloe, who is working on her own shoe collection, added: "He says it's been really good, he enjoys watching me on TV. It's fun for my parents. As long as I stick to working on my shoes, they'll be happy."</p><p>Despite enjoying her new-found celebrity, the heiress insisted she wouldn't be giving up her designing work.</p><p>"I've always been a worker. My dad brought my brother and I up in a working environment, and the whole TV thing is so new to me, I still have a lot of things I want to do fashion-wise and I'll always do that," she said.</p><p>"I think the more episodes are coming out, the more I'm getting recognised. It's really strange. It's kind of nice as well to meet the people who watch the show and nice to see the support that there is behind it. It's fun."</p> <br>?<p>Topshop heiress Chloe Green has become embroiled in Tulisa Contostavlos' split from her N-Dubz bandmate Fazer, after The X Factor judge was allegedly ...</p>?<p>It's a mother's worst nightmare ? Olivia Newton-John's, to be more specific. </p><p>In the new music video for her single, "," the 25-year-old daughter of the "Grease" star, Chloe Lattanzi, slithers about in deep-set makeup and proceeds to undertake a shocking string of suicidal, self-mutilating acts. She electrocutes herself while soaking in a bathtub with toaster ovens, radios and hairdryers, plays with exacto knives, shows off mangled, bruised arms and poses with a gun to head, all the while singing "Never knew love would taste like this." She cries in blood tears, then appears to snort cocaine and blow the dust straight into the camera's lens in a single poof.</p><p>For the record, we think the song is sort of catchy in a NIN, Evan Rachel Wood-during-her-Marilyn-Manson-phase way, even if we don't really believe her when she sings "Play With Me." (Or maybe we'd just rather not play with her, thank you.) But for all the typical teenage angst depicted in the film, the graphic component is aggressively morbid, and has drawn fierce criticism from her native Australia, according to .</p><p>"This simply glamorizes a range of harmful behaviors and does nothing to help empower young people to cope [with] relationship problems," President for the Australian Council for Children and the Media Elizabeth Handsley told the website.</p><p>Lattanzi has defended the video, calling it a form of "'artistic expression" in a press release and has since released a follow-up video, "," on YouTube.</p><p>WATCH:<br></p>CORRECTION: The above article misstated the source of Lattanzi's "artistic expression" quote. She issued the statement in a press release, not to .<p>Need help? In the U.S., call 1-800-273-8255 for the .<br></p> <br>?<p>There's no denying that Chloe Moretz is growing up right before our very eyes, transforming from cute-as-a-button little girl to super-stylish teen. </p><p>The rising trendsetter has been recently. Unfortunately, this particular outfit may be one exception to her stylish chart toppers. </p><p>This Sunday Chloe attended the "Iris: A Journey Into The World Of Cinema By Cirque du Soleil" premiere at the Kodak Theater in Hollywood. She wore a leather motorcycle jacket that is totally biker-chic in the very best way possible. But we're not quite sure we're loving the yellow lace pants. Black and yellow is typically an appropriate color combo for a bumble bee, Wiz Khalifa and the Pittsburgh Steelers -- not fashionistas. </p><p>Take a look below and tell us: does this work look?</p><p></p><p><br><p><p></p> <br>?<p>She's known for her high-fashion gigs (including and ) as well as her surprisingly mature potty mouth in movies like "Kick-Ass" and even "(500) Days of Summer." </p><p>But there's no need for Chloe Moretz to grow up too fast when it comes to style -- at 14, she can wear all the party dresses she wants!</p><p>So we were bummed to see that Moretz chose a decidedly grown-up look for last night's WIE Symposium Ladies' Night Gala Dinner held at Le Caprice in New York City. </p><p>The 14-year-old star wore a conservative white blouse tucked into a high-waisted purple and black skirt, pairing with librarian-chic ensemble with plain, black T-strap pumps.</p><p>Moretz may have been trying to dress up for the mature crowd, which included Arianna Huffington, Iman, Elettra Wiedemann, Anouck Lepere, Rachel Roy and Alina Cho. But couldn't she have chosen something a little less boring? </p><p>For some tips she could call her peers, and , who have the fashionable-but-still-teenage look down to a science.</p><p>Take a look at Chloe's outfit below and tell us what you think.</p><p></p><p></p><p></p> <br>?<p>We first fell in love with Chloe Moretz in "(500) Days of Summer," where she played a cute, soccer-playing tween dishing out surprisingly tough love to her older bro, Joseph Gordon-Levitt.</p><p>But the rest of the world's fallen for Chloe as well and now she's got the magazine cover to prove it. </p><p>The 14-year-old actress , posing in all sorts of sweet, springy outfits and one pair of cool oversized shades.</p><p>She talks about acting, of course, but also sounds off on her recent rise to fashion fame. That rise, which has occurred at a lightning-fast pace in the span of a year, included ; cover shoots for and ; ; a seat in the front row, specifically for Calvin Klein's Spring 2012 show... and . </p><p>Sitting in the glamorous Calvin Klein front row, , was "superexciting." But she doesn't fancy herself a high-fashion girl -- at least not entirely. Her strategy is to "mix high fashion with high-street fashion. Like, I'll put an Alexander McQueen jacket with a nice Topshop T-shirt. That's more approachable than, 'Here comes Chloe in her runway look,'" .</p><p>Plus, she adds in the behind-the-scenes video:</p>"My mom doesn't really let me buy a lot of high fashion stuff, 'cause she's like, 'You get to do it in photo shoots and stuff, so you don't get to do it in real life!'" <p>Bummer! At least she's got plenty more high-fashion shoots in her future, we guarantee it.</p><p>Check out a few shots from the latest Teen Vogue editorial as well as Chloe chatting on video below -- and </p><p><p><p><p><p><p><p><p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p><br></p> <br>?<p>Celebrity brand endorsements are a dime a dozen, but we can actually muster some excitement when the brand-celeb pairing makes perfect sense (see: ). That's why we're totally digging .</p><p>We'll admit, we haven't shopped at Aero (as all the cool kids called it) since our middle school days. But we love the idea of a young starlet shilling for a brand that's age-appropriate. As Women's Wear Daily reported this morning, , making 15-year-old Chloe an ideal spokewoman. </p><p>For comparison's sake, Chloe's PYT peers, Hailee Steinfeld and Elle Fanning, and , respectively. The ads were lovely, of course, but you couldn't escape the fact they were 14-year-olds posing in grown-up clothes. </p><p>Chloe could legitimately shop at Aeropostale -- and she probably does. Her mother is strict when it comes to induling in designer gear, : "My mom doesn't really let me buy a lot of high fashion stuff, 'cause she's like, 'You get to do it in photo shoots and stuff, so you don't get to do it in real life!'"</p><p>With Chloe donning $12 tank tops for , that excuse seems slightly less useful. </p><p>Check out a sneak peek pic below and to see a super adorable video of Chloe posing in leopard print skinnies, graphic tees, printed maxi skirts and other adorable school-ready pieces. </p><p>PHOTO:</p><p></p><p></p><p>Want more? Be sure to check out HuffPost Style on , , and .</p>?<p>NEW YORK &mdash; At age 15, actress Chloe Grace Moretz is already an ambassador.</p><p>It's for Aeropostale, the youthful fashion brand, and it's a job that's likely to come with some clout and influence &ndash; especially with teenage shoppers.</p><p>Moretz's new gig was to be announced later Monday. She will be featured in advertisements through next spring, largely wearing clothing she's selected and styled herself. She will also curate collections in-store and online.</p><p>"I get my own section, I got to pull my own clothes. Girls can go and see what I love and what I wear in the shoots. It's a way for me to be in touch with girls," Moretz said in a recent phone interview.</p><p>Moretz starred in "Hugo" and "The Amityville Horror" and has the title role in the upcoming remake of the horror classic "Carrie."</p><p>The young actress said she sees a shift in her fan base since her Aeropostale ad campaign began appearing in magazines a few weeks ago. She noted her screen roles until now have been in films that typically attract adults. "I was in the airport a few days ago and these girls were reading their Teen Vogues, and then the girls came up to me!"</p><p>She describes her own style as fun, flirty and colorful, and she lives in skinny jeans cuffed at the ankle when she's not working. Most of her style cues come from her mother, but she greatly admires the look cultivated by Michelle Pfeiffer, her co-star in "Dark Shadows."</p><p>"She has the coolest clothes," Moretz gushed.</p><p>Moretz says she hasn't regretted one fashion choice she's made yet, whether it's for the first day of school or a celebrity-filled red carpet. "Fashion is another way to hone your artistic ability and to express your personality."</p><p>(Her favorite back-to-school outfit was in early grade school, she recalls, when she wore a blue dress covered with yellow elephants.)</p><p>Choosing Moretz for the brand was ultimately an easy decision, but not one that company officials took lightly, said Scott Birnbaum, senior vice president of Aeropostale marketing and e-commerce. The brand did its homework, seeking input from magazine editors, photographers and other industry insiders.</p><p>"When we met Chloe, it was really an instant love affair," he said. "She has such great style, she can mix it up. She wears great high-end designers and everyday stuff."</p><p>"We think she's a role model," he adds. "She's quirky and actually really funny, and those are things our brand stands for."</p><p>___</p><p>Online:</p><p>___</p>?Click here to leave a comment.HuffPost High School welcomes a lively, thoughtful debate in the comment section. Keep in mind that the articles here are penned by young authors, so please keep criticism respectful, and help us to keep this a safe and supportive place for writers of all ages to contribute.?<p>Harper's Bazaar likes to pay homage to major film directors, dressing up our favorite celebs and fashionistas in the latest ready-to-wear and posing as some of film's most iconic characters (see: )</p><p>This month, for , Bazaar pays tribute to the lovable and legendary Martin Scorsese, whose debuts on Thanksgiving. </p><p>Chloe Moretz, Christina Hendricks, Emily Blunt, Keanu Reeves, Emily Mortimer, Sir Ben Kingsley and more all show up as Scorsese characters, although our personal favorite is Moretz playing Jodie Foster in "Taxi Driver."</p><p>, saying:</p>"When we were shooting Taxi Driver, I think Marty was really uncomfortable with the fact that I was so young. The memory I have is of him and Robert De Niro trying to tell me how to unzip [De Niro’s] pants. And Marty keeps bursting out laughing. He can’t get a word out, and he tries to act serious, you know? He keeps smoothing down his face on both sides, but he just keeps laughing. And then De Niro decides he’s going to take over because he can do it."<p>As adept as Moretz looks playing the racy role for photographer Jason Schmidt's camera, the 14-year-old told the magazine, "I haven't seen 'Taxi Drive' yet. My mom won't let me watch it."</p><p>Check out Moretz, Hendricks, Blunt and more in the slideshow below and . </p><p><br></p> <br>?<p>The column inches given over to discussing teen actress Chloe Moretz are devoted almost as closely to the 15-year-old's wardrobe as they are to her sc...</p>?<p>According to music charts across the globe, Belgian-Australian musician Wouter "Wally" De Backer, aka , can now officially be referred to as a "pop" singer. A feat not often accomplished by "independent" or "alternative" bands, Gotye's single "Somebody That I Used to Know" has already peaked at #1 in almost 20 countries. So how did he do it?</p><p>For his most recent album Making Mirrors, De Backer wrote a part for a female vocalist on a song called "Somebody That I Used to Know." But after a few choice singers passed on the opportunity and several more didn't quite fit the bill during demo sessions, De Backer hit somewhat of a wall. "There was definitely a point there where I felt like maybe I wouldn't be able to finish the song," he says. But along came 22-year-old New Zealand singer Kimbra, and thank the gods of YouTube she did. </p><p>With over 160 million views of the for "Somebody That I Used to Know" on YouTube, De Backer's star, and Kimbra's along with it, has risen to heights visible beyond Tasmanian borders. If you turn on the radio, you can even spot it in the daylight.</p><p>But a shining star can be blinding the first time you see it in the mirror. With radio listeners' ears tuned to the voice (often compared to Sting's) and next move (will the song become a "noose around his neck?" De Backer muses) of a formerly sample-heavy artist, De Backer must now realize that, like any superpower, with great success comes great responsibility, and great expectations. </p><p>The wild card success of "Somebody That I Used to Know" has brought challenges both unforeseen and even a little uncomfortable at times. Not that De Becker is complaining. It's just that it can be a bit startling when you find out while in L.A. that Danny Elfman is a fan. Or when hear your song on the radio alongside Green Day. Or when, during one of those sidewalk autograph requests that suddenly mark each day, you catch sight of your reflection in a store window and wonder if now you're just somebody that you used to know. </p><p>Gotye's performs in San Francisco tonight, Wednesday, April 18, at the Bill Graham Auditorium. SF Weekly on the show's suprising venue change, from the 500-person capacity Independent to 8,000-seater, quoting Another Planet Entertainment executive vice president Allen Scott as never having seen anything like that in San Francisco. </p><p>I caught up with De Becker to talk about the making of the now-hit single, when Kimbra came into the picture, how the sudden rise to fame has affected daily life, and what he foresees happening next. </p>Photo: Cybele Malinowski<p>There are over 160,000,000 views of the music video for "Somebody That I Used to Know" on YouTube. When you wrote that song did you know it would be such a hit?</p><p>I knew it would be single but I didn't expect that level of YouTube success.</p><p>What do you think it is about that song that resonates with so many people?</p><p>?There's obviously the universal aspect of a breakup in a relationship. I think people relate to the fact that both Kimbra and I in the song are kind of untrustworthy narrators. In a way the song, through the lyrics and chances in emotion -- from reflection through to angsty bitterness -- tries to communicate this sense of how confused one can be, about either how memory can change, how you think you felt about somebody at the time or how you're not even sure how you feel once a relationship breaks up with somebody that you've been very close with. I suppose the fact that a lot of what we say in the song brings each other's statements into question reinforces that uncertainty. I think maybe people relate to that as having an element of truth to it in terms of what you tend to experience in life, which is that things aren't very easily wrapped up in black and white. And I don't know, maybe we sing good!</p><p>How did you come to work with Kimbra?</p><p>I met her about five years ago. She was covering one of my tunes and she was doing little gigs solo on guitar, doing lots of looping of her own voice and guitar at a little club in Melbourne where I went to see her play. We met up but we didn't really stay in touch very closely over the years. She worked a long time developing new material and working on her debut record. In the last year we hooked back up at a studio we were both working at, and started to become aware of the different stuff on our new records we were working on. It was actually Francois Tetaz, [who was at the time producing both Gotye's and Kimbra's records] who suggested I contact Kimbra about the song. I was already a big fan of hers and I love her voice but I'd almost told myself I thought she wouldn't be right, but I stayed open-minded. We sent her the track, she really loved the song, and the second we'd demoed some vocals together I knew I was wrong and that she had a really fantastic interpretation. She's so versatile with how she can use her voice. She found an insight into how to give it that thing that for many months I didn't think a vocalist could do for it.</p><p>The making of this album was very different than past attempts. You made more of the music from scratch versus from sampling records. Tell me about that evolution.</p><p>The main difference is that I played more acoustic instruments and I also used my sampling experience but just applied it to things like sampling bits of my own performance on different instruments: drum kit, things I've collected, like some pianos and autoharps, weird keyboards and things in second-hand shops. I still sampled records but I guess it was just broader. I went looking a bit further like with field recordings, a weird instrument called the Winton Musical Fence in the outback of Australia. I tried to go beyond sitting in a room referencing my record collection and manipulating bits from existing recordings, more using some of those samples as platforms and then mixing them more with playing things and applying that sampling approach to acoustic instruments.</p><p>Was there something specific that brought you to the decision to change your approach?</p><p>I'm pretty restless creatively, so I never really want to repeat myself. I feel like there are parts of my new record that are somewhat of an extension or distillation of stuff I was doing on my previous album, Like Drawing Blood, so I'm definitely inspired to try to head in a very different direction on my next album. I'd say its creative restlessness and a desire to explore new things. I want to keep it interesting for myself. It depends where you decide to define certain areas in which you're going to try to explore newness or variation or what you might call originality. You can just play an acoustic guitar and through doing things like trying a new tuning system or putting it through an effect pedal, then you reinvent that instrument for yourself. There are ways to simplify and on the one hand have a very limited palette, but still find ways to play with harmony or melody or just the pure sound of it. But I guess maybe I just need to be more spoiled. I need to go looking further for weird instruments, strange places, old records, or maybe I'm just not as easily inspired when I sit down at the piano and plunk out chords.</p><p>Any sneak peek into what we can expect from your next album?</p><p>I have no idea yet. It takes me a long time to make records and I'm not very successful at trying things out while I'm on the road, especially with what's happened with the success of this track and this record over the last nine months. I've been so busy I haven't really had a chance to work on anything new. When I go into a music-making space, that for me is when I go into an introverted place and I kind of need to withdraw, maybe process a few years' worth of things like doing shows and traveling the world. On the other hand I'm not really interested for that to be an experience platform to lead into writing songs. I've already written songs that involve being disenchanted with touring and feeling the wastefulness and use of resources when you travel and fly as much as someone does as a gigging musician. I need to withdraw, read some more things, or live somewhere I haven't been before and see if some stories arrive.</p><p>What are the differences between life before and after the success of "Somebody That I Used to Know?"</p><p>Well, I get recognized on the street in places I've never been before. I've never been in D.C. before and I went for a walk and bought a coffee this morning and three people wanted photos with me. That's sometimes pleasant, sometimes a bit annoying. That's one difference. Otherwise, I'm busier than I ever have been before. I've always been a bit of a workaholic and kept myself very busy, but at the moment it's one thing after the next, trying to think six months ahead. It feels like potentially it's always somewhere between excitement and a certain level of anxiety about what it means to have such a big single and whether it will actually become a noose around my neck. Whether it'll weigh so heavily on me when I start to write new stuff that it'll actually feel like a negative, I don't know. I'm just probably sometimes slightly confused or I'm putting that out of my mind and trying to focus on the task at hand, which is playing good shows, enjoying the time traveling, and seeing new cities, especially in the United States. Maybe I'll be able to process all of it a little bit down the track.</p><p>What has been the most surprising aspect of this whole whirlwind?</p><p>Maybe sitting in a taxi in L.A. when a modern rock station is playing Linkin Park, Green Day, Foo Fighters, and then my track. It feels a little bit surreal. It feels a bit incongruous, musically. You've got this really loud, heavy, compressed rock music and then this kind of restrained, xylophone naive melody, very soft, reflective song. Moments like that feel a bit strange, like I'm not quite sure how that's happened. There's been a bunch of weird things. Like I'll be doing promo in L.A. and drive up to a house where somebody's set up some webcam stuff and I find out it's Richard Elfman's house, a guy whose movies I used to watch when I was a teenager, who started the band Oingo Boingo with his brother Danny Elfman, who it turns out is a fan of my music. Things like that are kind of classic L.A. experiences, not things I thought would happen.</p><p>You say it feels incongruous to hear your song on the radio alongside other genres. How do you usually describe your music to people who haven't heard it?</p><p>I suppose "alternative pop" is a fairly boring generic way to say what it is. I came up with my own genre term which is "neurotic exotica." I'd like to try to come up with some others, though. Otherwise I'm like, have a listen to these songs and you'll see that describing certain genres is not really what it's about, the way I make music, really.</p><p>Given what a whirlwind it's been, what are your coping mechanisms and strategies for staying sane while on the road?</p><p>On some level you just have to shut certain things out. I haven't really been engaging with social media, like Twitter, for a while. I kind of checked out for a bit. I stopped reading press, firstly because there was just so much of it eventually and beyond a certain point, once you read, say, the 100th review -- well, I wouldn't get anywhere near that -- but once you've read 10 reviews of your record, some terrible, some great, some average, then you kind of realize it actually has no real bearing on the work you've done and it's not like you can change what you've done anyway. In the end it just reminds you that you're on your own journey and only you really know if you've worked as hard as you wanted to or done the best you can. And it's kind of interesting, I find it curious to then work out where other people think you fit, or what your work means to a certain audience or music scene. </p><p>But in the end, I don't think you need to let that affect anything about the path you're on or what inspires you. So a certain amount of checking out and trying not to think about the success or the bigness of it is probably the best coping mechanism, but just focusing on the task at head: Stay healthy, sing well, do shows that you find exciting with the guys in your band you like playing with, and enjoying the experiences with different audiences night by night, and when you do get a chance to see new cities, really appreciating that because it's a pretty amazing job in that regard.<br></p><p>Follow Chloe Roth on Twitter:</p>?<p>According to music charts across the globe, Belgian-Australian musician Wouter "Wally" De Backer, aka , can now officially be referred to as a "pop" singer. A feat not often accomplished by "independent" or "alternative" bands, Gotye's single "Somebody That I Used to Know" has already peaked at #1...</p>?<p>Meet , a freshman basketball player for Merrimack College in Mass. (D-II) with one hell of a crossover. Rothman embarrassed not one, but two defenders in a game recently with behind the back crossover. Both defenders fell down as she found a teammate wide open under the basket for an easy layup. The highlight would have been much greater had Rothman's teammate scored, but it's still quite entertaining. Well done, Chloe. </p><p>WATCH VIDEO ABOVE (H/T to ) </p> <br>?<p>Let's face it. Sometimes those trips to the mall aren't all fun and games for the little ones.</p><p>They get impatient, run around the store and hide under clothes racks, but every once in a while, if you're lucky, kids learn to entertain themselves with some pretty awesome activities.</p><p>Take Chloe, for example. Decked in her plaid dress and matching black boots, Chloe makes it her mission to wave to all shoppers on the mall's escalator with an enthusiastic "Bye!" And, as her father points, almost every person waves back and smiles. </p><p>Although the video is about three years old, the footage of Chloe's random act of kindness is just now making its way around the web. Because, really, to brighten their day?</p><p></p><p>Via </p> <br>?As Russell Crowe once said to a director who didn't like his behavior on set. "I don't owe you a good attitude, I owe you my best work"<br><br>As long as she goes in and does the best she can with what she has every day, then IMHO she's allowed to call it whatever she wants. It's not as if she'd be the first to voice displeasure at her job.<br><br>Robert Beltran (Chakotay, Star Trek: Voyager) complained bitterly about his character and the show pretty much for the last two years it was on.<br><br>Roy Scheider publically called Seaquest: DSV's second season Star Drek underwater after the show took a decidedly Sci-Fi bend and decended into farce doing it. He actually quit over it.<br><br>Point being, most people sometimes hate their jobs. Actors are no different.?<p>Opposites may attract, but not this much -- right?</p><p>When 'Big Love' star Chloe Sevigny was 'Jersey Shore' star Pauly D at a Knicks game in early January, gossip alarms went off -- were the indie darling and fist-pumping self-described 'guido' actually dating?</p><p>Not exactly, but Sevigny kind of likes the sound of it, it seems.</p><p>"No, but I wish, because that would be hilarious. That would be the weirdest couple in the world. It would be like the apocalypse," she . </p><p>But why, exactly?</p><p>"I think it's because we're both kind of extreme. We represent extremes, in opposite directions," Sevigny continued. "So for us two to come together, it would be a very strange meeting of the minds or colliding of two worlds. I haven't watched that many episodes, but of the ones I have... if I were to pick one of the dudes on the show, I'd definitely pick him."</p><p>In other hypothetical relationship news, she told the magazine which women she'd want to share a husband with, like she does in 'Big Love.'</p><p>"Maybe Michelle Williams and Amy Adams. They seem to have their heads screwed on straight and seem like they would be easy to get along with. They wouldn't be too diva."</p><p>For much more, .</p> <br>?<p></p><p>American actress Chloe Sevigny shouldn't expect a warm welcome if she ever returns to Manchester - she claims the city is full of "chavs".</p><p>The Brown Bunny star clearly didn't have a great time 'up north' after filming in Manchester for her new Sky drama Hit and Miss. After swerving the city's bustling nightlife in the hope of a more alternative scene she was dismayed by what she found.</p><p>She tells Psychologies magazine: "It's a small town. And I guess I'd grown up hearing so much about it, I had an idea it would be more bustling because of all the students there. Not that I would hang out with students - I'm 37 - but I expected it to have more alternative life. I thought it would be less... I'm trying to think of how to say it in a nice way. It's very mainstream. What is it they call the girls - chavs? They all go out wearing their huge fake Louboutins hoping to bag a footballer.</p><p>"There weren't any places to go where I could find kindred spirits. I'd go to pubs by myself and try to meet people, but people were very closed-off there. It was hard for me. The crew were very kind to me, but they were all working and going home to their respective loved ones. There weren't a lot of people to go out with. Going home and drinking alone is very depressing."</p><p>And when she was asked how British drinking compares to America, she added: "Oh my God - it's so intense. I had a night out in Leeds, and a night out in Blackpool and there were so many people out (drunk) on the streets. Even in London when I was hanging out in the '90s, it always felt like there was a weird confrontational spirit in the air. It felt vaguely threatening. I still feel that, especially in the North."</p><p>It's not the first time the indie actress has made disparaging comments about the home of Coronation Street - she told Interview magazine in February: "It was very hard being in Manchester. It was one of the grimmest places I'd ever been in my entire life, and I was there for so long. I hardly had any visitors. I was so alone. It rained every single day I was there."</p><p>Also on HuffPost:</p>?eGHZmFyID44mYu00M5dZQr%2BjdVtc6mbKKwyhi9exWxVPnmmfTCGgRFKlVEsUD4JFQsfXJ2dtLuzmVP8q1zOe6cFjXCBrfIccAcD2%2BZCj1ofCLNdb4PAUq1BGtDmh45514kIuB5Ua5hfpX3jCUjpesONZAp5v%2FZYto0CpL2BNQDbLKBQntDL%2BG0SOtgBpYqpM?eGHZmFyID44mYu00M5dZQr%2BjdVtc6mbKKwyhi9exWxVPnmmfTCGgRFKlVEsUD4JFQsfXJ2dtLuzmVP8q1zOe6cFjXCBrfIccAcD2%2BZCj1ofCLNdb4PAUq1BGtDmh45514kIuB5Ua5hfpX3jCUjpesONZAp5v%2FZYto0CpL2BNQDbLKBQntDL%2BG0SOtgBpYqpM?<p>The coolest person we (don't) know, Chloe Sevigny, swung by two events on Wednesday night, making one costume change but (presumably) sticking with the same pair of socks for both ensembles.</p><p>To the "Hugo Boss celebrates Hugo on Greene Street in Honor of the Young Collectors Council of the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum" event, she donned a buttoned-up white shirt, matching blazer, black skirt and platform Mary Janes. And to the Co-Op Food and Drink Restaurant preview party, she wore a lacy frock, leather jacket and what looks like Keds-meet-strappy sandals.</p><p></p><p></p> <br>?<p>HuffPost Style crush (a word we use sparingly) Chloe Sevigny is set to stage a runway show next month, .</p><p>The actress-turned-designer will send her Resort '11 collection for Opening Ceremony strutting, the first time the duds have ever been presented on the catwalk since she began partnering with the brand three years ago. She , "I've never done this part before and it's a little scary, to be honest. I'm still in the early stages, but I have been looking at spaces, looking at models, and selecting the music and all of that. It's pretty cool to be doing this."</p><p>Her last resort collection played with five prints -- paisley, polka dot, houndstooth, floral and leopard -- put together in five silhouettes. At the time, , "They're all prints I've worn since I've been old enough to buy my own clothes; I keep coming back to them," citing "early Benetton" as inspiration. And then, there were the shoes: chunky wooden clogs we'd never be able to walk in. Paired with socks.</p><p>. Or .</p> <br>?<p>Chloe Sevigny is the subject of , and in the interview she talks about the final season of 'Big Love,' her infamous oral sex scene in 'Brown Bunny' and her frustrations dating in New York. </p><p>Playboy's press release follows; scroll down for a sexy photo and read the whole thing . </p>On her regrets about bad-mouthing Big Love to a reporter: "I got into a lot of trouble. It was a huge thing on the Internet. Yeah, I got a little talking-to. [laughs] I don't want to bite the hand that feeds me. I loved being on the show; I love my character and my co-stars. The whole experience has been great. I just felt it was a weaker season than others. I shouldn't have said it. I don't want to offend anybody."<p> </p><p>On what to expect in the upcoming final season: "The writers are concentrating a lot more this year on the politics within the family. For viewers who keep asking why Bill and the family keep getting away with everything they do, this season the characters start having to face consequences. Since HBO said that viewers respond to how conservative my character is, she becomes stricter and more conservative. They're dressing me like Hillary Clinton in the 1980s."</p><p> </p><p>On co-star Bill Paxton exposing himself on the show more than the women: "Bill likes to get his kit off, and he looks great. The first season, my character was aggressive in bed, but that changed by the second and third seasons, and there was no sex on season four. I don't know why, and I was confused by that. This season, aside from stuff with the teen characters, sex is still on the back burner. And although I have done nudity on the show, the other girls won't do topless. I don't want to be the show's Samantha, like on Sex and the City--the only woman who'll do nudity. So I refused to do any more and there was a lot of back-and-forth about it."</p><p> </p><p>On her oral sex scene with Vincent Gallo in The Brown Bunny: "What's happened with that is all very complicated. There are a lot of emotions. I'll probably have to go to therapy at some point. But I love Vincent. The film is tragic and beautiful, and I'm proud of it and my performance. I'm sad that people think one way of the movie, but what can you do? I've done many explicit sex scenes, but I'm not that interested in doing any more. I'm more self-aware now and wouldn't be able to be as free, so why even do it?"</p><p><br> </p><p>On interesting sexual propositions from women: "By the time of Boys Don't Cry I had already spoken in interviews about my sexual experimenting as a young person. It sure seems that I have a pretty strong lesbian fan base because when I'm out, everybody responds to those films. I get letters. Last year I got a weird note on my car: 'If you're bored, me too. Let's meet. Your new neighbor,' signed with the person's initials. It's kind of creepy. Does this person see me in my rented backyard, smoking and lonely?"</p><p> </p><p>On what she looks for in a guy: "I want a guy who is masculine, good with his hands and able to build stuff and who has survival skills. Facial hair is a big turn-on. Most of the kids I hang out with in New York are hipster arty types, but I like a stronger, more physically imposing man--like a lumberjack. I'm also into a little hair pulling. I like boys to be aggressive and allow me to be a little aggressive back."</p><p> </p><p>On her texting relationships: "I've been texting for a year with a couple of guys without ever going on a date with them. The other day I got a text from a boy, but it wasn't hot. I mean, if you're going to text me every day, you haven't seen me for months and you're trying to seduce me, you'd better spice up that text and make it more exciting than 'How was your day? I hope you're having a beautiful one.' Sadly, I haven't been doing a lot of kissing lately." </p><p>PHOTO:<br></p> <br>?eGHZmFyID44mYu00M5dZQr%2BjdVtc6mbKKwyhi9exWxVPnmmfTCGgRFKlVEsUD4JFQsfXJ2dtLuzmVP8q1zOe6cFjXCBrfIccAcD2%2BZCj1ofCLNdb4PAUq1BGtDmh45514kIuB5Ua5hfpX3jCUjpesONZAp5v%2FZYto0CpL2BNQDbLKBQntDL%2BG0SOtgBpYqpM?<p>Chloe Sevigny can't be too happy with us. As part of , she talked about how annoying it is to have people call her stylish. Our response? Stop dressing so damn cool. Actually, no. Please don't stop.</p><p>Check out :</p>PLAYBOY: In a 1994 Jay McInerney New Yorker article you were crowned the "It girl" and "the coolest girl in the world." Did having style help or hurt? <p>SEVIGNY: I guess it helped more than anything else. I'm glad I grew up during the last vestige of cool, in the 1990s, when everything wasn't blogged and on the Interwebs, when things were more on the downlow and underground. I guess I am stylish, but I would rather have people come up and say "I really liked your performance in this or that" than "I really like the way you dress." That irks me. Anyway, the term It girl gets used too loosely. </p><p>PLAYBOY: How do you mean? </p><p>SEVIGNY: Today the term is used to describe, say, Peaches Geldof--a girl who doesn't do anything but is just sort of around. The original It girl was the 1920s movie star Clara Bow; then, in the 1960s, with Edie Sedgwick and Warhol, It girls turned into socialites, ladies of leisure--people who had "it" just for being "fabulous." But Edie was just a rich drug addict, and when I got called the It girl everyone thought I was that too. I looked like a junkie because it was the 1990s and grunge was the fashion. But I felt I was doing stuff, not just being a socialite. </p><p>(Via )</p> <br>?<p>Watch out, Fred and Carrie: A new hipster is moving to town.</p><p>, former "" star Chloe Sevigny is headed to the northwest to shack up with Fred (Fred Armisen) and Carrie (Carrie Brownstein) in Season 3 of the "." </p><p>Playing the quirky duo's roomie isn't Sevigny's only upcoming role. The actress is also set to play a nymphomaniac named Shelly on ""</p><p>In other casting news... </p><p>"Go On" nabs Bob Costas. The sportscaster will guest star on Matthew Perry's sitcom as a man who presents Perry with a career-changing opportunity. []</p><p>Kevin Sussman is now a "Big Bang Theory" series regular. Known for his recurring portrayal of comic book store owner Stuart, Sussman has been upped to a series regular for the CBS comedy's comedy's upcoming season. []</p><p>Maulik Pancholy is saying goodbye to "Whitney." Lily's (Zoe Lister-Jones) ex-fiance Neal will not be returning to the NBC comedy for a second season. Luckily, Pancholy is still going strong in his role as Jack Donaghy's (Alec Baldwin) overly eager assistant on "30 Rock." [] </p><p> Sprague Grayden and David Costablie land an AMC gig. Grayden and Costabile will appear on AMC's pilot "Low Winter Sun." Grayden will play Elena, a woman working to extend the family's crime network, while Costabile will portray an investigator from internal affairs. []</p><p> </p><p>Related on HuffPost:</p>?eGHZmFyID44mYu00M5dZQr%2BjdVtc6mbKKwyhi9exWxVPnmmfTCGgRFKlVEsUD4JFQsfXJ2dtLuzmVP8q1zOe6cFjXCBrfIccAcD2%2BZCj1ofCLNdb4PAUq1BGtDmh45514kIuB5Ua5hfpX3jCUjpesONZAp5v%2FZYto0CpL2BNQDbLKBQntDL%2BG0SOtgBpYqpM?<p>This month's issue of features fashion photographer Terry Richardson looking normal and Terry Richardson-y. Wait... that's not Terry Richardson?</p><p>Nope, the cover star of the mag this month is actually Chloe Sevigny dressed as Terry Richardson, photographed by Richardson himself. We'll give you a second to process that.</p><p>Chloe dons a beard, flannel and Terry's trademark hipster glasses to pose as "the Terryfic Chloe Sevigny." She's giving the camera two thumbs up, and we have to also give kudos to Chloe for how much she resembles the iconic photographer.</p><p>Candy, which "the first magazine ever completely dedicated to celebrating transvestism, transexuality, cross dressing and androgyny," also got a major celeb to pose in drag for their first issue: you probably remember , which was also shot by Richardson.</p><p>Aside from masquerading as Terry, Chloe's got a cool project up her sleeves: she'll as a pre-op transsexual that is also a hired assassin. </p><p>Check out the cover below.</p><p></p><p></p><p><br></p> <br>?<p>Chloe Sevigny is known for her atypical roles and on April 18 the "Big Love" vet and Oscar nominee is coming to "" (Wednesdays at 10 p.m. ET on NBC). And viewers who have come to expect those trademark twists and turns from her performances will not be disappointed.</p><p>When audiences meet Sevigny's character, Christine, she's video chatting with her husband. But things quickly sour and her husband sees Christine get attacked and kidnapped. As the detectives start their investigation, not everything is what it seems. When the detectives are on the scene for the ransom drop, it's not the kidnapper who shows up for the money, it's Christine. Sevigny's character comes into Detective Benson's crosshairs, providing Sevigny with lots of screentime with series star Mariska Hargitay.</p><p>"Ugh, she's the best," Sevigny told HuffPost TV in a phone interview in late March. "I'm so in love with her. She's so inspiring."</p><p>"" Rich Sommer, Ron Rifkin, Laura Benanti and Diane Neal also join Sevigny in the episode. Read on for more from Sevigny about "SVU," her new controversial miniseries and her love of quirky girls (or at least some of them).</p><p>Is "SVU" something you watch regularly? I'm sure you've seen it.<br>Well, I don't have a television, so I don't watch anything regularly.</p><p>Oh boy.<br>[Laughs.] But it is something you return to. There's a sense of comfort in the repetition and the familiarity of a show like that, but I don't have a TV so I don't watch it, no.</p><p>So why did you say "yes" to this role?<br>Every time I go to the theater, every Playbill I see, every actor has an "SVU" credit and I wanted one. So that's kind of how it happened. My friend Natasha did an episode and we were talking about it while she was there and I said, "I kind of want to do one. Why don't you say something to the producers and see if they'd be interested in having me do an episode?" So she did and I had my manager call and say, "Chloe really wants to do an episode" and they said, "We'll see what we have in the pipeline." And they came back with this, so that's how it happened.</p><p>Did you have to do any kind of special research for this?<br>It was kind of loosely based on this true story that happened in Florida -- so they sent me some of that, some of the press clippings about that. But no, no real research.</p><p>Your character has a lot of scenes with Detective Benson -- she gets suspicious of Christine -- so I assume you worked a lot with Mariska Hargitay. How was that?<br>She's been on that show for so many years and she handles herself so gracefully on it. She's just, she's cool to be around. She's funny, easy and she had good insight into some of the more difficult moments I had. I love an alpha female and she is like the ultimate. </p><p>Definitely. She's been carrying that show for 13 years now, so ...<br>[Laughs.] Especially now that Meloni's gone.</p><p>[Laughs.] My editor wanted me to ask you if you missed Stabler.<br>Aww, I know, I know. I think she's doing a good job carrying on without him.</p><p>How was working on "SVU" different than working on "Big Love"?<br>Well, "Big Love" was my show. [Laughs.] "Law & Order" is Mariska's show. It was very different. I go in for a week; I don't want to upset anybody; I don't want to do anything wrong. I just wanted to have a pleasant time and be easy. You're not as invested in something like that when it's not your show. You just want to go in and do the best job that you can for the people who are the regulars and for the fans, obviously. It's just different in so many ways. You're not very familiar with the character, you don't know the crew, there's not that comfort and ease like when you're on your own set. You just feed off the regular's energy, like Mariska's, which she had so much to spare. It was easy to feel comfortable there.</p><p>So your character is kidnapped while video chatting.<br>Yes. In lingerie.</p><p>Oh. A little more than just video chatting, perhaps?<br>[Laughs.] No, you know, she's talking to her husband! He's out of town. It's playful ... until the kidnapping ensues, of course.</p><p>And you're joined by a couple of other guest stars.<br>Ron Rifkin, Rich Sommer from "Mad Men," who I totally fanned out on and adore to no end. And Diane Neal, but I guess she's more of a regular. She was the laugh-riot of the set. I could barely contain myself.</p><p>So I was reading about your new show, "Hit and Miss," that's going to be on DirecTV.<br>Oh! It's not a show; it's just a miniseries. </p><p>You play a pre-op transsexual contract killer? That sounds like nothing I've ever seen on TV.<br>[Laughs.] I hope not! I got reamed out by The Advocate the other day for saying "tranny." I guess I a couple of times and apparently, that's a no-no in the community. I felt really bad! Nobody had ever told me. Did you know that?</p><p>I just know that now because so ... <br>Oh, so there's been some uproar. </p><p>Yes.<br>Reee-donkulous. You can't say anything anymore.</p><p>Can you tell me a little bit more about "Hit and Miss"?<br>It's a six-part miniseries we shot in Manchester, England. I play an Irish boy/girl from a Traveler's community, which is like the Irish gypsies. It's more about her and this family that she kind of falls into, these children she kind of inherits and how she learns to cope with being in a parental role.</p><p>So it's pretty different from your "SVU" role and what people are used to seeing you in with "."<br>Yes, really different.</p><p>I saw you attended the premiere of HBO's "" Did you like it?<br>I did like it. I love girls, not the show, but the sex. [Laughs.] The age group. I mean, I did love the show, but I love watching girls relating. It was just a fresh take on everything. I think that Lena [Dunham, the creator, writer, director and star] is really such a great talent and just so funny. She deals with subjects we've never seen dealt with before on TV really. It's kind of how I felt when I was like 14 or 15 years old and found Sassy magazine. It was like wow, "Somebody is actually talking about these things." It's great. I'm a huge fan.</p><p>It's the talk of the office around here.<br>I'm sure it is. I also saw Whit Stillman's "Damsels In Distress" the other night and it was equally as good. It's so inspiring. Greta Gerwig's performance is just amazing. She's irresistible. I'm such a fan of these quirky girls!</p><p>So have you seen "New Girl" then?<br>I tried to watch that, but I have to say that I didn't go for. Jeanne Tripplehorn, who was on "Big Love" obviously, is one of my closest friends and she did an episode and said, "Oh, it's going to be on!" So I was at my mother's house -- she has a TV -- so I watched it at her house, but it wasn't the episode. She had the date wrong. I have to say, there was a lot of yelling going on. Maybe it was just the episode I saw and I have to give it another whirl, but I've only seen one episode and it didn't really catch my interest so much.</p><p>Chloe Sevigny's episode of "Law & Order: SVU" airs Wednesday, April 18 at 10 p.m. ET on NBC</p> <br>?eGHZmFyID44mYu00M5dZQr%2BjdVtc6mbKKwyhi9exWxVPnmmfTCGgRFKlVEsUD4JFQsfXJ2dtLuzmVP8q1zOe6cFjXCBrfIccAcD2%2BZCj1ofCLNdb4PAUq1BGtDmh45514kIuB5Ua5hfpX3jCUjpesONZAp5v%2FZYto0CpL2BNQDbLKBQntDL%2BG0SOtgBpYqpM?eGHZmFyID44mYu00M5dZQr%2BjdVtc6mbKKwyhi9exWxVPnmmfTCGgRFKlVEsUD4JFQsfXJ2dtLuzmVP8q1zOe6cFjXCBrfIccAcD2%2BZCj1ofCLNdb4PAUq1BGtDmh45514kIuB5Ua5hfpX3jCUjpesONZAp5v%2FZYto0CpL2BNQDbLKBQntDL%2BG0SOtgBpYqpM?eGHZmFyID44mYu00M5dZQr%2BjdVtc6mbKKwyhi9exWxVPnmmfTCGgRFKlVEsUD4JFQsfXJ2dtLuzmVP8q1zOe6cFjXCBrfIccAcD2%2BZCj1ofCLNdb4PAUq1BGtDmh45514kIuB5Ua5hfpX3jCUjpesONZAp5v%2FZYto0CpL2BNQDbLKBQntDL%2BG0SOtgBpYqpM?eGHZmFyID44mYu00M5dZQr%2BjdVtc6mbKKwyhi9exWxVPnmmfTCGgRFKlVEsUD4JFQsfXJ2dtLuzmVP8q1zOe6cFjXCBrfIccAcD2%2BZCj1ofCLNdb4PAUq1BGtDmh45514kIuB5Ua5hfpX3jCUjpesONZAp5v%2FZYto0CpL2BNQDbLKBQntDL%2BG0SOtgBpYqpM?<p> stepped in where stepped out, in a way, on "" (Thu., 10:30 p.m. ET on FX). When Louis went back into the bookstore looking for Posey's character after that wild first date of theirs, he found that she was no longer working there. The new girl behind the counter is Chloe Sevigny's character.</p><p>When she heard that Louis was looking to reconnect with a woman he liked, Sevigny's character got a little bit crazy. Telling him how important it was that he find her, she wound up leaving the bookstore after her shift to try and help Louis track the woman down at her building.</p><p>When that failed, they wound up in a coffee shop. There, all the talk about destiny and never giving up on love must have finally pushed Sevigny's character to the brink, because she abruptly pleasured herself.</p><p>When she finished, she told Louis she's married and not to come back to the bookstore, wrapping up her short stint as yet another weird character on this bizarre season of "Louie."</p><p>"Louie" keeps the weird coming every Thursday at 10:30 p.m. ET on FX.</p><p>TV Replay scours the vast television landscape to find the most interesting, amusing, and, on a good day, amazing moments, and delivers them right to your browser.</p><p>Related on HuffPost:</p>?<p>Things that get better with age: , denim, ... and celebrity ad campaigns. </p><p>, a brand she first posed for back in 1996. Now the New York City style icon is back for more, helming the brand's Fall 2012 campaign shot by Mert Alas and Marcus Piggott. </p><p>It's easy to tell the two eras apart: snapped by Juergen Teller, Chloe's Nineties spots have the barefaced, brooding minimalist feel we associate with early Kate Moss, while the new ads are vibrant, sparkly and totally 2012. But remarkably, Chloe herself looks virtually the same, down to her red boyish haircut (it's almost as if the intervening years of blonde never happened). </p><p>Which explains Miu Miu's decision: with a model so nice, why not cast her twice? Plenty of other brands have felt the same way. From to , here are some models and celebs who keep on popping up again.</p><p></p><p>Want more? Be sure to check out HuffPost Style on , , and .</p>?<p>www.celebuzz.com:</p><p>Bikini-clad celebs are starting to get their tan on as summer quickly approaches. The latest starlet to hit to beach? Chloe Sevigny!</p><p>The 37-year-old was spotted hanging out with friends at Miami Beach this Saturday. Sporting a tie-dye two piece, the former?Big Love star had fun snapping photographs before kicking back in a lounge chai</p><p></p> <br>?eGHZmFyID44mYu00M5dZQr%2BjdVtc6mbKKwyhi9exWxVPnmmfTCGgRA5kxackm6DvoZoChgKGrpw9EF5FqFNNsaYCUtKkbuIyp2gU9Tgv%2F32B1nLrDWAGvDgxkkR8useG2rsOgEVoCnE5ndiIogXSiWqekkhv%2F224LC6oDGR6cYl%2B6JHTpajw%2BKtSnu4bt%2BPO?<p>How do you know when the New York Knicks are finally good?</p><p>Celebrities return to the sidelines.</p><p>Some famous faces like Spike Lee never left, sticking with the beleaguered basketball team through thick and thin. But, as everyone in New York City can sense, and have a chance to go all the way.</p><p>Which means the famous fans and their families are hitting the sidelines once again, showing off their courtside style against the blue and orange backdrop. On opening day, while rooting for the Empire State.</p><p>And last night, fashion darling Chloe Sevigny showed her team spirit in... leopard print. It wasn't the most baskeball-themed outfit (no mesh jerseys here), but she did look adorable in a black sweater, black tights, ankle boots and a pleated leopard-print skirt. Her latest hair style -- a orange crop with short bangs -- brightened up the stands.</p><p>It is only appropriate that the New York Knicks sidelines are filled with fashion favorites, as the court has its fair share of style as well. each fashion week and , attending fashion week, and even co-designing a line with Rachel Roy.</p><p>But when it comes to game day, it's the fans who have the most fashion cred. Check out Chloe's cute look!</p><p>PHOTOS:</p><p></p><p></p><p>Also on HuffPost:</p> <br>?<p>WHO: and designer </p><p>WHAT: Chloe Sevigny was street style bait as she arrived at the earlier this week. The lived up to her reputation as a fashion daredevil in an all-pink ensemble that only the brave could pull off. We love how Ms. Sevigny on top: The pattern in her button-up was echoed in a slightly different color palette in her blazer, but really made a visual impact (how clever). The Massachusetts native opted for a pair of pink and finished her look with a chunky to offset the otherwise feminine look. We wouldn't be surprised if most of the was looking at Sevigny instead of the show. </p><p>WHERE: was seen at on October 3rd. </p><p>Click to see Chloe Sevigny's style evolution.</p>Getty Images <p>Shop a similar look below, and check out more of our picks.</p><p></p><p>Want more? Be sure to check out HuffPost Style on , , and .</p>?<p>Chloe Sevigny will soon make her debut as an Irish assassin who's in transition from male to female in the six-part British series "" (premieres on Wednesday, July 11 at 10 p.m. ET on DirecTV's Audience Network).</p><p>Although Sevigny is used to difficult roles -- she played a sister-wife on HBO's "" and will take on the role of a nymphomaniac in --. </p><p>"Putting [the prosthetic penis on] took two hours," she said. "I shaved myself and they had to glue it on, paint it and pull away the skin to make it seamless. It's a tedious process, and it's hard having someone so close to your private parts for an extended period of time who you're not having sex with." </p><p>Uncomfortable as it was, Sevigny said it helped her understand her character more. "Having it on and looking at yourself is oddly disturbing. I felt like a freak," she continued. "A lot of transgender people feel like this shouldn't be part of their body, and so I guess it was a good thing. I reacted the way my character would."</p><p>While stepping into the role of someone who is transgender was a huge part of her character, Sevigny stressed other elements of it as well. </p><p>"It's more about her and this family that she kind of falls into, these children she kind of inherits and how she learns to cope with being in a parental role," . </p><p></p><p>"Hit & Miss" premieres Wednesday, July 11 at 10 p.m. ET on DirecTV's Audience Network</p><p></p><p>Related on HuffPost:</p>?Today New York City's Metropolitan Museum's Costume Institute will open its new exhibit, "American Woman: Fashioning a National Identity." Gazing at the glamorous finery of eras past, as usual I found myself wishing back certain flourishes and trappings, from hand-held fans to white gloves to turbans.?<p>The cast party might be the most interesting part of this show.</p><p>Katie Holmes is rumored to be headed back to Broadway, as she's in an upcoming production of William Mastrosimone's drama 'Extremities.' Joining her, perhaps, will be 'Big Love' star Chloe Sevigny, .</p><p>"I was reading it and I'm kind of seeing how the cast is gonna pan out," Sevigny told the site. "I know the director is great but I feel like the cast has gotta be real strong. And it's such a commitment."</p><p>Sevigny, whose run in 'Big Love' will end this season, has starred in two off-Broadway productions, including a 1998 run of 'Hazelwood Junior High.' Holmes, on the other hand, of Arthur Miller's 'All My Sons.'</p> <br>?<p>Lela Rose's celeb clientele includes Eva Mendes, Mary Kate and Ashley Olsen. We caught up with the designer at Fashion Week to talk about inspiration, her first fashion memory and her dream of owning an ice cream shop.</p>?<p>"I was wondering when did this whole chavvy thing take over," Chloe Sevigny enquires, with eyebrows raised. </p><p>The Oscar-nominated actress is obviously still getting over her culture shock on finding herself thousands of miles away from her It-Girl, and instead dealing with life in a northern town, on location for Hit and Miss.</p><p><br>Chloe Sevigny is an Irish, transgender assassin in Hit and Miss</p><p>"It just seems to permeate everywhere you look... there's girls with the eyelashes, fake hair, the tans, they're so plastic, it's really insane, how they put themselves together. I was playing a transgender person, but I wore less makeup than they did... not to be judgemental about it, but it was crazy to walk around Leeds, Manchester, Blackpool."</p><p>Normally, a self-contained, PR-conscious Hollywood actor would stop at this point, but Sevigny's got plenty more to say... </p><p>"And everyone's so obsessed with accents. At work, people would talk about each other's accents at least 20 times a day, at least... Essex this person, Jordie that person, there was this whole big thing about who's authentic from some town, and it's only 45 minutes away." </p><p>So how did this New York cool cat end up sticking out like a sore thumb on the dark moors of Northern England, giving it her all in surely one of the more unusual characters to grace the small screen. It seems she got a call:</p><p>"'You're going to be transgender. Oh, and you're going to be an assassin.'</p><p>"But they told me not to judge.</p><p>"Somehow, the creators thought of me!" </p><p>She sounds surprised, of her getting such a role. "I think of myself as looking quite masculine - I don't know if it was the looks or... " </p><p><br>Sevigny in action</p><p>Of course, Sevigny has form with this kind of offbeat, challenging fare - Oscar-nominated for her role in Boys Don't Cry, which saw her play girlfriend to Hilary Swank's androgynous role. What's more confusing why she chose this far-from-home gig?</p><p>"Well, my agents did some investigating and Paul Abbot (exec producer) is a stamp of quality in this country.</p><p>"And what a great part it was - this incredible, insane journey that this woman goes through, how complicated it was, you feel for her but you hate her. It was really rich, the biggest role I've had in my career, a great opportunity."</p><p>Tarring everybody with the same brush comes something of a surprise from Sevigny, who has herself been a victim of stereotyping in the past. </p><p>"In the 90s, early 2000s, I was doing lots of independent films, there was an abundance then, but the market is really shrinking.</p><p>"There are these big studio movies, with two or three girls who get in every single one of them, and I've never been on that list. So I've got to take the work where I can get it, and make a living."<br> <br>Surely an Oscar nomination helps? </p><p>"There's a bunch of other girls have that as well. I don't think that means anything, what means something is how much money you can make for them." </p><p><br>Sevigny with Hilary Swank in Boys Don't Cry</p><p>If all this makes Sevigny sound miserable, the opposite is true. She's just spunky, and very happy calling a spade a spade, is quick to mention how friendly everyone in the north was, despite the fact she felt "just misunderstood". No wonder she caught the eye of equally quirky Abbott. So what did she think of him?</p><p>Cue more revelations of the type to make a publicist blush. </p><p>"He never came to the set, but I heard he was really charming and amazing," she confides.</p><p>"I'm sure I would love him, he sounds really eccentric and I love eccentrics."</p><p>Finally, dare I ask, is she up for a second series of the show which divided critics but always kept them interested.</p><p>Small silence. "They haven't asked me yet. But sure... if it's filmed around London."</p><p>Hit and Miss is now available on DVD, Blu-ray and digitally. Chloe Sevigny below discusses the transgender issues the series raised for her...<br></p>?<p>Chloe Sevigny's chic East Village apartment at has hit the market for $1.7 million. </p><p>The actress showed off her lovely digs in a recent profile for New York Magazine, in which she hinted about possibly leaving the for a high-rise because of the home's lack of light and strict property rules. </p><p>Sevigny said, "I’m looking. Maybe I won’t find the right thing and I’ll just stay here. Or maybe I’ll fall in love and get married and move somewhere else entirely. You never know!”</p><p>The tour revealed that some of the home's who also helped outfit the Beatrice Inn, owned by Chloe's brother Paul. </p><p>Now the home is up for grabs and is being as such:</p>Upon entering this very special apartment through the gate, one is instantly transported to a retreat in the country...Continue through to the dining area complete with a wall of casement windows framing the view to the Old World, common garden behind and a Dutch door opening directly to this spectacularly private oasis.?With regard to The Brown Rabbit, do remember that there was a New York minute a few years back when it was sort of the in thing to have real sex in a mainstream movie. Until that time, it had been exceptionally rare. (I'm talking "In the Realm of the Senses" type movies here--not the porno version of "Caligula.") It was mainly a French/Rest of World type thing and never really caught on in the US. Only two examples I can think of are "Shortbus" and the aforementioned rabbit movie. One could say that makes Sevigny's on-film actions avant garde. <br><br>Of course, it was still a lousy movie.?<p>Our love affair with Chloe Sevigny's closet has continued as the "Big Love" actress stepped out to the show's season 5 premiere in L.A. on Wednesday night in a floral-print halter dress by Rodarte with a cutout and center slit. And even though her skirt was almost gone with the wind, we'd still borrow the frock. Call us, Clo!</p><p>She paired the number with lace-up, leopard print heels and a gold clutch. Take a look and tell us what you think.</p><p></p> <br>?Since Chloe Sevigny is obviously obsessed with fashion and style, I'm surprised she never took the effort to analyze her figure and determine what looks best on her. With her short neck and long, pointed chin, high necklines make her look freakish, as though her head were connected directly to her shoulders. To create the illusion of a longer neck or any neck at all, Chloe should wear moderately low but absolutely simple necklines without necklaces or any decoration to call attention to that part of her body. By all means, she needs to stay away from high necked tops, especially turtlenecks, which should be banished from her wardrobe immediately.?<p>Chloe Sevigny isn't afraid to go bold, when it comes to speaking her mind, her on-screen roles () and especially her style (case in point: ).</p><p>So the actress was not timid about debuting a new haircut that is... well, let's just say it's unconventional. Chloe attended last night's screening of ) wearing a short red hair style to match her short red dress.</p><p>There were bangs, there was a little flip at the bottom and there was some tucked-behind-the-ears action (which, ).</p><p>Overall we're sort of baffled. The color, the length, the bangs, the odd flip... can anyone tell us what's going on here?</p><p></p><p></p><p><br></p> <br>?<p>Whilst the focus on boobs is perhaps the only constant in TOWIE, the cast list changes more regularly than Joey Essex's catchphrase de jour (tonight, for example, it was 'salt', meaning 'attractive girl'). Gone are Mark, Kirk and Maria - and in their place a host of new faces. Meet the gang...</p>?<p>Chloe Smith has been appointed economic secretary to the Treasury as part of David Cameron's mini-reshuffle following the resignation of defence secretary Liam Fox.</p><p>The 29-year-old MP for Norwich North has had a meteoric rise through the ranks, having only entered Parliament in a 2009 by-election caused by the resignation of Labour MP Ian Gibson in the wake of the expenses scandal.</p><p>The post of economic secretary is the fifth most senior at the Treasury under George Osborne. </p><p>Smith will have responsibility for a wide range of issues including taxation of transport, North Sea oil, child poverty and the EU Budget.</p><p>Tipped for big things from the moment she set foot in Westminster, she was made an assistant government Whip following the general election in 2010.</p><p>Seen as a Cameron Conservative, Smith is a member of the Tory Reform Group which favours a Conservative Party that that pursues economic efficiency and social justice, equality, diversity and supports civil liberties.</p><p>The York University graduate worked as a consultant for Deloitte from 2004 until her election in 2009, when at 27 she became baby of the House.</p><p>Smith fills the post vacated by Justine Greening who has been promoted to transport secretary, following the departure of Philip Hammond to the Ministry of Defence.</p> <br>?<p>It is the latest in a long line of U-turns from the government that has led to George Osborne's 2012 Budget to be known as an "omnishambles".</p><p>On Tuesday the Treasury decided to delay a planned 3p rise in fuel duty in August until January 2013.</p><p>However having given a statement to parliament it was not the Chancellor who toured the television studios to defend the move, preferring instead to throw his junior Treasury minister, 30-year-old Chloe Smith, to the wolves.</p><p>And the economic secretary to the Treasury was subject to a Paxman savaging that caused The Huffington Post to hide behind our hands to avoid the full scale of the horror.</p><p>During the day on Tuesday there had been some confusion as to what the policy actually was and when the decision to U-turn was made - and Paxman wanted to know when Smith was told herself.</p><p>"When were you told?" he asked repeatedly. Smith explained however that she was not able to give him or the viewers the "full gory details".</p><p>Having insisted several times, in a line of questioning that looked in danger of going down , Paxman sighed:</p><p>"You cant even tell me when you were told what the change of policy was. You were told some time today clearly, was it before lunch or after lunch?"</p><p>Tory . </p><p>Chief among those yesterday must have been transport secretary Justine Greening, who was defending the rise as recently as Monday. Something made all the more embarrassing given she held Smith's job before being promoted to the cabinet.</p><p>"Why didn't the transport secretary know about it yesterday?" Paxman asked.</p><p>Smith's response, an unfortunate coughing fit, did little to pry the hands from the faces of those watching and sent us diving for the safe spot behind the sofa usually reserved for England penalty shoot-outs.</p><p>"Is this some sort of joke?" Paxman continued. "Do you ever think you're incompetent?"</p><p>While Smith may have endured one of the most cringe-worthy interviews in recent times, there was a sense that Paxman felt a tad sorry for her.</p><p>Among those was Tory MP Nadine Dorries, a long time and vocal critic of George Osborne, who tweeted on Wednesday morning: "If Osborne sent Chloe on re scrapping 3p he is a coward as well as arrogant."</p><p>She added: "The sumbmarine Chancellor sacrifices another Minister whilst he slips under the surface...again."</p><p>Fittingly the term "omnishambles" originates from the political satire The Thick Of It. In one episode minister Ben Swaine is subject to a Paxman beating described as "bare-knuckle backstreet talking". We will leave it up to you decide whether Smith did better than Swaine.</p><p></p>?<p>The government needs to deliver on its promise to introduce a statutory register of lobbyists, to restore faith in our industry and to put to an end the drip-drip of lobbying stories that rear their head from time to time and undermine the professional, ethical and useful job that the vast majority of lobbyists are doing day in day out.</p>?<p>The political spectrum is the range of political attitudes of the public, going gradually from extreme to moderate to extreme: radical, liberal, moderate, conservative, and then reactionary. Every individual lies somewhere along this political spectrum, but many do not know exactly where they lie, or they label themselves as something that they may not be entirely. Some even think that they lie nowhere on the political spectrum, because they label themselves as not involved or not feeling strongly about political issues, but the fact is that they are most likely moderate, or maybe they do feel strongly about many political issues but don't really know it.</p><p>These labels of "liberal," "moderate," "conservative," "radical" or "reactionary" are often misinterpreted or misunderstood. So the first thing is to know the true definitions of these labels before you apply them to your political description. Read up on them, from both viewpoints. I was scouring Google for an unbiased definition of each political label, but it is hard to find such unbiased sites, so my best advice is to look them up for yourself from both viewpoints. It just goes to show that everyone has their opinion, and most are very passionate about the political label that they apply to themselves.</p><p>But generally speaking, "liberal" refers to someone who advocates change, new philosophies and new ideas. "Conservative" describes someone who avoids change, preferring to stick to the tried and true. But these definitions have changed over time, and modern definitions of these political labels are much more complex.</p><p>Liberals today are very much for individual rights but also lots of government intervention and control. They want everyone to be treated equally, especially concerning health care, gay marriage, illegal immigration and minimum wage. They are very supportive of the poor and lower middle-class, believing that the rich should be taxed highly to help the poor. They believe that the government should protect the people from themselves, banning gun ownership and making unionizing of workers mandatory. They are also pro-choice but believe that the death penalty should be banned. They want to decrease defense spending and scrap the Missile Defense program.</p><p>Conservatives today are for a strong military and taking the necessary actions to protect America, even if it means intervening in other countries preemptively. They are against granting amnesty to illegal aliens and want to prevent illegal immigration as much as possible by building a fence along the border with Mexico. They are against abortion and physician-assisted suicide, and they believe that there should be more faith-based government initiatives, like introducing more religion into schools. They want to cut taxes, keep government out of business and have more capitalistic and free-market policies. They want to protect gun ownership rights, and they believe that there should be maximum punishment for crimes and that people should always be held responsible for their own actions. They also value tradition very highly, like keeping marriage between a man and a woman and keeping the death penalty.</p><p>Political attitudes usually run in the family and carry down through generation after generation. Children are influenced greatly by their parents' political ideologies, so families usually have the same or at least similar political views. Children with parents who have strong or passionate views politically will most likely grow up with the same views. They may go through a rebellious stage in their teenage or young adult years but will most likely always go back to their original political upbringing as a mature adult. Of course, there are exceptions, but for the most part this holds true. Many factors other than family also influence political attitudes, like gender, religion, education level and race/ethnicity. But above all, what runs in the family remains the biggest factor in determining political ideologies other than the individual's views on certain current topics or debatable issues.</p><p>"Radical" and "reactionary" are extreme versions of "liberal" and "conservative," respectively. A radical is extremely far left, or an ultra-liberal or extremist, and a reactionary is extremely far right, or an ultra-conservative or extremist. Reactionaries are so conservative that they want to reverse political progress or change. And radicals favor drastic political, economic or social reforms and often advocate these uncompromisingly.</p><p>One of the best ways to determine your place on the political spectrum and know exactly what political label best describes you and your views is to take a quiz. There are many out there, but the most popular are the and . These are great ways to know what political ideology you most agree with because they are determine your personal views based on issues and how strongly you feel about them. There are no family influences or pressures involved, and no labels on the answers that give away beforehand whether you are choosing a liberal or conservative view; many people feel pressure or obligation to remain true to their political label, instead of expressing their true feelings on certain subjects even if they contradict their label of "liberal" or "conservative." Once an individual claims him or herself to be a conservative or a liberal, a Republican or a Democrat, they usually automatically go with their group's decisions or views rather than their own if they happen to differ.</p><p>If you find many of your views differing from your current group's views that you have affiliated yourself with, then you may be giving yourself an incorrect political label. Or you may have just misunderstood the true meaning of the political label that you gave yourself, perhaps just based on the fact that your family holds this label and encouraged or pressured you to do the same, and you took it without current education on that political ideology. To find out whether any of your views differ from your group's, take a look at this . I mentioned many of these descriptions of conservative or liberal above.</p><p>Every individual has some kind of political attitude, whether it leans toward liberal or conservative, to the extremes or somewhere in the middle. But there's no general right or wrong, because everyone has a right to their own personal political ideology; that's the beauty of choice and personal freedom. I believe that every human being is equal, but we should let all people have their freedom and ability to live the life they choose to live. Allow people to do what they want with their lives, whether it's good or bad for them. Allow competition and the opportunity to become successful and wealthier than others. If there's no challenge in life, is it even worth living?</p><p>We all lead such different lives and go down different paths in life. We come from all sorts of different backgrounds and upbringings and aspire to different journeys through life. That is what makes us diverse, interesting and colorful in many different ways. And that in turn is what shapes our country, the United States of America, and ultimately the world around us.</p><p>Follow Chloe Spencer on Twitter:</p>?<p>Commercials are excellent means of advertising. But, they only reach audiences watching TV at that one moment that they are playing. Unless, they were good enough to go viral. If your commercial becomes viral, now you are reaching audiences across the Internet, on social sites like Facebook, YouTube, blogs, etc. So what makes a commercial good enough to be shared online and spread like wildfire? There's a few key ingredients to make a commercial viral. I have made a list of the top five factors below.</p><p>1. Humor</p><p>For a commercial to become viral, it almost always has to be funny. Humor is the number one key ingredient. But, it has to be the right kind of humor. Humor for five-year-olds is not the same as humor. You also need to think about your target audience, and who's going to be doing the social sharing of the commercial. For the most part it will be Digital Natives, aka Gen Ys, so targeting their age group and type of humor is your best game plan. Wacky humor is a great tactic, where it's original and kind of random, in such a way that it's hilarious. Take this for example; it's extremely random and kind of weird, but that's what makes it really funny. One of my favorite funny commercials is this , where a football player suffers an injury and is now convinced he is Batman. </p><p>2. Goes Over the Line</p><p>Which brings us onto the next factor, which is content that steps over the line, as slightly shocking, raunchy, politically incorrect, adult-themed, etc. Now, you don't want to go too far and offend a bunch of people, but if it's inappropriate in a hilarious way, you are on your way to viral success. People don't share commercials about $1 cheeseburgers, people share commercials that are funny, out of the ordinary, and what makes a commercial even more viral is adult humor. Take for example, which have a fantastic use of creativity, raunchiness and humor to create funny, extremely viral commercials.</p><p>3. Has a Twist</p><p>Commercials that appear to be ordinary at first but end in a hilariously unpredictable way really get people's attention. Even if it starts off weird, getting weirder at the end makes the commercial that much better. Take this for example; a random gorilla feeling the music listening to a Phil Collins song... it's definitely odd... then suddenly it starts playing the drums with extreme passion. And then the commercial ends. It's weird as heck, memorable, and it's funny. Another good example of a commercial with a twist is this , as well as the "That's Why I Chose Yale" commercial on this page of .</p><p>4. Rides on the Coattails of a Popular Trend</p><p>There's nothing more sharable than content that alludes to a popular trend or current fad that Digital Natives recognize and relate to. A commercial that incorporates something like this, such as an expression, song, word, dance, style, etc that is currently sweeping the youth, can be pure genius. When a digital native sees something that caters specifically to their generation and humor, they usually love it, share it with their friends, their friends share it with their friends, and from there it spreads like wildfire. For example, the expression "YOLO" is currently a huge fad, meaning "You only live once." Yes, it sounds stupid, but it's popular, and if a commercial were to incorporate this expression it's almost a guarantee it would become viral. Or for example, the current trend; even Rihanna is . Another idea is riding on the colossal trend of , which would get a lot of attention, especially among females, who make up the on Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, etc. Coming up with your own brilliant ideas can be hard, so riding on the coattails of existing trends and popular fads is an alternatively sure way to viral success.</p><p>5. Isn't Too Intellectual</p><p>Commercials need to be made for, let's face it, idiots. The lowest common denominator. This is what commercials need to be targeting, because that is the majority of your audience. Most highly intellectual people mute the commercials while watching TV, if they watch TV at all. And the fact remains that if a commercial has a joke that is very intellectual, it won't be understood by many of its viewers, and therefore won't be shared as much as it could've been if it was less intellectual. Highly sharable content is not content for geniuses, but for the average to low IQ. Raunchy and inappropriate or wacky and odd humor is what goes viral, for the most part. Take these , for example -- they all target an audience with lower IQs, which is key.</p><p>All of these factors are what can make a commercial go viral, shared via social media, blogs, articles, word of mouth, etc. All it takes is thinking about who your audience is, who's going to be sharing the video, where, and what will make that audience want to share the video. And these five key ingredients can help your commercial achieve viral success!</p> <br><p>Follow Chloe Spencer on Twitter:</p>?<p>Rewind 100 years when fur was the most desired item of clothing for the wealthy -- when basically you weren't worth anything unless you wore fur. Now fast-forward to today, where wearing fur has been protested for the past 60 years, yet, it is still a fashionable item to many, and in some ways is making a comeback. Sites selling brands like Juicy Couture and Marc Jacobs are beginning to sell fur again, in the form of $2,000 fur coats, and animal skin handbags of crocodile and python. </p><p>Skins have made a comeback as well, especially crocodile skin wallets, shoes and handbags, which have once again become a status symbol for those who can afford it. But many who can afford it instead choose to opt for a cruelty-free and animal-friendly substitute; faux fur and faux skins. Which surprisingly can be quite expensive, because they are hand cut, hand crafted and hand finished, to ensure quality workmanship so that it is unable to be distinguished from real fur. While still one-tenth of the price of real fur, with no conscience-stricken feelings of guilt when buying it.</p><p>But where do you find this quality faux fur compared to the cheap stuff you see in stores? I discovered , a company created by a woman who didn't want to support the killing of animals but loved the feel of fur, so she started a faux fur clothing line in her basement which expanded into a successful online store with hundreds of faux fur coats, vests, rugs, etc, that also donates to hundreds of non-profits and hosts fund-raising events every year. are also easy to find in most stores for very reasonable prices, but if you're looking for more realistic, expensive faux skins, shop at designer stores like and , who have lots of faux snake, lizard and croc bags and shoes for prices usually under $500.</p><p>The biggest factor in determining the popularity of wearing fur is that a lot of people don't actually know the process of which their fur coat was made, assuming that the animal only died of natural causes and was never killed just for its coat. But this is a common misconception, encouraged by big fur companies. Many fur-bearing animals are killed daily on fur farms by anal and vaginal electrocution, which ultimately fries their insides, and in the wild by drowning, beating, stomping or trapping. These ways to kill the animal are used as to do as little damage to the fur as possible. The pelts are then coated with many harsh and toxic chemicals to keep them from decomposing and losing their shine.</p><p>Fur farms are among the worst places on earth for an animal. Reading articles about these places and what happens to the animals is so horrifying and emotionally disturbing that I could no longer go on reading. To inform yourself on the truth about fur, here are a few must-read articles on , , and . More than half of the fur items sold in the United States come from China, where the fur industry is absolutely horrific, mostly due to the fact that there are no laws against animal cruelty on fur farms in China. is the world's largest, and before buying a fur item again, it is crucial you are fully aware of what goes on in these Chinese fur farms. Animals are kept in tiny wire cages their entire lives, and when their life is up and it's their turn to be made into a coat, undercover investigators from Swiss Animal Protection/EAST International found that after they are pulled from their cages and bludgeoned that many animals are still alive and struggling desperately, when workers flip them onto their backs or hang them up by their legs or tails to skin them.</p><p>You can help stop this inhumane and horrifying slaughter of animals for their furs and skins. And donating money or fund-raising are not the only ways to help put a stop to this. You, as one individual, alone refusing to buy fur your entire life, are making a huge difference, saving as many as 100 or more animals. Because not only are you not buying fur yourself, you are taking part in lowering the demand for fur. Small things like signing a petition like the on the Humane Society website can do a lot more than you think, for the more people who do small things, the bigger the difference.<br></p><p>Follow Chloe Spencer on Twitter:</p>?<p>Lady Gaga is one of the biggest stars today, known perhaps more for her outrageous outfits and performances than her music. She definitely has a taste for weird, and her outfits go from weird to weirder and even shocking. I put together a list of her 15 absolute worst outfits she's ever worn, for your enjoyment. This is exactly what she's trying to achieve by sporting these bizarre costumes in public, so we're not being mean, just giving her more press! Don't feel judgmental, and feel free to post your opinion on her number 1 worst outfit below.</p><p>Lady Gaga fashion is freakish -- but fans are following suit, literally, by imitating her strange fashion sense. Gaga is known for wearing her platinum blonde hair long and straight with a large piece of it tied into a , which fans have copied everywhere, and also for re-popularizing round . Gaga also wore "anime eyes" contact lenses in her music video, which started a huge trend of wearing "circle lenses", which are actually illegal in the U.S and . Fashion brands even started getting wilder and coming out with bizarre pieces to attract Lady Gaga fans, such as and . Wild shoes, wild hair, and wild outfits is getting popular, and Lady Gaga just keeps on getting weirder.</p><p>Terrible on so many levels.<br><br>Creative Commons - Flickr - TJ Sengal</p><p><br>The guy on the right makes me laugh more than her costume.<br><br>Creative Commons - Flickr - TJ Sengal</p><p><br>Oh my...<br><br>Creative Commons - Flickr - TJ Sengal</p><p><br>What...is that?<br><br>Creative Commons - Flickr - VJ Alisa!</p><p><br>She looks like a victorian fruit rollup.<br><br>Creative Commons - Flickr - Emma's..?</p><p><br>I don't even know what to say.<br><br>Creative Commons - Flickr - a_choudhuri</p><p><br>Woah, it's called a bra.</p>Creative Commons - Flickr - nellyfus<p><br>No, you could not pass as a nun.<br><br>Creative Commons - Flickr - nellyfus</p><p><br>Somebody call PETA.<br><br>Creative Commons - Flickr - Cate.Sevilla</p><p><br>It's Cousin It!<br><br>Creative Commons - Flickr - John Robert Charlton</p><p><br>She looks like a very scary wrestler. And so does that person next to her.<br><br>Creative Commons - Flickr - Michael_Spencer</p><p><br>One word: hideous.<br><br>Creative Commons - Flickr - TonyFelgueiras</p><p>A Viking stripper?<br><br>Creative Commons - Flickr - aphrodite-in-nyc</p><p><br>That looks dangerous.<br><br>Creative Commons - Flickr - StephenCarlile</p><p><br>This dress wins the most disgusting outfit award for me. A dress made entirely of raw red meat. She must've smelled really bad by the end of the night.<br><br>Creative Commons - Flickr - Beth77<br></p><p>Follow Chloe Spencer on Twitter:</p>?<p>Most people WANT to make a contribution to charities, but many have no idea which ones to donate to, and how much of their money actually goes through to the people in need on the other end. So, they usually end up not donating at all, except for maybe some clothes to the Goodwill every now and then.</p><p>So what should you do?</p><p>First, do research. Read up on different charities you can donate to, perhaps more local ones if you can find them. Talk to the people from the charities you research and ask them questions. Ask your friends and people you know where they donate to and how much. But if that even seems like too much for you, then just go to . I heard about Free Rice from a documentary on world hunger and poverty called One Peace At A Time (which was excellent by the way; be sure to pick it up from the library or add it to your Netflix que!). What Free Rice is is a nonprofit game. Several games to choose from to be precise. All you do is play the games and with every correct answer, you donate 10 grains of rice. You can play multiple choice games that test your vocabulary, grammar, famous paintings, chemistry symbols, geography, math and languages like Spanish and French. If you get a question wrong, no grains of rice are donated. Once you get a question correct, the 10 grains of rice are automatically and immediately donated. Your following question will be harder, and your next three consecutive correct answers will progress you to a harder level.</p><p>So where do these grains of rice go? They go to the . And you don't have to have an account to play Free Rice, you can start playing the moment the homepage loads. But you can have an account if you wish to track your totals of donated rice. And the best thing about donating to this charity is it's fun, educational, and addictive. I sat there and played Free Rice the first time I visited the site until I donated about 5,000 grains of rice. And I felt wonderful about it. There's no money lost in the process, it's just grains of rice being directly donated, and Free Rice donates 100 percent of it's earnings. The sponsors that advertise on the site are paying for the rice you donate. As quoted in the FAQ page on FreeRice.com, "FreeRice is not sitting on a pile of rice. You and other FreeRice players earn it 10 grains at a time. Here is how it works: when you play the game, sponsor banners appear on the bottom of your screen for every correct answer that you choose. The money generated by these banners is then used to buy the rice. So by playing, you generate the money that pays for the rice donated to hungry people."</p><p>Where does the rice go exactly? The grains of rice goes to hungry countries all over the globe, including Bangladesh, Cambodia, Uganda, Nepal, Bhutan and Myanmar. Watch a .</p><p>So who started this wonderful way to help stop world hunger? His name is John Breen, and he launched the fabulous FreeRice.com in October of 2007. In March 2009, he donated Free Rice to the UN World Food program, and it's been accumulating billions of grains of rice since.</p><p>So what are you waiting for? Play Free Rice today, and as many days as you can, and tell all your friends about it who don't know how to contribute to charities or think it's too hard or not worth it! And if you have a blog, promote Free Rice on it by having a banner, which can be found here: . You can feed the hungry...grain by grain.</p>?<p>As technology advances every year, electronics have taken over today's generation. Some call our generation "The Technology Generation." Everyone has an iPhone or a blackberry or an Android, a laptop, an iPod -- an ! What's really the use of an iPad?! Electronics have become accessories instead of necessities. And now you can get hundreds of accessories for your ! Six-year-old kids are getting cell phones for their birthday and starting early on the "texting craze," downloading games and spending time indoors on their phones instead of outside playing. Human interaction has drastically changed. It's the Myspace and Facebook era, where teens and pre-teens lead a huge percent of their social lives on the internet.</p><p>But, also because of this age of technology and electronics, more kids today than ever before are becoming young entrepreneurs, programmers, online writers, website designers, etc. I started my first online company at 14 years old by creating a website on the online virtual-pet site "" and monetizing it with Google Adsense. My parents at that age were probably doing paper routes, or were in boy or girl scouts, or watching old cartoons on their tiny family televisions! Not that any of those things were bad things, at all, because along with the advancement of technology today has come the pressure to grow up faster and start acting like an adult at an early age. Young kids using cellphones and laptops, for boys, playing violent video games and watching movies about degrading women, for girls, dressing provocatively and wearing makeup. Music playing on the radio about adult topics with crude lyrics; same goes for TV shows, movies, magazines, video games, billboards -- It's inescapable!</p><p>I guess what I'm trying to get across primarily is to be aware of all these influences on your kids, little sisters or brothers, nieces or nephews. And help promote a healthy, happy and lengthy childhood for the youth of today. Kids these days don't understand how quickly that beautiful innocence and care-free life full of imagination, wonder and play goes by, because they are trying to grow up as fast as they can, heavily influenced by the media. Seven year olds don't need an iPad, and 11 year olds don't need a Facebook. Playing outside, playing games with your family, helping mom or dad bake in the kitchen -- these are the activities young kids should be enjoying more.</p><p>Notice your kid shutting you out with their earphones on the way to school, or ignoring you while texting on their phone constantly, or not coming to dinner because they are too busy on Facebook? Don't worry, tons of families all over the world, especially in the U.S, are experiencing these behaviors too. Heck, my family experienced this with me when I was younger, and are still with my younger sisters right now! It's not because you are a bad parent or guardian, it's because electronics have taken over a huge percentage of our lives. Us adults too! Stuck in our phones, eyes glued to our computer screens for hours at a time. Maybe we are perhaps not finding enough time for our kids too... And I mean real quality time, like playing a board game or going outside and playing baseball. Watching a movie together isn't quality time, you're just zoning out and intently watching a screen for two hours.</p><p>I think this is a wake up call, to everybody, that we are losing a lot of normal human interaction, and because everyone does it and we do it all the time, it becomes routine. We forget, that going to see somebody is more heartfelt than a text, or that a real game with your kid is more bonding than watching Spongebob, or that a loving kiss with your partner is more affectionate than a "poke" on Facebook. This is the Marimba ringtone on your iPhone waking you back up to reality. This is the Facebook chat message alert telling you to put down your electronic devices and start giving your loved ones more of your undivided attention. This is the SMS Tri-tone going off saying:</p><p>"You only live once, and there's no telling when your life will end.<br>One day your life will flash before your eyes. Make sure it's worth watching."</p><p>Follow Chloe Spencer on Twitter:</p>?<p>What does it mean when an item of clothing or an accessory is "earth friendly", or "eco-friendly", or "green"? You see it on labels, it makes you feel good to buy it, or maybe you don't feel anything because you don't really know what it even means. An earth friendly or green shirt gets its label depending on the renewability and source of the fibers being used, the process of how it's turned into a textile, and the material's carbon footprint, as well as the working conditions of the people producing the material. Eco-friendly, earth friendly, and green all usually mean organic, free of insecticides and pesticides, and many times the label using that term supports charities and small local businesses in third-world countries. For example, is a non-profit organization that helps orphans by taking their hand-drawn designs and putting them on t-shirts, and the orphan receives the profits from their t-shirts that are sold. Another eco-friendly clothing brand is , and you can read their information on their products and FAQ's .</p><p>You can shop consciously easily when it comes to clothes; there are many brands and sites that sell organic and earth friendly clothing with no child labor or inhumane working conditions involved. Even bigger and more mainstream brands and sites have lines of green clothing and accessories, such as on ShopBop.com, Nudie jeans, and for men at the Gap. Even Victoria's Secret PINK has come out with green organic clothes and eco-friendly beauty products. Just Google "organic clothes" or "eco-friendly clothes", try different variations of words and combinations to get different results, and check out the sites that come up. You'll quickly have a list of your favorites to shop at. And you may find that it is expensive to shop eco-friendly all the time, so if you can't always, at least try to buy labels that are made in the USA and are sweatshop free.</p><p>Awareness is growing in the fashion industry, although it is still small. That's where you come in. Every individual who chooses to buy an earth friendly product over a product with a destructive carbon footprint is making a difference. Every purchase counts, because it increases the demand and supply of green products, and decreases the demand and supply of other products. No matter how small your purchase, it counts, because it adds to all those other millions of small purchases (and big purchases!) others have made in the world. It's easy, helps the environment, others, even you, and makes you feel good. So what are you waiting for, Go Green!</p>?<p>There has been a lot of buzz about Ralph Lauren lately, as some may know--The Lincoln Center in New York presented , hosted by Oprah Winfrey, on October 24th just 2 weeks ago. It was a benefit for the Ralph Lauren Center for Cancer Care and Prevention, and just about every celebrity was there in attendance. At the event, Michael Bloomberg, mayor of the City of New York, named October 24th the Ralph Lauren Center for Cancer Care and Prevention Day. Now, some of you may not know too much about Ralph Lauren, whereas some of you may know him as only a high-end fashion designer. But there's much more to this man, and a surprising story to how he came to his fame. And there's a reason why such a huge event was hosted in his honor.</p><p>Ralph Lauren grew up in a middle-class family in the Bronx, New York; his mother took care of him and his three older brothers, while his father was a painter. He saved his allowance to buy high-quality expensive clothing since the age of 12, which ultimately lead to his job at Brooks Brothers as a salesman during his attendance in business school, which he later dropped out of to create his own company. His first company revolved around designing and selling his own ties, under the label "Polo". Lauren never went to fashion school, so he used his imagination and personal creativity to come up with tie designs, which branched into designs of all sorts of clothing, shoes and accessories. He personally designed every detail of every item himself, and the 71-year-old still does to this day. His lines include , Golf, Black Label, Purple Label, Denim & Supply, and many more, which span from aristocratic to country wear to East Coast preppy to even gym and sport wear, . His fashion line later expanded into a as well, which includes furniture, bedding, dish ware, china, even paint. He even sells his own hand-picked antiques. Ralph Lauren is now considered the world's most successful fashion empire.</p><p>The most inspiring factors of the story of Ralph Lauren was his dedication and his passion as a young man, and his proof to the nation that no matter how little money you have, as long as you have dreams with an un-dying passion, you can most certainly achieve whatever you set your mind to. Under Lauren's photo in his senior yearbook is the word "Millionaire", the caption he chose for himself to represent his future. No body back then believed he would actually become a millionaire... and today is net worth is . He's happily married to his college sweetheart with 3 children, living most of the time in their home in the country. Lauren achieved his highest goals in business, but only after his company almost going bankrupt several times in the beginning. He never gave up, and he consistently held true to his love for class and elegance. His creation of foundations and his generous donations, atop all of these aspects of the man Ralph Lauren is, is what sparked the event held at the Lincoln Center, where Lauren was interviewed on stage in front of the world. Not his success in the fashion and home decor industry alone.</p><p>Although, his success is tremendous. His clothing is seen all over the nation as well as the rest of the world, especially his signature polo shirts which house the traditional polo player logo on the left breast. His clothes have a certain air about them; true American in taste with an English touch, always classy and always of immense quality. I personally, as a youngster in my early 20's, admire the brand, especially compared to cheaply manufactured items from generic brands like Old Navy and Gap that so many people wear. What you wear reflects how much you respect yourself, and more importantly how much you respect those around you. If you show up to a classy dinner party wearing jeans and a t-shirt you will offend the hosts as well as the others there. Your attire means so much more than it has become to the younger generation today. Kids with their pants hanging off and exposing their underwear I personally think is a signal of low self-worth along with little respect to the people around them. Where just 50 years ago you had to wear certain attire at dinner, out in public, to friends' houses, etc to even be considered of any class. What you wore was a symbol of who you were. And it still is, although no longer looked upon that way by so many people today. Many young men today don't even own a suit. Funeral dress codes aren't even followed anymore with strictly black in color, conservative clothing; young adults wear inappropriate clothing, and even many adults dress in casual attire and do not wear an all black ensemble. What has happened to respect in the way we dress? Ralph Lauren follows this view of attire in its design and image--it is an extension of who you are that you portray to the world.</p><p>Ralph Lauren holds this ideal in all its clothing and home decor designs, proudly holding its title as one of the best clothing brands in existence. Whereas Ralph Lauren himself remains the inspiration behind it, showing the world not only that America takes great pride in itself and its image, and that every individual can promote that too, but that you can achieve whatever you set your heart to, as long as you have passion. And in my opinion, passion is what sets one apart, immediately, from all the rest that are in it for the money or the fame, whatever the case. If you are trying to build a company, you are already ahead of the game if you have a true passion for what you do and a strong foundation for your beliefs. Passion is what drove Ralph Lauren, and today he is one of the most inspirational designers and successful Americans alive.<br></p><p>Follow Chloe Spencer on Twitter:</p>?<p>Over 50% of middle school and high school students are involved in a school sport, and it is widely looked upon as healthy, and highly encouraged. Schools pride themselves in their sports teams, most which have become no longer recreational activities but very serious pursuits. Even dangerous. Kids are often being overworked by their coaches, treated with disrespect, injured in ways which could've been prevented by the coach, and worst of all, are not even telling you about it.</p><p>I have personally experienced all of this, on my high school sports team. And this is my story.</p><p>At the end of my sophomore year, I tried out for the dance team, aka the poms team, being a dancer and gymnast for most of my life. I was accepted onto the team, much to my excitement. But that excitement didn't even last the year. I had to quit. The biggest reason being my health, and how it was carelessly and constantly jeopardized by the coach.</p><p>Now I'm talking about the dance team, but basketball, football, and baseball teams have the highest rate of injuries, and basketball, track and soccer teams have the highest rate of deaths (). Contact sports also have students pressured to take steroids, and worse. So keep in mind that even if your child is not on the dance team, it's still important to read on. And this poms team was not for sissy girls. We were worked hard, forced to run, sprint, do agonizing drills until our arms felt like they're going to fall off, can-can kick until our legs could hardly move, do 100 sit-ups in a row, and do jumps that required every ab muscle you have. We also had to wear ankle and wrist weights during practice sometimes, which make you feel like you're 300 pounds and moving underwater. But this wasn't the worst of it.</p><p>I was, and am, a thin girl, by genetics and a fast metabolism. But I was strong, healthy, and had fantastic stamina. But even these factors couldn't keep me going on this team. Our coach was a woman in her mid-20s, that had been coaching the team for the past year. She swore at us often, and said some things that alarmed me. But that was only the beginning. She got very angry at us when we didn't get the routine just right during practice, and would scream at us to do it over, and over, and over. She would yell things like "I'm going to rip you a new a**hole!", and "You all look like sh*t!". She wouldn't let us have any water until we got it right. The drinking fountain was a privilege, not available upon need. Practice was 2-3 hours after school every day, and sometimes on weekends. My thin form became bony, and I would sometimes get home from practice and throw up from being so overworked. I would get faint and dizzy during practice after doing our routine "full out" (with our best effort, as if there were judges watching) 6 times in a row without a drink of water, and would tell the coach I needed to sit down, but she wouldn't allow it. One afternoon during practice after she finally let us take a break, I had to lay flat on my back on the floor for 20 minutes just so I could stand up again, despite her snide remarks.</p><p>It got worse... For a competition routine some of us had to slide down onto the floor into splits, without using our hands, which can be done easily unless you have to do it 10 times a day. I pulled something in my leg because of this, but that was no excuse according to my coach. I had to keep doing it. It became so painful to slide into splits this way that my legs would become paralyzed in pain, and it took extreme effort to come out of the position quickly and run to my next spot. It got to the point where I was shaking trying to stand up out of the position and limping to my next spot with tears streaming down my face, and had to dance the rest of the routine including kicks, jumps, turns, etc. During one practice I was trying to come out of the splits and was locked into place by the pain, and the coach yelled at me. I told her my leg was hurt and couldn't move, and she screamed that she didn't care whether a bone was sticking out of my leg, I had to keep dancing. Exact quote.</p><p>After this, I finally confided in my mother. She took me to the doctor, and they told me that if I continued to do this to my leg that it may be damaged permanently. I was also taken to a nutritionist to help regain my weight and health. I was down to 86 pounds, and was blacking out in the mornings after not eating for 8 hours, collapsing on the kitchen floor while trying to fix myself cereal. My doctor said that if I did not quit the dance team, she would have to pull me off, for the sake of my life. Not to mention all the emotional stress I was undergoing, including anxiety and depression. I quit the team, even though it was just weeks until the State competition. My coach was angry, now that my spot had to be filled. I was shunned by the rest of the team at school, and was hated by a few in particular. But it was worth it, because I just may have saved my life.</p><p>Over half the team that year was made up of new girls, who didn't put forth a lot of effort most of the time and chose instead to put up with being constantly yelled at by the coach. So as far as I know, they didn't sustain the injuries I did. And the other girls were a tight-knit group of juniors who had been on the team since freshman year, and received special treatment from the coach. She even invited them to parties where they drank together. I thought that no one else would ever report her. But when my mother complained to the school, we were told that the coach would be let go after this year, because ours was not the first complaint made by a parent of a new girl.</p><p>Many coaches are not looking out for your kids, but pushing them to extremes, as a coach may with a professional sports team. But these are kids, not professional athletes. And being fit, like I was, doesn't protect you. Overuse injury is responsible for nearly half of all sports injuries to middle and high school students. And most of all sports injuries occur at practice (). I heard things about the other sports teams at my school too, such as the swim team being forced to come to school at 5 a.m. every day and swim for three hours before class then another three hours after class. They were also pressured to shave their heads, their legs and armpits, and most did. Are high school sports suddenly the Olympics? With immense pressure and potential permanent injuries? And how are schools really choosing their coaches? Many are college students, irresponsible, sometimes sports-maniacs or fitness-freaks, or older coaches that view their team as their life, and take it so seriously it becomes torture for the students. And in many cases, the parents are living through their child's achievements in their sports and extracurricular activities. And so even if they're told about what's going on, they disregard it. And it never gets reported, while most of the other kids feel too embarrassed to report a coach. And these coaches keep on coaching.</p><p>So this is where you come in. Look into your child's sports they're involved in. Check up on their health, on their coach, on how often they have practice. Ask them about how much fun they're having, how much they like their coach, and how they get along with the other kids on the team. They might not come right out with something, so keep trying. I know this from experience... I didn't tell my mom everything that was going on with the coach and on the team for almost a year. You have to be persistent, and somewhat of a detective! But you may just end up saving your child's ankle, leg, arm, or even his or her life.</p><p>There are up to 100 sudden deaths among athletes in middle, high school and college every year, said Dr. Marlon Rosenbaum, associate clinical professor of medicine and pediatrics at Columbia University College of Physicians & Surgeons. Not to mention deaths from dehydration, emaciation, concussion, and heat illnesses. Many of which could've been prevented by the coach.</p><p>Pass this on to all the parents you know that have children involved in sports, and let's spread the word about the shocking truth of what may be going on behind closed doors on your child's school sports team.</p><p>This post has been updated since its previous publication. </p> <br><p>Follow Chloe Spencer on Twitter:</p>?Chloe Spencer is a 21-year-old internet entrepreneur who started her first business at 14 years old, , a fan site on the hugely popular Nickelodeon-owned site Neopets. Some pages of her blog sport more than 5,000 comments. Chloe monetized her page 1 Google rankings and tens of thousands of daily pageviews into cold hard cash with Google AdSense at age 15, making over $1,000 passive income a month from NeopetsFanatic.com. No longer a Neopets fanatic, Chloe is now working as an individual consultant for web development, SEO and social media. She also has several new projects in progress, including a training program on how to make money online and a Facebook application she designed. Chloe is also a professional writer, and blogs for the , and . She also has a personal blog, .<br><br>Chloe has spoken at BlogHer, SMX West, Ypulse, DMA, BlogWorld & New Media Expo, SES, BlogPaws, and SMOC. She's presented live on Denver's 9News to an estimated 1.2 million viewers, and she appeared on the Bay Area's ABC7 News as part of their coverage of the BlogHer conference. Chloe also appeared in The Capital Times Newspaper, and was interviewed by Blog Talk Radio, WebProNews, ClickZ, Tech Smith, ProBlogger, ReelSEO, Blogger Stories and Business Week Magazine. In 2008 Chloe was on the list of Top 20 Young Internet Entrepreneurs Under 21.?<p>I have a significant issue with the negative connotations associated with the Chick Lit genre and, in particular, those stemming from the media who are constantly foretelling the "death of chick lit." </p><p>From my observations as a fan of the genre who also tweets, Facebook's and blogs chick lit content, it still certainly has a strong place in the book market, and has its fans who will always be more than happy to read "chick lit". </p><p>Unsurprisingly, people automatically assume several things when they hear the term "chick lit" -- pink, girly covers, idealistic female authors, stories about women falling in love with men, 'happily ever after' endings and light, fluffy reads. </p><p>In reality, as someone who reads roughly 150 chick lit books a year, I can whole-heartedly disagree with those assumptions and I hope to dispel some inaccurate perceptions.</p><p>I think it is the term itself is part of the problem. "Chick lit" is similar-sounding to "Chick flick" -- which is indicative of a sweet, soppy and romantic film which involves two people who end up falling in love with each other. </p><p>Furthermore, the adjective "chick" indicates it is a female-dictated genre, thus completely alienating male readers from its potential fan base. </p><p>While the primary market being targeted is women, this should not mean that men need to be put off from reading a first-class literary work. From what I have read in the genre in the last few years, the books are grittier than you'd expect, the authors aren't afraid to tackle more controversial topics, they cover a range of ages from the young women we expect these books to be based around, through to more mature women, and they do not always give us the happy endings you might expect. </p><p>I've read chick lit books dealing with infidelity, assisted suicide, death, infertility, adoption, murder and domestic violence.</p><p>Why should women be embarrassed to be seen reading chick lit? Those that make judgmental remarks about people who read chick lit clearly have never read an emotional rollercoaster of a novel from the likes of Elizabeth Noble or Jojo Moyes, experienced the laughter and realistic tales of Sophie Kinsella or Milly Johnson, nor the edgy and shocking tales woven by Dorothy Koomson, or the fabulous twists and turns contained within one of Melissa Hill's novels. </p><p>Bookstores should certainly not be afraid to stock chick lit, and promote the fact as well. I was disgusted to read that a popular British bookstore is to drop the term 'Women's fiction' after two, yes two, women . </p><p>My response? Don't buy it. Just because two women decide on behalf of the entire female population that a category isn't valid, does not make it so. </p><p>I, for one, enjoy going into a bookshop and seeing the bright, fun covers of chick lit, that stand out amongst the more serious titles, and I know what I'm looking for on the shelf too. Women who love chick lit often go into a book shop to seek out the latest release from favourites such as Kinsella, Jill Mansell, Jenny Colgan and more, so why should we be denied our right to buy the books we like because it MIGHT offend someone else? </p><p>Also, why should we be afraid to call a spade a spade? Why can't we name it "women's fiction", because that is what it is -- the target market is women. I don't want to sit down after a hard day at work, and read a violent crime thriller, or the tale of someone who has been abused since they were a child. </p><p>I want to read a story that is well written, has realistic and likeable characters that I can relate to, going through things that again I relate to or know about, and I'm going to be happy reading. </p><p>I don't know of many authors who don't like their work being classified as 'chick lit', or even 'women's fiction', and those that claim this are clearly kidding themselves. </p><p>It's a genre that has proved that it has selling and staying power - many of the big publishers have subsidiaries dedicated to just women's fiction, there are countless blogs and sites out there devoted to the genre, and readers who will always pick a chick lit book over any other - and I'm proud to be one of them. </p><p>Long live Chick Lit.</p><p>Follow Chloe Spooner on Twitter:</p>?I'm Chloe, I'm 25 years old, and live in Berkshire in the UK. I also have a nearly-6 year old son who is starting to be as much of a bookworm as his mum! As well as being a book blogger, I'm a University student finishing up my degree in English Literature and Language. I've been reviewing Chick Lit for 3 years now, and really enjoy .?the_north_face: tory burch&atilde;?&macr;&auml;&raquo;?&atilde;??&aring;&curren;&sect;&auml;&ordm;&ordm;&aelig;&deg;?&atilde;?&ordf;&atilde;??&atilde;?&iexcl;&atilde;??&atilde;?&middot;&atilde;?&sect;&atilde;?&sup3;&atilde;??&atilde;?&reg;&atilde;?&sect;&atilde;??&atilde;??&egrave;?&yen;&egrave;??&atilde;?&atilde;??&atilde;?&sect;&atilde;?&ordf;&atilde;??&aring;&curren;?&atilde;??&atilde;?&reg;&aring;&sup1;&acute;&eacute;&frac12;&cent;&aring;&plusmn;&curren;&atilde;??&atilde;??&atilde;?&reg;&atilde;?&para;&atilde;??&atilde;??&atilde;?&copy;&aring;??&atilde;?&laquo;&aelig;?&sect;&atilde;??&atilde;?&brvbar;&atilde;??&atilde;?&frac34;&atilde;??&atilde;??&atilde;?&raquo;&atilde;??&atilde;?&reg;&atilde;??&atilde;?&copy;&atilde;?&sup3;&atilde;??&aring;??&atilde;?&uml;&atilde;?&reg;&eacute;??&atilde;??&atilde;??&atilde;??&atilde;??&atilde;??&atilde;?&para;&atilde;?&curren;&atilde;?&sup3;&atilde;?&uml;&ccedil;&acute;&aelig;??&atilde;??&aelig;?&iexcl;&ccedil;?&uml;&atilde;??&atilde;?&brvbar;&atilde;??&aelig;&middot;&plusmn;&atilde;??&aring;?&deg;&egrave;&plusmn;&iexcl;&atilde;??&auml;&cedil;?&atilde;??&atilde;?&frac34;&atilde;??&atilde;??&auml;&raquo;?&auml;&cedil;?&ccedil;&acute;?&atilde;?&reg;&aelig;??&eacute;&laquo;?&atilde;?&reg;&atilde;??&atilde;?&iexcl;&atilde;??&atilde;?&middot;&atilde;?&sect;&atilde;?&sup3;&atilde;?&cent;&atilde;??&atilde;??&auml;&frac12;?&atilde;??&aring;?&ordm;&atilde;??&atilde;?&brvbar;&atilde;??&atilde;?&frac34;&atilde;??&atilde;??&auml;&cedil;&shy;&atilde;?&sect;&atilde;??&atilde;??&atilde;?&pound;&atilde;?&uml;&atilde;??&ccedil;?&reg;&atilde;??&atilde;?&ordf;&atilde;??&atilde;?&cent;&atilde;??&atilde;?&macr;&atilde;??&atilde;?&ordf;&atilde;?&frac14;&atilde;??&atilde;?&frac14;&atilde;?? &atilde;??&atilde;?&copy;&atilde;??&atilde;??&atilde;?&sect;&atilde;??&atilde;??&egrave;&iexcl;&uml;&eacute;?&cent;&atilde;?&macr;&auml;&cedil;&raquo;&aring;&frac14;&micro;&atilde;??&atilde;??&atilde;?&shy;&atilde;?&acute;&atilde;??&auml;&raquo;?&atilde;??&atilde;?&brvbar;&atilde;??&egrave;?&ordf;&atilde;??&atilde;??&atilde;?&copy;&atilde;?&sup3;&atilde;??&aring;??&atilde;?&reg;&aring;?&sup3;&atilde;??&atilde;??&atilde;??&aelig;&frac14;?&aring;?&ordm;&atilde;??&atilde;?&brvbar;&atilde;??&atilde;?&frac34;&atilde;??&atilde;??&atilde;??&atilde;??&atilde;?&laquo;&atilde;??&atilde;?&shy;&atilde;?&frac14;&atilde;??&atilde;?&frac14;&atilde;?&laquo;&atilde;?&reg;&atilde;??&atilde;?&para;&atilde;?&curren;&atilde;?&sup3;&atilde;?&sect;&atilde;??&atilde;?&curren;&atilde;??&atilde;?&frac14;&atilde;?&laquo;&atilde;??&aring;&plusmn;&yen;&atilde;??&egrave;?&brvbar;&aelig;??&atilde;?&reg;&aelig;?&sup1;&atilde;??&atilde;?&laquo;&atilde;??&atilde;??&ccedil;?&yen;&atilde;??&atilde;??&atilde;??&auml;&cedil;?&atilde;??&atilde;?&frac34;&atilde;??&atilde;??&aelig;??&aring;??&atilde;?&reg;&ccedil;?&ordm;&aelig;??&atilde;?&sect;&atilde;??&iuml;&frac14;??<p>Today a small but highly effective provision of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) expired. The Temporary Assistance for Needy Families Emergency Contingency Fund (TANF-ECF) accounted for a tiny proportion of ARRA dollars -- a mere three-fifths of one percent -- yet it created a quarter of a million jobs and kept countless families from hunger and homelessness. </p><p>The benefits of these types of programs ripple throughout the economy. Food stamps, for example, create a whopping $1.73 of activity for every dollar of state investment. The equivalent multiplier for corporate tax cuts is a measly .30. </p><p>In New York, TANF-ECF created over 4,000 jobs, mostly through a transitional jobs program that placed low income people in private companies and public agencies. </p><p>Take James Graham, a Brooklyn native. For years he participated in the City's Work Experience Program, which puts welfare recipients to work in unpaid jobs. The lack of pay and training opportunities frustrated him, so he joined Community Voices Heard, a grassroots group that organizes with low-income people for good jobs. </p><p>Last June, James' fortune seemed to turn. He secured a parks maintenance job for $9.21 an hour. The position, like all jobs created by the TANF-ECF, is temporary. In a better economy, James could use his new skills to secure permanent employment. But he is pessimistic that the sluggish job market will afford him real opportunities. </p><p>Though the US House of Representatives passed an extension of TANF-ECF twice, the Senate is unlikely to follow suit. Many states are ramping down their programs, dismantling infrastructure that took months to build. </p><p>According to the NYS Office of Temporary and Disability Assistance, New York has managed to extend its program through December with regular TANF funds. Come January, people like James will have even less of a chance of finding jobs. </p><p>This is a real shame. With 800,000 residents officially unemployed - and countless more under-employed or too discouraged to search for work -- New York is facing a jobs crisis of mammoth proportions. And we can't count on Washington to rescue us. </p><p>In light of New York's revenue shortfall, a projected $14 billion in 2011, it may seem like slashing the safety net and capping spending is our only option. That isn't so. </p><p>Last spring, the Center for Working Families issued a proposal for a temporary tax on high-end Wall Street bonuses that would generate between $4.7 and $6.9 billion without harming the finance industry -- more than enough to extend New York's TANF-ECF programs. </p><p>That's not the only option for revenue generation. We could partially roll back the rebate on the stock transfer tax which currently benefits wealthy, high volume traders, bringing in at least $3 billion. </p><p>And of course we must also save by eliminating real waste. Getting rid of state contracts with private employers who perform work that can be completed in-house at less cost is one place to start. </p><p>The fate of TANF-ECF lies with decision makers Washington DC. But New Yorkers can apply its lessons. Next year, when our elected leaders convene in Albany to make difficult spending choices, we should join James and his peers in reminding them that the way to recovery is through high quality jobs programs and supports for struggling families. </p>?Chloe Tribich is a Senior Policy Organizer at the Center for Working Families. She was a community organizer at the Northwest Bronx Community and Clergy Coalition for four years where she staffed the organization’s tenant organizing efforts. Most recently, she served as lead organizer at Housing Here and Now, where she worked on campaigns to strengthen New York State’s rent laws and hold multifamily lenders accountable for conditions in their mortgaged properties. She has a Bachelor of Arts in Gender Studies from the University of Chicago.?<p>PARIS - The Chloe fashion house is celebrating its 60th birthday during Paris Fashion Week but its spring-summer 2013 show proved it's still as fresh as a daisy.</p><p>Designer Clare Waight Keller's collection takes its cue from founder Gaby Aghion's mantra: "I lived the life I wanted."</p><p>Chloe, founded in 1952, practically invented ready-to-wear in the first place and has always confidently led the way. That rebelliousness came out Monday in the clothes ? strongly feminine and diaphanous but also structured with laser-cut edges in many large frills and ripples.</p><p>"I wanted a feminine spirit, but sharp," Waight Keller said after the show. "So we cut the ripples in the material, like a knife."</p><p>This contrasted with the collection's soft side. Transparent organza silks played on volume, giving a layered three-dimensionality to soft, oversized T-shirts and knee-length skirts. The light touches came from hibiscus flower appliques on sheer white tops, or in one instance, in green down a singular pant leg.</p><p>Features like this can look overly busy if handled poorly. But here the looks were paired with a clean-cut minimalist vest, jacket or Bermuda to tasteful effect.</p><p>Waight Keller is one of the nine designers being celebrated at an exhibit "Chloe: Attitudes," that opened Friday at Paris' Palais de Tokyo and features 70 influential Chloe pieces from 1952 until now.</p><p>___</p><p>Thomas Adamson can be followed at http:/ /Twitter.com/ThomasAdamsonAP</p>?<p>While most teens opt for a limousine, Chloe Webb and Lauren Huggett, two teens from Stroud, Gloucestershire, England, took things to the next level by .</p><p>The 16-year-old girls initially tried to book a limousine, only to find they had all been booked, . That's when Huggett's father decided to pay nearly $770 to have the girls flown to the dance.</p><p>According to This Is Gloucestershire, the girls were at the dance with their lavish entrance. </p><p> Webb told the Daily Mail.</p><p>PHOTO:</p><p></p>?<p></p><p>PARIS - Wearability and light shone from Chloe's fall-winter collection Monday ? unsurprising, perhaps, from the house whose founder coined the original phrase "ready-to-wear" more than 60 years ago.</p><p>A sense of spring, not fall, bloomed from the largely off-white array of diaphanous silk blouses, scattered pearls and applique lace flowers on display at a sky-lit showroom in Paris' central Tuileries garden.</p><p>Dimensional patchwork in wool that was felted gave the knitwear a playful, sporty ease, with airy lace sweaters. Even the British military parka constructions were cushioned by padding and soft-quilted silks.</p><p>One knit effect Teddy shearling in a leather V-neck captured the bohemian chic look of the Glastonbury music festival ? all with a Parisian neatness and sophistication.</p><p>Clare Waight Keller, who became Chloe's new creative director in June, conceded that her move to Paris six months ago could help explain the cross-Channel contrasts in Monday's collection.</p><p>"I've just come from London where there's a different spirit," she said backstage. "I love Paris, but the Chloe girl is somewhere in between."</p> <br>?<p>Ugg boots have never looked so good as on the (very high) heels of fashion month, where the celebrity contingent runs a sartorial marathon to make that famous Greek battle look like sissy stuff. If you don't believe me, I give you as exhibit A: During , the Fashion Police judge executed three high-end looks (, and ) in under five hours. As WWD , that's "the average time of a recreational female marathoner." And nearly as exhausting.</p><p>And I should know: At the close of New York Fashion Week, I headed to a cabin in the Sierras where nobody could see my freshly scrubbed face and, yes, Ugg boots -- a bad habit I indulge only in the privacy of the backwoods. But turns out, I'm not alone in this deep-seated desire to shelve my five-inch Alaia booties and nurture my inner bum. </p><p>Take : Seeing her in front rows across New York, K. Cav was a walking billboard for celebrity as chameleonic model -- at Luca Luca, at Malandrino and at Betsey Johnson. Now back home in LA, the Hills star is looking -- with minimal makeup, leggings and tees. Even Kelly Osbourne, who clearly takes great care with her look of late, let go her bouffant in favor of and glasses (and sweatpants?) for a recent dinner at Katsuya. Maybe celebrities really are just like me.</p>Photos by Pacific Coast News<p><br>Well, not exactly. There's no paparazzi waiting to shoot me landing at the airport in flip flops or kicking up my Uggs by a campfire in the Sierra. Thank god. But there lies the love part of society's love-hate relationship with the paps: Without them, in the age of stylists, how would we ever identify a celebrity's authentic style? , for instance, isn't the of Marchesa froth we see on the red carpet; she's who landed at LAX after the Miu Miu show in Paris. </p>Photos by Getty Images, Bauer Griffin<p><br>The true identity of a celebrity is only ever debatable -- what do we really know about them anyway? Today at , we were chatting about who we believe, despite a recent sartorial , resides in the upper echelon of stars with a genuinely primo sense of fashion. On the heels of her at Miu Miu's Paris show, Rihanna hit the streets looking decidedly more down to earth in monochrome leggings and a relaxed knit sweater. It seems that here we see the real Rihanna, off stage and able to poke fun at the game: Even in pale pink fishnet, Rihanna's daytime headband evokes a certain Rosie the Riveter roll-up-your-sleeves 'tude. </p>Photos by Bauer Griffin, Getty Images, Pacific Coast News<p><br><br><br>Photo by Photo Agency</p><p>Follow Chloe Harris on Twitter:</p>?<p>We've got to hand it to : She's the only gal we know who heads out for a facial wearing a straight from Balmain's spring runway. And that's to say nothing of her and thigh-high boots to match. </p><p>But of course we'd expect nothing less from the reality maven extraordinaire; nay, the fashion press would pan her for it. Thanks to the phenomenon of reality stardom and ubiquitous paparazzi, Kim can't afford a what-is-she-wearing gaff: She must both dress for the job she wants and be always on the job. </p><p>The job, of course, is to be superhuman; to rise to a pantheon of demi-gods somewhere above this mortal coil where there's a Louboutin for every day and Hermes bags are like Lays potato chips -- . It goes without saying that demi-gods do not dress down to get a pedicure. They wear, ahem, another Balmain blazer and Chanel costume jewels. And while Kim may deign to wear post-pedi flip flops, she in her arms, their scarlet soles unscathed. (We guess the unworn Loubs didn't fit inside her Birkin.)</p><p><br>Kim Kardashian gets pampered in style.</p><p>It can be lonely at the top for some, but Kim has family on Mt. Olympus. and share their middle sister's taste for luxury: This week, Khloe and pal Nicole Richie hit the gym with . She carried a of the same bag out for date night with Lamar last week.</p><p><br>Khloe takes her Birkin from the gym to date night night; Kourtney lays low in jeans.</p><p>While Kourtney, the only mom of the bunch (Khloe is expecting), can be seen in laid-back mohair sweaters, boyfriend jeans and flats, she isn't without the Kardashian luxury bug. And when she dresses, she goes all out. While taping Kourtney and Kim Take New York, the former was also spotted post-pedi. And that is to say nothing of her .</p><p><br>Kourtney plays mom and takes Manhattan in leopard print, capes and fur.</p><p>The new show debuted January 23 on E! The street looks on Kim and Kourt are, appropriately, out of this world.</p><p><br>Kim on the set that is her life, while taping Kourtney and Kim Take New York.</p><p><br>Correction: Khloe Kardashian is "reportedly" expecting. No confirmation just yet.</p><p>Follow Chloe Harris on Twitter:</p>?<p>On May 13, 2011, Cleveland's Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum raises the curtain on the much-anticipated new exhibit, "Women Who Rock," which explores more than 60 female recording artists who have changed the face of music from the 1920s through today. And guess what? The exhibit includes...</p>?<p>Frank Ocean is getting on my nerves. Not for the reason you're thinking. I don't care who you decide to love or sleep with. I'm frustrated because now that he has publicly clarified his sexual preference, folks are trying to predict who will be next.</p><p>Even Queen Latifah is catching flack. This past week while visiting The View, the musician, actress and spokesperson found herself dodging sexuality questions posed by Barbara Walters. In her 40's Latifah is childless and thinking of adopting which naturally means, it's time for her to address whether she is gay or straight. The awkward exchange didn't shake Latifah who declared that her private life is not open for discussion.</p><p>I'm not a celebrity but I have felt the prying eyes into my sexual origin.</p><p>I'm 31 years old, black and childless. Coming from an American-American family with strong southern roots, that means either I can't have kids or I'm a lesbian.</p><p>My mother got married at 19 and had me at 22. My grandmother got married late - 23. "And I was a grown woman," she likes to emphasize before reminding me that she also had seven kids. By their example I should have been married by now. They also don't buy into the hype that's managed to depress a lot of my girlfriends and sell thousands of magazines.</p><p>My singleness is a major issue of concern. "Chloe, I don't want you to be alone," my mother says with just enough love so I know that it's coming from a good place. I also know she fears that I'll end up being the old woman with 50 cats, eating cake frosting for dinner being featured on Hoarders: Buried Alive. Good thing I don't like cats.</p><p>Why would I subject myself to a life of solitude, unless I was a lesbian and didn't want my family to know? At a recent family gathering, I had a cousin flat out ask me "Chloe, do you like men?" Her bouncing her third child on her knee did not go unnoticed. "I've never seen you with one."</p><p>I've never been the type to bring every man I date around the family. There were no suitors calling my mom "Mom" or sitting on the couch watching the game with my dad. Throughout my entire dating life, I've only brought home two guys -- once in college and a recent ex. That leaves a gap long enough to keep my folks wondering what team I'm really playing on.</p><p>I could tell by the sound in her voice that she was hoping she would be the one to get me to crack. She would go down in our family history as being the one who "Chloe came out to."</p><p>But she was only right about one thing. She's never seen me with a guy because she lives 900 miles away. Apparently that wasn't a logical enough reason. No, I must be a lesbian.</p><p>When I told her I was indeed heterosexual, you know her response? "Well, when are you going to have kids?" While her first question had a sympathetic tone to it, this one had a heavy air of "girl, what's wrong with you?"</p><p>Just moments before she thought she was going win a . Now she's advocating for Occupy Chloe's Womb.</p><p>There was a time when my default response to that question was "I don't have kids because I'm not married." But then I made the mistake of saying that to a group of women at a BBQ, all with kids, none of them married. The conversation started with each of them talking about how happy they were to be out without their kids. Then when they noticed I was quiet on the subject, their attention turned to me. As soon as the "d" on "married" came out of my mouth I knew I had successfully offended every woman there. I was the enemy. I considered myself better than them because they took on the task of procreation without a ring. I was insulting their service to increasing the black population by any mean necessary. I was the problem with the world, me with my old fashion values.</p><p>Over the years I've found myself dropping hints letting my family know that yes, I enjoy the company of men. I have deliberately let condoms fall out of my pocketbook or popped birth control pills at the dinner table. Don't worry, I did it with class.</p><p>My bible-thumping grandmother even shows her concern on occasion. While sitting at her kitchen table, where she holds court, she once told me the story of her friend who found out her granddaughter "liked girls."</p><p>"Miss Deloris," she began, taking a sip of her homemade iced tea filled mason jar with a million ice cubes in it. "Those kids of hers got her going crazy. The youngest grand calls herself liking girls." She bit her bottom lip and looked at me with an ultraviolet ray stare.</p><p>"Someone said they saw the child walking and holding hands with a girl dressed up like a boy."</p><p>Death ray stare.</p><p>"The girl wants to move in with her girlfriend. She's only 19."</p><p>Gamma ray stare.</p><p>I knew exactly how to end this. I took out my birth control pills and popped one.</p> <br><p>Follow Chloe Hilliard on Twitter:</p>?As a journalist-turn-comedian, Chloe Hilliard is entertaining the masses with her wit. Over the last ten years, Chloe has been a culture/entertainment journalist, writing for The Village Voice, Essence, Vibe, King, and The Source. Most recently, Chloe was the Editorial Director of Loop21.com, which focuses on politics and culture. She is now the host of "Best Advice Ever," a YouTube web series that aims to solve everyone's problems.?<p>When Chris Brown performed at the Grammy Awards in February, it wondering how the Recording Academy and public alike could so quickly welcome back a man who, just three years earlier, before the same event.</p><p>Now that Fortune, Brown's fifth studio album, has been released, why so many people are willing to forgive the singer for his attack on Rihanna, especially when Brown for violent incidents. </p><p>Earlier this month, of Fortune went viral, when the : "Chris Brown hits women. Enough said."</p><p>Now, music journalist Chloe Papas' scathing review of Brown's album is as the "best album review you will ever read." </p><p>Papas holds nothing back as she decimates Brown's album. "Chris Brown has released his fifth studio album ? a 19-track repugnant record that we can only hope will be his last," she wrote.</p><p>Papas doesn't immediately go after Brown for his personal history, instead taking issue with his music. She called Brown's song "Till I Die" a "a catastrophic misogynistic sh-t of a song," and added that the entire album is "skitzy" with only two themes: "Unprotected sex is cool and partying is fun." </p><p>But then Papas asserts that it doesn't even matter if Brown has talent at all -- :</p>Regardless of whether Chris Brown has any musical talent (he doesn't) or whether this album is any good (it isn't), the man recently brutally assaulted a woman, and is still regularly invited back to award shows and worshipped by 'Breezy' fans worldwide. Which is, frankly, disgusting. And for those of you out there saying you need to separate the music and the man: screw you, don't encourage his actions. Final words: don't buy this album.<p>CORRECTION: An earlier version of this post identified the negative Chris Brown review was written by Chris Havercroft; it was actually music journalist Magazine. The post has been updated to reflect that change.</p><p>Celebrity Photos Of The Week:</p>?<p>Chris Brown's album Fortune has been slammed as "repugnant", "misogynist" and rated with "no stars ever" in a scathing review.</p><p>Reviewing the album for Australian magazine X-Press, Chloe Papas wrote: "Chris Brown has released his fifth studio album ? a 19-track repugnant record that we can only hope will be his last."</p><p><br>Chloe's review</p><p>Brown's violent past has divided public opinion. While some think he should now be judged on his musical talents alone - </p><p>Music critic Papas labels one of Chris' songs "misogynist" and argues that the album has two messages: "Unprotected sex is cool and partying is fun."</p><p>She continues: “Regardless of whether Chris Brown has any musical talent (he doesn't) or whether this album is any good (it isn't), the man recently brutally assaulted a woman, and is still regularly invited back to award shows and worshipped by 'Breezy' fansworldwide. Which is, frankly, disgusting.”</p><p>“Final words: don't buy this album,” she adds.</p><p>Chloe is not the only reviewer to focus on the violent past of Chris Brown, Chad Taylor's succinct review for Cityview went viral. he wrote.</p><p></p><p>What do you think - should Chris get judged on his music alone?</p><p>Also on HuffPost:</p>?<p>Chloe Moretz arrived late for , and it's for the reason you'd expect from a 15-year-old red carpet darling: "I must've changed my outfit three or four times before I left". </p><p>The actress, there to support the costume designer for her latest flick, Hugo, chose an asymmetrical dress along with Jimmy Choo heels and one unexpected accessory -- a streak of pink dye in her hair. "I was at the salon earlier today and wanted to get a lavender streak in my hair. They were out of lavender, but had plenty of pink -- so I just went for it!"</p><p>Meanwhile, Kate Beckinsale -- who was honored with the Lacoste Spotlight Award -- laughed when asked if she shares clothes with her teenage daughter, Lily. "Sometimes I'll get angry when I see my very nice knits going off to seventh grade on the bus." </p><p>Plus, Ellie Kemper of The Office-fame was on hand with her Bridesmaids costume designer. When asked which cast members' style she'd like to steal, it was a no brainier: "Rose Byrne. I have a girl crush on her to begin with and she always looks good in hats."</p><p>We wonder how she feels about Kate Middleton being named "."</p><p>From Rooney Mara's plunging neckline to Moretz's snakeskin heels (they're her mom's!) check out all the fashions from last night's awards show:</p><p></p> <br>?<p>Monochrome ruled the red carpet last night at the Costume Designers Guild Awards, where stars like Rooney Mara, Chloe Moretz and Kate Beckinsale came out to celebrate a year's achievement in really cool costuming.</p><p>Awards for costume design were and top winners included "The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo,” “W.E.,” “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2,” “Glee,” “Boardwalk Empire” and “Downton Abbey." Kate Beckinsale was awarded the Lacoste Spotlight Award.</p><p>And on the red carpet, the stars kept it low-key. (So as not to compete with the award-winners?)</p><p>Rooney Mara (!) in her plum low-cut dress, and Kate Beckinsale looked elegant in a long blue gown. Several celebs -- including host Jane Lynch -- opted for solid red frocks.</p><p>But it was teenage Chloe Moretz who piqued our interest with the pink streaks in her hair and python-print shoes.</p><p>PHOTOS:</p><p></p> <br>?<p>The lovely ladies that are the admonishing young women to stay away from handsome men, partied in Tribeca for the film's premiere on Monday. </p><p>The quirky movie, which focuses on and their coming of age romantic discoveries in a New England college, brought out Chloe Sevigny, Lorenzo Martone, and plenty of other pretty faces for the event. It's Stillman's first new film in twelve years. </p><p>The Observer's resident party reporter Drew Grant was at the premiere, where she spotted in a rather awkward manner. Also overheard, beautiful reminding us how they're beating us at life with book releases.</p><p>Check out photos from the premiere below:<br></p><p>Watch a preview of "Damsels in Distress:"</p>?["entry_id":"1943888","entry_url":"http:\/\/www.huffingtonpost.com\/2012\/10\/05\/smash-producers-new-musical-drama_n_1943888.html","content_type":"image","image_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/210883\/slide_210883_719756_small.jpg","thumbnail_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/210883\/slide_210883_719756_small.jpg","title":"2012 Renewal Index: Canceled, Safe and on the Bubble Shows","slideshow_id":"210883","vertical":"tv","entry_id":"1947424","entry_url":"http:\/\/www.huffingtonpost.com\/2012\/10\/08\/simpsons-treehouse-of-horror-paranormal-activity-video_n_1947424.html","content_type":"image","image_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/251866\/slide_251866_1547691_small.jpg","thumbnail_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/251866\/slide_251866_1547691_small.jpg","title":"The Simpsons Season 24","slideshow_id":"251866","vertical":"tv","entry_id":"1943506","entry_url":"http:\/\/www.huffingtonpost.com\/2012\/10\/05\/american-horror-story-asylum-plot_n_1943506.html","content_type":"image","image_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/248638\/slide_248638_1474521_small.jpg","thumbnail_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/248638\/slide_248638_1474521_small.jpg","title":"American Horror Story: Asylum Photos","slideshow_id":"248638","vertical":"tv","entry_id":"1944909","entry_url":"http:\/\/www.huffingtonpost.com\/2012\/10\/06\/celebrity-diving-show_n_1944909.html","content_type":"image","image_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/241358\/slide_241358_1290807_small.jpg","thumbnail_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/241358\/slide_241358_1290807_small.jpg","title":"&quot;Dancing With The Stars: All-Stars&quot; Cast","slideshow_id":"241358","vertical":"tv","entry_id":"1947240","entry_url":"http:\/\/www.huffingtonpost.com\/2012\/10\/08\/rehab-with-dr-drew-miscarriage-video_n_1947240.html","content_type":"image","image_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/246482\/slide_246482_1420753_small.jpg","thumbnail_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/246482\/slide_246482_1420753_small.jpg","title":"Where We Left Off And What&#039;s Ahead For Your Favorite Shows","slideshow_id":"246482","vertical":"tv","entry_id":"1943945","entry_url":"http:\/\/www.huffingtonpost.com\/2012\/10\/05\/nicki-minaj-mariah-carey-american-idol-feud-fake_n_1943945.html","content_type":"image","image_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/214224\/slide_214224_781591_small.jpg","thumbnail_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/214224\/slide_214224_781591_small.jpg","title":"Celebrity Feuds","slideshow_id":"214224","vertical":"tv","entry_id":"1945061","entry_url":"http:\/\/www.huffingtonpost.com\/2012\/10\/06\/chace-crawford-gossip-girl_n_1945061.html","content_type":"image","image_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/252911\/slide_252911_1569845_small.jpg","thumbnail_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/252911\/slide_252911_1569845_small.jpg","title":"'Gossip Girl' Season 6","slideshow_id":"252911","vertical":"tv","entry_id":"1943737","entry_url":"http:\/\/www.huffingtonpost.com\/2012\/10\/05\/rachael-taylor-666-park-avenue_n_1943737.html","content_type":"image","image_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/226524\/slide_226524_977878_small.jpg","thumbnail_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/226524\/slide_226524_977878_small.jpg","title":"New ABC Series","slideshow_id":"226524","vertical":"tv","entry_id":"1947488","entry_url":"http:\/\/www.huffingtonpost.com\/2012\/10\/08\/the-amazing-race-twins-dead-fish-video_n_1947488.html","content_type":"image","image_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/235502\/slide_235502_1154783_small.jpg","thumbnail_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/235502\/slide_235502_1154783_small.jpg","title":"CBS Shows","slideshow_id":"235502","vertical":"tv","entry_id":"1945278","entry_url":"http:\/\/www.huffingtonpost.com\/nick-antonelli\/americas-next-top-model-recap_b_1945278.html","content_type":"image","image_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/241994\/slide_241994_1307647_small.jpg","thumbnail_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/241994\/slide_241994_1307647_small.jpg","title":"America&#039;s Next Top Model","slideshow_id":"241994","vertical":"tv","entry_id":"1945217","entry_url":"http:\/\/www.huffingtonpost.com\/katherine-patke\/30-rock-final-season-premiere-recap_b_1945217.html","content_type":"image","image_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/223025\/slide_223025_1576901_small.jpg","thumbnail_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/223025\/slide_223025_1576901_small.jpg","title":"30 Rock","slideshow_id":"223025","vertical":"tv","entry_id":"1943768","entry_url":"http:\/\/www.huffingtonpost.com\/2012\/10\/05\/the-good-wife-maura-tierney-and-the-law-won-preview_n_1943768.html","content_type":"image","image_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/243947\/slide_243947_1534342_small.jpg","thumbnail_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/243947\/slide_243947_1534342_small.jpg","title":"The Good Wife Season 4","slideshow_id":"243947","vertical":"tv"]?<p>We're used to seeing this chap suited and booted and looking sharp as he scamps about our tellies like an excitable little puppy every Saturday night.</p><p></p><p>But Dermot O'Leary's certainly going for a different look as he cracks open the dressing up box to dress up as one of our fave TOWIE stars. </p><p>The presenter certainly looks like he has The EsseX Factor as he slaps on the fake tan and sports a set of oversized teeth to transform himself into Chloe Sims.</p><p>And the homegrown Essex lad has been keeping a secret under his suits for all this time - a set of rather good pins.</p><p>It seems Dermot's not a TOWIE fan though, admitting he has no idea who Chloe Sims is:</p><p>"I have no idea who this girl is, as I don't watch TOWIE," he said. "I look like a gypsy. Do you think those are her real teeth?</p><p></p><p>"But Dee [his fiancee] specifically told me not to camp it up. Is this camp?"</p><p>Err, do you even have to ask Dermot?</p><p>The X Factor presenter dragged up for Heat magazine and . </p><p>It's all to celebrate the National Television Awards which he is hosting again later this month.</p><p>Dermot is nominated for the Most Popular Entertainment Presenter along with Keith Lemon, Michael McIntyre and the formidable Ant and Dec.</p><p>Well, at least if you don't win Derms, you'll have a successful career as a drag act. </p><p>This week's issue of Heat magazine is on sale now.</p><p></p> <br>?["entry_id":"1943945","entry_url":"http:\/\/www.huffingtonpost.com\/2012\/10\/05\/nicki-minaj-mariah-carey-american-idol-feud-fake_n_1943945.html","content_type":"image","image_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/214224\/slide_214224_781591_small.jpg","thumbnail_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/214224\/slide_214224_781591_small.jpg","title":"Celebrity Feuds","slideshow_id":"214224","vertical":"tv","entry_id":"1947424","entry_url":"http:\/\/www.huffingtonpost.com\/2012\/10\/08\/simpsons-treehouse-of-horror-paranormal-activity-video_n_1947424.html","content_type":"image","image_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/251866\/slide_251866_1547691_small.jpg","thumbnail_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/251866\/slide_251866_1547691_small.jpg","title":"The Simpsons Season 24","slideshow_id":"251866","vertical":"tv","entry_id":"1947488","entry_url":"http:\/\/www.huffingtonpost.com\/2012\/10\/08\/the-amazing-race-twins-dead-fish-video_n_1947488.html","content_type":"image","image_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/235502\/slide_235502_1154783_small.jpg","thumbnail_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/235502\/slide_235502_1154783_small.jpg","title":"CBS Shows","slideshow_id":"235502","vertical":"tv","entry_id":"1943506","entry_url":"http:\/\/www.huffingtonpost.com\/2012\/10\/05\/american-horror-story-asylum-plot_n_1943506.html","content_type":"image","image_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/248638\/slide_248638_1474521_small.jpg","thumbnail_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/248638\/slide_248638_1474521_small.jpg","title":"American Horror Story: Asylum Photos","slideshow_id":"248638","vertical":"tv","entry_id":"1945061","entry_url":"http:\/\/www.huffingtonpost.com\/2012\/10\/06\/chace-crawford-gossip-girl_n_1945061.html","content_type":"image","image_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/252911\/slide_252911_1569845_small.jpg","thumbnail_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/252911\/slide_252911_1569845_small.jpg","title":"'Gossip Girl' Season 6","slideshow_id":"252911","vertical":"tv","entry_id":"1945217","entry_url":"http:\/\/www.huffingtonpost.com\/katherine-patke\/30-rock-final-season-premiere-recap_b_1945217.html","content_type":"image","image_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/223025\/slide_223025_1576901_small.jpg","thumbnail_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/223025\/slide_223025_1576901_small.jpg","title":"30 Rock","slideshow_id":"223025","vertical":"tv","entry_id":"1945278","entry_url":"http:\/\/www.huffingtonpost.com\/nick-antonelli\/americas-next-top-model-recap_b_1945278.html","content_type":"image","image_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/241994\/slide_241994_1307647_small.jpg","thumbnail_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/241994\/slide_241994_1307647_small.jpg","title":"America&#039;s Next Top Model","slideshow_id":"241994","vertical":"tv","entry_id":"1943768","entry_url":"http:\/\/www.huffingtonpost.com\/2012\/10\/05\/the-good-wife-maura-tierney-and-the-law-won-preview_n_1943768.html","content_type":"image","image_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/243947\/slide_243947_1534342_small.jpg","thumbnail_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/243947\/slide_243947_1534342_small.jpg","title":"The Good Wife Season 4","slideshow_id":"243947","vertical":"tv","entry_id":"1944909","entry_url":"http:\/\/www.huffingtonpost.com\/2012\/10\/06\/celebrity-diving-show_n_1944909.html","content_type":"image","image_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/241358\/slide_241358_1290807_small.jpg","thumbnail_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/241358\/slide_241358_1290807_small.jpg","title":"&quot;Dancing With The Stars: All-Stars&quot; Cast","slideshow_id":"241358","vertical":"tv","entry_id":"1943888","entry_url":"http:\/\/www.huffingtonpost.com\/2012\/10\/05\/smash-producers-new-musical-drama_n_1943888.html","content_type":"image","image_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/210883\/slide_210883_719756_small.jpg","thumbnail_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/210883\/slide_210883_719756_small.jpg","title":"2012 Renewal Index: Canceled, Safe and on the Bubble Shows","slideshow_id":"210883","vertical":"tv","entry_id":"1943737","entry_url":"http:\/\/www.huffingtonpost.com\/2012\/10\/05\/rachael-taylor-666-park-avenue_n_1943737.html","content_type":"image","image_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/226524\/slide_226524_977878_small.jpg","thumbnail_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/226524\/slide_226524_977878_small.jpg","title":"New ABC Series","slideshow_id":"226524","vertical":"tv","entry_id":"1947240","entry_url":"http:\/\/www.huffingtonpost.com\/2012\/10\/08\/rehab-with-dr-drew-miscarriage-video_n_1947240.html","content_type":"image","image_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/246482\/slide_246482_1420753_small.jpg","thumbnail_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/246482\/slide_246482_1420753_small.jpg","title":"Where We Left Off And What&#039;s Ahead For Your Favorite Shows","slideshow_id":"246482","vertical":"tv"]?<p>A copy of "Rain Man" proved to be something else entirely when June donated some of Chloe's things during a spring cleaning bout on "" (Wed., 9:30 p.m. ET on ABC). Instead of the modern classic film, the DVD was a sex tape Chloe and made during St. Patrick's Day 2007.</p><p>June donated it to her pastor friend, who sold it for thousands of dollars. When James got wind of it, he watched the tape to see what might be getting out there, and was none too pleased with what he saw.</p><p>Hoping to improve his performance and get a heads up on the people threatening to release the video, he and Chloe planned to recreate the scene. But they realized they couldn't, now that they care about one another.</p><p>That was June rubbing off positive things on Chloe. The opposite rub came when Chloe convinced June to give casual sex a try. She proved rather horrible at it, but with a little help from her roommate, she at least was able to break it off with the guy she'd never intended to get involved with in the first place.</p><p>"Don't Trust the B---- in Apartment 23" wraps its short first season next Wednesday at 9:30 p.m. ET. It has already been renewed for Fall 2012, where it will be paired with "Happy Endings" on Tuesday nights.</p><p>TV Replay scours the vast television landscape to find the most interesting, amusing, and, on a good day, amazing moments, and delivers them right to your browser.</p> <br>?<p>LOVE is known for publishing a slew boundary-pushing covers for a single issue, like . For this season's "Super Natural Issue," LOVE has assembled today's hottest stars...all under the age of seventeen.</p><p>Chloe Moretz, Nyasha Matonhodze, Elle Fanning and Hailee Steinfeld all sat for photographers Mert Alas and Marcus Piggot, striking ethereal poses with two tears streaming down each of their baby-faced cheeks. </p><p>While the tweens' shots are pure gorgeousness, they're just so sad. Cheer up, Elle -- and to boot! Give us a grin, Hailee, ! </p><p>With four LOVE covers released, we're only 50 percent there: that based on Tweets from Derek Blasberg, Mariacarla Boscono, Kristen McMenamy and Lara Stone will each get a cover for the upcoming issue, as well as a mystery "Daphne" (fingers crossed for Guinness!). </p><p>Click through the covers below and let us know what you think: are LOVE's tween snaps weirdly depressing or utterly inspiring? </p><p></p> <br>?I suppose that's why the fashion industry is so dominated by Republicans, and why Vogue is always filled with photos from Tea Party rallies. <br><br>Sarcasm aside, I agree with you that people tend to vote for boring looks in these polls. I attribute it to most people liking "safe" looks rather than to any political affiliation. There's a reason safe looks are safe.?i have enormous respect for daniel radcliffe (who reminds us that young people CAN have character) and everybody loves emma watson, but rupe was always my favorite in the hp movies.... <br><br>Life is so lonely. I am a 50-year-old doctor. I’ve been living alone since my wife passed away 2 years ago. Maybe I should get going so I got a profile on …… r?chh??k??. ? om …… under “denver50”. It’s the best place to meet CEOs, pro athletes, doctors, lawyers, investors, entrepreneurs, beauty queens, fitness models, and Hollywood celebrities. Maybe you can take a try.<br><br>it doesn't hurt that he's pretty hot, too... - but he really could use some help with his hair and clothes...?<p>Perhaps more than any other social network, Twitter is the land of influencers. You are your own channel. And media companies-- from newspapers to TV channels -- are scrambling to figure out how best to use the micro-blogging site to connect with their audiences and create new approaches to content curation (and creation). </p><p>Enter Sladden, Twitter's director of media partnerships. A veteran of , where she produced the Webby Award-winning program "," in addition to "," which was described as "perhaps the most radical attempt to merge television with the Internet," Sladden works closely with MTV, CNN, HuffPost and NYTimes.com, among others, to better integrate Twitter across media platforms. </p><p>She is one of 15 candidates for a video interview in our HuffPost Spotlight Series, presented by HP. The top five question-getters will be interviewed using your questions.</p><p>Question submissions for the Spotlight Series are now closed. Thank you for your questions and stay tuned for our interviews with the top five question-getters!</p> <br>?<p>Two new images have been released from the upcoming remake of Carrie, starring Chloe Grace Moretz and Julianne Moore.</p><p><br>Chloe Moretz gets into character as the telepathic Carrie</p><p>One of the stills revisits an iconic scene from the 1976 Brian De Palma horror film - Moretz, as Carrie White, standing in her prom dress and covered in blood.</p><p>The other image (see below) shows Moore as Margaret White, Carrie's abusive, religious fanatic mother.</p><p>"We only have, like, four chances to get it right. Because that stuff stains your hair," Moretz told Entertainment Weekly (which first published the photos) of filming that memorable scene.</p><p><br>'That stuff stains your hair'</p><p>Moore told EW of her character, "This woman has clearly had a psychotic break, perhaps several. But what's sad about it for me is that she's clearly sick and here's this poor child in the thrall of this person who is seriously ill. And on top of that, they have this mother-daughter relationship. So we want to make that relationship as meaningful as possible, even though it is horrible and destructive."</p><p>Sissy Spacek played Carrie White, the shy high school student with telepathic powers, in the original Carrie, while Piper Laurie played her mother. Both received Oscar nominations for their roles in the film.</p>?<p>Earlier this month, that told parents to "Stop Sugarcoating" the issue of childhood obesity. The ads feature real Georgia children with copy such as: "It's hard to be a little girl when you're not," and "Fat prevention begins at home. And the buffet line." Now, one of the young actresses has been interviewed -- and she's happy she participated. </p><p>The controversial ad campaign was launched as a result of soaring childhood obesity rates in Georgia, and based on a perception that parents were ignoring them. Approximately , only behind Mississippi for the highest rates of childhood obesity in the nation. However, critics say that the "Stop Sugarcoating" campaign isn't the most effective way to address the issue, and risks stigmatizing overweight children even more than they already are. </p><p>Dr. Miriam Labbok, director for the Carolina Global Breastfeeding Institute at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill told ABC News that the . "These children know they are fat and that they are ostracized already," she said.</p><p>Over 1,000 about the campaign on The Huffington Post. Some, like reader cbellabean, supported the ads:<br>I don't think this is shaming kids. It's educating others about how it feels to be fat. Fat kids already know how it feels, but parents, school boards and adults need to be educated and encouraged to change it.</p><p>Others disagreed. Emily Renee Lingenfelser wrote:<br>These ads seem to be trying to SHAME young children into losing weight, which I find disgusting. Spend the money that was wasted on these advertisements, that will probably do more harm than good, and get some education in schools about obesity and eating healthy. We should educate our kids, not bully them!</p><p>Chloe, however, has no regrets. "I'm very pretty and I need to start getting healthier and losing weight," said Chloe to CBS News. "I feel really good about myself. I have lots of self-confidence. [The campaign] is really supposed to help [kids] ... so they can get healthier."</p><p>Plus, she has the full support of her mother, Tiffany. "I was very proud of [Chloe] ... for having the courage to participate," she said. </p><p><br>WATCH: Chloe Speaks To CBS News<br></p>PHOTOS: Georgia's "Stop Sugarcoating" Ad Campaign <br>?<p>Another day, another shakeup at yet another fashion house.</p><p> that Hannah MacGibbon is out as creative director of French label Chloe. She will be replaced by Clare Waight Keller, creative director of Pringle of Scotland, come June 1. </p><p>Rumors of MacGibbon's departure began in March. At the time, : MacGibbon's "contract is up after this season, according to people knowledgeable about the house, who said the reaction to her show on Monday could determine whether her contract is renewed. That said, it's unusual for a designer to negotiate a new contract so close to the expiration date of his or her last one, and what's more, Chloe is said to have already interviewed other designers."</p><p>A spokesman for Chloe immediately made the media rounds, none of that was true.</p><p>Alas and alack, it was. MacGibbon will "pursue new projects," as they say, after helming the brand since 2008 and working there for 10 years total. Chloe CEO Geoffroy de La Bourdonnaye remarked in a statement, "We are grateful to Hannah for her contribution and commitment to Chloe. Her considerable talents will be missed." </p><p>.</p><p>Take a look at some highlights from MacGibbon's tenure at Chloe.</p><p></p> <br>?<p>We now bring you your Daily Dose of Cuteness in the form of Harper Beckham -- or more specifically, Harper's cute little legs. </p><p>The cutest celeb baby (fighting words, we know -- and ) is out and about again with her stylish mummy, this time at LAX in Los Angeles. </p><p>Ever the fashion plate, Victoria loves to hold Harper sans a Baby Bjorn-esque carrier, which both saves Posh the embarrassment of wearing such an ugly nylon appendage and allows the world to see Harper's adorable outfits. </p><p>This weekend Harper was dressed in : short-sleeve print dress, tights and hair accessory (this time it was a bow). But many took note of her particularly luxe label: the ankles of her tights bear the imprint "Chloe," a.k.a. the expensive French fashion label.</p><p>Sold online, . It's not exactly couture pricing, but certainly more expensive than our mommies spent on us. </p><p>But while many will decry the absurdity of design duds for tots, we're sort of OK with it. It's Posh's choice, after all, to spend her well-earned cash on pricey toddler tights... that will probably get dirty in 0.2 seconds.</p><p>See Harper and Victoria's doubly chic look below.</p><p></p><p></p> <br>?<p>Despite being 15 years old, is known for taking some risks. She famously uttered the C-word in "Kick-Ass," played a violent vampire in "Let Me In," and even went toe-to-toe with Alec Baldwin on "30 Rock." Her role in "Hick" might be the biggest risk yet -- and not just because she plays a teenage runaway. when the film debuted at last year's Toronto International Film Festival (): "'Hick' is an even worse film than 'Kick-Ass,' and a potential [Chloe] Grace-Moretz career-killer."</p><p>Well, then! With that in mind, check out the first trailer for "Hick," a red-band clip that isn't necessarily all that NSFW, but does include shots of Moretz brandishing a gun and/or flirting with a much older man (Eddie Redmayne).</p><p>Blake Lively, Juliette Lewis and Alec Baldwin co-star with Moretz, but it was Redmayne who really impressed her while filming.</p><p>"He's one of the most phenomenal actors I've ever worked with. He's gonna be the new actor to work with," . "I've never worked with a better actor than him."</p><p>Judge for yourself whether Moretz has made better movies than "Hick" when it arrives via VOD on May 8. The film hits theaters May 11, right when Moretz is busy starring in "Dark Shadows" with Johnny Depp.</p><p>PHOTOS:<br></p><p>Also on HuffPost:</p> <br>?<p>Chloe Sevigny returns to TV in "Hit And Miss."</p><p>The "Big Love" star plays a pre-op transsexual contract killer on the new DirecTV six-part miniseries. "I play an Irish boy/girl from a Traveler's community, which is like the Irish gypsies," "It's more about her and this family that she kind of falls into, these children she kind of inherits and how she learns to cope with being in a parental role."</p><p>Take a look at the new teaser trailer below. "Hit And Miss" premieres in July.</p><p></p><p>Take a look at what to watch on TV this week.</p><p> </p><p>Also on HuffPost:</p>?<p><br> The 15-year-old who's been spotted everywhere from the People's Choice Awards to Milan Fashion Week to a recent Kelly Clarkson concert is making her latest appearance , which hits newsstands April 17. </p><p>Chloe Moretz is making a serious bid for big-screen stardom with a handful of buzzworthy films in the works. She's starring alongside Johnny Depp in Tim Burton's upcoming vampire/witch/soap opera thriller Dark Shadows, playing the . She'll also be showing her dark side in an upcoming remake of the classic horror film Carrie. Chloe will be playing Carrie, the girl who turns her high school prom into a total blood bath. </p><p>But in real life -- and on her Seventeen cover -- Chloe is full of bubbly energy, stellar fashion sense, and smiles. Like her Hick co-star Blake Lively, Moretz has quickly established herself as a darling of the fashion world. Chloe told Seventeen:</p><p>"[Blake] wears the most amazing clothes every day of her life. I went into her closet one night when she was trying things on for an event, and she was getting dressed, and I was helping her choose what dress to wear. She had brought probably a hundred pairs of Louboutins, and she was like, Try these on, try those on. We basically had a little shoe party!"</p><p>But when she's not sitting front-row at fashion week and hitting the red carpet, Chloe spends much of her time playing video games. </p><p>"I just got my phone back yesterday. My mom had it for like two days. I was supposed to read a book and I really wanted play 'Call of Duty.' It’s not like I want to go read the hot story in Cosmo and get locked up! No, I get caught playing video games. I probably play video games more than any guy does!"</p><p>Fellow Justin Bieber . In his interview, the "Boyfriend" singer opened up about his relationship with girlfriend Selena Gomez. </p><p>Always the model boyfriend, Bieber said of Selena: "I’m just trying to make her happy, that’s all. I think it’s important to make all women feel like they’re princesses, because every girl is a princess. I’m serious."</p><p>Check out the slideshow below to see Justin and Chloe's Seventeen covers, as well as our picks Chloe's 10 best looks!</p>?<p>There's no question that Chloe of "" is, well, a bitch -- and Krysten Ritter, who plays her, is the first to admit it. </p><p>In an interview with , Ritter gleefully opened up about her character's conniving, boyfriend-stealing, psychotic ways.</p><p>"There's nobody else like her on television," Ritter said. "She's such a f----- ... I play her like she's got a screw loose. Everything's psychotically fun." </p><p>"Don't Trust The B----" centers on Ritter's Chloe, who has occupied the titular Apartment 23 for years She's managed to drive all of her roommates away except for June, played by Dreama Walker. She also happens to have a super-famous best friend: James Van Der Beek (played by James Van Der Beek), still basking in his "" glory. </p><p>Like Ritter, Van Der Beek has approached the series with the attitude that his character should push the limits. </p><p>"I told the writers: 'Don't ever be afraid of offending me. Always go for what's funniest," . "And they did. [Laughs.] We didn't find anything that offended me to the point where I said, 'We can't do that.'" </p><p>Season 2 of "Don't Trust The B---- In Apartment 23" premieres on Tues., Oct. 23 on ABC.<br><br></p><p>Related on HuffPost:</p>?["entry_id":"1943768","entry_url":"http:\/\/www.huffingtonpost.com\/2012\/10\/05\/the-good-wife-maura-tierney-and-the-law-won-preview_n_1943768.html","content_type":"image","image_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/243947\/slide_243947_1534342_small.jpg","thumbnail_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/243947\/slide_243947_1534342_small.jpg","title":"The Good Wife Season 4","slideshow_id":"243947","vertical":"tv","entry_id":"1944909","entry_url":"http:\/\/www.huffingtonpost.com\/2012\/10\/06\/celebrity-diving-show_n_1944909.html","content_type":"image","image_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/241358\/slide_241358_1290807_small.jpg","thumbnail_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/241358\/slide_241358_1290807_small.jpg","title":"&quot;Dancing With The Stars: All-Stars&quot; 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Shows","slideshow_id":"246482","vertical":"tv","entry_id":"1945061","entry_url":"http:\/\/www.huffingtonpost.com\/2012\/10\/06\/chace-crawford-gossip-girl_n_1945061.html","content_type":"image","image_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/252911\/slide_252911_1569845_small.jpg","thumbnail_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/252911\/slide_252911_1569845_small.jpg","title":"'Gossip Girl' Season 6","slideshow_id":"252911","vertical":"tv","entry_id":"1945217","entry_url":"http:\/\/www.huffingtonpost.com\/katherine-patke\/30-rock-final-season-premiere-recap_b_1945217.html","content_type":"image","image_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/223025\/slide_223025_1576901_small.jpg","thumbnail_url":"gadgets\/slideshows\/223025\/slide_223025_1576901_small.jpg","title":"30 Rock","slideshow_id":"223025","vertical":"tv"]?<p>Actress Chloe Sevigny, who recently won a Golden Globe for her role as second-of-three wives Nicki on HBO's Big Love, caused some controversy when she about the show's just-ended fourth season. Sevigny said, "It was awful this season, as far as I'm concerned. I'm not allowed to say that! It was very telenovela. I feel like it kind of got away from itself." </p><p>Once her comments began to circulate online, Sevigny quickly backtracked, that her words were taken out of context and that the journalist who asked her questions was trying to provoke her. I get that Sevigny is probably in damage-control mode, realizing that her comments might come off as more critical than helpful. After all, Katherine Heigl is still being vilified for complaining about the bad writing on Grey's Anatomy, and I'm sure Sevigny doesn't want to be tarred with the same "ungrateful" brush. Here's the thing, though: she's right. I have no idea if she's right about her words being used against her, but she is right about the most recent season of Big Love. It was a mess, and someone needs to be honest about it.</p><p>I'm a huge Big Love junkie. Before I came to TheGloss, I worked as a religion journalist, and I've read a lot of books by ex-polygamists like Elissa Wall and . I thought the first three seasons of Big Love were a great combination of interesting characters, compelling storylines, and little treats for viewers who were interested in FLDS (the Fundamentalist Church of Latter-Day Saints, an offshoot of the mainstream Mormon LDS church and the practitioners of polygamy) history. There were characters who represented a variety of viewpoints about polygamy: horny teenage son Ben thought it seemed kind of cool to get to have multiple wives, first wife Barb struggled to reconcile her current polygamist lifestyle with the teachings of the mainstream LDS faith she'd been raised in, and oldest daughter Sarah found herself seeking a relationship where she and her husband where equals. </p><p>But as the show's popularity rose, so did the cast of characters on the show's canvas. Most of season three was dominated by the trial of polygamist compound Juniper Creek's prophet and leader, Roman, which mirrored the real-life trial of Colorado City leader Warren Jeffs. When Roman was murdered on the season three finale, I figured that season four would be about the repercussions of Roman's death and the new power vacuum on the compound. I was partly correct.</p><p>Season four was only nine episodes long (most HBO series get 14-16). As Sevigny said in her Onion interview, it seemed as if the show's creators had "more story than episodes." And that assessment is pretty much dead-on: within those nine episodes, there was a storyline with family patriarch Bill running for office, storylines with each of the three wives trying to figure out their own identities, compound drama with three characters in line for next Juniper Creek prophet, a weird subplot about fertility treatments and incest, a convoluted side story where Sissy Spacek played a powerful Washington lobbyist and hater of polygamy, another side drama where Bill's parents and some other folks started a bird-importing scheme in Mexico and ran afoul of a rival polygamist sect, and a whole bunch more. To be honest, I'm exhausted just writing that, so I can only imagine what it felt like to act it. </p><p>It's a shame that HBO continues to treat Big Love like its awkward middle child, giving it fewer episodes and an undesirable time slot (this year, Big Love aired during the Olympics and had its finale on Oscar night). While True Blood is definitely sexier, Big Love continues to garner critical praise, and it deserved a full season to tell its story. Sevigny noted in her Onion interview that the show would be "returning to the family" next year, and I couldn't think of a better idea. It has always been the personalities at the core of the show that made it so compelling, even as the storylines grew increasingly absurd. Having to cram too much story into too little space led to episodes that felt cluttered and disjointed. Even the show's creators, Mark V. Olsen and Will Scheffer, that they hadn't been able to resolve all the storylines they'd started. When commenting on one unresolved plot point, Olsen said, "This is one of those moments, one of those pieces that was hurt by the loss of that 10th episode, because we just couldn't carry it. So, we thought, OK, we'll pick it up next year, but we need to park this one because it will be one too many balls in the air."</p><p>When Big Love's fifth season airs, I hope it brings the show back to the things that made it so great -- real struggles, human drama, family relationships. The show's creators have a ton of material to work with, and I know they're capable of greatness. I just hope they get fourteen episodes or so worth of greatness.</p><p>Read more on</p> <p>Follow Lilit Marcus on Twitter:</p>?<p>Bargain shoppers -- us included -- braved the rain in New York City on Thursday night to check out Target's GO International Designer Collective Launch. The big box store is set to re-release its more popular dresses created by the likes of Thakoon, Rodarte and Proenza Schouler come March 13 ().</p><p>On-hand to celebrate: a bow tie-clad Chloe Sevigny, Liv Tyler rocking a side-swept 'do and DJ Mia Moretti looking sassy in a number we now own.</p><p>Take a look and tell us what you think.</p><p>(All images by Getty/PatrickMcMullan.com)</p><p></p> <br>?<p>Sure, we've all spent hours daydreaming about what it would be like to be part of the cast of "The Hunger Games," but have you ever wondered what the movie would have been like had your favorite famous actors played the tributes -- instead of unknowns?</p><p>Enter a hilarious three-minute MTV video featuring actors like Max Greenfield, Chris Colfer, Chloe Moretz, Amber Rose, Vinny Guadagnino, and Questlove, who are "interviewed" as "lost" members of the cast that were cut from the film. Now, the "lost tributes" break their silence on the special survival skills they would have brought into the stadium. </p><p>Chloe Moretz explains that her character's specialty is looking great. "My favorite part is in the script when she makes a break for the cornucopia, and she goes straight for the hair products. Impractical? Yeah. But just because you're fighting for your life doesn't mean you shouldn't have great hair volume." </p><p>On the other hand, Max Greenfield's character, "Chutney McDougalbart" from District 43, has a special talent for creating elaborate balloon animals that would surely have served him well in the stadium. And Questlove, of course, would have brought some awesome beats to the final battle scene between Katniss, Peeta and Kato as house DJ of the cornucopia. </p><p>Need more awesome "Hunger Games" videos to tide you over until "Catching Fire"? Check out a in the video below -- or, if mini stuffed animals aren't your thing, don't miss this surprisingly realistic Lego version of the "Hunger Games" trailer.</p><p>Who's your favorite 'lost tribute'? Which of the actors in the video above would you most want to see in "Catching Fire"? Tell us in the comments below of tweet your #LostTribute pick ! </p><p>(H/T )</p><p><br></p>?<p>In the past, the films of Atom Egoyan generally have struck me as intellectual exercises that examine emotions without really pausing to feel them.</p><p>Every once in a while, however, he makes a film that does locate its heart - and also uses it. The Sweet Hereafter was one; his latest, Chloe, which opens Friday (3/26/10), is another.</p><p>Based on a script by Erin Cressida Wilson, Chloe casts Julianne Moore as Catherine Stewart, a Toronto gynecologist whose practice is thriving but whose life eludes her. Her teen-age son seems to have slipped out of her control and her husband, David (Liam Neeson), a college professor who apparently is catnip to the coeds, appears to have lost interest.</p><p>Indeed, she's convinced that he's cheating and apparently discovers proof: an email from a female student on his cell phone, accompanied by a photo - from a night where he failed to appear at his own surprise party because he supposedly missed his plane from New York.</p><p>Still, Catherine is enough of a pragmatist (and a bit of a masochist) that she wants hard proof. So she hires a callgirl named Chloe (Amanda Seyfried) and gives her the assignment of seducing her husband. Catherine is a bit of a prig, but even as she's telling Chloe not to give her the details of her encounter with David, she's coaxing them out of her and getting aroused as she listens.</p><p>She's so aroused, in fact, that, when Chloe summons her to a hotel room where Chloe and David have just had sex, she and Chloe couple up for an afternoon of their own illicit passion. Now what?</p><p>Now what, indeed. Egoyan has more on his mind than a married woman's awakening to her own Sapphic urges. Probably, he's got a little too much on his mind, including a Hitchcockian twist that takes this film into Fatal Attraction territory, where it's not all that comfortable.</p><p>I don't mean uncomfortable in the sense of making the viewer squirm. Rather, when the film takes a left turn in the final act, it moves into territory that's both too predictable and too implausible at the same time. Still, having gone there, Egoyan cranks up the suspense as best he can, creating a feeling of dread that's effective, if not quite believable.</p><p>Moore has a jittery reticence, an almost prissy quality that makes this character intriguing and believable. She's made herself into a prude, a quality that seems calculated to shield her from base urges that she would rather not deal with. Moore conveys a lot of feeling with a little, as a woman who finds herself in the deep end when she finally does give in to her suppressed appetite.</p><p>Seyfried has a kind of disembodied sultriness - she's a sex worker who doesn't get emotionally involved in her job, yet never betrays her lack of connection to the client. But she too is blocking feelings she can't control, which make her even more seductive when she gives in to them.</p><p>Neeson brings a melancholy to the role of a man who mourns the loss of intimacy with his wife and longs to have it back. That mournful quality may stem from Neeson's own life; he was making this film at the time that wife Natasha Richardson died in a ski accident.</p><p>Chloe builds to a climax you may or may not buy. But go along for the ride; it's one that's alternately hot and chilling. <br></p> <p>Follow Marshall Fine on Twitter:</p>?<p><p>"The lead character is a transsexual contract killer!"<p><p>This sounds like a movie pitch that would automatically be snapped up and subsequently made into one of the worst films of all time. The broadcast-network TV series that would be made from the same story idea doesn't even bear contemplating: The potential for leering exploitation and cheesy melodrama is just too extreme. </p><p>The accomplishment of the interesting "Hit and Miss" (premieres Wednesday, July 11 at 10 p.m. ET on DirecTV's Audience Network) is that it deftly navigates its minefield of a premise. The lead character, Mia (Chloe Sevigny) is indeed a coldly efficient killer, and she's also transgender, but first and foremost, she's a human being with flaws, an agenda and complex emotions that creator Paul Abbott ("," "") and writer Sean Conway spend a lot of time exploring. This show isn't about the premise, it's about the difficult person at the heart of it. </p><p>There's a moment, early in the first episode, in which you see Mia's body with full-frontal clarity, but that scene is not there in order to exploit her status. It's there to state, without words, "Here's one of several things you need to know about Mia. Decide now whether you're in or you're out." </p><p>Generally speaking, the low-key "Hit and Miss" does a good job of exploring Mia as a person while acknowledging her trans status matter-of-factly. Her transition isn't who she is, it's part of who she is; the difficulty she has achieving true emotional intimacy is more of a factor in her story than the status of her body or the hormones in it. Just as Mia carefully controls the images she projects -- she wears an asexual hoodie and dark clothing for work, but flowing dresses and colorful cowboy boots the rest of the time -- "Hit and Miss" is an exercise in measured, deliberate characterization. </p><p>Mia's rough underworld boss accepts her status quite calmly: They clearly have a long history, and to him, the most important thing about their relationship is that she does her job well. They also have a friendly camaraderie -- he's one of the few people this intimacy-avoiding woman confides in -- but Mia's former and present genders are acknowledged without much fuss. </p><p>That's not to say that everyone in Mia's world accepts her; another of this spare drama's achievements is the way in which it explores others' reactions to Mia without turning them into mindless bigots and portraying her as a saint. Early in the first episode, the pre-operative Mia finds that she has family connections and responsibilities she didn't anticipate, and the kids that she finds herself coping with are as confused, rude, thoughtful and curious as real kids would be in that situation. </p><p>The children she gets to know are also reeling from a major loss, and "Hit and Miss" depicts their grief with quiet but powerful observational moments. This isn't a show with a ton of dialogue; the characters are holding back a lot of strong emotions and confused reactions much of the time. "Hit and Miss" bides its time and allows halting alliances and simmering grievances to develop in realistic ways, and the unsentimental rural and urban landscapes add to the feeling of bleak, unshowy poignance. Much of Sevigny's work consists of subtle reactions and contemplation, and the actress is more than up to the task of depicting Mia's internal turmoil and her deep need for a link to the world that doesn't involve death. </p><p>Strangely enough, given the sexiness of the contract-killer part of the premise, there's not a whole lot of bloodshed in "Hit and Miss." I somehow feel guilty for wishing there was more of that, given that "Hit and Miss" sets itself up as a character drama and not a thriller per se, but it's hard to deny that the occasional violent moments give the show some welcome jolts of tension and drama. No doubt Mia's efficiency at work is meant to provide a contrast to the messiness of her personal life, but in the first couple of episodes of the show, the two worlds feel oddly disconnected (and would Mia the killer really recoil from separating the head of a dead chicken from its body while cooking a meal?). </p><p>"Hit and Miss" also indulges in a tendency I often see in ambitious British dramas like "Luther" and "The Fades": It tends to mistake style for substance, and at times, it falls a little too in love with its moody aesthetic conceits. The lack of overt plot mechanics and the lean dialogue are a welcome change, until these things begin to make you wonder whether the creators have a lot to say about Mia's unusual attempts to balance her career and her personal responsibilities. </p><p>Still, I found the two episodes I saw refreshingly thoughtful, though the second episode has a good deal less tension than the first and it's hard not to wonder if that bodes well for the rest of the season, which totals six episodes. The first two hours of "Hit and Miss" come across as a finely observed, well-acted independent film, and I wasn't really sure whether there was a lot more story left to tell as Episode 2 came to a close, but I'm willing to let Mia prove me wrong.</p><p>"Hit and Miss" debuts alongside the final season of "," and we have interviews and features about that show . Also, my colleague Chris Harnick interviewed Sevigny recently . </p><p>"Hit and Miss" premieres at 10 p.m. ET on Wednesday, July 11 on DirecTV's Audience Network. </p><p><p><p><p><p></p> <br><p>Follow Maureen Ryan on Twitter:</p>?<p>Lucky magazine Beauty Director Jean Godfrey June once wrote of then Creative Director that if her outfits walked through a room without her body in them, you'd know whom they belonged to. It's true--Andrea's signature skinny jeans, rock & roll boots, abundance of delicate layered jewelry, hippie bags and self-described "hole-y cashmere sweaters" are uniquely her. So is that wavy, just-the-right shade of dark hair; the open laugh; the keen eye for style and the refreshingly democratic attitude about fashion ("We can all have style and you should have fun getting dressed," she said). All of these together make Andrea one of the most beloved and influential individuals in the industry today.</p><p><br>Confession: I worked at Lucky under Andrea, who co-founded the magazine, for several years. So did over half the regular contributors to . Andrea was our Pied Piper of style, setting the tone for the oft-copied look of the glossy as well as the office, where a handbag she a mentioned casually in conversation somehow ended up on the arm of the entire staff the following week. "I want to be her" was something we all thought more than once about Andrea. (It's also the name of her new , where she deconstructs the style of cool girls around town and tells you where you can guy score their stuff.)</p><p>Andrea, whose own fashion icons include Bob Dylan, Jane Birkin and "anyone who looks like they're not trying too hard--even if they're trying really really hard," recently signed on as the Creative Director of eBay Fashion. What follows is an excerpt of my interview with Andrea, which can be read in full at . </p><p>The Inside Source: I've heard stories about how you discovered actress Chloe Sevigny while at Sassy. What's that all about? </p><p>Andrea Linett: I was the stylist for the Jane Pratt Show [Sassy Editor-in-Chief Jane Pratt's talk show]. So we were shooting a commercial for the TV show and I saw Chloe at a newsstand and I said to the producers, "We have to put that girl in the commercial." And they said, "Oh no. She's weird." And I said, "No you don't get it; she's amazing." So I went up to her and I asked her and she sad, "Well, I'm actually cutting school. I live in Connecticut." So she was playing hooky. So we put her in the commercial.</p><p>I said I want to shoot you for Sassy. And so I gave her my number and her mother called me and said, "I think its great for her to model, but I think she should do something more worthwhile. So can she be your intern?" We said sure, we love her--she had already modeled for us for a while by then--and then she became our intern. She was like our mascot.</p><p>.</p><p>The Inside Source: Have you always wanted to work in fashion? <br><br>Andrea Linett: I either wanted to work in advertising, because my mom's always been in advertising and I grew up with it and I always found it really interesting, or fashion, because I have been obsessed, even from a very young age, with fashion magazines and catalogues and books about fashion. My first job out of school was at Sassy magazine. I was beyond thrilled to answer the phone. I was the receptionist. I could not believe I got the job. I was interviewing at fashion magazines and I think I found this one in the New York Times--"receptionist wanted"--very "Gal Friday". I was the receptionist for six months. Then I was promoted to Fashion & Beauty Assistant. We did everything there. Everything but the layouts. We did the casting, the styling. I got to do everything for our photo shoots. You would never get to do that now. So I learned a lot in a short time. </p><p>The Inside Source: Ok, so how about your personal style? How would you describe your style uniform?<br><br>Andrea Linett: I think I just like things that are classic. Most people think of classic as a white button down and a loafer. But even classic rock & roll clothes, to me, that's a classic. Even a fur vest is a classic because it's been around forever and is never going away. But I like to throw a little trend in there once in a while for fun. But I feel like, as I get older, I don't do that as much. I pair down a little more than I used to.</p><p>I'm embarrassed to admit that one of my signature pieces--that Kim France [Lucky's founding Editor-in-Chief] pointed out to me--is that my sweaters always have holes in them!</p><p>The Inside Source: So in your new role as Creative Director of eBay Fashion, what are you tasked to do at eBay?<br><br>Andrea Linett: eBay is one of the most amazing marketplaces in the world. It needs to reflect that this is the fashion destination and it doesn't at the moment. It doesn't have the right look and the right voice and it's still amazing. So imagine when it does. It's a lady who needs to be pampered. It's a beautiful woman walking around with a horrible haircut. It needs to be treated like the beautiful lady it is. It needs to be elevated. We have to make her up. There's going to be a point of view.</p>?<p>"I look for personality, confidence and, you know, we hang out," said at his after-party on Saturday night when asked how he chooses models for his runway show (think and ).</p><p>And when Wu says "hang out," he means fete his spring 2013 collection at a Belvedere-hosted bash at the Standard Hotel's Boom Boom Room. Aren't the crazy parties what is all about? (Oh yeah, there's clothes too.) </p><p>From at the Frick, to Rodarte's after-party at Acme, take a look at the photos below to see some of the models, celebrities and fashion stars who have already gotten their party on, including , , and more.</p><p></p><p>Want more? Be sure to check out Stylelist on , , and .<br><br></p>?<p>TORONTO - Two Canadian labels are heading to the Big Apple as part of a special fashion showcase for emerging talents.</p><p>Chloe comme Parris and Amanda Lew Kee will be part of the designer lineup for GenArt's Fresh Faces in Fashion during New York Fashion Week.</p><p>Marking its 14th year, the event is slated to take place on Sept. 9 at Runway at Pier 57 in Manhattan, and will feature spring 2013 collections in both men's and women's ready-to-wear.</p><p>The program has been a showcase for other up-and-coming designers who now are among the top names in the industry. Rodarte, Zac Posen, Phillip Lim and Vena Cava are among those on the roster of past participants who debuted their very first runway shows at the event.</p><p>Here are some celebs you might be able to catch sitting front row at New York Fashion Week. Story continues below.</p><p></p><p>The budding Canadian labels taking part in this year's showcase have established a presence in the homegrown design scene with their own dedicated runway presentations staged during Toronto Fashion Week.</p><p>Chloe comme Parris is helmed by sisters Chloe and Parris Gordon who founded their Toronto-based contemporary womenswear and accessories brand in 2009. Elder sister Chloe is in charge of drafting the collection and dealing with the ready-to-wear side of the label, while Parris handles the metalwork.</p><p>Chloe took costume studies at Dalhousie University in Halifax for a year, learning different tailoring techniques and sewing skills, and later switched to the Nova Scotia College of Art and Design, studying there for two years before Parris attended.</p><p>In addition to her namesake line, Ryerson graduate Lew Kee has designed signature looks for HBO's vampire series "True Blood" and custom pieces for Canadian electronic producer Deadmau5 and "90210" star Shenae Grimes.</p>?<p><br>Chloe, video still from her live performance at the Centre Pompidou.</p><p>The Ingenue Interview features select artists and scene-makers from around the world, revealing their inspirations, cultural tastes, and dance party playlists. This week, French DJ, artist, and composer Chloe discusses Surrealism, the enduring "French Kiss", and her most experimental project to date.</p>***On October 13th at the in Lille, French DJ and producer Chloe Thevenin - or , as she's known - will reprise her sold-out, special live performance of "Chasser Croiser/The Surreal and Its Echo", an un-broadcast radio sound piece that debuted last month at Paris' Centre Pompidou. Steeped in Surrealism, the piece draws upon elements of the early 20th century avant-garde, both in its composition and content. Eclecticism, juxtaposition and an irregular strobe rhythm inform its intentionally illogical structure, while manipulations of archival voice recordings of Dadaist and Surrealist icons evoke sensations of dream, desire and revolt.<p>This week's performance, accompanied by Bernard Joisten's light/video installation "Rainbow", coincides with the global release of the project's second component: a book bearing the same name. Published through , Chasser Croiser/The Surreal and Its Echo attempts to illuminate Chloe's creative process through montages of personal ephemera: photographs taken during tours, notes on various projects and collaborations, and extracts from the notebooks she keeps while traveling. In addition, the book includes a CD-version of the sound piece, which is set to air November 3rd on the French radio program "Atelier de Creation Radiophonique".</p><p>Chloe's style, poised between genres and aesthetics, reflects a unique eclecticism which has led her to become one of the most sought-after leaders of the contemporary electronic scene. She became one of the emblematic figures of the legendary Pulp Club in Paris through her monthly residency; she plays at all the most prestigious European clubs, including Frankfurt's Robert Johnson, Barcelona's Mondo and Paris's Rex Club; and is a regular headliner on the festival circuit. Chloe continues to produce remixes, EPs and albums, including 2010's One in Other, which was nominated for a French music award, "Les Victoires de la Musique" and was released through the label she co-founded, . She continues to expand her collaborations with other artists, choreographers, performers and filmmakers.</p><p><p><p>How did the idea for Chasser Croiser/The Surreal and Its Echo come about?This project was commissioned by the French radio show called "Atelier de Creation Radiophonique" (ACR). Frank Smith and Philippe Langlois, coordinators of the program, also published books taken from some of their radio shows in partnership with the publisher Dis Voir (ZagZig). They had already published books and CDs with Laurie Anderson, Jonas Mekas, Lee Ranaldo/Sonic Youth, Ryoji Ikeda, and Dennis Cooper/Gisele Vienne/Peter Rehberg. They asked me to be part of this series. <p>Were you given any parameters? How did you approach the project? <br> tends to ask artists from an array of disciplinary backgrounds to arrange and to compare their artistic practice to radiophonic creation. Really, radio is a laboratory of sound experimentation. </p><p>This project was one of the most inspiring I have had as I was free to choose the theme of the radio show, and for the book I was very free, too, as it is an intimate book, for which I've selected some pictures from my tours as a DJ and live gigs and some other notes. </p><p>This project took me nearly a year to work on, especially because I never thought one day I would release a book. I selected some interviews from the French National Archives, interviews from Man Ray, Duchamp, Elsa Triolet, Aragon, etc. and then I made a forty-minute radiophonic piece. I revisited the sound piece for the live performance at the Centre Pompidou. It's a mixture of interviews, surrounded sounds, and music. It was a very exciting and inspiring performance. </p><p>In addition to voice recordings of Man Ray, Marcel Duchamp, Elsa Triolet, Gertrude Stein, and others, you've incorporated poetry by Guillaume Apollinaire, Louis Aragon, Vladimir Maiakovski and Joyce Mansour. What attracted you to the audio clips and poems that you ultimately chose?<br>I was interested in having diverse languages, diverse vocal tones, men, women, diverse recordings, from the past, but also from today. I found Guillaume Apollinaire reading his poem "Sous le pont Mirabeau"; it is a specific recording from his time. I also found some funny interviews with Man Ray, Duchamp et al. in which they explain their own approach to Surrealism. I've found some extracts of Dadaist performances. I didn't find any Maiakovski interviews, so since he was Russian, I asked a Russian singer if she would recite a poem by Maiakovski in Russian. I asked a friend of mine to recite in many diverse ways the Joyce Mansour poem "I want to sleep with you" so that I could have more material, and mix the vocals I had recorded myself with some old recordings.</p><p>Appropriately Surrealist, your use of these audio archives manifests itself as a hybrid of art and life, in which there is no clear delineation between the two realms. Would you comment on your use and manipulation of the voices throughout the sound piece?<br>My idea was to have some vocals I've found with their original old recordings, but also treated with many diverse processes from today that we can find in electronic music. This work allows me to enter my music even further, going further, allowing me to challenge some technical work that I use and get some interesting results.</p><p>In terms of composition, how is this piece a departure from work you've previously produced?<br>I've always composed music without setting a limit of styles on myself. I'm a DJ, playing club music, but I've also composed slow songs as well, beginning with my first EP released in 2002 on the label Karat. I've released a lot of club music and remixes, but at the same time I spent four years attending some electro-acoustic classes at a conservatoire in Paris.</p><p>Was it necessary for you to break from the traditional forms of electro music in order to render this piece an evocation of Surrealism?<br>There are many different ways to do electronic music, each artist has his or her own approach. It is a way of being totally independent and free in the creation, and this freedom is a real boost to my work.</p><p>Surrealism is more of a lifestyle than an artistic movement; it does not set any limits. It boasts a spirit of liberation. I can have the same approach when I produce music, and especially with this project, in which I wanted to have the freedom of Surrealism.</p><p>The juxtaposition and eclecticism of both the sound piece and the book appear to reflect your itinerant lifestyle as a DJ and collaborative methods as a producer. Would you say that your lifestyle and work propel your creative impulses?<br>I am inspired by many different things. I get inspired by many things to create: it can be a book, a feeling, a show, a record, etc. I am very open to having new projects that can nourish my work, by collaborating with performers, dancers, cineastes.</p><p>Which artists, writers, or filmmakers (past or present) do you admire?<br>I recently really liked Metronomy's latest album. There's an exhibition on Munch at the moment at the Centre Pompidou that I would love to see. I have times when I like to listen only to my old vinyls at home, so it can be from classical music to rock music, and there are times I like to have silence. </p><p>What are your favorite dance tracks?<br>I'm still listening to some old club tracks like "French Kiss" from Lil Louis, Georges Morel's "Sex Groove", and "Blue" by Latour...</p><p>Where do you like to spend your time in Paris?<br>I like to be out on some terraces in Paris, wherever.</p><p>Thank you.</p>??Trailer from Chloe's live performance at the Centre Pompidou. <p>Follow Nicole Garton on Twitter:</p>?<p>Leave it up to the beauty teams at to remind us that is rapidly approaching, and more importantly, that we need to come up with some costume that isn't a rip off of , or . Sorry, girls! Even your outlandish outfits have become a bit boring for a night of trick-or-treating. </p><p>And while we may use all of the next four weeks to design a ghoulish, yet glamorous getup, we can certainly take a cue from a few shows when it comes to channeling our inner child and wearing Crayola-like makeup.</p><p>For 's Game of Thrones-meets-Hellraiser collection, models marched down the catwalk wearing crimson-colored lipstick and eyeshadow (which was applied in an exaggerated raccoon-eye shape). But it was the single teardrop that took this look to frightening proportions. The makeup artists backstage at stayed true to the designer's Indian roots and adorned the girls' eyes in bright layers of orange, green and purple shades, complementing their jeweled headpieces. Red-orange and fat crayon-esque strokes around the eyelids in black, blue and white ruled 's runway. Yet, the paprika smokey eye makeup at seems like a great starting point for us all when coloring our faces come All Hallows' Eve. </p><p>Click through the slideshow below to see these looks, and tell us in the comments section which show is your favorite.</p><p>See all of our fashion week coverage .</p><p></p><p>Want more? Be sure to check out HuffPost Style on , , and .</p>?<p>"Pat, I'm scared. I had a really bad dream. Can I sleep in here with you?"</p><p>"Oh, I'm sorry, Chloe. Of course you can," I answered. And I put my arms around her and wrapped her in a comforter and once she'd finished relating her horrible dream, she fell back to sleep.</p><p>I have many kids of every age in my life all the time. I work in a homeless shelter. The kids at work overflow into my home life. It's the saddest job benefit in the entire world's occupations. It's sad because these kids should live in a home somewhere safe and warm. And it's a job benefit because if homeless kids must exist as least I get to spend time with them.</p><p>Every week one or more of the shelter kids come to my house. We cook homemade food together, watch movies, dance, talk and laugh. Some of the homeless kids are homeless because of parents' poor choices, parents' economic situations, parents' illness, or parents' neglect and/or abuse. While it's often not the parent's fault, it's never the kids' fault. </p><p>It's hard on adults to be homeless. It frightens them, infuriates them and humiliates them. It's worse for their kids. Shelters are noisy crowded places. It's tough to sleep. Everyone in a shelter is stressed out by their homelessness. Kids in shelters have to navigate the anger and ugliness around them and then go to school and are supposed to get decent grades.</p><p>Homeless kids don't want anyone to know where they live. They don't invite friends over to visit. They don't have play dates. </p><p>It's a tough life. But it's not the worst thing some of these kids face. Some of them faced worse before they became homeless. In fact the Domestic Violence Counts National Survey identified tens of thousands of kids on a single night in 2009 who became homeless when their parent fled an abuser.</p><p>Chloe dreamed -- Chloe's not her real name by the way -- that someone was in her room screaming. Screaming and screaming and screaming, the person just wouldn't stop. Her mom used to scream. Her dad used to beat her until she screamed. Then Chloe and her mom moved a few states over and hid in a domestic violence shelter.</p><p>Chloe's mom was one of the few people who thought that the economy tanking was a good thing. She lost the job she'd had for about eight years and qualified for unemployment. She thought with the unemployment benefits to lean on that she could make a break and her cruel husband wouldn't be able to find her. </p><p>Every state handles unemployment compensation differently. And Chloe's mom got confused and misfiled a few times. And the little family falls further and further behind while Chloe's mom searches for a new job. The domestic violence shelter they went to was a help, but it was in a large inner city and Chloe's mom needed a place to live that was less scary. They came to us.</p><p>In the mean time, Chloe who had lived in an affluent community and gone to a private school left her friends hundreds of miles behind and can't tell them where she's gone. She can't even call to say "hi."</p><p>When I first met them, Chloe couldn't talk about her friends without crying. She missed them and she missed the soccer team on which she played. Some of the kids at her new school found out she was homeless and began to tease her. Her grades suffered; so she pretty much hates school now. </p><p>Every night before Chloe goes to bed she and her mom do the ABC's of gratitude. They use the letters of the alphabet to name something that they are grateful for each day. It's a trick her mom picked up at the ALANON meetings she's been attending since they left Chloe's dad. </p><p>I've known Chloe now for about six months. She smiles a lot more than she did when I first met her and seems better able to transition from affluent victim of domestic violence to a safe and sound homeless child -- at least until she falls asleep. </p>?If the designers really want celebrities to wear their clothes, maybe they should give them to them free with the caveat that the celebrity has to donate an equal amount of money to charity. <br><br>These people get paid hundreds of thousands of dollars per movie and can easily afford a few thousand for designer clothes, yet the people who can most easily afford expensive things are often the ones who aren't asked to pay for it. The way I see it, diverting that money to charity would be a win-win-win solution.?<p> ("") takes the reins on the latest installment of "" (Thu., 10 p.m. ET on MTV). It was a return for Shepard, who used to be a co-star of the original iteration. And he proved just as fun and clever with this second appearance as well.</p><p>He put Chloe Moretz into the middle of an awkward love triangle with her limo driver. Metta World Peace, the athlete formerly known as Ron Artest, also faced Shepard head on and failed to recognize him. Shepard accosted him in a parking garage asking for an autograph and picture. But he saved the nastiest for ("").</p><p>Conrad and her friends witnessed as a woman fell into a trash dumpster and then got dumped into a trash truck. When the driver refused to believe them that there was a woman, Conrad and her friends had to hear the woman shouting that she was being crushed "like 'Star Wars.'"</p><p>The woman was rescued, and even had a big trash-covered hug for Conrad for helping "save" her life. It was certainly a lot of fun, with the pranks a little more elaborate and longer-running than much of what has been seen so far since this reboot.</p><p>"Punk'd" continues Thursdays at 10 p.m. ET on NBC.</p><p>TV Replay scours the vast television landscape to find the most interesting, amusing, and, on a good day, amazing moments, and delivers them right to your browser.</p> <br>?The Rev. Chloe Breyer is Executive Director of the and also serves as an associate priest at St. Mary’s Episcopal Church in West Harlem. Previously, Breyer worked at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine, as Chaplain to the Cathedral School and Director of the Cathedral Forums on Religion on Public Life. After 9/11, Breyer undertook an interfaith initiative to rebuild a bombed mosque in Afghanistan and has returned four times for additional faith-based aid projects, including a women’s health clinic and a co-ed school. Prior to the 2005 Millennium Summit, Breyer worked with the US Campaign for the Millennium Development Goals to raise awareness about the MDGs among American religious leaders of different faith traditions. Breyer’s publications include (Basic Books, 2000), along with chapters in (Church Publishing, 2005), and (Beacon Press, 2006). Breyer is also a contributor to and is working on her Ph.D. in Christian Ethics at Union Theological Seminary.?<p>Age gap relationships seem to be all the rage among those celeb types at the moment, and the latest couple to join the ranks is Richard and Judy's daughter Chloe Madeley and former Hustle star Marc Warren. </p><p>Chloe, 24, was spotted smooching 45-year-old Marc as they enjoyed a date in Brighton over the weekend. </p><p>After strolling through the streets together, they went to see pal Denise Welch appearing in the touring production of Steel Magnolias and were caught kissing outside a bar after the show.</p><p>Chloe recently ended her relationship her former Dancing On Ice co-star Sam Attwater - just months after they moved in together.</p><p></p><p>She told The Mirror earlier this year she had no regrets over their on-off romance.</p><p></p><p>Marc's previously dated former glamour model Abi Titmuss between 2008 and 2009, but the couple split after it was revealed Marc had cheated on her. </p><p>> IN PICS: AGE GAP CELEB COUPLES<br></p><p>Earlier on HuffPost:</p> <br>?<p>If you've seen a scary movie made in the last ten years, you may have noticed a pattern in the casting. Whether it's "The Ring" or "The Grudge," it seems that whenever studios want to up the creepiness factor, they take a pale child actor, put a weird wig on her and have her lurk ominously behind the other characters.</p><p>Our friends at were lucky enough to track down Enid Krysinski (a.k.a. Chloe Moretz from "Kick-Ass"), Hollywood's official "scary girl" and ask her a few questions about her technique and career, and the resulting interview is pretty hilarious. And creepy. </p><p>That yearbook photo alone is enough to give you night terrors.</p> <br>?<p></p><p><br><br>If you've kept up with the season's viral video hits, you'd recognize these from Chloe Sevigny's checklist of things to do . The brains behind it? Comedian and Groundlings alum , whose homage to one of fashion and art's simultaneously inspiring and inscrutable icons is, well, genius.</p><p>"It's fun because I really like Chloe--often because she never stops being ridiculous," Droege says during a recent visit to (we're big fans; so is ). "Like, really? Were you really reading J.D. Salinger while sipping some rare scotch and talking poetry with Da Brat?"</p><p>Chloe has been in Droege's character arsenal for years, but only recently did he connect with director for the web series, which now also includes Chloe's stab at stand-up comedy and a list of her birthday gifts (among them: a vintage half-caftan by Vivienne Westwood gold label). "It cracks me up what she wears sometimes," Droege says. "It's very early nineties. Very Sara Gilbert, very afghan on the back of the couch from Roseanne."</p><p>A native of North Carolina, Droege recently nabbed the award for Outstanding Emerging Talent at Outfest last month. As for the Chloe series, be on the lookout for a new chapter on soon. A good source tells us Chloe herself has seen Droege's work; what does she think? We're not sure, but we're trying to find out.</p><p>"I'd hope she would get it," Droege says of his tongue-in-cheek tribute. "It's not a straight up imitation. I don't even try to do her voice. It has as much to do with that whole scene as it does with her. I've seen her at parties before but have never met her. Now I think I'll have to introduce myself."</p><p>Before he left us on a recent afternoon, Droege morphed into character and gave us the download on Chloe's recent L.A. adventures. Enjoy. </p><p></p><p><p><p><p></p><p>Get the latest in L.A. style, fashion, shopping, culture and nightlife at </p><p>Follow Style Section L.A. on Twitter:</p>?<p>"Harry Potter" star Rupert Grint has just signed on to the Dennis Wilson biopic "The Drummer." </p><p>According to Variety, . Joining Rupert will be Chloe Grace Moretz, who'll portray Wilson's daughter, Jennifer.</p><p>Set to begin production this June, "The Drummer" will focus on the last few years of Wilson's life (he passed away in 1983). Aaron Eckhart has already been cast as Dennis; Vera Farmiga will play Fleetwood Mac member Christine McVie, who had a relationship with Wilson before his death.</p><p>[via ]</p> <br>?<p>Home secretary Theresa May, the most senior woman in government and Treasury minister Chloe Smith were among the guests at the First Women Awards on Thursday.</p><p>The awards were founded in 2005 by Real Business and the CBI and recognise "trailblazing women" from the business, entrepreneurial, engineering, science and technology, and media sectors </p><p>May, who is also minister for equalities, said: "All the winners and nominees are leading the way and I hope these awards will inspire even more women to become pioneers. </p><p>"That's good for our economy, good for our society, good for women and good for Britain.<br> <br>"Women are at the heart of our economic future and making the most of their skills is essential. I want us to do everything we can to unleash women's talents and give them the support they need to reach the top."</p><p>Among the winners was Diane Johnson, the first woman to be appointed President of the Electrical Contractors’ Association - the 110 year-old trade body representing 3,000 UK electrical contracting businesses, who was honoured for her ground-breaking work in transforming the industry.</p><p></p><p>Smith, the 30-year-old economic secretary at the Treasury who has rocketed up the ministerial ranks at a young age, also spoke at the event, . </p><p>Not really.</p>?<p>All the drama on usually happens on screen, but even with the show on a break there is still plenty going on. </p><p>The stars of the show have been left worried about their roles on the hit series after ruthless new producers begun to wield the axe.</p><p>Among the cast up for the chop include the long-serving , who is said to be "more interested in her own shop and clothing line", according to . </p><p></p><p>Other stars facing the axe are who Heat says didn't find the last series "exciting", and Cara Kilbey who has annoyed producers with her on-set moaning. </p><p>HuffPost UK blogger and Joey Essex's best mate 's position is also said to be "shaky". </p><p></p><p>Back in July, it was reported </p><p>When we got in touch with a spokesperson for the show regarding the latest cast change rumours, they told us: "We always review the cast at the beginning of any new series so we’re unable to confirm anything at this time."</p><p>Last month saw , and with all these possible departures, we're wondering exactly who will be left when the series returns later this year. </p><p>> IN PICS: WHY WE HEART TOWIE<br></p><p>> WATCH: CATCH UP ON ALL TODAY'S CELEB GOSS</p>?<p> Chloe Sims has confessed she fears for her safety since appearing in the show.</p><p>The mum-of-one's co-star Lauren Goodger recently had her brand new beauty salon torched, and last year sisters Sam and Billie Faiers were attacked by a gang of girls on a night out.</p><p>Chloe, who also has faced jibes from online bullies, told The Star: "I worry about my safety if I'm where people are drinking. They feel confident and people think they know you. It can be intimidating when there are lots of people around you wanting a picture taken. </p><p>"I do have security when I do public appearances, but only what the club provide. When first on the show, I worried about mine and (daughter) Madison's safety."</p><p>But Chloe, 30, said on the whole she's happy to be part of the ITV2 reality show.</p><p>"After my first episode there were so many people gunning for me. I cried afterwards because I thought: 'What have I done? I've got a daughter. It's her I've got to worry about.'</p><p>"But for me the positive that's come out of the show has completely outweighed any negatives."</p><p>SLIDESHOW: The original TOWIE cast<br></p> <br>?<p>Wednesday is the new Friday, it seems. At least thinks it is.</p><p>Let's look at the . And there's .</p><p>The star partied like it was the weekend again last night and was spotted looking more than a little wobbly as she attempted to make her way home from the Aura nightclub in London's Mayfair.</p><p></p><p>Luckily for Chloe, her TOWIE co-star, was around to lend his support in the form of an arm around her waist to steady her as they walked to a waiting taxi.</p><p>But as soon as Tom let go, the poor lamb did her very best newborn bambi impression and tumbled into the cab.</p><p></p><p>Smooooooooth.</p><p>Chloe - dressed in a high-waisted pink pencil skirt, black turtleneck and skyscraper heels - had earlier been at the London Film Museum for a games launch.</p><p>But instead of calling it a night, she then headed to Novikov restaurant before moving on to the club, tweeting: "Gonna pop to Aura be rude not to X'.</p><p></p><p>Bet she's regretting that decision today.</p><p> </p><p>> IN PICS: TIRED AND EMOTIONAL CELEBS<br></p>?<p>Yes, you read right. TOWIE star Chloe Sims is explaining why she wants to have bottom implants. In an exclusive interview and photoshoot with Reveal magazine, she opens up about why she is resorting to desperate measures to mend her shattered confidence and boost her love life:<br>On why she still isn't happy with her mirror image: <br>"At the moment, I don't feel attractive in the body department because I'm so skinny. I've tried to put on weight but it just goes straight to my belly. I end up looking like a gangly girl with a pot belly, big boobs and no bum."<br> <br>On why she wants bottom implants: <br>"A big bottom will make me sexier and more confident. It's the last part of my body I want to change. Men like confident girls with a bit of meat on them."<br> <br>On wearing bum implants during the day: <br>"I wear knickers which have foam bum implants sewn in underneath my jeans If I'm wearing leggings, I'll wear two pairs of tummy control tights underneath as they lift my bottom up and make it look firm."<br> <br>On why she wants more than just subtle implants: <br>"I want to go much bigger than the surgeon suggested on TOWIE. I love Nicki Minaj's bum, but he hadn't heard of her, so I explained that I'm quite a dramatic person and want it to look like a perfect peach."<br> <br>On the extremely tough recovery period after the surgery: <br>"You can't sit down for two weeks, in case the pressure moves the implants out of place. I'll be able to stand up, lie down on my side and my tummy, but I can't lie on my back. I won't be able to drive and I'm not sure how I'm going to go to the toilet. I'm presuming I'll have to squat!"<br> <br>On when she is intending to get it done: <br>"I'm going to wait and have it done when Maddie (her seven-year-old daughter) is on holiday with her grandparents. I don't want her to know what I've had done or see me looking poorly. She is too young and impressionable."<br> <br>On why she thinks the bum op will be worth it: <br>"Although men check out your looks first, I don't want a guy to go with me just because I look sexy. Even if I don't bag a man, at least I'll be happy knowing I finally look good."</p><p><br>Chloe Sims is intent on bettering herself, going under the knife once more</p><p>Check out our slideshow of those RUMOURED to have gone under the knife in search of the perfect gluteus maximus...<br></p><p>Read the full interview in Reveal Magazine, on sale today. <br><br></p> <br>?<p>Given that has just landed a book deal (yes, really) she did have a reason to celebrate on Saturday night. </p><p>And that she did. And then some. </p><p></p><p></p><p>The star had clearly enjoyed the benefits of the free bar at The Villa nightclub in Epping as she was spotted leaving looking, errrm, a little tired and emotional.</p><p></p><p>But luckily her TOWIE co-star was on-hand to prop her up as she left in the wee hours - we're guessing she would have had a bit of trouble putting one foot in front of the other by herself. </p><p></p><p>The pair had been toasting the news that Chloe is set to follow in the footsteps of TOWIE regular and pen her life story. </p><p>The tell-all book is set to hit shelves in November, just in time for Christmas (handy).</p><p>A source told </p><p>"There will be a lot in it which people don't know and there will be some bombshells.</p><p>"She is really excited about it and is the only TOWIE star bringing out a book like this before Christmas."</p><p>> IN PICS: TIRED AND EMOTIONAL CELEBS<br></p><p>Also on HuffPost:</p>?<p>Quick, somebody call a doctor! Chloe Sims has become the latest TOWIE star to have contracted the disease prone to many reality stars, which we have given the (very catchy) name of 'I-haven't-had-much-screen-time-recently-let's-do-something-to-get-me-a-headline-itis'. </p><p>Or as it's more commonly known, getting absolutely blotto and stumbling about in front of the paps.</p><p></p><p>Chloe put on quite the display as she hit London town with her pal Lauren Pope and cousin Frankie Essex last night. </p><p></p><p>Suppose you can always rely on a TOWIE girl to show everyone how NOT to get in a taxi, can't you?</p><p></p><p>The girls indulged in one too many sherries as they boozed it up at Aura nightclub, but luckily a scaffolding pole came in handy to steady Chloe as she headed home in the wee small hours. </p><p></p><p>The evening started out so civilised as well, as the girls previewed Chloe Green's collection at Topshop in Oxford Circus (wonder how on earth Phillip Green's daughter managed to bag herself that one, eh?) before they hit the club, meeting up with fellow cast mates Joey Essex, Diags and Tom Pearce.</p><p></p><p>> IN PICS: TIRED AND EMOTIONAL CELEBS<br></p> <br>?<p>Oh babes, you are a doughnut!</p><p> has been caught out for putting £60 worth of petrol in her new diesel sports car.</p><p>The star was forced to part ways with the new white Mercedes soft top after it broke down and had to be towed.</p><p><br>"Oh shut up!"</p><p><br>Doh!</p><p>The big-bosomed star was en route to Sam Faiers' house to film scenes for the . </p><p>The star must have been distressed, but she still found time to put on some slap at the side of the road while her car was seen and fellow TOWIE star Lauren Pope rushed to the rescue.</p><p><br>Lauren Pope offered support, and some concealer</p><p>Later at a car was delivered to her co-star's home, but the full-lipped star could have to wait for five days to get her new wheels back.</p><p>That'll teach ya, love!</p><p>>IN PICS: Other celebs who've gone under the knife<br></p><p>Also on HuffPost:</p>?<p>If there is anyone we can usually rely on to stumble out of a party looking a little refreshed, it's , but for once the high-heeled shoe was on the other foot, as she was on the receiving end of someone else's boozy antics last night. </p><p></p><p>The star had to help her castmate as she staggered out of a club following yet another party to celebrate 's 22nd birthday. </p><p></p><p>, so it was only right that she repaid the favour to someone else. </p><p></p><p>The girls were joined by other members of the TOWIE cast cast including Sam and Billie Faiers, Frankie Essex and at Funky Buddha nightclub in London.</p><p></p><p>And the party went on until the wee small hours when Arg tweeted a picture of him and Sam still partying in her kitchen at 6am. </p><p></p><p>But we're guessing Popey was tucked up in bed with a bucket by her side at that point...</p><p>> IN PICS: OTHER 'TIRED AND EMOTIONAL' STARS<br></p>?<p>Topshop heiress Chloe Green has become embroiled in Tulisa Contostavlos' split from her N-Dubz bandmate Fazer, after The X Factor judge was allegedly left fuming by their blossoming friendship.</p><p>, which was reportedly ruined by a series of furious rows.</p><p>According to reports, the feisty TV star grew angry as Fazer began spending more and more time with the Made In Chelsea rich girl.</p><p>It's not the first time Chloe and Tulisa have had a run-in - the N-Dubz star snubbed Sir Philip Green's daughter at London's Whisky Mist nightclub before Christmas.</p><p></p><p>At the time, Chloe tweeted, "Tulisa needs to remember her humble beginnings... Rude to me and my friends?!! Hmmm... That’s a clever move!"</p><p>Now the fact Fazer has been spotted clubbing with her posh nemesis is making the split all the harder to deal with, according to the .</p><p>A source tells the publication, ". There were claims Tulisa was 'rude' but she genuinely didn't know who Chloe and her pals were when they were cleared from her table.</p><p>"."</p><p>Chloe took to Twitter on Monday night to seemingly insist she and her new pal have a purely platonic relationship, writing, "I just don't get why every guy who is my friend is suddenly someone I am supposedly with. Girls can have friends that are guys! #notacrime." </p><p></p><p>CELEB PICS OF THE DAY:<br></p> <br>?<p>That poor lamb must be going through the mill after . She's probably spent her time sitting in her PJs, eating ice cream and watching Bridget Jones... Hang on, wait a minute...</p><p>Nope, the X Factor judge has been out on the razz again, and this time she has enlisted some celebrity chums to dance the night away with.</p><p>Tulisa has been spotted on various nights out since the news of the split was revealed last week, and on Saturday night she was out on the tiles again - this time with The Saturdays' Vanessa White and Rochelle Wiseman.</p><p></p><p>The girls glammed it up for their night out, with Tulisa donning a floral LBD to show Fazer exactly what he was missing. But the orange hue she has been sporting of late is showing no signs of fading. </p><p>The trio dined at London's exclusive Nobu Berkeley restaurant before heading to Movida Nightclub for a night of fun.</p><p>But it was cut short when Tulisa spotted her nemesis, Topshop heiress Chloe Green partying with her friends at the same club. </p><p>Tulisa made a dash for it after spotting the Made In Chelsea star, leaving the club to avoid a confrontation.</p><p></p><p>Speaking to , a source close to the X Factor star said: ".</p><p>"But when she spotted some of Chloe's posse, the gang decided to move on. The last thing Tulisa needed was to waste her breath arguing. So her group swiftly legged it to nearby Jalouse."</p><p>The pair previously came to blows after the talent show judge ordered Chloe away from her VIP table at London's Whisky Mist.</p><p>, so Tulisa would have been in no rush to make small talk with the star on Saturday. </p><p>"Tulisa and Chloe are from different worlds and will never be best buddies," the source told The Mirror. But when she's had a drink, Tulisa knows what she's like. She decided not to risk 'having a word' and left before Chloe made her entrance."</p><p>TIRED AND EMOTIONAL CELEBS:<br></p> <br>?<p>PARIS &mdash; Everyone loves a high-profile rivalry, but perhaps the fashion world more than most.</p><p>This might explain why fashion writers have so eagerly pitted the two new influential faces of Paris' ready-to-wear calendar against each other.</p><p>In the Christian Dior ring, Raf Simons &ndash; the house designer appointed in April whose Friday collection wowed journalists &ndash; and in Yves Saint Laurent's, Hedi Slimane, the 44-year-old appointed in March, who himself used to work at Dior menswear.</p><p>Amid incredible pressure to deliver, Paris-born Slimane unveiled his new vision for the rival house Monday, with YSL themselves adding to the buzz through their strict guestlist and restricted invitations.</p><p>Meanwhile, the front row presence was proof enough of the brand's enduring allure: From French First Lady Valerie Trierweiler, actress Jessica Chastain and a roll call of his designing peers Vivienne Westwood, Alber Elbaz and Marc Jacobs.</p><p>So who won?</p><p>YVES SAINT LAURENT</p><p>When fashion editors put down their pens halfway through a catwalk show, it's always cause for worry.</p><p>This was the case at Hedi Slimane's disappointing debut at Yves Saint Laurent &ndash; a rather confused ode to excess that used fringing, leather, lacing, tassels, feathers, sequins, skinny menswear tailoring, baggy pants, cinching cummerbunds, capes, tribal pendants and almost everything else under the sun.</p><p>Pierre Berge, Saint Laurent's former partner said: "(Slimane) knows the Saint Laurent DNA, the spirit."</p><p>There was definitely a nod to that. For example, black silk neckbows, a house signature that was used as a leitmotif. But the collection lacked the empowering sex appeal that made Saint Laurent one of the most famous names in fashion.</p><p>The bows, rather symbolically, instead of unifying the collection, fought with other busy materials for attention.</p><p>Unflattering floppy Stetson hats capped it off.</p><p>Slimane took a gamble on the no-holds-barred approach to impress, but somehow fell short of the mark in his basic silhouette.</p><p>Many individual garments &ndash; like one sumptuous look with side a spread of black feathers &ndash; were highly creative.</p><p>But here the plumes' dynamic horizontal energy was drowned out by the bow.</p><p>Slimane pulled it off well when he wasn't trying too hard: A classy skinny menswear pant looked great with a sharp shouldered tuxedo &ndash; and a spot on merging of YSL and Slimane's own personal style.</p><p>Had he kept it cleaner, Slimane might not have given the upper hand so easily to his Dior rival.</p><p>CHLOE</p><p>The Chloe fashion house is celebrating its 60th birthday during Paris Fashion Week but its spring-summer 2013 show proved it's still as fresh as a daisy.</p><p>Designer Clare Waight Keller's collection takes its cue from founder Gaby Aghion's mantra: "I lived the life I wanted."</p><p>Chloe, founded in 1952, practically invented ready-to-wear in the first place and has always confidently led the way. That rebelliousness came out Monday in the clothes &ndash; strongly feminine and diaphanous but also structured with laser-cut edges in many large frills and ripples.</p><p>"I wanted a feminine spirit, but sharp...like a knife," Waight Keller said after the show.</p><p>This contrasted with the collection's soft side. Transparent organza silks played on volume, giving a layered three-dimensionality to soft, oversized T-shirts and knee-length skirts. The light touches came from hibiscus flower appliques on sheer white tops, or in one instance, in green down a singular pant leg.</p><p>Features like this can look overly busy if handled poorly. But here the looks were paired with a clean-cut minimalist vest, jacket or Bermuda to tasteful effect.</p><p>STELLA MCCARTNEY</p><p>"Palatable, everyday." That's how Stella McCartney, backstage, describes her fresh, optimistic and relaxed spring-summer outing.</p><p>If she hoped the collection to be everyday, the show itself &ndash; in the gilded foyer of the Paris Opera Garnier with ornate, swinging double chandeliers in gold , not to mention the famous faces like Kate Moss, Salma Hayek and McCartney's former Beatle father Paul &ndash; was not.</p><p>It's hard to be casual when you were born with one of the most famous dads on the planet &ndash; but she got full marks for trying.</p><p>Silhouettes ignored the waist, with a cool, low-slung belted vibe, and the big curves of last season were gone.</p><p>Thinking outside the box, McCartney created some fantastic elliptical curves in vibrant saffron yellow and forest green, sculpting a feminine shape like a geometric hourglass.</p><p>Black and white camouflage print looked fantastic on a silky jumpsuit, worn by sassy model of the moment Karlie Kloss.</p><p>This look wasn't exactly everyday, but it's sure going to sell.</p><p>HAKAAN</p><p>There's going to be a one-hour hole in the normally tight Paris Fashion Week calendar, after representatives of label Hakaan said its entire collection had been lost.</p><p>Turkish designer Hakaan Yildirim was set to present his spring-summer 2013 to the media on Tuesday afternoon.</p><p>But PR company Karlaotto sent out emails Monday to all those with invitations saying the preview was canceled &ndash; after all the clothes had mysteriously disappeared. "The whole collection is lost," said Karen Nitsche of Karlaotto. "It was when they were being transported. We don't know how."</p><p>Last November, Marc Jacobs canceled a London press preview after his collection was stolen during its transfer from Paris.</p><p>____</p><p>Thomas Adamson can be followed at http:/ /Twitter.com/ThomasAdamsonAP</p>?<p>George Osborne, a politician who enjoys trying to wrong foot his opponents, stood up and unexpectedly announced during routine Parliamentary questions that he was scrapping the planned 3p rise in fuel duty due to come into effect in August.</p><p>But far from coup he was hoping for within 24 hours Mr Osborne’s surprise announcement had unravelled ? undone by mismanagement, a junior minister being “Paxmaned” and the complete inability of the Treasury to provide a plausible explanation of where the money to pay for it was coming from.</p><p>Even the Sun, which had championed the fuel freeze in the first place, turned its teeth on the Government describing the u-turn as “the final unravelling of the most shambolic budget in memory”.</p><p>The whole affair was not so much an example of an “ominshambles” (although it was) ? but like watching an entire episode of the political comedy The Thick of It which spawned the phrase.</p><p>The first mistake made by Mr Osborne was the surprise itself.</p><p>Either fearful that the news would leak out before he could announce it or perhaps because the decision had been rushed at the last minute the Chancellor somehow managed to ‘forget’ to tell his Cabinet colleagues what he was planning to do.</p><p>That led Justine Greening, who most people would assume as Transport Secretary, would have been in the loop on petrol prices, to give an interview to the Daily Telegraph ruling out a freeze.</p><p>Embarrassing but not disastrous.</p><p>But then someone had the bright idea of putting Chloe Smith, a junior Treasury minister, on Newsnight.</p><p>Until yesterday Ms Smith, 30, had been considered something of a rising Government star.</p><p>Despite suggestions that David Cameron only appointed because he wrongly thought she was an accountant until this week she had proved a safe pair of hands.</p><p>But on last night she was unable to convincingly answer a single question posed to her by Jeremy Paxman.</p><p>“When were you told?” he asked her seven times. She couldn’t say.</p><p>“How are you paying for this?” She didn’t have a clue.</p><p>“Do you ever think you’re incompetent?” Ouch.</p><p>One respected Westminster journalist watching tweeted: “That is one of the five worst ministerial interviews I have ever seen in 12 years.”</p><p>Her only support came from the ever off-message Tory backbencher Nadine Dorries who to use Ms Smith’s discomfort to compound her boss’s problems.</p><p>“If Osborne sent Chloe on (Newsnight) re scrapping 3p he is a coward as well as arrogant.”</p><p>By this afternoon at Prime Minister’s Questions the whole policy had unravelled. Not just in presentational terms but practically as well.</p><p>The Prime Minister’s spokesman was unable to say how the Government knew ? just two months into the financial year - that there would be enough spending shortfall by departments to pay the £550 million the freeze will cost.</p><p>Aides were also unable to explain why is deficit reduction was the Government’s primary focus they were breaking their own rules by spending millions of pounds on a tax cut.</p><p>Not only that, but the £500 million only pays for the freeze until January when Mr Osborne will face the same dilemma yet over again. Over a year the total cost of the measure would cost the Treasury a further £1 billion.</p><p>Quite a lot of money when you’re in the middle of the biggest public spending squeeze for a generation.</p><p>In contrast to those real dilemmas the disaster of Chloe and the problems of the off-message Nadine will likely pale into embarrassed insignificance.</p><p>“Nadine is Nadine”, sighed the Prime Minister’s press secretary.</p><p>“What can you do?”</p>?<p>The Oscar nominations, unveiled today, set up a race which seems likely to be headlined by an intriguing battle between Hugo and The Artist, a pair of films which both set out (in very different ways) to pay homage to the earliest days of cinema.</p><p>Martin Scorsese’s Hugo, a hugely-ambitious, motion-capture animation which is short-listed in 11 of the 24 categories, revolves around a heart-felt tribute to the Parisian movie pioneer, George Melies. It will contest the Best Picture, Best Director, and Best Screenplay awards, along with a slew of technical Oscars.</p><p>Its nearest rival, The Artist, is a black-and-white silent movie which explores Hollywood’s transition to “talkies.” Made on a tiny budget, it has dominated the 2012 awards season so far, and will now seek ten Academy Awards, including Best Director for its French creator Michel Hazanavicius.</p><p>Playing into the nostalgic tone of proceedings is a wider short-list dominated by some of the industry’s most enduring legends. Woody Allen will rub shoulders with Scorsese and Hazanavicius in the Best Directing category, thanks to Midnight in Paris, his first nomination in six years; Steven Spielberg, who was last in the running for an Oscar in 2007, saw his War Horse short-listed in six categories.</p><p>The favourite to win Best Actress will once again be Meryl Streep, for her portrayal of Margaret Thatcher in The Iron Lady. She is attempting to break a run of twelve straight Oscar defeats, and faces perhaps her stiffest challenge from Glenn Close, another veteran leading lady with blue-chip credentials who is nominated for her lead role in Albert Nobbs.</p><p>Leading contenders for the Best Actor crown include George Clooney, who is nominated for The Descendants, a well-made drama which picked-up five nominations and now has an outside shot at Best Picture. His best-known rival will be Brad Pitt, who is seeking a first Academy Award for the baseball film Moneyball.</p><p>Underlining his growing creative stature, Clooney is also nominated for a share of a writing award, after The Ides of March - a critically-acclaimed political thriller he co-wrote, co-produced, directed and starred in - was nominated for Best Adapted Screenplay. “George is an extraordinarily complete film-maker,” his co-producer Nigel Sinclair told The Independent. “He was disciplined and personable. He showed us the first cut of the film three weeks after shooting wrapped, he came in under budget, and he made an incredible film.”</p><p>Today's short-list adds clarity to what has so far been a confusing Hollywood awards season, in which The Artist has picked-up the lion’s share of plaudits without ever gaining sufficient momentum to lend inevitability to its march towards the industry’s most prestigious event.</p><p>The film, made for just $15m, would be the first silent, black-and-white movie to win Best Picture since Wings in 1927. It also has a decent shot of landing major acting awards, with previously-unknown stars Jean Dujardin and Berenice Bejo short-listed for Best Actor and Best Supporting Actress respectively. &quot;I can't believe that a year ago I was learning how to tap dance and today I am nominated for an Academy Award,&quot; said Bejo today.</p><p>Hugo's dramatic emergence meanwhile came as a surprise. The children’s film, which has a star-studded cast, gained only mixed reviews when it debuted before Christmas, and has so far disappointed commercially, returning only $83 million globally, against a production budget of around $150m.</p><p>Scorsese’s backers will now hope that filmgoers take a second look at the title. Producer Graham King today described Hugo as &quot;the movie I'm most proud of in my career,” adding: &quot;I really have to take my hat off to Marty for not just the technical aspect but making a genre-defining film.”</p><p>Other intriguing story-lines include the two nominations gained by the summer comedy Bridesmaids ? which, though hugely successful, hardly fits the earnest profile of a typical Oscar movie - and the relatively-poor showing by British films and stars.</p><p>Whereas last year’s Oscars were dominated by The King’s Speech, this year our leading hopes lie with Gary Oldman, who wins his first ever nomination as Best Actor for Tinker Tailor, Soldier , Spy, and Kenneth Branagh, short-listed for Best Supporting Actor for My Week With Marilyn.</p><p>Golden oldies: Nominated again</p><p>Martin Scorsese</p><p>The 69-year-old received his seventh 'best director' Oscar nomination yesterday for Hugo.? Scorsese was nominated five times for the best director prize (the first for Raging Bull in 1980) before finally winning for The Departed in 2007.</p><p>Meryl Streep</p><p>Up for best actress at this year's awards, the 62-year-old already has two Oscars for her roles in Kramer vs Kramer in 1979 and Sophie's Choice in 1982. She has received 17 Oscar nominations ? more than any other actor.</p><p>Woody Allen</p><p>The 76-year-old yesterday picked up his seventh nomination in the director category for his 41st film Midnight in Paris. He has two Oscars, one for his screenplay of Hannah and Her Sisters in 1987 and one for directing Annie Hall in 1977.</p><p>?</p><p>?</p><p>Here is the full list of nominations for the 84th Academy Awards:</p><p>Best Picture</p><p>The Artist</p><p>The Descendants</p><p>Extremely Loud &amp; Incredibly Close</p><p>The Help</p><p>Hugo</p><p>Midnight in Paris</p><p>Moneyball</p><p>The Tree of Life</p><p>War Horse</p><p>Best actor:</p><p>Demian Bichir - A Better Life</p><p>George Clooney - The Descendants</p><p>Jean Dujardin - The Artist</p><p>Gary Oldman - Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy</p><p>Brad Pitt - Moneyball</p><p>Best actress:</p><p>Glenn Close - Albert Nobbs</p><p>Viola Davis - The Help</p><p>Rooney Mara - The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo</p><p>Meryl Streep - The Iron Lady</p><p>Michelle Williams - My Week with Marilyn</p><p>Supporting actor:</p><p>Kenneth Branagh - My Week with Marilyn</p><p>Jonah Hill - Moneyball</p><p>Nick Nolte - Warrior</p><p>Christopher Plummer - Beginners</p><p>Max von Sydow - Extremely Loud &amp; Incredibly Close</p><p>Supporting actress:</p><p>Berenice Bejo - The Artist</p><p>Jessica Chastain - The Help</p><p>Melissa McCarthy - Bridesmaids</p><p>Janet McTeer - Albert Nobbs</p><p>Octavia Spencer - The Help</p><p>Adapted screenplay:</p><p>The Descendants</p><p>Hugo</p><p>The Ides of March</p><p>Moneyball</p><p>Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy</p><p>Original screenplay:</p><p>The Artist</p><p>Bridesmaids</p><p>Margin Call</p><p>Midnight In Paris</p><p>A Separation</p><p>Directing:</p><p>The Artist - Michel Hazanavicius</p><p>The Descendants - Alexander Payne</p><p>Hugo - Martin Scorsese</p><p>Midnight in Paris - Woody Allen</p><p>The Tree of Life - Terrence Malick</p><p>Animated feature film:</p><p>A Cat in Paris</p><p>Chico &amp; Rita</p><p>Kung Fu Panda 2</p><p>Puss in Boots</p><p>Rango</p><p>Art direction:</p><p>The Artist</p><p>Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2</p><p>Hugo</p><p>Midnight in Paris</p><p>War Horse</p><p>Cinematography:</p><p>The Artist</p><p>The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo</p><p>Hugo</p><p>The Tree of Life</p><p>War Horse</p><p>Costume design:</p><p>Anonymous</p><p>The Artist</p><p>Hugo</p><p>Jane Eyre</p><p>W.E.</p><p>Documentary (feature):</p><p>Hell and Back Again</p><p>If a Tree Falls: A Story of the Earth Liberation Front</p><p>Paradise Lost 3: Purgatory</p><p>Pina</p><p>Undefeated</p><p>Documentary (short subject):</p><p>The Barber of Birmingham: Foot Soldier of the Civil Rights Movement</p><p>God Is the Bigger Elvis</p><p>Incident in New Baghdad</p><p>Saving Face</p><p>The Tsunami and the Cherry Blossom</p><p>Film editing:</p><p>The Artist</p><p>The Descendants</p><p>The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo</p><p>Hugo</p><p>Moneyball</p><p>Foreign language film:</p><p>Bullhead (Belgium)</p><p>Footnote (Israel)</p><p>In Darkness (Poland)</p><p>Monsieur Lazhar (Canada)</p><p>A Separation (Iran)</p><p>Make-up:</p><p>Albert Nobbs</p><p>Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2</p><p>The Iron Lady</p><p>Music (original score):</p><p>The Adventures of Tintin - John Williams</p><p>The Artist - Ludovic Bource</p><p>Hugo - Howard Shore</p><p>Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy - Alberto Iglesias</p><p>War Horse - John Williams</p><p>Music (Original Song):</p><p>Man or Muppet (The Muppets)</p><p>Real in Rio (Rio)</p><p>Short film (animated):</p><p>Dimanche/Sunday</p><p>The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr Morris Lessmore</p><p>La Luna</p><p>A Morning Stroll</p><p>Wild Life</p><p>Short film (live action):</p><p>Pentecost</p><p>Raju</p><p>The Shore</p><p>Time Freak</p><p>Tuba Atlantic</p><p>Sound editing:</p><p>Drive</p><p>The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo</p><p>Hugo</p><p>Transformers: Dark of the Moon</p><p>War Horse</p><p>Sound mixing:</p><p>The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo</p><p>Hugo</p><p>Moneyball</p><p>Transformers: Dark of the Moon</p><p>War Horse</p><p>Visual effects:</p><p>Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2</p><p>Hugo</p><p>Real Steel</p><p>Rise of the Planet of the Apes</p><p>Transformers: Dark of the Moon</p>?<p>But the online fashion and beauty site Asos.com has performed consistently well throughout the credit crunch and continues to thrive, even in the face of the dreaded double dip.</p><p>Originally its success was attributed to having cornered the impressionable and trend-led youth market, whose cash was not yet tied up in mortgages or childcare and could be frittered away on faddy pieces at pocket-money prices.</p><p>But the launch of three new premium ranges this month ? as well as the introduction of new high-end and niche labels with every season ? is proof that Asos's secret lies not so much in budget fashion, but in its infinite variety and eminently reliable customer service.</p><p>&quot;The launch of Asos 12 years ago was a game-changer for the fashion sector,&quot; says Caroline Nodder, editor of industry magazine Drapers. &quot;Most retailers before that time didn't believe consumers would ever fully embrace the idea of buying clothes online. Recently, although growth in the UK market has plateaued, Asos has grown its business in international markets such as Australia, where it now has a £100m operation. It also continues to lead the pack with magazine-style online content, collaborations on exclusive clothing ranges, ease of purchase through mobiles, and quick delivery options.&quot;</p><p>The latest of these exclusive launches is a collaboration between Asos and the cult London boutique bStore, which features polka dot pyjama-style separates and aquamarine palm print T-shirts, shorts and sundresses.</p><p>&quot;It was the perfect partner for us,&quot; explains bStore's womenswear designer Chloe Struyk, &quot;as we're both young and creative in our offering. Where a lot of brand partnerships limit creativity in favour of commerce, with Asos we could push the boundaries a little, sitting alongside the brave buys they have from other brands.&quot;</p><p>It's a far cry from the site's beginnings, as purveyor of copycat celebrity items ? the name stands for &quot;As Seen on Screen&quot;. This has become a minority part of the business in recent years. Instead, Asos has focused on fashion in high and low budget incarnations but always with an eye on the more directional aspects. It has injected accessible fashion with a more discerning edge, although it also offers high-street brands, comfy casuals and workwear.</p><p>Two more collections launching this month are proof enough of that: Salon, inspired by a nostalgic, vintage look, and Africa, the USP of which is ethically sourced Kenyan materials. They nod to trends, but are more daring than the average high-street tastes.</p><p>&quot;Salon is vintage-inspired yet still modern,&quot; explains Asos's womenswear director Caren Downie. &quot;This season there are lots of sugary-sweet pastel shades, embellishment and floral applique, as seen on the catwalks. In Africa, we incorporate Kenyan fabrics and prints to highlight the fact that most of the collection is produced there by an organisation called Soko, who provide fair pay and childcare for the predominantly female team.&quot;</p><p>Price-wise, these collections nestle between the high-street ranges and designer brands such as House of Holland and Nudie Jeans. Asos has come a long way since it peddled imitation Wayfarers &quot;as worn by Peaches Geldof&quot;.</p>?<p></p><p>?</p><p>Top Row</p><p>1 Azania Stewart 2 Julie Page 3 Jenaya Wade-Fray 4 Temi Fagbenle 5 Joel Freeland 6 Dan Clark 7 Kieron Achara 8 Pops Mensah-Bonsu 9 Jon Schofield 10 Liam Heath 11 Richard Jefferies 12 Lynn Beattie 13 Jo Morgan 14 Grace Carter 15 Janine Sandell 16 Dami Bakare 17 Dan Hunter 18 Andrew Pink 19 Jason Haldane 20 Ryan Giggs 21 Micah Richards 22 Ryan Bertrand 23 Aaron Ramsey 24 Craig Dawson 25 Danny Rose 26 Ellen White 27 Karen Bardsley 28 Eniola Aluko 29 Kim Little 30 Sophie Bradley 31 Karen Carney 32 Sophie Troiano 33 Anna Bentley 34 James Honeybone 35 Natalia Sheppard 36 Louise Bond-Williams</p><p>Second Row</p><p>1 Stef Collins 2 Rachel Vanderwal 3 Natalie Stafford 4 Dominique Allen 5 Andrew Lawrence 6 Eric Boateng 7 Nate Reinking 8 Luol Deng 9 Tim Brabants 10 Ed McKeever 11 Lucy Wicks 12 Maria Bertelli 13 Rachel Bragg 14 Lizzie Reid 15 Ciara Michel 16 Peter Bakare 17 Ben Pipes 18 Joel Miller 19 Chris Lamont 20 Tom Cleverley 21 Jack Butland 22 Scott Sinclair 23 Marvin Sordell 24 Jack Cork 25 Daniel Sturridge 26 Jill Scott 27 Anita Asante 28 Alex Scott 29 Kelly Smith 30 Casey Stoney 31 Fara Williams 32 Husayn Rosowsky 33 James Davis 34 Richard Kruse 35 Corinna Lawrence 36 Sophie Williams</p><p>Third Row</p><p>1 Rose Anderson 2 Johannah Leedham 3 Chantelle Handy 4 Kimberly Butler 5 Kyle Johnson 6 Andrew Sullivan 7 Mike Lenzly 8 Robert Archibald 9 Jess Walker 10 Angela Hannah 11 Rachel Cawthorn 12 Louisa Sawers 13 Rach Laybourne 14 Jennifer Taylor 15 Savanah Leaf 16 Mark McGivern 17 Mark Plotyczer 18 Nathan French 19 Kieran O'Malley 20 Craig Bellamy 21 James Tomkins 22 Jason Steele 23 Joe Allen 24 Neil Taylor 25 Steven Caulker 26 Stephanie Houghton 27 Rachel Williams 28 Rachel Brown 29 Claire Rafferty 30 Ifeoma Dieke 31 Rachel Yankey 32 Chris Adcock 33 Imogen Bankier 34 Susan Egelstaff 35 Rajiv Ouseph</p><p>Fourth Row</p><p>1 Katherine Grainger 2 Beth Rodford 3 Annie Vernon 4 Lindsey Maguire 5 Katie Greves 6 Stuart Bithell 7 Philip Hindes 8 Annie Last 9 Laura Trott 10 Richard Hounslow 11 David Florence 12 Abigail Edmonds 13 Tim Baillie 14 Etienne Stott 15 Lizzie Neave 16 James Ellington 17 Marilyn Okoro 18 Holly Bleasdale 19 Robbie Grabarz 20 Perri Shakes-Drayton 21 Gareth Warburton 22 Lisa Dobriskey 23 Michael Rimmer 24 Lawrence Okoye 25 Andrew Osagie 26 Laura Weightman 27 Abdul Buhari 28 Lynsey Sharp 29 Mervyn Luckwell 30 Chris Thompson 31 Shara Proctor 32 Daniel Awde 33 Scott Overall 34 Nick McCormick 35 Johanna Jackson 36 Phillips Idowu</p><p>Fifth Row</p><p>1 Greg Searle 2 Natasha Page 3 Debbie Flood 4 Melanie Wilson 5 Andrew Simpson 6 Ben Ainslie 7 Jason Kenny 8 Chris Hoy 9 Dani King 10 Victoria Pendleton 11 Mark Cavendish 12 Edward Clancy 13 Chris Froome 14 Steven Burke 15 Mara Yamauchi 16 Lee Merrien 17 Paula Radcliffe 18 Rhys Williams 19 Yamile Aldama 20 Ross Murray 21 Christine Ohuruogu 22 James Dasalou 23 Martyn Rooney 24 Danny Talbot 25 Chris Tomlinson 26 Dwain Chambers 27 Nigel Levine 28 Mark Lewis-Francis 29 Luke Lennon-Ford 30 Adam Gemili 31 Simeon Williamson 32 Eilish McColgan 33 Rob Tobin 34 Conrad Williams 35 Ashley McKenzie 36 Winston Gordon</p><p>Sixth Row</p><p>1 Constantine Louloudis 2 Tom Ransley 3 Anna Watkins (Nee Bebington) 4 Frances Houghton 5 Stevie Morrison 6 Jessica Varnish 7 Liam Killeen 8 Joanna Rowsell 9 Wendy Houvenaghel 10 Liam Phillips 11 Shanaze Reade 12 Geraint Thomas 13 Ian Stannard 14 Zoe Smith 15 Tash Perdue 16 Peter Kirkbride 17 Jack Oliver 18 Gareth Evans 19 Lawrence Clarke 20 Eilidh Child 21 Carl Myerscough 22 Katarina Johnson-Thompson 23 Stuart Stokes 24 Claire Hallissey 25 Anyika Onuora 26 Margaret Adeoye 27 Shana Cox 28 Tiffany Porter 29 Abi Oyepitan 30 Nicola Sanders 31 Greg Rutherford 32 Lee McConnell 33 Goldie Sayers 34 Euan Burton 35 Daniel Williams 36 Christopher Sherrington</p><p>Seventh Row</p><p>1 Peter Chambers 2 Rob Williams 3 Chris Bartley 4 Heather Stanning 5 Iain Percy 6 Stuart Hayes 7 Jonathan Brownlee 8 Alistair Brownlee 9 Lizzie Armitstead 10 Nicole Cooke 11 Andrew Tennant 12 Peter Kennaugh 13 Bradley Wiggins 14 David Millar 15 Samantha Murray 16 Mhairi Spence 17 Nick Woodbridge 18 Sam Weale 19 Jessica Ennis 20 Barbara Parker 21 Richard Buck 22 Dominic King 23 Brett Morse 24 Jo Pavey 25 Andrew Baddeley 26 Sophie Hitchon 27 Alex Smith 28 Louise Hazel 29 Emily Diamond 30 Andrew Pozzi 31 Dai Greene 32 Jack Green 33 Colin Oates 34 James Austin 35 Gemma Howell 36 Karina Bryant</p><p>Eighth Row</p><p>1 Zac Purchase 2 Mark Hunter 3 Richard Chambers 4 Caroline O'Connor 5 Ali Young 6 Helen Jenkins 7 Lucy Hall 8 Vicky Holland 9 Lucy Martin 10 Emma Pooley 11 Shauna Mullin 12 Zara Dampney 13 John Garcia Thompson 14 Steve Grotowski 15 Joanna Parker 16 Na Liu 17 Kelly Sibley 18 Liam Pitchford 19 Andrew Baggaley 20 Paul Drinkhall 21 Mo Farah 22 Julia Bleasdale 23 Andy Turner 24 Kate Dennison 25 Hannah England 26 Steve Lewis 27 Christian Malcolm 28 Sarah Thomas 29 Hannah Macleod 30 Helen Richardson 31 Nicola White 32 Emily Maguire 33 Alexandra Danson 34 Ashleigh Ball 35 Laura Unsworth 36 Sally Conway</p><p>Ninth Row</p><p>1 Jade Jones 2 George Nash 3 Pete Reed 4 Will Satch 5 Ben Rhodes 6 Louise Jukes 7 Sarah Hargreaves 8 Nina Heglund 9 Marie Gerbron 10 Ewa Pailies 11 Christopher Mohr 12 Steven Larsson 13 Bobby White 14 Ciaran Williams 15 Rob Parker 16 Matthew Holland 17 Jonathan Hammond 18 Elena Allen 19 Georgina Geikie 20 Rory Warlow 21 Richard Faulds 22 Richard Brickell 23 Mary King 24 Zara Phillips 25 Kristina Cook 26 Nicola Wilson 27 William Fox-Pitt 28 Charlotte Dujardin 29 Laura Bechtolsheimer 30 Ashley Jackson 31 Kate Walsh 32 Crista Cullen 33 Georgie Twigg 34 Sally Walton 35 Laura Bartlett 36 Annie Panter</p><p>10th Row</p><p>1 Sarah Stevenson 2 Andrew Triggs Hodge 3 Sam Townsend 4 Charles Cousins 5 Jess Eddie 6 Paul Goodison 7 Britt Goodwin 8 Zoe Van Der Weel 9 Kathryn Fudge 10 Sebastien Edgar 11 Christopher McDermott 12 Gawain Vincent 13 Mark Hawkins 14 Robin Garnham 15 Jack Waller 16 Alex Parsonage 17 Sean King 18 Adam Scholefield 19 James Huckle 20 Charlotte Kerwood 21 Jen McIntosh 22 Ed Ling 23 Peter Wilson 24 Ben Maher 25 Peter Charles 26 Scott Brash 27 Nick Skelton 28 Richard Davison 29 Carl Hester 30 Richard Smith 31 Iain Lewers 32 Alastair Wilson 33 Ben Hawes 34 Barry Middleton 35 Glenn Kirkham 36 Dan Fox 37 Chloe Rogers</p><p>11th Row</p><p>1 Martin Stamper 2 Stephen Rowbotham 3 Tom Solesbury 4 Bill Lucas 5 Nick Dempsey 6 Bryony Shaw 7 Jane Mayes 8 Holly Lam-Moores 9 Yvonne Leuthold 10 John Pearce 11 Sebastian Prieto 12 Martin Hare 13 Jesper Parker 14 Daniel McMillan 15 Ed Scott 16 Glen Robinson 17 Sean Ryder 18 Ciaran James 19 Chris Mears 20 Stacie Powell 21 Jack Laugher 22 Nick Robinson-Baker 23 Alicia Blagg 24 Rebecca Gallantree 25 Larry Godfrey 26 Alan Wills 27 Simon Terry 28 Andy Murray 29 Jamie Murray 30 Colin Fleming 31 Anne Keothavong 32 Rob Moore 33 James Fair 34 Matt Daly 35 James Tindall 36 Beth Storry</p><p>12th Row</p><p>1 Mohamed Sbihi 2 James Foad 3 Alex Partridge 4 Victoria Thornley 5 Hannah Mills 6 Saskia Clark 7 Kelsi Fairbrother 8 Lyn Byl 9 Lynn McCafferty 10 Angela Winstanley-Smith 11 Lisa Gibson 12 Rebecca Kershaw 13 Ciara Gibson-Byrne 14 Francesca Clayton 15 Chloe Wilcox 16 Craig Figes 17 Jake Vincent 18 Joseph O'Regan 19 Tom Daley 20 Peter Waterfield 21 Tonia Couch 22 Monique Gladding 23 Sarah Barrow 24 Hannah Starling 25 Amy Oliver 26 Naomi Folkard 27 Alison Williamson 28 Heather Watson 29 Elena Baltacha 30 Laura Robson 31 Ross Hutchins 32 Iain Mackay 33 Harry Martin 34 Jonty Clarke 35 Nick Catlin</p><p>13th Row</p><p>1 Lutalo Muhammad 2 Alan Campbell 3 Alex Gregory 4 Tom James 5 Annie Lush 6 Luke Campbell 7 Tom Stalker 8 Josh Taylor 9 Anthony Joshua 10 Rosemary Morris 11 Robyn Nicholls 12 Frances Leighton 13 Alex Rutlidge 14 Fiona McCann 15 Hazel Musgrove 16 Francesca Snell 17 Simon Burnett 18 Joe Roebuck 19 Amy Smith 20 Ross Davenport 21 Elizabeth Simmonds 22 Liam Tancock 23 Francesca Halsall 24 Ieuan Lloyd 25 Keri-Anne Payne 26 David Carry 27 Marco Loughran 28 Grant Turner 29 James Disney-May 30 Gemma Spofforth 31 Ellen Gandy 32 Dan Purvis 33 Georgina Cassar 34 Jade Faulkner 35 Rachel Smith 36 Sarah Clark 37 Kelly Edwards</p><p>14th Row</p><p>1 Matthew Langridge 2 Richard Egington 3 Matthew Wells 4 Louisa Reeve 5 Olivia Whitlam 6 Lucy Macgregor 7 Savannah Marshall 8 Nicola Adams 9 Natasha Jonas 10 Anthony Ogogo 11 Asha Randall 12 Katie Skelton 13 Jennifer Knobbs 14 Vicki Lucass 15 Caitlin McClatchey 16 Rob Bale 17 Joanne Jackson 18 Rebecca Adlington 19 Jessica Lloyd 20 Roberto Pavoni 21 Daniel Fogg 22 James Goddard 23 Adam Brown 24 Craig Gibbons 25 Andrew Willis 26 Craig Benson 27 Antony James 28 Hannah Miley 29 Kate Haywood 30 Hannah Whelan 31 Louis Smith 32 Sam Oldham 33 Kristian Thomas 34 Max Whitlock 35 Jennifer Pinches 36 Francesca Fox</p><p>Bottom Row</p><p>1 Phelan Hill 2 Sophie Hosking 3 Katherine Copeland 4 Helen Glover 5 Luke Patience 6 Kate Macgregor 7 Fred Evans 8 Andrew Selby 9 Katie Dawkins 10 Jenna Randall 11 Katie Clark 12 Olivia Federici 13 Yvette Baker 14 Chris Walker-Hebborn 15 Robbie Renwick 16 Sophie Allen 17 Michael Rock 18 Stacey Tadd 19 Michael Jamieson 20 David Davies 21 Georgia Davies 22 Aimee Willmott 23 Jemma Lowe 24 Eleanor Faulkner 25 Siobhan-Marie O'Connor 26 Stephanie Proud 27 Rebecca Turner 28 Rebecca Tunney 29 Beth Tweddle 30 Imogen Cairns 31 Kat Driscoll 32 Lynne Hutchinson 33 Francesca Jones 34 Louisa Pouli 35 Olga Butkevych 36 Sophie Cox 37 Gemma Gibbons</p>?<p>Yet, when Parliament returns from its summer recess, so too will the acerbic Westminster satire after a three-year hiatus.</p><p>Rebecca Front, who plays hapless MP Nicola Murray, said: &quot;The jokes write themselves in political terms,&quot; adding: &quot;The writers are so in tune with the vicissitudes of political life, that often politics follows storylines we have done.&quot;</p><p>The show cannot be reactive, she said, as it is filmed months in advance. &quot;Instead it looks at the political landscape and satirises a broader picture.&quot; While much has been kept under wraps, season four will get its teeth into a coalition government.</p><p>After a season as Secretary of State for the fictional Department of Social Affairs and Citizenship, dubbed DoSAC, Murray is now in Opposition scheming, along with foul-mouthed spin doctor Malcolm Tucker, to get back into power. &quot;I was only too delighted that the show is covering the Opposition,&quot; Front said. &quot;This is a bonus for me; I thought we might not be in it at all.&quot;</p><p>The Thick of It has been hailed alongside Yes Minister as one of the great political TV satires produced in the UK. It has twice picked up the Bafta for best sitcom. In 2010, Front and Peter Capaldi, who plays Tucker, won Baftas for best male and female performers in a comedy.</p><p>Front said the reason it works is the &quot;claustrophobic&quot; nature of politics. &quot;Westminster really is a village; it's completely up itself and self-referential. That really works in comedy terms because these people are solely obsessed by the thinking: 'How will this play and how will I look? Will the other guy look worse than me?' There's a lot of that in the next series.&quot;</p><p>Despite the venal view of politics, those working in Westminster have told Front it is actually &quot;a fairly gentle portrayal. That's when you think: 'My God, these people are really up against it. No wonder they're behaving like idiots'.&quot;</p><p>She even admits that while the programme has made her more cynical, &quot;I'm also more sympathetic&quot;. During Tory minister Chloe Smith's recent car crash interview with Jeremy Paxman, &quot;I groaned all the way through, because I could imagine it being Nicola Murray. I thought: 'Oh that poor woman, this is agony.' I found it funny afterwards. She is a government minister, and should have done better.&quot;</p><p>The major reactive nod to events, Front said, is the next series' own Leveson-style inquiry. Front said she did not see as much of the inquiry into press ethics as she would have liked, but was &quot;riveted&quot; when not filming by some of those called to give evidence. &quot;It's as big a draw as Wimbledon,&quot; she said, and revealed she was a fan of Robert Jay QC.</p><p>Front is a veteran of the satire circuit and had an association with Thick of It creator Armando Iannucci from her early days of radio and television comedy. They worked on Radio 4's satirical news show On The Hour in 1991, which was adapted for television as The Day Today several years later, and Knowing Me, Knowing You with Alan Partridge. The pair had been contemporaries at Oxford, although were not friends at the time.</p><p>The satire first tore on to British screens in 2005 on BBC4. Iannucci said at the time he wanted to show politics as &quot;rough and messy, slightly improvised and realistic&quot; and developed it in response to a series of studied political dramas.</p><p>He invited Front to join the third season in 2009 as the new minister for DoSAC. While she was &quot;ridiculously excited&quot; by the offer, Front said: &quot;I'd watched the show since the beginning and there was a great sense of trepidation going into a fairly visible role in something you already love.&quot; On her first day, her husband waved her off with the encouraging words &quot;Please don't balls this up. It's my favourite show.&quot;</p><p>Before the character even had a name, she experienced a verbal volley from Malcolm Tucker. &quot;Armando asked us to improvise. Peter, this nice gentle man, stood up and suddenly turned into Malcolm. It was terrifying.&quot;</p><p>Yet being &quot;Tuckered&quot; as the cast call it, is a particular pleasure for Front. &quot;Peter is one of the best actors I've ever worked with, he's extraordinary. There's a real pleasure in having a scene where you're being screamed at by somebody who's a fantastic actor.&quot;</p><p>Returning for the fourth season as an established character &quot;means it's less scary going in this time round&quot;. She added: &quot;Nicola Murray is a dream character, I would be delighted to carry on playing her until she goes into some sort of politicians' retirement home or goes mad. Or both.&quot;</p><p>She defended Iannucci, who was recently criticised by Alastair Campbell, who Tucker is believed to be based on, for accepting an OBE. &quot;It's not like he's taking a seat in the House of Lords or been conferred with a superpower. Someone said: 'We like your work,' and he said: 'Thank you.' I don't see what all the fuss is about. Maybe because he's my mate.&quot;</p><p>Front has found regular comedy work since starting out in the industry, with one-off appearances to series including Al Murray's Time Gentlemen Please, to Nighty Night, The Catherine Tate Show and more recently Just William and Grandma's House with Simon Amstell. She has also taken on serious roles, most notably that of Chief Superintendent Jean Innocent in Lewis.</p><p>Currently, Front is shooting a new comedy, The Spa, for Sky Living written by Derren Litten, who also wrote comedy-drama series Benidorm. &quot;It's a bit of a departure for me, it's a very much a mainstream broad comedy.&quot;</p><p>While she appears regularly on topical news shows like Have I Got News for You and Radio 4's The News Quiz, she sees herself &quot;not as a comedian, but as an actor who does a bit of chat&quot;.</p><p>'The Thick Of It' returns to BBC2 this autumn</p>?<p>Evans is being given little hope of success at London 2012 after being drawn against the man many believe to be the greatest player of all time.</p><p>The world number 76 faces the great Chinese, who is tournament favourite despite being seeded second, in what is effectively a knockout contest on Monday afternoon.</p><p>The first round of the men's singles is round robin but Evans and Lin are the only players in Group P.</p><p>Dubliner Evans, 24, said: &quot;I'll prepare like I do for any other game, making sure that I'm mentally ready, go out, enjoy myself and embrace it - even if I break my leg on court, I'll enjoy it.</p><p>&quot;I'll change tactics because of who he is, being a left-handed player - but I'll play my own game.</p><p>&quot;I've played Lin Dan a few times before so I know what he can do.</p><p>&quot;When you go into the?Olympics?there are no easy games.</p><p>&quot;If I want to win a medal then I'll have to beat Lin Dan whether now or in the final. It would have to happen.</p><p>&quot;I'm tired of people being negative about it. You have to be positive.&quot;</p><p>Evans has played Lin three times previously, including at last year's World Championship at the same Wembley Arena venue, but lost on each occasion.</p><p>Ireland's women's singles entrant, world number 44 Chloe Magee, will play at least two matches in her group.</p><p>Magee, of Raphoe, County Donegal, opens against Hadia Hosny of Egypt on Sunday before playing former world number two Pi Hongyan of France next Tuesday.</p><p>Magee said: &quot;I have to be happy with the draw, it's about the best I could have expected.</p><p>I've never beaten Pi before but I'm feeling in good shape so I've got a good chance.</p><p>&quot;I played her once before and she beat me in three sets last year. The Egyptian is going to be a tough one but if I can remain focused it will be a good match for me.&quot;</p><p>PA</p>?<p>The Oscar nominations, unveiled yesterday, set up a race headlined by an intriguing battle between Hugo and The Artist, a pair of films which both set out in very different ways to pay homage to the earliest days of cinema.</p><p>Martin Scorsese's Hugo, a hugely ambitious, motion-capture animation which is shortlisted in 11 of the 24 categories, revolves around a heartfelt tribute to the Parisian movie pioneer, George Melies. It will contest the Best Picture, Best Director, and Best Screenplay awards, along with a slew of technical Oscars. Its nearest rival, The Artist, is a black-and-white silent film that explores Hollywood's transition to &quot;talkies&quot;. It has dominated the 2012 awards season so far, and will now seek 10 Academy Awards, including Best Director for its French creator Michel Hazanavicius.</p><p>Playing into the nostalgic tone of proceedings is a wider shortlist dominated by some of the industry's most enduring legends. Woody Allen will rub shoulders with Scorsese and Hazanavicius in the Best Directing category, thanks to Midnight in Paris, his first nomination in six years; Steven Spielberg, who was last in the running for an Oscar in 2007, saw his War Horse shortlisted in six categories.</p><p>Favourite to win Best Actress will once again be Meryl Streep, for her portrayal of Margaret Thatcher in The Iron Lady. She is attempting to break a run of 12 straight Oscar defeats, and faces her stiffest challenge from Glenn Close, nominated for her lead role in Albert Nobbs.</p><p>Leading contenders for Best Actor crown include George Clooney, who is nominated for The Descendants, which picked up five nominations and now has an outside shot at Best Picture. His best-known rival will be Brad Pitt for the baseball film Moneyball. Underlining his growing creative stature, Clooney is also nominated for a share of a writing award, after The Ides of March ? a critically acclaimed political thriller he co-wrote, co-produced, directed and starred in ? was nominated for Best Adapted Screenplay.</p><p>Yesterday's shortlist adds clarity to what has so far been a confusing Hollywood awards season, in which The Artist has picked-up the lion's share of plaudits without gaining sufficient momentum for its march towards the industry's most prestigious award.</p><p>The film, made for just $15m, would be the first silent, black-and-white film to win Best Picture since Wings in 1927. It also has a chance of landing major acting awards, with unknown stars Jean Dujardin and Berenice Bejo shortlisted for Best Actor and Best Supporting Actress respectively. &quot;I can't believe that a year ago I was learning how to tap dance and today I am nominated for an Academy Award,&quot; said Bejo yesterday.</p><p>Hugo's dramatic emergence, meanwhile, came as a surprise. The children's film gained only mixed reviews when it debuted before Christmas, and has so far disappointed commercially, returning only $83m globally, against a production budget of around $150m. Scorsese's backers will now hope that filmgoers take a second look at the title.</p><p>The UK's leading hopes lie with Gary Oldman, who wins his first ever nomination as Best Actor for Tinker Tailor, Soldier, Spy, and Kenneth Branagh, shortlisted for Best Supporting Actor for My Week With Marilyn.</p>?<p>The Public Accounts Committee (PAC) is to take evidence from BBC chiefs over what one committee source said was a &quot;big issue&quot;. The witnesses called will include the BBC's chief financial officer Zarin Patel and head of employment tax, David Smith.</p><p>&quot;The BBC appears to have a multitude of different ways they ensure people pay less tax. Either they use a service company or pay them on freelance contracts or pay them through personal companies, or they pay them goodness knows how,&quot; the source said.</p><p>The Committee will not yet look at tax-avoidance schemes. &quot;We're coming back to that in the autumn,&quot; the source said.</p><p>The PAC is chaired by Margaret Hodge and includes the Economic Secretary to the Treasury, Chloe Smith, Stewart Jackson and Ian Swales.</p><p>The hearing into off-payroll public-sector pay arrangements was scheduled following the publication of a report into the practice, overseen by Danny Alexander the Chief Secretary to the Treasury, in May.</p><p>This followed the report's findings that 2,400 senior public officials earning £58,200 a year were paying the lower level of corporation tax rather than higher rate tax because they were paid as off-payroll consultants.</p><p>Mr Alexander said at the time: &quot;It's clear that off-payroll engagement without sufficient transparency has been endemic in the public sector for too many years.&quot; It did not include the BBC or local authorities.</p><p>A Freedom of Information request to the BBC revealed that 36 employees earning more than £100,000 were paid through personal service companies, with a total of 300 employees paid in the same way.</p><p>The off-payroll format is not illegal, but the source said: &quot;Nobody should be avoiding tax. If your income comes from taxpayers' contributions, you have a moral imperative to ensure you are paid in a way that meets tax liabilities. You should lead by example.&quot;</p><p>But a BBC spokeswoman said last night that using service companies meant staff could be &quot;flexible&quot; in how they worked. She added: &quot;They are not used as a way to avoid paying National Insurance employer contributions which are paid by the service company as required.</p><p>&quot;In its contracts the BBC also stipulates that individuals must pay the appropriate amount of tax and we provide HMRC with a detailed annual report of all payments made to such companies.&quot;</p>?<p>And you don't get much more box-fresh and up-to-the-minute than a monologue about a female boxing star bidding for glory in East London. But while Nicola Adams is still basking in the golden glow of her real-life happy ending, our fictional heroine's future is less assured. Hailing from the school of hard knocks, she took up boxing aged 11 when her mother walked out but when her beloved father/trainer dies suddenly, everything she has worked for is thrown into jeopardy.</p><p>Written and performed by the expressive, energetic Charlotte Josephine, Bitch Boxer is in the finest tradition of fighting dramas - a pumped-up, underdog monologue with a big heart, delivered in a hail of upper-cuts and a spray of sweat. Josephine puts in an impressively physical performance broken up with tender moments. It's more coming-of-age fable than insight into life in the ring but then, as she reminds us, &quot;every fighter has a reason&quot; - and in this most emotional of sports, the two are often intimately linked.</p><p>Returning servicemen, sex workers and teen obesity are among the hot potatoes tackled in the other OVNV plays. In Chapel Street, Binge Britain is put under the microscope in a simple tale of a schoolgirl and a twentysomething lad whose paths cross, fatefully, one Friday night.</p><p>Part spoken word, part play and delivered through microphones like stand-up, Luke Barnes' two-hander glitters with promise and pep. There's sharp-eyed humour to his picture of modern Britain and teenage life - all Kardashians, sequins and shots - but there are a troubling undertones, too - the angry drinker who threatens the pub landlord with his shotgun, the fact that &quot;no-one's got a job and everyone lives with their mum&quot; and, most crucially, the deadening lack of any ambition greater than getting blind drunk at the weekend.</p><p>Cary Crankson, charming as Joe the wastrel who gradually reveals the yawning extent of his disaffection and Ria Zmitrowicz as a Vicky Pollardesque teen motormouth put in two of the wittiest and most engaging performances I've seen this Fringe.</p><p>To 26 August (0844 545 8252)</p>?<p>With the full list of ministerial changes emerging yesterday, a key feature was the rapid promotion of Tory MPs elected two years ago. Among those about half are women ? moving into key departments such as Education, Health and Justice. Mr Cameron, who has faced the charge that he has a &quot;women problem&quot;, has pledged to have women in one-third of ministerial posts by 2015.</p><p>Those promoted include Liz Truss, once a member of CND, who has been put in charge of early-years education with a remit to make childcare more affordable. She has recently published research in the area and her promotion is a clear sign that the Government wants to bring forward new proposals on an issue that Mr Cameron believes will be vital at the next election.</p><p>Also promoted is Anna Soubry who becomes Under-Secretary at Health. Once a presenter on Central Television, she retrained as a barrister, was a member of David Cameron's A-list of candidates and was tipped for promotion. She is on the left of the party and is close to Ken Clarke ? with the pair sharing neighbouring seats.</p><p>Former lawyer Helen Grant, the MP for Maidstone and the Weald, is the Conservatives' first black female MP. Before being promoted to Under-Secretary at the Justice Department she sat on the Justice Select Committee and criticised plans to reform legal aid.</p><p>The other noticeable feature of those 2010 MPs chosen for early promotion is their closeness to George Osborne.</p><p>Some Tory backbenchers expressed concern that Mr Cameron had prioritised promoting the new intake of Tory MPs over those elected in 2005.</p><p>They pointed out that a number of the new ministers did not have extensive managerial experience and could have benefited from longer on the backbenches before being promoted.</p><p>They pointed to the experience of Chloe Smith ? elected in a by-election in 2009 ? who was rapidly promoted to Economic Secretary to the Treasury in October last year only to get effectively sidelined in this reshuffle. She now takes on a less demanding role in the Cabinet Office after being blamed for a faltering performance while being questioned by Jeremy Paxman on Newsnight.</p><p>The more outspoken members of the new intake have been sidelined. Jesse Norman, who openly defied Mr Cameron on House of Lords reform but who is seen as a rising intellectual star in the Parliamentary party, looks set to remain on the backbenches.</p><p>Leading ladies promoted in the reshuffle</p><p>Anna Soubry</p><p>Under Secretary at Health</p><p>Previously not afraid to speak her mind ? she once supported the legalisation of cannabis ? she now has the job of selling the Government's controversial heath reforms.</p><p>Esther McVey</p><p>Under Secretary at Work and Pensions</p><p>Described as a &quot;glamorous, sparky, fast-talking Liverpudlian television presenter&quot;, McVey once worked on GMTV with Eamonn Holmes. She now has the drier task of implementing Universal Credit.</p><p>Helen Grant</p><p>Under Secretary at Justice</p><p>The first black female Tory MP helped Oliver Letwin put together the policy review in opposition before inheriting Ann Widdecombe's seat. In 2008 Grant was quoted a saying she would &quot;never play the race card&quot;.</p><p>Liz Truss</p><p>Education Minister</p><p>Not from a traditional Tory background, Truss was once a member of the CND and a leading Liberal Democrat at university. Recently the New Statesman dubed her Iron Lady 2.0.</p>?<p>The Prime Minister used a visit to a hospital in Newcastle to promise moves to tackle the &quot;scandal&quot; of Britain's drinking culture through a mixture of higher taxes, better education ? and tougher police action.</p><p>His support for American-style &quot;drunk tanks&quot; ? one-person cells housing people overnight ? was his most controversial suggestion for getting tough on alcohol-fuelled trouble.</p><p>Paul McKeever, the chairman of the federation, which represents grassroots officers, said: &quot;To recommend locking people up in so-called 'drunk tanks' to resolve the issue of binge drinking is dangerous. People who are very drunk can be vulnerable and often require medical attention, so locking them in a confined space is not an effective solution.&quot;</p><p>The Prime Minister has hinted at his support for imposing a minimum price of about 45p a unit on alcohol, based on a similar move planned in Scotland. The drinks industry warned him that setting a minimum price would be &quot;probably illegal&quot; as it could breach trade laws, a problem that was acknowledged last night by Government sources.</p><p>Two ministers ? Chloe Smith, the Economic Secretary to the Treasury, and Anne Milton, the Health minister ? have also admitted the measure could be challenged in the courts.</p><p>Ministers are still struggling to find a formula for stopping the sale of very cheap alcohol five months after Mr Cameron first signalled his general support for the move. The Government's long-awaited alcohol strategy is now expected next month. One Whitehall source said: &quot;There is general agreement that action needs to be taken and discussions are taking place, but no decisions have been taken.&quot;</p><p>From April it will be illegal to sell alcohol in England and Wales at below the cost of duty and value added tax ? a move will affect very few current cut-price deals. However, any attempt to set a higher minimum price could run counter to European laws guaranteeing the free movement of goods.</p><p>When an attempt to introduce a minimum price was first mooted in Scotland ? the scheme is currently on hold there awaiting new proposals from the SNP administration ? the Law Society warned it could run into trouble in the European Court of Justice.</p><p>Last night, the Wine and Spirit Trade Association said: &quot;Minimum unit pricing is a blunt tool which would both fail to address the problem of alcohol misuse and punish the vast majority of responsible consumers. As Government ministers acknowledge, it is also probably illegal.&quot;</p><p>Downing Street selected the Royal Victoria Infirmary for his visit as it regularly has police officers on duty to combat drink-fuelled problems.</p><p>PM's past: When booze paid the bills</p><p>Eyebrows were raised at David Cameron's attack on binge drinking among those who recalled his 2005 party leadership campaign. It emerged then that Mr Cameron was a director of the company which runs the Tiger Tiger chain, where the cocktail Pink Pussy could be bought in jugs for £7.99. Teresa Pearce MP, said his &quot;attempt to take the moral high ground on excessive drinking looks distinctly shaky&quot;.</p><p>Now you see him, now you don't... where's Lansley?</p><p>Newcastle's Royal Victoria Infirmary, where police have to be on patrol two nights a week to help out with the drunks arriving in A&amp;E, was just the place for David Cameron to sound off about the pitfalls of drink. Being in the Labour-voting North-east of England sent a signal that here is a Prime Minister for the whole country, not just the middle-class south.</p><p>But hang on, where is Andrew Lansley? This is a hospital. The Health Secretary should surely be at the PM's side, as he used to be in happier days.</p>?<p>Cameron's EU veto turns out to be no more than a UK opt-out. Just so, it turns out that Prince Andrew has not been sacked from his role as UKTI's Special Representative for Trade and Investment (as we thought had been announced last summer), but is actually carrying on business as usual with an all-expenses paid trip to Davos (jet, chalet and drinks reception), and a series of other meetings with foreign dignitaries lined up in the future.</p><p>And now it seems that the civil servant we thought had been employed to run the Student Loans Company isn't actually a civil servant paid in the conventional way, but a private contractor paid via his own company, his arrangements (which saved him some £40,000 pa) authorised by some as yet unnamed being.</p><p>Danny Alexander, who, with David Willetts, was somehow involved in the decision, was asked about this in the Commons but refused to accept any responsibility, resorting to what is now known as the &quot;Murdoch defence&quot; ? namely that he wasn't shown and didn't see (and didn't, one might suggest, ask for) the details.</p><p>And then there's the growing list of pariahs, all of them tried in the court of public opinion. Last week it was Stephen Hester and his bonus. This week it's Fred Goodwin. Doubtless there'll be someone else next week. Emblems of a bloated, arrogant, self-satisfied City elite who are completely bewildered that anyone could ask whether their remuneration had been rather over-generous.</p><p>But the problem is not the one-offs. It's the system that sees boardroom pay soar by 49 per cent while the cleaners who have to scurry round their feet get a pay freeze on a pittance. This isn't about class warfare. It's just about a sense of common decency. Because above all in an age of austerity the sense, that there is one rule for the rich and another for the rest of us is dangerously unsettling.</p><p>I know government by hysterical outrage is rarely a success. It leaves a nasty taste in the mouth. But my fear is that ordinary working people, who are working harder and longer for salaries that are losing value, will simply look at the all these stories and think work is a mug's game.</p><p>Five portraits of political failure</p><p>Overlooking Westminster Bridge, there is a room in the Commons with oak-panelling to head height and hideous yellow walls above. It must have been a dining room, as it has a serving room adjacent to it with a large buffet. But now it is the shadow Cabinet room.</p><p>I've been intrigued for a while about the five portraits. The largest is of Sir Arthur Haselrig MP, an absurd, bold and almost certainly corrupt man who sat on the Commonwealth Council of State and who died in the Tower awaiting trial for treason on 7 January 1661. To his left is his colleague, young Sir Henry Vane MP (to distinguish from his father), one of the leading figures in the English revolution who was angrily executed in 1662. To Haselrig's right is John Hampden, the MP who fought against Charles I's un-parliamentary exaction of ship money and who died on 24 June 1643 from wounds probably received when his gun exploded in his face at the battle of Chalgrove Field.</p><p>Above one fireplace is Charles I, executed outside Banqueting House on 31 January 1649. And opposite him, the only one of the five who died quietly in his bed, William Pierrepont MP, who did everything he could to prevent the restoration of the monarchy.</p><p>I know not whose idea it was to put this five together, but maybe it just reinforces the message that every political career ends in failure. Even Pierrepont lost his seat in the 1661 election, never to return.</p><p>The tragedy of wasted talent</p><p>On Tuesday evening in the Speaker's House, the Tory MP for Wirral West, Esther McVey, held an event with the National Youth Theatre, with whom she has produced a play called If Chloe Can. We were treated to an excerpt.</p><p>Perhaps the most striking moment of the evening, though, was a fantastic poem, written and recited by another of the NYT members, about wasted talent and lack of ambition among young women. It reminded me of the most depressing moment I have yet experienced as MP for the Rhondda when I asked a 17-year-old what she hoped to do after school. &quot;I'd like to be a lawyer, but Careers say that girls from the Rhondda don't get to be lawyers, so I'm not sure.&quot; I could have boiled with fury or cried with sadness.</p><p>The director makes beautiful music</p><p>Which reminds me, as well as a spell in the NYT in the 1970s and 80s, I played Mack the Knife in The Threepenny Opera while at Oxford. I wasn't particularly good but I was particularly fed up with our director, who had a habit of calling the wrong actors for rehearsals, so we ended up practising some scenes time and again and others rarely. Eventually, my temper broke when he came into my dressing room for the dress rehearsal and offered me some &quot;tips&quot; on my singing.</p><p>I let rip. &quot;You're the worst director I've ever worked with. You know nothing about theatre, or music or singing. Leave me alone.&quot; Well, Ian Bostridge, for 'twas he, now has countless beautiful classical CDs to his name, has recently performed at the Carnegie Hall and will be appearing at the Queen Elizabeth Hall singing Bach Arias with the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment on 25 April. What do I know?</p><p> </p>?<p>From mainstream witch to indie darling ? or, more precisely, from Fleur Delacour in the Harry Potter series to Chloe in In Bruges ? Poesy is increasingly bestriding the Anglo-Gallic film-making divide, a duality neatly encapsulated last year when she played both the French national icon, Joan of Arc, in the Cannes-competing Jeanne Captive, and a piece of arm candy in the hip American cable show Gossip Girl.</p><p>&quot;I feel very privileged to have been welcomed in England in that way,&quot; says Poesy, who flits between London and Paris almost as often as the Eurostar. &quot;I always thought that there was a little door that was open for me.&quot; Her latest English project has also been her most daunting ? and although the role of Queen Isabella in Shakespeare's Richard II is only a minor one, the challenge of mastering iambic pentameters for the BBC's upcoming cycles of Shakespeare plays was considerable.</p><p>&quot;It was like learning how to speak another language,&quot; she says in accented but perfectly fluent English. &quot;You do Shakespeare at drama school but you do it in French. It's interesting to see, when you study theatre in France, the different translations of Shakespeare ? because obviously in England you just work on one material.&quot;</p><p>She was able to learn from her Bard-hardened Richard II co-stars, Rory Kinnear, Ben Whishaw and Patrick Stewart, and to reflect with amusement how she managed to get into the Conservatoire National Superieur d'Art Dramatique (France's equivalent of Rada) by performing, in English, Juliet's balcony scene from Romeo and Juliet. &quot;No one had any idea of whether it was any good,&quot; laughs Poesy, who took her mother's maiden name for the stage. Her father, Etienne Guichard, is a theatre director, who used to pretend to Clemence and her younger sister, Maelle, that their TV only played videos of movies.</p><p>After a stab at couture that ended after a disastrous work-experience placement when she was expected to stitch together a wedding dress, Poesy grudgingly accepted her thespian fate.</p><p>&quot;I was the one in the family who was saying I wanted to do something else,&quot; she says. &quot;Mostly because I felt a bit silly saying that I wanted to be an actress before I actually was an actress ? or it might have been being scared of failure.&quot; A string of French roles playing teenagers ensued, before her English-language breakthrough as Mary, Queen of Scots in Jimmy McGovern's 2004 BBC drama Gunpowder, Treason &amp; Plot ? a role that led to Harry Potter. Her mother, a schoolteacher, had already encouraged her to read JK Rowling's books, although Poesy says she only really became interested in witches ? &quot;what were considered witches in those days&quot; ? when reading up for her role as Joan of Arc.</p><p>Harry Potter led to a variety of English language parts, from the aforementioned In Bruges, with Colin Farrell (&quot;people love that film&quot;), and the 2007 TV mini-series War and Peace, to playing Jim Sturgess's enigmatic girlfriend in the London-set horror film Heartless and as James Franco's lover in Danny Boyle's 127 Hours. Now Poesy is involved in a somewhat more unusual romance, Mr Morgan's Last Love, an age-gap meeting of lonely hearts between a free-spirited Parisian and Michael Caine's retired and widowed American philosophy professor. It sounds like Lost in Translation.</p><p>&quot;Yuh, it's two lonely people finding each other, except it's Paris and not Tokyo,&quot; she says. &quot;It's not a real love story but there's a lot of love in it... It was lovely to get to know him. He's incredibly simple, and he's got a very playful approach to the whole thing still. &quot;</p><p>Apart from being an actor, Poesy is also a musician (she plays guitar, and sang on last year's debut album by the Last Shadow Puppets' Miles Kane) and fashion icon ? a face of the perfume Chloe and now the new face of Dutch urban fashion chain G-Star Raw ? as well as being something of an all-round It Girl and muse for Karl Lagerfeld at Chanel ? although she thinks the Lagerfeld connection is exaggerated.</p><p>&quot;I'm not that close,&quot; she says. &quot;It's very strange to read these things&quot;. One poster we won't be seeing however, is of a naked, or semi-naked, Poesy. After a bad experience as an 18-year-old starlet, she has a clause in all her contracts that states that any nude scenes she films can't be used in trailers or publicity stills. &quot;People can find the scene and so whatever they want on the internet,&quot; she says defiantly, &quot;but at least they can't use on the trailer.&quot;</p><p>'Birdsong' is out on DVD on 12 March. 'Richard II' is on BBC2 in July. 'Mr Morgan's Last Love' is released this autumn</p>?<p>Daniel Parr, 25, admitted he was driving his Megabus too fast on the M5 in Gloucestershire, killing 30-year-old Raymond Vaughan.</p><p>The early-morning crash just before Christmas 2010 caused a horrific pile-up involving a lorry, a coach and three cars.</p><p>Gloucester Crown Court heard that other motorists were so concerned about the fog and icy conditions on the morning of December 12that they had slowed down to 40mph.</p><p>Yet Parr, who admitted he could see just 72ft (22m) ahead of him,was driving at 62mph - the maximum speed under law for his coach.</p><p>Because of the appalling weather Parr did not see the articulatedSainsbury's delivery lorry travelling at 40mph in front of him on the northbound carriageway.</p><p>The court heard that he tried to take evasive action but clipped the rear of the truck causing it smash through the central reservation onto the southbound carriageway.</p><p>Mr Vaughan's black Ford Fiesta, which was coming the other way, then collided with the lorry and a Rover ploughed into his car.</p><p>The married father-of-two, an engineer from Birmingham, died at the scene of the crash near junction 8 of the M5, between Strensham and Tewkesbury.</p><p>Prosecutor Martin Steen told the court: &quot;This is a tragic case in every sense of the word.</p><p>&quot;In short Parr was driving a Megabus on the northbound carriageway in thick fog.</p><p>&quot;He came to collide with a Sainsbury's lorry in front of him causing that lorry to smash through the central reservation and onto thesouthbound carriageway with the result that much-loved Raymond Vaughan died.&quot;</p><p>Mr Steen said that passengers on the coach felt Parr was &quot;in a hurry&quot; by the way he threw their luggage on the coach as they boarded and how quickly he pulled away from the pick up.</p><p>&quot;A passenger described the conditions as cold, foggy and icy. She heard a loud crash and a continuous scraping noise,&quot; he said.</p><p>&quot;The noise was horrendous and the windscreen shattered and fell all over her. She said afterwards the driver looked scared and shocked.</p><p>&quot;Other witnesses on the motorway described the vehicle driving fast in the conditions given the fog.&quot;</p><p>Mr Steen said that Parr told police he could only see the length of a cricket pitch in front of him - a distance of 72ft (22m).</p><p>Parr, who was taking the coach with a co-driver from Cardiff to Leeds, told officers: &quot;The wagon just appeared in front of me. I didn't know it was there. If there were fog lights they were very dim.</p><p>&quot;The back of the coach must have caught the truck and after that I don't really remember anything.&quot;</p><p>The court also heard moving statements from Mr Vaughan's wife andmother describing how their lives had been devastated by his death.</p><p>Julie Vaughan, his mother, said she and her two daughters, Patricia and Chloe, were already coping with the death of their father and her husband when Mr Vaughan died.</p><p>&quot;Chloe told me that everyone she loves dies,&quot; Mrs Vaughan said.</p><p>&quot;Since my son's death I have not slept a full night. I cry every single day for my son. The thought of him not being around to speak to or hold him is tearing me apart.</p><p>&quot;My last image of him was going to see him in the mortuary.&quot;</p><p>Mrs Vaughan added: &quot;I do want to see justice but nothing will bring Raymond back and that's all I want.&quot;</p><p>Mr Vaughan's wife, Hayley, said she had been left to care for their two children, one of whom was disabled.</p><p>&quot;Raymond was the best dad and husband you could wish for,&quot; she said.</p><p>&quot;My children find it difficult to sleep and cry at night.</p><p>&quot;I desperately miss my husband. He was my rock and I thought he would be with me for the rest of my life.&quot;</p><p>At an earlier hearing, Parr, of Penallt Estate, Llanelly Hill, Abergavenny, Monmouthshire, admitted causing death by dangerous driving.</p><p>Robin Shellard, defending, said Parr, a coach driver for five years and of previous good character, was truly remorseful for what had happened and had written of his regret.</p><p>&quot;The death of Mr Vaughan is something that has haunted him every day,&quot; Mr Shellard said.</p><p>&quot;It is quite clear that he was driving too fast for the conditions.&quot;</p><p>Mr Shellard said that since the crash Parr, a father of two boys aged six and two, had changed from an outgoing person to someone who stayed at home and drank heavily.</p><p>&quot;I hope Mr Vaughan's family accepts that whatever Mr Parr has been through in the last 18 months is of course nothing to what Mr Vaughan's family has been through,&quot; he said.</p><p>&quot;No sentence of imprisonment can bring Mr Vaughan back.</p><p>&quot;He just hopes Mr Vaughan's family can accept the feelings he has towards Mr Vaughan and the great regret he has.&quot;</p><p>Judge Susan Evans QC jailed Parr for two years, banned him from driving for three years and ordered that he take an extended driving test.</p><p>She said: &quot;This case is tragic in every sense of the word.</p><p>&quot;On December 12 2010 you were the driver of a coach on the M5 in very difficult conditions early in the morning.</p><p>&quot;You had a responsibility to your passengers and to other road users. As you said in your interview your visibility was less than 22 metres just before the collision.</p><p>&quot;It was apparent from your passengers that some of them were concerned at the speed of your driving in the prevailing conditions.</p><p>&quot;You were driving at the maximum speed of 62mph and a collision with another slower vehicle was inevitable.</p><p>&quot;Your coach collided with the rear of the lorry and began a chainof events which neither you or the lorry driver could have prevented.</p><p>&quot;It led to the tragic death of Mr Raymond Vaughan and the loss to his family has been immense.&quot;</p><p>Judge Evans added: &quot;I know what happened that day will have a profound effect upon you for the rest of your life and that you wish youcould turn back the clock.</p><p>&quot;This court has to send out a message to those that drive dangerously in icy conditions and that is what you did.</p><p>&quot;Nothing this court can do can repair the damage done to Raymond Vaughan and his family.&quot;</p><p>PA</p>?<p>Photographs: Katya De Grunwald</p><p>Model: Smita at IMG</p><p>Make-up: Angela Davis-Deacon at Sue Allatt using Chanel Hydra Beauty Serum</p><p>Hair: Jan Przemyk at Naked Artists using Kiehl's</p><p>Retouching: Samuel Bland</p>?<p>David Beckham was at the ancient Panathenaic Stadium to help collect the flame and bring it back home.</p><p>The historic event took place in a rain-hit sundown ceremony at the stadium in Athens, venue of the first modern Olympics in 1896.</p><p>The flame has been handed over to London to host the Games for the third time since the birth of the Olympics - in 1908, 1948 and now 2012. No other city has staged the Games three times.</p><p>Despite the buzz triggered by the last-minute news that the LA Galaxy star and former England skipper was flying in specially to be part of the ancient ceremony, the more formal duties came down to the Princess Royal as leader of the British delegation to Athens.</p><p>Both she and Karolos Papoulias, the Hellenic Republic president, sat in ancient thrones that are part of the stadium during the hour-long ceremony.</p><p>The flame was handed to the Princess, who was watched closely by other members of the official delegation including London 2012 chairman Lord Coe, Olympics minister Hugh Robertson, London mayor Boris Johnson, Beckham and five British sporting teenagers.</p><p>Each member of the British VIP delegation sheltered under blue umbrellas as they walked through the centre of the stadium to their front-row seats.</p><p>Everyone from the Princess Royal to Mr Robertson were named over the loudspeakers and greeted by cheers from the crowd.</p><p>There was also a chuckle from British people in the crowd as the announcer twice insisted on introducing Beckham as Sir David Beckham.</p><p>The youngsters were picked by London 2012 for displaying Olympic values. During the ceremony they exchanged symbolic olive branches to the tune of John Lennon's Imagine.</p><p>The five, who come from different national regions, are from schools and colleges which are part of London 2012's Get Set education network and school linking programmes run by the British Council.</p><p>A smiling Sakinah Muhammad, 15, from Clapton Girls' Academy in Hackney, east London, who is one of the British youngsters, said: &quot;When I first found out I was in shock. I did not believe what they were telling me and that I was going to be something that is such a big deal. I am so excited that I am part of it.&quot;</p><p>The other British teenagers included Scottish rugby player Dennis Coles, 17, from Doon Academy, Dalmellington, East Ayrshire; hockey player Chloe Brown, 18, from South Eastern Regional College in Bangor, Northern Ireland; and Swansea Harriers athlete and Mumbles Rangers FC player Sean White, 17, from Bishop Vaughan Catholic School in Swansea.</p><p>There was also Falmouth Ladies hockey player Georgia Higgs from Helston Community College and school sports ambassador who represents Cornwall, where the flame will touch down ahead of the 70-day torch relay to the start of the London 2012 Olympics.</p><p>The Olympic Flame has been taken on a relay around the Greek mainland and islands since it was lit by the rays of the sun in ancient Olympia last week.</p><p>It has visited Crete, Piraeus, Thessalonica, Xanthi and Larissa, among other places.</p><p>The torchbearers have been taking it from Olympia to the Panathenaic Stadium. The Olympic flame was &quot;laid to rest&quot; at the Acropolis overnight before being taken on the eighth and final day of its Greek relay - taking it to the Acropolis Museum, the centre of Athens, Zappeio and to the handover ceremony.</p><p>A trio of world champions brought the flame safely to the stadium. It arrived in the hands of rower Christina Giazitzidou and was carried by gymnast Vasilis Tsolakidis and rower Alexandra Tsiavou.</p><p>Chinese gymnast Li Ning, who lit the cauldron at the opening ceremony for the 2008 Beijing Games, and Greek weightlifter Pyrros Dimas were the last torchbearers in Greece.</p><p>In a new symbolic move by the Hellenic Olympic Committee, they were picked to represent a link between the last Olympics in Beijing, with Greece as the birthplace of the institution and also the next Games in London 2012.</p><p>Li Ning is the 14-time world champion who won six medals at the 1984 Olympics including three golds, while Pyrros Dimas is something of a modern-day Greek sporting hero.</p><p>He won Greece's first Olympic weightlifting gold since 1904 when he was a 20-year-old competing in the 82.5kg weight class at the Barcelona 1992 Games.</p><p>He was on his way to winning three Olympic gold medals during his career, which he ended with a bronze in front of his home crowd at the 2004 Athens Games.</p><p>The image of him symbolically leaving his shoes on the platform to a standing ovation is one of the most memorable of the Games.</p><p>The ceremony also included priestesses in a performance choreographed by Artemis Ignatiou.</p><p>Drummers and children took part in a musical number.</p><p>It was to wish good luck to the Greek team that will compete in London, complete with the slogan &quot;Greece you can do it&quot;.</p><p>The British delegates fly back tomorrow evening, landing at RNAS Culdrose in Cornwall, where they will attend a special ceremony welcoming the flame.</p><p>A 70-day relay, involving 8,000 torchbearers covering 8,000 miles, will then take the flame to east London's Olympic Stadium and the opening of the Games on July 27.</p><p>PA</p>?<p>The LA Galaxy star and former England captain, who was part of London 2012's winning bid team to stage the Games, will meet the official delegation led by British Olympic Association president and London 2012 board member the Princess Royal in Athens.</p><p>Beckham will be joined by five young people, from schools and colleges which are part of London 2012's Get Set education network, for tomorrow's handover ceremony at the Panathenaic Stadium in Athens.</p><p>They have been invited by London 2012 and the British Council as a reward for their commitment to sport and for promoting the Olympic values of friendship, excellence and respect within their school or college.</p><p>A mix of some of Britain's hard-working younger generation and a touch of the Beckham stardust is the right way to shine the spotlight on the 70-day relay involving 8,000 torchbearers which will begin after the Olympic flame touches down on home soil, Lord Coe said.</p><p>&quot;Working with one of our most inspiring sports people is also fitting for this hugely exciting time for the London 2012 Games,&quot; he said.</p><p>During the final push of the 2005 bidding campaign, the Leytonstone-born footballer said he was dreaming of the day the Olympics would be staged in his old East End &quot;manor&quot;.</p><p>He spoke of the potential to inspire and the possible regeneration value of hosting the Games.</p><p>Lord Coe said: &quot;We wanted to involve young people from across the UK in bringing home the Olympic Flame.</p><p>&quot;Their stories of personal achievement and contribution to sport echo the 8,000 inspiring torchbearer stories that will be shared from this weekend and over the next 10 weeks in the build-up to the start of the Games.&quot;</p><p>The youngsters, who come from different national regions, are from schools and colleges which are part of London 2012's Get Set education network and school linking programmes run by the British Council.</p><p>They include Scottish rugby player Dennis Coles, 17, from Doon Academy, Dalmellington, East Ayrshire, hockey player Chloe Brown, 18, from South Eastern Regional College in Bangor, Northern Ireland, and Swansea Harriers athlete and Mumbles Rangers FC player Sean White, 17, from Bishop Vaughan Catholic School in Swansea.</p><p>There are also two 15-year-olds among the group.</p><p>Representing Cornwall, where the Olympic Flame arrives and starts its 70-day journey, is Falmouth Ladies hockey player Georgia Higgs from Helston Community College and School Sports Ambassador plus athlete Sakinah Muhammad from Clapton Girls' Academy in Hackney, east London.</p><p>Lord Coe, Olympics minister Hugh Robertson and London mayor Boris Johnson are also part of the official delegation to Athens.</p><p>The British delegation flies back on Friday evening, landing at RNAS Culdrose in Cornwall, where there will be a special ceremony welcoming the flame.</p><p>The relay, covering 8,000 miles, will bring the flame to east London's Olympic Stadium and the opening of the Games on July 27.</p><p>PA</p>?<p>The Government's economic strategy is in tatters and our blundering part-time Chancellor seems to have no idea what to do. Indeed, there is now talk that the much-hallowed AAA credit rating is now seriously in doubt because of his incompetence.</p><p>In a research note M&amp;G's Jim Leaviss has argued that the rating looks &quot;increasingly vulnerable ... because of deterioration, both in economic growth and on the fiscal side&quot;. This would be a further nail in Osborne's economic coffin.</p><p>U-turn follows U-turn ? pasties, charity donations, church renovations, caravans and now fuel. Sending out the junior minister Chloe Smith, who had clearly been instructed not even to admit when the volte face had been decided, to be eaten up by Jeremy Paxman on Newsnight was an act of cowardice on the part of George Osborne, who increasingly seems to be hiding from the press.</p><p>Plus Slasher still hasn't explained how this tax cut of £500m is to be funded. It makes perfect sense to me to put a half-billion-pound stimulus into the UK economy, but makes no sense in the context of Osborne's loopy deficit reduction plan.</p><p>The inference that should be drawn from the fact that the stimulus seems to be unfunded is, of course, that the Coalition's fiscal Plan A is dead and buried. Good riddance. And postponing the 3p tax rise alongside rapidly falling oil and commodity prices further improves the near-term inflation outlook.</p><p>Data releases continue to come in thick and fast confirming that the economy is going nowhere. As is clear from the above chart, consumer confidence as well as respondents' views on their financial situation are showing no sign of recovery. Another poor set of figures on government borrowing in the first two months of the fiscal year showed they were 15 per cent higher than a year ago, reflecting both high spending growth (central government current spending rose by 7.9 per cent year on year) and weak tax receipts growth of 1.6 per cent.</p><p>The latest revisions to GDP out last week indicated that the 08-09 recession was not as deep as had initially been believed, which is what the Monetary Policy Committee had been saying, so power to them for that. This is illustrated in the other chart above. But recovery since then has been slower and more prolonged. The ONS confirmed that output in the first quarter fell by 0.3 per cent, but the extent of the decline in the final quarter of 2011 was revised down from -0.3 per cent to -0.4 per cent, confirming we are in an even deeper double-dip recession than was previously thought. The recession deniers have gone quiet again.</p><p>Not even half of the output lost since the last recession has been restored under the Coalition's disastrous and reckless economic policies. I fully expect output in the second quarter to also be negative.</p><p>The big question, as panic has gripped both Downing Street and Threadneedle Street, is: what now? Mervyn King last week made clear that the economic situation had worsened sharply over the last six weeks. The Coalition bet the 2015 election on their economic policy working; it was the centrepiece of their agreement. All else was in second place. It was entirely predictable that the economic strategy would end in tears. Once that happened the illusion of competence would inevitably crumble, as it has. Very quickly Osborne has turned from being economic guru to goat.</p><p>The problem is that it is likely too late for them to do anything to rescue the economy in time for the 2015 election, and the Liberal Democrats are already toast. It will take two years at least for any growth strategy to have any effect. Firms are still not getting enough credit and attempts to clamp down on the banks after the Barclays Libor debacle will only restrict lending further. Calls by David Laws and others for even deeper spending cuts are ridiculous.</p><p>Last week the Nobel laureate Paul Krugman and Lord Richard Layard launched a Manifesto for Economic Sense*. This sets out realistic and sensible alternatives to Osborne-style austerity. Within two days over 4,000 people, mainly economists, had signed up, including a number of distinguished names such as the Nobel laureate Chris Pissarides, John Van Reenen and Lord Skidelsky.</p><p>The argument is that Osborne, along with other European leaders, are relying on the same ideas that governed policy in the 1930s. These ideas, the manifesto argues, are &quot;long since disproved, involve profound errors both about the causes of the crisis, its nature, and the appropriate response&quot;. Amen to that. The usual response from right-wing academics and business folk to such calls in the past has not appeared. I wonder why not? It's time to get the economy moving again. And for that to happen, Osborne must go.</p><p>*</p>?<p>The comedian is working on a pilot of the show - called I Love My Country - in which he will team up with Frank Skinner and Greg Davies.</p><p>It is based on a show which has already proved to be a hit in the Netherlands, created by TV gameshow guru John De Mol.</p><p>Britain's Got Talent judge Walliams has previously hosted Sky 1's panel show Wall Of Fame.</p><p>The pilot programme is not due for broadcast but the series is being considered for BBC1.</p><p>The BBC's executive editor for entertainment commissioning, Alan Tyler, said: &quot;David, Frank and Greg are three of the UK's biggest comedy talents. Bringing them together on one show is a really exciting prospect.&quot;</p>?<p>The reality is completely different. Instead of weighty proclamations, there are sardonic one-liners. In place of furrowed brows, frequent laughter and a fine line in self-mockery. It's as though you turned up to meet Dawson Leery and found his best friend PaceyWitter there instead.</p><p>&quot;I think there was a time during and post-Dawson's Creek when I took myself too seriously and felt I had something to lose,&quot; Van Der Beek says with a slightly incredulous laugh. &quot;Plus, there's the whole thing about doing a teen show and having young fans and they're supposed to see you in a certain way...&quot;</p><p>Such is the curse of teen drama. Van Der Beek, now 35, played Dawson Leery, melodramatic deliverer of angst-ridden dialogues, would-be Spielberg, uncertain seducer of Joey Potter and possessor of television's most over-the-top crying face, for six years from 1998 until 2003. And, just as to many thirtysomethings Claire Danes will always be Angela Chase, no matter how many terrorists she tracks down on Homeland, so too is Van Der Beek forever Dawson.</p><p>Luckily it's not an association he minds, these days at least. &quot;In retrospect I look back and I'm grateful,&quot; he says. &quot;But it was an exhausting six-year marathon. I was shooting movies or doing photo shoots when the show was on hiatus. I felt burnt out when it ended. I needed time to duck away and disappear, figure things out and grow up a bit. When I was 24 the character I played on TV was a teenager losing his virginity...&quot;</p><p>It helps that Van Der Beek is that unusual thing, a former teen idol whose looks have improved with age. Where Dawson was all wrinkled forehead and bad hair, Van Der Beek wears the passing of time well, a fact he attributes in part to being more at ease. &quot;When Dawson's ended I just reacted to having been on this highly successful teen show for the last six years. I get very bored doing the same thing so, for example, I did Rules of Attraction [an adaptation of a Bret Easton Ellis novel, filmed just before Dawson's final season] because I felt finally I had a chance to try something like that.&quot;</p><p>Yet while Van Der Beek received good reviews the big movie roles never quite materialised. While fellow cast members Michelle Williams, Katie Holmes and Joshua Jackson went on to carve out careers on film and television with varying degrees of success, it seemed as though the series' official romantic lead would be an also-ran.</p><p>&quot;I look at some of my decisions in that time and I think 'why did I do that?'&quot; admits Van Der Beek. &quot;I turned down auditions for things I probably shouldn't have like the role that went to Bradley Cooper in Wedding Crashers because I was worried about being seen in a certain way.&quot; A pause before the sardonic aside: &quot;In retrospect that was something of an unnecessary worry...&quot;</p><p>Such fears are in the past. In recent years, Van Der Beek has reinvented himself as something of a go-to-guy for smart cameos ? he's been described as a straight Neil Patrick Harris, a comparison he describes as &quot;a huge compliment&quot; ? turning up in everything from sitcom How I Met Your Mother to police procedural Criminal Minds. Now a clever turn as a more self-absorbed version of himself in the acerbic and very funny sitcom Don't Trust the B---- in Apartment 23,which starts on E4 tomorrow, should thrust him back into television's spotlight. Like Matt Le Blanc in Episodes, Apartment 23 uses Van Der Beek's history as a teen idol as a starting point, painting a picture of a self-obsessed former star, happy to use the remnants of his fame to talk fans into bed.</p><p>&quot;It's been a lot of fun not only to send up my own history but also because it's evolved into more of a parody of actors in general,&quot; says Van Der Beek. &quot;I see fake James Van Der Beek as the sort of guy who is quite talented but in this very savantish way. He can be sweet, he's a good friend to Chloe [the show's (anti) heroine and the B of the title] but he's also completely self-absorbed.&quot;</p><p>Most entertainingly as the series progresses so the careers of the two Van Der Beeks diverge. Thus, fake Van Der Beek has starred in a Guy Ritchie film, is considering doing Dancing with the Stars and has his own jeans line that he markets with the brilliantly cringeworthy slogan: &quot;Put your cheeks in a Beek.&quot;</p><p>He is also single, unlike his real-life counterpart who is married with two children. &quot;It's not so much that my family life was off-limits as that it's much funnier if he's single,&quot; says Van Der Beek. &quot;When I started working on the show I said: 'Don't be afraid of offending me, I'll tell you if something goes too far.' Nothing has.&quot;</p><p>That's largely because Van Der Beek's sense of humour is surprisingly caustic. &quot;Yeah, I've always had a dark sense of humour,&quot; he admits. &quot;When I was filming Dawson's I felt awkward about letting that be seen. There was always a sense that you were representing the show and you had to take the material seriously and show a level of respect. One of the funniest things about doing this show and the videos I've done recently was my mother said to me: 'It's so nice to be able to see you showing your sense of humour.' So she was obviously worried...&quot;</p><p>Ah, the videos. Shot for comedy website Funny or Die the videos changed Van Der Beek's career trajectory, ensuring that instead of ending up a &quot;whatever happened to?&quot; punchline in a trivia quiz he reinvented himself for the internet generation. &quot;Basically, I ended up working on the videos because of the crying Dawson meme,&quot; he says.</p><p>The crying Dawson meme, a GIF (video grab) of Van Der Beek's hilariously over-the-top crying face, is used to mock people all over the internet. Van Der Beek met the writers of Funny or Die. &quot;They said very tentatively 'so you know there's this GIF...' and I said 'I know, I love it' so we decided that we could provide people with all kinds of Dawson needs.&quot;</p><p>Those needs can be seen on the Van Der Meme website, which features the actor doing everything from sarcastically clapping to disco dancing, all with an admirably straight face. &quot;I'd always had that sort of sense of humour but only my friends had really seen that,&quot; he says. &quot;Suddenly I had the chance to show people I know how to laugh at myself and my image.&quot;</p><p>His recent marriage (he married second wife, Kimberly, in 2010) and the arrival of his two children, the youngest of whom is just two months old, played a big part in his transformation. &quot;That just showed me what was important,&quot; he says. &quot;It gave me a foundation so I realised that everything else didn'tmatter. I could get back to being who I really was.&quot;</p><p>And what of that much fantasised-about Dawson's Creek reunion, which pops up as internet gossip every six months or so? Van Der Beek laughs. &quot;You know what I love most about that?&quot; he says. &quot;That Michelle [Williams] is always so up for it when they ask.&quot; He pauses again, adding with deadpan timing. &quot;Well, of course she is, her character died.&quot;</p><p>?</p><p>'Don't Trust the B---- in Apartment 23' begins tomorrow at 9.30pm on E4</p>?<p>Mr Desmond made the surprise announcement when the Irish newspaper, which he part owns, became the second publication to run the images, after the French magazine Closer.</p><p>&quot;I am very angry at the decision to publish the photographs and am taking immediate steps to close the joint venture,&quot; Mr Desmond said. &quot;The decision to publish these pictures has no justification whatever and Northern &amp; Shell condemns it in the strongest possible terms.&quot;</p><p>This sudden move was believed to be an attempt to protect himself and his British newspapers from any commercial damage.</p><p>Mr Desmond's partners in the paper, the Irish newspaper group Independent News and Media (INM), said the decision to republish the pictures was &quot;regrettable and in poor taste&quot;. A spokesman for INM &quot;had no prior knowledge of the decision to publish&quot;.</p><p>On Friday, a spokesman for the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge said the couple are to sue the French celebrity magazine for a &quot;grotesque and totally unjustifiable breach of privacy&quot;.</p><p>The decision by the Irish paper to risk legal action came as Chi, an Italian magazine owned, like Closer, by Silvio Berlusconi, announced its intention to run 26 pages of pictures tomorrow. The willingness of publications to risk breaking editorial codes of conduct, and even the law, exposes the calculated commercial decision being taken in newsrooms: that revenues generated by printing the pictures will outweigh the cost of any legal reparations.</p><p>A royal spokesman condemned the Irish Daily Star's decision, saying: &quot;There can be no motivation for this action other than greed.&quot; However, she declined to say whether the royal couple will take further legal action against any other publication that runs the images. &quot;We will not be commenting on potential legal action ... save to say that all proportionate responses will be kept under review. Any such publication would serve no purpose other than to cause further, entirely unjustifiable upset to the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge.&quot;</p><p>Gareth Morgan, the editor of Mr Desmond's UK Daily Star Sunday, moved quickly to quash fears his paper might also publish the images. &quot;This decision has no merit morally,&quot; he said. &quot;We have no involvement. They've made a frankly horrible decision.&quot;</p><p>But Mike O'Kane, the editor of the Irish Daily Star, said he was &quot;taken aback&quot; by the reaction. &quot;The duchess would be no different to any other celeb pics we would get in, for example Rihanna or Lady Gaga,&quot; he said. &quot;She's not the future queen of Ireland so really the only place this is causing fury seems to be in the UK.&quot;</p><p>The decision strikes at the heart of the dilemma that Lord Leveson currently faces: the difference between the public interest and what is of interest to the public. On Friday there had been 2 million Google searches for Kate Middleton in the US alone, underlining the enormous public interest in the images.</p><p>&quot;Of course people are going to be interested in this,&quot; said Mr O'Kane. &quot;She's married into the Royal Family, she's one of the most photographed people in the world, and she decides to partially disrobe on a balcony where it can be seen from a public road and she's stunned now, or the palace are annoyed, that people are interested in this.&quot;</p><p>Seamus Dooley, the Irish Secretary of the National Union of Journalists, expressed concern for the employees of the Irish Daily Star. He said the Desmond announcement had stunned Irish staff and readers. &quot;The Irish Daily Star has always been marketed as an Irish title free of UK interference in editorial matters. The editor took a controversial decision on this issue just as he and his predecessors have done in the past, without reference to the owners. I do not understand why this particular decision is being treated any differently.</p><p>Ingrid Seward, the editor-in-chief of Majesty magazine, also appeared to blame the duchess for bringing the scandal upon herself by posing topless within zoom-lens range of a public road. &quot;Quite simply, this ghastly situation should never have happened,&quot; she wrote. &quot;And only two people could have stopped it. The Duke and Duchess themselves.&quot;</p><p>Some questioned whether royal protection officers were to blame, asking how a paparazzo could have got so close to the future king and queen. Ken Wharfe, a former bodyguard of Diana, Princess of Wales, said: &quot;If a photographer can poke a lens through some greenery and take these type of pictures then a gunman with a high-powered weapon and telescopic sight could have done far worse.&quot; The vantage point on the public road from which the images are thought to have been taken is at least 1,000 yards from the villa's swimming pool terrace.</p><p>The publication of the images has dredged up memories of the duke's mother, who was hounded by photographers. The 2008 inquiry into her death in a car crash in Paris found she had been unlawfully killed due to the behaviour of paparazzi. After her death in 1997, British newspapers agreed to respect the privacy of the young princes. However, some editors now argue that the growth of the internet means it's unrealistic for them not to publish what their readers can look up with seconds. The Royal Family rarely takes legal action over libel or press intrusion, and the announcement they are to on this occasion shows the extent of the young couple's fury and upset. Sir Christopher Meyer, a former chairman of the Press Complaints Commission, said they had no choice but to sue so as to deter others.</p><p>Additional reporting by Sam Creighton and Chloe Hamilton</p><p>Royals and the lens</p><p>Jonathan Brown</p><p>The publication of topless photographs of the Duchess of Cambridge in France is the latest in a depressingly long history of similar stories.</p><p>?Twenty years ago, Sarah Ferguson was pictured lying topless on a sun-lounger in France having her toes sucked by her Texan financial adviser, John Bryan.</p><p>The images ended up in Paris Match, and the duchess sued, winning an £84,000 payout. In 1994, Prince Charles suffered a similar ignominy, when he was pictured naked at the window of a room in a friend's chateau near Avignon after a swim, a towelling robe thrown over his shoulder.</p><p>Then there were the pictures of Princess Diana kissing Dodi Fayed during a holiday in France in 1997. Princess Margaret memorably took a dim view of royals who were caught in embarrassing positions by paparazzi, saying: &quot;We've got plenty of houses. If you don't want to be seen and photographed, you don't have to be.&quot;</p>?<p>But the Hansard Society has done what it calls an Audit of Political Engagement, published today, which shows that tabloid readers are wise to what they read. </p><p>According to the survey, 70 per cent or more think that tabloids &quot;look for any excuse to tarnish the name of politicians&quot;, &quot;focus on negative stories about politics and politicians&quot; and &quot;are more interested in getting a good story than telling the truth&quot;. People who do not read tabloids are less uncomplimentary about the quality of political journalism than those who do. Broadsheet newspapers do better on these findings, and television news better still.</p><p>The problem, according to the report, is not that people uncritically soak up what they read in the tabloids but that the general negativity leaves them with no sense than it is possible to get involved and make a difference. </p><p>Or as the society's director of research, Dr Ruth Fox, puts it: &quot;These findings suggest that the media ? particularly the tabloids ? do not greatly benefit our democracy from the perspective of nourishing political engagement.&quot; </p><p>A Tory with a BBC in his bonnet</p><p>One source of news that is widely trusted is the BBC. For that very reason, the corporation infuriates certain political types who think that it is emitting the wrong values. </p><p>Speaking in the Commons this week, the MP Daniel Kawczynski frankly admitted to being the sort of Tory who reveres almost every established British institution except the BBC. </p><p>Indeed, so great is his reverence for monarchy that he advocated that Libya, post-Gaddafi, should send for the heir to the deposed King Idris to be its constitutional monarch. </p><p>But he told MPs: &quot;I don't know what it is about (the BBC) that gets my blood pressure rising and gets me so upset and irritated.&quot; </p><p>He then went on to suggest that he knows what he does not like about the BBC ? that it is funded by the TV licence instead of operating in a competitive market, that it did not treat the Queen's Jubilee with sufficient seriousness, that it employs Jeremy Paxman, who humiliated the junior Treasury minister, Chloe Smith, and that its interviewers are respectful to experts, such as people who write, but disrespectful to politicians. </p><p>His solution is to scrap the licence fee and flog the BBC to some multinational corporation.</p><p>Lords reform delay good for one Dad </p><p>When the Government caved in on Tuesday and abandoned the timetable for Lords reform, there was a wave of relief in the household of John Denham, Ed Miliband's parliamentary aide. </p><p>Scenting a Government defeat in the offing, the Labour whips were not allowing anyone to be out of London for the crucial vote, which coincided with the day Nottingham University was holding its graduation ceremony for students such as Edward Denham, who has just completed a music course. </p><p>Cancelling the vote freed up Dad to rush to Nottingham to see his son ascend the stage in gown and mortar board to receive his degree.</p><p>A high-risk way to watch the Games</p><p>With the Olympics drawing so close, those who have accommodation to rent and no takers are naturally starting to fret. Hence an email inviting the Diary to publicise &quot;a very special and historic castle available in Dorset, with the benefit of a London Bridge Apartment which can be included in the package (and the possibility to helicopter transfer between the two!)&quot; </p><p>This is Pennsylvania Castle, once owned by a lawyer named Stephen Curtis, who got into some very deep water when working for Russian oligarchs. </p><p>&quot;If you find me dead, it won't be an accident,&quot; he reputedly said, and one day his helicopter crashed on the way to Pennsylvania Castle, and he was killed. So my advice to punters is beware that helicopter link: it is jinxed.</p>?<p>At last, a day off and a lie in after all those 6.30am starts. No shooting all day, so I wake up at 10am in the Olympic village. Me, Alan [Wills] and Simon [Terry] go around Hyde Park. We are dressed in civvies so nobody knows we are athletes. The sun is out and you can feel everyone is anticipating it. We people-watch a bit and have a really relaxing day. When we get back to Stratford, I nearly don't get out because I somehow managed to lose my 12-month athlete's Oyster card. I just flash accreditation and say &quot;You have to let me out&quot; and they wave me through. We have a chilled-out rest in the athletes' village. On my first night there, last week, I had a Big Mac meal, but now I'm eating a lot of chicken. We brought a projector screen with us, so we have our own cinema, watching The Green Lantern and The Dictator, which was quite good fun.</p><p>Monday</p><p>Get up at about 7am and head down to Lord's. We practise until 12, stopping for lunch, then another session until 3pm. The village is getting busier now but we don't mix much with the other athletes. Everyone keeps to themselves in the Team GB House. I've got a travel keyboard and my friend Alan has a little ukulele which he likes to play, so we have a little jam session. We're not any good, but it takes our mind off competing.</p><p>Tuesday</p><p>Get up and pack up ? we won't be back in the village until we've finished competing now. We travel to Lord's and our staff take all our bags to the hotel nearby. After practice, we settle in and unpack. I watch Ice Age 3 on television. I like my films ? it's nice to be able to switch the brain off. If I start thinking about competing too much, I play a game or put a film on. I really want the competition to start now.</p><p>Wednesday</p><p>Getting into a routine now. Up at 6.30am and in bed by ?10.30pm. It's a case of getting the body and the mind relaxed and ready. I play a game on my iPad called Water Crocodile. My daughters (Shelbie, 15, and Chloe, 13) stuck it on there and I'm hooked on it now. I speak to my fiancee, Becks (Rebecca Hocking) every night on the phone or on Skype, and we catch up on what we've been doing. We're trying to do our house up at the minute, so tonight we talk about light fittings. It's nice to get a bit of normal life.</p><p>Thursday</p><p>Training as normal all day. We're just trying to keep the same routine. In the evening I watch Weird Science, a good old Eighties film. It's about two young lads who create a woman. Start looking online at armchairs to do up our new place and send Becks some pictures of wingback armchairs. It all starts tomorrow but I'm trying not to think about it.</p><p>Friday</p><p>I wake up nervous at the hotel, not knowing what to expect and wanting to shoot well. The first end [round] I shoot is below my average and I think &quot;Oh dear&quot;. It's a 54 and it makes me think, &quot;Oh no, what is today going to bring&quot;. Then I relax into it and get some fantastic scores. After the first end, I am in about 33rd position, but afterwards I end up shooting a personal best. I'm pleased with the result because I came here to shoot a personal best. I'm a tiny bit surprised that a 680 has got me fourth, but then it's the Olympics. It's a big deal and you look at the Koreans and they smashed it. I'm so glad it's started now and it's nice it went well.</p><p>Saturday</p><p>I wake up earlier than usual because we're the first match on. Everything went OK: the shooting was good but the scores just weren't there. The Ukrainian team [which eliminated Team GB from the group competition] were just absolutely fantastic. This afternoon we trained for the individual archery event.</p><p>Larry Godfrey was talking to Emily Dugan</p>?<p>On the eve of the embattled legislation's final hurdle in Parliament, scores of GPs, consultants and other NHS doctors have signed a letter to The Independent on Sunday condemning the Bill as an &quot;embarrassment to democracy&quot; and pledging to stand as candidates against MPs who backed it.</p><p>Nick Clegg and other senior Lib Dems will be specifically targeted on polling day in 2015, as well as those in marginal seats, for betraying the wishes of activists at last week's spring conference who called for a last-minute rethink of the reforms.</p><p>But the doctors' coalition will also target vulnerable Tories in marginal seats who voted for the Bill. The Health Secretary, Andrew Lansley, who is blamed inside the Government for overseeing the reforms which have been heavily amended, is almost certain to face an electoral battle.</p><p>Yet it is the Lib Dems, who the latest poll for the IoS shows are on just 10 per cent, who face an existential threat if dozens of doctors fight in many of their 57 seats. One of the Deputy Prime Minister's Sheffield Hallam constituents, Jenny Bywaters, a retired consultant in public health, put her name forward yesterday as a possible candidate, describing the Bill as an &quot;affront to democracy&quot;.</p><p>The 240 signatures ? including 30 professors ? underline the depth of anger felt by NHS frontline staff at the legislation which they claim &quot;fundamentally undermines the founding principles&quot; of the health service.</p><p>Dr Clive Peedell, a cancer specialist and co-chair of the NHS Consultants' Association, organised the letter and said he was overwhelmed by how many names had come forward since starting to collect signatures on Thursday evening.</p><p>Dr Peedell said they hoped to field &quot;as many candidates as possible&quot; at the next election, while other supporters will help with fundraising and organising the campaign. His original plan was to get 50 names but the overwhelming response suggests they could field more than that.</p><p>Pointing out that none of the major professional associations and healthcare organisations has supported the reforms, the letter says: &quot;It is our view that coalition MPs and peers have placed the political survival of the coalition government above professional opinion, patient safety and the will of the citizens of this country.</p><p>&quot;We are shocked by the failure of the democratic process and the facilitating role played by the Liberal Democrats in the passage of this Bill. We have therefore decided to form a coalition of healthcare professionals to take on coalition MPs at the next general election, on the non-party, independent ticket of defending the NHS.&quot;</p><p>Mr Clegg and his MPs already face anger from voters over broken promises on tuition fees and doubts over whether they have lived up to pledges to impose fairness in the tax system by targeting the richest. But the Deputy Prime Minister is now being blamed for failing to limit the wide-ranging reforms in Mr Lansley's Bill.</p><p>The doctors' letter comes as Mr Clegg and his cabinet lieutenant, Danny Alexander, enter the final stages of negotiations tomorrow with David Cameron and George Osborne over the Budget on Wednesday. The Lib Dems are fighting to impose their stamp on the measures that will restore fairness to the tax system.</p><p>Tomorrow in the House of Lords, the former SDP leader Lord Owen, now a crossbencher, will lead an amendment calling for the Bill's final stage, the third reading, to be delayed until the Government publishes the risk register ? an assessment by civil servants of the consequences of introducing the legislation. Labour peers will back Lord Owen's amendment, but it is expected it will not gain enough support to block the Government forcing through the final stages of the Bill, and the legislation is expected to be granted Royal Assent on Tuesday.</p><p>Dr Peedell said: &quot;Despite all the promises, the Liberal Democrats have failed to make a bad Bill a better Bill. Despite over 1,000 amendments, all the key policy and legal mechanisms remain in place to turn the NHS into a competitive external market, which will see increasing privatisation of provision and commissioning of care.</p><p>&quot;This fundamentally undermines the founding principles of the NHS and will undermine professionalism and the doctor-patient relationship. We think this is scandal that is much worse than the MPs' expenses scandal because the dismantling of such a crucial and important institution will cost lives and damage the social fabric of this country.&quot;</p><p>Richard Taylor, the retired consultant who was elected as an independent MP for Wyre Forest in 2001 in protest at the downgrading of his local hospital, said he was advising the doctors. &quot;I had no more thought of becoming an MP when I retired than I had of going to the moon, and I'm sure these doctors were the same,&quot; he said. &quot;The doctors selected as candidates need to be popular in their own areas and they have to portray what they stand for as a vital national issue. They will need an unpopular sitting MP or one who has voted the wrong way, so they must choose their targets wisely.&quot;</p><p>Coalition MPs in the line of fire: How small majorities, national prominence and polling results have conspired to produce an early list of likely targets</p><p>Lib Dems:</p><p>Nick Clegg Lib Dem, Sheffield Hallam. 2010 majority 15,284 (29.9%)</p><p>The Liberal Democrat leader headed off a stiff challenge at the last election, but remains the top target of any &quot;decapitation&quot; strategy.</p><p>Simon Hughes Lib Dem, Bermondsey and Old Southwark. Majority 8,530 (19.1%)</p><p>The Lib Dem Deputy Leader has grumbled about the health Bill, but his seat is on the vulnerable list.</p><p>Lynne Featherstone Lib Dem, Hornsey and Wood Green. Majority 6,875 (12.5%)</p><p>The Home Office minister has faced down local pressure for her to oppose the Bill, insisting &quot;there is a clear consensus that the NHS needs to change&quot;.</p><p>Jo Swinson Lib Dem, Dunbartonshire East. Majority 2,184 (4.6%)</p><p>Position as Clegg's parliamentary aide makes her a prime target; the prospect of a battle against the resurgent SNP makes Swinson even more vulnerable.</p><p>John Leech Lib Dem, Manchester Withington. Majority 1,894 (4.2%)</p><p>Has made it clear that he is not entirely happy with the Bill, but his status as a crucial Lib Dem toehold in a big city puts him in the cross-hairs.</p><p>Sarah Teather Lib Dem, Brent Central. Majority 1,345 (3%)</p><p>Declaration that &quot;I'm afraid the Bill needs to go through&quot; will not stabilise the education minister's wafer-thin majority.</p><p>Tories:</p><p>Jacob Rees-Mogg Con, Somerset North East. Majority 4,914 (9.6%)</p><p>A Eurosceptic, invariably described as an old-style Tory toff, a campaign against Rees-Mogg would be a strike against traditionalist Conservativism.</p><p>Chloe Smith Conservative, Norwich North. Majority 3,901 (9.2%)</p><p>Unseating the Economic Secretary to the Treasury would be a dramatic coup.</p><p>Louise Mensch Con, Corby. Majority 1,895 (3.5%)</p><p>Has not risen beyond the Culture Select Committee, but as an A-list candidate, successful author and vocal new MP, she would be a valuable scalp.</p><p>Anna Soubry Con, Broxtowe. Majority 389 (0.7%)</p><p>A prime target almost exclusively due to her tiny majority, but told constituents &quot;people opposed to the Bill have somewhat taken advantage of people's genuine concerns and heartfelt support for the NHS&quot;.</p><p>What next for the Deputy PM? An exit route via Brussels for Nick Clegg?</p><p>If the prospect of his party becoming obliterated by a wave of angry doctors in May 2015 gets too much for Nick Clegg, he can always jump on Eurostar and head to Brussels.</p><p>Senior diplomats have begun informally circulating names for candidates for the UK's EU commissioner, a post which becomes vacant in 2014 ? months before the election.</p><p>Mr Clegg, who is a former MEP and was chef de cabinet to Leon Brittan when he was Trade Commissioner in the 1990s, is being talked about as a potential candidate. Diplomatic sources believe it is a &quot;priority&quot; that Britain secures one of the economic portfolios ? preferably the internal market commissioner post, which would defend the City from further incursions from the EU.</p><p>Baroness Ashton, the EU's representative for foreign affairs, is unlikely to seek another term. The preference for an economic role in 2014 is a recognition that Gordon Brown's enthusiasm for the UK getting the foreign affairs job was a mistake.</p><p>But a Lib Dem spokesman said: &quot;Nick Clegg will be Deputy Prime Minister until 2015 and will lead the Liberal Democrats into the next election.&quot;</p><p>Jane Merrick</p>?<p>He is taking the title role in Mr Stink, adapted from the hit children's novel by comic David Walliams, which is being brought to life for BBC1.</p><p>Bonneville, known to viewers for his role as the Earl of Grantham, will swap his country pile for a garden shed in the family comedy which begins filming next month.</p><p>Walliams will also make an appearance playing the Prime Minister after notably playing a fawning aide to the PM in his hit comedy Little Britain.</p><p>In the story, lonely 12-year-old Chloe befriends local tramp Mr Stink and invites him to hide out at the end of her family's garden.</p><p>The book by Walliams, who has worked with Men Behaving Badly writer Simon Nye to adapt the tale, has sold more than a quarter of a million copies.</p><p>Bonneville, 48 said: &quot;I'm delighted to be adding my own whiff to the odour that emanates from David Walliams, and his very funny, touching and thought-provoking story.&quot;</p><p>Walliams, whose production company is working on the hour-long drama, said: &quot;I am thrilled that Hugh is playing Mr Stink. He is one of the most popular and talented actors around, and is the perfect person to bring out the character's humour and sadness.&quot;</p><p>Also in the cast is comic actor Harish Patel, whose past appearances include Run Fat Boy Run and Coronation Street, playing Chloe's pal Raj, the newsagent.</p><p>Executive producer Mark Freeland, the BBC's head of in-house comedy, said: &quot;I fell in love with David's book when I read it to my kids. I fell in love with David 15 years ago.&quot;</p><p>The show is expected to be screened around Christmas.</p><p>Mr Stink was Walliams's second children's book and was shortlisted for a Blue Peter award for the best book of the past decade, but lost out to Diary Of A Wimpy Kid.</p><p>PA</p>?<p>In it, Agassi describes the miserable years he spent as a teenager at Nick Bollettieri's tennis camp in Florida ? the man who has coached stars from Jim Courier to Monica Seles, including the new Brit wondergirl Heather Watson, who crashed out of the tournament on Friday. Agassi recalled the time he shouted at Nick: &quot;Do you have any idea what it's like to be here … 3,000 miles from home, living in this prison, waking up at 6.30, having 30 minutes to eat that shitty breakfast … going to that lousy school for four hours … only having 30 minutes to eat more crap before going on the tennis court day after day … This place is hell and I want to burn it down!&quot; He was 14 at the time. Nick B was in the BBC commentary box, heard our conversation and came on air, claiming that Andre and he are the best of pals these days. He told me he loves an opinionated woman and did I fancy a week's free coaching at his ranch? I might ask Heather if the food has improved first.</p><p>Male pride</p><p>Paxo wasn't the only alpha male sinking his teeth into the hapless Chloe Smith, top, the government minister charged with the unenviable task of selling another George Osborne U-turn (he scrapped the planned 3p rise on fuel duty) as a new policy. Her interview with Krishnan Guru-Murthy on Channel 4 News was excruciating, featuring the same piffle about &quot;one-off factors&quot; and &quot;evolving figures&quot;. As a television professional, I rate Chloe's performance as piss-poor. She lacks any authority, veering from patronising boffin to nodding puppet repeating the same mantra 20 different ways. Has Chloe been promoted above her capabilities? That is not the issue. This sorry episode proves that politics remains a boys' club. Cameron and Osborne cooked up this latest bit of &quot;policy&quot; without discussing it in Cabinet, and decided to trot out a docile female to sell it to the media. </p><p>The PM claims his government is female-friendly, but our cowardly Chancellor used a 30-year-old woman (elected to Parliament in 2009) to sell the indefensible while he, the architect of this piece of economic conjuring, lurked out of sight. </p><p>To be taken seriously in politics, women still have to emulate Maggie Thatcher ? behaving like men, immaculately groomed in a suit. Louise Mensch even has the power handbag. Chloe Smith might have the statement necklace and the tailored jacket, but sadly not the imperious manner necessary to silence the likes of Paxo. One critic called her &quot;clueless&quot; ? she is not stupid, but lacks the ability to spout bollocks convincingly, essential for a front-line politician these days.</p><p>Mr Osborne must have a cynical view of the public. The UK has a huge financial deficit. To reduce it, we've been told to accept massive cuts to pensions and put up with reductions in public services. Faced with a massive slump in popularity, Osborne decides that some government departments have &quot;underspent&quot; and he finds around £550m ? to fund cheaper petrol, and placate us. The Chancellor's problem? His fragile ego has to be protected ? he must be seen as a macho man, master of his brief, ready to make tough decisions. That is why he sacrificed a young woman's career. Ugly behaviour.</p><p>Silver tops</p><p>Last week I judged the Theo Fennell awards, given to Royal College of Art graduates in silversmithing and jewellery. Their work, on show in the main building on Kensington Gore, ranges from the wearable to the sculptural, thought-provoking and intensely personal. My favourite: the fake money created by Dutch designer Laurie Schram, who has cleverly doctored coins and created a unique coinage, merging the Queen and George Washington. The British Museum has already bought her silver-plated dollar bill. Afterwards, I realised that every one of the 25 graduates in the department was female ? unlike politics, jewellery is a profession where women excel.</p><p>Sound of silence </p><p>The Olympic organisers, like the National Trust, want to attract a wider audience. They have announced that music will be played at venues and that musicians from the Chemical Brothers to Dizzee Rascal have been asked to compose music to vibe up the more esoteric sports, such as Greco-Roman wrestling and handball. Locog claims that generally the music will be played before, after and in the breaks of events, but why turn a celebration of sporting excellence into a rock concert? Last week I was filming at a stadium near the Olympic site, where hundreds of teenagers were playing football and hockey, without music to spur them on. I love a bit of silence in a big stadium before an event, a chance to listen to the buzz of excitement and the sense of expectation. Does everything in modern life need a soundtrack?</p><p>'Appy in Soho</p><p>Ann Widdecombe has been dismissive about the National Trust's latest attempt to entice younger members ? not a guidebook, but a free phone app. Widdie claims it will never work ? I disagree. Downloaded on to a mobile phone, the app enables you to wander through Soho using GPS technology, listening to entertaining stories about the area's colourful past from the Second World War to the present day. Today, Soho is in danger of eradicating the quirky shops and drinking holes that made it such a fabulous place as chain stores and coffee stores invade this precious village, but it is still packed with Georgian gems and a rich mix of buildings. Barry Cryer introduces the aural tour and I've made a small contribution. </p><p>My relationship with Soho spans 50 years ? at 14, I belonged to clubs such as the Marquee, the Scene and the Flamingo and, as a journalist in my twenties, graduated to lunchtimes in the French pub and finally lost afternoons in the Colony Club up the road, where Francis Bacon told me he used Pond's face cream and dyed his hair with black boot polish. There was late-night boozing in Gerry's Club (nicknamed Loser's Lounge) with Jeffrey Bernard and, more recently, riotous nights in the Groucho club ? I sold them my snooker table. Damien Hirst told me the other day that he thought I'd had a naughty moment with a famous actor on the baize. Sadly, that's an urban myth. </p>?<p>Lucy St George, founder of home accessories retailer RockettSt George comments: “At Rocket St George, we’ve embraced this trend with somefabulous faux-stuffed parrots, flamingos and cockatoos that conjure up imagesof tropical environments and bring a welcome boost of colour to the home. Meanwhile,Laura Oakes’ multi-coloured cushions use all the colours of paradise with hotpinks, greens and reds; and our Chloe Croft flamingo and flower cushionscertainly make things feel quite tropical.”</p><p>Embracing bold prints, bright colours and a relaxed, subtlyglamourous vibe reminiscent of 70s Palm Springs styling, the tropical lookoffers an unusual way to inject some colour, opulence and a little humour intoyour home whether it’s through Graham &amp; Green’s magnificent pineapple lamp base,mydeco’s tropical bed throws and cushions, or a faux-parrot perched on yourfireplace (“sure to make you smile,” says St George).</p><p>For those keen to embrace the trend more comprehensively,Dan Hopwood from the British Institute of Interior Design (BIID) suggests using“emerald and green jazzed up with lime and a splash of terracotta” in kitchensor conservatories. Other colours being picked up by interiors designers includeindigo blue, flamingo pink, mango, coral, sunny yellows and Pantone’s colour ofspring/summer 2012, tangerine orange. “The tropical look is all about goingbold with colour and print,” says Nina Maklin, a Scandinavian interior designerbased in London, who advises using colour “in bold blocks rather than in tinydetails to make that instant statement” and embracing the daring? clashes found in tropical sunsets.</p><p>For statement walls, Hopwood suggests using a wallpaper suchas Cole &amp; Son’s ‘Palm Jungle.’ Failing that Julien Macdonald’s has recentlycollaborated with wallpaper retailer Graham &amp; Brown to produce a runway-inspiredrange of exotic florals, bold cat prints and butterflies in a riot of colours.Meanwhile, the Content by Conran Tamar sofa (pictured), upholstered inSanderson’s lush rainforest fabric, is about as ‘jungle’ as it gets, short ofintroducing live monkeys as part of your home decor.</p><p>If that sounds like too much, fret not. The tropical trendis not all about wild colours and statement walls and can be embraced as partof a relaxed Colonial villa vibe with crisp white fabrics, subdued palm printsand natural materials introduced through hardwood floors, rattan furniture,bamboo blinds or plantation shutters. A more tasteful, low-key version of thetropical look, this style is typified in the projects of interior designerIndia Hicks, whose island life in the Bahamas inspires much of her work. </p><p>Whether you’re escaping the rain or embracing the sun, goingfor bold bird of paradise colours or understated colonial chic, the tropicallook offers a highly adaptable way to update your interior. The only thingmissing? Make that a pina colada - andan umbrella cocktail stick, obviously.</p><p>Emily Jenkinson is interiors writer for the , an online shopping experience where you can search hundreds of homefurnishings and accessories all in one place.</p>?<p>Ministers are poised for a major cabinet shake-up which will be the first opportunity the PM has had to undertake a full reshuffle since the coalition was formed in May 2010.</p><p>But the shake-up is also expected to extend across junior government posts and will be an opportunity for Mr Cameron to win over MPs on the right of his party who have felt overlooked for promotion. The timing is planned to coincide with an EU summit at which European leaders will thrash out a new treaty that could form the focus of a fresh revolt in the Commons.</p><p>Last October, Mr Cameron suffered a revolt by 81 of his MPs over calls for a referendum on Britain's membership of the EU. Many of those MPs were angry at the mini-reshuffle earlier that month, which included the controversial promotion of Chloe Smith, 29, who had entered Parliament in 2009, as Economic Secretary to the Treasury.</p><p>Tory backbenchers returning to Westminster this week remain jubilant at the Prime Minister's veto at last month's EU summit, but are holding out the prospect of defying the whip again in the Commons in March.</p><p>As the issue of Europe returns to test coalition harmony, Nick Clegg will host a summit of European Liberal Democrat leaders and European Commissioners in London tomorrow to discuss the new EU treaty.</p>?<p>1. Leather jacket, Daniel Silver for Acne, £1,200, Acne</p><p>2. DL &amp; Co 'Cassis' rare botanic candle, £55, Browns</p><p>3. Bespoke stand, from £80, Yunus &amp; Eliza; Alexander Wang dalmation print bag, £270, Browns; Illesteva sunglasses, £180, Browns</p><p>4. Frog Prince decoration, £2.50, National Gallery shop</p><p>5. Christian Lacroix 'Sleeping Beauty', £10.39, Waterstones</p><p>6. Chloe leather wallet, £310, Net-a-Porter</p><p>7. Miu Miu glitter boots, £555, Net-a-Porter</p><p>8. Collar, Michele Corty for American Retro, £250 for 4, American Retro</p><p>9. Weston scarf, £160, Net-a-Porter</p><p>10. 'Guy Bourdin' book, £7.95, Phaidon</p><p>11. Polaroid camera, £85, Gift-Library</p><p>12. Pommery Pop mini champagne, £15, John Lewis</p><p>13. Christopher Kane top, £1,160, The Corner</p><p>14. Lips pins, £146 each, Sonia Rykiel</p><p>15. 'A Very She &amp; Him Christmas', £7.99, Amazon</p><p>16. Esquivel 'Saddle' leather shoes, £535, Browns</p><p>17. 'It's Hot' cup and saucer, £39, This is a Limited Edition</p><p>18. iPad covers, Louise Gray for the V&amp;A, £95, V&amp;A shop</p><p>Click the links below to view the gift guides</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p></p>?<p>Examination of the red North Face sports holdall also showed traces of the DNA of another person in the zip toggle and the padlock, the inquest into the computer specialist’s death was told. Detective Chief Inspector Jackie Sebire, who led the murder inquiry said “They were two minor components of another contributor's DNA. My thought or my opinion since I went into the scene is that a third party had been involved in the death or by putting the body in the bag.”</p><p>A graphic impression showed the way 34 year old Mr Williams was found inside the bag - in a foetal position lying on his back,? naked, with his knees raised and arms folded across his chest.? The key to the padlock was under his right buttock, making in “incredibly difficult” for him to have reached it in an attempt, somehow, to escape.? In any event, said DCI Sebire, “there were no signs that he was trying to get out, no damage to his fingernails or hands, no tear in the lining inside the bag. He was very muscular, he trained regularly. I would at least expect some tearing to the netting. He was very calm, his face was very calm.”</p><p>An examination of the holdall in court showed that it would have been seemingly impossible for Mr Williams to have locked himself into the bag and then moved it into a bathtub where it was found, the coroner, Dr Fiona Wilcox, pointed out. Yet, apart from the speck of DNA on the bag, detectives had been perplexed by any sign of the presence of a ‘third party’ anywhere else in the MI6 officer’s home in Pimlico, south west London.</p><p>The police had found no evidence that attempts had been made to wipe out incriminating evidence. &quot;There was no sign of the place being cleaned so there were no signs of bleach to destroy it” said DCI Sabire. &quot;There was no evidence the bag itself had been cleaned or washed down or the lock or handles had been cleaned to remove traces of DNA evidence.&quot; </p><p>What the police did find in the flat was £20,000 worth of designer clothes for women all &quot;immaculate&quot; and &quot;in pristine condition&quot; and many in tissue paper; make-up items including nail varnish and eye shadow that were &quot;all new&quot; and apparently unused; wigs wrapped in net packaging, which &quot;appear to be unused&quot;, including one Mr Williams had bought on his recent trip to the US and 26 pairs of boot and shoes most bearing designer labels such as Christian Louboutin, Stella McCartney, Christian Dior and Chloe, some which appear to have been worn.</p><p>The video footage, taken on the evening of 23rd August 2010, when Mr Williams’ body was discovered, revealed no sign of a break-in at his home, with? cash left in a cupboard and a mobile phone on the living room table. The place was in a pristime condition apart from the bedroom where a blue toweling dressing gown, which had shown traces of Mr Williams’ semen, the inquest was told, and a duvet cover had been flung on the floor. The wardrobe door was open and a white shirt, still in its laundry wrapping.</p><p>Giving evidence later, Sian Jones, who described herself as a “close friend” of Mr Williams, denied that he was a transvestite. “ We talked about all kinds of things, personal matters. I feel he would have been able to confide in me, I wouldn’t have been judgmental” she said.</p><p>The inquest continues</p>?<p>He also lost his own label, only days before shows for both were staged. Everyone from Karl Lagerfeld to Natalie Portman (among the faces of Dior) was quick to condemn the designer, who, in September, was found guilty on both charges. Those who witnessed the extraordinary workings of his mind couldn't help but mourn his departure from a position that he lit up with his wild imaginings.</p><p>2. Art attack</p><p>The gap between high and low culture continued to narrow as Yves Saint Laurent's Stefano Pilati dressed the cast of Harold Pinter's Betrayal for Ian Rickson's production at London's Comedy Theatre in June. Kristin Scott Thomas, Douglas Henshall and Ben Miles all wore his designs. In November, Louis Vuitton unveiled a trunk created in collaboration with Grayson Perry, with his bear Alan Measles ? or at least a stunt double ? in pride of place. LV is the title sponsor of Perry's ongoing British Museum show.</p><p>3. Harsh words</p><p>In March Hermes CEO Patrick Thomas accused LVMH (Louis Vuitton Moet Hennessy) president Bernard Arnault of &quot;rape&quot;, when it was revealed that the latter had acquired a 20 per cent stake of his label. In an uncharacteristically exasperated moment in the history of a venerable status name, Thomas said: &quot;If you want to seduce a beautiful woman, you don't start by raping her from behind.&quot; That same month, Christophe Lemaire took over from Jean-Paul Gaultier as creative director of Hermes womenswear and showed his first collection there.</p><p>4. Happy birthday</p><p>On 8 April, Vivienne Westwood turned 70. Gucci celebrated its 90th birthday with the opening of a Gucci museum in its hometown of Florence in September. The Marc by Marc Jacobs collection was born a decade ago this year as was designer Peter Jensen's eponymous label ? a book was published to commemorate the event in the autumn, and last month Jensen staged a retrospective fashion show at the Victoria &amp; Albert Museum. Dazed &amp; Confused is now 20, meanwhile. Another book (Making It Up As We Go Along, published by Rizzoli) and an exhibition of pioneering photographic work (at Somerset House, central London) marked this anniversary.</p><p>5. There went the brides</p><p>While Alexander McQueen's Sarah Burton denied claims that she would be dressing Catherine Middleton for her marriage to Prince William, on 27 April she was spotted entering the Gore Hotel in Kensington where the Middletons spent the night before the wedding and the truth was out. The gown was received as a thing of great and suitably modest beauty the world over. No one could ever accuse Kim Kardashian of modesty. Kardashian commissioned no less than three wedding dresses for her marriage to Kris Humphreys on 20 August, all by Vera Wang. Wang has since designed affordable copies for lesser mortals and due to go on sale in February, some time after Ms Kardashian filed for divorce, then, which is romantic. Her marriage lasted just 72 days. Another Kate ? Ms Moss ? got married too, to long-time partner, Jamie Hince, on 2 July and wearing an ivory bias-cut slip made for her by John Galliano.</p><p>6. The rumour mill</p><p>Even before Galliano had officially parted company with Dior, the rumour mill began turning regarding his successor. Until recently, Marc Jacobs, creative director of Louis Vuitton, was considered to be frontrunner, but it is now believed that Raf Simons is the main contender. Givenchy's Riccardo Tisci, Alexander McQueen's Sarah Burton and Balenciaga's Nicolas Ghesquiere have also been cited as in the frame. While LVMH continues its search, Galliano's long-time first assistant designer, Bill Gaytten has taken over his signature line and is also caretaker at Dior.</p><p>7. Ruby slippers</p><p>On 8 April, it emerged that shoemaker to the stars, Christian Louboutin, was suing Yves Saint Laurent for using a red sole to match the upper of a new-season suede pump. Louboutin trademarked his signature sole in 2008 and asked YSL to withdraw the offending item. &quot;M Louboutin is the first designer to develop the idea of having red soles on women's shoes,&quot; his lawsuit stated. Attorneys acting on behalf of Yves Saint Laurent responded: &quot;Red outsoles are a commonly used ornamental design feature in footwear, dating as far back as the red shoes worn by King Louis XIV in the 1600s and the ruby red shoes that carried Dorothy home in The Wizard of Oz.&quot; On 10 August, at the preliminary hearing in New York, Judge Victor Marrero took such flamboyancy one step further, denying the injunction and comparing the case to a hypothetical one in which Picasso sued Monet for using the colour blue. Louboutin's lawyers have said that they will keep fighting.</p><p>8. Going Gaga</p><p>Lady Gaga took to the Paris catwalk for her friend and collaborator Nicola Formichetti's debut show for Thierry Mugler on 3 March and the media went into overdrive. It's been a busy year for Formichetti elsewhere too. Since Jil Sander's departure from Uniqlo (her final collection is in store now), he has been appointed fashion director of the Japanese high-street giant's Innovation Project while Naoki Takisawa, formerly of Issey Miyake, is its new design director. Formichetti also curated a series of T-shirts for Uniqlo ? designed by Gaga again, Alber Elbaz, Karl Lagerfeld and more ? to raise money for those affected by the earthquake in Japan.</p><p>9. High fliers</p><p>On 17 June, Prada floated on the Hong Kong stock exchange. Any interest was generated not least because it demanded full disclosure from the business, which hitherto had the luxury of keeping any figures to itself. And so it emerged that Miuccia Prada and her husband and Prada Group CEO Patrizio Bertelli earned ?10m and ?9.7m the previous year respectively, making them among the most highly paid figures in fashion.</p><p>10. Alexander the great</p><p>Savage Beauty ? an Alexander McQueen retrospective ? opened at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York on 4 May and broke all attendance levels. The show was extended for a week in August to accommodate as many visitors as possible. McQueen's contemporary, Hussein Chalayan, was also honoured with an exhibition, this time at Paris's Les Arts Decoratifs ? Mode et Textile that opened at the beginning of July.</p><p>11. Back to school</p><p>In September, the £200m Central Saint Martins redevelopment opened its doors at Granary Square, King's Cross. For the first time in the college's history, students from the fine art, graphics, fashion, drama and performance departments gathered under one enormous roof ? there's a massive 10 acres of floor space. The most famous fashion college in the world now has a working environment to match.</p><p>12. Cool Britannia</p><p>Tom Ford now thinks London Fashion Week is high-profile enough to be home to his twice-yearly women's ready-to-wear show ? he unveiled his summer collection in the British fashion capital in September. If ever there was a year when this all-too-often beleaguered event exceeded all expectations then 2011 was surely it. Unprecedented attendance levels, not to mention talent that, like Meadham Kirchhoff's, more than lives up to the hype that surrounds it notwithstanding , Italy's Camera Nazionale della Moda has fixed its autumn 2012 collection dates in direct conflict with those of the British collections. The Huffington Post described this turn of events as &quot;The Battle of the Catwalks&quot; as, despite increased pressure from all sides, Milan's designer superpowers have refused so far to budge.</p><p>13. Viva Versace</p><p>There's nothing like a well-judged collaboration and 2011 has seen its fair share. Top of the list must be Versace for H&amp;M, a baroque extravaganza that went on sale on 18 November ? La Versace went so far as to make a personal appearance at the chain's Regent Street store. The collection sold out in a matter of days and was so successful there's more to come next year. Christopher Kane's line for J Brand, which launched in November, was an equally impressive coup, featuring candy coloured denim with fashionably frayed edges, courtesy of British fashion's designer du jour. Also of note this year has been Opening Ceremony's link-ups with MM6, Rodarte, Chloe Sevigny, Pendleton and more, and M.A.C's with Cindy Sherman, Gareth Pugh and Miss Piggy. Soon to come is the make-up brand's Daphne Guinness collection. Ms Guinness also launched a fragrance ? named Daphne ? with Comme des Garcons in September.</p><p>14. Bear necessities</p><p>Whoever said the fashion industry has no heart? In November, some of this world's main protagonists gave Pudsey Bear a makeover. Erdem, Louis Vuitton, Topshop, Giles Deacon, Pringle, Mulberry and Liberty were just some of the names who took part and bears were auctioned online to raise money for Children in Need. Vuitton's Pudsey (designed by Kim Jones, named Louis Vuitton's menswear director in March) went for a massive £35,600, putting any competition, however well-intentioned, into the shade.</p><p>15. Great British brand</p><p>Never a brand to miss a trick as far as digital innovation is concerned, at London Fashion Week in September Burberry gave the world its first ever &quot;tweetwalk&quot; ? every exit appeared on Twitter moments before it made it on to the catwalk proper. Also of note, several key looks in the collection went on sale online immediately after they were shown ? normally even the most fashion obsessed consumer would have to wait a good six months to buy them. More generally, and despite global recession, this much-loved British label continued to post figures that are surely the envy of its esteemed competitors the world over.</p><p>Fashion Awards</p><p>The 2011 British Fashion Awards took place on 28 November at the Savoy Hotel. And the winners were...</p><p>Designer of the Year: Sarah Burton for Alexander McQueen</p><p>Isabella Blow Award for Fashion Creator: Sam Gainsbury</p><p>New Establishment Award: Christopher Kane</p><p>Red Carpet Award: Stella McCartney</p><p>Designer Brand: Victoria Beckham</p><p>Menswear Designer: Kim Jones</p><p>Accessory Designer: Charlotte Olympia</p><p>Outstanding Achievement Award: Paul Smith</p><p>Model of the Year: Stella Tennant</p><p>British Style Award (voted for by the British public): Alexa Chung</p><p>The contribution to fashion of stylist and editor-in-chief of LOVE magazine, Katie Grand, was acknowledged when, on 27 October, she received the Wall Street Journal Fashion Innovator Award. Grand was in elevated company. Ai Weiwei (art), Bjarke Ingels (architecture), Steve Ells (food), Elon Musk (technology), Joris Laarman (design) and The Giving Pledge (philanthropy) were among those also awarded gongs by the paper.</p><p>The Way We Wore</p><p>Looks we loved...</p><p>Block colour (best at Jil Sander). Neon (Miu Miu and Christopher Kane). Pleats (that Whistles skirt). Androgyny (everywhere from Stella McCartney to Chanel and all over the high street too). Fetish (leather leggings and Louis Vuitton latex and handcuffs). Theyskens Theory (what's not to want?). Baseball jackets (Isabel Marant's spawned a million imitations). Polka dots (so Rive Gauche). Duffel coats (think Paddington Bear). Flats (finally running is fashionable). Glitter shoes (Dorothy lives and breathes). Knee boots (in leather, rubber, wedge, spike or flat-heeled). Practical bags (from the Celine cabas to the Cambridge Company's satchels).</p><p>And weren't so sure about...</p><p>Victoriana (a nice idea but so last century). Gap flares (we tried ? and failed). Fruit prints (Prada's bananas were a timely ruse but grapefruits took things a step too far). Designer star prints (over before they had even started so easy were they for the high street to emulate). Navajo (the meaningless appropriation of faraway styles is less than desirable).</p><p>Launches to remember...</p><p>Prada costume jewellery (so true to the first lady of fashion's personal style). Make-up ranges from Tom Ford and Dolce &amp; Gabbana (what could be more glamorous?). No. 19 Poudre (a lovely new interpretation) of the original scent. Chanel Peridot (the green/gold nail colour of the year). Jonathan Saunders menswear (chic but not cheap). Current Elliott menswear (now boys can wear the most beautifully worn denim too). Eres London (the finest swimwear in the world now has its own London home).</p><p>And forget...</p><p>Lanvin childrenswear (although we hate to say it, cuteness can go too far). Lip transfers (the last word in over-embellishment). Fe jeans (sitting on silicone implants seemed like a good idea at the time but then it didn't).</p><p>And so farewell...</p><p>Elizabeth Taylor, Loulou de la Falaise, Francois Lesage and Evelyn Lauder.</p>?<p>Wendy Evans and her partner, Kate Riseborough, both 36, said that they would prefer to marry rather than have a civil partnership, as is currently allowed under English law. &quot;We just want the same rights as everyone else and part of that is the right to a conventional wedding,&quot; said Ms Evans.</p><p>Duncan Shrewsbury, 26, and his partner, Maciek Krezolek, 30, from Birmingham, were at the show to look for something &quot;out of the ordinary&quot;. &quot;We want our civil partnership ceremony to be some time in 2014 and if there is the option of a wedding at a later date it would be a good excuse for another party,&quot; said Mr Shrewsbury.</p><p>For many, the specialised nature of the show comes as a relief. Natasha Huxtable and her partner, Chloe Napier-Jones, who are due to enter into a civil partnership next September, were browsing for rings. The atmosphere at the wedding show was more relaxed, they said, because &quot;questions do not need to be asked&quot;. &quot;This show is much better for us. Because everyone knows you're a couple it's not awkward and there is no bias,&quot; said Ms Napier-Jones. &quot;At other wedding shows people get taken aback because most assume that one of us is a bridesmaid and the other is the bride.&quot;</p><p>Gino Meriano, who founded the show, said: &quot;In the gay community we just want to have all the options opened up to us. There are also people who believe it's all or nothing and if we can't have gay weddings they don't want anything at all. Basically, we want to have our cake and eat it.&quot; He added: &quot;Part of my job is to promote gay rights but more recently in the gay community it has been a case of fighting for the straight community in the battle to allow them civil partnership rights.&quot;</p><p>The show sheds light on the businesses that are springing up to cater for same-sex unions, from gay ceremony ring specialists to the wedding venue Over the Rainbow, a Georgian mansion in Pembrokeshire.</p><p>Angharad Griffin of The Griffin and the Faerie women's wedding tailors in Cardiff, said there was a gap in the market with same-sex ceremonies for women: &quot;Not every girl wants to wear a wedding dress and neither do they want to wear a man's suit. My outfits are tailored for each individual couple because everyone is different.&quot;</p><p>The Government is currently consulting on proposals for civil marriages for same-sex couples in England and Wales, with legislation promised before the next general election in 2015. Independent Voices is campaigning for equal civil marriage and religious institutions to be free to marry gay couples. A petition has been launched at Independentvoices.com.</p><p>&quot;We have been running the show for nine years and we have seen a change in attitudes, but there is still a long way to go,&quot; added Mr Meriano.</p><p>&quot;In previous years when we had the show in Cardiff City Hall, we could not display any banners outside the building for fear of a negative reaction and putting people off turning up.&quot;</p><p>Last year, 6,795 civil partnerships were formed between gay couples in the UK, which indicates a rise of 6 per cent on the figure from 2010, according to official figures. The total number of couples who have entered into civil partnerships since the bill was passed in 2005 is currently 106,834.</p><p>There have been warnings of revolt within the Conservative Party if David Cameron pushes forward with legalising gay marriage. Consultation on a Marriage Bill is expected to go ahead by April and the proposed legislation would only apply to England and Wales as the Scottish Parliament pushes ahead with its own White Paper.</p><p>The next Gay Wedding Show is slated for the same time next year at Jolyon's Hotel in Cardiff, by which time the landscape of equal rights for gay couples in England and Wales could look very different.</p><p>Altar egos: planning the big day</p><p>&quot;We're being judged either way and don't want to push against tradition too much&quot;</p><p>Ruth Mark and her partner, Emma Parton, are due to have a civil partnership ceremony on 15 February 2012 and agreed that matrimony would not make a great deal of difference to them. &quot;We are being judged either way and we do not want to push against tradition too much,&quot; said Ms Mark. However, they could not agree on the issue of whether they would want a wedding in a church.</p><p>&quot;We want a 2014 ceremony but a later wedding is an excuse for another party&quot;</p><p>Duncan Shrewsbury, 26, and his partner, Maciek Krezolek, 30, from Birmingham came to look for something &quot;out of the ordinary&quot;. &quot;We want our civil partnership ceremony to be some time in 2014 and if there is the option of a wedding at a later date it would be a good excuse for another party,&quot; Mr Shrewsbury said.</p><p>&quot;We're looking forward to being civil partners&quot;</p><p>John Jones and Kris Bell from Newbridge, South Wales, said they wanted purple kilts for their ceremony in May 2014. &quot;We are looking forward to being civil partners and we've decided to have the ceremony right here at the Pack House Club.&quot;</p>?<p>Christine Sharp, 46, was detained following the discovery of a body at her home in New Addington, near Croydon, south London, yesterday.</p><p>Her partner Stuart Hazell, 37, was arrested last night on suspicion of murder.</p><p>Ms Sharp's next-door neighbour Paul Meehan, 39, was later taken into custody on suspicion of assisting an offender.</p><p>In the wake of Mr Hazell's arrest, Scotland Yard today announced that a 46-year-old woman and 39-year-old man had also been arrested yesterday.</p><p>Sources later identified the two further suspects as Ms Sharp and Mr Meehan.</p><p>The 12-year-old girl was reported missing last Friday.</p><p>A team of forensic officers discovered the body during a fourth search of Tia's grandmother's home, prompting some to ask questions about Scotland Yard's handling of the case.</p><p>Police reportedly removed the body, which is yet to be identified, from the terraced house late last night after Mr Hazell was taken into custody.</p><p>A post-mortem examination is expected to take place in the coming days.</p><p>Police have not revealed where the body was discovered, but officers were seen taking a ladder into the property yesterday afternoon, sparking rumours that it may have been in the loft.</p><p>A dark holdall was later seen being removed from the house.</p><p>Mr Hazell was arrested in a public place - believed to be a park - in the south London borough of Merton at about 8.25pm last night.</p><p>It is understood he was identified by schoolgirl Chloe Bird, 11, shortly after he bought alcohol in an off-licence.</p><p>Her stepfather Nick Keeley, 40, said she came back home and told him that she had spotted Mr Hazell.</p><p>He said he was not then aware he was wanted by officers but when his step-daughter directed him to news reports he rang the police.</p><p>&quot;The police were here within five minutes,&quot; he told Sky News.</p><p>&quot;I hadn't even finished telling them where he was, and they were here.</p><p>&quot;There were like five cars within five minutes and then the whole area was swarmed with police.&quot;</p><p>There was a significant police presence today at the house where the body was found.</p><p>Flowers, teddy bears and candles remained near the house after neighbours and friends left tributes to Tia last night.</p><p>One message read: &quot;Rest in peace Tia. Justice will be served.&quot;</p><p>Another read: &quot;Tia Sharp, beautiful angel, taken too soon, our thoughts are with all of you.&quot;</p><p>Neighbours continued paying their respects this morning, with one woman breaking down in tears after leaving flowers.</p><p>Nicky Taylor, 46, and Shara Kinsley, 40, lit two candles for Tia.</p><p>Ms Taylor said: &quot;She's only a child, it's so sad.&quot;</p><p>A poem was left with a photo of Tia which described her as &quot;heaven's little angel&quot;.</p><p>PA</p>?<p>Yet, when Parliament returns from its summer recess, so too will the acerbic Westminster satire after a three-year hiatus.</p><p>Rebecca Front, who plays hapless MP Nicola Murray, said: &quot;The jokes write themselves in political terms,&quot; adding: &quot;The writers are so in tune with the vicissitudes of political life, that often politics follows storylines we have done.&quot;</p><p>The show cannot be reactive, she said, as it is filmed months in advance. &quot;Instead it looks at the political landscape and satirises a broader picture.&quot; While much has been kept under wraps, season four will get its teeth into a coalition government.</p><p>After a season as Secretary of State for the fictional Department of Social Affairs and Citizenship, dubbed DoSAC, Murray is now in Opposition scheming, along with foul-mouthed spin doctor Malcolm Tucker, to get back into power. &quot;I was only too delighted that the show is covering the Opposition,&quot; Front said. &quot;This is a bonus for me; I thought we might not be in it at all.&quot;</p><p>The Thick of It has been hailed alongside Yes Minister as one of the great political TV satires produced in the UK. It has twice picked up the Bafta for best sitcom. In 2010, Front and Peter Capaldi, who plays Tucker, won Baftas for best male and female performers in a comedy.</p><p>Front said the reason it works is the &quot;claustrophobic&quot; nature of politics. &quot;Westminster really is a village; it's completely up itself and self-referential. That really works in comedy terms because these people are solely obsessed by the thinking: 'How will this play and how will I look? Will the other guy look worse than me?' There's a lot of that in the next series.&quot;</p><p>Despite the venal view of politics, those working in Westminster have told Front it is actually &quot;a fairly gentle portrayal. That's when you think: 'My God, these people are really up against it. No wonder they're behaving like idiots'.&quot;</p><p>She even admits that while the programme has made her more cynical, &quot;I'm also more sympathetic&quot;. During Tory minister Chloe Smith's recent car crash interview with Jeremy Paxman, &quot;I groaned all the way through, because I could imagine it being Nicola Murray. I thought: 'Oh that poor woman, this is agony.' I found it funny afterwards. She is a government minister, and should have done better.&quot;</p><p>The major reactive nod to events, Front said, is the next series' own Leveson-style inquiry. Front said she did not see as much of the inquiry into press ethics as she would have liked, but was &quot;riveted&quot; when not filming by some of those called to give evidence. &quot;It's as big a draw as Wimbledon,&quot; she said, and revealed she was a fan of Robert Jay QC.</p><p>Front is a veteran of the satire circuit and had an association with the Thick of It creator Armando Iannucci from her early days of radio and television comedy. They worked on Radio 4's satirical news show On The Hour in 1991, which was adapted for television as The Day Today several years later, and Knowing Me, Knowing You with Alan Partridge. The pair had been contemporaries at Oxford, although were not friends at the time.</p><p>The satire first tore on to British screens in 2005 on BBC4. Iannucci said at the time he wanted to show politics as &quot;rough and messy, slightly improvised and realistic&quot; and developed it in response to a series of studied political dramas.</p><p>He invited Front to join the third season in 2009 as the new minister for DoSAC. While she was &quot;ridiculously excited&quot; by the offer, Front said: &quot;I'd watched the show since the beginning and there was a great sense of trepidation going into a fairly visible role in something you already love.&quot; On her first day, her husband waved her off with the encouraging words &quot;Please don't balls this up. It's my favourite show.&quot;</p><p>Before the character even had a name, she experienced a verbal volley from Malcolm Tucker. &quot;Armando asked us to improvise. Peter, this nice gentle man, stood up and suddenly turned into Malcolm. It was terrifying.&quot;</p><p>Yet being &quot;Tuckered&quot; as the cast call it, is a particular pleasure for Front. &quot;Peter is one of the best actors I've ever worked with, he's extraordinary. There's a real pleasure in having a scene where you're being screamed at by somebody who's a fantastic actor.&quot;</p><p>Returning for the fourth season as an established character &quot;means it's less scary going in this time round&quot;. She added: &quot;Nicola Murray is a dream character, I would be delighted to carry on playing her until she goes into some sort of politicians' retirement home or goes mad. Or both.&quot;</p><p>She defended Iannucci, who was recently criticised by Alastair Campbell, who Tucker is believed to be based on, for accepting an OBE. &quot;It's not like he's taking a seat in the House of Lords or been conferred with a superpower. Someone said: 'We like your work,' and he said: 'Thank you.' I don't see what all the fuss is about. Maybe because he's my mate.&quot;</p><p>Front has found regular comedy work since starting out in the industry, with one-off appearances to series including Al Murray's Time Gentlemen Please, to Nighty Night, The Catherine Tate Show and more recently Just William and Grandma's House with Simon Amstell. She has also taken on serious roles, most notably that of Chief Superintendent Jean Innocent in Lewis.</p><p>Currently, Front is shooting a new comedy, The Spa, for Sky Living written by Derren Litten, who also wrote comedy-drama series Benidorm. &quot;It's a bit of a departure for me, it's very much a mainstream broad comedy.&quot;</p><p>While she appears regularly on topical news shows such as Have I Got News for You and Radio 4's The News Quiz, she sees herself &quot;not as a comedian, but as an actor who does a bit of chat&quot;.</p>?<p>Her brainchild is the world's leading commercial art library. It gives its clients online access to images of over 300,000 artworks (and 750,000 historical photographs) held by the world's top galleries and museums in 8,000 locations. It has the most comprehensive system of cross-referencing imaginable. If you want 50 different images of The Last Supper, the library will track them down in seconds. If you want all three versions of Gerome's Pygmalion and Galatea, they'll find them. If you want the complete works of Velazquez or Van Dyck, they're the guys to call. Their elaborate indexing system records the artist, title, gallery and date of each picture, but also its theme, genre and significant details ? type of clothing, breed of dog, genus of plant, date-specific historic events, usefulness as period 'reference'. They license the rights to reproduce images for commercial use by publishers, greeting-card manufacturers, and movie studios in search of the right sword-and-buckler outfit in Pirates of the Caribbean. Check out the 'permissions' line on the back of any Christmas card with a Nativity scene, and you'll find the Bridgeman Art Library's name. Look at the illustrations in any biography of an artist in the past 30 years and the library's name will appear 19 times out of 20.</p><p>This spring, Viscountess Bridgeman celebrates 40 years of constant travel and the patient accumulation of the reproduction rights to the world's art. Though her empire is global, her headquarters are modest. The Library occupies a space just off Westbourne Grove, west London. In a sunlit atelier of Vermeer-like tranquility, a score of young art graduates, mostly women, sit at computer screens, fielding requests for pictures from around the world, asking a Dresden gallery if they mind having their Cranach nude featured on the cover of a retro-punk CD, telling a private caller that no, sadly they haven't any paintings of &quot;a typical Roman Christmas&quot;.</p><p>Overseeing their endeavours, Harriet Bridgeman resembles not so much a tough, monopolistic entrepreneur than an indulgent mother pigeon. Clad in voluminous lilac skirts, she glides about the office, joshing, encouraging, bigging up, calming down. She shows you the ceiling-to-floor cabinets that used to house thousands of transparencies, before the whole operation went online. She introduces you to a chap adjusting the colour tones on Gerard's Daphnis and Chloe. In her tiny office, the wall-mounted artefacts include a pair of Peter Blake's Union Jack underpants (framed). Later, over lunch, she turns out to be an excellent gossip as she evokes her past, recalls which pillars of the community turned out to be &quot;pouncers&quot; and explains, in her cut-glass voice, how she's had &quot;the perfect working life&quot;.</p><p>Born Harriet Turton in 1942 in Durham, she was one of four daughters educated at home. &quot;The governess followed a home-teaching syllabus,&quot; she said, &quot;which meant that, every month, we were sent a marvellous folder of colour reproductions with a lovely silk tassel that held everything together. It caught my imagination. It was a good way to learn.&quot; Her mother, Mary, &quot;was very intellectual, always reading us poetry and taking us to exhibitions. I grew up with art as part of the background.&quot; Her father, Ralph, was a politician who once stood as an independent candidate against Willie Whitelaw. The Turtons were well-connected with the Anglo-Irish Protestant Ascendancy, and Harriet's childhood was filled with big houses. &quot;I had a cousin with a romantic house in Cork called Ballynatray. He was wildly eccentric. He had a pack of hounds, and it was said that one of them had eaten a baby lying in a pram. But that was just a rumour.&quot;</p><p>She studied English and History of Art at Trinity College, Dublin and on graduation, walked into a job at The Lady, &quot;this rather sober women's magazine that Rachel Johnson has made more interesting. It was awfully middle-class and down-market, with pictures of the bluebells in Hyde Park. I was the youngest staffer by 30 years, so I was given all the beauty samples. I remember being asked to cover 'Teasy Weasy' Raymond's wedding in Soho Square.&quot;</p><p>Just one year later, she was in more exalted company. &quot;Somebody introduced me to Sir John Rothenstein, just retired from being Director of the Tate. He'd been asked by the British Printing Corporation to produce a new weekly art magazine called The Masters, based on an Italian journal called I Maestri del Colore. He said, 'Would you like to have lunch at the Athenaeum?'. I thought he meant the gentlemen's club, but it was the Athenaeum Hotel on Park Lane, a rather seedy place where Swedish air hostesses went.&quot;</p><p>Good heavens, I said. You don't mean he tried to... &quot;No, no,&quot; she said, with an as-if crease of the brow, &quot;we sat in a banquette for hours and to my amazement he asked me to be executive editor.&quot; She found herself in at the deep end. &quot;Sir John knew a lot of interesting people ? Miro, Chagall, Picasso. He had the right contacts. Some big names wrote for us. For the first issue, Herbert Read wrote on Vermeer; Roland Penrose on Miro.&quot; It must help the confidence of a 23-year-old ingenue to have the titans of the art world on her Rolodex. &quot;It was really hard work but I was fascinated by what I was doing.&quot;</p><p>When The Masters folded, she was given three months to think up a new magazine. She decided on Discovering Antiques (&quot;It was the time of Arthur Negus and Going for a Song on television&quot;) and, with typical efficiency, ran it from home. &quot;I'd just got married [to Robin Bridgeman, the third Viscount of the family; they have three sons] and moved into a large house in Chelsea. The publishers hadn't much space so they said, 'Why don't you work from your house and we'll send you money to pay the staff?'.&quot; Over the next six years, she edited the antiques magazine while bringing up the babies. With two women, Helena Hayward and Erica O'Donnell, who ran an art course at the V&amp;A, she started to publish books, and formed her own production company.</p><p>&quot;The editorial staff were on the top floor, and 16 picture researchers on the bottom. Because it was a weekly magazine, it required a lot of illustrations. We soon realised it was very difficult to get any.&quot; Lady Bridgeman gave an unladylike snort of disapproval at how badly organised museums were at supplying images of their paintings. &quot;The National Gallery and the Tate had skeleton picture libraries. We could send a photographer but only after the museum closed, we had to pay attendance fees, and they didn't keep transparencies afterwards. So the same pictures were being photographed several times, and museums weren't taking advantage of the only means by which they could generate income.&quot; She encountered some bizarre attitudes. &quot;I met academics who were such purists they thought it undesirable to reproduce paintings in colour. Because one mightn't be able to reproduce the colour 100 per cent true to the original, they'd only allow black-and-whites. It didn't really make much sense.&quot;</p><p>And so the Bridgeman Art Library was born in 1972. No more would commercial image-buyers have to track down paintings at galleries and museums, visiting them one by one, camera in hand. The Bridgeman could offer a one-stop destination, offering excellent large transparencies of key paintings.</p><p>She travelled across England, visiting obscure museums, signing up their collections. How did they respond? &quot;Some said to me, 'It's a win-win situation' because they didn't have to put any money upfront ? all they had to do was bank a cheque every quarter. We promised to give them 50 per cent of every fee we received, whether it was for education or publishing or advertising.&quot; On her royal progress, she was startled by the lack of local knowledge, &quot;the amazement of getting off a train somewhere like Preston, asking where the local art gallery was, and finding that nobody knew. It was a revelation of how uninterested we are in the treasures we have.&quot; She signed them up anyway, in Bristol, Exeter, Wolverhampton, Accrington... Her trip paid off. When the Royal Academy in 1998 exhibited Art Treasures of England: the Regional Collections, Harriet's library represented 98 per cent of them. It was, she said, &quot;a moment of triumph&quot;.</p><p>Her library rolled across Europe, visiting galleries, acquiring collections, and discovering what had become of arts and books during the war. &quot;One of the most tragic stories I heard was about a castle near Prague that housed an extraordinary collection of books dating back to the Dukes of Habsburg. The Nazis invaded the library, pitchforked the books out into carts and took them away to burn, all these wonderful, irreplaceable manuscripts. The librarian was so heartbroken, he flung himself out the upper window and committed suicide. The barbarity of it sticks in my memory.&quot;</p><p>She gradually wore down the defences of Mark Getty, owner of Giraudon, the 125-year-old archive of French art (&quot;they've photographed the Louvre and all the provincial galleries&quot;) and persuaded him to sell it to her. She opened offices in France, Germany ? and America, where her only rival is Art Resource, run since 1968 by Theodore Feder, and able to boast 450,000 fine art images from around the world. &quot;But we represent four times as many of the American museums as they do,&quot; said Harriet. &quot;We've done incredibly well.&quot;</p><p>So well indeed that she has found herself invited across the pond to have her brains picked by the Yanks. &quot;I was asked to go and talk at a museum in Kansas. I felt like that painting ? And When Did You Last See Your Father? ? as I sat facing 16 people at an enormous table, telling them what we were doing in England and how new technology was coming to our aid. It felt amazing that I should be talking to a superpower, way ahead of us, about such things. But they've been very slow in coming to the table.&quot;</p><p>She herself shows few signs of slowing down. In 2006, a year after being voted International Business Woman of the Year, she set up the Artists' Collecting Society to streamline the collection of royalties on Artists' Resale Rights ? so that, every time an artist's work is re-sold on the commercial art market, the artist gets a percentage of the sale price. Unsurprisingly, many big-name artists clamoured to be represented ? especially after Lucian Freud received £22,000 in extra royalties over six months.</p><p>Everyone, you see ? all the galleries, all the museums, all the artists ? wants to be in Harriet's gang. Everyone wants to have this shrewd, persuasive, rather raffish British aristocrat on their side, handling the copyright to their artworks, cutting deals with the image-making world, insisting on fairness for all, bringing the finest of fine arts to the biggest possible audience. Just as she once had beautiful images delivered every month to her door ? as if by magic, bound with a silk tassel like a gift from the gods.</p>?<p>And the time when, for a few godforsaken months after a particularly ferocious storm bent our aerial, we were forced to watch the local news from Hull rather than from Leeds. That taught me a lot, not only about the bathetic tragedy of the human condition but also about Hull's premiere aquarium, The Deep. It's actually the Humber's only surviving tourist attraction, seeing as the rest of them have already fallen (or jumped) off the cliffs and into the sea.</p><p>It's precisely this seam of mediocrity that Steve Coogan has mined for his latest Alan Partridge venture. And before anyone accuses me of being all metropolitan and sneery, let me also point out that it has been at the heart(ridge) of Partridge since day one. He's a depressing and slightly tawdry character built from the pomposity of the distinctly average, for a knowing middle-class fanbase that revels in poking fun at such things. There's even a Guardian joke thrown in to highlight his provincial bigotry, so we know it's OK to laugh.</p><p>Welcome to the Places of My Life is a charming info-mercial for the his native Norfolk ? &quot;the plump peninsula, the Wales of the East&quot; ? co-produced with the Norwich Chamber of Commerce. It's a &quot;Partridge pilgrimage, or a Partrimage, a pilgrimartridge&quot;, and it makes for a rich feast of snide laughs and superb characterisation crafted from the crass crumbs of some of bad telly's most pompous banquets. Apparently, Hitler had intended to use Norwich City Hall as his base, had the invasion gone as planned.</p><p>&quot;The more I learn about Hitler,&quot; Partridge intones meaningfully, &quot;the more I dislike him.&quot; I was reminded of that old adage about Les Dawson ? that to play the piano that badly on purpose, you actually have to be rather good at it. By that token, Steve Coogan is a consummate pianist, not to mention writer and producer, given the brilliant slip-ups that his protagonist hands us with every cyclist he abuses, every rolled &quot;r&quot; and micro-expression, every accidental overdose of prescription drugs.</p><p>We might not be grateful for the existence of David Starkey very often, but the mock-canticle theme tune (sung, we can infer from its nasal tones, by Alan himself), the disembodied shouts from Norwich councillors past as they debate the issue of city centre parking after 7pm, the earnest walk-throughs and quasi-intellectual register have all the hallmarks of that historian's grandiloquent one-man shows. (You can expect your local pub to resound with cries of &quot;brouhaha!&quot; every time the saloon doors twitch from now on).</p><p>The strengths ? that is to say, the inherent crapness ? of this genre give our old friend a new dimension. As Alan interviews a local hydrotherapist, the grunts of him trying not to drown are brilliantly audible throughout her pieces to camera. When it pans back, he is floating competently in the shallows, his reactions re-recorded post-production to save not only his face, but his elaborate pompadour too.</p><p>Some of the best bits of Welcome to the Places of My Life are when we get a sense of the cameras rolling for about four seconds longer than they should have done, just like in Knowing Me, Knowing You, Partridge's first TV outing, but also to what Coogan himself is mocking ? the overblown ceremony and rubbish incompetence of low-budget telly.</p><p>And it's the deliberate roughness that really sticks in the mind. Because in this age of high gloss and HBO, there's a real danger that some of our worst regional programming could well die a death.</p><p>No doubt, that's what we think we want. But then where would we be? Poking fun at glossy vacuous crap that even the producers know is rubbish isn't half as satisfying as laughing at something someone you probably don't like thinks is a masterful piece of broadcasting. And that is the point of Alan Partridge. Aha!</p><p>Harriet's marmalade dropper</p><p>The exchange between MP Chloe Smith and Paxo. &quot;Do you think you're incompetent?&quot; he asked. Was he attacking her because she was a woman in a pink suit? No, it was because she was an idiot.</p>?<p>She was moved from the Treasury to the Cabinet Office in the recent reshuffle, and yesterday it was announced that she will be taking responsibility for overseeing the Government's preparation of a statutory lobbying register.</p><p>But one of the main groups representing Britain's lobbyists got off to an uneasy start with the new minister yesterday after it included unflattering remarks about her in a press release responding to her appointment.</p><p>The PRCA, the professional body that represents UK PR consultancies, sent a statement to journalists calling on Chloe Smith to &quot;listen and engage&quot; with the industry over Government plans for a statutory register of lobbyists.</p><p>But in a sentence unlikely to be included in any &quot;good PR&quot; manual, it added: &quot;Smith has joined the Cabinet Office from the Treasury, where she was best known for her poor performance when interviewed by Newsnight's Jeremy Paxman&quot;.</p><p>While undeniably true, the indelicate statement raised eyebrows. It was later withdrawn but not before it was picked up and publicised by the Guido Fawkes political gossip website.</p><p>Ms Smith was considered something of a rising government star until being savaged by Jeremy Paxman for her inability to expain the Chancellor's sudden decision to drop the planned 3p rise in May ? at the height of the &quot;omnishambles&quot; fall-out from the Budget.</p><p>Under the Government's present plans only external consultants ? not in-house lobbyists ? would have to sign up to the register. Bodies such as the PRCA want all lobbyists included.</p>?<p>But a decade after an opulent toga party in Cyprus it appears that the retail tycoon is finally slowing down.</p><p>The owner of the Arcadia group, which includes Topshop and Bhs, celebrates his birthday on 15 March, and his wife, Tina, is organising a multimillion-pound party to mark the event with the singer Adele rumoured to be appearing. He will share the celebrations with his daughter, Chloe, whose 21st birthday is two weeks earlier.</p><p>As in the past, Lady Green has fiercely guarded the details of the party, with guests given the location of the airport and told to pack &quot;warm weather&quot; clothing. They will then be flown to the mystery resort by private jet.</p><p>The retail tycoon has had some of pop music's most recognisable names perform at his parties in the past, and according to reports, Lady Green has approached Adele to appear.</p><p>For his 50th birthday, Sir Philip spent an estimated £5m on flying 219 friends to Cyprus, for a four-day bash that culminated in a toga party on the final evening. The entertainment included Tom Jones as well as Rod Stewart, who was reportedly paid £750,000.</p><p>Five years later, he marked his birthday with a lavish, five-day celebration at the Maldives resort of Soneva Fushi, where singers George Michael and Jennifer Lopez performed.</p><p>Last year's event was held at the exclusive Belgravia dining club Mosimann's. Kate Moss, the supermodel who calls the retailer &quot;Uncle Phil&quot; and has designed a fashion collection for Topshop, was among the guests as was Simon Cowell. The entertainment was provided by the classical singer Katherine Jenkins.</p><p>Sir Philip has also spent big on his children's parties. His son Brandon's bar mitzvah in the south of France is believed to have cost £4m. He flew 300 guests to the Grand-Hotel du Cap Ferrat in France, with performances by Beyonce and Andrea Bocelli.</p>?<p>Professor MacCulloch, presenter of BBC series A History of Christianity, said that breaking up the Mendham Collection, which has been held in Canterbury Cathedral since 1984, would undermine academic research. The Law Society of England and Wales, which was bequeathed the collection by Sophia Mendham in 1869, decided to sell 300 books from the 5,000-strong collection despite an agreement allowing the cathedral and university to keep the books until December 2013.</p><p>MacCulloch, Professor of the History of the Church in the University of Oxford, is among hundreds of scholars who have signed an online petition against the decision. He told The Independent: &quot;These libraries and manuscripts are the heritage of everyone, not just of the organisations who currently own them. Collections lose their value when they are dispersed, especially when as in the case of the Mendham collection they have annotations from the person who built them up.&quot;</p><p>Canterbury Cathedral and the University of Kent were told in April that items from the collection were going to be put up for auction. Historians from the cathedral and the university claim they were given only 72 hours to put in a bid.</p><p>A Law Society spokesperson said the auction will not take place until November, allowing further time for offers to be made.</p>?<p>The hosts struggled without the services of captain and most experienced player Kate Walsh, who watched the match from her hospital bed as she recovers from having a plate inserted in a broken jaw.</p><p>Aside from leaking goals from a leading position the sight of striker Alex Danson being carried off on a stretcher with an ankle injury was the last thing GB wanted having seen Walsh receive a stick inthe face on the very same corner of turf on Sunday.</p><p>Nic White and Crista Cullen had given the hosts a 2-0 lead and although they were initially pegged back Danson restored the two-goal cushion.</p><p>However, Korea stunned the Riverbank Arena with two quick goals but GB bounced back with Georgie Twigg and Chloe Rogers scoring the goals which took them top of Pool A after two matches.</p><p>The game could not have begun better with a brilliant run from White out on the right bringing the first goal in the sixth minute.</p><p>Her dipping shot, having cut into the circle, should have been dealt with by Jang Soo-ji but she allowed it to sneak under her foot.</p><p>But midway through the half Korea levelled when a defensive mix-up between Rogers and goalkeeper Beth Storry enabled Kim Darae to poke home from close range.</p><p>But 10 minutes before half-time GB restored their lead when Cullen produced a low penalty corner flick.</p><p>It was to prove the end for Jang, patently at fault for the firstgoal, who was immediately replaced by Moon Young-hui and returned to the bench to receive a torrent of harsh words from the coaching staff.</p><p>Within three minutes of the second half starting GB had extended their lead.</p><p>A driving run from Helen Richardson won a penalty corner and whenCullen flicked low Danson dived across her marker and slid her stick into the path of the ball to divert it past Moon.</p><p>From that point it began to unravel somewhat as Han Hye-lyoung fired a penalty corner move through Storry's legs and then a long pass from the inside-left picked out the unmarked Park Mi-hyun to deflect in at the far post.</p><p>But after hours and hours with the psychologist this team is madeof sterner stuff and they bounced back with two goals in quick succession.</p><p>With Cullen off the pitch the regular corner routine broke down but when Richardson returned the ball back into the circle Twigg was on hand to reverse-sweep home from close range.</p><p>And when Wales international Sarah Thomas cut in from the left her pass across goal was tapped in by Rogers.</p><p>Danson's departure on a stretcher late on was a concern having already lost Walsh, who has not ruled out making a comeback at these Games yet, but it may be the spirit within the camp will see them through such adversities.</p><p>PA</p>?<p>Aides to the Deputy Prime Minister have been only too keen to leak embarrassing details of life as the Government’s junior partners, the writers of the Bafta-winning series have revealed.</p><p>The fourth series of Armando Iannucci’s acclaimed comedy, which spawned Westminster’s post-Budget buzz-phrase “Omnishambles”, will air on BBC2 next month.</p><p>Real life is reflected with the Opposition now in government but forced to share office-space with their ambitious junior coalition partners, known as “The Inbetweeners”.</p><p>Malcolm Tucker, the fearsome former No 10 enforcer, is at bay. In a shock turn of events, Nicola Murray, the previous “Dosac” department minister, has become Leader of the Opposition after accidentally winning an election through a block vote mechanism no-one can quite understand. Murray, although no less inept, is now Tucker’s boss.</p><p>There are big changes in Whitehall, where Peter Mannion, the world-weary opposition MP with more than a touch of Kenneth Clarke, finally takes over the Social Affairs department. But he has to live with a “Lib Dem” junior minister, keen to make his mark, who publicly contradicts any policies Mannion dares to put forward.</p><p>Did the producers have a high-grade Coalition source? Sean Gray, series writer, said: “Armando got an email after a political awards. The person said ‘I’m working in Nick Clegg’s office until June. I’ll let you know what happened after that.’”</p><p>Gray did not disclose if the offer was followed-up. His co-writer Roger Drew added that a female member of David Cameron’s press office also approached the writers at a Westminster screening of Veep, the HBO political satire that the pair penned with Iannucci.</p><p>Adam Tandy, producer, said: “We don’t think anyone had a meeting but we keep our ear to the ground. We don’t have any deep sources - apart from Nick Clegg.” The writers employ a political adviser based at the BBC’s Millbank studios who helps them gauge the mood of the Coalition.</p><p>Nicola Murray’s elevation was sealed after Ed Miliband won Labour’s leadership election. She was initially going to be deputy leader. Gray said: “Nicola has somehow gone from being inept to becoming leader through strange mathematics. Ed winning made it feasible that Nicola could be leader.”</p><p>In a political world where Boris Johnson gets stuck on a zip-wire, Treasury Minister Chloe Smith is mauled on Newsnight and U-turns are forced over a pasty tax, the writers’ biggest problem is staying ahead of events.</p><p>Tandy said: “There are things we say we couldn’t put in the script because no-one would believe it. Then Jeremy Hunt did his bell-ringing (where the bell flew off). And he’s still got a job. We get very lucky sometimes.”</p><p>At one point the writers feared that a script leak had been turned into Whitehall policy. The opening episode finds Mannion announcing the “silicon playground” ? school children design apps for free, with the profits offset against future university tuition fees.</p><p>“Next day Michael Gove announced exactly the same policy,” complained Gray. The Education Secretary backed a cheap computer circuit board, the Raspberry Pi, which he wants children to use in schools to develop their programming skills. Drew said: “We thought ‘the fucker’s nicked our material’. There’s been a leak and they’ve decided to use material from our show.”</p><p>A judicial inquiry, sucking in ministers and advisers, provides the backdrop for the new series, although the subject is not phone-hacking. The promise of a 5-year Coalition allowed the team to “reboot” the series. Tandy said: “We’ve embraced wholeheartedly the fact that no-one won the election. Peter Mannion has to share his office with an upstart schoolboy.”</p><p>Roger Allam, who plays Mannion, said: “The Coalition means there’s even more conflict and less possibility of anyone being happy. No-one’s in real power.”</p><p>Will Smith, a series writer who plays Mannion’s adviser Phil Smith, said: “The Lib Dems are keen to show they can work harder and can be as tough as the larger party. We were hearing that the Coalition parties were getting on with each other and the tensions were actually within each party. Luckily for us by the time we filmed the series it was starting to come apart a bit more.”</p><p>Smith admits: “When Francis Maude told people to fill up the jerry cans in their garage, that was rather like a scene we would have done. It was so ludicrous that this could actually happen.”</p><p>Who’s who?</p><p>Fergus Williams (Junior Minister, DOSAC, Coalition) , played by Geoffrey Streatfeild</p><p>Upwardly-mobile “Lib Dem” arriviste complains when his “network nation” policy is mangled by “Tory” boss Mannion. Ministerial inspiration could include Steve Webb and Jeremy Browne.</p><p>Helen Hatley (Special adviser to Leader of the Opposition), played by Rebecca Gethings</p><p>Controlling influence over Nicola Murray, thwarting Malcolm Tucker. “More of a carer than an adviser”. Ed Miliband’s private office has included Polly Billington, Lucy Powell and Ayesha Hazarika. (nb- past tense, they have now quit)</p><p>Stewart Pearson (Director of Communications, Government), played by Vincent Franklin</p><p>Blue-sky thinker whose “touchy-feely” policies are sidelined in Downing Street as Coalition faces daily crises. Bears close comparison to Steve Hilton, David Cameron’s departed policy guru.</p><p>Malcolm Tucker (Media advisor, Opposition), played by Peter Capaldi</p><p>Muted in opposition, berates Murray for not being hungry enough for power. “You’ve got be a Hutu, hacking your way through the fucking opposition.” Former Times political journalist Tom Baldwin is Ed Miliband’s strategy chief.</p><p>Peter Mannion MP (Minister of DOSAC, Coalition government), played by Roger Allam</p><p>Old-school, lazy Tory, behind the curve on technology who confuses “silicon playground” policy with “Fibre-optic Fagins”. Allam calls him “a Ken Clarke who has never held the big offices of State”.</p><p>Glenn Cullen (Fourth sector guru, Government), played by James Smith &amp; Olly Reeder (Special advisor to leader of the Opposition), played by Chris Addison</p><p>The former Dosac advisers split up with Cullen “crossing the floor” to work with the Coalition while Reeder spars with Tucker in the Opposition leader’s office.</p>?<p>This is the demographic courted by politicians as Britain's loyal army of &quot;hard-working families&quot;. Yet while much of their attention on yesterday's Budget was focused, naturally, on the future of child benefit, for the mothers and fathers juggling jobs and childcare, the issues stretched far beyond, into the travails of the wider economy.</p><p>Student nurse Nicola Palmer, 21, was collecting her daughter Chloe, two. She said she and her partner would benefit from the increased lower tax threshold but the few hundred pounds extra this would glean would be swallowed up by their outgoings.</p><p>Between them, they currently get by on £10,000 a year; £6,500 from her nurse's bursary and the balance made up by her partner, who despite graduating last summer in finance and investment management is barely turning a profit working for himself.</p><p>She agreed that the very well off had often worked hard to achieve high salaries, although not all of them ? and that they didn't merit a tax break when so many others were struggling. &quot;Sometimes people at the top end do a lot less than I do for not even a quarter of their salary,&quot; she said. &quot;I still graft hard but as a nurse I will never earn anything like that amount of money, ever.&quot;</p><p>In the car park, Michael Johnson, 42, who has two children including a seven-month-old, said the region's economic woes were brought home last month when he lost his job in sales and marketing.</p><p>Since then he has yet to get an interview and, with his wife on maternity leave, the young family are struggling to make ends meet. He is considering retraining as a teacher.</p><p>&quot;I had a relatively good job with good pay but what we get in benefits does not cover anything. The mortgage is double what we receive and there is no help with childcare. You just don't realise how little you get when you are made redundant,&quot; he said.</p><p>The sense of middle-class anxiety was evident among all parents. &quot;I work within the NHS but I don't know if there is any such thing as a secure job any more,&quot; said Carol Ellen Starkie, 38, a doctor and mother of two whose husband is self-employed.</p><p>Each works four days a week so that they can be there for their children. &quot;The people that are earning more should pay more yes, but the Government should look at families as a whole. My husband and I work as a team. You can have one person earning a huge amount but changes should be based on joint earnings,&quot; she said.</p><p>Nursery principal Liz Cook said many parents have been working longer hours and were finding new ways to cope since the recession.</p><p>&quot;Over the last couple of years our overall numbers have been consistent. The number of different children attending has increased because parents are reducing days and using family for childcare instead,&quot; she said.</p>?<p>Consumer Prices Index (CPI) inflation dropped to 2.4 per cent last month, its lowest level since December 2009, according to figures released by the Office for National Statistics (ONS).</p><p>The fall was driven by lower clothing and footwear prices, which declined by 4.2 per cent over the month. </p><p>The ONS ascribed this to retailers starting their summer sales earlier than last year.</p><p>Transport prices also fell 0.5 per cent, due to lower petrol prices which were down 3 per cent in June.</p><p>The consensus of City analysts was that CPI inflation would remain at the 2.8 per cent level recorded in May. Instead, it fell for the third straight month, prompting some economists to argue that inflation will now retreat to the Bank of England's official two per cent target before the end of 2012.</p><p>&quot;Inflation is finally within sight of the target and we expect it to be well below the target by the end of the year,&quot; said Vicky Redwood, of Capital Economics. </p><p>&quot;Evidence is building that the weak activity and large amounts of spare capacity in the economy are bearing down on underlying price pressures&quot;.</p><p>The Bank of England will certainly be relieved by the figures, after its Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) voted this month to increase its £325bn quantitative easing programme by £50bn to support the economy. </p><p>Some MPC members had expressed concerns that monetary stimulus was feeding through into higher inflation.</p><p>However, price rises are still outstripping pay growth, with total income growing by around 1.4 per cent, according to the ONS's most recent figures. </p><p>&quot;The chances of a sharp upturn in domestic consumer spending driving an upturn in recovery prospects look low,&quot; said Victoria Clarke of Investec.</p><p>Chloe Smith, the Economic Secretary to the Treasury, said: &quot;Inflation has more than halved since September, meaning a little less pressure on family budgets.&quot;</p>?<p>The Consumer Price Index (CPI) rate of inflation fell to 3% in April, compared with 3.5% in March, its lowest level since February 2010, the Office for National Statistics (ONS) said.</p><p>In further evidence that the weak economic climate is forcing retailers to cut prices to draw in customers, clothing and footwear prices rose by just 0.2% in the period compared with 1.4% last year.</p><p>And softer excise duty rises on alcohol and tobacco, as well as lower air fares due to the timing of Easter, also helped keep a lid on the rising cost of living.</p><p>Bank of England Governor Sir Mervyn King narrowly avoided sending his 10th “Dear Chancellor” letter to explain why inflation is higher than the Government's 2% target, as at 3% it is now within one percentage point of that goal.</p><p>Inflation has fallen from 5.6% last September due to the waning impact of the VAT hike at the start of 2011, falling energy, food and commodity prices and a number of bill cuts from utility providers.</p><p>However, it has not dropped as quickly as the Bank of England expected after fears over increasing tensions between the West and Iran pushed oil prices higher in March.</p><p>The sharp decrease in inflation in April is likely to bolster the case for the Bank to pump more emergency cash into the economy through its quantitative easing programme.</p><p>The economy entered a technical recession in the first quarter of the year as gross domestic product declined 0.2%, following a 0.3% drop in the final quarter of 2011.</p><p>Chloe Smith, the economic secretary to the Treasury, said: &quot;Inflation is down and back within the target range for the first time since 2010, which is good news and will provide some welcome relief for family budgets.&quot;</p><p>The most significant downward pressure on prices in April came from the transport sector, which saw prices rise 1.2% compared with a 2.8% rise the previous year.</p><p>The largest downward effect came from air transport where the timing of Easter meant fares rose 7.4% compared with a huge 29% surge last year.</p><p>A smaller downward impact came from second-hand cars, the ONS said, where prices rose by less than a year ago.</p><p>Alcohol and tobacco prices rose 2.9%, compared with a record 5.3% rise last year, as excise duty rises in the March Budget had a smaller impact on overall prices.</p><p>The softer rise in clothing prices was driven by cheaper womenswear, the ONS said.</p><p>Retailers have kept prices low and sacrificed profit margins in a bid to draw in cash-strapped consumers, whose confidence has been knocked by the weak economic climate.</p><p>The most significant upward contribution came from restaurant and hotel prices, which rose 1% compared with a 0.6% increase a year ago.</p><p>Housing and household services also had an upward effect as lower utility bills were overshadowed by higher rents.</p><p>Alternative measures of inflation also fell, as the Retail Price Index fell to 3.5% from 3.6% in the period.</p><p>The Chancellor of the Exchequer welcomed today's drop in inflation.</p><p>Speaking at a press conference in the Treasury, George Osborne said: &quot;It means that for the first time since I became Chancellor, I have not this morning received a letter from the Governor of the Bank of England explaining why inflation is off-target. Indeed, it is the first time since 2009 this has happened.</p><p>&quot;This brings welcome relief to families on tight budgets and the Bank of England expects inflation to continue to fall further over the next year or so.</p><p>&quot;Unemployment has also fallen this month, but it remains too high and we need to do even more to help.&quot;</p><p>Labour Treasury spokeswoman Catherine McKinnell said: &quot;The fall in the rate of inflationis welcome as last year's VAT rise continues to drop out of the figures. But families and pensioners are facing a harsh squeeze on theirincomes from the Government's policies.</p><p>&quot;The independent Institute for Fiscal Studies says a family with children will lose an average of £511 from changes coming into force this year. And while millions are paying more, the Government is giving a£3 billion tax cut to millionaires.</p><p>&quot;With the economy pushed into recession by this Government's economic mistakes, those on low and middle incomes are paying a heavy price from this out-of-touch Government's unfair choices.&quot;</p><p>PA</p>?<p>Beckham's Bodywear range was launched at H&amp;M last Thursday, while vest sales have risen over the past year for the Jockey underwear brand; and it is predicted that sales of the notoriously difficult-to-pull-off-with-style (think Rab C Nesbitt) garment will rise even further.</p><p>H&amp;M's Chloe Bowers said: &quot;The vest has become cool, with old-fashioned granddad styles worn under clothes, and as a top itself. Women have also been buying them for themselves; it appeals to both teenagers and 40-year-olds.&quot;</p><p>Ruth Stevens, marketing manager for Jockey Europe, said: &quot;We are seeing a massive fashion following, with magazine photo-shoots concentrating on vests. Vogue recently did a shoot with women wearing Jockey vests.&quot;</p><p>Last year, Jockey sales rose by 5 per cent. &quot;It's for fashion, not just keeping warm,&quot; Ms Stevens said. &quot;Traditional-style underwear is gaining in popularity, with a resurgence in popularity for Y-fronts in 2010, and a 15 per cent rise in long-john sales this year.&quot; Jockey introduced coloured vests last year, though white tank vests remain the classic.</p><p>Across the UK, the men's vest market has grown from £49m in 2005 to £54m in 2010, according to Mintel. Sales of women's vests are rising too, with lingerie ? excluding bras, pants and hosiery ? increasing from £325m in 2005 to £368m in 2010.</p><p>Marshal Cohen, of the NPD market research firm, said: &quot;Sales growth is now in undershirts. Men have recognised they can't do shabby chic and look like they just rolled out of bed.&quot;</p><p>Rana Reeves, of the John Doe consultancy, said: &quot;There used to be two sets of men wearing vests as fashion: gay men showing off their bodies in clubs, and Afro-Caribbean guys. Fashion is obsessed with both, and their styles have been appropriated as they offer a form of masculinity the fashion world likes to emulate.&quot;</p>?<p>Claims that sex-grooming rings have operated with impunity in several British cities, the low numbers listed in the sex crime prosecution statistics, and cases such as that of the so-called black cab rapist ? John Worboys, the London cabby believed to be Britain's most prolific sex attacker, jailed in 2009 ? have fuelled fears that advances made since the Thames Valley scandal are being lost.</p><p>As many as 400,000 women are sexually assaulted and 80,000 women raped each year, according to the authoritative British Crime Survey, yet only 11 per cent of victims report crimes to the police. While numbers of rapes recorded by police rose by 3, 261 (26 per cent) in the past three years, police insist the increase is not because of a rise in offences, but rather that victims have more confidence that police and prosecutors will deal with cases sensitively and professionally, as well as there being better links between police and outside agencies to which rape victims turn. The Home Office acknowledges the rise is a &quot;real cause for concern&quot;, but insists that improvements are being made.</p><p>The issue comes under a harsh spotlight on Friday, when Ryan Coleman-Farrow, 30, a former officer in the Metropolitan Police's Sapphire Unit, which investigates rape and other serious sexual assault ? lauded as the &quot;gold-standard&quot; of sex crime investigation ? will be sentenced at London's Southwark Crown Court after admitting to failing to investigate rape cases properly and falsifying records. Eleven suspected sex attackers are said to have escaped justice because Coleman-Farrow, described in court as a &quot;rogue officer&quot;, ignored allegations and then covered up his inaction. One woman involved in a case dealt with by the disgraced officer later committed suicide.</p><p>The Crown Prosecution Service is examining similar charges against a second officer from Sapphire Unit, and the Independent Police Complaints Commission has launched an inquiry into its operation.</p><p>Vera Baird, QC, a former solicitor general, said yesterday: &quot;Savile, Rochdale, and, in a secondary way, the Assange/Galloway devaluing of rape all make clear that there are counter winds blowing all the time on these issues. Now that nobody is driving it forward, the whole sex crime agenda in government is going backwards at a rapid rate.&quot;</p><p>Dr Jane Monckton-Smith, a criminologist at Gloucestershire University, said: &quot;I absolutely do despair that the police haven't learnt more lessons. The biggest reason is our incredible reluctance to believe women who come forward. It's all down to culpability. The more culpable the women is perceived to be, the less she is believed.&quot; </p><p>Dr Monckton-Smith, a former police officer, added: &quot;We've got the?wrong picture of what a rapist?looks like in our collective imagination. We think they're monsters, but they're not. They're ordinary people. We haven't got rid of the idea that most people are suspicious of a woman making a claim of rape if she doesn't present as extremely traumatised. If she's not screaming and crying, it makes her less believable. We look for a stereotypical jump-out-of-the-bushes rapist to substantiate a story. If it's?just some guy in a suit, then people can't see it as a straightforward case. </p><p>&quot;The Worboys case shows that some things haven't changed. There is still that macho canteen culture, which affects policewomen as well. It runs through society in general.&quot; </p><p>The criminologist and film-maker Roger Graef, who made the 1982 Thames Valley Police documentary, said the major problem is that rape and other sex crimes &quot;do not fit&quot; the stereotype of what the police deem a real crime. &quot;There's a suspicion built into the investigation of sex crimes that women ask for it. Juries also feel that,&quot; he said. The Worboys case was &quot;just bad policing&quot;, he said. &quot;There's no excuse. It is indicative of the default sexism that is built into the ordinary policing culture.&quot;</p><p>Dr Kate Cook, a senior law lecturer at Manchester Metropolitan University, said the Savile allegations would &quot;upset a lot of abused young women&quot;. &quot;It's incredibly hard to know that this man may have been protected until he died. How many men in the public eye are doing the same?&quot; According to Dr Cook, one in four girls is hurt by a man before the age of 16. </p><p>&quot;Police are continually revealed as just not taking this seriously enough,&quot; she said. &quot;We need specialist officers who are allowed to stay in that position for a long period of time and develop skills and expertise. They often get moved on, so no one really develops the kind of skills that you need to deal with victims of abuse.&quot;</p><p>Advances in investigating sex crimes and the treatment of victims since the mid-1980s amounted to a &quot;beginning&quot;, but were still &quot;not enough&quot;, she added.</p><p>&quot;There are still a lot of improvements to come. Repeat rapists have not been adequately investigated. Police officers have to learn to listen in a different way,&quot; she said.</p><p>The reality of this is illustrated disturbingly in a case investigated by The Independent on Sunday. A high-flying female banker who reported being drugged and sexually assaulted by a colleague in a London wine bar later discovered widespread failures in the initial police investigation. The failures included many highlighted in the IPCC investigation into the Worboys case, which the Metropolitan Police said they had rectified only months earlier.</p><p>Vera Baird described the case as &quot;horrifying&quot;. &quot;This case is shocking because the Met have been so recently criticised over Worboys, who used the same rape drug and yet still they didn't respond well. It is amazing that even when the police had a highly articulate woman fully prepared to stand the strain of being a witness, they treated her in this dismissive way. I worry about how more vulnerable women are treated.&quot; </p><p>Expert view</p><p>By Dr Nicole Westmarland, senior lecturer in criminology at Durham University and former chair of Rape Crisis</p><p>Anyone thinking that the Jimmy Savile case is a one-off product of another era should think again. Look at the recent cases in Rochdale and you see that abuse is still swept under the carpet. People don't want to see the possibility of abuse happening on their doorstep by their friends, their family and colleagues.</p><p>We are still failing victims of rape and we need to make it easier for people to come forward. When the Savile story broke, the first questions asked on radio phone-ins were &quot;are the women lying?&quot; and &quot;why didn't they come forward before?&quot; We're not starting from a position of believing victims.</p><p>If you report a rape today to the police you will get a better response than before, but it still needs to improve. There's this &quot;real rape&quot; stereotype, where not just members of the jury but victims, too, feel as if certain acts are rape and others are just &quot;something else&quot;. Things like getting drunk and not knowing what happened, being pressured into having sex when they didn't want it, or being taken advantage of. There has to be more effort put into targeting men who are continually preying on young girls and women who aren't able to consent. I think that if a famous person today in a powerful position was having sex with 14- or 15-year-olds and openly targeting them, they probably would be reported. But if those girls were 16 and 17 and drunk or taking drugs, it would still happen and get swept under the carpet. And the victims would blame themselves.</p><p>We know that about nine out of 10 victims who ring Rape Crisis never report to the police. I've just finished a study on why victims don't come forward, and many said it was a lack of trust in the police.</p><p>A recent report by the Independent Police Complaints Commission showed many cases where police officers used their position to make vulnerable women have sex with them. Society is just catching up to the idea that that is called rape.</p><p>There needs to be more awareness about what rape is. If someone doesn't want to have sex they shouldn't have to, regardless of how much alcohol they've had, how much power someone has over them ? or if their abuser is famous.</p>?<p>The reality is completely different. Instead of weighty proclamations, there are sardonic one-liners. In place of furrowed brows, frequent laughter and a fine line in self-mockery. It's as though you turned up to meet Dawson Leery and found his best friend Pacey Witter there instead.</p><p>&quot;I think there was a time during and post-Dawson's Creek when I took myself too seriously and felt I had something to lose,&quot; Van Der Beek says with a slightly incredulous laugh. &quot;Plus, there's the whole thing about doing a teen show and having young fans and they're supposed to see you in a certain way...&quot; Arguably some of them still do. When I mention to friends that I'm interviewing Van Der Beek, five out of them gasp: &quot;Oh my God, Dawson.&quot; The sixth sniffs: &quot;I always preferred Pacey.&quot;</p><p>Such is the curse of teen drama. Van Der Beek, now 35, played Dawson Leery, melodramatic deliverer of angst-ridden dialogues, would-be Spielberg, uncertain seducer of Joey Potter and possessor of television's most over-the-top crying face, for six years from 1998 until 2003. And, just as to many thirtysomethings Claire Danes will always be Angela Chase, no matter how many terrorists she obsessively tracks down on Homeland, so too is Van Der Beek forever Dawson.</p><p>Luckily it's not an association he minds, these days at least. &quot;In retrospect I look back and I'm grateful,&quot; he says. &quot;But it was an exhausting six-year marathon. I was shooting movies or doing photo shoots when the show was on hiatus. It was just a really long haul and I felt burnt out when it ended. I needed time to duck away and disappear, figure things out and grow up a bit. When I was 24 the character I played on TV was a teenager losing his virginity...&quot;</p><p>It helps that Van Der Beek is that unusual thing, a former teen idol whose looks have improved with age. Where Dawson was all wrinkled forehead and bad hair, Van Der Beek wears the passing of time well, a fact he attributes in part to being more at ease. &quot;When Dawson's ended I just reacted to having been on this highly successful teen show for the last six years. I get very bored doing the same thing so, for example, I did Rules of Attraction [an adaptation of a Bret Easton Ellis novel, filmed just before Dawson's final season] because I felt finally I had a chance to try something like that.&quot;</p><p>Yet while Van Der Beek received good reviews the big movie roles never quite materialised. While fellow cast members Michelle Williams, Katie Holmes and Joshua Jackson went on to carve out careers on film and television with varying degrees of success, it seemed as though the series' official romantic lead would be an also-ran.</p><p>&quot;I look at some of my decisions in that time and I think 'why did I do that?'&quot; admits Van Der Beek. &quot;I turned down auditions for things I probably shouldn't have like the role that went to Bradley Cooper in Wedding Crashers because I was worried about being seen in a certain way.&quot; A pause before the sardonic aside: &quot;In retrospect that was something of an unnecessary worry...&quot;</p><p>Such fears are in the past. In recent years, Van Der Beek has reinvented himself as something of a go-to-guy for smart cameos ? he's been described as a straight Neil Patrick Harris, a comparison he describes as &quot;a huge compliment&quot; ? turning up in everything from sitcom How I Met Your Mother to police procedural Criminal Minds.</p><p>Now a clever turn as a more self-absorbed version of himself in the acerbic and very funny sitcom Don't Trust the B---- in Apartment 23, which starts on E4 tomorrow, should thrust him back into television's spotlight. Like Matt Le Blanc in Episodes, Apartment 23 uses Van Der Beek's history as a teen idol as a starting point, painting a picture of a self-obsessed former star, happy to use the remnants of his fame to talk fans into bed.</p><p>&quot;It's been a lot of fun not only to send up my own history but also because it's evolved into more of a parody of actors in general,&quot; says Van Der Beek. &quot;I see fake James Van Der Beek as the sort of guy who is quite talented but in this very savantish way. He can be sweet, he's a good friend to Chloe [the show's (anti) heroine and the B of the title] but he's also completely self-absorbed.&quot;</p><p>Most entertainingly as the series progresses so the careers of the two Van Der Beeks diverge. Thus, fake Van Der Beek has starred in a Guy Ritchie film ? &quot;we really did that just so we could shoot scenes from a fake Guy Ritchie movie&quot; ? is considering reality show Dancing with the Stars and has his own jeans line that he markets with the brilliantly cringeworthy slogan: &quot;Put your cheeks in a Beek.&quot;</p><p>?</p><p>He is also single unlike his real-life counterpart who is married with two children. &quot;It's not so much that my family life was off-limits as that it's much funnier if he's single,&quot; says Van Der Beek. &quot;One of the great things about working with Nahnatchka Khan [the show's creator] is that I can completely trust her. When I started working on the show I said: 'Don't be afraid of offending me, I'll tell you if something goes too far.' Nothing has.&quot;</p><p>That's largely because Van Der Beek's sense of humour is surprisingly caustic. &quot;Yeah, I've always had a dark sense of humour,&quot; he admits. &quot;When I was filming Dawson's I felt awkward about letting that be seen. There was always a sense that you were representing the show and you had to take the material seriously and show a level of respect.&quot;</p><p>His voice brightens. &quot;But you know one of the funniest things about doing this show and the videos I've done recently was my mother said to me: 'It's so nice to be able to see you showing your sense of humour.' So she was obviously worried...&quot;</p><p>Ah, the videos. Shot for comedy website Funny or Die the videos essentially changed Van Der Beek's career trajectory, ensuring that instead of ending up a &quot;whatever happened to?&quot; punchline in a trivia quiz he reinvented himself for the internet generation. &quot;Basically, I ended up working on the videos because of the crying Dawson meme,&quot; he says.</p><p>In the unlikely event that you've missed it, the crying Dawson meme, a GIF (video grab) of Van Der Beek's hilariously over-the-top crying face, is used to mock people all over the internet. &quot;I first found about it when I joined Twitter,&quot; says Van Der Beek. &quot;Someone tweeted me a link and before I clicked on it I thought it was going to be some I don't know cool classic shot from the series and instead there was this picture of me crying... it was hilarious. Then I discovered there were whole forums where people would post that picture as a way of mocking the sadness of other people and I just thought 'wow this really is pretty funny'.&quot;</p><p>Soon after Van Der Beek met with the writers of Funny or Die. &quot;They said very tentatively 'so you know there's this GIF...' and I said 'I know, I love it' so we decided that we could provide people with all kinds of Dawson needs.&quot;</p><p>Those needs can be seen on the Van Der Meme website, which features the actor doing everything from sarcastically clapping to disco dancing, all with an admirably straight face. &quot;I'd always had that sort of sense of humour but only my friends had really seen that,&quot; he says. &quot;Suddenly I had the chance to show people I know how to laugh at myself and my image.&quot;</p><p>He admits too that his recent marriage (he married second wife, Kimberly, in 2010) and the arrival of his two children, the youngest of whom is just two months old, played a big part in his transformation. &quot;That just showed me what was important,&quot; he says. &quot;It gave me a foundation so I realised that everything else didn't matter. I could get back to being who I really was.&quot;</p><p>And what of that much fantasised about Dawson's Creek reunion, which pops up as internet gossip every six months or so? Van Der Beek laughs. &quot;You know what I love most about that?&quot; he says. &quot;That Michelle [Williams] is always so up for it when they ask.&quot; He pauses again, adding with deadpan timing. &quot;Well, of course she is, her character died.&quot;</p><p>'Don't Trust the B---- in Apartment 23' begins tomorrow at 9.30pm on E4</p>?<p>According to a new, unauthorised biography, Who's Laughing Now? The Story of Jessie J, not only is The Voice star allegedly a lesbian, she's also had the thumbscrews put on her by her record company, Universal, who apparently forced her to hide her Sapphic ways in favour of a bisexual image or risk her contract.</p><p>Judging by what the book's author, Chloe Govan, has written, Jessie had made no secret of her sexuality since realising she was gay in her teens, and was incensed by the demand, which was framed as a way of protecting her interests from &quot;rampant&quot; homophobia: &quot;She was advised not to come out, though. Certain people thought being bi was trendy, exotic and a fashion statement. It would increase her allure.&quot;</p><p>There's so much wrong with this, it's hard to know where to start with the ideological sledgehammer. But let's kick off with the evidently vexing notion of bisexual and lesbian sexual identities. That &quot;certain people&quot; view a bi identity as less commercially suicidal than a lesbian one is predicated on a belief that anything outside of heterosexuality is aberrant, and therefore a threat to patriarchal social organisation.</p><p>That may sound old school but then so are &quot;certain people's&quot; views on the matter, it seems. Why are there fewer out A-list lesbian celebrities than there are out gay celebs? Take a wild guess? Could it be something to do with sexism and the fact that young women are still required to look pretty, and to present as if they are available to men?</p><p>The truth is that despite the recent move towards greater tolerance of lesbians, bisexuality is as misunderstood and misrepresented as ever. In one camp we have the folk who think bisexuals are fickle floosies, and in the other there are those who see bisexuality as a bridge to &quot;normal&quot; living because there's a 50/50 chance, theoretically, that the (usually conventionally attractive and young) woman in question may end up being schtupped by a chap.</p><p>Of course neither sexuality is better or worse than the other ? both exist outside of &quot;the norm&quot;, but in recent years, ever since, say, Katy Perry kissed a girl and liked it (and went on to become a global phenomenon as a result) this sexual identity has been hijacked by some, to the detriment of many bisexuals whose sexuality is not taken seriously.</p><p>But the allegations about Jessie's sexuality are not news to us at Diva. We've been aware of rumours that she's gay for some time now, just as we are about others. It's certainly not uncommon for us to receive emails from music PRs that read &quot;thanks, but Xxxxx has no press time at present&quot; from the closeted lesbian popstrels' minders we approach (and there are many). Indeed, save for Gossip's wonderful Beth Ditto (on our cover next month) it's nigh on impossible to get A-list lesbian pop stars to agree to grace our cover. It's strange to think that so little has changed since the days of someone like Rock Hudson who had to lead (almost) the same kind of double life over 50 years ago.</p><p>When we do strike gold and convince PRs to let us feature their closeted stars, often it's on the condition that we're not to touch on the thorny issue of sexuality, so a question about what it's like to be gay in the heterocentric music biz, or a mention of a same-sex partner or a love song written for a woman is out of bounds.</p><p>It's not as though we want to harp on about our cover stars' sex lives anyway ? we just want to live in a world where it's not considered &quot;bad for business&quot; to be openly gay.</p><p>Jane Czyzselska is the editor of 'Diva' </p>?<p>No, I haven't taken leave of my senses. I'm just sick of interviews conducted in a style more appropriate to the Colosseum than a civilised country. On Newsnight and Radio 4's Today programme, presenters swagger into interviews like lions about to devour cowering Christians. Paxman is the retiarius of interrogators, casting a net over his victims and giving them repeated jabs with his trident while they're tangled up in words.</p><p>I think Smith did rather well to keep her temper in the face of a performance ? I use the word deliberately ? whose chief purpose seemed to be her humiliation. Paxman began with a question she was clearly not able to answer and kept repeating it, with all the incredulity of a prosecution lawyer confronting a wife-beater. It would have been mildly interesting to know when the Government made its decision to postpone an increase in fuel duty, but Smith's reluctance to reveal confidential conversations wasn't nearly as incriminating as Paxman made out.</p><p>Confrontation has become the dominant style of current-affairs programmes. I know and like John Humphrys but it's impossible to listen to him, Paxman or Jonathan Dimbleby interrupting yet another politician without wishing they'd shut up. Often the interviewee is on the verge of saying something interesting when the interrogator decides it isn't the answer he wants, and we get another fusillade of interruptions. It doesn't make for a stimulating or informed debate.</p><p>But then I don't think that's the purpose. Gladiatorial contests are about one person coming out on top, and the interviewer has all the advantages. He doesn't have to worry about breaking confidences or letting down colleagues, while appalling rudeness is excused as fearless pursuit of the truth. &quot;That's absolute tripe!&quot; Paxman told the Italian journalist Annalisa Piras on Monday, dismissing her views on the Eurozone as though he were a Nobel-winning economist.</p><p>If Smith is smarting from her experience, she might want to consider this. When presenters harrumph and cut someone off mid-sentence, they think they're showing intellectual rigour. But it's really a boorish form of populism, which is just what the Colosseum audience loves.</p><p> </p>?<p>An absentee Perry was honoured in five categories, including favourite female artist, tour headliner, song of the year for ET with Kanye West, music video for LastFriday Night and TV guest star for How I Met Your Mother.</p><p>Despite originally being touted by the show's organisers as amongthe nominees expected to attend, the singer-actress told fans on Twitter earlier this week that she would not make it to the show, but she added: &quot;I want to thank u all for voting for me, fingers crossed!&quot;</p><p>It would have marked Perry's first public appearance since British actor-comedian Russell Brand filed for divorce last month after 14 months of marriage.</p><p>Harry Potter And The Deathly Hallows: Part 2, the final instalment of the magical film series starring Daniel Radcliffe, followed Perry with four wins for favourite movie, action movie, book adaptation and ensemble movie cast, but the film's stars also were not at the ceremony, leaving more screen time on the CBS broadcast for other winners in the show's 43 categories honouring TV, film and music.</p><p>Ellen DeGeneres, Nina Dobrev, Chloe Grace Moretz, Adam Levine, Lea Michele and Demi Lovato, who performed Give Your Heart a Break, wereamong the winners on hand to accept their awards selected by internet votes.</p><p>&quot;For all the Rachel Berrys out there, this one's for you guys,&quot; said Michele, who won as favourite comedy TV actress for her role in Glee.</p><p>Emma Stone and Johnny Depp - another no-show - each won two trophies at the ceremony, which was hosted by The Big Bang Theory star Kaley Cuoco. Depp and Stone won the favourite movie actor and actress awards, while Depp was also honoured as favourite animated movie voice for Rango, and Stone was selected as favourite comedic movie actress.</p><p>&quot;I moved to LA eight years ago this week with my mum, who's rightthere,&quot; Stone said while accepting her pair of crystal trophies. &quot;It isso insane to be standing up here right now. It is hard to describe to you.&quot;</p><p>Among the TV winners were How I Met Your Mother for TV comedy, Two Broke Girls for new TV comedy, Hot In Cleveland for cable TV comedy,Neil Patrick Harris for TV comedy actor, Supernatural for TV drama and sci-fi/fantasy show, Person Of Interest for new TV drama, Pretty Little Liars for cable TV drama and Nathan Fillion for TV drama actor.</p><p>Winners in the movie categories included Hugh Jackman for action star, Bridesmaids for comedy movie, Water For Elephants for drama movie,Adam Sandler for comedic movie actor and Ryan Reynolds as Green Lanternfor favourite superhero. Morgan Freeman was bestowed with the first movie icon award.</p><p></p>?<p>The sequel to the incredibly successful Kick-Ass picks up the story of teenager Dave Lizewski and his continuing attempts to be a crime-fighting superhero called Kick-Ass. However, this time around things get nasty with the return of his old foe and self-proclaimed super villain Red Mist. Under the new moniker of ‘The Mother Fucker’, Red Mist takes revenge on Kick-Ass and New York, leaving mayhem in his wake.</p><p>Kick-Ass creator Mark Millar says: ‘Book two is as dark as a superhero movie can get, I wanted to show what would really happen if you tried to be a superhero in the real world. In the first one it was as simple as you could get, ending up in hospital for three months. In this one I really wanted to explore the ramifications [of what happens] if a bad guy didn’t like you and knew your secret identity. What they would do to your friends and family? I really wanted to explore all of that in depth and have a superhero’s life torn apart.’</p><p>Millar says he has always envisaged Kick-Ass as a trilogy that takes his characters on a journey, so fans can expect a third book. &quot;I think the closest comparison I can get is with the Star Wars trilogy and I’m not even a major Star Wars fan. The structure is so beautiful, it’s the most brilliant structure I’ve seen in a trilogy and I just find myself naturally copying it and that hero’s journey is just timeless. The idea of the guy who starts out rubbish, who gets better, who saves the day at the end.&quot;</p><p>Inspiration for the character of Kick-Ass came from Millar’s teenage years. &quot;When I should have been doing maths and physics I was thinking about being a superhero. It was kind of a plan I had - even though I lived in Glasgow, not New York.&quot;</p><p>This didn't hold his imagination back, however. &quot;Maybe you don’t need to come from Krypton or get bitten by a radioactive spider. You can maybe just do some press-ups.&quot;</p><p>Compared to other superheroes, Kick-Ass is far from archetypal, he is just an ordinary teenager without any special superpowers or a Batmobile, simply longing to help others.</p><p>As well as being a well-loved comic book, Kick-Ass was adapted into hugely popular film in 2010 that garnered mainstream appeal. So why has Kick-Ass been so successful? &quot;‘For me, it’s popular because it’s real. It’s from the heart,&quot; he says.</p><p>&quot;I think the enthusiasm that a writer can have is infectious. Somebody else pointed out to me that he’s the recession superhero. He doesn’t have a Batcave or a billion dollar fortune. He’s just got two sticks and good intentions. He’s as poor a superhero as you can possibly get so he just seems bang on for right now that’s why it caught fire so quickly the way it did.&quot;</p><p>The other notable character in Kick-Ass is Hit-Girl, also known as Mindy McCready, a real crime-fighting superhero who was played by Chloe Moretz in the film adaption of the first book. Laced with sardonic wit and a foul-mouth, she was trained in combat from an early age by her father. Unlike Kick-Ass she can quickly dispatch an army of gangsters twice the size of her.</p><p>Her father was killed in the first book and she has been adopted. In Kick-Ass 2 she has promised her adoptive father that she will leave her superhero days behind and live life like any other 12-year-old girl. She is the most compelling character in Kick-Ass and now has her own comic entitled Hit-Girl which came out last week.</p><p>&quot;What’s interesting is that it’s not somebody in a thong and it’s not like a swimsuit model, a 25-year-old or something. [Hit Girl is] a female character who is as de-sexualised as you can possibly get. I think it’s really odd that’s actually sold because I know that Marvel and DC try to make these characters as sexy and as racy-looking as possible and it doesn’t work. It’s weird that the one that has actually broken out is the character who’s completely covered up.&quot;</p><p>He explains that the inspiration for the character of Hit-Girl stemmed from playing with his daughter in the park where he would time her doing chin-ups and other challenges. He originally wanted to write something child-friendly that his daughter could watch because she was too young to see the adaptation of his comic Wanted.</p><p>He says: &quot;I’ll do a thing about a dad and a daughter and it will be really cute, a superhero dad and daughter and within 24 hours it became the most violent superhero story ever.&quot;</p><p>With the release of at least one superhero film every couple of months, this genre has clearly caught the public’s imagination. This year alone has seen the release of The Amazing Spider-Man, The Avengers and Wrath of the Titans, with The Dark Knight Rises to follow shortly.?Why now?</p><p>&quot;There is no question that after September 11 these movies started to do really well. In the 1980s and 1990s superhero movies were more misses than hits. You almost always lost money and there was just a very, very rare exception,&quot; he says.</p><p>&quot;It’s quite interesting that superheroes were created in the depression whenever people needed something to distract them from bad times. […] And then the global economic collapse back in 2008 which seemed to worsen every day. When times are tough people often want to see superheroes, they don’t really want to see real-life drama. They want to see something so fantastical.&quot;</p><p>Millar is busy with a whole raft of other projects, including a spy project with fellow Kick-Ass producer Matthew Vaughn. Wanted 2 is in the works as is his project Superior which is about a boy with multiple sclerosis who wishes to become a superhero. There are also plans for Supercrooks which Millar describes as a heist movie with super heroes. Meanwhile filming on the sequel to 2010’s Kick-Ass movie will be starting in August and it should be out at the end of next summer.</p><p>&quot;My plan over the next 10 years? I want to do what Stan Lee did in the 1960s and bring a whole wave of these characters that can go on and have a life in different media. I love doing this, I love doing comics.&quot;</p><p>‘Kick-Ass 2’, Mark Millar and John Romita Jnr, Titan Books, £18.99 is out now</p>?<p>The BBFC's guidelines are based on a public consultation conducted every four years, the last of which was in 2009. Language tends to be the least controversial issue for audiences, but the most controversial for film-makers. Loach has wrestled with the delicate sensibilities of the censor before. In 2002, his Palme D'Or-nominated Sweet Sixteen was awarded an 18 certificate for its 20 C-words and 313 F-words, meaning the teenagers portrayed in the film would be unable to see it.</p><p>His predicament recalls the row over the certification of Made in Dagenham in 2010. Producer Stephen Woolley was outraged when his film, which told the story of the 1968 women's strike for equal pay at Ford, was given a 15 certificate for its 17 uses of the F-word. He believed younger audiences would benefit from its message of equality and empowerment. &quot;The BBFC surmises that the F-word will deprave or corrupt 13-year-olds,&quot; he wrote. &quot;Who are these delicate flowers who have never been in a playground... or heard a rap record?&quot;</p><p>In the same year, much to Woolley's chagrin, The King's Speech was awarded a 12A, despite repeated use of the F-word. The BBFC allowed it because it appeared &quot;in a speech-therapy context&quot; in the film. This led to accusations of classism by the censor, which appeared to deem posh &quot;fucks&quot; acceptable, but not working class ones.</p><p>Extreme violence, meanwhile, finds its way into 12 certificate films with increasing regularity. This year, the makers of The Hunger Games made cuts to earn a 12A rating, yet the film still features children being brutally killed by other children. The most controversial C-word of recent years was uttered by 11-year-old Chloe Moretz, in the 15-rated Kick Ass (2010); four letters subjected to far more censure than her character's multiple violent murders.</p><p>Perhaps it was to avoid such disapproval that 12A blockbuster Avengers Assemble (2012) looked to the past for its single instance of swearing, with a word so long out of service in spoken English that it's actually more shocking to hear: the evil Norse god Loki insults female super-agent Black Widow, calling her a &quot;mewling quim&quot;.</p>?<p>In fact, you're unlikely to get a punchline at all unless one of the characters tells a knowingly corny joke, and in that case the whole point is that it isn't funny. It's a distinctively modern mode this, pioneered by programmes such as The Royle Family and Craig Cash's Early Doors, and, far from shying away from banality and tedium ? as most other kinds of comedy do ? it embraces it affectionately, as the common grain of daily life. From the opening lines of last night's episode ? an inconsequential, lopsided conversation about a binman falling over (and then getting up again unharmed) ? we knew where we were and, more importantly, what was expected of us. Not hilarity or the guffaw, but fond recognition and a wry smile. By the end of the episode, we knew a bit more: that almost every encounter would begin with &quot;Arroight?&quot; and end with &quot;Laters&quot;; that there would be an undertow of melancholy and disappointment beneath the surface placidity; that the dialogue would be stitched together from cliches, not because the writers can't think of anything better, but because that's mostly how people talk.</p><p>The setting is a struggling promenade cafe in Weston-super-Mare, run (and almost exclusively occupied) by Carol and her daughter, Sarah. Carol's mother has a permanent spot by the door, where she contentedly destroys her knitting. Various regulars drift in and out: Chloe, a cheerfully vacuous hairdresser, Richard, a nurse in an old people's home, who once went out with Sarah and wants to do so again, and Stan, a local florist who has a bit of a thing for Carol but is currently communicating his feelings only in the language of flowers. And, to ruffle this tranquil little tide pool, there's also John, a Porsche-driving London returnee who talks about the town as &quot;the arse end of nowhere&quot; and stirs up the discontents of its inhabitants. Sarah dreams of making it as a writer of children's stories, Richard dreams about getting a car and Kieran, the local living statue, dreams of getting a boyfriend, but for the moment all those hopes look like forlorn ones. And I defy you to get through a conversation about it without someone using the word &quot;warm&quot; or &quot;gentle&quot;.</p><p>There is a danger here, though not a huge one. The difference between a wittily observed cliche and a flatly repeated one is hazardously small, as is the distinction between calculated eventlessness and the dull kind. Sentiment can easily turn cloying too, as it did in the final minutes here. &quot;Were you happy?&quot; Sarah asks her nan about her long marriage. &quot;God, no... he was a cantankerous old bugger.&quot; &quot;Do you miss him?&quot;she continues. &quot;Every day, love, every day.&quot; Too neat and too sweet, I think. On the other hand, it's far better to stumble into over-kindness than into cruelty, and the second episode suggests that the slow build of affection doesn't level off. It might take a while, but these characters could become as lovable to us as they already clearly are to their creators.</p><p>In Your Money and How They Spend It, Nick Robinson offered an instructive beginner's guide to the budget deficit. It was essentially a study in political dishonesty and the wilful blindness of voters, with short-term decisions taken to win elections generating the kind of liabilities that lose them. It also included one great historical footnote, with Alistair Darling revealing that he'd gone to a crisis meeting of Treasury officials in 2008 straight from a Leonard Cohen concert, and so had been pre-tuned for the mood of millenial gloom that prevailed. &quot;Dance me through the panic till I'm safely gathered in&quot;, sang Leonard mournfully, over trading screens flickering red. Best match between music and material this month... and quite possibly this year too.</p>?<p>The truth of Big Fat Gypsy Weddings ? as the advertising campaign that promised that this series would be &quot;Bigger. Fatter. Gypsier&quot; ? is that it knowingly toys with feeding a social prejudice while taking care to keep its toes just this side of the line. Logically and legally, you can argue, &quot;Gypsier&quot; is no more racist than &quot;more French&quot; or &quot;Dutcher&quot; would be. But all the same Channel 4's marketing department knows perfectly well that the series' main audience will get the message. More to gawp at, more to tut at, more to consolidate that pleasing sense that you are on the right side of respectability and you're free to look down. And if you still maintain that everyone watching is tuning in for a sympathetic explanation of a life lived at an angle to convention, then I'd suggest that you follow a Twitter feed or comment board when the programme is on. One warning, though ? it isn't pretty.</p><p>It's true that you'd have to watch with a lot of prejudice never to feel sympathy at all. When Chloe went straight from her Holy Communion to visit her father in jail and was turned away from the visitors' centre because they'd been delayed in traffic, you didn't see a Traveller child. You just saw a little girl weeping because her big day had crumbled. And following the scramble of eviction from one site and the race to beat the authorities to the next one, you got a sense of how harried life can be. Even then, though, for every stereotype Big Fat Gypsy Weddings disturbs, it reinforces another two. They're very clever about not crossing that line. There's not a frame that couldn't be defended as just a transcription of the facts. But you can't help wondering if the nuanced truth of Traveller life lies anywhere near the line at all. Or if nearly as many people would watch if they weren't teetering so close to falling.</p><p>Watching Prisoners' Wives, I couldn't help wondering what would have happened if Chloe had made it in time to see her dad. Searching her would have been a nightmare, given that she had enough room under her skirt for a collapsible ladder and a getaway car. The proxy humiliations of incarceration are one of the consistent themes in this series, which continues to impress. It does raise one question, though. We're invited to sympathise with all the men in prison but permitted to loathe the criminals outside it, including a memorably nasty drug dealer. If he goes inside, do we have to care about him too?</p>?<p>Richard MacAndrew</p><p>Steeple Aston, Oxfordshire</p><p>I have just listened to a mealy-mouthed representative of the Financial Services Authority refer to the latest banking scam (fiddling the Libor rate) as &quot;misconduct&quot;, and learnt that Bob Diamond is declining his multimillion-pound bonus.</p><p>If my staff had fiddled figures that resulted in me or my company making yet more buckets of money at others' expense, I suspect I would be suffering more serious consequences than that. In the circumstances I'd be only too pleased to decline my annual bonus ? if I had one.</p><p>If no one is above the law, there seem to be those who come as close as to make little difference.</p><p>Colin Bland</p><p>Nottingham</p><p>Once again we see bankers causing damage to our economy, both on a national scale and also to every customer, yet little seems to happen to them. Our society seems to be almost reaching the point that the French were at prior to the Revolution, where the aristocracy were immune to taxation and almost immune to the law. ?</p><p>How long before the members of Britain's &quot;hard-working&quot; middle and lower classes reach the same conclusion as the French did 200 years ago?</p><p>John Broughton</p><p>Haverfordwest, Pembrokeshire</p><p>The Prime Minister is concerned about possible damage to the City of London from a eurozone &quot;banking union&quot;. Given recent events, he should realise that the greatest threat to the City is the rampant greed and incompetence of its leading financial institutions.</p><p>Meredydd Morris</p><p>Bodorgan, Ynys Mon</p><p>A life on benefits should not be an option</p><p>The letters you have published (27 June) on the Prime Minister's efforts to return this country to something approaching financial health are snide and negative. The writers seem to have wilfully misunderstood what is being attempted ? that people who are capable of working and supporting themselves and their families should be required to do so.</p><p>I agree wholeheartedly that a civilised society should provide decent healthcare, education and other public services to its citizens, and that there should also be a financial safety net for those in genuine need. What is not acceptable is that a life on benefits should be on offer as a lifestyle choice.</p><p>David Cameron's personal financial circumstances are irrelevant to this debate. Something has to be done to reverse the fortunes of this country, or we will end up like the eurozone countries who thought that there would always be someone else to pay the bills. It's time for a reality check.</p><p>Katherine Scholfield</p><p>Roborough, Devon</p><p>You present as a huge injustice the Conservative idea that the taxpayer stop paying huge sums to let unruly youth escape the tyranny of being civilised in their parents' homes. For many of us it was that &quot;tyranny&quot;, or reluctance to be civilised, which made us get a job as soon as possible after leaving school.</p><p>Your two under-25s illustrating the cruelty of the idea (25 June) are hardly deserving of sympathy. If they are typical, they illustrate better the perils of teenage pregnancy, as both are single mothers under the age of 20. Despite sex education in schools, neither apparently had the sense to insist on a condom for protection against pregnancy and disease from men unreliable enough to have disappeared since. They are estranged from their parents for reasons not revealed.</p><p>Of the two, Claudette Shay, has at least found a job. The whole experience may have made her a responsible member of the community. Stacey Prigmore lives entirely on benefits and believes that the withdrawal of housing benefit would make it impossible for her to be &quot;independent&quot;. How is it independent to have her rent and other benefits paid by every taxpayer in the United Kingdom? She is dependent on every one of us.</p><p>She whinges that living on benefits is tough. She should know that it is pretty tough having to pay them.</p><p>Tim Major</p><p>Ansty, West Sussex</p><p>The idea of disallowing the under 25s housing benefit is not only immoral but self-defeating. All it will cause is a sharp rise in homelessness. This idea that they should stay with their parents until they can afford to buy their own homes is utter tosh.</p><p>What about people who have no family, what about those who cannot stay with family for abuse reasons? Are these people to be just put on the street?</p><p>First, it was the disabled who the government decided were the cause of the monetary problems, and now it's the under 25s who get the blame for a shambolic government. Who's next, the children, for being born into a country that won't, can't, doesn't want to support them?</p><p>Matthew Laughton</p><p>Middlesbrough</p><p>Does David Cameron know what he is talking about, apart from &quot;going back to basics&quot;; does he have any evidence or is he just spinning to appease those Tory MPs who want to replace him?</p><p>The multi-millionaires in the Cabinet obviously do not know what it is like to be out of work. It is a desperate struggle to make ends meet from week to week. Most people who are without work are not there through choice, but because of poor decisions made by the government and their funders, the bankers.</p><p>Duncan Anderson</p><p>Immingham, Lincolnshire</p><p>I was delighted when I heard the Prime Minister calling for the ending of Britain's &quot;something-for-nothing culture&quot;. Because this obviously means a harsh government crackdown on all large-scale financial parasites: the idle rich, tax-evaders, the aristocracy and the Royal Family, corporations in receipt of subsidies and tax-breaks, bankers ....</p><p>(I hope I got the right end of the stick? This is who the Prime Minster is gunning for, isn't it?)</p><p>Dr Rupert Read</p><p>Norwich</p><p>Older generation had it tough too</p><p>What is it that people have against my generation? John Kampfner was joining the chorus in his article &quot;Greece may be the epicentre …&quot; (18 June) when he said that &quot;the post-war, baby-boom older generation&quot; have &quot;a sense of entitlement&quot;.</p><p>Our generation started in a world of extensive rationing of basic food such as milk, bread and potatoes. When the word &quot;austerity&quot; is used today, please look at the picture of the late 1940s and 1950s; there really is no comparison.</p><p>We experienced high unemployment in the late 1970s and up to the mid-1980s, together with rampant inflation of more than 20 per cent during that time. Those of us who did gain a mortgage had initially to save for a significant deposit and had interest rates usually well above 10 per cent. We did not see our home as some alternative form of credit card facility.</p><p>As we experience retirement now, we face some of the poorest pension arrangements of similar economies in the EU. Those of us who tried to save for our old age now have meagre interest rates, usually below the inflation level.</p><p>Peter Thompson</p><p>Tarleton, West Lancashire</p><p>Aren't older people usually richer than younger? I was poor when I was young. At nearly 70 I am poor no longer. But that's a more or less normal progression, isn't it? We leave home with nothing, work for fifty years and, if we're able and sensible, save or invest anything we can spare after living costs.</p><p>I don't think I have &quot;stolen&quot; anything from younger generations, any more than my elders stole from me.</p><p>Sara Neill</p><p>Tunbridge Wells, Kent</p><p>Rescuing girls from gangs</p><p>The new parliamentary inquiry into the sexual exploitation of children has shone a light on the dangers of internet grooming and social media, as well as a worrying trend of vulnerable young girls being exploited within Britain's gang culture.</p><p>Sexual violence against young girls in gangs is a hidden issue and at Westminster Council we are in the process of recruiting a new officer to identify who has been affected and provide them with support in conjunction with our wider gangs strategy, launched last year.</p><p>The Government's announcement earlier this year of £1.2m investment to help girls affected by gangs was good news, but it's a drop in the ocean in terms of tackling the true extent of sexual abuse in gangs ? particularly since it costs about £4,000 to intensively treat each young victim of severe sexual abuse.</p><p>We also need to recognise that the influence of social networking and the way women are portrayed in the wider media are key factors in young girls becoming vulnerable to exploitation at the hands of gangs.</p><p>There is no quick fix to this issue, but we need the Government to commit to longer-term funding so local authorities can provide young victims with the complex support network they require ? whether that be housing, counselling, therapy or other services. If we leave this problem unresolved, the generational impact will be felt for years to come.</p><p>Cllr Nickie Aiken</p><p>Cabinet member for children, young people and community protection, Westminster City Council</p><p>Paxman and the minister</p><p>Joan Smith misses the point of Jeremy Paxman's haranguing of Chloe Smith on Newsnight (&quot;Give the viewers a break, Paxo&quot;, 28 June). If senior ministers (in this case Osborne and Alexander) don't have the balls to front up their own mismanagement, why should Paxman go lightly on the sacrificial lamb?</p><p>Robert Stewart</p><p>Wilmslow, Cheshire</p><p>Joan Smith is right to criticise the boorish interviewing style of certain TV and radio presenters. But I'm astonished she didn't mention a relevant fact: all the presenters she identifies as behaving badly thus are male.</p><p>It is indefensible that male presenters still dominate current affairs. We need equal representation ? if only to find out whether women can behave just as badly.</p><p>Dr Alex May</p><p>Manchester</p><p>Price of glory</p><p>Terence Blacker (26 June) is right: how absurd to hope to put serious prices on landscapes, Even on buildings. Back in the late Sixties, the Department of Housing and Local Government wanted St Pancras Station and Hotel not listed ? it made Sir John Summerson (then the guru of architectural taste) feel sick every time he passed it. Wayland Kennet (junior minister in the Lords) insisted on them being listed Grade 1. Value then to the officials? Nil. Value now? One of London's glories.</p><p>Elizabeth Young</p><p>London W2</p><p>Choosing to die</p><p>No one wants someone else to feed them or to wipe their backside (&quot;Dementia? I'd rather kill myself&quot;, says Simpson, 27 June). My parents died this year. Both had dementia. Neither would have wanted to be in that condition. Does John Simpson really think that there came a day when one of my parents might have said &quot;Oops, I'm not quite as sharp as I was yesterday. Better take those tablets&quot;?</p><p>Carolyn Broadhurst</p><p>Nottingham</p><p>Early flight</p><p>You report about Aborigine paintings 28,000 years old in Australia (26 June). The report reveals that not only were those ancient people fine artists, but also aeronautical engineers: &quot;The team has found evidence that the site ? accessible only by helicopter ? was occupied 45,000 years ago.&quot; By now, presumably, those clever Aborigines have also invented spaceships and moved to another planet.</p><p>Jon Summers</p><p>Petton, Devon </p>?<p>I have two sons and a daughter who are all sports-mad and love tennis, I have three cousins who have won multiple Wimbledon doubles titles and I live just around the corner from a tennis club with well-maintained, floodlit all-weather courts. </p><p>The attitude, genetics and facilities are all in place, so one would think that we are well-placed to produce a candidate for the future top 100. Sadly, it's not going to happen because a family membership at the tennis club costs more than £360 a year, and although I earn a good salary, the cost of bringing up three children in the South-east of England means we just can't afford it. </p><p>We do play at the free municipal courts in the town but they are five miles away, there are only two courts and they are very poorly maintained and, of course, without floodlights.</p><p>Surely some of the vast amount of money generated by the LTA could be channelled into subsidising children's membership of tennis clubs. If there is any left over after that they could spend it on tennis infrastructure in schools and on free public courts. </p><p>In the UK, we have to deal with poor weather, short winter days and time-poor parents, Surely the LTA can use its funds to alleviate the one negative it can control, the very high cost of access to tennis courts.</p><p>Craig Black</p><p>Maresfield, East Sussex</p><p>When did the craze for instant interviewing after a sporting event begin? </p><p>Following the Derby, we get a morning-suited broadcaster holding his hat as he rushes up to the successful jockey still astride his horse. No football game is complete without a string of sweaty players, articulate or otherwise, being questioned about the match. And now, with television the all-important god of the event, the Wimbledon finalist, whether winner or loser, no matter the emotion evolving, is subject to inquisition.</p><p>Why not celebritise all areas of human activity? At the next Coronation, perhaps Clare Balding will be on hand as the new monarch leaves the Abbey, ready with the inevitable, &quot;How did the anointing go, Your Majesty?&quot; Or we could have a surgeon in mask and gown emerging from the theatre to deal with, &quot;Just take us through the difficulties of removing Tracy's spleen&quot;.</p><p>Edward Thomas</p><p>Eastbourne</p><p>In sport, women now compete in disciplines previously reserved for men: they box, weightlift, run marathons and compete in many endurance events.</p><p>The presumption is that they have stamina equal to their male counterparts. Why then, in tennis, are they still restricted to three-set matches when the men must labour through five?</p><p>Peter Glover</p><p>Rayleigh, Essex</p><p>I'm assuming those criticising Andy Murray's lack of ability and big-match mentality are the second- or third-best in the world in their own professions?</p><p>Mark Piggott</p><p>London N19</p><p>Does anyone else feel that Roger Federer, if he just put a bit of effort into it, could be quite good?</p><p>John Wheaver</p><p>Wellingborough, Northampshire</p><p>All religions are obsessed with sexual behaviour</p><p>John Sweeney (article, 9 July) claims ex-Scientologists report that the cult's leader, David Miscavige, is &quot;obsessed with sex and especially other people's sex lives&quot;.</p><p>Surely this is a common feature among religions and their leaders? Has John Sweeney not noticed how the Catholic and Anglican churches and their respective leaderships have been, throughout history, and remain to this day, utterly obsessed with what consenting adults might be getting up to behind the bedroom curtains? </p><p>Given both these churches have been mired in scandals concerning the rape of children by their clergy, many would suggest their concerns should be more inwardly focused. Motes and beams, and all that. Scientology has many unique faults, but an obsessive and destructive voyeurism is by no means unique. It is unfair to single out it or its leader in this regard.</p><p>Alistair McBay</p><p>National Secular Society, London WC1</p><p>In your article on Scientology (9 July), you quote me as describing John Sweeney's report of my comments in Parliament as being &quot;selective&quot;.</p><p>Mr Sweeney quotes me as saying of Scientology that, &quot;It is not a cult&quot;. The actual words I used in Parliament were that Scientology has been able to broadcast on television by &quot;satisfying the Independent Television Commission that it is not a cult&quot;.</p><p>To say he was quoting selectively was an understatement.</p><p>Charles Hendry MP</p><p>House of Commons</p><p>Osborne should remember Keynes</p><p>The latest quantitative easing demarche indicates how desperate the government is to pump demand into the economy, and of course it may possibly work, to some degree. But why on earth can George Osborne not bring himself to take the direct route from A to B, namely either spend the money directly or cut taxes? (I cannot take credit for this suggestion, as J M Keynes got there first.) This is a clear case of pure right-wing dogma getting in the way of the national welfare.</p><p>Jim Bowman</p><p>South Harrow, Middlesex</p><p>I hope that the parliamentary inquiry into the unpleasant activities of the banking community will also be allowed time to take apart the appalling misuse of the English language by the likes of Mr Diamond. He has talked constantly about his obscenely high level of pay as being &quot;compensation&quot;. </p><p>&quot;For what?&quot; we may ask. </p><p>Steve Clarke</p><p>Portree, Isle of Skye</p><p> </p><p>For the good name of Barclays to be restored, I would propose a radical solution: go back to the future. Fire the entire board and key senior managers and replace them with Quakers to revive the original Quaker owners' precepts of honesty, integrity and plain dealing, from the top down. </p><p>Elizabeth Marshall</p><p>Edinburgh</p><p>Adrian Hamilton (6 July) plays down the difference between a parliamentary and a judicial inquiry. The main difference is that if you lie to the first you get away with it but if you lie to the second you are in contempt of court.</p><p>Professor Raymond Levy</p><p>King's College, London</p><p>In the unlikely event that I get into legal trouble, can I be investigated by a Commons select committee please? </p><p>Bob Morgan</p><p>Thatcham, West Berkshire </p><p>Undemocratic Lords reform</p><p>What right has the Coalition to lecture anyone, least of all Syria, over what it means to be a democracy when they are bartering our constitution away as if it consisted of goodies in an egg-and-spoon race?</p><p>The &quot;reforms&quot; put forward by Nick Clegg for the House of Lords are illiberal. Why are the elections in the House of Lords concerned by a system which ensures proportional representation of (and therefore dominance by) the political parties? </p><p>But, should any Tory MP wish to understand fully the ramifications of the reforms by not rushing them through this parliament, then the Lib Dems will take their ball back by blocking plans to redraw parliamentary boundaries and slash MPs from 650 to 600.</p><p>When did we come to this? If these so called reforms have proved anything then it is that Rowan Williams was right to question what democracy means in the context of the remarkable speed the Coalition is committing us to radical, long-term policies for which no one voted.</p><p>To alter our constitution without reference to the electorate is scandalous and should be resisted by anyone who truly values our democracy. </p><p>Julie Partridge</p><p>London SE15</p><p>Data loss can wreck your books</p><p>Although the loss of all the back issues of 3:AM (report, 7 July) may be unfortunate, it's not the first time business has been wrecked through electronic data loss. Causes run from not paying fees on time to the servers being shut down after being found to be hosting some one else's illegal content. </p><p>There is a growing, if deeply boring, literature on the goverance on data retention. I know, I've written a draft European standard on the subject, but the starting point for this is the Trustworthy Repositories Audit and Checklist, which gives the criteria for trusting your data to the ether. Read the licence on your Kindle, and ask what happens to your books if Amazon goes out of business.</p><p>Sean Barker</p><p>Bristol</p><p>God particle? Just ask Tony</p><p>Another prime example of profligacy: it has reportedly cost $9bn to discover the God Particle. Surely to God, at a fraction of the cost the answer could have been found with a quick tweet or text to the Office of Tony Blair and its Supreme Being ?</p><p>Martin Wallis</p><p>Shipdham, Norfolk</p><p>Foreign language opens doors</p><p>This is precisely why it is important to learn other languages (letters, passim). Just from a simple train warning sign we can see that there are significant cultural differences between peoples, and if we speak only English we understand only ourselves. Voltaire said that for each language we learn we are a new person. It is also true that only by learning other peoples' languages can we begin to understand other people. Try reading and watching the news in German and French as I do. Makes the BBC look another world.</p><p>Martin Stokes</p><p>Ashtead, Surrey</p><p>The freaks of fashion</p><p>Ah, what fun at the Spring 2013 men's fashion collections and a big thank you to Adam Welch (9 July) for bringing these to our attention. The accompanying photos of male models contrived, in their misery, to appear variously as demented psychopaths or charity-shop refugees, conveying the message that however ridiculous anyone might feel about their dubious wardrobe there is always someone who will think it's great.</p><p>Peter Coghlan</p><p>Broadstone, Dorset</p><p>Classy clanger</p><p>All this talk about national ranking that Mr Gove is keen to introduce for maths made me remember the time I brought my end-of-term report home. I must have been nine or 10 years old, and while handing it to my mother I proudly exlaimed, &quot;Look: 27/28; I only got one wrong&quot;. My mother looked at me with great affection and said, &quot;No darling, that is where you are in the class.&quot;</p><p>Chloe Pearse</p><p>Bangkok</p><p>Query for Noah</p><p>I know how to start rain: I just clean my car. But how can I make the rain stop?</p><p>Tony Wood</p><p>Farnborough, Hampshire </p>?<p>Breasts continue to be debated, frequently in an unhelpful way, most often by people who don’t have them; photographs of women on holiday are making great sport for headlines about shifting weight for the New Year; and ? although it’s funny ? the viral video doing the rounds for a fake beauty ad for an improving product called “Fotoshop, by Adobe” has a shifty undertone about a lady’s supposed obsession with looking perfect.</p><p>So, not a great week to be a woman. And now we get the shortlist for the Orange Rising Star award at the forthcoming Baftas. All five on the list are male.</p><p>I don’t often get all hurrumph-ish about such matters and the idea of quotas makes me feel distinctly uneasy, but 2011 wasn’t exactly a year without stellar film performances by women. Let’s look back...</p><p>Since Bafta doesn’t limit its award to those born in the UK, there’s no reason to exclude the dazzling Emma Stone, Noomi Rapace, Jennifer Lawrence, Rooney Mara, Chloe Moretz, Hailee Steinfeld or Jessica Chastain.</p><p>From arthouse fare like The Tree of Life and True Grit to multiplex pleasers like Hugo and Sherlock Holmes, they have delighted us.</p><p>Let’s suppose we had to choose from home talent. What about Felicity Jones or Saoirse Ronan? This year’s most versatile actress on the up escalator is Olivia Colman, wry and warm in Rev, quaking and damaged in Tyrannosaur.</p><p>Unlike many awards at this time of year (whose main criteria for winning is sentiment and past glories), these women are bursting with potential ? I can’t wait to see what all of the above do next, from kids’-movie-for-adults The Hunger Games (Lawrence) to the heartbreaking Like Crazy (Jones).</p><p>Apart from their towering talent, one thing I’ve noticed about all of these women is that not one of them looks in the least “surgically enhanced”. They are all exquisite, of course, but not necessarily in the way that conforms to the tired old “blonde, pneumatic”. Wouldn’t it be marvellous if these women, hugely admired by cinema-goers, if not the Bafta judges, finally turned attention away from cookie-cutter beauty and towards celebrating what comes naturally? And if, as a byproduct, breast enhancement returned to a service for medical reasons, due to lack of interest.</p><p>Meanwhile, it’s worth noting that yesterday lunchtime I went to buy my 13-year-old daughter a bra ? not as an affectation. She needs one.</p><p>The bras in the range for youngsters were almost all quite substantially padded. Still, after years of complaints from parents. Ugh. </p>?<p>So, not a great week to be a woman. And now we get the shortlist for the Orange Rising Star award at the forthcoming Baftas. All five on the list are male.</p><p>I don't often get all hurrumph-ish about such matters and the idea of quotas makes me feel distinctly uneasy, but 2011 wasn't exactly a year without stellar film performances by women. Let's look back... Since Bafta doesn't limit its award to those born in the UK, there's no reason to exclude the dazzling Emma Stone, Noomi Rapace, Jennifer Lawrence, Rooney Mara, Chloe Moretz, Hailee Steinfeld or Jessica Chastain.</p><p>From arthouse fare like The Tree of Life and True Grit to multiplex pleasers like Hugo and Sherlock Holmes, they have delighted us.</p><p>Let's suppose we had to choose from home talent. What about Felicity Jones or Saoirse Ronan? This year's most versatile actress on the up escalator is Olivia Colman, wry and warm in Rev, quaking and damaged in Tyrannosaur.</p><p>Unlike many awards at this time of year (whose main criteria for winning is sentiment and past glories), these women are bursting with potential ? I can't wait to see what all of the above do next, from kids'-movie-for-adults The Hunger Games (Lawrence) to the heartbreaking Like Crazy (Jones).</p><p>Apart from their towering talent, one thing I've noticed about all of these women is that not one of them looks in the least &quot;surgically enhanced&quot;. They are all exquisite, of course, but not necessarily in the way that conforms to the tired old &quot;blonde, pneumatic&quot;. Wouldn't it be marvellous if these women, hugely admired by cinema-goers, if not the Bafta judges, finally turned attention away from cookie-cutter beauty and towards celebrating what comes naturally? And if, as a by-product, breast enhancement returned to a service for medical reasons, due to lack of interest.</p><p>Meanwhile, it's worth noting that yesterday lunchtime I went to buy my 13-year-old daughter a bra ? not as an affectation. She needs one.</p><p>The bras in the range for youngsters were almost all quite substantially padded. Still, after years of complaints from parents. Ugh.</p>?<p>The rhetorical question with Mr T is the one asked in the Supergran theme song: is there nothing that he cannae do? But what on earth will he do? Lesser men would regard his vindication over Mr Assad, for whom we learn he wished to fix an honorary knighthood, as a cue to bank a matchless reputation for geopolitical nous, bow out of public affairs, and devote himself to pleasure. Yet this is too colossal a figure to rest on his altruistic laurels, and it is agonising to watch him beg for seemly work in interviews like Saturday's cri de coeur with the Financial Times.</p><p>From Lionel Barber's wry references to Mr T's eagerness to pose for the camera, and from his own perplexed tone at being overlooked for important posts, you suspect his fictional role model is an even earlier paradigm of broken dreams than Yosser. Mr Tony, ever ready for his close up, is the Norma Desmond of disregarded global statesmen. He is still big. It's the world that got small.</p><p>Not everyone agrees that Chloe's Newsnight appearance was a fiasco. The Guardian's Michael White thought she did fine, ending his thoughts with a cheering &quot;Well done, Smithy!&quot; Tremendous stuff. In Britain, Michael is almost a lone practitioner of that style of punditry which automatically takes the contra-intuitive line in the quest to appear above the fray and fearsomely individualistic. It's a more popular journalistic form in the US, where various geniuses have explained why the survival of the Affordable Care Act is a catastrophe for Obama, but we don't get enough of it here. Well done, Whitey!</p>?<p>It's hard to disagree with that. It would be no surprise now to find the former PM whispering, &quot;I could do that&quot; in Graeme Souness's shell-like in a Sky Sports studio. </p><p>The rhetorical question with Mr T is the one asked in the Supergran theme song: is there nothing that he cannae do? But what on earth will he do? Lesser men would regard his vindication over Mr Assad, for whom we learn he wished to fix an honorary knighthood, as a cue to bank a matchless reputation for geopolitical nous, bow out of public affairs, and devote himself to pleasure. Yet this is too colossal a figure to rest on his altruistic laurels, and it is agonising to watch him beg for seemly work in interviews like Saturday's cri de coeur with the Financial Times.</p><p>From his perplexed tone at being overlooked for important posts, you suspect his fictional role model is an even earlier paradigm of broken dreams than Yosser. Mr Tony, ever ready for his close up, is the Norma Desmond of disregarded global statesmen. He is still big. It's the world that got small.</p><p>Take some advice on legal affairs, Ed</p><p>If that erstwhile barrister wants to make himself useful, Mr Tony might advise Ed Miliband on legal affairs. On the weekend, seeking a clever contrast with bankers who go unpunished after costing us untold billions, Ed mentioned that people who shoplift goods worth £50 &quot;go straight to prison&quot;. No they do not. It may be an engaging fantasy with Anthony Worrall-Thompson in mind, but they seldom go as far as court. If they do, a small fine, or community service for repeat offenders, is as draconian as it gets. Ire towards the bankers hardly needs inflaming with babyish drivel, and Little Ed is directed to Christopher Hitchens's fabled rebuke to his friend Martin Amis. Don't. Be. Silly.</p><p>Marcos makes his mark </p><p>Sporting Villain of the Week is Marcos Baghdatis, who effectively gifted Andy Murray the last two games on Saturday night to ensure their match finished just minutes after that gloriously daffy 11pm curfew. The Cypriot robbed a viewing public of the worst mob violence in Centre Court history. Had the match been postponed, crowd mentality psychologists would have regarded a slow handclap as inevitable, while three deranged spinsters in Come On Tim! T-shirts would have had a crack at ironic hissing.</p><p>Do us a favour, Nadine</p><p>So far as our most beloved Nadine Dorries, we here at SOD (Save Our Dorries) HQ begin to feel like Jehovah in the joke about the synagogue-goer who week after week begs Him to win the lottery. After the fourth prayer, the clouds part and a basso profundo voice thunders, &quot;Hymie, for heaven's sake, meet me halfway. Buy a f****** ticket&quot;. </p><p>Nadine's Mid-Beds seat will vanish at the next election, but she does nothing to help us find her a replacement by lacerating George Osborne for his cowardice in throwing Chloe Smith to the Paxonian wolves in the Mail on Sunday. It's a fair point, but it isn't doing SOD any favours. Nadine, for heaven's sake, meet us halfway. Buy a f****** gag. That or cross the floor, and join George Galloway on the Respect bench opposite.</p><p>Bless you, Michael</p><p>Not everyone agrees that Chloe's Newsnight appearance was a fiasco. The Guardian's Michael White thought she did fine, ending his thoughts with a cheering &quot;Well done Smithy!&quot; In Britain, Michael is almost a lone practitioner of that style of punditry which takes the contra-intuitive line in the quest to appear above the fray and fearsomely individualistic. It's a more popular journalistic form in the US, where various geniuses have explained why the survival of the Affordable Care Act is a catastrophe for Obama, but we don't get enough of it here. Well done, Whitey!</p>?<p>Dawn Makin, 35, pleaded guilty at Preston Crown Court to the manslaughter of Chloe Burke on the grounds of diminished responsibility.</p><p>The body of the youngster was found with stab wounds at the family home in Lea Mount Drive, Bury, Greater Manchester, on February 17last year.</p><p>Makin, who worked as a nurse, was at the scene when police arrived and was taken to hospital, where she has remained since.</p><p>It is understood she had attempted to take her own life.</p><p>She was later charged with her daughter's murder.</p><p>Her plea to manslaughter was accepted by the Crown Prosecution Service today.</p><p>Appearing in court in a wheelchair, she was bailed to appear again at Preston Crown Court for sentencing on August 30.</p><p>PA</p>?<p>&quot;I was desperate and literally had no money,&quot; she recalls. When Maria appeared in court she thought she was going to jail. It was her second offence. She had already been convicted for benefit fraud. Struggling to make ends meet, Maria had taken an extra job working night shifts without declaring it. She had done it for a year, over-claiming £40 a week.</p><p>But Maria, who is 49, was one of the lucky ones. Some 10,181 women were put behind bars in 2011 and the population of Britain's women's prisons has more than doubled over the past 15 years. Maria, however, was sentenced to attend something called the Inspire project, a ground-breaking initiative run by a women's centre near her home in Brighton.</p><p>Similar projects are being pioneered in Bradford, Glasgow, Calderdale, Worcester and London to find more effective ways of stopping women from offending than the traditional prison system affords. At the centres, women undergo a detailed individual assessment and then are given help with a range of problems including drug and alcohol misuse, parenting and budgeting skills, debt, housing and employment problems, anger management, and mental and physical health problems.</p><p>The aim is to address the root causes of crime more effectively ? and more cost-effectively ? than prison. The approach works. The average court-directed order at the Together Women Project in Bradford costs between £750 and £1,000 per woman per year ? compared with the £56,415 a year it costs to keep a woman in jail. It has a compliance rate of 80 per cent. And it has reduced reoffending to less than 10 per cent compared to a national average of 62 per cent.</p><p>Funding for these centres grew out of the recommendations of a major report commissioned by the then Labour Government from Baroness Jean Corston in 2007 into how to improve the way the criminal justice system deals with women offenders. &quot;The vast majority of women offenders are not dangerous,&quot; it said. Only those comparatively few women who are a danger to others need be locked up.</p><p>There was cross-party approval when it recommended fundamental reform which included developing a network of centres to support and supervise more and better punishments in the community. It also recommended improved sentencing and reconfiguring the prison system to close big women's prisons and replace them with smaller units better able to address the re-offending problem. They would also house mothers nearer to home so their children could visit more.</p><p>But although the Government accepted 40 of Corston's 43 recommendations it has stalled on implementing its biggest reforms. In the five years since the report &quot;little progress has yet been made,&quot; says the umbrella group of 21 campaign groups in the Corston Independent Funders' Coalition.</p><p>&quot;Everyone agrees we need fewer women in prison but nothing happens,&quot; says Juliet Lyon of the Prison Reform Trust. So how has this impasse come about?</p><p>Short sentences do not work</p><p>Why are more women in jail? Most of the rise comes from a significant increase in the severity of sentences. Just 10 per cent of women convicted of an indictable offence were sent to prison in 1996. A decade later the figure had risen to 15 per cent. &quot;Not since the mid-19th century has our prison system held as many women as it does today,&quot; says the Chief Inspector of Prisons, Nick Hardwick.</p><p>&quot;We've seen an incredible ratcheting up of sentencing in Britain in the last 20 years,&quot; says the barrister and equality campaigner Helena Kennedy QC. &quot;It began with Michael Howard [under the Conservatives] but then Labour joined in with a Dutch auction of who could be toughest. It has created a sense among magistrates and judges of what's expected of them as the press constantly berate judges for soft sentences. Despite the drawing up of sentencing guidelines there's been a tabloidisation of the whole sentencing process.&quot;</p><p>Some types of crime ? particularly centred on drugs ? have increased but, in the main, women are being jailed more often for comparatively minor offences like shoplifting and benefit fraud. They are what Corston called &quot;low level 'nuisance' offending&quot; often driven by the woman's need to provide for her family or to fund an addiction. A quarter of those jailed had no previous convictions.</p><p>Yet two thirds of the 10,181 women sentenced to prison in 2011 served sentences of six months or significantly less. In 2008, the most recent year for which full statistics are available, 3,338 women were sent to prison for three months or less. Another 986 women went inside for less than four weeks. And 139 got less than 10 days in jail, sometimes for offences like not paying their council tax.</p><p>Such short sentences are extraordinarily ineffective. They appease those sections of public opinion which demand retributive punishment. But they allow no time for serious work on reform and rehabilitation strategies. &quot;A six-week sentence may involve two weeks detox, two weeks to stabilise medication and two weeks to prepare for release,&quot; admits civil servant Debra Baldwin. &quot;So there is no time for prison to do much more.&quot;</p><p>And such short sentences are not subject to any form of statutory supervision on release. &quot;Most women offenders leave prison still encumbered by the debt, mental health, or substance abuse problems with which they entered,&quot; says Nick Hardwick. &quot;It is no surprise that the majority go on to re-offend.&quot;</p><p>Indeed the problem is getting worse. Reconviction rates have risen for women. Short sentences have the worst rate of recidivism; almost two-thirds of those who have served sentences of less than 12 months, are re-convicted within a year of release.</p><p>&quot;If women are in for selling drugs or sex, many go back to it straight away when they get out,&quot; says Juliet Lyon of the Prison Reform Trust. &quot;In the 1990s the reoffending rate was 40 per cent; now it's over 50 per cent. They get more dependent on the institution and less capable of coping outside.&quot; The idea that you have to be tougher on repeat offenders doesn't work with drugs, adds Helena Kennedy.</p><p>Intensive interventions make a demonstrable difference. In the Mother and Baby Units inside prisons, which can house a total of just 80 mothers at one time, the intensive skills tuition reduces reoffending. At Styal prison in Cheshire, KarenMoorcroft, project manager of the mother and baby unit run by Action forChildren, says: &quot;The rate of those who return to prison is around 52 per cent in the general prison population but just 15 per cent in the unit.&quot; The reoffending rate for women on sentences shorter than 12 months rises to 62 per cent.</p><p>The same is true with punishment in the community. In South Ayrshire, 37 per cent of women offenders breached their community service orders until the children's charity Barnardo's introduced parenting, truancy and debt counselling, along with housing and employment support. Breaches then dropped by almost two-thirds.</p><p>Many of the women in our prisons are, in Nick Hardwick's words, &quot;repeat petty offenders, trapped in a cycle of deprivation, disadvantage, drug abuse and crime that the prison system is conspicuously failing to break&quot;. Very short prison sentences served little purpose except to further disrupt sometimes already chaotic lives. &quot;Prisons ? particularly as they are currently run,&quot; he says, &quot;are simply the wrong place for so many of the distressed, damaged or disturbed women they hold.&quot;</p><p>How to cut the cost of prison</p><p>The Inspire project in Brighton works because it understands that. &quot;We are working with people who have been though a lot of trauma in their own lives and quite often the women are very vulnerable,&quot; says Sara Hughes, an Inspire case worker.</p><p>&quot;Obviously they have been convicted of a crime but often they are victims of crime themselves.&quot; Many also live in poor circumstances. &quot;The project is really about helping people break out of that cycle of crime, substance misuse, domestic violence and homelessness. Sending them to prison would only compound their problems,&quot; she adds.</p><p>This is not special pleading. National statistics offer shocking confirmation. More than half of women in UK prisons have suffered domestic violence. One in three has experienced sexual abuse. One in four has been in care. Their levels of education are very low: 74 per cent left school at 16 or before. They have less than half the academic qualifications of the general population. Almost half have not worked in the past five years.</p><p>To all of that must be added extremely high levels of drug use: almost 60 per cent have used drugs daily in the six months before prison. Their physical and psychological health is poor. Almost half the incidents of self-harm in prison are by women, even though they constitute around five per cent of the total prison population. Evidence suggests that community sentences are far better than prison at enabling women to tackle the triggers of their criminal behaviour ? such as substance abuse and mental health issues ? while reducing the level of disruption caused to their families. Such problems, said Baroness Corston, &quot;are all far more likely to be resolved through casework, support and treatment than by being incarcerated in prison.&quot;</p><p>The Brighton Women's Centre project is run by five charities which work closely with the probation service. The probation officers suggest to local magistrates and judges which women might benefit from Inspire as an alternative to prison.</p><p>To be considered the women must be classed as a low risk to the public.</p><p>And yet Inspire is not a soft option. &quot;We have had people who have done prison a number of times and been unfazed by it,&quot; says Helen Race, a project case worker. &quot;But when they have had to stop and reflect on their actions they have found this very challenging. Unlike prison it requires women to address the causes of their crime, the consequences of their actions, their role within the community and that it could change.</p><p>Mother-of-three Sue Martin, 41, was referred to Brighton women's centre after being convicted of benefit fraud. Sue, a nursery worker, had worked extra hours over the summer holidays without declaring the income. She was prosecuted two years ago for benefit fraud after receiving &quot;a couple of hundred&quot; extra pounds in family tax credits. She was terrified she would be separated by prison from her children, now aged 17, 15 and nine. Instead she was sentenced to pay back the money and attend sessions at Inspire.</p><p>&quot;The project helped me resolve a lot of my problems. My whole personal life was pretty grim at the time. My partner was very abusive and I wanted to leave him,&quot; he says. She had taken the extra work to build a fund to run away. &quot;Although the conviction was just awful it is still the best thing that has happened in the long term. A domestic violence case worker here helped me resolve a lot of things. We also worked on my parenting. My daughter was then 13 but because of the situation with my then-partner she had lost all respect for me and was getting into all sorts of risky behaviours. I think that if I'd been jailed my daughter would have ended up following suit. But this project gave me the tools to change my life.&quot;</p><p>After the Corston report, similar projects were funded by the Ministry of Justice across the country. But there are not enough of them, nor are they evenly spread geographically. Funding has been cut and the centres stagger from one year to the next financially. Next year funding of such centres will pass from central to local government, says Rachel Halford of the charity Women in Prison, and there is no guarantee that the cash will continue.</p><p>&quot;Women offenders are generally a high priority with ministers,&quot; says Debra Baldwin, the senior civil servant responsible for women's prisons in the Ministry of Justice. &quot;It is a priority to reduce reoffending among women.&quot;</p><p>One big problem, she says, &quot;is that the money for these various services and initiatives come from different pots&quot;. The prison system, probation service, Department of Health and local authority social services departments are all involved. &quot;So a cost in one is not offset by a commensurate saving in the same budget, but in a different budget entirely. That is one of the real challenges on where do you break the cycle of intergenerational crime.&quot;</p><p>What that means is that &quot;civil servants are back in their comfort silos&quot;, says Baroness Corston, who tried to build links between different Government departments to prevent such budget myopia.</p><p>Such thinking is short-sighted, according to the New Economics Foundation which conducted a study of women and the criminal justice system. It concluded that imprisoning mothers for non-violent offences carries a massive cost to the state in extra benefits and unpaid taxes from the diminished life chances inflicted upon the children of prisoners. &quot;It is difficult to understand what value is being delivered for the billions of pounds being spent in the criminal justice system,&quot; the report said.</p><p>By contrast there are huge benefits from investing in alternatives to prison. &quot;Even small reductions in re-offending translate into significant savings,&quot; it said. Every pound invested in alternatives to prison generates £14 of additional benefits to society within 10 years through reduced unemployment, ill health and family breakdown. &quot;If alternatives to prison were to achieve an additional reduction of just six per cent in reoffending, the state would recoup the investment required to achieve this in just one year.&quot;</p><p>Clearly the Government is alive to the question of cost-effectiveness. Earlier this year ministers published a consultation document which revealed that ministers want to introduce a &quot;payment by results&quot; system for running community sentences and want it to be working by 2015.</p><p>Prison reformers have mixed views on the idea. While welcoming the increased commitment to punishment in the community they have reservations about payment by results.</p><p>&quot;You only get paid if people on your courses don't re-offend at all,&quot; says Roma Hooper of the campaign group Make Justice Work which gave evidence to the Commons Select Committee Inquiry on Women Offenders this month. &quot;But that's not the only measure of success. Some offenders will stop, but others will do a much lower level type of crime, say shoplifting after conspiracy to supply drugs. That would be accounted as failure, though it would be an incremental success.&quot;</p><p>She adds: &quot;It can take more than one go to stop people offending. If you don't recognise that you might be setting up the new system to fail. That could discredit the entire strategy of finding alternatives to prison in the community. The two years they have allowed for pilot schemes is not enough.&quot; The jury will be out on payment by results for some time yet.</p><p>The names of some of the offenders and their children have been changed</p><p>Tomorrow: Part 6 - What needs to be done</p>?<p>&quot;They were in a pretty poor state,&quot; says Nikki Bradley, who runs the Family Interventions service at Tower Hamlets, east London. &quot;They only had one pair of trainers between them so they used to take turns to wear them, going to college in them on alternate days.&quot;</p><p>When a woman is sent to prison it is not just she who is punished. The children of prisoners ? who have done no wrong, whatever crime their mother may have committed ? are punished too. But little account is generally taken of their needs.</p><p>According to the most recent figures around 200,000 children each year suffer from the loss of a parent in prison ? far more than are separated through divorce. When mothers are jailed only nine per cent have fathers who step forward to take care of them. That means that 17,000 children a year are left effectively parentless. They are the hidden victims of a system in which the number of women jailed has doubled in the last 15 years.</p><p>&quot;Prison is needlessly cruel in the harm it does to children,&quot; says Juliet Lyon, director of the Prison Reform Trust. The problems begin almost from birth. In the first six to nine months of life a mother and baby bond in a process which psychologists call attachment. &quot;If the quality of that relationship is impaired it can damage the way a child develops, emotionally and socially, and impair its ability to form normal relationships throughout its life,&quot; says Tessa Baradon, head of the Parent Infant Project at the Anna Freud psychotherapeutic centre who devised the parenting course currently used in a number of women's prisons.</p><p>The extent of the disruption is significant. For eight out of ten children when their mother goes to prison it is the first time they have been separated from her for more than a day or so. Half of the babies who are taken into care when their mothers go to prison are moved from one carer to another, two, three or even four times.</p><p>Babieswho suffer poor attachment with their mothers are more likely to be involved incrime as adolescents, according to a report by the Children's Commissioner forEngland. There is also an increased likelihood of the child having learning difficulties or developing personality problems or other psychiatric disorders.</p><p>The Prison Service attempts to address this through the mother and baby units it runs in eight of its 13 women's prisons. &quot;We support the mothers in developing their confidence as mothers and their attachment with their babies and older children,&quot; says Karen Moorcroft of the charity Action for Children which runs the units inside Styal prison in Cheshire and New Hall in West Yorkshire.</p><p>Several prisons have run a New Beginnings programme devised by Ms Baradon , though funding for the work was axed by the Ministry of Justice last year. &quot;If you work with the baby in parallel with the mother,&quot; she explains, &quot;you can actually influence the baby's development directly in such a way that it helps the mother. &quot;</p><p>The aim is to make the mothers more aware of the needs of the baby as separate from their own. It promotes what the psychotherapist calls, &quot;a shift towards understanding the baby as a person with a separate, and therefore different, mind&quot;. Yet such units only allow children to be cared for by imprisoned mothers until the child is around 18 months old.</p><p>Child development experts suggest that children can become institutionalised if they remain much longer. Ms Moorcroft says: &quot;We had one child who whenever she saw a door out on a visit she wouldn't push it but would stop and wait for someone to produce a key as though she thought all doors were locked. The prison environment had begun to affect her.&quot;</p><p>It is important to recognise that there is rarely a perfect solution, says a Prison Service policy document which concludes: &quot;It is commonly a matter of finding the least bad option.&quot; Alison Phillips of the charity Babies in Prison ? which funded the sensory playroom in Holloway prison, provides equipment and day trips to the units and spreads good ideas and practice ? agrees. &quot;Mother and baby units,&quot; she says, &quot;are in our view the least worst option.&quot; And there are places for just 80 mothers in total.</p><p>Around 6,000 of the children affected by the imprisonment of their mother are under five-years-old, according to figures from the Howard League for Penal reform. (There are no official statistics). Around another 7,000 are between the ages of five and ten. Some have to deal with the trauma of seeing their mother arrested. All have to cope with being deprived of their mother's day-to-day love. They almost always have to leave their home and often their school. Many are separated from their brothers and sisters.</p><p>A study by Dr Joseph Murray of Cambridge University's Psychiatry Department found that they are three times more likely to exhibit antisocial behaviour, ranging from persistent lying and deceit to criminal behaviour. Individuals were affected right through to 48 years old. Nearly two thirds of boys who have a parent in prison will go on to commit some kind of crime themselves.</p><p>It begins with mood changes, hyperactivity, and what Deirdre King, author of Parents, Children and Prison: Effects of parental imprisonment on children, calls &quot;acting up&quot; with their carers in their parents' absence. Others, she says, become &quot;very clingy&quot;. The children worry about their imprisoned parent. &quot;Do you get beat up?&quot; one boy asked his mother on a visit. They worry about the visits, which are usually not child-friendly, and where they can often be shy or awkward with their own mother.</p><p>&quot;They are often ashamed,&quot; says Sarah Salmon of the charity Action for Prisoners' Families. &quot;They won't tell their school or friends where their mum is. That enforced silence about their situation deprives them of support which might otherwise be forthcoming from school or the local council.</p><p>Their confusion can be exacerbated by the lies their mothers tell them. &quot;Some mothers don't tell their children they are in jail,&quot; she adds. &quot;</p><p>Later years throw up new problems. &quot;My daughter Gwyneth started her periods last week,&quot; says Susan, who is halfway through a two-year sentence for arson in Eastwood Park prison, Gloucestershire.</p><p>&quot;I had a talk with her about it before I came in. But it's hard for her not having her mum around at that time. She's 12 and just starting comprehensive.&quot;</p><p>Her son Bryn is nine. &quot;He's been teased at school with the other kids asking him: 'What do you have for breakfast? Porridge like your mother.' Though a couple have said: 'Your mam's a gangster, that's so cool'. He's had huge hair loss because of stress and he's not gaining weight. The school have had to give him a counsellor.&quot; Teenagers, who might be supposed to be more self-sufficient, are thought by many charities to be particular vulnerable to separation from a parent due to imprisonment.</p><p>Many children become withdrawn. Some suffer depression. Children who have a parent in prison are three times as likely to suffer from mental health problems as other kids.</p><p>So many are deeply affected by their mother's imprisonment during these formative periods of their life that Baroness Jean Corston, who wrote a key report into vulnerable women in the criminal justice system five years ago, has described the impact of mothers' imprisonment on their children as, &quot;often nothing short of catastrophic&quot;.</p><p>Not all of the problems in these children's lives can be put down to their mother's imprisonment. They were often already suffering considerable disadvantage because of their mother's behaviour before she went to jail. &quot;Sixty per cent of women in custody have children under 18,&quot; says Debra Baldwin, the Ministry of Justice senior civil servant in charge of policy on women's prisons. &quot;But two-thirds of them didn't have their kids living with them when they went into prison.</p><p>&quot;These women have very damaging and chaotic lifestyles in terms of drink and alcohol use. They can be very damaged and also very damaging. So it's a real mixed picture.&quot;</p><p>Even so prison appears to be a decisive adverse factor. Dr Murray says: &quot;The evidence does seem to point to the fact that kids whose parents go to prison do worse than those who have committed a crime, gone to court and got a non-custodial sentence.&quot;</p><p>For some children, of course, prison can be a good thing. &quot;For some families the mother going into prison is a relief because she has been causing merry hell,&quot; says Sarah Salmon of Action for Prisoners' Families. &quot;</p><p>Prison can have beneficial effects for mothers too. &quot;For some women prison can be a safe haven,&quot; says Tessa Baradon. &quot;The very aspects of the regime of the prison which brings huge resistance from prisoners ? the rules, the regularity of food being provided, no drugs, no domestic violence etc ? can have hugely positive results in the attachment between mothers and babies.&quot;</p><p>But however bad a mother has been,&quot; she adds, &quot;it is rare that a child will feel more relief than loss when their mother goes to prison.&quot;</p><p>A number of changes could be made to reduce the stress on children. A more systematic programme of support could be put in place for the children of prisoners. At present unless a child is already known to school or social services as &quot;at risk&quot; no mechanism exists for informing those authorities that a parent is in prison.</p><p>Courts could shower greater awareness of the needs of children when passing sentence on mothers. The charity Partners of Prisoners and Families Support Group wants the introduction of a formal procedure to require courts to establish the existence and whereabouts of offenders' children before sentencing. The campaigning barrister Helena Kennedy QC wants to go further and impose a duty on a judge or magistrate to order a pre-sentencing report on the impact custody would have on the children of the family. &quot;Good probation officers already include that but it should be a statutory requirement,&quot; she says.</p><p>Above all there is a need to ask why Britain is now sending so many more women to prison ? and whether there are not punishments in the community which would be more effective and fairer to these children who get a bad deal from our criminal justice system ? and through no fault of their own.</p><p>&quot;Whenever mother is taken away from her child we punish the child as well as the mother,&quot; says Sheila Kitzinger, the childbirth activist who two decades ago campaigned successfully to have handcuffs removed from women prisoners as they gave birth in NHS hospitals. &quot;That is particularly true of babies who are the most vulnerable members of society. To penalise them for a crime the mother has committed is an abuse of adult power.</p><p>&quot;The mothers of small children should not be in jail at all, except in the most extreme circumstances.&quot;</p><p>Tomorrow, Part 5: Is there any another way?</p>?<p>&quot;It was a terrible, terrible thing for the girls,&quot; says their grandmother, Margaret Jones, who, at the age of 59, should be making indulgent grandparental visits but now, instead, cares for them full-time. &quot;When they were only eight they lost their mother, their friends, their school, their home all in one go. I think they found it not too bad to start with ? it was a bit like a holiday ? but later when they realised she wasn't coming back for such a long time they found it very difficult.</p><p>&quot;The twins have gone through some very emotional times ? and they still are. Emotionally I think they are still doing quite badly. Even now they need hugs all the time.&quot;</p><p>More than 4,000 children every year in England and Wales move in with their grandmothers because their mother has been sent to jail. Another 5,000 are taken in by other family members or friends. Some 2,000 others are adopted or fostered because their mother is behind bars. Those who volunteer ? often at dramatically short notice ? are faced with substantial responsibility, stress and expense as a result.</p><p>It often begins with a sudden call from the local police station or social worker. &quot;Relatives get a call out of the blue to be told: 'Can you come and pick this child up from us, otherwise they will go into care',&quot; says Sarah Salmon, deputy director of Action for Prisoners' Families.</p><p>&quot;In some cases it is not until the woman gets from the court to the prison that she announces: 'I've left my baby with a neighbour who's expecting me back' and the authorities have to go round.&quot;</p><p>Children often seem an after-thought in the British criminal justice system, says another charity. Grandparents Plus is campaigning for changes to the system in order to put the interests of children first. Its policy and research manager Sarah Wellard says: &quot;One of the appalling things is that a child can go off to school without any idea that their mother is going to be jailed and that nobody is going to be there to pick them up. There is no duty to inform social services when a mother is given a jail sentence. It can leave children in a very vulnerable situation.&quot;</p><p>It is revealing that a charity acting for grandparents is taking a lead here. Only a few children are cared for by their fathers when their mother goes to jail. That has far-reaching consequences. When a father is jailed, it is likely that his children will remain in their own home with their mother. But only 9 per cent of children whose mothers are jailed are cared for by their fathers.</p><p>That is, in part, a reflection of the widespread dereliction of duty among many fathers. But it is also because some of the men are also in prison; a survey of the women at HMP Styal showed that as many as a third had partners in prison. But it also reflects the fac t that twice as many women prisoners were single parents before they were jailed, compared to the general population. The impact of this is significant. It means that a mere five per cent of youngsters stay in their own homes once their mother has been imprisoned. A study by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation found that the impact of imprisonment and separation disrupted every aspect of the lives of the family left behind.</p><p>Imprisonment has profound impacts on psychological health of both the children and their new carers. Margaret Jones is visibly upset as she recounts her family's experience. &quot;Rachel will end up in tears at bedtime even now, three years on. Sometimes she wakes up and has had a dream about mummy being hurt. They worry that their mother isn't coming back,&quot; she says. &quot;Chloe has had a lot of problems ? sadness, anger, you name it we've had it. Her behaviour and attitude has been very bad&quot;. Chloe is now under the care of the Child Mental Health Service.</p><p>All this is despite the fact that the twins ? unlike many prisoners' children ? have been able to visit their mother regularly. &quot;We have been lucky that she has been placed in two prisons that are reasonably close to where we live,&quot; grandma Margaret says. &quot;But it has just been luck ? there isn't anything in the system that thinks about the practicalities of how children can visit their mother.&quot;</p><p>Having a mother in prison can also quickly stretch family finances to breaking point. Not only does the family lose the prisoner's former income, but extended family members are often forced to quit work to care for their children.</p><p>That happened to Sue Smith, a business consultant who was forced to reduce dramatically the time she could spend on work to enable her to care for her grandson. She spoke as she sat in a budget hotel in Wakefield not far from New Hall prison from which her daughter was due to be released next morning. With her was her 3 year old grandson. Sue had brought him to see his mother as she walked through the 20 foot high metal-mesh fence that separates inmates in the closed women’s prison from the outside world.</p><p>Her daughter’s offences were related to such a history of drug abuse that social workers had made it clear that the child would be taken into care as soon as he was born. Sue and her husband took out a Special Guardianship Order then and began to pick up the pieces of her daughter’s life. “He calls me Nan,” Sue says, “He is four next month and is a very happy, confident well-adjusted little lad. He treats my other daughters as his big sisters. To all intents and purposes me and my husband are his Mum and Dad.”</p><p>But she has seen her income fall by three quarters since she began caring for him. “When you are a grandparent or kinship carer you always have financial problems. I’m self-employed and I had to downsize my workload to cope ? not just with the child but because there are the battles with the prison over all sorts of things which are very time-consuming and emotionally exhausting.”</p><p>The majority of grandmother carers find it impossible to get back into work during or after the childcare. According to Grandparents Plus, 47 per cent of carers who were previously working gave up their job when the child moved in. And 41 per cent are now dependent on welfare benefits. Yet unlike new parents or adoptive parents, family carers are not entitled to paid leave from work to meet the children's needs. Unlike foster parents they receive no allowances or payments from the state Many are tipped into poverty as a result ? leading to deprivation and hardship for the children in their care.</p><p>Margaret and her husband have found it difficult to afford the new uniforms as the twins start secondary school. &quot;Financially it has been very difficult,&quot; she says. &quot;We get no allowance; all we get is child benefit and tax credits. Having the twins also put us in debt as it took so long to get child benefit and until we got that, we could not get any other benefits. If we were foster carers we would get paid.&quot;</p><p>In addition to normal childcare costs the families of prisoners have additional expenses. Women prisoners wear their own clothes, not prison uniforms, so their families have to find the money to buy clothes. Many try too to send in cash for the prisoner to buy phonecards to ring their children. The Joseph Rowntree Foundation estimates that the average additional cost to relatives of a prisoner is £175 per month. Most prison charities think the figure is higher.</p><p>Some local authorities do give kinship carers an allowance of around £200 a month, according to Sarah Salmon of the charity Action for Prisoners' Families.</p><p>&quot;But someone in a neighbouring authority will get nothing,&quot; she says. &quot;It's a postcode lottery.&quot;</p><p>Nor is such assistance matched to the needs of the children. &quot;You can have a child with serious emotional problems whose carers get nothing in terms of support,&quot; she says.</p><p>Sarah Wellard of Grandparents Plus says: &quot;In some areas social workers will work tirelessly to get people support while in others they do not see the need for it.&quot;</p><p>The strain of caring also throws up personal problems for the grandmothers. &quot;It affects your social life,&quot; says Sue Robson, who is 52. &quot;At my age none of my friends or peers have got children any more, so it's difficult to get babysitters. It also sets up tensions in the family, because my other daughters, who ought to be able to rely on me to give them some help as a grandmother, have to help me instead.&quot;</p><p>Margaret Jones has similar problems. &quot;I have lost touch with all my friends. We used to go out most weeks. All our friends have families who have grown up. They go off for the weekend all the time but we cannot do any of it. We need to be here 24 hours a day, seven days a week for the girls. We also can't afford to go out. I do feel very isolated sometimes.&quot;</p><p>Depression among grandmother carers is unusually high. So are stress-related illnesses as a result of the extra care burden combined with declining physical health. And family relationships are destabilised and fragmented as a result of the pressures of what can be a very isolating experience.</p><p>A number of charities are campaigning for more state support for the emotional, financial and practical needs of the carers ? and their children. The charity Kinship Carers wants a national allowance. &quot;It should be straightforward, transparent to all carers and irrespective of the child's legal status,&quot; a spokesman said. At present financial support is often refused if the child has not previously been in care. Grandparents Plus also wants kinship carers to be entitled to unpaid parental leave.</p><p>For some prisoner's families the sentence is open-ended. Within one week of beingreleased from New Hall prison, Sue Smith’s daughter was admitted to a MentalHealth unit. Sue will continue to look after her grandchild indefinitely now.</p><p>The names of the prisoners and their children have been changed</p>?<p>Two of News Corp's non-executive directors ? Sir Rod Eddington, the company's senior independent director, and Andrew Knight, a former chairman of News International ? held discussions in London last month with representatives of the powerful Local Authority Pension Fund Forum (LAPFF), which has backed a resolution calling for Mr Murdoch to stand down from his position as chairman and chief executive of News Corp.</p><p>The resolution, which will be discussed at News Corp's annual shareholder meeting in Los Angeles in October, is supported by several mainstream British investors including Aviva and Legal &amp; General.</p><p>A consortium of 18 heavyweight investors are calling for Mr Murdoch to stand down as chairman in the interests of good corporate governance and be replaced by an independent figure who is seen to be acting in the best interests of shareholders.</p><p>LAPFF, a coalition of pension funds with total assets of £115bn, said the meeting on &quot;governance issues&quot; had been &quot;very positive&quot; and that it had been encouraged by the willingness of the News Corp non-executives to engage in discussion on governance reform. It is thought that the News Corp non-executive directors have met other investors with similar concerns.</p><p>The resolution is the latest in a series of attempts by some independent investors in News Corp to wrest power from the Murdoch family. But following the turbulent recent history of the company, in which its share price has been damaged by the phone-hacking scandal and it has failed in an attempt to take full control of BSky B, the new resolution is thought to have a stronger chance of success than previous actions.</p><p>&quot;If it gets anywhere near 50 per cent [support] of independent share- holders then I think the company has a problem if it doesn't decide to act,&quot; said Ian Greenwood, the LAPFF chairman. </p><p>He said the concerns were related to reputational damage to the company arising from &quot;concentration of power&quot; and its effect on share price, rather than any criticism of Mr Murdoch's actions.</p><p>Mr Murdoch has recently shown an inclination to lessen his grip on the company by splitting News Corp into two and giving up his chief executive's role at the smaller publishing division of the business. But dissenting investors feel he must also reduce his position at the head of the more important entertainments division.</p><p>Living with Wendi is like being in war zone, claims nanny</p><p>A &quot;disgruntled&quot; former nanny who looked after the children of Rupert Murdoch and Wendi Deng is ruining any celebration the family might have prepared to mark the end of the Leveson Inquiry next week. </p><p>Mr and Mrs Murdoch have had to turn to their PRs to sort out allegations levelled by Ying-Shu Hsu, who tutored and looked after their daughters, Chloe and Grace.</p><p>Five years after an accident in the Murdoch's Beverly Hills kitchen, when the nanny alleges she fell over one of the children's tricycles and fractured her knee, sparking a lengthy legal battle which she eventually lost, Ms Hsu told the US website Gawker that living with Mrs Murdoch ? who famously rushed to her husband's aid when he was attacked by a pie-wielding protester at a parliamentary hearing ? was like being &quot;in a war zone&quot;.</p><p>The account, which suggests dysfunctional parenting, class-driven meanness and Hollywood excess, was dismissed by a family spokesman as &quot;unfounded and untrue&quot;.</p><p>James Cusick</p>?<p>Then a fellow nightclub waitress, Buckman is now Schwimmer's wife, and a photographer with whom Mahfouz is collaborating on a series of installations that they hope to exhibit together one day.</p><p>&quot;We decide on one of my poems to present and then Zoe interprets it through photography. Sometimes the poem will be etched onto the image; sometimes the poem just accompanies it.&quot; Several of the poems they've worked on are from Dry Ice, which is written in a performance-poetry style. It has also inspired a short film that Mahfouz is developing for Film 4, and, following performances at the Edinburgh Festival, she has a forthcoming run at the Bush theatre in London.</p><p>The storyline pivots around a stripper called Nina. At one point, she goes to a dinner party with P, her half art-dealer, half drug-dealer, boyfriend where she tells attention-grabbing stories about the world of stripping.</p><p>&quot;You see the stereotypical stripper profile on the television which says, 'this is what it's like to be a stripper'. There are elements of that: you see what the customers are like and the things they might say, but the play tries to go a bit deeper and show how Nina's life continues outside the strip club. It asks how much these worlds collide and where the crossover starts and ends,' she reflects. Many of the characters Mahfouz acts out started life as notes she took while waitressing. &quot;I wanted to go into politics but I liked writing on the side so I spent a lot of time in the background observing. Once I got into theatre I remembered my notes. I'd written poems about that world already so it seemed a natural place to start a play.&quot; In fact, Mahfouz, who studied classics and English literature at the University of London before doing an MA in international politics and diplomacy, only thought of writing professionally when she was asked to give up her Egyptian passport (her father is half Egyptian and lives there) in order to progress in her Government policy-adviser job.</p><p>She left and, after a stint in journalism, moved into poetry and then the theatre. She did the Royal Court's Young Writers &quot;Unheard Voices&quot; for British Muslims programme, producing End of the Line, a showcase of short plays with other writers from the group. Since then she has written everything from a mini-opera for the Royal Opera House, to Sirens, a work-in-progress adaptation of three ancient Greek texts.</p><p>Her second solo show, Zainab Chloe Katya, about &quot;underground clean criminals who do things that don't directly hurt people but are still naughty&quot;, will have its first outing at this year's Latitude festival, where she's headlining the poetry arena on the Sunday.</p><p>&quot;It's like a computer game in the form of a long poem,&quot; she explains. There's also a novel and several short stories in the pipeline, plus One Hour Only, set in an upmarket brothel, and which will be part of the Old Vic New Voices inaugural season of work at this year's Edinburgh Festival.</p><p>'Dry Ice', Bush Theatre, London W12 (020 8743 5050) 8 to 12 May</p>?<p>Then a fellow nightclub waitress, Buckman is now Schwimmer's wife, and a photographer with whom Mahfouz is collaborating on a series of installations that they hope to exhibit together one day.</p><p>&quot;We decide on one of my poems to present and then Zoe interprets it through photography. Sometimes the poem will be etched on to the image; sometimes the poem just accompanies it.&quot; Several of the poems they've worked on are from Dry Ice, which is written in a performance-poetry style. It has also inspired a short film that Mahfouz is developing for Film 4, and, following performances at the Edinburgh Festival, she has a forthcoming run at the Bush theatre in London.</p><p>The storyline pivots around a stripper called Nina. At one point, she goes to a dinner party with P, her half art-dealer, half drug-dealer, boyfriend where she tells attention-grabbing stories about the world of stripping. &quot;You see the stereotypical profile on the television which says, 'this is what it's like to be a stripper'. There are elements of that: you see what the customers are like and the things they might say, but the play tries to go a bit deeper and show how Nina's life continues outside the strip club. It asks how much these worlds collide and where the crossover starts and ends,' she reflects.</p><p>Many of the characters Mahfouz acts out started life in notes she took while waitressing. &quot;I wanted to go into politics but I liked writing on the side so I spent a lot of time in the background observing. Once I got into theatre I remembered my notes. I'd written poems about that world already so it seemed a natural place to start a play.&quot;</p><p>Mahfouz, who studied classics and English literature at the University of London before doing an MA in international politics and diplomacy, only thought of writing professionally when she was asked to give up her Egyptian passport (her father is half-Egyptian and lives there) in order to progress in her job as a government policy adviser. She left and, after a stint in journalism, moved into poetry and then the theatre. She did the Royal Court's Young Writers &quot;Unheard Voices&quot; for a British Muslims programme, producing End of the Line, a showcase of short plays with other writers from the group. Since then she has written everything from a mini-opera for the Royal Opera House, to Sirens, a work-in-progress adaptation of ancient Greek texts.</p><p>Her second solo show, Zainab Chloe Katya, about &quot;underground clean criminals who do things that don't directly hurt people but are still naughty&quot;, will have its first outing at this year's Latitude festival, where she's headlining the poetry arena on the Sunday.</p><p>&quot;It's like a computer game in the form of a long poem,&quot; she explains. There's also a novel and several short stories in the pipeline, plus One Hour Only, set in an upmarket brothel, and which will be part of the Old Vic New Voices inaugural season of work at this year's Edinburgh Festival.</p><p>?</p><p>Dry Ice, Bush Theatre, London W12 (020 8743 5050) 8 to 12 May</p>?<p>While the balance between creative and commercial has always been a fine one to strike, the decision to shock or to sell takes on even more importance given widespread unemployment and the on-going difficult climate for retail.</p><p>&quot;They've got to find jobs,&quot; agrees Rob Templeman, chairman of Graduate Fashion Week and of The British Retail Consortium. &quot;At the moment there's 1.5 million under-24-year-olds unemployed. Fashion's moving, and you need younger people to help move it on.&quot;</p><p>After last year's GFW event, title sponsors George took on 68 fresh faces across their head office, in both design and marketing roles, including last year's Gold Award winner Rory Langdon, who has since created a sell-out collection for the brand. &quot;We realise that the talent of tomorrow is the lifeblood of our business,&quot; says Fiona Lambert, George's brand director, &quot;and we need that fresh young talent, because newness is what's driving the business forward.&quot;</p><p>George, along with seven other high street names including Karen Millen, New Look and House of Fraser, are also part of the GFW &quot;protege programme&quot;, which aims to place graduates in temporary ? but paid ? employment, so they can bolster their CVs and chances of getting something more permanent.</p><p>This year's Gold award winner, womenswear graduate Chloe Jones from Bath Spa university, impressed judges with sportified silk maxidresses, rendered modern with hoods and toggles, delicately finished with butterfly prints and raw hems.</p><p>Her collection will be adapted to make a high-street line, which will be sold by George later this year. There was innovative use of knits and textiles too, in Kingston University student Caitlin Charles-Jones's bright and futuristic wool separates, which featured Aztec-inspired go-faster stripes and rigid tubi sleeving picked out in high-gloss and iridescent metal threads. Both collections had a sense of directional wearability, blending complex design with something more ubiquitously palatable.</p><p>Meanwhile, the Zandra Rhodes award for Textile Innovation went to Xiaoping Huang of Lancashire University, for his deckchair-striped voluminous and three-dimensional concertina-pleated tailoring. While not traditionally commercial, there were aspects of this young designer's work which showed great potential for an imaginative take on mass-produced womenswear ? something which the high street sponsors are keen to invest in. But there is a different, and more difficult, direction to take: while many college-leavers will choose to work for big high street names and corporate conglomerates, there are those who aim to make it on their own. And although the terrain is particularly inhospitable to small businesses and those starting out right now, the A-list's increasing tastes for the unknown ? and more importantly, the as yet un-copied ? mean there are more avenues than ever for graduates to taste success even at this early stage in their careers.</p><p>&quot;Anyone who wants to start their own label, should ask themselves if that is really and truly the only thing they want to do,&quot; advises designer David Koma, who was also a judge at this year's event. He won awards for both his BA and MA collections at Central Saint Martins, before shooting to fame soon afterwards when his metallic, art deco designs were worn by both Beyonce and Rihanna in the same week. &quot;It is very, very hard and talent is only one of many elements you need.&quot;</p><p>But for Claire Barrow, who left Westminster University last month, it is about to become a reality. She has already had her pieces ? intricately illustrated leather separates in a grungy, punkish vein ? featured in Vogue, has designed a capsule for Joseph, a range of shoes for the brand Underground and is set to show at London Fashion Week in September.</p><p>Her classmate Ashley Williams, whose ironic trash-luxe collection was inspired by Texan oil wives and featured shopping bags reworked as jumpers and coats, had a host of celebrity friends (Alice Dellal, Pixie Geldof et al) modelling her creations at her graduation show and has already dressed pop star Rita Ora. In this age of Lady Gaga and directional divas, eye-catching and original graduate designers stand to gain plenty of exposure if they choose this sort of route.</p><p>&quot;These students are very rare,&quot; says the director of Westminster's fashion design course Andrew Groves, &quot;and most prefer to work within a design studio. It's a tough market ? more than 3,000 people will be graduating with a fashion-related degree, so employers can pick the very best.</p><p>&quot;But what's also vital is having a great personality ? the hours in this industry are very long, and it doesn't matter how good you are as a designer, people need to enjoy being in your company as well.&quot; With some of the wit and warmth on show, it seems young London designers are an easy-going bunch: at Central Saint Martins in particular (showing its students' work for the first time in its new home in King's Cross), humour was prevalent as a weapon in the armoury against the potentially bleak employment market these designers are about to face.</p><p>Tigran Avetisyan's menswear featured oversized shirts and smocks covered in blackboard graffiti that read &quot;so much pressure&quot; and &quot;nothing left to say&quot;, with models exiting to a soundtrack of Pink Floyd's &quot;We Don't Need No Education&quot;.</p><p>Less strident, although just as characterful, were Ruoxin Jin's marvellously intricate knitted pieces: heavy on construction and bright colours, they also featured hundreds of painstakingly rendered knitted warrior figures, clutching spears and shields, climbing across sleeves, yokes, even hats.</p><p>And Molly Goddard's oversized crinoline dresses, layered in delicate doily crochet and gauzy neon pink tulle, combined prettiness with a certain nonchalance ? a sort of statement dressing for the understated, which perfectly suited the mood and showcased her talents for texture and palette. Erin Hawkes, winner of the Young Design Talent Award, opened the show with a collection of loose-fitting and mannish modern-rustic pieces. She subverted latterday staples such as plaid and hoodies, with nostalgic, almost puritanical, apron skirts and Flemish-style hoods.</p><p>At the Royal College of Art, which showed collections from its MA students, menswear was treated inventively and irreverently, flouncing prettily as sporty pink separates by Hiroaki Kanai and as geometrically patterned tailoring, which bulged and distorted with extrusions that cleverly rendered print as structure, by Ichiro Suzuki.</p><p>Womenswear was rather more pragmatic though no less imaginative: Holly Russell's holographic and iridescent pieces set a tone of low-key, androgynous and accessible glamour, done with one eye on sales ? it was easy to imagine a Topshop-friendly version of her high-waisted shimmering jeans, for example. Rebecca Thomson's printed-silk shirtdresses and all-in-ones were practical and chic; the furry gauntlets and veiled hats topped off with fuzzy pom-poms worn by her models belied the innate commercial nature of the collection.</p><p>Given the financial pressures on students these days, perhaps it comes as no surprise that the graduate collections feel more and more professional every year. It has been a rousing and spirited showing from the country's young talents ? the future may be uncertain for them right now, but it'll certainly be bright.</p>?<p>Dawn Makin, who also attempted suicide after pretending for a year that she was going to work when she had in fact been suspended, appeared in court in a wheelchair yesterday to plead guilty to manslaughter.</p><p>She had originally been charged with murder but the plea was accepted on the basis of diminished responsibility as she was suffering from an &quot;abnormality of mind&quot; after being fired for selling information to Martin Campbell, who has pleaded guilty to breaking the Data Protection Act.</p><p>The body of Chloe Burke was found at the family home in Bury, Greater Manchester, in February last year. Ms Makin, 35, was lying unconscious nearby having cut her wrists and drunk a liquid thought to have been anti-freeze or bleach.</p><p>Ms Makin was bailed to remain in Rochdale's Birch Hill Hospital and is next due to appear in court on 30 August.</p>?<p>British delegates including David Beckham fly back from Greece to RNAS Culdrose in Cornwall.</p><p>They will attend a special ceremony welcoming the flame, before it is taken on a 70-day relay involving 8,000 torchbearers covering 8,000 miles.</p><p>The flame will finally reach east London's Olympic Stadium and the opening of the Games on July 27.</p><p>London was officially handed the flame yesterday in a rain-hit sundown ceremony at the old Panathenaic Stadium, venue of the first modern Olympics in 1896.</p><p>The flame was handed over to London to host the Games for the third time since the birth of the Olympics - in 1908, 1948 and now 2012. No other city has staged the Games three times.</p><p>Despite the buzz triggered by the last-minute news that LA Galaxy star and former England skipper Beckham was flying in specially to be part of the ancient ceremony, the more formal duties came down to the Princess Royal.</p><p>Both she and Karolos Papoulias, the Greek president, sat in ancient thrones that are part of the stadium during the hour-long event.</p><p>The flame was handed to the Princess, who was watched closely by other members of the official delegation including London 2012 chairman Lord Coe, Olympics minister Hugh Robertson, London mayor Boris Johnson, Beckham and five British sporting teenagers.</p><p>In his speech, Lord Coe thanked the damp crowd for Greece's warm hospitality and also for &quot;laying on the British weather for us&quot;.</p><p>The past week had linked Britain and Greece in a &quot;very special way in the spirit of peace and friendship&quot;, he said.</p><p>He added that the arrival of the flame on British shores will be a &quot;resounding clarion call&quot; to the world's top athletes to gather for the Games, and millions of Britons have been working hard to create a great welcome.</p><p>&quot;If the Olympic Games are about celebrating the best athletes in the world, the Olympic spirit is about celebrating the best in ourselves and in our communities.</p><p>&quot;We have found the very best torchbearers who, like Olympic athletes, will inspire a generation.</p><p>&quot;As we prepare to bring the flame to the UK, we are reminded of our responsibility - like that of our predecessors in 1908 and especially 1948 - to stage Games that use the power of sport to unite the world in a celebration of achievement and inspiration in challenging times. A Games that will inspire the next generation to choose sport,&quot; he said.</p><p>Each member of the British delegation sheltered under blue umbrellas as they walked through the centre of the stadium to their front-row seats.</p><p>Everyone from the Princess Royal to Mr Robertson was named over the loudspeakers and greeted by cheers from the crowd.</p><p>There was also a chuckle from British people in the crowd as the announcer introduced Beckham as &quot;Sir David&quot;.</p><p>The youngsters, who were picked by London 2012 for displaying Olympic values, exchanged symbolic olive branches to the tune of John Lennon's Imagine.</p><p>The five, who come from different UK regions, were from schools and colleges which are part of London 2012's Get Set education network and school linking programmes run by the British Council.</p><p>A smiling Sakinah Muhammad, 15, from Clapton Girls' Academy in Hackney, east London, said: &quot;When I first found out, I was in shock. I did not believe what they were telling me and that I was going to be something that is such a big deal.&quot;</p><p>The other British teenagers included Scottish rugby player Dennis Coles, 17, from Doon Academy, Dalmellington, East Ayrshire; hockey player Chloe Brown, 18, from South Eastern Regional College in Bangor, Northern Ireland; and Swansea Harriers athlete and Mumbles Rangers FC player Sean White, 17, from Bishop Vaughan Catholic School in Swansea.</p><p>There was also Georgia Higgs from Helston Community College, a Falmouth Ladies hockey player and school sports ambassador who represents Cornwall.</p><p>The Olympic Flame was taken on a relay around the Greek mainland and islands since it was lit by the rays of the sun in ancient Olympia last week, before a trio of world champions brought it safely to the stadium.</p><p>It arrived in the hands of rower Christina Giazitzidou and was then carried by gymnast Vasilis Tsolakidis and rower Alexandra Tsiavou.</p><p>Chinese gymnast Li Ning, who lit the cauldron at the opening ceremony for the 2008 Beijing Games, and Greek weightlifter Pyrros Dimas were the last torchbearers in Greece.</p><p>In a symbolic move by the Hellenic Olympic Committee, they were picked to represent a link between the last Olympics in Beijing, Greece as the birthplace of the institution, and the next Games in London.</p><p>PA</p>?<p>From mainstream witch to indie darling ? or, more precisely, from Fleur Delacour in the Harry Potter series to Chloe in In Bruges ? Poesy is increasingly bestriding the Anglo-Gallic film-making divide, a duality neatly encapsulated last year when she played both the French national icon, Joan of Arc, in the Cannes-competing Jeanne Captive, and a piece of arm candy in the hip US cable show Gossip Girl.</p><p>&quot;I feel very privileged to have been welcomed in England in that way,&quot; says Poesy..Her latest English project has also been her most daunting ? and although the role of Queen Isabella in Shakespeare's Richard II is only a minor one, the challenge of mastering iambic pentameters for the BBC's upcoming cycles of Shakespeare plays was considerable.</p><p>&quot;It was like learning how to speak another language,&quot; she says in accented but perfectly fluent English. &quot;You do Shakespeare at drama school but you do it in French. It's interesting to see, when you study theatre in France, the different translations of Shakespeare ? because obviously in England you just work on one material.&quot;</p><p>She learned from her Bard-hardened Richard II co-stars, Rory Kinnear, Ben Whishaw and Patrick Stewart, and reflects with amusement on how she got into the Conservatoire National Superieur d'Art Dramatique (France's equivalent of Rada) by performing, in English, Juliet's balcony scene from Romeo and Juliet. &quot;No one had any idea of whether it was any good,&quot; laughs Poesy, who took her mother's maiden name for the stage. Her father, Etienne Guichard, is a theatre director, who used to pretend to Clemence and her younger sister, Maelle, that their TV only played videos of movies. After a stab at couture that ended after a disastrous work-experience placement, Poesy grudgingly accepted her thespian fate.</p><p>&quot;I was the one in the family who was saying I wanted to do something else,&quot; she says. &quot;Mostly because I felt a bit silly saying that I wanted to be an actress before I actually was an actress ? or it might have been being scared of failure.&quot;</p><p>A string of French roles playing teenagers ensued, before her English-language breakthrough as Mary, Queen of Scots in Jimmy McGovern's 2004 BBC drama Gunpowder, Treason &amp; Plot ? a role that led to Harry Potter. Her mother, a schoolteacher, had already encouraged her to read JK Rowling's books.</p><p>Harry Potter led to a variety of English language parts, from the aforementioned In Bruges, with Colin Farrell (&quot;people love that film&quot;), and the 2007 TV mini-series War and Peace, to playing Jim Sturgess's enigmatic girlfriend in the London-set horror film Heartless, and as James Franco's lover in Danny Boyle's 127 Hours. Now Poesy is involved in a somewhat more unusual romance, Mr Morgan's Last Love, an age-gap meeting of lonely hearts between a free-spirited Parisian and Michael Caine's retired and widowed philosophy professor. It sounds like Lost in Translation.</p><p>&quot;Yuh, it's two lonely people finding each other, except it's Paris and not Tokyo,&quot; she says. &quot;It's not a real love story but there's a lot of love in it... It was lovely to get to know him. He's incredibly simple, and he's got a very playful approach to the whole thing still. &quot;</p><p>Poesy is also a musician (she plays guitar, and sang on last year's debut album by the Last Shadow Puppets' Miles Kane) and fashion icon ? a face of the perfume Chloe and now the new face of Dutch urban fashion chain G-Star Raw .One poster we won't be seeing however, is of a naked, or semi-naked, Poesy. After a bad experience as an 18-year-old starlet, she has a clause in all her contracts that states any nude scenes she films can't be used in trailers or publicity stills. &quot;People can find the scene and so whatever they want on the internet,&quot; she says, &quot;but at least they can't use it on the trailer.&quot;</p><p>Birdsong is out on DVD on 12 March. Richard II is on BBC2 in July. Mr Morgan's Last Love is released this autumn</p>?<p>County were officially formed in 1862, playing matches among themselves for two years, and until 1910 they shared Trent Bridge cricket ground before moving to Meadow Lane. For their centenary they played an England XI and this time they have promised supporters a pre-season visit from &quot;one of Europe's top clubs&quot; ? surely Juventus, who in September opened their new stadium with a friendly against Notts, the original donors of the Italian club's famous black-and-white stripes ? readers may recall that when Juve's pink shirts faded too much, an Englishman playing for them arranged with a Nottingham friend for a set of County kit to be sent over. </p><p>Also commemorating this year's anniversary are a new book, Tied Up In Notts, by the veteran Radio Nottingham commentator Colin Slater MBE, who has now reported on nearly 2,200 of their games; and a new beer, brewed by Castle Rock and called &quot;Pie Eyed 150&quot;. </p><p>Albrighton swift to shell out</p><p>It is always good to hear of a Premier League player properly rooted in his local community, so a happy new year to Aston Villa's Marc Albrighton, who watches his hometown teams Tamworth and Bolehall Swifts whenever he can, and is now sponsoring the Swifts, a team he watched with his father as a small boy. </p><p>The England Under-21 winger paid for a set of tracksuits and polo shirts in the Swifts' yellow-and-green colours, buys the winner of the club's man-of-the-month award a pair of top-of-the-range boots and does the trophy presentations at awards nights for the junior sides. </p><p>&quot;I absolutely love watching non-League football, whether it's at Bolehall or down at The Lamb [Tamworth's ground],&quot; he said. &quot;It's good, honest football and there are no prima donnas.&quot; </p><p>Now Albrighton is part of the Bolehall family in more ways than one. His girlfriend Chloe is the daughter of the Swifts manager Daren Fulford and is expecting their first child next month. </p><p>Family background on both sides will, however, tell her what to expect: Albrighton's dad Terry missed his wife's birthday in 1982... because he had been following Villa to their glorious European Cup final victory over Bayern Munich in Rotterdam.</p><p>Red mist falls over Christmas</p><p>In the days when clubs played each other twice over the holiday period ? often on successive days ? there could be some remarkable swings in results, not always attributable to overdoing the festivities. </p><p>The most famous examples were probably in 1963, when West Ham lost 8-2 at home to Blackburn on Boxing Day and won the return at Ewood Park two days later 3-1; Fulham drubbed Ipswich 10-1 (which is still their record score) then lost 4-2; and Manchester United recovered from a 6-1 mauling by Burnley to beat them 5-1 at Old Trafford. </p><p>Something of the tradition survives in non-League football, though eight sendings-off in the Blue Square Bet Premier when the same teams were in opposition for local derbies this season on Boxing Day and New Year's Day suggests that ill-feeling carried over from the first game is a good reason to leave rather longer between the meetings. </p><p>The happiest club were Luton Town, who played Kettering twice and won 5-0 home and away, with no fewer than eight different scorers ? and no red cards. </p><p>Put the boot into Boot Room</p><p>Liverpool's public relations effort before the Luis Suarez case was heard had been widely condemned. </p><p>Once the damning judgment was published last weekend and the club had another go at winning friends and influencing people, the verdict from media commentators included &quot;staggering lack or remorse&quot;, &quot;served only to make matters worse&quot;, &quot;deeply self-serving&quot;. </p><p>From one self-confessed Liverpool supporter working for a national paper: &quot;a farce... a shambolic display... a public relations disaster. The cup for cock-ups has a new home&quot;. </p><p>So that went well. </p><p>; </p>?<p>Nick Knight: &quot;To 'I'm Rei. I don't exist'. I have been looking at your Tumblr and really like it. Do you fancy guest curating the SHOWstudio Tumblr for one week. Sorry if this is weird and out of the blue but I don't know a more formal way of contacting you. Nick Knight.&quot;</p><p>I'm Rei, I don't exist duly replies: &quot;Can you imagine this being actually real?&quot;</p><p>&quot;It was this Tumblr full of slightly strange images&quot;, Knight says now. &quot;It was a lot to do with death, a lot to do with sex and a lot to do with fashion. There were some abstract ones. And this blonde girl appeared every now and then. She was photographing herself and putting the photographs on to her Tumblr, and people were commenting on it. She's got a very distinctive face, an unconventional beauty. And people wrote quite savage things to her. 'What's wrong with your face?' That sort of thing. But she was putting herself out there, answering those comments. Her answers felt fast, open and vulnerable but at the same time tough. So I thought she'd be really good. I'm going to write to her.&quot;</p><p>To cut a long-ish story short, after some decidedly sceptical to-ing and fro-ing, culminating in Knight encouraging Nadal to contact the stylist Simon Foxton, who had guest curated Tumblr for SHOWstudio the month before and to substantiate his veracity, Ms Nadal, who also clearly does exist after all, agreed to participate.</p><p>With that, Knight dispatched an assistant who &quot;struggled down to Barcelona with suitcases full of clothes&quot; to a hotel near Nadal's home and, each morning, for seven days, asked her to deliver a white leather box overflowing with the requisite tissue paper and replete with a designer look and maybe accompanying music, make-up, scent, flowers, and even food, should it add to any atmosphere.</p><p>Nadal had the contents of this box to do with as she wished for 24 hours and, occasionally, there would be a second delivery, quaintly, for evening, and then it would be collected and a new look would arrive. The project was styled remotely by Ellie Grace Cumming and it says something of the weight of authority behind this project that clothes were provided by everyone from Alexander McQueen to Rick Owens.</p><p>The end results are remarkable, particularly given that the images of Nadal herself were shot on the photobooth application on her computer. They are interspersed with various carefully juxtaposed and more formal inspiration pictures ?a close-up of hair backstage at McQueen, snakes, hard-to-identify nudes, a Nick Knight rose.</p><p>&quot;This is her dancing in the Jil Sander dress,&quot; says Knight, speaking from SHOWstudio's London headquarters and scrolling through the finished work. &quot;The tones are gorgeous. Cecil Beaton wouldn't have done any better. It's like a painting.&quot;</p><p>Praise indeed, given that this is a man responsible for many of the most arresting fashion images of the age, from a young Naomi Campbell dressed in Yohji Yamamoto to Kate Moss on any number of British Vogue covers. Having, over more than three decades, climbed his way to the top of the (establishment) tree, Knight, still potently idealistic after all these years, continues to fight against it. &quot;What really gets to me is that you talk to art colleges and they're still teaching dark room,&quot; he says. &quot;But nobody uses it any more. Nobody. Nobody teaches Tumblr, Instagram, Twitter, but that's what they should be doing.&quot;</p><p>Embracing new media was at least partly Knight's reason for founding SHOWstudio 12 years ago. And since that time he has put his money where his mouth is. Self-funded, the site features nurtures bright young talent as well as featuring many of the biggest names in fashion and indeed contemporary culture more broadly. Victoria Beckham, Lara Stone and the Chapman Brothers have all recently collaborated and allowed unprecedented access to their working process. They are awarded complete creative freedom in return.</p><p>The democracy of the internet has always been a driving force. In particular, the removal of the (frequently commercially interested) middle man is appealing, as Knight goes on to explain. &quot;10 years ago I was working for magazines,&quot; he says. &quot;I had no idea whether anybody was looking at my work. The only way I knew whether something I was saying had resonance was if I was booked by a client again. But the situation has changed. With things like Tumblr and Instagram, you're immediately and directly in contact with your audience. When I publish a picture on Tumblr, it's seen by more people than a picture I might have published in Vogue. And they tell me what they think and I can see them sharing. Previously, going right back to any form of patronage of the arts, to the Medicis, say, they would say, 'okay you paint the painting for that church but we tell you how to do it, we decide'.&quot;</p><p>&quot;I started using Tumblr as both an inspiration source and a way to record the things that inspire me,&quot; Nadal says. &quot;Because I am a very shy person, it's not logical to expose myself that way, where anyone can see me and comment. Maybe it has to do with the fact that I wanted to make it more personal, to make my Tumblr more than one image after another, and to make it more conceptual, although that might sound pretentious.&quot;</p><p>Away from the camera's gaze, she dresses &quot;like a tomboy&quot; in &quot;skinny jeans, a T-shirt and a variable number of layers of shirts, jumpers or jackets.&quot; She rose to the challenge of wearing more complex looks ? from overblown and beautiful to highly provocative ? in the manner, Knight argues, of a &quot;a modern Cindy Sherman&quot;. &quot;I was in different moods depending on what I was wearing,&quot; she says. &quot;I tried to let the clothes influence me and can honestly say I gained self-confidence wearing these outfits and felt very powerful.&quot;</p><p>&quot;I'm so excited about this project because it reinforces many of the things that I think fashion should be,&quot; says Knight. &quot;We get very cut off and systematic and maybe miss the fact that fashion is capable of making somebody fall in love. I wanted to put the power back into it in a way.&quot;</p><p>showstudio.com</p><p>Concept: Rei Nadal and Nick Knight</p><p>Tumblr curation: Rei Nadal</p><p>Styling selection: Ellie Grace Cumming</p><p>Headpieces: Sam McKnight</p><p>Make-up consultation: Val Garland</p><p>Nails: Marian Newman</p><p>Project photography and assistance: Chloe Orefice</p><p>Styling assistance: Gerry O'Kane</p>?<p>The average cost of a litre of petrol has risen to 137.44p, topping the previous all-time high of 137.43p a litre in May 2011, the AA said.</p><p>The rise puts more pressure on Chancellor George Osborne to reduce the tax burden on drivers in his Budget later this month.</p><p>Diesel is up to 144.67p a litre which is another new record.</p><p>AA president Edmund King said: &quot;This new record for petrol and diesel just confirms what every family and business knows -?fuel?prices are hurting them badly and there seems no stopping them.</p><p>&quot;We have asked the Chancellor to do what he can to protect the UK economy from?fuel?market volatility and record high prices which are stemming growth.&quot;</p><p>Mr King went on: &quot;There is no more give in family and business budgets despite them cutting back on?fuel?purchase and other spending so they can get to work and go about their business.</p><p>&quot;Britain cannot get back on its feet if?fuel?prices hold drivers and business to ransom every time market sentiment takes hold.&quot;</p><p>The price of petrol has risen by more than 1.25p a litre in the past week.</p><p>Overall, UK drivers are spending more than £6.8 million extra a day on?fuel?compared with a year ago, and more than £24 million more a day than they were two years ago.</p><p>It is now costing drivers around £3.45 more than it was a year ago to fill a typical 50-litre tank with petrol, while the cost has risen about £12.30 compared with two years ago.</p><p>The extra monthly cost to a family with two petrol cars, each consuming an average of 106.17 litres a month, has risen by more than £2.65 in the last week, about £14.65 in the last year and around £52.24 in the last two years.</p><p>Today's unwanted records follow a survey by the Countryside Alliance which showed that the price of diesel in rural filling stations is, on average, 4p more than in urban areas.</p><p>The alliance said cars are becoming an &quot;unaffordable necessity&quot; for many living in rural communities.</p><p>The costliest diesel - at 146.9p a litre - was in Purbeck in Dorset and Ryedale in North Yorkshire.</p><p>In contrast, diesel in Birmingham and in Dartford in south east London was &quot;only&quot; 139.7p a litre.</p><p>Overall, the alliance found that diesel in rural areas averaged 144p a litre, while in urban areas the average was 140p.</p><p>Countryside Alliance executive chairman Barney White-Spunner said: &quot;Not only do people living in rural areas have to drive further to go to work, further to access essential services like schools, doctors and the supermarket, but they have to pay a lot more for their diesel to do so.</p><p>&quot;The cost of?fuel?is a major concern for everyone who lives in the countryside, and cars are fast becoming an unaffordable necessity for many rural families.</p><p>&quot;We urge the Chancellor to help the rural economy get back on its feet and to cut?fuel?duty in his forthcoming Budget.&quot;</p><p>The alliance survey follows findings earlier this week that UK motorists pay more in?fuel?tax than any other drivers in Europe.</p><p>And a report by the Centre for Economics and Business Research (CEBR) has said that cutting?fuel?duty would create thousands of jobs and could be done at no loss to the Treasury.</p><p>Campaign group FairFuelUK met Treasury Minister Chloe Smith this week, armed with the initial findings of the CEBR report.</p><p>Ms Smith was expected to receive the full report today.</p><p>PA</p>?<p>Documenting this annual migration is the young British photographer Chloe Dewe Mathews, whose project &quot;Hasidic Holiday&quot; captures scenes akin to a Victorian seaside trip: men in long, dark coats and brimmed hats wandering along the promenade; families playing in the seaside playground; and young men bathing fully clothed in the sea.</p><p>But perhaps most fascinating is what the Hasids bring with them: they don't simply arrive for a two-week holiday; they relocate wholesale. Arriving in large groups, with removal lorries in tow, the community bring all their possessions ? and practices ? from home, from children's bikes to cookers to fridges filled with kosher food.</p><p>And on the campus where they stay, a large marquee is erected as a temporary synagogue for the regular daily schedule of prayers and community meetings, demonstrating an unshakeable commitment to their way of life.</p><p>Chloe Dewe Mathews' 'Hasidic Holiday' will be showing at the inaugural Eye International Photography Festival, which runs from Friday to 1 July in Aberystwyth (aberystwythartscentre.co.uk/theeye)</p>?<p>The wettest June since records began in 1910 saw clothing retailers bring their summer sales forward while food stores suffered from a lack of demand for barbecue meat.</p><p>The consumer price index (CPI) rate of inflation subsequently fell to 2.4% in June, from 2.8% in May, the Office for National Statistics (ONS) said.</p><p>Some economists said inflation would continue to fall - possibly below 1% - while unions said the drop in inflation was not enough as wage growth was still too weak.</p><p>Inflation has fallen from 5.2% last September to within 0.5 percentage points of the Government's 2% target, due to the waning impact of the VAT hike, falling energy, food and commodity prices, and bill cuts from utility providers.</p><p>Economic Secretary to the Treasury Chloe Smith said: &quot;Inflation has more than halved since September, meaning a little less pressure on family budgets. This lower inflation should support high street spendingand growth in the economy in the months to come.&quot;</p><p>The fall in CPI was driven by a record May-to-June decline in clothing and footwear prices, which the ONS said was more typical of theJune-to-July period, reflecting earlier than average seasonal discounting.</p><p>The overall rate was also driven down by transport prices, which dropped 0.5% as the price of petrol at the pump fell by 4.3p to 132.8p in June and diesel dipped by 0.7p to 135.6p.</p><p>Food also helped pull down the overall rate after prices edged 0.1% lower. The ONS said the biggest fall within food came from meat prices, which fell 0.5%, with reports that the recent washout weather had hit demand for barbecue foods.</p><p>But the most recent figures on wages growth showed average earnings increasing by 1.4% in the year to April, far below the current rate of inflation.</p><p>TUC general secretary Brendan Barber said: &quot;While the sharp fall in inflation will bring welcome relief for many workers, millions are still facing real wage cuts as the longest squeeze in living standards for decades continues.</p><p>&quot;Falling inflation alone won't tackle our living standards crisis. We also need to see stronger wage growth, and for the Governmentto reverse damaging cuts to tax credits.&quot;</p><p>Last month's drop will add weight to the Bank of England's decision earlier this month to pump more emergency cash into the economythrough its quantitative easing programme.</p><p>The steeper-than-expected fall is also likely to raise the likelihood of further emergency support later this year as the UK struggles with weak growth.</p><p>Vicky Redwood, economist at Capital Economics, said inflation could fall below 1% by the end of the year.</p><p>&quot;Admittedly, this was driven by a sharp drop in clothing inflation, which is probably a temporary result of the poor weather denting clothing sales,&quot; she added.</p><p>&quot;Nonetheless, we think that evidence is tentatively building thatweak activity and large amounts of spare capacity are bearing down on underlying price pressures.&quot;</p><p>The largest upward effect on prices came from recreation and culture, in which the price of digital cameras fell at a slower rate than last year.</p><p>Alternative measures of inflation also fell, as the retail price index fell to 2.8% in June, from 3.1% in May.</p><p>Labour Treasury spokeswoman Catherine McKinnell said: &quot;This fall in the inflation rate is welcome as last year's VAT rise continues to drop out of the figures. But families and pensioners are still facing a real squeeze on their incomes because of this Government's policies.&quot;</p><p>PA</p>?<p>Gross domestic product (GDP) shrank by 0.3% between January and March, down from a first estimate of 0.2%, with much of the deterioration due to a 4.8% decline in construction - the sector's steepest fall in 11 years.</p><p>Labour said the revised figures from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) showed that the coalition Government's austerity programme had failed, and called on David Cameron for a change of course to boost growth and jobs.</p><p>But Treasury minister Chloe Smith insisted the Government would not be deflected from its drive to get the deficit down.</p><p>&quot;We need to stick to our path. It would not be acceptable to fail to deal with our debts,&quot; she told the BBC.</p><p>Ms Smith indicated that the most appropriate response might be for the Bank of England to print more money or cut interest rates, as the International Monetary Fund recommended in its report on the UK economy earlier this week.</p><p>&quot;Monetary easing would be for the Bank of England to consider,&quot; she said. &quot;That would be one of our first lines of defence.&quot;</p><p>The second estimate, which could be revised later, means the UK is in a technical recession - defined as two quarters of decline in a row - following a 0.2% fall in national income in the final three months of 2011.</p><p>Economists and business leaders have warned that a technical recession will hit confidence and could cause businesses to rein in spending at a time when they are being encouraged to invest to stimulate growth.</p><p>The current downturn is expected to be nothing like as severe as the previous recession of 2008/09, which spanned more than a year.</p><p>But uncertainty remains over the future of the eurozone, following an inconclusive summit in Brussels last night at which EU leaders failed to reach agreement on the balance between austerity and growth.</p><p>Chief Secretary to the Treasury Danny Alexander said that the UK economy was suffering a &quot;chilling&quot; effect from the situation in Greece, which goes to the polls on June 17 amid fears it might be forced out of the euro.</p><p>Speaking on ITV1's Daybreak, Mr Alexander said: &quot;No rational person would think it would be right for Greece to come out of the euro.&quot;</p><p>Downing Street pointed out that while exports of goods to non-EU countries had grown by 4.4% over the period, exports to the EU had fallen by 3.1%.</p><p>&quot;We have always made clear - and the Chancellor said in his autumn statement - that if the rest of Europe doesn't grow it would prove hard to avoid a recession here in the UK,&quot; said Mr Cameron's official spokesman.</p><p>&quot;We cannot be immune from what is happening on our doorstep.&quot;</p><p>But shadow chancellor Ed Balls said that Britain's economic problems could not be blamed exclusively on the crisis in the eurozone.</p><p>&quot;This is a recession made in Downing Street by this Government's failed policies,&quot; said Mr Balls</p><p>&quot;Despite all the problems in the euro area, France, Germany and the eurozone as a whole have so far avoided recession and only exports to other countries stopped us going into recession a year ago.</p><p>&quot;The result is that Britain is now in a weaker position if things get worse in the eurozone in the coming months.&quot;</p><p>Business leaders expressed surprise at today's gloomy figures from the ONS, which many had expected to be revised upwards.</p><p>David Kern, chief economist at the British Chambers of Commerce, said: &quot;Fundamental doubts about the accuracy of the ONS's estimates persist. Virtually every business survey has indicated positive growth in the economy in the first quarter.</p><p>&quot;Furthermore, the ONS's own labour market figures have shown an increase in employment and a 0.9% increase in the actual number of hours worked, which makes a quarterly fall in GDP difficult to comprehend. It is possible that the GDP estimate will be revised upwards later in the year.&quot;</p><p>The national chairman of the Federation of Small Businesses, John Walker, said: &quot;Confidence among small businesses has picked up, and this resilience needs to be supported by Government if they are going to make use of it to pull Britain back out of recession.</p><p>&quot;In order to strengthen economic recovery, Government policies must be bold to boost business investment and job creation - as well as consumer confidence.&quot;</p><p>The second estimate provides data for the expenditure side of the economy for the first time and revealed a slowdown in household spending, which increased by 0.1% in the first quarter, compared to 0.4% growth in the final quarter of last year.</p><p>But Government spending surged 1.6%, the biggest rise since the first quarter of 2008, driven by spending on health and defence.</p><p>The services sector, which accounts for some three-quarters of the economy, saw unrevised growth of 0.1%, after a decline of 0.1% between October and December last year.</p><p>The industrial production sector declined at an unrevised 0.4%, with manufacturing flat after a 0.7% decline in the previous quarter.</p><p>PA</p>?<p>The news heaps more pressure on the Coalition over its handling of the economy and increases the likelihood that the Bank of England will approve more money printing in the coming months to boost demand. The UK sank into its first double-dip recession since the 1970s last month when the ONS estimated the economy shrank in the first quarter, following a 0.3 per cent contraction in the final three months of 2011.</p><p>Further grim economic news came yesterday from the Department for Education, which said the number of young people aged between 16 and 24 now considered &quot;Neet&quot; ? not in enducation, employment, or training ? rose to 954,000 in the first quarter of the year, up from 925,000 in the first quarter of 2011. The figures also show that the numbers of 16-18-year-olds alone who are considered Neet are rising again. In total, 183,000 were out of education and work in the first quarter of this year, compared to 159,000 for the same period in 2011.</p><p>The Treasury minister, Chloe Smith, rejected calls for the Chancellor to slow down the planned spending cuts. &quot;We need to stick to our path. It would not be acceptable to fail to deal with our debts,&quot; she said</p><p>Yesterday's downward revision was prompted by a larger than realised fall in output in the construction sector. The ONS said building activity shrank by 4.8 per cent over the first three months of the year. Central government spending on building projects fell by 13 per cent in 2011 and is scheduled to fall by a further 5 per cent this year.</p><p>The second estimate of GDP showed that consumer spending rose by just 0.1 per cent over the quarter and that manufacturing output was flat. Despite the Government's austerity drive, government expenditure rose by 1.6 per cent, which the ONS said reflected an expansion of the defence and health sectors.</p>?<p>The designer brands giant Richemont yesterday added the upmarket leisurewear brand Peter Millar to its wardrobe, which already holds Chloe clothes and Cartier jewellery. The Swiss firm's acquisition of Peter Millar, popular with US golfers, comes just weeks after Burberry's profits warning shocked the European luxury sector.</p>?<p>Salt, Root and Roe homes in on Iola and Anest, a pair of identical Welsh twins, now in their seventies, who live on the coast of North Pembrokeshire. In a fantastical underwater sequence at the start of Hamish Pirie's beautifully realised production, we see the two old ladies tied together with a skipping rope, recreating a childhood game. The rope symbolises the umbilical strength of their bond and, indeed, the next time we see them thus bound, at the end, it is in the ultimate sisterly solidarity of a suicide pact, weighed down with pebbles and walking into the sea. The mettle of their mutual devotion has certainly been proven by Iola's drift into dementia.</p><p>Price's writing is amusingly alert to the absurdities that surround this heartbreaking situation. The play plunges us into the hapless predicament of Anest's middle-aged daughter, Menna (a comically distraught and very touching Imogen Stubbs). She can't seem to win on any front. Her husband is so obsessed with germs he hasn't touched her for years and makes her wear latex gloves. And when a letter sends her rushing back to her childhood home, all her attempts to put a stop to the schemes of her aunt and mother re-emphasise her essential exclusion from their intimacy. &quot;I used to tell myself I was one of them. That we were three twins,&quot; she confides to the local copper. Like triplets, he suggests. No, hers was the forlorn fantasy of being a third twin.</p><p>Anna Calder-Marshall piercingly traces Iola's erratic shifts between eccentric scattiness (boiling Menna's mobile in the teapot, for example) and bewildered, bullying violence, while Anna Carteret brings a moving dignity to the anguish and determination of her unafflicted sibling. Chloe Lamford's excellent design hangs swags of soiled sails over the proceedings and surreally displays a miniature model of the farmhouse in a bubbling fish tank. Just as Prices's script seamlessly combines the dotty and the distressing, so it is able at once to invoke poetic marine myths and hilariously debunk them. There seems to be a tradition in this family of fathers going missing. Is it because they were mermen? Anest suggests a more prosaic explanation. &quot;What's more likely,&quot; she asks, &quot;that he's a cheating bastard, or half-fish?&quot;</p><p>To 3 December (0844 871 7632)</p>?<p>Booth in talks for Kick Ass sequel</p><p>Lindy Booth is in talks to play Night Bitch, a superhero with no powers, in Kick-Ass 2: Balls to the Wall. Directed by Jeff Wadlow, the sequel sees Aaron Johnson and Chloe Moretz reprise their respective roles of Kick-Ass and Hit-Girl with Christopher Mintz-Plasse returning as the villainous Red Mist.</p><p>Will Jolie take on Cleopatra?</p><p>Hollywood is getting hot under the collar about Cleopatra with Columbia Pictures, courting Ang Lee to direct a movie starring Angelina Jolie. The project has been coveted by directors since Scott Rudin acquired Stacy Schiff’s non-fiction book Cleopatra: A Life and began developing it as a Jolie vehicle.</p><p>McTiernan faces jail over wiretaps</p><p>Die Hard director John McTiernan faces 12 months in prison for his links with the private investigator Anthony Pellicano and illegal wiretaps. The case has bounced around for five years. The filmmaker was first indicted for hiring Pellicano to wiretap The Dark Knight Rises producer Chuck Roven.</p><p>DeGeneres set for Nemo sequel</p><p>Ellen DeGeneres is being lured back to reprise her role in Disney/Pixar’s planned Finding Nemo sequel. Assuming a successful cast, DeGeneres would voice Dory, a fish suffering from short-term memory loss. Writer/director Andrew Stanton, who wrote the original 2003 film and co-directed it, is set to return.</p><p>Gaghan’s Candy Store irresistible</p><p>Writer-director Stephen Gaghan has written a crime-thriller, Candy Store. Such is the Oscar-winning scribe’s draw, the script already has Brad Pitt and Denzel Washington sniffing around. No deals are done but if the film comes together it would mark Gaghan’s highest-profile directing project since 2005’s Syriana.</p>?<p>Smith will play wannabe MP Mrs Crumb, the mother of young heroine Chloe who befriends a whiffy tramp in the best-selling children's tale.</p><p>She will be joined by comedian Johnny Vegas, who has been added to the one-hour film, playing her husband Mr Crumb.</p><p>Olivier Award-winning Smith, 31, has recently been seen in ITV's drama Mrs Biggs, playing the wife of great train robber Ronald Biggs. She is also known for Two Pints Of Lager, as well as her stage roles in Legally Blonde and Rattigan's The Flare Path.</p><p>She is currently playing the title role in Hedda Gabler at the Old Vic.</p><p>Downton Abbey star Hugh Bonneville was recently announced in the lead role as the homeless but refined Mr Stink who goes to live in lonely Chloe's shed. Walliams will also make an appearance playing the prime minister after notably playing a fawning aide to the PM in his hit comedy Little Britain.</p><p>Smith said: &quot;David is such a brilliant writer, and the character just jumped off the page when I read it. I can't wait to work with Hugh and Johnny.&quot;</p><p>The book by Walliams, who has worked with Men Behaving Badly writer Simon Nye to adapt the tale, has sold more than a quarter of a million copies.</p><p>Chloe's &quot;perfect&quot; younger sister Annabelle is being played by Isabella Blake-Thomas, who appeared as Violet-Elizabeth Bott in the BBC's Just William adaptations two years ago.</p><p>The BBC is working with Walliams's production company on the family story, expected to be screened around Christmas.</p><p>Mr Stink was Walliams's second children's book and was shortlisted for a Blue Peter award for the best book of the past decade, but lost out to Diary Of A Wimpy Kid.</p><p>PA</p>?<p>I dare say most people would not have heard of Ms Smith, pictured, until the other night, when she was sent into gladiatorial combat with Paxman to explain the Government's decision to scrap the 3p fuel duty rise announced in August. Armed with nothing more than a pleasant manner and a few practised platitudes, Ms Smith's performance came across like a trailer for The Thick of It. As the answers to Paxman's grilling got more vague, her arms moved more wildly, almost assuming a life of their own. You didn't need to be a body-language expert to work out she wasn't waving, but drowning.</p><p>Ms Smith, 30, is a beneficiary of the MPs' expenses scandal, winning the Norwich North seat in a by-election after the resignation of Ian Gibson. She became the youngest person in the Government when she was appointed Economic Secretary to the Treasury. I would like to bet that she's a very competent, confident person in what might loosely be called real life, but that's not much to fall back on when Paxman has been let off the leash and hasn't had any red meat for a while. </p><p>Of course, she was given a hospital pass by George Osborne's department ? a point made with characteristic pomposity, and opportunism, by John Prescott yesterday ? but we have a right to expect a minister to have a certain mastery of his or her brief, and old Paxo was perfectly within his rights to give her a going over. </p><p>He was as remorseless and dismissive and supercilious to Ms Smith as he was to Michael Howard all those years ago, when he asked the same question 14 times. Nevertheless, what seemed like aggressive journalism in the public interest when a grizzled veteran like Mr Howard was the subject (or victim, more like) felt rather different when a young woman was in the firing line. </p><p>The imbalance of power between Paxman and Ms Smith threw off the faint aroma of bullying, but one of the laudable aspects of his style of interviewing is that he is completely gender blind, so perhaps we should be, too. And, judging from the response of the Twitterati, the principal loser from this unfortunate situation will be Mr Osborne, who was likened to an armchair general sending in his young troops as cannon fodder. </p><p>On Ms Smith's website yesterday, there was no mention of her appearance; she's more concerned with the shortcomings of our rail system preventing her from getting to the Royal Norfolk Show. There, no doubt, she'll encounter creatures with tough hides and thick skins. And they won't even have heard of Paxman!</p>?<p>The company said the sales have exceeded its expectations and it also revealed that two million games have been sold globally since the Vita's launch in Japan on December 17 last year.</p><p>The machine was finally released in America and Europe this month, selling 800,000 units.</p><p>When added to the 400,000 sold in Japan, the overall salesbase is 1.2 million.</p><p>In comparison, Vita's rival, the Nintendo 3DS, is said to have sold 400,000 unit sales over its Japanese launch weekend although it has gone on to sell 6.7 million consoles worldwide in the eight months since.</p><p>The Vita is essentially a remodelling of the Sony PlayStation Portable, adding a second thumbstick which gamers say it vital for playing many titles.</p><p>Featuring a large screen and a rear touchpad and coming in WiFi-only and 3G versions, it has been bolstered by critcally acclaimed games such as handheld versions of the popular Uncharted franchise and another iteration of WipEout.</p><p>SCE group president Andrew House told MCV magazine: &quot;PS Vita was designed to deliver the ultimate portable entertainment experience, and we couldn’t be more thrilled with the reaction we’re seeing from consumers and the pace at which PS Vita is selling.&quot;</p><p>?</p><p>Top three Vita games</p><p>?</p><p>Uncharted: Golden Abyss</p><p>A small-screen version of a big console classic, Uncharted: Golden Abyss is seen as the flagship launch game for the Vita. Although it is lighter on the cut scenes and cliff-hanging set-pieces, it retains the ethos of the series to date. As a boys-own adventure - and despite not including the popular female characters Elena and Chloe - it sets a high bar for future handheld releases and it looks as lush as the PS3 version.</p><p>?</p><p>WipEout 2048</p><p>When the PlayStation launched in the mid-1990s, WipEout was one of the outstanding early games and it helped to heave gaming out of the bedroom and into mainstream lives. It became a favourite in clubs up and down the UK but it was also a tricky beast. Today the controls are more fluid, the action is just as slick and fast and it is retains all of the challenge of its predecessors. There are few finer racers out there.</p><p>?</p><p>Everybody's Golf</p><p>Games such as Everybody's Golf are almost expected launch titles for a Sony games console and while it is not going to be the game that makes your gran pick up the handheld in the hope of some Wii Sports-style play, it is nevertheless a cute and fun game of golf which is well worth buying, particularly because it is available for just under £30 (Sony, to its credit, has unveiled more fluid price structures for Vita games).</p>?<p>Photographs: Andrew Leo</p><p>Model: Zhulin at IMG</p><p>Hair and make-up: Krystle G using Chanel S 2012 and Hydra beauty Serum</p><p>Photographer's assistant: Chloe Coates</p><p>Stylist's assistant: Magda Bryk</p><p>Location courtesy of the Barbican Centre; </p>?<p>But that's another story, for in the time it takes to walk to the lifts, Beacham has eyeballed me with amusement and we've made a connection. By the time the lift has reached the 32nd floor, she's telling me how young people &quot;now call a blow-job a blowey&quot; and all about her dog, Sienna, rescued from Houston gangland and &quot;tattooed like a Russian tart&quot;.</p><p>But then there are two Stephanie Beachams, it transpires. Or rather there is 'Stephy', whose interest is in decorating houses and making jewellery, and there is 'Stephanie Beacham', who is sent out to work in order to keep 'Stephy' comfortable in her pink, Malibu, cliff-top house (&quot;better for tsunamis&quot;), her mews cottage in Bayswater (&quot;or a pissed-in passage in Paddington&quot;) and a house in Marrakech, Morocco, that she bought during the post-9/11, anti-Muslim hysteria in order to make up her own mind about Islam. &quot;Stephanie Beacham feeds me,&quot; confides Stephy. &quot;She is the cash cow and we have to keep her going. She has to go and get her hair done. Stephy doesn't look in a mirror.</p><p>&quot;Don't make me sound schizophrenic,&quot; she adds hastily, but her arrangement seems admirably sane to me. Anyway, Stephy/Stephanie Beacham ? for clarity's sake let's call her Beacham ? has been on this side of the Atlantic for most of the summer, filming Sky1's supermarket comedy, Trollied, in which she plays a new manageress. &quot;She's not Hilary Devey [of Dragons' Den fame], but she smokes 40 cigarettes a day,&quot; says Beacham in a husky, Hilary Devey-esque Lancashire accent. &quot;She does her eyeliner on the bus and from 20 feet away she cuts a figure, but close-up she looks terrifying.&quot;</p><p>The 65-year-old Beacham is anything but terrifying in close-up. I'm far too ancient to be considered one of the 'toy boys' that delighted tabloid hacks for so long, but it's plain to see her allure for all those young men she has now abandoned. &quot;I had to give them up,&quot; she says. &quot;I was getting older and older and they were staying the same age ? I always said they came in at 27 and I got rid of them at 32.&quot; She's now in a long-term relationship with an older man, a West Country doctor called Bernie. &quot;He came as a surprise… out of left-field,&quot; she says. &quot;Before he came along I was thinking, 'That's it ? I retire'.&quot;</p><p>She also thinks the role in Trollied may be &quot;game-changing&quot; for her, and the start, she hopes, &quot;of really fun character roles&quot; ? although she took it originally to be near her grandson, Jude, in Bristol, and to help her daughter, Phoebe, who has well-publicised problems with depression and drugs. Any improvement there, I enquire? Beacham shakes her head sadly, but this is the one area of her life she refuses to discuss.</p><p>The stunning panorama of London from the top of Centre Point proves a bit of a distraction ? Beacham breaking off midpoint to snap (Stephy likes taking photographs and painting) such landmarks as the Gherkin (&quot;cheeky&quot;), the Shard (&quot;it looks unfinished&quot;), her anecdotes as picturesque and wide-ranging as the view. Like being offered £40,000 for a one-night stand (&quot;I was 20 ? you could buy a house for four grand in those days so I suppose that wasn't a bad offer&quot;) and that blacklisting incident, instigated by the powerful Hollywood producer Joseph E Levine. &quot;He said, 'You walk out of this office with that attitude and you're dead'. Sam Peckinpah wanted to use me for Straw Dogs, apparently, and he said, 'You must have done something really bad because I'm a son of a bitch who can make anyone do anything and they won't let me use you'.&quot;</p><p>This was in 1972, stunting a highly promising career that had begun opposite Ava Gardner and continuing with Marlon Brando (who was to become a close friend), but was now largely restricted to the meagre offerings of the British film industry during its 1970s nadir, schlock such as And Now the Screaming Starts!, Schizo and Inseminoid.</p><p>&quot;Insecticide as I called it,&quot; she says. &quot;If I just snipped the scissors through it you could make a really classy CV. Unfortunately it's got some ugly things in there. For example, I had a play I wanted to do and I had Inseminoid ? but I also had two babies upstairs who were my responsibility and I had £2,000-worth of bills sitting in front of me and so that was the decision made.&quot;</p><p>Single motherhood ? bringing up daughters Phoebe and Chloe ? began in 1979 after the break-up of her six-year marriage to the actor John McEnery. &quot;Wrong man&quot;, she says. &quot;I was an idiot and he's the first person to admit it.f But the point is we're now friends… in fact he was round having coffee when I was in London a week ago.&quot;</p><p>Salvation came in the form of Tenko, the acclaimed BBC drama about women inmates in a Japanese prisoner-of-war camp, and the eponymous lead role in Connie, the underrated ITV rag-trade saga that was also a comment on Thatcherite Britain, and led directly to Beacham's casting opposite Charlton Heston in The Colbys ? Aaron Spelling's spin-off from his hit US soap, Dynasty. When, after two seasons, The Colbys was cancelled, Beacham was invited to flounce off with Sable and join Joan Collins' Alexis Carrington on Dynasty for a season-long &quot;battle of the bitches&quot;. Catch them on YouTube ? they're hilarious, a wonderfully insincere &quot;whoops&quot; as Sable spills a drink down Alexis's decolletage, or (my favourite) her description of an ex-parte agreement: &quot;Don't you understand Latin? It means the party's over&quot;.</p><p>&quot;Camp enough for you?&quot; asks Beacham wryly. &quot;It got so silly but generally we did it. Bless Joan Collins. If it wasn't for Joan they would have thought an English accent wasn't understandable. Joan and I are nothing like each other, but she was very welcoming. We felt we represented the Eighties. Joan still is ? if they've got a big enough spread, I'll be there too,&quot; she says, referring me to a recent advert for Snickers, starring Collins in fully Dynasty rig, but also featuring Beacham. &quot;I only get the tail-end of it,&quot; she says. &quot;Joan was kind enough to say, 'Let Stephanie do it', because she didn't want Linda [Evans] to do it.&quot; Ah, just like old times.</p><p>Sable was followed by a recurring role as Luke Perry's estranged mother in Beverly Hills 90210 and an oceanographer in Steven Spielberg's submarine adventure, SeaQuest DSV. But mainly, says Beacham, &quot;the Nineties were about the death of parents. All my choices were so that I could be on the same time-frame as my mother… so I could talk to my mummy every day&quot;. Her mother, Joan, had been a housewife in Barnet, her father working in insurance, and Beacham once thought that sounded so uninteresting that she told as reporter she was born in Casablanca.</p><p>The Noughties saw her returning to British television ? three years in Bad Girls (&quot;fun, but not an absorbing job&quot;) and a stint in Coronation Street as Ken Barlow's bit-of-cultured-posh-on-the-side, the barge-dwelling Martha Fraser. &quot;I started that with a lot of major problems and Bill (William Roache, who plays Barlow) was an ideal companion ? he's so lovely. And then his wife died suddenly and I think it was a time that we were just meant to be working together. I think he believes the same thing as well.&quot;</p><p>Beacham's &quot;major problems&quot; included the death of her older brother. &quot;He was only 70,&quot; she says. &quot;The only thing I didn't do right was that he had a blackout ? he thought it was a near-death experience ? and he said, 'Stephy, I didn't see anything' and I didn't reassure him. Foolishly with my beliefs I didn't send him off.&quot; What are her beliefs? &quot;I'm not a Christian… I'm open to all-comers. The most terrible thing is the absolute certainty of teenagers and Hitler.&quot;</p><p>I say I'm surprised she isn't a Christian, given the vivid nature of her own &quot;near-death experience&quot; in London's Royal Free Hospital in 1983. &quot;I got gangrene,&quot; she recalls. &quot;It was a mucked-up operation and I did the old white-light business. I was going towards the most magnificent and beautiful light and funnily enough it was the stone of Jesus's tomb and the light was behind it. I was being led by rough-hewn, brown, Franciscan monks.&quot;</p><p>In fact, there was speculation during her stay in Celebrity Big Brother in 2010, one of the reality show's vintage seasons, that she had been converted by Bible-thumping, born-again Christian Stephen Baldwin. &quot;I loved that show,&quot; she says. &quot;It was like being in a convent ? it was poverty, it was chastity and obedience.&quot; Not a description many viewers would recognise, I suggest. &quot;More obedience than I think people watching realise,&quot; she says, &quot;a lot of temperature turning down and turning up… a lot of manipulation.</p><p>&quot;I was doing it for the money,&quot; she adds, straying into the blindingly obvious, although she won't say how much. &quot;I turned it down three times and they offered me such ridiculous amount of money I would have been mad not to do it. I thought I was going to be kicked out after the first day because of my demographic.&quot; Instead, audiences warmed to her relationship with Ivana Trump, bonding over life's little luxuries (&quot;I was really jealous of the percale of her sheets&quot;), and her role as peace-maker amid a volatile mixture of Vinnie Jones machismo, Stephen Baldwin eccentricity and Heidi Fleiss fragility. &quot;I loved Heidi Fleiss, and I'm still in touch with Ivana,&quot; says Beacham, who beforehand sought tips from someone she knew in the SAS about surviving in a hostage situation. &quot;Always look after the weakest member of the group ? that was Heidi Fleiss; never volunteer ? humiliation is their tool; find everything that happens to you funny.&quot;</p><p>And Beacham does see the funny side of most things, although she admits to being dragged down by her deafness in one ear, the result of her mother contracting chickenpox during pregnancy. However, there are small compensations. Disability means that her two dogs, Nutrina and the aforementioned Sienna, get to travel with her in first class when she jets between LA and London. &quot;When my assistant brought them over for the first time they said, 'You're only allowed one service dog' and she said, 'But they only work eight-hour shifts…'.</p><p>&quot;I think the deafness affects me more than I realise, I think it makes me more tired. I loathe parties. I attend, smile and leave.&quot; In fact, she's now reluctantly heading off to a party being thrown for Sky talent. She invites me along, but I have to be somewhere else ? a pity because it would fun to catch Stephy's acerbic asides while Stephanie Beacham dutifully attends and smiles.</p><p>I leave her as I found her, standing stock still, a petite statue amid the madding crowd, her hair immaculately in place.</p><p>'Trollied' is on Sky1 HD at 9pm on Fridays</p>?<p>Security at the flat was tight and basic contents insurance was included in the room charge, but it was while she was on a weekend visit to a friend in Nottingham that she was robbed. &quot;I had my phone stolen from my bag on a night out at a club in Nottingham. It was an iPhone 4. I'd just walked into the club, and went straight to the bar. I put the bag on the counter and just turned round and found the bag was unzipped and my ID and phone were missing,&quot; says Glews.</p><p>The bar manager was sympathetic but told her that there had been a spate of similar thefts in the club. Normally standard contents insurance wouldn't have covered her for the loss, but Glews had been sensible enough to take out an additional policy with that covered high-value personal possessions away from home. After reporting the loss to the police and getting a crime number, Glews telephoned her insurance company, Endsleigh Insurance, the following morning. She says her claims adviser was extremely helpful and with a minimum of formality a cheque for the £400 value of the phone, minus a £10 excess charge, was on its way. &quot;The loss was reported on Easter Saturday and the cheque came through on Tuesday immediately after the bank holiday,&quot; says Glews.</p><p>Glews paid her premium in instalments of £10 a month, a sum easily budgeted for, unlike the loss of something as vital as a phone. Not all of her friends are so prudent.</p><p>&quot;One of my friends, she's never had insurance and she's had four phones lost or stolen. Her dad's very patient. But after the last time, he put his foot down and made her take out insurance,&quot; recalls Glews. She adds that few of her contemporaries are aware of the high cost of an iPhone or that such a phone makes them a target for thieves. &quot;If you get it supplied free under a contract you just aren't aware of how expensive it is to replace. Mobile phone companies will offer insurance when you buy so it makes sense to take up that offer,&quot; says Glews.</p><p>Theft prevention and insurance is something universities take very seriously these days, especially when students bring high-value items such as mobile phones and laptops to their halls of residence. &quot;Insurance is essential, especially in a big city, and we encourage our students to make sure their belongings are covered. Comparison sites are a good way to shop around for the best deal and to find one which fits their needs while watching out for inflated premiums and high excesses,&quot; says Mark Crawley, dean of students and director of widening participation and progression at the University of the Arts London, the umbrella body that covers Central St Martins and the major London art and design colleges.</p><p>At University of the Arts London, contents insurance is included in the charge for a room at halls of residence and claims can be made through the university. &quot;We have an excellent relationship with our insurers and we can help students settle claims quickly. But if they have any unusually high value kit, like high-end cameras or computers, they can extend their cover when they arrive,&quot; adds Crawley.</p><p>Prevention and awareness are also important. Goldsmiths, University of London includes information on personal security on its induction material, on its student website, and on the contract students sign when applying to live in halls of residence. &quot;We tell them to lock up before you go out and to always include friends in your travel arrangements so no one's travelling alone at night,&quot; says Sue Tarhan, accommodation services manager. Halls are extremely secure with 24-hour security on site and resident assistants working on a rota system to provide care and advice.</p><p>Last year, Goldsmiths offered contents insurance as part of its service to students in halls. This covered students' loss of valuables if flats were broken into and flood and fire damage to articles in rooms. Water leaks can easily cause damage. The university's insurance will cover up to £3,000 for the loss of a mobile phone, £2,500 for a computer and up to £600 for a musical instrument, or for jewellery or?watches.</p><p>Not all claims are as dramatic as a flood, fire or theft. It is important to be covered for everyday accidents, especially for peace of mind. Charlotte Binks was in her second year of a business studies BSc at Coventry University when a late night essay came to an abrupt end.</p><p>&quot;It was during the end of year exams and I was working at my desk late at night with a glass of water on the side when my dress caught the edge of the glass and tipped the contents right over my MacBook Pro. It died straightaway,&quot; she says. Fortunately she had taken out a top-up policy covering loss or damage to expensive IT and phone equipment.</p><p>Following advice from the manufacturer, Binks unplugged the laptop and stood it on its side for the water to drain out before putting it in a warm dry place. It was no use and armed with a report from the Apple Store Binks contacted Endsleigh who paid up immediately.</p><p>For students away from home for the first time, taking out insurance is a wise precaution. Though it is fair to say that if you are thinking of taking your rare Stradivarius violin to your student halls of residence, forget it! The premiums alone would probably cancel the hall fees ? and then some!</p>?<p>Save with first online Sainsbury's shop</p><p>New customers doing their first grocery shop using Sainsbury's' online store are entitled to £10 off purchases over £50. To claim the discount simply enter the code 4FG6-J3ND-RRPH at the checkout. The offer is only available to customers opening a new online account with the supermarket, and can only be used on a single grocery shop.</p><p>Designs on a deal with Bronx Shoes</p><p>Bronx Shoes specialise in making similar versions of high-end footwear that often come in at less than 10 per cent of the price of the designer products. A current example is a black leather boot with a similar stud and buckle design to a Chloe shoe. The Chloe version costs £850, while Bronx's is just £80. Visit BronxShoes.com for more information.</p><p>Hurry up for Wallis money-off offer</p><p>New customers shopping at Wallis only have today to claim £10 off orders over £50. The offer created in partnership with , is activated by entering the code MVC50 at the Wallis checkout, and expires at midnight. Get your orders in quick at </p><p>Sweet discount on Greggs doughnuts</p><p>Greggs has a discount on the new addition to its &quot;superstar doughnuts&quot; range. Four cinnamon &quot;ball&quot; doughnuts with whipped-cream fillings and icing are available for £2.15. Visit .</p><p>j.hall@independent.co.uk</p>?<p>Adidas, supplier of Olympic kit for Team GB ? including cyclist Victoria Pendleton ? has slashed sales forecasts for its Reebok brand after it lost to Nike the rights to supply all NFL American football jerseys. The company also discovered fraud in its Indian business. Adidas chopped Reebok's targets by ?1bn to just ?2bn</p><p>HMV woes mount in slow summer </p><p>Loss-making retailer HMV blamed a &quot;very quiet new release schedule&quot; in music, DVD and games markets for poor summer sales. Like-for-like retail sales at HMV fell by 11.6 per cent over the 20 weeks to 15 September. The company, which has 243 shops in the UK and Ireland, suffered a loss of £16.2m for the year to April.</p><p>Buyers circle Aer Lingus stake </p><p>Ryanair chief executive Michael O'Leary said the low cost airline has received a number of approaches to buy its 30 per cent stake in Aer Lingus. Addressing shareholders at yesterday's annual meeting in Dublin, O'Leary said Ryanair had been approached by other airlines and financial institutions who wanted to break up Aer Lingus.</p><p>G4S recovers in Scotland</p><p>Beleaguered security giant G4S has won its first British contract since failing to provide enough guards for the London Olympics. The £20m, five-year deal with the Scottish government to manage electronic tagging of offenders comes at a crucial time for G4S. It has already taken a £50m hit on the Games.</p><p>BP eyes Rosneft share swoop</p><p>Oil giant BP yesterday said it was ready to invest in state-owned Russian rival Rosneft if the British firm sold its 50 per cent stake in troubled joint venture TNK-BP. BP said: &quot;If we are successful in selling our stake in TNK-BP we would be interested in investing some of the proceeds in buying shares in Rosneft.&quot; </p><p>Bloomsbury in Indian move</p><p>Harry Potter publisher Bloomsbury has launched its own imprint in India. Chief executive Nigel Newton has high hopes for Bloomsbury India, saying the country has &quot;probably more of the book-buying demographic than that of the UK, US and Canada combined&quot;.</p><p>British Land sells supermarkets</p><p>British Land has sold seven supermarkets to a variety of investors for a total of £118m. The property group, which is the largest owner of supermarket buildings outside the retailers themselves, said all the sites had been sold at or above their March book value.</p><p>Investec bankers sue for bonuses</p><p>Two former Investec bankers are suing the Anglo-South African financial services group for £6.3m in a claim for unpaid bonuses. Andrew Brogden, who ran the structured finance desk until 2011, and deputy Robert Reid have made the claim, which the bank said &quot;had no merit&quot;. whatsoever.&quot; </p><p>Achica breaks through 1m mark</p><p>Achica, the online homewares retailer set up by the co-founder of Asos, said its customer numbers have smashed through the 1 million barrier this month. The private members' site sells luxury brands at up to 70 per cent off via flash sales lasting 48 hours.</p><p>Millar time as Richemont buys</p><p>Luxury goods giant Richemont yesterday added upmarket leisure-wear brand Peter Millar to a wardrobe, which already holds Chloe clothes and Cartier jewellery. The deal for the brand comes weeks after a Burberry profit warning shook the sector. </p>?<p>The financial advisory group Hargreaves Lansdown has posted record results, with annual revenues up 15 per cent at £239m and profits up more than a fifth at £153m. Its co-founder Peter Hargreaves, whose 34 per cent stake is set to net him a £34m dividend payout, said: &quot;We have done incredibly well in the face of such malign markets.&quot;</p><p>Ashley jackpot as JJB flourishes </p><p>Sports Direct has shown its troubled arch-rival JJB Sports a clean pair of heels , posting a 25 per cent rise in sales in recent months to £519m, with profits up 20 per cent to £211m. This leaves its founder andowner Mike Ashley in line to pocket 8 million shares under his bonus deal, worth £256m at yesterday's share price.</p><p>Richemont luxury sales soar 12% </p><p>Chinese consumers have been flying to Europe to take advantage of thefalling euro to buy Cartier watches, Mont Blanc pens and Chloe handbags, according to the Swiss luxury group Richemont, which has reported jewellery sales up 12 per cent and forecasts a 20 to 40 per cent jump in first-half profits.</p><p>Fennell in talks with EME Capital</p><p>Theo Fennell, the king-of-bling jeweller beloved by Victoria Beckham and Sir Elton John, is in talks to be taken over by a private-equity house. The company confirmed it is in &quot;very preliminary talks&quot; with the private-equity firm EME Capital, perhaps best-known as bankers to the night club firm Soho House.</p><p>Fees soar by 70% in four years</p><p>Mortgage fees have reached new high levels, according to analysts at Moneyfacts. Four years ago the average fee was £889. Since then it's climbed 70 per cent to £1,514. Sylvia Waycot of Moneyfacts said: &quot;There is no logical reason why fees have increased so much. In August and September alone, they have increased by an average of £42.&quot; </p><p>UK rises in global competition table</p><p>The UK has climbed from 10th to eighth place in the World Economic Forum's annual league table of global competitiveness. The table is onceagain topped by Switzerland. The WEF said the UK benefited from an &quot;efficient labour market&quot; and was praised for having &quot;sophisticated and innovative businesses&quot;.</p><p>Blessing wants pay linked to economy</p><p>Bankers' pay must be geared more towards pay in the real economy, Martin Blessing, the chief executive of Commerzbank, said yesterday. Hissalary has been limited to below £400,000 after the German bank needed astate bailout. </p><p>Direct Line to axe jobs and call centre</p><p>Direct Line Insurance plans to cut 891 jobs to make it more profitable as it heads towards a £3bn stock market listing. Britain's largest motor insurer, part of Royal Bank of Scotland, is looking to close its call centre in Teesside and cut costs at its head office in Bromley.</p><p>Casino and bingo games boost 32Red </p><p>The online gaming firm 32Red has posted a 50 per cent rise in half-yearly revenues to a record £16.5m, boosted by casino and bingo games. It said the buoyant performance has continued despite the &quot;distraction&quot; of the Olympics.</p><p>Prezzo profits are on the rise</p><p>Prezzo has posted a 14 per cent rise in half-yearly revenues to £68m as it opened 12 new restaurants. The group, which runs 194 Italian restaurants, reported a 4 per cent rise in underlying profits to £7.6m. Prezzo opened seven new restaurants in its first half last year.</p>?<p>Critic's stout denial</p><p>It is not unheard of for hardbitten news reporters on rival titles to wrong-foot each other, but who knew that things were so cut-throat on the arts pages? As the curtain came down on a late-running out-of-town show last week, London critics fled to catch the approaching train on an infrequent service. But when one reviewer, faced with a sprint down the high street that would serve as an Olympic qualifier event, asked Mark Shenton of the Daily Express and The Stage if she could hitch a ride in his taxi, he pronounced the car full, climbed in with his two companions and slammed the doors shut as the driver sped off, leaving one surprised woman of a certain age standing in the road. But hang on, taxis take four passengers, don't they? Shenton is the well-built pal and Critics' Circle ally of Financial Times critic Ian Shuttleworth, or Fatty, as he was dubbed in a spat with The Daily Telegraph's Tim Walker, which led to factions standing on opposite sides of the room at interval drinks time. Maybe needing extra room in the car is a sign that Shenton too has chosen avoirdupois over chivalry.</p><p>Job risks</p><p>And talking of chivalry, popular singer and actor Jess Conrad OBE, 76, has been talking about the success of his fast-selling new CD of old favourites, Dreamboats and Petticoats: Three Steps To Heaven. Jess, though, seems to know more about crooning than he does about chivalry, or even self-deprecation. He tells me: &quot;I still get women throwing underwear at me. It used to be skimpy, but these days there's a lot of pretty large button-gusset stuff and it's a bit of a health and safety issue ? they could have my eye out!&quot; He adds: &quot;I'm a sex symbol for women who no longer care. I mean, women still fall for me ? but that's only because they can't stand up.&quot; </p><p>Scot-free</p><p>What lies behind Rupert Murdoch's casual dismissal of &quot;the English&quot;, when asked why he was reluctant to invest in the UK. Author Peter Jukes, who is just finishing his book The Fall of the House of Murdoch, tells me it's all down to Murdoch, with his Scottish Presbyterian ancestry, seeing himself as &quot;a poor colonial boy, fighting against elites and the 'English' establishment&quot;. </p><p>&quot;Murdoch effectively parlayed the anti-establishment rhetoric of the New Right, derived from Richard Nixon, to a British audience. So much of that rhetoric, especially in Scotland, comes from the imagined community of betrayed Borderlanders,&quot; says Jukes, who says Murdoch was heavily influenced by Richard Nixon's famous 1952 &quot;Checkers&quot; speech. &quot;Nixon hailed from a Scottish background, like so many of the shock jocks and avatars of the New Right from the 60s onwards: Nixon, Limbaugh, Coulter, Beck, Perry. They tally with a wave of Scottish immigration, trapped between the Protestants of New England and the Royalists of the South, who migrated along the marginal lands of the Appalachians, through Tennessee and the Ozarks to Oklahoma, and then followed through to southern California in the depression.&quot;</p><p>Who he?</p><p>Notwithstanding Janet Street-Porter's strictures referenced in her column today, we shouldn't be too hard on poor Chloe Smith, who was on the wrong end of a Paxo-bashing on Newsnight on Tuesday. Despite having had a rough time of it on Channel 4 News at 7pm that evening, evidently she did little to improve her prospects in the intervening three hours or so before appearing with Paxo. But it's quite possible she didn't know who he was. She didn't have a TV until she entered parliament in 2009. Laudable, maybe, but unwise for a modern politician, surely.</p><p>What a card</p><p>Herman van Rompuy, President of the European Council, may be many things to many people. Ukip leader Nigel Farage, for example, said a couple of years ago that Van Rompuy has &quot;all the charisma of a damp rag and the appearance of a low-grade bank clerk&quot;. But you can't say he lacks magnanimity. Those who attended Stanhope Capital's debate on the future of Europe last week heard Farage admit that he and Mr Van Rompuy will never be bosom buddies, &quot;but he did send me a Christmas card last year&quot;. &quot;I was totally astonished when I opened it,&quot; says Farage, who was lucky to survive a plane crash a few months after issuing his damning verdict. &quot;Perhaps he felt sorry for me after my trials and tribulations. But if he thinks I'm going to ease up on him, he's got another think coming.</p><p>Pasty-faced</p><p>For the third year in succession, David Cameron will be spending at least part of the summer holidays in Cornwall. So be braced for lots of, er, cheesy, or indeed meaty photo-opportunities of Dave tucking into a tax-free warm pasty....</p><p>'Oy George</p><p>Exciting news from clubland. Iain Duncan Smith has been made an honorary life member of Pratt's, saving himself the annual £265 per year membership fee. Pratt's, as you won't need reminding, is a gentleman's club just behind the Ritz in central London. The male staff are all called George, presumably to save members the bother of remembering their names. The club suffered a crisis in the 1980s when a woman took a key drink-pouring post, but further angst was averted when it was agreed that she should be called Georgina. </p><p>High notes</p><p>Booking opens on Friday for the viewing galleries at the Shard, architect Renzo Piano's crystalline London spike, but the musically minded may be able to get to the top another way. Composer Samuel Bordoli wants to use the Shard as a concert venue. His &quot;Live Music Sculpture&quot;, to be played a week today above the newly installed Olympic rings on Tower Bridge, could be a precursor to a performance at the Shard. In the Tower Bridge work, 30 instrumentalists will be dispersed around the vast 42-metre-long walkway at the top of the bridge, enabling the audience (also in the walkway, high above the road) to hear music which, rather than emanating from one source as in a conventional concert, effectively envelopes them. Bordoli is a believer in audiences' &quot;remarkable ability to hear and process 360-degree sound&quot;, and is keen to immerse them in it. Given that the Shard is, at 310 metres tall, the highest building in Europe, with 95 floors and a £450m price tag, in Bordoli's hands it has the potential to be the world's largest and costliest glass harmonica, too.</p>?<p>Green, 20, is the daughter of Sir Philip Green, the Topshop tycoon and fearsome fashion mogul behind the Arcadia group, which is home to the high street stores Miss Selfridge, Dorothy Perkins, Wallis and Burton.</p><p>Better known until now for appearing in the reality TV series Made in Chelsea, Chloe made her first foray into the family business this week, with an eight-piece footwear collection available in her father's many outlets.</p><p>CJG, after the designer's own initials, is a capsule of hyper-high heels and wedges for the ultra-glamorous; every style of footwear, be it stilettos or booties, is equipped with a towering platform that makes other vertiginous shoes on the market look practically sensible in comparison.</p><p>&quot;My girlfriends and I sat down and spoke about shoes,&quot; Green says. &quot;What we wanted, needed, and everything kind of started from there.&quot; It goes without saying that what the daughter of Britain's 17th richest man needs from a shoe is rather different from what the rest of us look for ? these are not for you if you need to run for a bus, have to do your own supermarket shop, or are lowly enough to ever have to bend over.</p><p>But of course, walking is certainly not what these shoes are made for. They tap into exactly the sort of taxi-to-table lifestyle that seems so prevalent right now, despite the supposed &quot;age of austerity&quot;. Just look at the guest list from Green's launch party last month: most of her Made in Chelsea chums, and a healthy smattering of faces from its rival series The Only Way is Essex (the common ones). Aspirational doesn't even begin to cover it.</p><p>&quot;Designing my first shoe collection is a dream come true,&quot; Green adds. &quot;Each shoe is named after someone special to me.&quot;</p><p>The gold peep-toe booties that I tried are dubbed &quot;Tiger Lily&quot; (£150), in homage to an unknown, but presumably rather glitzy, friend. Each pair in the collection is finished with a jade green, lacquered sole ? a nod to the success of the scarlet soles of shoe-turier Christian Louboutin. Green knows her stuff.</p><p>The question is, though, can she design shoes? In a recent interview with Grazia, she laid bare her creative process: colouring in pre-printed templates. More traditional cordwainers need not worry then.</p><p>Shoppers are suckers for shoes: you get a lot of wear from them; they won't look any different if you get a bit fat; and they fulfil every last gaudy fashion fantasy that you dare not wear above your ankles. In that respect, she clearly has her father's eye for a prize.</p><p>But while Green's shoes may be high, they're far from the height of cool ? which isn't to say they won't sell well among the clubbing classes. The exaggerated chunky soles and 14cm heels in the collection feel dated, but Green's fans won't care about that. And as I teeter ludicrously down the street, I certainly feel swayed by the power of celebrity. Swayed almost to the point of falling on my face.</p>?<p>It's fairly well known (publicists are relentless) that I had wanted to write something about King George VI ever since &quot;Bertie&quot; became my boyhood hero for handling his stammer a great deal better than I was handling mine.</p><p>&quot;Listen to him,&quot; my parents urged, as we crowded around our wood-cabinet vacuum-tube wartime radio, listening to his measured tones accompanied by a symphony of static.</p><p>&quot;He was far worse than you,&quot; the parental team assured me. &quot;Listen to him now.&quot; Translation: there's still some hope for you, poor stammering blighter.</p><p>Years later I started doing some research and stumbled across the King's speech specialist, Lionel Logue ? an untrained, non-credentialed Australian wannabe actor with a Harley Street practice. Ah ha!</p><p>I made contact with one of his sons, Valentine, who offered to meet with me and show the notebooks his father kept while treating the King. There was one minor caveat: I had to get permission from the Queen Mother. She wrote, &quot;Please, not during my lifetime, the memory of those events is still too painful.&quot; I dutifully waited a quarter of a century until that wonderful lady had her last gin and tonic. Then I got to write the movie and the play. Got what I wanted. Easy peasy. Not quite.</p><p>I was two thirds into the screenplay when I had the distinct feeling that air was leaking from the tyres. I showed the pages to my then wife who, with great diplomacy, suggested that while of course it was utterly brilliant, it was just a tad... er... diffuse. She recommended ? as an exercise ? it might benefit by first being written as a play. The physical limitations of the stage would force me to concentrate on my key relationship. After all, The King's Speech is basically two men in a room. If that tent-pole were firmly erected I could then hang everything from it like Christmas tree ornaments.</p><p>Trouble was, once written, I began to view it as far more than an exercise. I'd always wanted, above all things, to be a playwright. Being a born show-off is an unfortunate state for a boy who can't speak publicly. However, if stammering meant I couldn't say the lines, at least a playwright might create them. So I wrote leaden imitations of George Bernard Shaw, and the occasional earnest homage to Bertolt Brecht.</p><p>It will not come as a total shock to learn that this didn't help me earn a living. Then, after decades of bill-paying years in the trenches of Madison Avenue, Fleet Street and Hollywood... Eureka! TKS had been born.</p><p>My offering made its way to the desk of a fledgling producer, who managed to arrange a reading at the Pleasance theatre in Islington. The director, Alan Cohen, had only a few hours to work with the cast and then... There I was listening to my play. People were laughing, crying, clapping. Good Lord.</p><p>Afterwards, a nice couple came over and asked if they could send the piece to their son. I had no idea who they were, or who their son was, but feeling benign, I said &quot;Send to your heart's content.&quot; Later I learned that their son was the TV and film director Tom Hooper.</p><p>Tom didn't read it. Not for months. I suppose directing 14 hours of the TV mini-series John Adams was time consuming. Meanwhile, attempts were being made to get the play produced. Some of the very best people in London said no. A rejection note I will always treasure came from a reader at the National Theatre who sniffed, &quot;This is not yet a play, and if it were to become one it still wouldn't be for us.&quot; I've had it framed.</p><p>Other energies were afoot. Bedlam Productions and See-Saw Films teamed up and raised enough development money for me to transform my stage play back into a screenplay. That took about two weeks. Geoffrey Rush committed to play Logue. Momentum jumped in on the UK side, The Weinstein Company from the other side of the Atlantic.</p><p>After six months silence, Tom Hooper surfaced and asked if the rights were available. I said no, but the job of director was. Suddenly we were off to the races. Colin Firth came on as Bertie (did I get lucky!) and a truly Best of British cast was assembled.</p><p>When Tom first read my script, he declared it the best he'd ever been sent. I reminded him of that several dozen drafts later. In the process I learned, scene by scene, line by line, the difference between what works on the screen and on stage. I'm grateful for the lesson.</p><p>The film went on to win every gong in sight and make buckets and buckets of money for everyone except the author (bad contract!)</p><p>&quot;No, you can't always get what you waaaaaaant.&quot; Which sounds like I'm being an ungrateful sod. But truly, I was thrilled with the film. Yet I desperately wanted to see it on stage.</p><p>Then, miraculously, it started to happen. The first requirement was a name director.</p><p>A friend was appearing in a production of The Madness of King George, directed by Adrian Noble. When I saw it, I knew he was a man who understood how to do a history play.</p><p>Timing, however, presented a problem. The film was almost too successful. Would people really want to see it again, albeit in a different form? Would there be any actors brave enough to test their mettle against the acclaimed work of Firth and Rush? It was decided that it would be very modest. A nice UK tour. That would suit me fine.</p><p>Rehearsals began. Immediately I realised that I was getting both what I wanted and needed. Within days, Charles Edwards as Bertie and Jonathan Hyde as Logue had made the roles their own, as did the rest of the wonderful cast. The film was quickly forgotten. Don't get me wrong, Tom's captaining of my ship was brilliant; he made some wonderful choices. For the film. But now I was able to go back to my original vision. More wicked humour. More of the behind-the-scenes politics that make this very personal story so fascinating. More domestic drama. More... immediacy. Because film and stage are so very different.</p><p>Not only is the writing itself different, so is the acting. A film performance is an edited assemblage of hundreds of little bits ? short &quot;takes&quot;, or pieces of takes. That's not in any way to denigrate a great film performance (I was privileged to get many in The King's Speech). Film acting requires a prolonged overview that makes my mind boggle ? keeping emotional track of scenes filmed out of sequence, often weeks or months apart.</p><p>The stage presents a different challenge. The actor must craft an entire performance in one take. Then do it eight times a week. From the moment the curtain goes up, it's all one long &quot;take&quot;. One can feel the electricity.</p><p>As I watched the actors (Charles, Jonathan, Emma Fielding as Elizabeth, Ian McNeice as Churchill, Joss Ackland as George V, Charlotte Randle as Myrtle, Michael Feast as Archbishop Cosmo Lang, David Killick as Stanley Baldwin, and Daniel Betts as Edward VIII) work their magic, I was humbled ? and very grateful. This was my King's Speech.</p><p>We opened to a packed house at the Yvonne Arnaud Theatre in Guildford with bravos, cheers and a standing ovation. This joyous reception continued in Nottingham, Bath, Brighton, Richmond and Newcastle. Now we embark upon the West End.</p><p>As a young lad in austerity England (the one after the war), my grandfather would take me to plays at the Hippodrome. The diva and leading man would swoop on stage, stop in a pool of light, strike a grandiose pose, and everyone would clap thunderously. I so wanted to be part of that world.</p><p>Now I've got both what I wanted and needed. No need to sing another Rolling Stones number, the one about not getting no satisfaction.</p><p>This is very satisfying indeed.</p><p>'The King's Speech', Wyndham's Theatre, London WC2 (0844 482 5120) to 21 July</p>?<p>Six people have been charged after an Indian woman, 37, from Hyderabad was allegedly trafficked to Britain and subjected to a series of sex attacks, Scotland Yard said yesterday. The six, who include an optician and a supermarket manager, will appear in court next month. </p><p>UK a world leader in cyber crime</p><p>The UK has leapt up the world's cyber crime league table, and is now the seventh worst country for cyber attacks. Britain is responsible for 2.4 per cent of all hacking attempts worldwide, according to figures forthe first three months of this year compiled by IT security firm the NCC Group.</p><p>Anger over invites to Jubilee lunch</p><p>There was controversy over the guest list for the Queen's Jubilee &quot;Monarchs' Lunch&quot; at Windsor Castle. Autocratic rulers from Bahrain and Swaziland were among attendees, but the Foreign Office said invitations were issued to all of the world's sovereigns. </p><p>De Botton seeks the thinking man's porn</p><p>Philosopher Alain de Botton is to bring together leading figures frompornography and the arts to identify a &quot;new pornography&quot; which is ethical and &quot;fit for thoughtful, good human beings&quot;, including children.His initiative is part of his School of Life movement, which offers advice on leading fulfilled lives.</p><p>President's guerrilla past leads to apology</p><p>The Rio de Janeiro state government has said it will apologise to Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff for the human rights abuses she suffered during the country's 1961-1985 dictatorship. Rousseff is a former leftist guerrilla who spent three years in prison during the dictatorship. </p><p>Qatada may be freed by end of the month</p><p>Abu Qatada could be freed on bail by the end of the month. The Jordanian, described as Osama bin Laden's top man in Europe, will have his bail application heard by an immigration judge on 28 May. The radical cleric is being held in a high security prison while he fights deportation to Jordan.</p><p>Island nation joins fight against piracy</p><p>Mauritius has agreed to prosecute Somali pirates, helping overcome one of the main hurdles in cracking down on the piracy that has hit international shipping. Mauritius has agreed with Somalia, Somaliland and Puntland to accept suspected pirates for prosecution and trial from June.</p><p>Warsi takes aim at 'minority' of men</p><p>The Muslim cabinet minister Baroness Warsi has hit out at the &quot;small minority&quot; of Pakistani men who see white girls as &quot;fair game&quot;. In outspoken comments following the Rochdale grooming scandal, she urged Muslim community leaders to act to isolate such men.</p><p>Two protesters shot dead in Damascus</p><p>Forces loyal to President Bashar al-Assad shot two protesters in the capital, Damascus, and fired in the air to break up demonstrations in Aleppo, activists said. It was the second consecutive day of street protests in Aleppo, Syria's largest city, visited by UN monitors on Thursday. </p><p>Condemned killer fights for hip surgery</p><p>A condemned killer's fight to receive surgery for agonising hip pain has given Kentucky officials a headache. Robert Foley, 55, was convictedof killing six people between 1989 and 1991, and officials are struggling to justify spending thousands of dollars for surgery on a manthey plan to execute.</p><p>Student fees to blow out national debt</p><p>Higher university fees could raise the national debt by up to £100bn over the next two decades, researchers say. Students at English universities are eligible for government-backed loans to cover fees of up to £9,000 a year, and the total debt will build up until sufficient repayments kick in.</p><p>Trayvon killer may have called for help</p><p>An FBI expert has found crucial evidence in the Trayvon Martin case was inconclusive, saying it was impossible to tell if the voice screaming for help belonged to the black Florida teenager or to George Zimmerman, the neighbourhood watch captain who shot him. </p><p>UN nuclear chief to sign deal on access</p><p>The UN nuclear agency chief will visit Tehran to sign a deal allowinghis organisation to resume probing Iran's nuclear programme. The visit by Yukiya Amano will allow both sides to agree on access to sites, information and officials for the International Atomic Energy Agency investigation.</p><p>Fry and Laurie to reunite in ghost film</p><p>Stephen Fry and former comedy partner Hugh Laurie are to reunite in anew animated film based on The Canterville Ghost, a short story by Oscar Wilde. The actors, who met at Cambridge University, have collaborated on numerous shows including Jeeves and Wooster and A Bit ofFry and Laurie.</p><p>UN 'did not want to embarrass dictators' </p><p>Sacha Baron Cohen has revealed the UN barred him from shooting footage for his film The Dictator in its New York headquarters. He told the UN: &quot;This is a pro-democracy movie&quot;. But the organisation claimed filming was problematic, as it represents &quot;a lot of dictators&quot;. </p><p>Monmouth signs up to be first 'Wiki' town</p><p>Monmouth in South Wales is to be the world's first &quot;Wikipedia town&quot; in a collaboration with the web's most popular encyclopaedia. The Monmouthpedia aims to cover all aspects of local life, including people,places and wildlife. Wikimedia UK, its charity arm, said it will be thefirst of many such projects.</p><p>Italian Proms kingis back for more</p><p>An Italian man who has attended every single Proms season for the past half century has told i that the BBC and the Royal Albert Hall are his &quot;real family&quot;. Giancarlo Stoppini, who lives near Milan, has securedtickets for 55 of this year's BBC Proms. </p><p>Bust-up rumoured as Van Halen delay tour</p><p>Van Halen's fractious history of bust-ups seemed to continue yesterday with the postponement of more than 30 concert dates in the band's US summer tour. Rolling Stone magazine reported that a source with knowledge of the tour said: &quot;The band is arguing like mad. They arefighting.&quot;</p><p>Country singer is not getting any younger</p><p>The Associated Press has discovered documents that show country-musiclegend Loretta Lynn is three years older than she has led people to believe. The documents show Lynn is 80, not 77. The new age calls into question the story she told in her autobiography that she was married atjust 13.</p><p>Templates the trick to Green's shoe line? </p><p>Sir Philip Green's daughter has spoken of the creative process behinddesigning her new Topshop shoe collection. &quot;My girlfriends and I sat and spoke about shoes,&quot; said Chloe Green. &quot;Everything kind of started from there.&quot; But she admitted recently to simply colouring in templates.</p><p>Ladyboy brightens up Brighton contest</p><p>A Thai competitor who sailed through the early rounds of Brighton's Next Hot Model has revealed that she's actually a man. Thai ladyboy Angkookrat Warangnam, 26, had wowed the judges with her looks. An organiser said that &quot;nobody twigged&quot;.</p><p>Zoo has first jaguar cubs for 30 years</p><p>San Diego Zoo in California has unveiled its first newborn jaguar cubs in 30 years. The cubs, born three weeks ago, weigh around 5lbs each. The word &quot;jaguar&quot; derives from the South American native term &quot;yaguara&quot;, meaning &quot;animal that kills in a single bound&quot;.</p><p>Football brings clash of cultures to Munich</p><p>As Bayern Munich host Chelsea this evening in the Champions League final, the two cultures they represent could not be more different. Munich, a city of sturdy workers and sausage-based cuisine, could be overwhelmed by the sight of so many wealthy, fashion-conscious Londoners. </p>?<p>The London Paralympics will be an emotional experience like no other. Unlike the Olympics, the Paralympics have never been solely hosted by Great Britain before. Across the country, the excitement is palpable. More than 2.2 million tickets have already been sold, more than the 1.8 million sold at Beijing in 2008. In fact, there are only 300,000 tickets left, which are fully expected to be snapped up over the coming days, which could make this the first Paralympics to sell out.</p><p>Tim Hollingsworth, chief executive of the British Paralympic Association, says: &quot;The British public are more excited than even we thought they would be.&quot; They are right to be. If anything, this is the real jaw-slackener, the event that will show what humans are capable of. For behind every Paralympian is not just the determination common to all athletes who reach the top. There's that extra shovel of grit that comes from having to overcome the capriciousness of fate.</p><p>Take Martine Wiltshire. On 7 July 2005, she was running late for work. Like many Londoners, she was celebrating the news that her home city had won the bid to host the 2012 Olympics. But she chose to take the Circle Line instead of the overground train during her commute from Stroud Green to St Katharine's Docks, and found herself sitting six feet from Shehzad Tanweer. At 8.50am, he detonated a peroxide-based bomb in his rucksack. It was the first of three explosions to rock the Underground within 30 seconds. Trapped beneath mangled metal, Martine was the last person to be rescued from the trian, and lost three-quarters of her blood volume. It was probably only because Elizabeth Kenworthy, an off-duty police officer, tied a makeshift tourniquet round one of her legs that she didn't die.</p><p>So when, on Friday, the world tunes in to watch Martine represent Britain in the preliminary rounds of the women's volleyball they will see how Britain ? and one Briton in particular ? responds to terrorism. Not with a whimper. Not with vengeance. But with a personal crusade to be harder, better, faster and stronger. Her presence among the 301 athletes who make up ParalympicsGB in this week's Games will be the most potent symbol of the stoicism that has characterised London's adoption of the Olympic mantle since that day in 2005. Martine's determination will be a characteristic of all 4,200 athletes from 166 countries taking part in the 20 sports of these Paralympics, the biggest of its kind ever.</p><p>Like Tom Aggar. In 2005, aged 21, the 6ft 3in rugby player fell 12 ft on to concrete in the dark during a party. He awoke paralysed from the waist down, knowing that his life had changed for ever. Three years later, he was rowing in the Beijing Paralympics, and won gold in the single scull event. Stefanie Reid was a rugby-mad 15-year-old when she lost her right foot in a speedboat accident. She nearly died from loss of blood, but has since retrained in athletics, partly because her prosthetic limb was considered a hazard for other rugby players. Now, she has christened it &quot;the cheetah&quot;. Heather Frederiksen was told she would never swim again after an accident in 2004. But in 2006, watching a former rival swimming in the Commonwealth Games on TV, she said to herself: &quot;I'm not ready to finish. I'll finish when I want to finish, not when someone else tells me to.&quot; She won four golds at Beijing.</p><p>Theirs are stories of astonishing resilience. Many are also reminders of the personal cost of world events. Like that of Jon-Allan Butterworth, the cyclist who lost his arm in a rocket attack while serving in Iraq in 2007. Or Private Derek Derenalagi, the discus thrower who lost his legs the same year, when his vehicle was blown up by two Taliban mines. Or Captain Nick Beighton, leader of the rowing squad, who lost his legs in 2009 when he stepped on a mine in Afghanistan.</p><p>Their injuries testify to the destruction of war. But in the Rwandan sitting volleyball team, there is also a tale of reconciliation. It was founded by two athletes who lost limbs while fighting against each other on opposite sides during the civil war and genocide of 1994. An estimated 800,000 people were killed in about 100 days during the conflict between the Hutus and Tutsis. One athlete lost a leg when he trod on a mine fighting for the Tutsi rebels; the other lost a leg from a bomb while serving in the mainly Hutu army. This week, they will together try to assert their country's position as a credible force in world sport.</p><p>But the country that has most cause for pride this week is Britain. No, really. For it was here that the idea for a Paralympic event was born, though perhaps typically for an island of immigrants, it was conceived by a German emigre. As we have seen in the BBC's show Best of Men, starring Rob Brydon, Sir Ludwig Guttman was a neurosurgeon at Stoke Mandeville hospital in Buckinghamshire who tended to Second World War veterans with spinal cord injuries. He wanted to end the perception of paraplegics as lost causes. His idea was that one should concentrate on what they could do, not what they couldn't. His assistant, the late Joan Scruton, later recalled: &quot;They had to do a sport. It was part of the treatment. It was not a question of 'would you like to do archery?'; no, it was part of the treatment, like taking their medicine or doing physiotherapy. And Sir Ludwig would make sure they did it.&quot;</p><p>In July 1948, to coincide with the London Olympics, he organised an archery competition between Stoke Mandeville and the Royal Star &amp; Garter Home in Richmond. His team lost, but the Stoke Mandeville Games were born, and took place every year from then on.</p><p>In 1952, a Dutch team competed, making it the first international event, and in 1960, the first proper Paralympics took place in Rome, a week after the Olympics. Four hundred athletes from 23 countries competed in eight sports, and their packed lunches included a bottle of wine each. Britain did very well, winning 20 golds and coming second in the medal table behind Italy.</p><p>There may not be wine this time, but there will be medals. At the 2008 Paralympics, Britain finished second, with 42 golds, beaten only by China. Well, China is so successful now that it almost doesn't count: as one commentator said, China has made silver the new gold. This time, ParalympicsGB is hoping to win 103 medals across 12 of the 20 sports. That is the target set by UK Sport, Britain's central funding body, which has put £49m into the London Paralympics. Team GB well exceeded their target of 48 in the London Olympics, bagging 65 medals, including 29 golds.</p><p>Another major difference between now and 1960 is the range of disabilities allowed. The first events were open only to those with spinal injuries. Now, those born disabled are eligible to compete. George Fletcher is a 17-year-old footballer from Liverpool who was born with cerebral palsy on both sides of his body. Despite that, he plays for Everton Disability and in May scored a hat-trick for ParalympicsGB in their 7-0 defeat of the US. This will be his Paralympic debut. Sarah Storey was born without a functioning left hand, after her arm got tangled up with the umbilical cord in the womb. The 34-year-old swimmer and cyclist already has seven gold medals. The weight-lifter Ali Jawad was born with no legs, and has wanted to win a gold medal since he was six. Fate dealt him a cruel blow when, after qualifying for Beijing, he was diagnosed with Crohn's disease, a debilitating inflammation of the gut. He abandoned his sport for two years, but has now staged a comeback, and is ready for lift-off on Thursday.</p><p>Here on the sofa, we can't wait. We may have loved the Olympics, but as Boris Johnson says, that was &quot;just the antipasto&quot;. This is the primo, secondo, and dolce all at once, the spectacle to round off a year of great British achievement. Plump up the cushions, pour a drink, and raise a glass to the triumph of mankind over misfortune. The Paralympics are coming home. Now let them begin.</p><p>Additional research by Chloe Hamilton and Sam Creighton</p>?<p>What a 24 hours she's survived. A brutal mutilation ? actually two brutal mutilations, she went from one to the other last night without any intervening briefing and now this. The banking system her pals are supposed to be supervising is run by racketeers. From the silly to the supreme, she is equally in her element.</p><p>Chloe's boss had been conspicuously absent from Newsnight; was that why Tories were shouting &quot;Where's Balls!&quot; to cover their shame? The shadow chancellor was absent for the Libor statement. Ah, but was he there in spirit? From their front bench the same hectoring, humourless, self-exculpating partisanship ? it wasn't Balls himself but almost as good: Rachel Reeves is Balls in a dress.</p><p>On the front bench, that little monkey Chris Leslie kept yelling to Osborne &quot;YOUR mess!&quot; And the Treasury yelled back, &quot;YOUR mess!&quot; And Chris Leslie yelled ? but you get the idea.</p><p>He does lack a lower register, but the Chancellor spoke as gravely as he could about Barclays traders failing &quot;to give proper information about the true price of money&quot;. It's a dusty way of putting it.</p><p>Andrew Tyrie, chair of the Treasury select committee, told the House that Barclays had lied. Lied to the markets. It's a whopping charge. Institutional lies that rigged the bank rate. Why wouldn't the Chancellor make this a criminal offence, he asked, in the Bill going through parliament now?</p><p>It's a corporate crime, but the task is to sheet the charges back to individual criminals. Osborne said we must find out &quot;who knew what when&quot;. All very well for civil penalties, but who DID what when is better for our blood lust.</p><p>Ex-banker Desmond Swayne asked: &quot;When did bankers start treating their customers as punters to be devoured?&quot; Round about the time Glass-Steagall was repealed perhaps. Dennis Skinner thought Big Bang started it. &quot;When you [Osborne] were in the Bullingdon Club!&quot; And Chloe was rollerskating in a little blue dress.</p><p>Others had put more work into their descriptions. &quot;A sewer of systematic dishonesty&quot; (John Thurso). &quot;Daily daylight robbery - anything goes but nobody knows&quot; (Mark Durkan). &quot;Thieves and criminals who've made beggars of our constituents!&quot; (Clive Efford)</p><p>Thieves and criminals, Efford heckled, increasingly loudly until deputy Speaker Lindsay Hoyle told him to desist. Nor would he. &quot;Speak For England&quot; Efford kept up his gargling, incoherent anger until Hoyle asked lightly, &quot;Are you challenging me?&quot; Efford stood quickly. &quot;I apologise,&quot; he said. It was a snack, not the Big Mac meal with extra fries the Speaker would have made of it.</p><p>What a relief it is when Alistair Darling speaks. &quot;In his quieter moments he will reflect...&quot; he began. It had all been pandemic, he said. &quot;But Libor can't be a work of fiction.&quot; And even if they can't be prosecuted, bank executives can be &quot;put off the road&quot;.</p><p>Why isn't he on the front bench? Because he'd make George Osborne look like Chloe Smith. </p>?<p>The Leader of the Opposition said that &quot;a more stable government in Afghanistan&quot; would produce &quot;more stable outcomes&quot;. It might have been the last of the horse jokes. </p><p>Surely not, you think, too questionable. You'd get short odds if you were betting against that. </p><p>Even David Cameron ? who we can still hope is the most decent leader since John Major ? said our plan was to defeat both al-Qa'ida and the Taliban, yes, as though they were allies. Politicians are directed by different drivers from the rest of us. Nothing is beyond them, given the right incentives. </p><p>A small example. Labour has a communications strategy to show they are more &quot;in touch with ordinary people&quot; than the Conservatives. So we are getting questions starting &quot;Tim from Dartford says&quot;. Rachel Reeves got clobbered by little Chloe Smith when the minister replied &quot;Rachel from Leeds says,&quot; and quoted her opposite number to Tory cheers. </p><p>Yesterday, Joan Ruddock had a go. It didn't go very well either. </p><p>She claimed the PM had taken all benefits away from a 10-year-old with cerebral palsy, and she wanted to know with fluting piety: &quot;Is he truly proud?&quot;</p><p>What could gilded Cameron know of such things? He replied that one piece of support had been replaced with another, and that he well knew how onerous the previous forms were because time was when he had filled them out himself. Indeed. The Cameron family is known to have been touched with that particular brush. Dame Joan looked perfectly composed, despite the cries of &quot;Shame!&quot; (for once, merited).</p><p>But back to our soldiers, and their political directors. Here's an awful thought: we could be heading into World War Three because it's not in any leader's interests to hold back. Doing so may require a moral grandeur beyond anyone in Parliament at the moment. We can, however, hope. </p>?<p>Champagne and haute cuisine are standard, exotic locations preferable. With most celebrations lasting at least a weekend, a one-day party looks like not trying. The hotel heiress Paris Hilton celebrated her 21st birthday across five time zones, while the Sultan of Brunei's 50th birthday clocked up 15 days of revels.</p><p>The entertainment is crucial. The bar stands at about a million dollars for a romp through the greatest hits by Rihanna, Beyonce or anyone else too famous to need a surname. Then the host has to throw in an A-list actor or two and an internationally renowned flying circus troupe, because a Spotify playlist and bit of chat is not going to make the grade.</p><p>Rich kids are raising their expectations, too. The Israeli defence contractor David Brooks paid Aerosmith and 50 Cent more than £1m to perform at his daughter's 13th birthday party.</p><p>Last, but not least, there must be presents for everyone: the goodie bag arms race seems to escalate with each event, although the Sultan of Brunei has yet to be outdone with his gift of gold medals for 60,000 guests at his &quot;golden birthday&quot; in 1992.</p><p>As Sir Philip and friends enjoy a four-day thrash, The Independent on Sunday considers how his revels compete with some of the biggest and brashest of recent times.</p><p>Financier: Leon Black, 60th birthday last year</p><p>The founder of the US private equity firm Apollo invited 200 guests to his estate in the Hamptons for his 60th birthday last year, where he transformed his backyard into a &quot;faux nightclub&quot;. Sir Elton John ended his £600,000 set with &quot;Crocodile Rock&quot;, performing to guests including the businesswoman Martha Stewart, the television host Howard Stern and the New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, while seared foie gras, crab cakes and steak featured on the menu.</p><p>Sultan of Brunei: Hassanal Bolkiah 50th birthday in 1996</p><p>For the Sultan's self-proclaimed 'golden birthday' in 1996, rather than a party bag, the 60,000 guests ? who included Prince Charles ? were surprised with a gold medal as their going- away gift. Michael Jackson performed three concerts, at a cost close to £10m. The celebrations continued throughout Brunei for 15 days.</p><p>Model: Naomi Campbell, 40th birthday in 2010</p><p>The venue was the Hotel du Cap Eden Roc in Antibes, the transport Dolce &amp; Gabbana's superyacht, the occasion Campbell's 40th. Guests included Eva Herzigova, Jennifer Lopez and Marc Anthony, Sarah Ferguson and Princess Beatrice, and Grace Jones. The cocktails on offer were the Campbelltini, made from vodka, cranberry, lime and Triple sec, and the Naomito, a rum, soda water, brown sugar and fresh mint concoction.</p><p>Hotel heiress: Paris Hilton, 21st birthday in 2002</p><p>When the heiress turned 21 in 2002, she didn't celebrate only once. Or twice. Instead, she had six parties, in New York, Los Angeles, Las Vegas, London ? and two in Tokyo, flying round the world to celebrate in different time zones. The great-granddaughter of Conrad Hilton took care of the bill, which reportedly amounted to £45,000 per guest. Her high point: the 21 birthday cakes at her New York party at Studio 54.</p><p>Financier: Nat Rothschild, 40th birthday last year</p><p>Montenegro turned into Chelsea-on-Sea for Nat Rothschild's three-day 40th birthday bash last year, celebrated by 400 close friends, including Lord Mandelson, the tennis player Novak Djokovic, the Ukrainian supermodel Sasha Volkova and Tony Hayward, the former boss of BP. A 215ft infinity pool at Porto Montenegro's marina, decorated with giant disco pools, was the 'centrepiece'. Guests drank Tattinger and Bellinis, and danced until sunrise.</p><p>Ukrainian steel magnate: Victor Pinchuk, 50th birthday in 2010</p><p>The Ukrainian steel magnate treated 300 guests to a holiday in the French ski resort of Courchevel for his 2010 birthday bash. The slopes were not enough to mark his half century: Cirque du Soleil was flown in to perform, and the local schoolchildren had the surprise of watching the circus troupe rehearse its acrobatics. Alain Ducasse, who has 19 Michelin stars across his restaurants, cooked a gastronomic buffet.</p><p>Retailer: Sir Philip Green, 60th birthday this weekend</p><p>The Topshop boss is celebrating his 60th birthday as his daughter Chloe celebrates her 21st. Like any other family, they are marking their milestones with a party to remember. Only in their case their 150 guests, including Kate Moss, Simon Cowell, Gwyneth Paltrow and Katherine Jenkins, were jetted off to a mystery location ? which turned out to be Mexico ? to stay in a five-star hotel of private villas and pools. With separate performances from Rihanna, Bruno Mars and Stevie Wonder, reportedly costing a total of £3.1m, rooms at £1,500 each, flowing Pol Roger champagne and feasts of sushi and Thai food, there was no scrimping. As for surprises, a firework display ending with a pyrotechnic portrait of Green, at £150,000, took the place of a slice of cake in a party bag.</p><p>President of Chechnya: Ramzan Kadyrov, 35th birthday last year</p><p>With acrobats, fireworks, a laser display, a performance by the violinist Vanessa Mae costing £320,000, and appearances from Hilary Swank and Jean-Claude Van Damme, who ended his speech by yelling: &quot;I love you, Mr Kadyrov&quot;, it was a celebration to remember. Coinciding with Kadyrov's birthday last year, he insisted it was a celebration of the Chechen capital, Grozny, and threatened to fire any official who gave him a birthday present. But the party left a bitter aftertaste as human rights groups accused the Chechen warlord of torturing and murdering opponents.</p>?<p>Last week's partial reversal on fuel duty was intended to garnerpositive headlines for having helped hard-pressed motorists.Instead, Mr Osborne attracted the opprobrium of his fellowministers for leaving them in the dark after they had publiclyrejected the idea just days before. Two poor TV interviews oneevening by Chloe Smith, a junior Treasury minister, added to thesense of chaos.</p><p>A Tory cabinet member claimed the last-minute decision to delaynext month's 3p rise in fuel duty until January was &quot;just mad&quot; andrisked undermining the Government's claim to have a credible planfor deficit reduction. &quot;If there is half a billion pounds sittingunspent somewhere, I would like to see it,&quot; he said.</p><p>There is a growing sense of unease about the Government beingrun by the &quot;duopoly&quot; of David Cameron, the Prime Minister, and MrOsborne, with complaints over Europe and House of Lords reform topof the list.</p><p>The Independent on Sunday has learnt that another furiousCabinet minister lashed out after the fuel duty U-turn, tellingfriends they would in future do nothing to help &quot;that bastardOsborne&quot;.</p><p>A third minister said there was now widespread disillusionacross the Tory party. &quot;We cannot simply rely on dripping outpolicies and then announcing a U-turn the next day. It looks likegovernment by PR, not by ideology.&quot;</p><p>One minister said: &quot;The coalition is rotting from the bottom up.It started with the local associations, it's reached the backbenches and it is creeping up. We need to [stop it] reaching thetop before 2015. The PM mustn't be pulled by our hard right. Itwould mean the retoxifcation of the party. To think we will win bybeing more right wing is mad.&quot;</p><p>Ministers are pinning their hopes on this month's Olympics tolift the coalition out of the gloom.</p><p>The IoS understands that Boris Johnson is to join the Cabinet ?at least for the duration of the sporting spectacular. Eachmorning, Mr Cameron will chair an Olympics cabinet.&quot;It will beinteresting to see how Cameron deals with Boris,&quot; said oneprospective attendee. &quot;They will be fighting for the glory, andtrying to dodge the blame.&quot;</p><p>Mr Cameron tried to soothe his backbenchers last night bypromising a referendum on the EU ? but only when there was a &quot;realchoice&quot; for voters. The PM wrote in The Sunday Telegraph that hewouldn't hold an immediate in/out vote but added: &quot;For me the twowords 'Europe' and 'referendum' can go together... but let us getthe people a real choice first.&quot;</p>?<p>Therehas never been a minister since who took up so much floor space ? until thismonth’s ministerial shuffle. Where there had previously been one minister ofstate, Oliver Letwin, working with the Minister for the Cabinet Office, FrancisMaude, there are now two, after the rehabilitation of David Laws. There arealso two junior ministers, Nick Hurd and Chloe Smith, and, uniquely, twoMinisters without Portfolio, Grant Shapps and Kenneth Clarke.</p><p>So the room that once housed MichaelHeseltine and that has served for many years as a meeting room, is nowan office. Its proud occupant is Francis Maude.</p><p>***</p><p>Nameless minister spills the beanson being sacked</p><p>Today’s Spectator has a witty account byan unnamed government minister describing what it was like being sacked.Rumours suggested Nick Gibb, sacked from his job as an education minister. MrCameron told the Commons: “Let me pay tribute to him for his long-standing workon educational standards and his belief in true rigour in schools. He has seenmany of his ideas put into practice…” Yes, Mr Cameron, people say he was goodat his job. But then, why sack him?</p><p>***</p><p>Thanks Norman, what joy it is to buya train ticket</p><p>“Passengers continue to enjoy widespreadand easy access to the purchase of rail products,” says a written statementfrom the Transport minister, Norman Baker. It takes a minister to remind us ofthe fun that can be had buying a rail ticket.</p><p>***</p><p>A woman’s place is behind the fridge, anddon’t forget it</p><p>An indignant email pings in from GodfreyBloom, Ukip member of the European Parliament. He has been on local radio withSarah Veale of the TUC, who accused him of having said that “women should notgo to work but should stay at home and clean behind the fridge”. Mr Bloomclaims this is “simply a lie” and Ms Veale should apologise.</p><p>What he actually said, shortly after hewas elected MEP for Yorkshire and Humberside in 2004, was that he wanted todeal with women’s issues because “I just don’t think they clean behind thefridge enough.”</p><p>He added: “I am here to representYorkshire women who always have dinner on the table when you get home. I amgoing to promote men’s rights.” Not at all the thoughts of a man who thinkswomen belong in the home, cleaning fridges. </p>?<p>The news heaps more pressure on the Coalition over its handling of the economy and increases the likelihood that the Bank of England will approve more money printing in the coming months to boost demand. The UK sank into its first double-dip recession since the 1970s last month when the ONS estimated the economy shrank in the first quarter, following a 0.3 per cent contraction in the final three months of 2011. The Bank of England has warned that productivity could also fall in the second quarter of 2012 because of the Diamond Jubilee bank holiday.</p><p>The Treasury minister, Chloe Smith, rejected calls for the Chancellor to slow down the planned spending cuts. &quot;We need to stick to our path. It would not be acceptable to fail to deal with our debts,&quot; she said. Labour's shadow Chancellor, Ed Balls, said the figures underlined the need for a shift in strategy. &quot;What more evidence can David Cameron and George Osborne need that their policies have failed and that they now need a change of course and a plan B for growth and jobs?&quot; he said.</p><p>The International Monetary Fund said this week that the Bank of England should restart its £325bn quantitative-easing programme without delay. It also said the Chancellor should relax his deficit reduction schedule if the economy does not return to healthy growth later this year.</p><p>Yesterday's downward revision was prompted by a larger than realised fall in output in the construction sector. The ONS said building activity shrank by 4.8 per cent over the first three months of the year. Central government spending on building projects fell by 13 per cent in 2011 and is scheduled to fall by a further 5 per cent this year. The Deputy Prime Minister, Nick Clegg, said this week that the Government would soon announce &quot;massive&quot; infrastructure projects, but these are expected to be funded by guarantees for private sector investment, not direct state spending.</p><p>Further grim economic news came from the Department for Education, which said the number of young people not in work, school or training rose to 954,000 in the first quarter of the year, up from 925,000 in the first quarter of 2011. Yesterday's second estimate of GDP showed consumer spending rose by 0.1 per cent over the quarter and that manufacturing output was flat. Despite the austerity drive, government expenditure rose by 1.6 per cent.</p><p>When the first estimate of GDP was released last month many financial analysts cast doubt on the figures, pointing out that several surveys of business activity since the turn of the year had suggested a rise in economic activity. However, there has been an increasing acceptance since then that the economy is indeed in a feeble state.</p><p>Clegg fails to bond with Merkel</p><p>Nick Clegg was forced to temper his enthusiasm for eurobonds during a visit to Germany yesterday after being warned off the subject by Angela Merkel. The German Chancellor told him she had gone to bed at 4am on Thursday, having blocked French President Francois Hollande's eurobond plans. &quot;I think I was quite successful in that,&quot; she is reported to have told Mr Clegg. According to insiders, the Deputy Prime Minister was left in no doubt that eurobonds were not up for discussion.</p>?<p>Panto season has arrived (oh yes it has) and bumper ticket sales means there are lucrative opportunities for anyone who can rustle up an Equity card. Advance bookings are strong for this year's crop of thigh-slappers. Qdos, the UK's biggest pantomime producers with 23 shows, said it had already recorded takings of £18m. The company, which has added an extra week to its Sleeping Beauty at Newcastle's Theatre Royal, estimates that 1.5 million people will see its productions before the final curtain comes down in February.</p><p>The fad for &quot;posh panto&quot;, which reached a peak with Sir Ian McKellen's Widow Twankey in the Old Vic's Aladdin, has faded. This year, children will be entertained by reliable favourites such as the Krankies and John Barrowman in Robinson Crusoe in Glasgow and Brian Conley and Basil Brush at the Birmingham Hippodrome's Cinderella. Panto &quot;dames&quot; can earn around £8,000 a week ? but often have to pay for their own outfits. The highest-paid star this year will be Steve McFadden, the EastEnders actor, who has secured £200,000 for his stint as Captain Hook.</p><p>Baywatch alumni Pamela Anderson, now in her third year on the panto stage, and David Hasselhoff, are getting £125,000 each to tread the boards.</p><p>Last year, panto sales were hit by heavy snow, which prevented coach parties from reaching venues and forced cancellations. But bookings for Hasselhoff's Peter Pan at the Bristol Hippodrome are 25 per cent ahead of the same period last year. Reality television stars have found panto a useful way to extend their stay in the spotlight and earn some cash. Harry Derbidge, a17-year-old member of the cast of The Only Way Is Essex, will earn £15,000 for playing piratical second fiddle to McFadden in Woking.</p><p>Strictly Come Dancing contestant Edwina Currie turned down the chance to follow Ann Widdecombe on to the stage, when she was offered the role of the Wicked Fairy in Sleeping Beauty in Windsor. Britt Ekland snapped up the part.</p><p>But Neil Hamilton, Currie's former Tory colleague, is appearing as Baron Hardup, with wife Christine as the Fairy Godmother, in Kettering's Cinderella.</p><p>Oh yes they are...Who's playing where?</p><p>Chatham</p><p>Vanilla Ice is the star attraction at the Chatham Central Theatre production of Peter Pan. The 1990s rapper plays Captain Hook but admits he had never heard of panto before the offer. &quot;I'll be putting my own spin on it. I'm sure there'll be some rapping involved,&quot; promises Ice, whose good friend Adam Sandler has promised to see the show. &quot;Adam might be kidding,&quot; the Ice Ice Baby chart-topper adds.</p><p>Dublin</p><p>Terrible twins Jedward have masterminded their own bespoke panto. The duo auditioned 800 children to appear in Jedward and The Beanstalk at Dublin's Olympia Theatre. How much will they earn? &quot;A lot,&quot; says manager Louis Walsh.</p><p>Dartford</p><p>The pantomime inherent in Strictly Come Dancing is given free rein when former contestant Ann Widdecombe stars alongside judge Craig Revel Horwood in Snow White at the Orchard Theatre, Dartford. The ex-MP plays the Widdy in Waiting.</p><p>Cheltenham</p><p>&quot;A bonafide Hollywood actress is appearing in pantomime in Cheltenham this year,&quot; the Gloucestershire Echo boasted. Emma Samms, who starred in the US soap Dynasty, will play The Good Fairy in Jack and the Beanstalk at the Everyman. &quot;I'm not going to be there as a celebrity. It's a job and I'm proud to be joining a cast of talented people.&quot;</p><p>Woking</p><p>Controversy surrounded the £200,000 fee reportedly pocketed by Steve McFadden, the EastEnders star, for playing Hook in Peter Pan at the New Victoria Theatre, Woking. Harry Derbidge from The Only Way Is Essex plays one if Hook's pirates. It is McFadden who is shifting tickets.</p><p>Also showing...</p><p>Gareth Gates will play Aladdin in Milton Keynes. Hackney Empire's Cinderella contains witty allusions to phone hacking and the Olympics. Dame Edna Everage represents the Spirit of London in Dick Whittington at New Wimbledon Theatre, London. Chloe Madeley gets her big break in Sleeping Beauty at the Theatre Royal, Windsor.</p>?<p>Although the entire team of Olympians and Paralympians will parade in open-topped buses through London, many argue that rather than focus the main event in the capital, it should take place in Yorkshire. With six gold, two silver and three bronze ? so far ? the White Rose county now accounts for nearly a quarter of all GB podium finishes.</p><p>Yet Yorkshire's proud cities are vying between themselves to trumpet their own talent. Leeds will put on a choir to welcome home the Brownlee brothers, who took first and third in the triathlon. The first ever gold medal-winning female boxer, Nicola Adams, will get at a reception in Millennium Square. Sheffield will offer Jessica Ennis the freedom of the city.</p><p>Hull, meanwhile, will be laying on a party for boxer Luke Campbell who fights for gold tonight. In Scotland the rivalry between Edinburgh and Glasgow has flared over the honour of hosting Sir Chris Hoy. Edinburgh, his home town, is in danger of losing out to Glasgow, host of the 2014 Commonwealth Games, which has already named its new velodrome after the six-time gold medallist. Yet Sir Chris is also likely to be included in celebrations in Manchester, where the council has acceded to demands that our cycling stars be honoured in the city which is host to the National Cycling Centre and home for the majority of the team. In Huddersfield, West Yorkshire, there are plans to mark cyclist Ed Clancy's success with a golden fireworks display.</p><p>Local sensitivities have also been gently ruffled in Cornwall, where rower Helen Glover is to diplomatically parade in an open-topped bus through both Penzance and Newlyn, where her father's ice cream shop has been mobbed with well-wishers since her triumph.</p><p>It is a similar story in Flint, North Wales, where the butcher's shop where Jade Jones' mother works was at the centre of celebrations yesterday, as the town prepares to honour the Taekwondo Olympic champion.</p><p>Meanwhile, Henley will honour Team GB rowers with a row-past on the Thames. Twelve medallists come from the local Leander Club.</p>?<p>Click to view graphic</p><p>Inspired by the smiling army of pink-and-purple-clad Olympic volunteers who have helped overseas visitors navigate the intricacies of the District and Circle lines in recent weeks, Londoners have started behaving nicely.</p><p>From teenagers helping elderly tourists find their way to the train cleaner who hunted through a bin to salvage a woman's lost Olympic hockey tickets, outbreaks of decency have been widespread.</p><p>There have even been reports of strangers talking on the Tube.</p><p>As anyone familiar with sullen and stony-faced demeanour of the typical London Underground commuter will testify, the new convivial mood borders on the revolutionary.</p><p>But has the Olympic spirit really sweetened our souls? How kind have the residents of the capital actually become? Can a fortnight of good cheer change a character of a city?</p><p>To test the theory that the Games have made the capital a more honest, considerate, helpful place, The Independent decided to revive a kindness test dreamed up by P G Wodehouse. The novelist and wit famously declared that he had so much faith in his countrymen that he never bothered to post letters, preferring to throw them out the window and wait for passing pedestrians to drop them in the postbox.</p><p>Following the formula, stamped letters were left at 50 locations around London last week, addressed to the fictional Jeremy Fingham at a London address. But to add a little extra test, a note was scrawled on the back of each letter, reading: &quot;Closing Ceremony tickets for Jeremy&quot;.</p><p>Inside were two pieces of blank card that, to the unsuspecting, would feel exactly like Olympic tickets. Some were left near post boxes, some on cafe tables in folded newspapers, some on the Underground, some in the street.</p><p>Would Londoners resist the temptation to pocket poor forgetful Mr Fingham's hypothetical tickets or would they do the decent thing and put the letter in the post? The outcome: a large minority of Londoners are honest folk who would forgo a freebie to help a stranger. But many others are just as self-serving as they ever were.</p><p>Of the 50 letters dropped, 20 found their way to Mr Fingham. Even allowing for some letters that were never found, that still suggests that around half of Londoners would gladly open someone else's post to make it to the Olympics closing ceremony ? The Independent can only hope they were terribly disappointed to find blank pieces of card inside.</p><p>But on the positive side, four Londoners were so keen to bend over backwards in the name of honesty that they didn't post the letter they found ? they ran after our letter-dropper to return it.</p><p>One of London's good people was 18-year-old Julia Dalrymple, from Notting Hill, who found a letter in a Starbucks cafe. Not only, nice, but rather savvy, Julia, wrote her number and a message on the envelope before posting it:</p><p>&quot;Dear forgetful Mr Starbucks, seeing as I am a morally conscious person I will go on to post this letter that I found… If you have any more where these came from and you're feeling generous, let me know.&quot;</p><p>Speaking to The Independent yesterday, and thankfully not at all bitter about the deception, Ms Dalrymple, who plans to do charity work in Asia during her gap year, said that the Olympics had &quot;changed the atmosphere in the city. It has really perked up the energy in London, but there's still a lot of people who don't care,&quot; she said.</p><p>Most of those people, it would appear, commute through London Bridge train station or live in Brockley, south London, or the well-to-do north London neighbourhood Crouch End. Not one letter was returned from these locations.</p><p>Thankfully, in most other parts of London, some people at least are keeping the Olympic spirit alive and well.</p><p>Additional reporting by Chloe Hamilton.</p>?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?<p>Welcome back to Missdemeanors, in which we issue virtual wrist-slaps to popular gossip bloggers for Crimes Against Womanity. This week? Women are sluts, look like dudes, are probably on line for abortions and should get AIDS. Another great week of "writing" on the internet! The offenders, their crimes and sentences, after the jump.</p> <p><br> <br> <br> <br> <br> <br> <br> <br> Since it the internet is so awash in misogyny and woman-bashing that it's like we're living in the dark ages, this week all sentences will be . Fun and educational!</p> <p>The Accused: IDontLikeYouInThatWay<br> The Crime: Use of the oh-so handy "slut" label.<br> : "George Clooney's Girlfriend Is A Slut: One day this chick doesn't mind getting dry humped on camera, the next she's a demure flower on the red carpet. Why the sudden change? Was it true love's first kiss? Did George Clooney fill her empty heart? 'Oh, and he's really rich and famous,' Sarah Larson added. 'Don't forget rich.'" So yeah. What does it matter that Sarah Larson's been photographed Last Nights Party-style? So have lots of girls. Also, calling someone you don't know a slut on the internet is immature, stupid and makes you look like and idiot. Cut it out. Also? Women are complex. Deal with it.<br> The Sentence: The .</p> <p>The Accused: WWTDD?<br> The Crime: Getting on 's case; calling her fat.<br> : "She says, 'It's what I was born to do - posing for the camera. And as I keep saying, I love my body. People seem desperate to get me to say that I don't, that deep down I'm not happy and would rather be thin, but the fact is I wouldn't change myself at all. Do I have fat days? Of course, but what woman doesn't!' I think the difference being Chloes fat days are more commonly known as, 'Monday-Sunday.'" Miss England, Chloe Marshall, is a lot of things: Brave, confident, 5 foot 10 and recently signed to a modeling agency. She is not, however, fat.<br> The Sentence: .</p> <p>The Accused: Hollywood Tuna<br> The Crime: Calling a supermodel a man.<br> : "I know I rip on Gisele Bundchen a lot, but even I've got to admit she's looking pretty hot here at the launch of the Vogue Eyewear Play Everyday Campaign in that tight dress of hers. And that's hard for me to admit considering I'm not into dudes." Please, that woman does not look like a man. And this isn't even "funny."<br> The Sentence: The .<br> <br> The Accused: Your friend, Drunken Stepfather<br> The Crime: Bashing Miley Cyrus (again), wishing disease on Audrina Patridge.<br> : "I guess one of the good things about 15 year old girls is that they don't have cellulite like they will when they actually become women, but they are so annoying when all they want to watch is Hannah Montana reruns, especially when they are Hannah Montana... bitch is probably the next in line for an abortion at the on studio abortion clinic they are rockin' over at Disney and this bitch and her crooked smile don't have shit on the 15 year old girls I see out in clubs..."<br> : (Audrina Patridge gets a tattoo) "The only hope we have is that the needle is tainted and she gets herself some AIDS and the good news is that she's enough of a slut to make that happen on her own, without dirty needles." You don't need me to explain why all of this is distasteful, derogatory, misogynist, degrading, demeaning and malicious. And yeah, we're going to keep writing about DS, because someone keeps paying him to post stuff like this. It's wrong, and people should know that.<br> The Sentence: Being .</p>?<p>"It was an amazing character and so different from what any other kid has done, : Natalie Portman in The Professional and Jodie Foster in Taxi Driver." &mdash; 13-year-old , of Kick-Ass. []</p>?<p>When we posted about Tina Fey's last week, one of our commenters asked, "Am I the only person who finds Fey very traditionally attractive?" Chloe at Feministing :</p><p>"The most frustrating thing about 30 Rock, an otherwise excellent show, are the constant references to the fact that Tina Fey's character Liz Lemon is ugly," Chloe writes, "The thing is, Tina Fey fits conventional standards of female beauty almost to a T." including Rachel from Glee and Ugly Betty's America Ferrera, noting that "in reality, those "ugly" women look an awful lot like the beautiful ones." In other words, isn't it time everyone just admits that Liz Lemon is like, really pretty?</p> <p>Slapping a pair of glasses on a woman and declaring her "ugly" is nothing new; the website TVTropes sums it up quite nicely with a category called "," noting She's All That's Laney Boggs as a prime example, and adding that the phenomenon is "mainly possible because most of the 'ugly' women on TV are beautiful actresses in bad clothes, though it also has something to do with narrow standards of beauty in movies and TV."</p> <p>Discussions surrounding Fey's looks are always a bit weird, which I suppose speaks to the fact that, as Irin noted, Fey is often presented as a "." Tina Fey seems to be the type of woman who can admit that her transformation is a bit of a Hollywood Cinderella story while simultaneously calling bullshit on Cinderella stories in general.</p> <p>But this "relatability" factor causes a weird defense that seems to spring up whenever anyone points out that Fey actually fits into conventional beauty standards: she's thin, white, glossy hair, always looks glamorous at events, and so on and so forth. People rush to point out that Fey used to be heavier, or that she has a scar, or that she wasn't always as glamorous as she has appeared over the past six or seven years. It's almost as if people feel the need to justify the fact that Tina Fey is actually quite traditionally beautiful in the Hollywood sense by attempting to point out the days when she wasn't.</p> <p>I'm not exactly sure I agree with Chloe's post, in that I think Liz Lemon is a character whose self-deprecation speaks more to her internal state than her external one, though I do think the idea of trying to pretend some women are "ugly" simply because other characters on a television show tell them so is a bit tired and played out. Liz Lemon is actually a bit of a step in the right direction, in that her truly "ugly" moments come from poor decision making and selfishness and have very little to do with her looks whatsoever.</p> <p>It's the narrative that surrounds Fey off-screen that's a bit more puzzling: she's not your typical starlet, sure, but she's not Marla Hooch, needing "a lot of night games," either. Fey made fun of herself (allegedly) in wherein she described her Vogue shoot as what it "would be like if Vogue gave your 40-year-old sister-in-law a makeover." But the makeover happened years ago, and it's probably time we all just stop acting surprised whenever Fey shows up looking absolutely gorgeous. That should really be the territory of every dumb magazine that can't get over the fact that yes, women can be smart, funny, and pretty. I know, right? Madness.</p> <p> [Feministing]<br> Earlier: <br> </p>?<p>The new mini-trend in more naturalistic beauty pageants is being bucked by "" - in which only the surgically enhanced need apply.</p><p>"Ever had plastic surgery to become beautiful? Are you proud of your body? Would you like to put yourself to the test?" asks the pageant's website. The competition, which has already attracted 100 entrants, is open to women 18-30 - although there is an older "dame" category, too - as long as they've had "a surgical procedure done under general or local anesthesia."</p> <p>The pageant, according to its founders (), seeks to, ahem, destigmatize cosmetic enhancement which, despite its increasing affordability and popularity, still gets a bad rap. Says its press director, "Unfortunately, people in Hungary are still rather negative about ladies who have had (cosmetic) surgery and there are also a lot of stereotypes going about...We are not seeking to promote extremely large breasts and the like." She adds, "The whole thing is about harmony, that's what the contest seeks to emphasize...Let's not forget that there are ladies who have had new perspectives open up for them thanks to plastic surgery, who could get rid of their complexes with an operation and can now have a more complete life."</p> <p>Well, uh, sure. Whatever floats your boat. And I guess as long as we're promoting unnatural standards of beauty, there's a lot to be said for admitting they're...artificial. Maybe it makes more sense than the nudge-wink wholesomeness of the typical American varietal. Is it less offensive to find someone's taste wanting than her genetics? And if these women are indeed facing discrimination - I'll admit, something I'd never really considered - then I guess anything that encourages choosing your choices is good?</p> <p>But, of course, more pageants aren't exactly the way most of us see aesthetic relativism triumphing; objectifying other kinds of figures has never really been the thinking woman's preferred alternative. And what amounts to the promotion of plastic surgery (obviously a lucrative source of money and tourism) - and heralding it as a road to "a more complete life" - isn't really how we see women feeling more confident about their "complexes." It's not like they're making us comfortable with a new aesthetic, after all.</p> <p>But maybe there's something to be said for cutting the crap and going back to the original goal of pageants: arbitrary physical standards. We ran across that shows how the Miss Universe "winner was picked" and it had precious little to do with world peace. Legs "too irregular?" Shoulders "too square?" Sorry, Charley.<br> <br> <br> <br> In a way, it seems important to be reminded that this is what pageants were - and are. Especially since they show no sign of going away. Indeed, tells us that the scourge of the baby pageant has hit Great Britain, with attendant stage moms, pancake makeup and dubious invocations of God, (whom many parents seem to think takes a strong personal interest in the direction of local children's beauty contests) and quotes like this: "It was a long day. Scarlett had an asthma attack the day after ? we think it was inhaling others' hairspray. I don't regret it, though; it was a learning experience and she had a lovely time." While these moms are not yet up to American levels of shamelessness - we have, after all, had generations to hone our skills, things like this - "Chloe (8) is used to make-up ? she usually does her eyes, her cheeks and lipstick. She's a little young, but I don't mind if she wears it now and then, to go out to parties" - make us think they're going to catch up just fine. In a few years, these girls too can make the choice between the route of "scholarships/self-esteem and self-confidence" or the more frank future heralded by Miss Plastic.</p> <p> [Reuters]<br> [Sociological Images]<br> [Telegraph]</p>?<p>"This," says Chloe, sitting on a mahogany bench and looking around the expansive marble and brass-accented lobby, "this is how we live." That's the last line of "Drinking Diaries," a story in next month's Teen Vogue, in which Eva Chen goes drinking with high schoolers in San Francisco and New York and, well, I would say she compares them, but that would make it sound more service-y than it actually is. It's hard to say exactly how much they drink, but she makes it sound like a lot. In San Francisco, for instance, she goes to a Japanese place with what seem to be five kids who order "eleven 40-ounce bottles of Japanese beer and eleven bottles of hot sake" &mdash; and you're like, "For reals, the Japanese make forties?" &mdash; but whatevs, that's nothing compared to what happens back in New York the night she gets a text-message from "Chloe"</p> "My friend, "Audrey", if visiting from boarding school," it reads. "And when she's here, Things Happen. Holy mother dude, again, really? Capital-T-Things, capital H Happen? <p>Oh, and if you were wondering, Chloe, who is 16, wears skinny jeans, leopard print Tory Burch flats and a ruffled Juicy Couture peacoat while Audrey, who is 17, wears a Pucci-print tunic with Chanel boots.</p> "Audrey passed out on the beach, and a friend buried her up to her head. But then the tide came in! She woke up, and water was in her face. Audrey, you could've died!"<br> <p><br> Audrey laughs. Chloe smiles and says, "Whatever, I've been worse. The drunkest I've ever been, I passed out in a cab, and I don't remember anything from that night. I think everything was fine but I just can't remember!<br></p> <p><br> The girls flag down a waiter, who asks to see their IDs. Audrey shows her fake and Chloe says, authoritatively, "I just talked to your manager. He says we're fine." The waiter takes their order. It's their fourth drink of the night&mdash;they were at a pre-party earlier. "Girls can get away with anything," pronounces Chloe. Adds Audrey, "It's funny&mdash;we're both obsessed with the show Gossip Girl. "Seriously, we're the real-life Gossip Girls&mdash;but who really goes to the New York Palace Hotel to drink?"</p> <br> So anyway, Chloe turns out to be a big liar because nothing really happens except they go to some hotel and get drunker and talk about doing drugs but don't really do any, though Audrey promises she usually does coke which is where that quote in the headline came from. And that would make sense because Audrey can't really handle drinking as much without coke, so she stumbles around and gets kicked out of a cab and needs to find another cab. Oh yeah, and that paragraph where the magazine gets all "So here are the risks of drinking and why you should probably try to do it in moderation and try and have a good time with two or three beers because your tolerance has nowhere to go but up, kids"? Yeah, there is none! Huh. All right then.?<p>Fearful of going the betrayed-Sandra route, some women turn to a "professional honey-pot." Who, obviously, to the tabloids!</p><p>There's a weird dichotomy going on right now, society-wise. On the one hand, we've got Sandra. Or rather, 's husband, who apparently has a full of tattoos. And, of course, we've got Tiger himself. It's a smorgasbord of betrayed wives, sheepish husbands, settlements and tabloids, leaving us with a general sense that all marriages &mdash; at least the public varietal &mdash; are doomed.</p> <p>Then, on the other hand, there's what I will call Chloe. If you're not breathlessly following Amanda Seyfried's career, Chloe is a remake of the French film Nathalie..., in which a suspicious wife has a sexy young temptress engage her husband in an affair and give Penthouse Forum (or at least, Breaking the Waves) -style reports to the wife so she can find out what gets his motor running. It's a "psychological", "erotic" tale, you see, of jealousy, desire and possession. Chloe is a "honey-trapper," if you will.</p> <p>Squarely in this camp I'll place a story from today's Sun, which details the career of 54-year-old , "a highly paid honey-trapper and spends her working life proving whether or not a husband or boyfriend will cheat. In the past 12 months she has honey-trapped more than 60 men and slept with 15 of them &mdash; all at the request of their wives."</p> <p>Ok but...that's prostitution, right? She says no. In fact, she says "I may be paid to sleep with a man, but I am in no way a prostitute... I don't think of it as sex, but as a service to their wives and children." Indeed, a criminal lawyer in the piece confirms this, since this sort of thing "is not under the sexual offence act."<br> She adds,</p> <p>I am proud of what I do and feel good I am helping other women to catch out their cheating husbands. After seeing the evidence, the wives often send me letters of thanks. My success rate as a honey-trapper is 100 per cent. I have never failed to get a kiss at the very least. It is my responsibility to discover if a man would cheat. If it takes sleeping with him to do that, then that is merely part of my work. No woman ever deserves to be cheated on and it's my job to make sure wayward men don't get away with it.</p> <p>If you're wondering why going all the way is necessary, well, get in line. If it's legal proof that's needed, doesn't the entrapment angle kind of complicate things? (Although Jones does say, "I am certainly not entrapping them." And I kind of like this policy of just asserting things to make a point.) She adds that this proof is necessary to the wives, as are any "rude" texts or pix the dudes send, but that going over this evidence is "agony" for the wives. Whether controlling the process &mdash; versus being subjected to a media blitz a la Sandra Bullock or Elin Nordegren &mdash; brings more closure is an open question. I'm going to go ahead and guess it's horrifying either way. There's also something of the service that reminds me of those low moments when some of us have tortured ourselves by demanding all the details of an illicit liaison, which is a self-inflicted orgy of mortification and masochism that's neither cathartic nor helpful. But the sentence that was perhaps most heartbreaking was this: "Many save for months, even years, to discover if their man is a cheat. If a job requires sex, it will cost the client around 8,000 pounds." So, really, everyone loses.</p> <p> [Sun]</p> <p>Related: [Star]</p> <p>[Image via ]</p>?<p>In this week's TV roundup, the premiere of GCB, Springfield is Westeros in The Simpsons opening titles, the most awkward serenade on Smash and the return of an old young nemesis on 30 Rock.</p> <p> 1.) The first official preview for Community Season 3.5<br> Six seasons and a movie. We got this.</p> 2.) A death by road head sets the tone for GCB.<br> And it happened in the first three minutes. <p> 3.) The Simpsons pays homage to Game of Thrones.<br> Ned "Flanders" Stark?</p> 4.) Leslie is drunk on air on Parks & Recreation.<br> Jesus, Sean Hayes. Girl needed to let off a little steam. Give her a break. 5.) Nick has a cancer scare on New Girl.<br> And he's taking his fears out on Jess. Also, Schmidt rapping. <p> 6.) Jack's teenage nemesis is back and craftier than ever on 30 Rock.<br> Poor Fat Vicky.</p> <p> 7.) Kumail Nanjiani does standup on Conan.<br> Kumail is great, you guys. Let's make him very famous.</p> <p> 8.) Stephen Colbert sings "Good Old Mountain Dew" with Emmylou Harris, Elvis Costello and Don Fleming.<br> What a crew.</p> 9.) Watching this seduction on Smash is like watching the most awkwardly sung train wreck in the history of time.<br> As a lover of musicals and Angelica Huston, I should really be enjoying Smash, but this? Oy. Just...oy. <p> 10.) Jon Hamm is the father of Snooki's baby.<br> Lindsay Lohan's SNL was rough, but we did get a couple of great Hamm appearances. She can come back anytime as long as she promises to bring him with her.</p>?<p>Last year, the state of Georgia started running "Stop Child Obesity" ads real-live kids employed as child actors. But, of course, the part the kids are playing &mdash; that of an overweight child &mdash; mirrors reality. Chloe McSwain, one of the kids on billboards and in commercials, has fantastic self-esteem: "I'm very pretty," she tells CBS News. She admits that she worried what people would think when she took the job (she's called "Martiza" in the ), but decided it was important to help kids. A noble goal, but does this fat-shaming campaign work? The negative tone and "stop sugarcoating it" message seem to encourage the other-ing of overweight people.</p> <p>As Pam Davis of the Obesity Action Coalition says, "Obesity is a complex, multi-factorial disease process, and it needs to be treated as such." The ads don't offer any guidance or advice &mdash; only scolding. Apparently this hasn't affected Chloe, who says: "I feel really good about myself. I have lots of self-confidence."</p> <p></p> <p> [CBS News]<br> Earlier: </p>?In this edition of Tweet Beat, Chloe Moretz reminisces about the good ol' days with Jennifer Lawrence, Juliette Lewis and Bret Easton Ellis have opinions on men and women, Sarah Silverman wants you to can it with the baby talk and Courtney Love is spitting diamonds.?<p> Chloe Holmes has been living without a hand since lost her fingers when she was a toddler after complications with chicken pox resulted in blood poisoning. Her parents paid £38,000 for the bionic attachment, which officially makes her the youngest recipient of a bionic limb in Europe. She says that kids used to laugh and stare at school, but now when they stare it won't bother her anymore: "I think I'll get a lot of staring and stuff, but I won't mind now because I got this [hand] and I like it."</p> <p>[ via ]</p>?<p>Today, performing arts magazine brings us "The Bella Swan Syndrome," in which the object of love-triangle affection simply...doesn't seem worth the effort. We kinda see their point. But this is one syndrome that goes both ways:</p><p>While we can't help but agree that Bella Swan inspires a rather mysterious level of adulation from ridiculously handsome men (yeah, yeah, cue the "I don't see what the fuss is about" chorus) and that just saying a lot that Carrie Bradshaw "isn't like other women" doesn't make it so, this is by no means a phenomenon restricted to female characters. Indeed, I'd argue that the male counterpoint is an even sorrier specimen. Because for every Keith Nelson, there are a lot of duds out there. And to demonstrate this type's utter sadsackery, he shall be known, henceforth, as "The Ross."<br></p>?<p>The problem with trying to write about women's sexuality on the internet is that it is either pegged to or it devolves into everyone taking one side or the other. Or both. And I hate that.</p><p>That's one of the reasons I reached out to the women and men who you've been reading &mdash; and many others &mdash; to talk about what meant to them. I didn't just want to skewer the existing obvious dichotomies (casual sex is good/casual sex is bad, or abstinence is terrible/abstinence is great) but I wanted to skewer the idea that any discussion had to devolve into the conclusion that there was only one right way to think about sexuality in a feminist context.</p> <p>Like the women who identify as feminists (or womanists or egalitarians), there's no singular model. And that's okay &mdash; some people's viewpoints can serve as stepping-off points, ideas to contemplate, positions to disagree with, or behaviors to emulate.</p> <p>But a couple points of view stood out to be as pretty basic. One came from :</p> <p>Here's my definition:</p> <p>That seemed like a good place for anyone to start: decide what you want, ask what your partner wants, do it safely and respectfully, and then have fun, as you define it.</p> <p>And, for the something that spoke to me particularly, this line seemed about right:</p> <p>"I don't need to love them to fuck, but I do need to trust them. I need to know that they understand and accept that I am not going to stop being a free spirited pro-sex feminist just because I am fucking them. And that, them fucking me will not change who I am. And if they can honestly and truly handle that then we're fine, but the moment they try to change or control me, the fun and fucking will be over."</p> <p>There's a whole world of thought about sex and feminism, from the truly academic to the more colloquial. But after a week of reading through emails, doing interviews, reading blog posts and looking at comments, the one thing that strikes me as suspicious at its core is when someone points to a (safe, respectful, consensual, fun) thing someone else does and says, "That's not what a feminist would do."</p> <p> [gURL.com]<br> [Goddesses Rising]</p> <p>And with special thanks to at Feministing, who sent along , and Sarah Jaffe who sent along and , that I tried and failed to incorporate but probably should have.<br> [Image via on Flickr]</p>?<p>Once I met a woman with a beautiful newborn girl. "What's her name?" I asked. "Murray," said her mother happily. "Murray Olivia." Thank God for middle names. But "Murray" did not make the list of . What did?</p><p>There are some goofy names out there. Sure, I'm probably in the belly of the beast in brownstone Brooklyn, but sometimes it seems like sensible monikers have gone the way of the dodo. (I don't recuse my own; playgroups are apparently rife with little Sadies and Pearls and Maxes and generally read like the sign-in list for a Miami water-aerobics class.) On the up-side, there should be a definite downturn in playground name-teasing; who's going to bother taunting another kid's handle when everyone's named after a 19th century theologian, a Brutalist architest or an obscure European cartoon character...nevermind the fact that "Django" doesn't rhyme with anything.</p> <p>And yet, the names that make up the "most-regretted" list seem pretty, well, tame. (Possibly because the sorts of people who go in for the really peculiar ones are either defiant or...in Hollywood?) Granted, this is a British list (courtesy of ) and the trends vary - and maybe I'm defensive because my brother and father's names, respectively, take up positions 8 and 9 on the male list. But "William?" "Jessica?" "Grace?" Anyway, here's the list of "Regrettable Baby Names" (and check out the pained, disillusioned expression of the baby in the accompanying picture):</p> <p>BOYS<br> 1. William<br> 2. Oliver<br> 3. Jack<br> 4. Alfie<br> 5. Thomas<br> 6. Joshua<br> 7. Daniel<br> 8. Charlie<br> 9. Harry<br> 10. James</p> <p>GIRLS<br> 1. Chloe<br> 2. Ruby<br> 3. Olivia<br> 4. Emily<br> 5. Grace<br> 6. Jessica<br> 7. Charlotte<br> 8. Evie<br> 9. Sophie<br> 10. Daisy</p> <p>Yes, maybe "Harry" evokes boy witches. And maybe Charlotte's mom will get over SATC fever. But aren't there monikers out there more likely to cause a child psychic distress? Even so, there are options and solutions later in life &mdash; more than one scion of flower-children saw fit to re-christen himself as soon as he became sentient. Nor are parents tied to one bad decision: My grandfather famously came home one day and announced that my teen mother and her grown siblings were to be re-named "Tamasin," "Meigs" and "Return." (They failed to respond to the new names and eventually, like many of his schemes, it was forgotten.) And what if a child finds his name too dull? Well, that's what the courts are for. 19 years ago, one man may have been christened "George Garratt," but now that teenager is legally "Captain Fantastic Faster Than Superman Spiderman Batman Wolverine Hulk And The Flash Combined." he wanted to be unique. Hopefully Murray will agree.</p> <p> [SunUK]</p> <p> [Telegraph]</p>?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?<p>First Karl Lagerfeld said she was and then he came out and , saying that his words were taken out of context and he too knew the sting of being vilified for your weight in the press. But Adele has come forward to say she couldn't give a fat fuck one way or the other because she's never aspired to be a model and is proud to offer a little balance when it comes to the representation of different body types in the media. "I've never wanted to look like models on the cover of magazines," she said. "I represent the majority of women and I'm very proud of that." And it seems she's never been one to worry too much, saying last year that she tries to keep away from people who think weight is super-important. "I've seen people where it rules their lives, you know, who want to be thinner or have bigger boobs, and how it wears them down. And I just don't want that in my life," she said. "It's just never been an issue ? at least, I've never hung out with the sort of horrible people who make it an issue. I have insecurities of course, but I don't hang out with anyone who points them out to me." []</p> <p> It's an unsettling day when you discover that you agree with Fox mouthpiece Bill O'Reilly ? but somewhat reassuring to know that it's because he's actually supporting Ellen DeGeneres in the whole One Million Moms . Going to town on fellow Fox correspondant Sandy Rios, he said: "What is the difference between a McCarthy era communist blacklist in the '50s and the Million Moms saying, 'Hey, JCPenney and all you other stores, don't you hire any gay people. Don't you dare.' What's the difference? ... A conservative group in this country is asking a private company to fire an American citizen based upon her lifestyle. And I don't think that's correct … this JCPenney thing is a witch hunt and it shouldn't happen." []</p> <p>Though Scarlett Johansson, Charlize Theron and Jessica Chastain have been tipped to play Princess Diana in a , Naomi Watts is confirmed to play her in Caught In Flight - which follows the Princess of Wales during the last two years of her life. "It is such an honour to be able to play this iconic role," said Watts. "Princess Diana was loved across the world, and I look forward to rising to the challenge of playing her on screen." Do you think she has what it takes, or should every serious biopic role be handed directly to Meryl Streep? []<br> In other royal news, Prince Harry is heading back to Afghanistan after qualifying as a front line Apache attack helicopter pilot. []</p> <p> As you're probably aware, Valentine's Day is almost upon us. What you may not know is that Valley ‘n' Teens Day is also right around the corner. Let Chloe Sevigny ? aka the brilliant Drew Droege ? tell you what she's got in store for this auspicious occasion. []</p> <p>Making one of the only logical, non gay-porn-for-pay career moves post-The Bachlor, Jake Pavelka has signed on with the Chippendales for their 10-year anniversary sextacular. Though just a month-long contract for now, the position will give him the chance to "use his charm, sex appeal and hosting skills to keep the women entertained while leaving the dancing to the men of Chippendales." Because the Chippendales are nothing if not charming. []</p>?<p>The music video for Best Coast's new track, "Our Deal," is directed by Drew Barrymore, and features a slew of young stars acting like street toughs. A la Romeo and Juliet or West Side Story, Chloe Moretz of Kick Ass and Tyler Posey of Teen Wolf are star-crossed lovers from rival gangs; iCarly's Miranda Cosgrove is uh, Mercutio? You'll also see Alia Shawkat (aka Maeby from Arrested Development and Pash in Barrymore's Whip It!), Donald Glover, and a lot of swoopy hairdos.<br> <br></p> <p><br> <br> [The Insider]</p>?<p></p> <p>[Vancouver, February 10. Image via ]</p>VANCOUVER, BC - FEBRUARY 10: of Canada competes in the women's practice held at Cypress Mountain ahead of the Vancouver 2010 on February 10, 2010 in Vancouver, Canada. (Photo by Streeter Lecka/Getty Images)?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?And I do mean all. Not just It-folks and and fashionistas, but so cool you can't even pretend they're not, like Kim and Thurston, who are so secure they can guest-star on Gilmore Girls, because they want to.<br>?Last night's premiere of Hugo &mdash; the film version of the book The Invention of Hugo Cabret, directed by none other than Martin Scorsese &mdash; brought out some of my fave folks. Marty! Steve Buscemi! Patricia Clarkson! Chloe Moretz! Something about a rainy New York night and a movie about an orphan who lives in a train station in Paris brings out the glow in actors. Let's curl up with some tea and check out the clothes.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?<p>A federal appeals court in California today that Proposition 8, which would ban gay marriage in the state, is unconstitutional.</p> <p>In a strongly worded , the court found that the law violated the Fourteenth Amendment. Judge Stephen Roy Reinhardt wrote in his opinion, "Although the Constitution permits communities to enact most laws they believe to be desirable, it requires that there be at least a legitimate reason for the passage of a law that treats different classes of people differently. There was no such reason that Proposition 8 could have been enacted." The court also said, "Proposition 8 served no purpose, and had no effect, other than to lessen the status and human dignity of gays and lesbians in California." Undeterred, anti-gay-marriage bigots plan to appeal the decision, and it could go before the Supreme Court as early as next year.</p> <p>In the meantime, as Chloe Angyal , we are all legally required to marry someone of the same sex. That's how this works. Also, all straight married people have to get divorced, and custody of their kids will be given to their dogs. Plus if there's bad weather anywhere this week, this ruling is probably why.</p> <p> [LA Times]<br> [LA Times]</p>?<p>Earlier this year, Tina Brown announced that needs to carve out time to go to the gym, while Laura Ingram launched a jab about 's weight. Chloe Angyal from SpliceToday is : why all the woman-on-woman hate?</p><p>Angyal neatly sidesteps the ever popular "catfighting women!" angle and instead shifts the focus on why so many conversations about prominent women in the public eye revolve around their physical appearance. She writes:</p> <p>It's notable that in both of these cases, women were attacking their own. In an age where "bitchy" women make for big news and big box office, it would be easy to imagine that women are to blame for their own double-bind. But the truth is, America has a widespread cultural discomfort with women in positions of power. Sexist remarks about Clinton's appearance and demeanor, made by Chris Matthews and other pundits, were infuriatingly frequent during last year's primaries.</p> <p>Indeed they were. As you may remember, the put together a video for their campaign , released during the height of the election season:</p> <p><p> <p> </p> <p>Sadly, this can't just be blamed on the crush of the election cycle - the gendered attacks on women working in and around politics have continued to this very day.</p> <p>I fully cosign with Angyal when she concludes:</p> <p>The time has come for America to decide: are we going to be a nation in which any person, regardless of their appearance, can contribute their valuable ideas to our public debate? Or are we going to continue to waste time, and women's talent, chatting about lipstick, hairstyles, shorts and pantsuits?</p> <p> [Splice Today]</p> <p>Related: [WMC]</p>?The fashion world is pretty much jizzing itself over the new Versace for H&M collaboration. The clothes will be in stores November 19th, but last night, celebrities and fashion folk took over Pier 57 on the Hudson river for an exclusive runway show. The red carpet was black, the walls were covered with crocodiles, and the stars dressed up in their brightest, most colorful prints, for once.?<p>Looks like Austin, America's warmest , has gone all and developed a little crush on Ryan Gosling, who's there to film Lawless with director Terrence Malick. As evidence, we submit : a collaborative photo-Tumblr inspired by our 's attendance at one of the Texas city's nightly music festivals.</p> <p>Austin-based writer and artist , who created RGAFFF, calls it "[q]uite possibly the dumbest thing I've done on the internet. Definitely the most immediately popular." Unlike , which asks the viewer to decide whether Gosling out-cutes a series of similarly posed babydogs, RGAFFF poses no pressing questions but simply invites people to upload and share their photos of Gosling , breaking up more fights, posing with , or doing whatever else they catch him doing (mainly standing around).</p> <p>As someone who lived in Austin for three too-short years during the 00's, I'm equal parts amused and bemused by the existence of this thing. In my Austin day (grabs corncob pipe, rearranges threadbare, Lone Star flag afghan on lap), the city's hip, cool vibe kept people in line whenever a star came to town to appear at SXSW or make a movie or play a show. People were too laid-back (or high) to get excited and take paparazzi-style pictures of celebrities. (Also, people didn't have smartphones yet, but this is a trifling detail.) Austin, what's gotten into you? Go have some dinner at Polvo's, take a long walk along South Lamar, and think about what you've become.</p> <p>[. Image . Thanks to for the tip!]</p>?<p>We regularly bemoan the conversation around in the United States. Let's check in with Australia and see if they're faring any better with their first female prime minister.</p><p>This weekend, Australians go to the polls and decide whether they want to keep Julia Gillard, who was installed to replace her fellow Labor Party politician Kevin Rudd. Here's how Chloe Angyal Gillard in Foreign Policy:</p> <p>As a politician, Gillard has an impressive record. A 48-year-old former lawyer, she rose quickly through the Labor Party ranks since becoming a member of Parliament in 1998. She is quick on her feet and renowned for exercising a quick wit in parliamentary debates. She is an unabashed supporter of women's rights and, though some progressives have been dismayed by the conservative stances she has taken on issues like immigration and gay marriage, her takeover was seen by many as a welcome change.</p> <p>Angyal also notes that although Australia has a rep for being macho, a legacy of its frontier past, the country is used to women in power, currently including mayor of Sydney, governor general, premiers of Queensland and New South Wales.</p> <p>That doesn't mean forestall any crudely sexist obsessions with Gillard's personal life, though.</p> <p>Back in 2007, a senator told a magazine that Gillard couldn't properly represent her constituency because she was "deliberately barren''. He later his position by saying the following:</p> <p>"I won't walk away from that. So rude, crude and unattractive as it was ... if you're leader, you've got to understand your community....One of the great understandings in a community is family and the relationship between mum, dads and a bucket of nappies.''</p> <p>More recently, the focus has been on the shocking fact that she is in a relationship with a man to whom she isn't married. And the man, , is a hairdresser. He might as well hand in his man card in shame.</p> <p>Reporters like to Gillard if they're getting married, presumably so as to end the national disgrace of having a first couple living in sin.</p> <p>It appears that Australia also has a few moralists who her for setting a bad example, including the columnist who sniffed, "It's fine for Gillard - a 48-year-old woman - to live with her bloke. Yet as a popular role model for women, her lifestyle choice may influence other women into making big mistakes about their lives."</p> <p>The Sydney Morning Herald assuring us that Mathieson is no mere "manbag," but rather a "man's man," also included a friend saying this:</p> <p>"He's in it as the first bloke and he'll make sure Julia is cared for at home." And that means doing all the cooking for Gillard, who has said her culinary specialty is toast and once bought him a barbecue on the strict condition that she never be asked to use it.</p> <p>Mathieson himself has been quoted as saying that he has perfected the early morning blow-dry. "That's my forte, the famous 5.30am blow-wave," he said. "Sometimes it's 4.30. I've learned to blow-wave with one eye open or even in my sleep."</p> <p>Is it wrong to be jealous?</p> <p> [Foreign Policy]</p> <p>Related: [SMH]<br> [The Australian]<br> [SMH]<br> [National Times]</p>?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?<p>The Daily Mail identified the model whose "socially irresponsible" swimsuit photos were recently by the U.K. Advertising Standards Authority as 21-year-old Scottish model Amanda Hendrick. Hendrick, who has been working as a model since she was 14, had a pretty great spring-summer runway season: she walked for Balenciaga, Jean Paul Gaultier, Costume National, Temperley London, and Paul Smith, among others. She once in an interview, "I still do sometimes think that I would be better off going to college and just getting a wee job somewhere…In Milan I would spend about 10 hours a day just running from casting to casting without getting a break." And models are under plenty of pressure to stay thin. "I remember going to one casting where a girl fainted through lack of food. Another girl I lived with out there for a while obsessed about food all the time." []</p> Mike "The Situation" Sorrentino is suing Abercrombie & Fitch for damaging his image and infringing on his trademarks &mdash; and he's seeking damages of $4 million. Judging, correctly, that Abercrombie's little "open letter" stunt of a few months back, in which the clothing company pleaded for Sorrentino to stop wearing its clothing because he was damaging their brand image, was actually just a big P.R. ploy intended to distract the press from Abercrombie's disappointing quarterly results, Sorrentino's lawyers are arguing that Abercrombie essentially made the reality star the unwitting and uncompensated star of an ad campaign. []<br> In other news of Jersey Shore "stars" and their legal business, Snooki is suing to get out of a contract she signed with a company that wanted to manage her "brand," because the deal is apparently not as lucrative as she had hoped (or, allegedly, been promised). What, you mean the pickle flip-flops aren't a hot seller? [] Versace's collection for H&M is now on sale. As is to be expected, there were long lines. Donatella Versace put in a store appearance in London, and in Shanghai, people paid others to wait in the line for them. Many people openly admitted to buying pieces to re-sell online. []<br> And in the U.K., where H&M has e-commerce (unlike in the U.S.), traffic crashed the site. [] At a benefit for the Coalition for the Homeless in New York City, Coco Rocha took the stage and promised to do an Irish jig if attendees made donations. She raised $35,000 in one minute, took off her heels, and made good on the offer. There are no photos of the dance online, but here's a video of Rocha &mdash; who was an Irish dancer before she became a model &mdash; doing a jig on Jean Paul Gaultier's runway. [] Rejoice, every woman who loves Costello Tagliapietra's gorgeous draped aesthetic, but can't afford to buy them: the designers are launching a second line this spring, which comprises 13 dresses. They still cost $298, but if you could get one on sale, that would almost be affordable. "This is almost like a love letter to all the women we worked with who couldn't afford what equates to rent on a dress," says Robert Tagliapietra. The line, called C&T, will go on sale first at Barneys New York Co-Op in March, before expanding into other department and specialty stores. [] If you're not yet sick of the Victoria's Secret show, Victoria's Secret show diets, Victoria's Secret show backstage photographs, Victoria's Secret show runway photos, and everything else Victoria's Secret-related that has eaten up the fashion pages since the show taped on November 9, you could watch this video where Victoria's Secret models deliver factoids like, "There's 4,000 linear feet of truss" and "Approximately 300 pounds of glitter will be sprinkled down the runway." [] Here are Nicki Minaj and Ricky Martin posing for M.A.C.'s Viva Glam lipstick. [] Women's Wear Daily made Silvio Berlusconi its Man of the Week. The noted bunga-bunga fan and activist for women's rights rates only a C. WWD says the former Prime Minister's "home hair treatments need to stop" because they "make him look ridiculous." And it suggests he skip the orange self-tanner. "Spring for a good photofacial" instead. []?<p>Yes, the premiere of season 3 of Big Love, at Hollywood's Cinerama Dome, was Wednesday night...but we just had to cry together over the weird, tragic fashions on display!</p> <p><br> <br> <br> <br> <br> <br> <br> <br> <br> <br> <br> <br> The Good:<br> On the rack, this must have looked like three kinds of dust-ruffle. But makes it work!<br> <br> Jolean Wejbe gets included for her pitch-perfect teen face.<br> <br> I have loved Tina Majorino since Andre. I make no apologies for this fact, nor for liking anything Poiret-inspired.<br> <br> Why the bish-face, Chloe? I like this one!<br> <br> The Bad:<br> Hey, Branka Katic, have you seen my dropcloth? I wanted to do some painting...oh, hai.<br> <br> Can we abolish skin-tight satin, Noa Tishby?<br> <br> Send that memo to Melora Walters, too, please.<br> <br> Mary Kay Place: please return this to the 19th century child who's now running around naked.<br> <br> What Say You?<br> : ready for a cocktail party...or the Christmas tree?<br> </p> <p>[Images via ]</p>?<p>This weekend, our Beauty 101 series is focusing on all aspects of hair care and styling. Yesterday, , and today, your fellow commenters have provided the answers:</p><p> <br> Sadly, I'm not able to use every single answer that was submitted on the original post or via email, though I do appreciate everyone's replies. I also urge everyone to , where our commenters have listed hundreds of . And now, a few helpful highlights (no pun intended):</p> <p>On Straightening Hair:<br> :</p> <p>For properly straightening hair, the number one tip I can give is to put all of your hair into a ponytail and then remove inch-wide strands and straighten them one at a time &mdash; starting at the back and moving to the sides and then the front</p> <p>:</p> <p>Buy high quality tools. There is no short cut with this one. Get a good quality flat iron: Solia, Sedu, Chi, GHD are good brands. It's a lot cheaper to find a good quality curling iron. Hot tools is awesome for a good price.</p> <p>From Laura, via email:</p> <p>I have hair that is curly, wavy, and straight at the same time. Since I can't deal with the first two (hopefully I will after this post!), I have become an expert on doing the last.</p> <p>After you shower, towel dry and put in some silicone based serum (John Freida is good and cheap). Then blow dry, using your fingers is fine, you aren't aiming for perfect straightness here- just get it consistently close to dry throughout. To add body, blow dry upside down. Too start tackling really curly hair, use a large round brush and work in sections. Be gentle, though, as not to break the hair.</p> <p>Next comes the flat iron- and I highly recommend you get a high-end one. It makes all the difference in the world to have a high quality flat iron! One that is thin, an inch to an inch and a half wide is the easiest to use. If you are concerned about damage, add some more product now that protects against heat damage. Now comes my secret to shine: I always iron my hair in front of an open window or a fan: it cools the hair shaft while it is straightened, leaving it shiny. Starting with the bottom, in 2 inch sections, flat iron the hair gently but be sure to move quick to avoid damage and iron creases. I brush the section of hair immediately after ironing, in front of the fan or window, to cool it off right away.</p> <p>Do this until most of your hair is done except for the parts around your face. These parts can be hard to do without burning yourself, especially girls with curls (gurls?) that need to get close to the root. To do these sections, I bend over and tip my hair in front of my face so I don't burn myself, and get really close to the root, working on much smaller pieces. Now you can style it additionally, i.e. to add body, use large round rollers for a few minutes to set some big waves, or curl the ends with a curling iron. Finish with a light shine spray.</p> <p><br> On Adding Volume To Thin/Fine Hair:<br> </p> <p>I've got straight, somewhat thin, flat hair and being from Texas, I like it big, lol. Here's my tips for getting some volume at the crown:</p> <p>1) You'll always have more volume the 2nd day after a wash; the product buildup helps stiffen the hair a bit, so don't shampoo every day.</p> <p>2) When your hair is wet & clean, let it air dry a few minutes; then spray a good volumizer like Aveda Volumizing Tonic or Bumble & Bumble Thickening Spray all over, taking care to get some at the roots.</p> <p>3) Flip your hair upside down and blow most of the moisture out, until it's just barely damp.</p> <p>4) Blowdry the crown using a vent brush. Let the brush pick up a chunk of hair, point the dryer nozzle DOWN towards the roots, blast on hot for about 10 seconds, then either hit the cool button or take the dryer away long enough to cool the hair section.</p> <p>5) Once you've done the roots, it can be tricky blowing the bottom half out to look smooth, because if you pull the brush down, you'll pull the crown flat. I use a hot-air curling brush or a regular round brush (gently).</p> <p>6) When you're all dry, flip your hair over and using either a teasing comb or wide pick (my choice), tease the roots all over the top of your head.</p> <p>7) Flip back over, smooth down any wayward strands and spray the shit out of the top with L'Oreal Elnett (available at Tar-jay...$$$ but worth it).</p> <p>Secret weapon for adding volume to dirty hair: Ojon Rub-Out Dry Shampoo spray. Smells good, takes away the oilies and provides huge hair with minimal effort. Believe it or not, the above system only takes me 10 minutes flat.</p> <p>:</p> <p>1. Fine hair rocks the pixie cut. The longest I can feasibly grow it to is a shaggy bob - anything longer looks pants.<br> 2. Spray in some dry shampoo before blow drying - it's way less crispy than mousse, and way more effective than any volumising sprays/preps I've ever used. Often means I don't have to use any styling product on top, so nothing to weigh down my hair.</p> <p>From mikskeezy, via email:</p> <p>I have fine/thin hair and I've found the best way to get it to behave and be bouncy-flouncy is some mousse, a round brush and a hairdryer. After a shower, wait until your hair is about half dry before adding mousse (or other volumizing agent). Then, pin most of it up except for the lowest layer, and proceed to blow dry hair with the round brush, being sure to pull the hair up (ie: parallel to your head, towards Jesus!) and then down towards your shoulders. Continue with various layers until you're done! Learning to blow dry with a round brush is a bitch, but it's saved my flat hair's life. Volumizing conditioners and shampoos are not necessary; I've achieved these results with your run of the mill shampoos/conditioners. Also: LAYERS ARE YOUR FRIEND. The top layer of your hair needs to be a wee bit short so it not only will have volume on its own but it won't weigh down the hair below it.</p> <p>If the hair is also mega greasy like mine, be sure to only put conditioner on the lower 1/4-1/3 of your hair or else you're going to weigh down the roots. I have to wash my hair every day and since I shower at night, by the end of the day my hair can be a little bit greasy. Using a dry shampoo (this one is my favourite so far; better than baby powder and smells delicious) is super helpful because all you have to do is put a little bit in your hands, gently massage into roots and voila! Goodbye oil. If your hair is really being ridiculous after the work day and you're going out, just re-blow dry your hair using the steps above. It redistributes the oils and tends to help fix any style mishaps that might have arisen during the day.</p> <p>On French Twists:<br> :</p> <p>For the French Twist, it's best if you have medium to slightly long hair (not short or too long) that's not too curly or too fine. Some hair types just can't pull it off.</p> <p>1. Gather your hair like you're tying it up.<br> 2. Pull it to the bottom.<br> 3. Twist from the bottom up.<br> 4. Pull your hair up, so the twist is against the back of your head.<br> 5. Pin it with lots of pins and secure with hair spray.<br> 6. If you have chunks that won't stay put or are falling down after pinning, use a hairclip close in color to your hair to hold in place. You won't be able to notice.<br> 7. Use a second mirror/trustworthy friend/Mom to see how your hair looks in the back.<br> 8. Add a pin/flower to make it look extra pretty and/or cover up any clips or pins that are showing.</p> <p>On When, And How Often To Wash One's Hair:<br> :</p> <p>some people with very oily scalps need to wash their hair every day, but for the most part, 2-3 times a week is best, some people can go up to once a week. if you do wash every day, use a gentle, sulfate free shampoo (especially if you have colored hair). you can also just use a tiny bit of conditioner daily if you need to style your hair everyday. if you was 2-3 times a week, shampoo twice. you'll notice the first shampoo won't really lather because it is breaking up the oils, the second with be much more bubbly and ensure that the hair is clean. use a good quality conditioner and leave on for 5-10 minutes before rinsing. regarding hair masks, do NOT over use protein based conditioners, they can over proteinize hair making it more brittle and stiff. about once every 2 weeks for dry hair and once a month for normal hair is fine.</p> <p>From Julia, via email:</p> <p>I have been told that people with curly to wavy hair should not wash it more frequently than every other day, and my experience has backed this theory up. My hair tends to be on the drier side, and washing it everyday strips your hair's natural oils away and leaves it drier than normal. By all means take a shower every day if you like, but don't wash your hair every time you do- besides, sometimes the steam alone can help reactivate your curl/wave and will save you the restyling time.</p> <p>On Dealing With Curly Hair:<br> From Honor, via email:</p> <p>Less is more with curly hair, as I've finally figured out after years of sticky hair gels, hairdryer attachments and tears (hey, I was sensitive in middle school). The No. 1 rule of curly hair - when you air dry (and really, who actually uses a diffuser?) keep your paws off of it! No patting, finger combing, or "scrunching" until it is 100% dry. This alone, will tame frizziness by 80%. No. 2 rule - conditioner is the only product you need! Ignore all those creams and serums. Buy a decent brand of conditioner - I use the AVEDA one for curly hair - use it to condition and rinse in the shower and then rub a nickle-sized amount into your hair after your shower. I hear leave-in conditioner works, too. No. 3 rule: shampoo the roots, condition the ends. No. 4: If you have the dough, buy an expensive Korean flat iron for the days you want straight hair. Just knowing that you can go straight if you want to makes you appreciate your curls more.</p> <p>From Sarah, via email:</p> <p>I have really long, thick curly hair. It was stick-straight until I hit puberty, and for a few years I had no idea how to handle it. Now it looks totally awesome. Here's what I find works to keep it bouncy and happy and tamed:</p> <p>- If at all possible, buy shampoos without sulfates, which are drying to curly hair due to the porous hair shafts. Also avoid products with silicone, dimethicone, or most other -cones. They make your hair shiny, but also build up pretty heavily and weigh down curl pattern. Just check the ingredients on the back of the bottle. Most natural brands will be good (Burt's Bees, Nature's Gate, and whatever the Whole Foods store brand is, for example &mdash; bonus: the Whole Foods brand is way cheap), and some Suave/Herbal Essences/etc stuff is good too.</p> <p>- Condition your hair! A lot! Always! And never, ever brush it when it's dry &mdash; use a wide-tooth comb in the shower, preferably while the conditioner is in it.</p> <p>- I try not to dry my hair with terrycloth towels &mdash; the friction creates extra frizz. I usually dry my hair with an old pillowcase or t-shirt, and I usually dry it by scrunching my hair with the fabric, rather than turban-ing the whole thing. Sometimes I flip my head upside down, scrunch all my hair into the t-shirt/pillowcase, and then twist it around my head and secure it with an elastic if I need my hair to dry more throughly more quickly. Once your hair is damp rather than dripping, gently work a little anti-frizz serum and/or a light gel/styling cream into your hair. Then you can scrunch it up with your hands, or if you're me, detangle it into smaller sections and twist the wet hair around your finger to guide it into ringlets. Don't touch it once you've done that, and it should try in pretty, semi-frizz-free curls. Let your hair air-dry if you have the time. Often I don't, and I'll blow dry it, but only if it no longer looks wet (just feels wet...you know that feeling, right?). If I shower at night and don't want to wait for my hair to dry before going to bed, I like to put my hair in pin-curls to avoid bedhead and it's extra boing-y in the morning.</p> <p>- In terms of styling, try to keep any ponytails/braids loose around the face so there's no tightness to clash with the soft poofiness of the rest of the hair. If your hair is flat or otherwise funky after sleeping on it or being out all day, scrunching some mousse into the ends often helps. Hairspray to the roots + some scrunching helps too.</p> <p>- Lastly, and this is just a personal preference/plea: don't straighten your hair to try to "fix it"! Natural curls are so pretty and awesome! Rock them!</p> <p>:</p> <p>I have very, very curly, frizzy, messy hair. I rarely straighten my hair, so I've explored many ways to rock the curls. The best, hands down? HOT ROLLERS.</p> <p>My curls love 'em, in spite of the fact that they are uber-80s. I have a set that is all differently sized rollers, and I usually don't heat them very high. I will roll warmed-up rollers into damp hair, give my head a squirt of hairspray, and let 'em set. If I'm in a rush (usually not, since I shower and fix my hair in the evening) I will use a blowdryer, with the rollers still in, to dry them. When I take the rollers out of the now-dry hair, my curls have obediently made themselves into lovely, bouncy waves.</p> <p>This method is much, much better than using a curling iron or other tool, since (i) your hair, if you start out wet, will set in curls that won't fall out during the day and (ii) the hot rollers don't get hot enough to damage your hair like a curling iron or flatiron will.</p> <p>Also, re: the hair washing, as a curly girl I shampoo my hair 1-2 times a week. Shampooing every day make curly hair quite thin and brittle &mdash; you need those oils. I do condition it much more frequently.</p> <p>On Keeping Hair Healthy While Using Relaxers:<br> :</p> <p>1. Stop playing kitchen beautician and get your hair done by a pro at least every other week, if not every week.</p> <p>2. Yes... I said every week. You want your hair to grow and be healthy with a relaxer (yes, it is possible) you need to put down the pressing comb and let a pro do your hair. It's hard for a layperson to gauge the amount of heat and therefore people unknowingly burn their hair.</p> <p>3. Avoid heat whenever possible. Get a wet-set: roll the hair while it's wet and sit under the dryer. I either wear the curls for a few days, then wrap it flat until my next appointment, or I wrap it flat from the beginning... it depends on my mood that week. I do not own a curling or flat iron. I do not put ANY heat in my hair... ever.</p> <p>4. When I work out, I keep with wrapped and tie a funky scarf around it. Keeps it from frizzing.</p> <p>5. I love to swim in the summer, so after I wash my hair with Swim Ease to remove all the chlorine, I use the same shampoo & Conditioner my stylist uses: Design Essentials Ultra Moisturizing Shampoo & their Leave In-Conditioner. Then I use A LOT of Elasta QP Mousse and let the hair air-dry. It creates waves I can wear all week.</p> <p>6. regular trims (every 6-8 weeks) and root touch ups (every 5-7 weeks) will keep help your hair grow.</p> <p><br> On Setting Vintage Styles:<br> From Chloe, via email:</p> <p>No matter what, you need to start with a pin curl set - if you are sleeping on it, do flat pin curls. This video is great, but if you have naturally frizzy/curly/kinky hair, do this on dry hair and do not spray your hair with anything before wrapping each section toward your scalp. In order to avoid dents, I only use one bobby pin per pin curl, and I don't let it cross the entire curl.</p> <p>(She also linked to , for those interested.)</p> <p>:</p> <p>If you're looking for a particular style i.e: retro, updo, glam, etc. YouTube has a TON of great videos. There are even videos on how to style wigs. (which I used for Halloween when I went at Betty Draper)</p> <p>Consider Asking A Pro For A Lesson:<br> From Bailey, via email:</p> <p>Hi, I know this tip isn't very hands on, but the best $40 I ever spent was having a blowout class at my salon. I have heard of salons doing blowout bootcamps, but I just brought my dryer and brush and my hairdresser talked me through giving myself a blowout. By taking the time to section and blowdry correctly I save a ton of time on drying and straightening and my hair looks healthier too.</p> <p>:</p> <p>The best possible answers to these questions will vary based on your hair type, budget, how much time you're willing to spend, and exactly what look you're trying to achieve (I mean, c'mon, there are infinite curled and straightened styles!). The best idea is to get a trusted hairstylist to talk you through how she styles your hair and have her style it differently each time you go in, so you can get new ideas.</p> <p>Seriously, most stylists would much rather talk about your hair than about your sister's cheating boyfriend anyway.</p> <p>Didn't get the answer you were looking for? Please take a minute to look through yesterday's thread, where there are over 500 comments providing detailed, helpful hints. Disagree with something you see in this post? Feel free to set things straight (or curly, wah wah waaaaah) in the comments. And as always, if you have a suggestion for next week's Beauty 101 topic, feel free to share your ideas and questions, as well.</p> <p>Earlier: <br> <br> </p>?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?<p>This week's sees the characters torn between what they want for themselves and compromising for the sake of everyone around them. Bill toys with politics, Nikki battles competing allegiances again, and Sarah officially leaves the flock.</p><p></p> <p>Chloe Sevigny picked up a Golden Globe for acting, and last night's Big Love was a conveniently strong showing for her. With the closing of the federal investigation against her, Nicki ill-advisedly showed up on prosecutor Ray Henry's doorstep, trying to explain her actions. Her development over the past few seasons has been all about shaking her firmly-held beliefs, instilled &mdash; or brainwashed &mdash; on the compound. Though she ultimately chose Bill over her father, that allegiance is shaky as well. In earlier seasons, the temptations included material goods (and credit card debt), an outside job and an attraction to another man.</p> <p></p> <p>Meanwhile, Bill &mdash; never one to stay at equilibrium &mdash; has come up with his wackiest scheme yet: running for state senator. The family is constantly teetering on the edge of collapse, only to somehow right itself, more or less intact. With Roman dead, Bill's crazy campaign provides a whole new tight-rope walk for this season.</p> <p></p> <p>Nicki is desperately trying to tie together her past and her present by insisting that Bill is the prophet. His brother Joey agrees, but Bill &mdash; despite having just built a church &mdash; is resistant. So far, he's more interested in earthly power and forging some kind of powerful future in politics. He wants to change the secular (or at least Latter Day Saints) world, rather than restoring the Hendricksons' dominion over the compound. What still ties Bill and Nicki together (besides, well, their kids and her general lack of options) remains an open question.</p> <p></p> <p>Sarah, who already violated her family's values with premarital sex &mdash; and with an older ex-Mormon! &mdash; is threatening to estrange herself even more by refusing to be sealed in her father's church. Both Nicki and Barb have had their beliefs challenged, but they still seem to firmly believe that "til death do us part" is a blasphemy that denies the afterlife portion of marriage. Sarah is taking a chance that she'll find happiness on earth and that will be enough. But she still gushes over that uber-plain dress.</p> <p></p> <p>Nicki is desperately trying to give Cara Lynn the life she didn't have &mdash; going to school and avoiding being put in the Joy Book. Her father's death allows her to free herself even more from the pulls from the compound, so when her mother shows up with her sister to try to convince her to come to the funeral, we see Nicki stand up to her as never before. (Using vaguely feminist language, no less!) Still, I thought her sister's casual use of "that's how he was brought up" to be somewhat implausibly consciousnes-raised, even after all the outside assaults on their values.</p> <p></p> <p>Bill has already given up on his dreams to run when, in a nice twist, Sarah's talk about not hiding who you are and being improbably inspired by his polygamous example renews his resolve. He's going to run with the family's structure kept secret &mdash; and when he wins, all will be revealed. After all, polygamy's only a misdemeanor. Well, this is television, so maybe he can pull it off.</p> <p></p> <p>In an episode of compromises, Sarah makes one that somehow still feels true: she marries in the backyard with her family around her. (Did they get a justice of the peace to make a last minute house-call?) A brilliant ending shot pans from one family member to another: Barb, relieved and moved, Margene, caught up in the moment but full of doubt about what Bill's decision will mean for her business, Nicki, weeping openly &mdash; maybe a little bit because she's moved by the wedding, or because she compromised and showed up to her father's funeral, but also because she seems to be contrasting Sarah's choice with her lack of it as a younger woman.</p>?<p>Maybe we're attracted to the mystique of polygamous Mormon sects, or to being confronted with blatant sexism, or to 's character's wardrobe ? whatever the case, we're totally into HBO's .</p> <p>It's great that the show is going deeper into Albie's homosexuality, which his own mother ? who we learned probably put a hit out on him ? says is a choice. Interestingly, whenever any of the polygamists on the show talk about their religion and/or relationships, they refer to them as "destiny," which really illustrates how arbitrary and retarded their beliefs are. Clip above.</p>?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?<p>"What is it about Americans and la pipe?" asked my Parisian friend Anne* in between puffs of Marlboro. I stopped and looked at her, perplexed. La pipe is French slang for "fellatio."</p> <p>"You're going to have to be a little more specific," I said.</p> <p>Anne, who was born and raised in Paris, went on to ask why it is that so many young Americans don't consider oral sex to be "real" sex. "It's like a stop gap measure on the way to intercourse," she observed, "and people in America don't think it's intimate the way we do in France. But it's so intimate! Parce que c'est" -? and here she switched from French to English so she could use an utterly apt turn of English phrase ?- "in your face!" </p> <p>Anne, who observed this phenomenon during her study abroad at a large Midwestern university a few years ago, was right, of course. In American culture, we don't count oral sex as "real" sex. The "base" system, which was also the dominant framework when I was a teenager in Australia, privileges vaginal intercourse (I have never understood why Australians use the base system when they don't even play baseball. Why wouldn't we come up with our own cricket-based analogy?). In the bases framework, oral sex happens before intercourse, and it's simply a stop on the way to the main event. It's foreplay, not sex. And it's good, but it's not as good as "stealing home."</p> <p>Among young people in France, on the other hand, oral sex counts as real sex. While every individual is different ?- and that applies in the US as much as in France -? the sense I get when I talk to French people about sex is that to them, oral sex and intercourse are by and large equal. "For us, it's really the same thing, which is to say, it's a sexual act of the same seriousness as penetration. Maybe even more intimate," says Johanna Luyssen, assistant editor of the French feminist magazine Causette. "When you go to bed with a guy for the first time, you don't necessarily give him a blow job. That can even often come later, after intercourse." Another young French woman agreed with Johanna, saying that this order of sexual behaviour makes sense because of the French perception that oral sex is far more intimate than intercourse. "I'll have sex with someone I don't know very well," one young woman told me. "But [oral sex] I only do with people I really like. But if I did it, I would still say that we had sex."</p> <p>I'll be the first to say that in many respects, the French attitude to sex is far from perfect. But in this regard, I think Americans could benefit by taking a page out of the French book. If America could work toward a new sexual framework, a way of thinking about sex that doesn't treat intercourse as the be all and end all, we'd be a healthier, more equitable, and I dare say more sexually satisfied people.</p> <p>It's crucial to note that in a country of 66 million people, there will of course be great diversity of attitudes and behaviours around sex. It will vary widely by age, ethnicity, religion, and by many other factors. Some of the French people I spoke to were of two different minds even over the course of one meal, so really we're talking about more than 66 million attitudes. The same goes for the US, too, which has a larger population and greater racial and ethnic diversity than France does.</p> <p>Generally speaking, though, among young people in the US, the base system reigns. The details of the sexual diamond vary from place to place, but the general framework is consistent: first mouths on mouths, then hands on genitals, then mouths on genitals, then vaginal intercourse. And only this last one is "real" sex. Debra Herbenick, a sex researcher and a sexual health educator at the Indiana University's Kinsey Institute for Research in Sex, Gender and Reproduction, believes that the separation of oral and vaginal sex is the prevailing attitude among people under forty in the US. But the base system leaves an awful lot to be desired.</p> <p>For one thing, it all but ignores gay and lesbian sex. Under the current framework, it's impossible for a lesbian, no matter how many same-sex hook ups she has, to really truly lose her virginity. The same goes for gay men: if the only real way to have sex in America is to stick your penis in a vagina, then there are lots of very sexually active gay men out there who are still technically virgins. The privileging of heterosexuality, and of vaginal intercourse above all other kinds of sex, shuts them out and invalidates the sex that they have. Which, you know, seems pretty damn unfair, and like the kind of arrangement that equality-minded folk should be interested in fixing.</p> <p>A majority of women ?- something like 75% -? don't orgasm during intercourse. They come instead from the kind stimulation that, in the current framework, isn't considered "real sex," like oral or digital stimulation. The privileging of vaginal intercourse as the sexual be all and end all, the "home run" of sex, means that for a lot of women, orgasm happens outside of "real" sex. Intercourse is still pleasurable for them, of course, but in a less extreme and discriminatory way than gays and lesbians, they too are shut out of "real" sex.</p> <p>It's true that oral sex, and gay and lesbian sex, can't result in a baby. For some people, the possibility of procreation might be reason enough to hold intercourse up above all other forms of sex. But most of the time, intercourse doesn't result in a baby, and a lot of the time, that is deliberate: straight people have a lot of intercourse purely for pleasure. If the possibility of procreation is what makes sex real, does that disqualify intercourse that's had using the IUD, which has a failure rate that is statistically minuscule?</p> <p>Finally, there's the public health argument. You can catch STIs from oral sex. Chlamydia and herpes can all be transmitted through cunnilingus and fellatio. But it becomes awfully hard to prevent sexually transmitted diseases if lots of Americans don't classify some of their sexual behaviour as "sex." You can catch gonorrhea by having sex with someone who has it? That's fine, says the young American who got little to no sex education in high school, I'll just do oral. Except, yikes, you can absolutely catch gonorrhea from oral sex. A new sexual framework, one in which oral sex "counts," would make it easier to prevent the spread of STIs in America.</p> <p>However, when it comes to public health, the case for that new framework is a complicated. Herbenick warns that given the shoddy quality of sex education in this country, and the comparatively poor availability of contraception, the oral sex-real sex distinction might serve a purpose. "We're just not equipped," she says, to re-classify oral sex as real sex, because we don't yet have the education or healthcare policies that would have to accompany it to prevent further spread of STIs and unwanted pregnancies. "I think it's healthy to think about all of these things as being on the table," she says. "At the same time, when people think, ‘well, I don't know this person very well, so I'll have oral sex with them but not intercourse,' that probably does prevent an awful lot of pregnancies and infections." So if we want a more inclusive and egalitarian vision of sex ?- and why wouldn't we? ?- it'll have to come with more inclusive and egalitarian education and healthcare policies.</p> <p>In other words, we're looking at a huge overhaul here. We're looking at a radical re-thinking of sex, not just a re-classification of the blow job. But I think the French have got this one right. Oral sex is real sex, and here in America it ought to be thought of as such. We need to do away with the base system, or at least with the idea that intercourse is the most superior form of sex, the "home run," the ultimate way to score. Done right, it's the kind of shift that could make America a healthier place. It would certainly make it a more equitable place. We already French kiss: why shouldn't the rest of our sex lives be a la francaise?</p> <p>*not her real name. She's named for a different Bronte sister.</p> Chloe Angyal is an editor at . She is working on her doctoral thesis on romantic comedies, and on a book on the same topic.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?<p>The official name of this event was "The Annual Loveday Celebration and Cartier Love Charity Bracelet Launch." None of which really explains why A-listers like Rosario Dawson, Fergie and Eva Mendes congregated at some "private residence" in L.A. yesterday. (Maybe the bracelets were given out as party favors?) Anyway, a satisfying gallery of good, bad and baffling awaits the intrepid, after the jump.</p><p><br><br><br><br><br><br><br><br><br><br><br><br><br><br><br><br></p><p>The Good:<br></p>?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?In today's Tweet Beat, Jimmy Fallon and Channing Tatum are beautiful women, Chloe Moretz offers a boring sneak peek of the Carrie reboot, a Sister, Sister throwback and Dr. Ruth wants you to have one real orgasm in the memory of Nora Ephron.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?<p>Chloe, which opens today, starts as a sexy psychological drama, but devolves into a "Canadian lesbian version of Fatal Attraction." It's titillating, but ultimately the film "can't be recommended even to people who just want to see naked."</p><p>This remake of the 2003 French film Nathalie certainly sounds promising: It's directed by Atom Egoyan, who earned an Oscar nomination for The Sweet Hereafter, and written by Erin Cressida Wilson, who wrote the screenplay for Secretary (and recently about the new film). plays Catherine, a wealthy Toronto gynecologist who suspects her college professor husband David () is cheating when she finds a message from one of his students on his phone. She hires Chloe (Amanda Seyfried), to test her husband by trying to seduce him at his favorite coffee shop. Things go awry when Chloe starts relating their encounters in graphic detail to Catherine, and the two women wind up having sex, a scene that the movie's marketers have been pushing as the film's main selling point.</p> <p>Critics generally like the first two thirds of the movie, but say it falls apart toward the end when Chloe turns out to be a psycho. All three leads turn in good performances, and one reviewer claims a monologue by Moore about women becoming less desirable as they age redeems the entire film. But despite good acting and cinematography, eventually the plot becomes far too ludicrous and overly-serious, like trying to intellectualize a late-night Cinemax movie.</p> <p>Below, a selection of reviews:</p> <p></p> <p>Deception lies at the core of Chloe, which is a remake of the more subtle and philosophical French film Nathalie...Up to about the one-hour mark, [Chloe is] an excellent re-interpretation that had me excited by the possibility of the "old" Egoyan re-emerging like Rip van Winkle from a long slumber. Then, for reasons known only to the filmmakers, it metamorphoses into a Canadian lesbian version of Fatal Attraction. Far be it from me to complain about a surprisingly explicit sex scene between Julianne Moore and Amanda Seyfried, but what the hell...? What was Egoyan thinking? (Out of context, I loved the scene. It is tremendously erotic. Four-star material on the soft core meter.)</p> <p></p> <p>Seyfried plays Chloe as a woman in command of her instrument &mdash; her body, which is for sale, and her mind, which works for itself. Moore, that consummate actress, undergoes a change she only believes is under her control. Neeson is an enigma to his wife and in a different way to us. Egoyan follows his material to an ultimate conclusion. Some will find it difficult to accept. Is it arbitrary? Most of life's conclusions are arbitrary. I am not sure this particular story should, or can, be wound up in a conventional manner. It's not the kind of movie that depends on the certainty of an ending. It's more about how things continue.</p> <p></p> <p>Moore and Neeson (who had been shooting the film at the time of the death of his wife, Natasha Richardson) beautifully underplay their roles, lending screenwriter Erin Cressida Wilson's (Secretary) dialogue an unexpected, palpable poignancy. But it's Seyfried &mdash; also represented at the festival in Jennifer's Body &mdash; who makes a major impression, adeptly navigating the twists and turns of her character's not-so-apparent motivations.</p> <p></p> <p>Moore's character clearly gets a charge from Seyfried's detailed reports, a charge she can't admit to herself at first. Hers is just one example of desire submerged beneath sterile surfaces, be they the spotless interiors of Moore's ultra-modern home or the cell phones and computer screens that serve as passion's intermediaries. It's rich material for Egoyan, who's made the intersection of technology and passion a recurring theme, and he films it with a mix of cool reserve and slow-burning lust. Moore's performance links neurosis to an arousal she can never fully conceal. Her work nicely contrasts with Seyfried's, whose Na'vi-like eyes never stop looking expressive, even when it isn't clear what her character's trying to say, or to hide. It's a shame, then, that a film so rich in enigma should ultimately take a turn toward the obvious.</p> <p></p> <p>There are grown-up moviegoers who will appreciate Chloe - a titillating piece of fromage directed by Atom Egoyan from a script by Erin Cressida Wilson - for its psychological insights and its ideas about identity and desire in modern life. There are also teenage boys who get a hold of Playboy for the articles. There is nothing necessarily wrong with dressing up skin and sex with lacy frills of intellectualism, but too much self-conscious seriousness can spoil both the cerebral turn-on and the voyeuristic thrill.</p> <p></p> <p>Simply stated, when Catherine starts losing control, so does the film. The sexual deceptions, experiments, lies and revelations from this point on are polymorphously perverse, as they used to say, but decreasingly credible, leading to a denouement both ludicrous from a dramatic p.o.v. and far too punitive morally for the most transgressive of the central figures. For whatever investment a viewer has left in the story by the climax, the finale blows it all to bits.</p> <p></p> <p>Egoyan has always been good with actors, and Moore and Neeson are skilled at making trouble interesting to watch, while Seyfried, with that Rapunzel hair ever coming loose from its filigreed comb, certainly looks the seductress. At times, the texture of the film is so seductive it is almost enough to forgive the flaws. The filmmaker, along with frequent collaborators cinematographer Paul Sarossy and production designer Phillip Barker, and costume designer Debra Hanson, have created an exceedingly lush canvas, particularly for Chloe, where desire hangs like a heavy perfume in her crushed velvet world.</p> <p></p> <p>Egoyan's penchant for casting, and eroticizing, the starlet of the moment has begun to rival Woody Allen's - here, he tries to turn Seyfried into a femme fatale, but she just comes off as a wholesome ingenue without layers. The film is Moore's story, and she acts the hell out of one sexy scene, but most of Chloe is plodding and drab. We're a step ahead of Egoyan's tricks, and that's because we've seen them - all of them - before.</p> <p></p> <p>No one wants to trash the movie that Liam Neeson was making last year when his wife, actress Natasha Richardson, was fatally injured in a freak skiing accident. Unfortunately, that movie is Atom Egoyan's Chloe, and it can't be recommended even to people who mostly just want to see Amanda Seyfried naked.</p> <p>When the movie's big twist comes to light and Chloe's darkest side is unleashed, we don't know her well enough to understand the depths of her damage. We do know she's turned on by fashion, though. In one unintentionally hilarious sexual encounter with a man in Catherine's bedroom (let's keep his identity a surprise), Chloe looks over at a closet full of designer high heels and climaxes in a literal shoegasm.</p> <p></p> <p>What seemed like standard practice for Parisians comes across here as unsmiling porno-farce. Even the throbbing score, by Mychael Danna, sounds unwittingly risible, and there were times-I refer you to David's first, salivating gaze at Chloe across a coffee shop-when I felt that we could be watching one of those soft-core cable dramas starring the redoubtable Shannon Tweed, with titles like Night Raptures IV or Executive Sensations. Wait, if you must, for the DVD, although even then, once you've heard the hooker say, "I try and find something to love in everybody," there is a strong case that Chloe should be pulled from your Erotica shelf and moved to Science Fiction.</p> <p></p> <p>When you strip it down, Chloe is really about women and aging and the different value placed on men and women as they age... Cressida Wilson writes one of the best monologues I have seen about how women start to become invisible as the age while men become more desirable. It was hands down the best scene in the film and Julianne Moore nailed it.</p> <p></p> <p>Chloe descends into a preposterous third act that, by any measure, qualifies as a disaster. But it's proof of Egoyan's skill that the film works for as long as it does. Chloe is worth the time if only for Catherine's impassioned, utterly convincing speech to her husband late in the film when she confronts him in an empty cafe. The moment is riveting and authentic, and conveys a raw-boned truth about women in midlife who are continually told that 50 is the new 30, but wake up every day to a mirror that knows otherwise.</p> <p></p> <p>Egoyan appears convinced that he's creating a suspenseful work of art, rather than a mildly kinky bit of arthouse exploitation. As a result, Moore genuinely seems to believe she's taking risks simply by dropping her top, while poor Seyfried looks lost every time she's directed to behave like a lunatic. Egoyan could have found something interesting to say about high-priced escorts and the complex relationship they share with their clients. Instead, he's more interested in fetishizing the (barely-there) sexual tension between his gorgeous, oft-naked actresses. So in the end, all Chloe really feels like is the whim of a man who was able to order up his wildest fantasy, and charge it straight to his expense account.</p> <p></p> <p>Unfortunately, after liberating this premise from some weaknesses endemic among lesser European films - a bland story, no third act, a certain maudlin pomposity in place of genuine seriousness - Chloe falls prey, near the finish, to weaknesses that plague American movies. We'll leave it at that, except to say that, had this movie ended five minutes earlier, it would probably be counted among the best films of 2010.</p> <p>... Screenwriter Erin Cressida Wilson. She takes a ponderous, overly serious, underplotted French film - Nathalie, by the otherwise terrific French director Anne Fontaine - and turns it into something profound and satisfying. Wilson brings out elements in the original film that were not subtle, but subterranean, latent and completely unexplored. She makes sense of motivations and of the characters' personalities and relationships. The result is a remake that's an improvement over the original, and an English-speaking women's film that, for once, beats the French at the genre they do best.</p> <p></p> <p>Chloe is that rare Egoyan movie that the filmmaker didn't write himself, but it does hit many of his usual notes: sexual intrigue, an estranged family, the role of modern technology in both connecting and alienating its users. Yet finding the inner Egoyan in Chloe's lurid scenario probably wasn't the most fruitful approach; emphasizing the script's farcical elements might have worked better, since taking the thing seriously is pretty much impossible. Egoyan gets fine performances from his cast, and he sets the tale in a tasteful demimonde of elegant architectural lines and pristine classical music. But c'mon! Erotic obsession, catfights, naked chicks making out - at heart Chloe is a midnight movie, and all the Vivaldi in the world can't change that.</p> <p>Earlier: </p>?<p>Julianne Moore and Amanda Seyfried's explicit sex scene in Chloe has the . Critics have called it , or part of a cliche. "It's not like they're just fucking," screenwriter Erin Cressida Wilson (Secretary) told me.</p><p>So what exactly is going on? Moore plays a gynecologist who suspects her husband is cheating on her and hires a &mdash; a high-class call girl, played by Seyfried &mdash; to try to seduce him to test his loyalty. The high-melodrama plot (based on a French film) is offset by the chilly discipline of Atom Egoyan's direction and visuals. Wilson's script is the first he's directed that's not his own.</p> <p>"You open with this sort of cold blue wintery situation and immediately Julianne Moore has her fingers inside another woman on an examination table," Wilson told me last week. "And so it's immediately not going, woo woo, sex. It's very clinical at that point. We see her as someone who sees sex as clinical and who then realizes sex is not about manipulation of the clitoris which she says at the beginning, but sex is about fantasy."</p> <p>Wilson's interest in fantasy &mdash; specifically women's sexual fantasies and desires &mdash; is apparent to anyone who has seen Secretary, or checked out the of heterosexual erotica she helped put together. She's also writing an HBO pilot, Untitled Woman Walks Out, with Oprah as executive producer, about a who abruptly abandons her "perfect" family to pursue other fantasies.</p> <p>But let's go back to Moore's character, Catherine, and her transformation. In the first half of Chloe, which opens to limited release this Friday, Catherine is repeatedly made to feel that as a middle-aged woman, she's sexually invisible. Wilson, who is 46, said that at first she focused on Seyfried's character, Chloe, "I thought, 'I don't know how to write Catherine because I don't know what a middle-aged woman feels like. And then I suddenly realized, I'm middle-aged. I then looked at my own life and realized this feeling I'd started to have of invisibility, as a woman who was no longer a flibbertigibbet, which I had been used to being."</p> <p>It's not a spoiler to anyone who has read anything at all about the movie: after Chloe repeatedly narrates her encounters with Catherine's husband (played by Liam Neeson), Chloe and Catherine get it on. I asked Wilson whether she was worried that the onscreen result would be exploitative.</p> <p>"I mean, how would it be exploitative?" She didn't seem to like the question.</p> <p>I replied that two women having sex onscreen was often marketed in a way that's titillating for men as opposed to for the women's pleasure.</p> <p>"I think the truth is that it's titillating for women too though," Wilson said. "I mean, I &mdash; the exploitation &mdash; if there is any &mdash; is look what's in this film, a long, drawn-out, pretty explicit scene between two women with a lot going on in it. It's not like they're just fucking. They're both thinking completely opposite things in a way. The scene is about [Moore] having this painful experience where she's feeling what this woman does to her husband and in the process, she is longing for desire, to be desired and she's finding herself desired by a beautiful young woman and the beautiful young woman is falling in love with her, with this woman who's fantasizing."</p> <p>She had told me about her brief, ill-fated career doing celebrity profiles for a men's magazine. "I wasn't hitting what they thought a woman should write about sex," she said.</p> <p>Which was what? "You know, taking a class in pole dancing, that was what they were interested in reading about, rather than an empowered, maybe an intellectual and maybe naughty and kinky idea of what sex could be, so the conversations that I gave them seemed to frighten them."</p> <p>In the years since then, Wilson said, she's been seeing more complex representations of female sexuality, including on cable with shows like Mad Men and The L Word, something she's happy to get in on.</p> <p>"A lot of people are watching these cable shows &mdash; and certainly I am because I don't have a TV, I'll watch the L word over a period of two weeks, an entire season on my laptop in bed, alone. That's a very erotic experience in a way. I think that people are uncomfortable sitting in a theater around a bunch of strangers watching sex. That's becoming increasingly so because they have this way of watching it at home."</p> <p>She remembers seeing Jane Campion's In The Cut alone. "I thought that film was really pretty darn sexy at points and I just remembered all this gasping at the way that I was feeling in front of so many people, which was in itself exciting. That's the way we always used to watch movies. The one that most hits me is Swept Away. I remember I saw that when I was very young and having those erotic &mdash; being overwhelmed in my body by these feelings in front of people, all around me, who may have been having the same feeling. Well, that communal experience is waning with DVD and with television."</p> <p>If you see Chloe in the theater, you have a fair shot at that feeling of communal erotic discomfort and fascination. (And if you watch it in a small screening room full of mostly male film hacks, s I did, all the more so.)</p> <p>As for that scene, Wilson said, "I feel like some of the scenes in which Chloe is telling Julie sexual stories [about her encounters with Catherine's husband] in some ways are more of a sex scene than [the literal sex] scene... Chloe is telling Catherine a story, they might as well be fornicating basically. This is sex. You don't have to even touch each other. It's virtual sex."</p> <p>And is the viewer, too, meant to be included in this narration-as-sex? "Yeah, I hope so," she said.</p>?<p>NEW YORK, NY - MAY 03: Actors Chloe Grace Moretz and Rory Culkin attend the Cinema Society & Phase 4 Films screening of 'Hick' at the Crosby Street Hotel on May 3, 2012 in New York City. (Photo by Stephen Lovekin/Getty Images)</p>?<p>They're remaking Carrie. Is this news to you? I guess it shouldn't be &mdash; Hollywood is full of dummies making remakes because the world is full of dummies who refuse to see anything new. Why wouldn't they remake something so dear to so many horror loving hearts?</p> <p>You could argue that the time-tested fanfare surrounding Carrie is derived as much from its cheesy 1970s-ness as it does its story. The dialogue, the costumes, William Katt (whose photo on IMDb, I feel compelled to tell you, is ). And the bush! Who could forget the magnificent 70s bush in that movie? That bush &mdash; occurring in the movie's first 5 minutes &mdash; encapsulates the decade as much as Watergate.</p> <p>Oh, well. Out with the old and in with the new. Taking the ethereal and eerie Sissy Spacek's place as the title role will be none other than Chloe Moretz (of Kick-Ass and Hugo fame). Will she bring it with the same fragile danger that Spacek managed to? Will they leave in the locker room scene in which Carrie gets her period and loses her fucking mind because she thinks she's dying and all the other girls will do is throw tampons and pads at her? It seems unlikely &mdash; it's the same gutless Hollywood execs that insist on remaking movies over and over again that will think a scene with a girl bleeding all over herself will be too risky (that is if the blood is coming out of her vagina &mdash; anywhere else is totally cool).</p> <p>I judge too soon. The movie isn't even shooting yet and they do have Kimberly Peirce as director. Peirce has proven herself able to artfully portray both vulnerability and brutality in the past, most famously with . And Moretz has done remakes justice before with &mdash; she could completely nail it. Who knows? Maybe there will be a menstruating beav gushing blood in every scene. We can dream, friends. Together, we can dream.</p> <p> For kicks, here's the 1976 trailer. God, is it perfect.</p> <p> [A.V. Club]</p> <p>Image via </p>?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?<p>We're not sure why, but we're finding it impossible to stop watching these "drag " vids.</p><p></p> <p>Indeed, we are now slightly obsessed with comedian , and having exhausted every one of these bizarre flights of mimicry, are breathlessly awaiting a new one. The real Chloe interviews just don't have as much style.</p>?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?<p>This is truly awe-inspiring. These may be satirical, but it's easy to believe that vermin actually did (as reported) sometimes make nests in women's wigs. []</p>?<p>Dear Christian Siriano: We're sorry (okay, I'm sorry) for making disparaging comments about your ego and your hairstyle during the beginning of the most recent Project Runway. We (okay, I) now understand the error of our ways. Because truth be told, you seem like a totally nice guy; the kinda guy we would probably be friends with. And if the you gave with The Advocate, is any indication, you are one earnest, humble, hard-working, fierce tranny mess.</p> I was actually pretty surprised I won. I wanted it so badly, but I needed it more than I wanted it. I'm just getting started....I'm not looking to make hundreds of thousands of dollars. I want to brand myself as well, but I want my clothes to be high fashion, avant-garde. It's easier to take inspiration from something that's creative than to build on something that's not. I don't want to do QVC. <p>Fortunately for Siriano, he &mdash; unlike Project Runway alums Chloe Dao, Jay McCarroll, Emmett McCarthy, and Laura Bennett &mdash; won't have to: Barneys New York, Jeffrey's, and Saks Fifth Avenue have all already bought pieces of his. So, yeah &mdash; one week after winning and Siriano, on talent and personality alone, is already the most successful person to have come out of the Bravo show. Other reasons to love Christian? He cares about his friends. "The only episode that bothered me was the first part of the finale. They showed all of the other designers with their friends and family, but not me. I had a bunch of friends over, and they cut it out of the episode. I'm not alone out here," says the clearly sensitive soul. Also, he's still friends with model Lisa Nargi. Says Lisa, "He's someone I'm always texting or sending messages to on MySpace. When things calm down for him, we'll definitely see a lot of each other....His clothes are going to be up there with the top designers. They're going to be the clothes that everyone wants to have. He'll be a designer like [John Galliano]."</p> <p>And how is his life different post-Runway? "I can hardly go out anymore," he says. "Everyone wants to touch me or carry me, which gets really annoying after the first few times. You'd think I was naked the way people look at me....But I get paid to do parties now." Oh and does he say "fierce" anymore? Of course not: His phrase du jour is now "I'm gonna stab you."</p> <p> [The Advocate]</p>?<p> Screenwriter Andrea Portes, whose novel Hick has been made into a feature film starring Chloe Grace Moretz, recalls that after one preview screening a middle-aged male viewer commented, "I can see making a coming-of-age story about a boy. But when it's a girl... it's just creepy."</p> <p>Great point, guy. That just gave me a flashback to my own spooooooky girl-puberty, and I'm totally creeped out now! Could you come over and comfort me with a bedtime story about the time your soothing man-pubes grew in? Thx, bro.</p> <p>Now, I haven't seen Hick and I have no idea whether or not it's a good movie&mdash;from the trailer above it seems like it could skew drastically in either direction&mdash;but in , Portes plugs her movie (understandably), while making some cogent points about the way we like our girls in popular media. Namely: as uncomplicated as possible.</p> <p>Most of this backlash was coming from guys who don't want to be put into the head of a thirteen-year-old girl. Luli is curious, she's smart, she's kind of manipulative, she's vulnerable and, guess what... she is wondering about sex...You may not want to hear things that make you uncomfortable. But if you just allow girls to be more than one thing, not just virgins, not just whores, not just princesses, not just basket-cases, not just hot chicks, if you just allow us to be, say, human... you might just learn something.</p> <p>It's an important point. Cramming all women (and this applies to any group) into archetypal categories obviously isn't the same degree of harm as, like, "I STAB YOU," but it can have some real consequences in terms of the way people treat women. Like, if we're all either virgins or whores, then birth control is only for whores. And who cares about whore health?* And if we already know which old-timey boxes women fit into, then why bother listening to what women actually have to say? And what if you accidentally think of a conventionally unattractive woman as a human being? You might end up marrying her and IT WOULD BE CHAOS!</p> <p>People are more than groups. People are individuals. So I guess what I'm saying is that, uhhh, everyone should spend more time running up to 12-year-old girls on the street and asking them about their changing bodies.** Progress!</p> <p> [Women And Hollywood]</p> <p>*To be clear, I do. I care about it.<br> **NOT REALLY. PLEASE DO NOT DO THIS.</p>?The inimitable Pedro Almodovar was honored last night at New York's Museum of Modern Art. Instead of a red carpet, there was a wall of roses. The clothes were almost as lovely. But, as always, there were a few exceptions and near-misses.?<p>With a pair like this it was bound to happen eventually. Though Jennifer Lopez seems to be getting what's hers since the split &mdash; with a steady stream of gentlemen callers caught leaving her place in the morning hours &mdash; it's the big guns that apparently have Marc Anthony in a lather. Even though he's been hanging out with mysterious mystery women, he's allegedly taken issue with his ex's Bradley Cooper dalliance and doesn't want him near their kids Max and Emme. "Marc doesn't want Bradley playing dad to their twins Max and Emme," says someone. Here's hoping this is half true or even just makes it back to Jenny &mdash; say what you will about her, I'd be placing everything I have on her to win in any Halle Berry-esque divorce battle. []</p> <p> Khloe Kardashian, aka the only likeable one, caught the SNL spoof over the weekend and thought it was pretty golden. "Ha! I just saw the SNL skit they did and I could not stop laughing.... LOL," she tweeted. Sister Kourtney was especially taken at the treatment of her mom, Kris Jenner. "I peed," she tweeted. "The @KrisJenner was classic." Which provides us with an excellent excuse to run the clip again. Kristen Wiig for everything! []<br> Modern-day Kris takes time out of her busy fat shaming schedule to talk more about her golden goose. []<br> The latest installment of Ringgate sees reports of Kim buying it herself (years ago). The plot thins … []<br> Want to help lift Kim's spirits? Why not get her a little something from her still active wedding registry? []</p> <p>Equal parts sad and disturbing, a 14-year-old developmentally disabled girl has been investigated by the LAPD after it was discovered she threatened to kill Justin Biber's ex, Caitlin Beadles, and skin her alive. Going under the interwebs handle KILLSGANDCB ? Kill Selena Gomez And Caitlin Beadles ? the teen said that Caitlin won't know what's coming until she "wakes up on the other side of her bed with a knife." Her mom is now said to be monitoring her internet activities. Let's hope closely. []<br> For his part, Justin takes cover with the gays. Or just hits up a random club. []</p> <p>Rihanna has proven herself savvy with social media, scoring 750,000 new Facebook fans and a million extra Twitter followers by creating an app called Rihanna Unlocked that allows access to behind-the-scenes tour shots. I should give that a crack, but I'm not sure if the Twitterverse is ready to see photos of me hunched over my laptop eating a breakfast of caramel popcorn in my delicates. []</p> <p>It's true that angels are watching over us if hardscrabble Candy Spelling's $90K slots win is anything to go by. Mindful that she received $65 million less than she wanted for the eventual sale of her $85 million mansion earlier this year, the cherubs ensured her latest win was in addition to recent jackpots of $200K and $190K. Oh, and that car she won in a charity raffle a few years back. You'll get there Candy, stay strong! []</p> <p>Forget Oscar talk, Elizabeth Olsen and co. just got the okay from President Obama himself after he and Michelle ordered a print of Martha Marcy May Marlene to watch at home. Hugh Hefner also held a screening at the Playboy Mansion, but whatever. []</p> <p>Though it sounds like endless shower-nozzle masturbation material for some, Jennifer Garner was "horrified" when she had to shoot the vocals to a sex scene with Hugh Jackman. "Of course, it was like the first day we worked together," she said. "It's always like that. It's always like, 'It's nice to meet you, now let's moan and groan.'" []</p>?<p>In their Herculean efforts to avoid doing chores around the house, fathers will stoop to pretty much everything, even sitting through an excruciating pee-wee basketball game during which their children forget which end of the court to defend and accidentally score a miraculous, game-winning field goal for the opposing team.</p> <p>A new study from the Social Sciences division at UCLA called "Fatherhood and Youth Sports: a Balancing Act between Care and Expectations" that the pressure to get involved in their kids' lives leads many dads to volunteer their outdated junior varsity sports knowledge in the effort to make little Chloe or Sebastian a future Olympian and score that sweet million-dollar Wheaties contract, long-recognized as the highest achievement in the sporting world. Though men often take on the sporting responsibilities in a household, researchers found that this involvement did little to assuage traditional gender divisions for day-to-day housework &mdash; moms, it seems, are still largely considered the default vacuumers and mysterious-stain scrubbers.</p> <p>Study author Dr. Tamar Kremer-Sadlik explained this trade-off in child-rearing responsibilities. "Women may be unhappy about this inequality," he said, "but at the same time they value the fact that their partners are involved with the kids &mdash; even if it is mostly manifested on the soccer field." Translation: at least dads are doing something to keep kids from mucking up the house with their dirty fingernails and carelessly-brandished Ring-Pops. Though researchers found that most fathers are gently nurturing their kids' athletic travails rather than forcing them to shoot baskets until well-past dinner time like Denzel Washington in He Got Game, women are still stuck doing the "lion's share" of more quotidian childcare and household chores, i.e. the thankless stuff that keeps a household from devolving into a jungle of crayon wall-art and discarded jack-in-the-box landmines.</p> <p>Kremer-Sadlik explained that critical studies investigating the link between masculinity and fathers' involvement in youth sports is limited, but modern dads do seem to be a little gentler when it comes to encouraging their children to play sports. Still, men aren't making much progress in taking over some of the less-glamorous housework. "The fathers we studied," said Kremer-Sadlik, "are finding ways to create a new ideal of fatherhood, but they are not creating a new ideal with their partners." He added that some fathers even use sporting events as an excuse to get out of doing housework, but it's easy to imagine that watching children try (and fail) to hit a baseball off of a tee must be its own kind of karmic comeuppance.</p> <p> [Science Daily]</p> <p>Image via Everett Collection/.</p>?<p>The overly made-up faces, overly sexed-up outfits, and vicarious living featured on Dance Moms all evoke easy comparisons to Toddlers & Tiaras. But what makes Dance Moms standout is that it's not just the kids who are yelled at till they cry&mdash;it's also the adults. </p> <p> Dance Moms follows the drama at the Pittsburgh dance studio of Abby Lee Miller, a woman who prides herself on making stars through her unorthodox approach to dance instruction, which involves admonishing and belittling both little girls and their mothers. As Abby sees it, she'd rather give it to them straight so that they cry in the privacy of her dance studio, rather than have them hear the same critiques in the real world and cry at an audition in front of 800 people. What's confusing is that we never actually see Abby choreographing or doing any kind of actual dance instruction for these girls, some of whom she's supposedly been training since they were toddlers. Instead, she sits in the studio and barks orders. Funny how she rides these kids so hard when she barely even moves a finger.</p> <p>Then, of course, there are the moms, who sit behind a glass partition and watch as their 8-year-olds are worked until they vomit, and are then criticized for not working through the vomit. There's definitely a lot of politics at play, particularly surrounding one mom, Christi (who admitted in an interview that she sometimes put dance before her child's education), whose daughter Chloe is always deemed second-best and another mom, Melissa (who admitted that she put dance before her now failed marriage), whose daughter Maddie is Abby's favorite, something that Abby doesn't keep secret&mdash;she actually has developed a "favorites" visual pyramid, to let everyone know exactly where they stand in her eyes. In the clip above, Christi&mdash;who blew off some steam just before a dance competition started by double-fisting some glasses of wine&mdash;gets reamed out by Abby for spending time at the bar instead of properly sewing her daughter's headpiece into her hair. The women are so busy screaming at each other that neither of them even care that number they are arguing about just won first place at the competition.</p> <p><p> <p> <p> <p> <p> <p> <p> <p> </p> <p>Adding to the tension that Abby fosters between Christi/Chloe and Melissa/Maddie is the fact that Melissa seems to work at Abby's studio, which enables Abby to pick her brain to find out what the other moms say about her behind her back. Additionally, she airs Christi's dirty laundry in front of Melissa, bringing out records of her late tuition payments.</p>?In today's Tweet Beat, David Lynch is a regular Snow White, Chloe Moretz has no filter, Lisa Rinna's living in Bonnie Raitt's sloppy seconds and Kyle Richards wants your thoughts on placenta-eating.?<p>On April 22, Chloe Rubenstein posted a note on her Facebook page.</p><p>"ATTENTION WOMEN," she wrote, before identifying two American university students by name and calling them rapists. She went on: "we should all be aware! Stay away at all costs. They are predators and will show no remorse for anyone. If you have been effected by either one of these sickos please feel free to talk to me. With enough help we can take them down!"</p> <p>Two months earlier, the American University sophomore and a group of her fellow students had gathered to pass the time during the snowstorm. As feet of snow blanketed the city, Rubenstein's apartment filled with friends and one new acquaintance-a male AU student who lived in the same building. They drank cheap vodka and danced. At the end of the night, a female friend left the party and entered Rubenstein's bedroom. Five minutes later, the new guy followed. Rubenstein noticed and followed him in.</p> <p>Four years earlier, as a high school junior in Massachusetts, Rubenstein found herself alone with a classmate she barely knew, a football star she described as "100 percent muscle." Rubenstein was 16. She didn't tell anyone what happened for four months. Even after she moved to D.C. and entered college, she wasn't comfortable calling the incident by its name. But when she walked into her own bedroom the night of the snowstorm, she recognized what was happening. "It was re-traumatizing for me. I was trying to wrap my head around it for a month," says Rubenstein, now 20. "It was the same weird feeling I had had a month after I was raped."</p> <p>Weeks after the snow had melted, Rubenstein called her friend to see how she was doing. She refused to take Rubenstein's calls, but a mutual friend informed Rubenstein that the woman was still reeling from the events of the party. "I started slowly trying to figure out what I was going to do about that," Rubenstein says. Around the same time, another friend informed her that she had recently been raped by another AU student in an unrelated incident. Then, Rubenstein did something she couldn't do in high school: She attempted to tell as many people as possible what happened.</p> <p>Rubenstein posted the note without consulting anyone on strategy. "I just did it," Rubenstein says. "I followed what I believed was right to do at the time." The accusations were disseminated to 968 of her online friends. A dozen people clicked a box indicating that they "liked" the announcement.</p> <p>Two female AU students sent Rubenstein private messages claiming that one of the alleged rapists had "done some really screwed-up things to them, too," Rubenstein says. When she would see him in her building or on campus, Rubenstein says that the accused would run in the opposite direction.</p> <p>Others were more confrontational. On campus, Rubenstein says that supporters of the accused started to walk "in circles around me, trying to intimidate me." She received several anonymous phone calls at odd hours. When she picked up the phone, from a private number, a male voice repeated the phrase, "I'm a police officer and I have a few questions I need to ask you," growing sterner with each iteration. Friends warned Rubenstein of the legal implications of making a rape accusation without absolute proof.</p> <p>"You're playing with fire when you throw people's names out," admits Rubenstein. "I was aware of the dangers of that. I knew it was a bold move," she says. "But when I told people that I was fully aware of what I was doing, it made them feel a little more fearless. After that, I started getting a lot more support from people."</p> <p>It's been a banner year for controversial rape announcements on the American University campus. Added encouragement for Rubenstein's activism came from an unlikely source: Alex Knepper, a sophomore columnist for school newspaper the Eagle, who devoted a great deal of column inches this year to complaining about AU's "campus of victims." On March 28, Knepper explaining how women who have been drinking can't really be raped: "Let's get this straight: any woman who heads to an EI [fraternity] party as an anonymous onlooker, drinks five cups of the jungle juice, and walks back to a boy's room with him is indicating that she wants sex, OK? To cry ‘date rape' after you sober up the next morning and regret the incident is the equivalent of pulling a gun to someone's head and then later claiming that you didn't ever actually intend to pull the trigger."</p> <p>On the day the column was published, an anonymous group of campus activists returned them to the paper's offices, and hung posters printed with the words "NO ROOM FOR RAPE APOLOGY" around campus. Rubenstein participated in the stunt, albeit halfheartedly. "I took some of the copies and moved them around," she says. "The article was insulting to every woman who has ever been sexually assaulted on campus. So it was an effective action in the sense that it got people to talk, but it was sort of an immature way to do it," she says. But Knepper's column shifted something else for Rubenstein. "I wasn't able to comfortably talk about rape until that article came out," she says. "Now, I can say, ‘I am a victim of rape and I'm not afraid to say it.' But this time last year, I wasn't saying that. This time three months ago, I wasn't saying that."</p> <p>On April 13, two weeks after the column dropped, Rubenstein attended AU's "Take Back the Night" rally, an annual demonstration against sexual violence. It was the first time Rubenstein openly referred to her experience in high school as a rape. A week later, she wrote her Facebook note. Rubenstein says she posted it for all the women on AU's campus who might find themselves drunk at parties around the accused. "At first, I wasn't thinking that this was going to help my friends. I felt like I needed to warn everyone else about these guys," Rubenstein says. After leaving the message up for a few days, Rubenstein removed it. "I don't clear my status because I'm scared," she wrote on Facebook. "I clear it for legal reasons and because my message reached 968 people. If you or someone you know has been raped or sexually assaulted and needs a safe place to talk about how they feel or what can be done, please contact me. No Fear. No Secrets. 2010."</p> <p>After removing the note, Rubenstein finally heard from the woman she had followed into the bedroom. "That's the most beautiful thing that came out of all this," says Rubenstein. "She called me and asked me why I took my status down…She said that if the other victims decide they<br> want to do something, that she might want to be there to do something too," she says. On Facebook, 968 people can be warned of potential predators in an instant; reaching actual victims of sexual assault is more difficult. "When it had happened to me in high school, I did nothing about it," Rubenstein says. "There is not a day that goes by that I don't think about that. I promised myself that I would do whatever I possibly could when this happened to people I know. I just didn't expect it to happen to so many of them."</p> <p>Photo by Darrow Montgomery</p> <p>This post on the blog The Sexist. Reprinted with permission.</p>?<p>Not to shit all over the fine work of Destiny's Child, but Rutgers University doctoral student and lecturer Kevin Allred is reaching by comparing the lyrical style of Beyonce to Alice Walker and Sojourner Truth ? especially because he's so obsessed he's based a whole subject around it called Politicizing Beyonce. "This isn't a course about Beyonce's political engagement or how many times she performed during President Obama's inauguration weekend," explained Allred "She certainly pushes boundaries. While other artists are simply releasing music, she's creating a grand narrative around her life, her career, and her persona." You just know that if Beyonce ever releases a doll Allred will go bat-shit nuts if you try to take it out of the box. []</p> <p>Diddy fans get excited because he is selling tickets to his Grammy's after party for anyone who can pony up the cash. The caveat is that you'd better be able to cough up big time because they start at $1,500 and go right up to $50,000. They say that the upper tier tickets are for those requiring more services, but for that kind of cash I'd want to be doing lines off of Diddy's ass. Though we should cut him some slack ? read: we'll settle for body shots ? because he's being a dear and donating the funds to Angelwish Foundation for children afflicted by HIV/AIDS. Worth it! []</p> <p>Amy Winehouse's dad Mitch has come out to say that the family is upset Jean Paul Gaultier used his daughter as inspiration for his couture show. "To see her image lifted wholesale to sell clothes was a wrench we were not expecting or consulted on," he said. "We're proud of her influence on fashion but find black veils on models, smoking cigarettes with a barbershop quartet singing her music in bad taste. It portrays a view of Amy when she was not at her best, and glamorizes some of the more upsetting times in her life. That's upsetting for her family." Normally one would side with the family in a case like this, but this is the same father who used to sell tell-alls to the UK papers to make a bit of dosh. Besides, it glamorizes her period, not just the bad times. []</p> <p> Jenna already covered this in , but I wanted to make sure that those not big into fashion got a look-in, too ? because watching fat-hating megalomaniac Karl Lagerfeld interview himself is something I think everyone can enjoy. You can so see him talking to himself in the mirror like this at home. You know, right before his morning cup of baby blood. []</p> <p>Absolute pieces of shit will be sad to hear that the "good bits" of Demi Moore's 911 call will be redacted ? no talk about her medical condition or medication will be available for your listening pleasure now that the Los Angeles City Attorney's Office has done an edit. I'm no lawyer, and excuse me while I clutch my pearls, but I fail to see how the public release of someone's 911 recording is even legal. In this instance, what purpose does it serve? []<br> In other Demi news, the super sleuths over at Entertainment Tonight have dug up proof she's always been a cougar ? even at 19. []</p>?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?<p>You bet it did! Figuratively, of course, not, like, literally or whatever, otherwise we'd be looking at pictures of Steven Spielberg polishing Paul Rudd's balls with steel wool. I know, wild, but this is the sort of crazy shit that indulgent empires like Rome and the United States do &mdash; they gather up all the notable people in one glossy marble room and let them do sex stuff to each other. Some notable people-we-can't-be-sure-are-real-because-most-of-us-have-never-seen-them-in-person included Lindsay Lohan, Kim Kardashian, Sofia Vergara, and George Clooney (even Jason Stackhouse showed up, looking serenely attractive). Rick Santorum, who recently wrapped the filming of a long, found-footage style horror movie about a crazed, pro-life politician from Pennsylvania that makes an unexpected splash in the Republican presidential primary was there, looking dashing as usual, and so too was Jimmy Kimmel, who presided over the festivities with a Priapus gavel and a crown of grapes tilted at a drunken angle on his narrow little head (j/k, he has a huge head). The question of the day isn't, "Who was there?" but "Who wasn't there?" You! You weren't there because you're an out-of-the-beltway loop loser who will never ever get an invitation to the bacchanal that is the White House Correspondents' Dinner. Hope you enjoyed your TV dinner and those old Twin Peaks episodes via Netflix instant watch (spoiler alert: nothing happens). [, ]</p>?<p> Is Marissa Mayer, Yahoo's new (and six months pregnant!) CEO, a feminist trailblazer if she doesn't want to be one?</p> <p>Just when we'd finally determined that women , 37-year-old Mayer announced her &mdash; and soon-to-be mother. A pregnant CEO of a Fortune 500 company? That would have seemed unfathomable a generation ago. (And, unsurprisingly, still .)</p> <p>But although Mayer, who was Google's first female engineer, is only , she doesn't think the feminist movement contributed to her rise to the top of the tech world. In fact, she doesn't even consider herself a feminist. As she told the :</p> <p>I don't think that I would consider myself a feminist. I think that I certainly believe in equal rights, I believe that women are just as capable, if not more so in a lot of different dimensions, but I don't, I think have, sort of, the militant drive and the sort of, the chip on the shoulder that sometimes comes with that. And I think it's too bad, but I do think that feminism has become in many ways a more negative word. You know, there are amazing opportunities all over the world for women, and I think that there is more good that comes out of positive energy around that than comes out of negative energy.</p> <p>Many writers who do consider themselves feminists are understandably disappointed and angry that Mayer could be so ignorant about the movement unarguably responsible for her success. "In a world where a hiring decision like this one is momentous, groundbreaking, trailblazing news, being a feminist is not having a chip on your shoulder. It is simply an awareness of reality," . "Marissa, it is too bad that feminism has become a negative word. You know what's also too bad? Your failure to acknowledge that without feminism, you could never have become the CEO of Yahoo."</p> <p>Over at Salon, that, while for being too "positive" and thus dishonest about the struggle between career and family life, "Mayer, who takes that right for granted, blames feminism for being too negative. Where is this feminist Borg they speak of? There are as many versions of feminism as there are women. Leave feminism alone!"</p> <p>At first I felt like Mayer's dismissal of feminism was disappointing but not the biggest deal; after all, 71% of American women don't identify as feminist, a statistic Caitlin Moran touches upon in How To Be a Woman, her UK bestseller which just came out in the US. "What part of ‘liberation for women' is not for you?" . "Is it freedom to vote? The right not to be owned by the man you marry? ‘Vogue' by Madonna? Jeans? Did all that good shit GET ON YOUR NERVES? Or were you just DRUNK AT THE TIME OF THE SURVEY?"</p> <p>So what part of the feminist movement isn't for Mayer? Is she loath to call herself a feminist because she wants to be taken seriously by her mostly male peers? (Who, it should be noted, are never asked by journalists if they are feminists.) It's frustrating that Mayer doesn't want to proudly proclaim herself a feminist, but getting riled up about her unwillingness to "thank" her foremothers kind of proves her "chip on their shoulder" point. As Susan B. Anthony , "Our job is not to make young women grateful. It's to make them ungrateful."</p> <p>However, the Makers' interview wasn't the first time Mayer distanced herself from feminism; she once told that she was "much less worried about adjusting the percentage [of women in the industry] than about growing the overall pie.… We are not producing enough men or women who know how to program." This, to me, is shittier than propagating hurtful feminist stereotypes &mdash; and that's what we should be angry about, instead of getting all butt-hurt that she doesn't want to be one of us. We can't force Mayer to identify with the feminist movement, but it's irresponsible for her to pretend that equality for women in tech isn't still a huge issue.</p> <p>The goal of the movement is equal opportunity, not gratitude, and actions speak louder than words. There are tons of female anti-choice leaders like Sarah Palin which bothers me way more than women like Mayer who shun the term; I'd pick a "non-feminist" Marissa Mayer over Palin as a role model any day. But I think that now's the time for Mayer to accept that she's a role model for women whether she likes it or not, and her words have real power to make a difference in terms of the women who want to follow in her footsteps, self-described feminists or otherwise.</p> <p> wrote that it "was a good day for women in Silicon Valley &mdash; and women in business everywhere" when Marissa Mayer became Yahoo's CEO and announced her pregnancy, but that the news is a "blip" since:</p> <p>There remain distressingly few women among Silicon Valley engineers, start-up entrepreneurs, venture capitalists and computer science and engineering majors, for reasons including the technology industry's girl-repelling image problem, the tiny number of powerful women role models and the insular Silicon Valley deal-making boys' club.</p> <p>Miller believes that Mayer's two new roles "mean that Silicon Valley, the heart of American innovation, could become the place where a more progressive attitude toward women and work takes root" and that "whether or not it's fair to talk about her pregnancy in the same breath as her new job, it's a chance to figure out how Yahoo and other Silicon Valley companies can make sure that women at every level have the same chance to prosper both professionally and personally." She concludes that "This is an opportunity."</p> <p>She's right; it's a huge opportunity. But Mayer needs to accept that she's not just one of the boys and therefore has a responsibility to acknowledge that her rise to the top is noteworthy. You can choose whether to use the word "feminist," but you don't get to choose whether to be a feminist role model.</p>?<p>If you're reading this, you've probably noticed that your baby is starting to exhibit personal preferences. Like any other self-involved parent, you probably assumed that your lifelong carefully cultivated aesthetic choices would transfer directly to your offspring via your DNA. Or at least that your own indiscretions of taste simply didn't stick to you, like that one time right after college when you were pretty wasted and you actually said out loud that Counting Crows might be onto something. </p> <p>Well, you're no Teflon, friend. And your baby knows it. Unlike adults, babies aren't good at being pretentious. At least not on purpose. Remember how supposedly Arcade Fire got signed for their U.K. deal all because some A&R guy's baby heard it and loved it? Your baby likes Seven Mary Three.</p> <p>Your baby, fruit of a carefully seasoned womb that never read a single Harry Potter book, marches over to the television and with a single pointed finger pushes past the local arts shows and PBS Kids and stops directly ? purposefully, even ? on Cops. She prefers poorly animated cartoons ? like that one about the cheesy dinosaurs on the train ? to the slick wit of Phineas and Ferb.</p> <p>Well, they can't all be Chloe Sevigny, as the New York Times Style Section is fond of saying. But would a baby legging every now and then hurt so much? Anything but the one red sock with everything? At this point she may as well throw on a pair of acid-washed hemmed jean shorts and order up a glass of White Zinfandel.</p> <p>You have a few options here. Simply reframe all your baby's cultural missteps as either totally ironic or obviously precocious. One nanosecond of a glimpse at the parenting forum Urban Baby proves 5 out 5 of moms choose the latter in all situations.</p> <p>Your baby smiles giddily when she hears the guitar intro to the original Melrose Place because, at 15 months, she's taken an interest in farcical romps examining West Coast representations of itself. From the early ‘90s. You can't help it if your baby just happens to hate Marc Jacobs sunglasses, and that the only sunglasses she will wear are these faux Raybans that say XL Recordings on the side that came from SXSW three years ago when it was still cool? She's so picky like that. And Cops? Well, she's only taken an interest in criminal justice since just about as long as any of us can remember.</p> <p>If that doesn't guarantee a personal invite to Chloe Sevigny's brother's impossible-to-get-into summer pop-up mixologist speakeasy, hire a Cool Tutor. They are all the rage in parenting circles on the upscale playgrounds of the tonier neighborhoods in Los Angeles, and for only $450 a "session," they promise early exposure to the so-called tenets of cool, from showing short clips of New Wave films and influential choreography, to contemporary art and other iconic cultural references in the form of easy to understand Flash cards, such as the series of images of girls wearing Wayfarers (the Tumblr) or editorial layouts from the French magazine for kid style, Milk. OK, I made all that up, but it certainly sounds like something that could do the trick.</p> <p>I guess in the end you should probably take that pointed baby finger and turn it squarely at yourself. You, after all, are the one who, while pregnant, made fun of parents who dress their babies in the same personal style as themselves, only to find that it took you less than 2 months to break down and buy your baby a black hoodie. On a baby? So it was only a matter of time before she would you find your old leather Hot Topic wristband. Remember how you were still wearing it when you were 30?</p> <p><br> <br> Tracy Moore is a writer living in Los Angeles. She doesn't seriously hold a 1-year-old baby's taste up to the aesthetic criteria of adults, and actually thinks that one of the greatest things about babies is that they like so much shitty stuff.</p><p>Image by .</p>?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?<p>Last night the 136th annual Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show kicked off in New York. The show was first held in 1877, making it the second-longest continuously held sporting event in the U.S., second only to the Kentucky Derby. But like any high-profile event, we're mostly interested in how they looked. Let's take a look, shall we? </p><p>Above, Sophie, a Standard Poodle, pairs an elegant updo with a simple silver chain. As for the makeup, well, Sophie is planning on firing this fool toot suite.</p>?<p>Above, Katie Holmes is on the new cover of Elle magazine &mdash; meaning the normally sleepy August issue is bound to be a big seller. Though the interview and photo shoot happened some six weeks before the actress filed for divorce from Tom Cruise, the magazine appears to be scrambling to highlight passages of its cover story that could be seen as pertaining to...something about Tom Cruise, marriage, or whatever. (Kind of like how Marie Claire that divorce-related cover lie on its December cover, which hit newsstands days after Kim Kardashian announced her intention to divorce that tall felluh.) "Katie didn't speak about Tom in a lovey-dovey way at all," a "source" from the magazine tells the New York Post. "She deflected the Tom questions and brought them around to herself." In response to a question about being in her 30s, Holmes said, "I feel sexier. I think in my 20s, it's like you're trying too hard to figure everything out . . . I'm starting to come into my own. It's like a new phase." A new phase! That's a vague enough phrase that it could mean just about anything, but let's all just opt to believe that Katie Holmes was signaling her imminent desire to leave Tom Cruise via generic answers to softball magazine questions. That seems highly likely. [, ]<br> Holmes & Yang, the clothing line Holmes has with stylist Jeanne Yang, will be shown at New York fashion week for the first time this coming September. The company plans a small presentation. []</p> Christian Louboutin designed this shoe as "a modern-day Cinderella slipper" because Disney is re-releasing Cinderella on Blu-ray. [] Anna Wintour met with a man who looks an awful lot like disgraced Dior designer John Galliano at the Ritz in Paris. [] Chloe Sevigny is the face of Miu Miu for fall. Women's Wear Daily points out that Sevigny has actually fronted a Miu Miu campaign before, in 1996. [] Fashionista has a round-up of 25 apparel brands that manufacture in the U.S. While the list is frustratingly light on hard numbers &mdash; sales volume, percentage of goods manufactured domestically, percentage of textiles made domestically &mdash; and has some dubious inclusions (Levi's, which its Cambodian garment workers $61 per month for working six eight-hour days per week, makes the list on the grounds that it produces "much of" its "high-end line" in the U.S.), it's still an interesting guide. Chris Benz, Jason Wu, and Rodarte make the list, along with emerging designers like Katie Ermilio. []?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?<p>Writes , author of The Single Girl's Guide to Meeting : "Girls, next time you face a bad breakup, take a trip to Europe. It's a perfect anecdote." Oh, that it is.</p><p>Cahoon's a former Vanderbilt cheerleader who "spent four summers studying in Europe and had fabulous experiences with native men." And her is just chock-full of perfect anecdotes. Here she is on the genesis of her project:</p> <p>I was bombarded with questions from girlfriends about the guys, flirting tips, and hot spots…never mind what I studied! When I was graduating, the girls urged me to write a tip book. I wanted them to have excellent man-meeting experiences too, so I did.</p> <p>And here she tells the tragic tale of a friend who was too self-conscious to don a bathing suit. Solution: tankinis!</p> <p></p> <p>Yes, ladies, find the right combination of spandex and you too will soon be in the arms of a Euro dude. But you don't have to take Cahoon's word for it &mdash; over at Shine, Leonora Epstein the pluses of dating French guys. Apparently these charmers will not automatically think less of you if you have sex on the first date. How sweet! Also, "the French move fast. They'll probably refer to you as their 'girlfriend' after the second date, say 'I love you' some two weeks into it, and possibly propose to you before a year is up." So if you love feeling rushed and pressured, get thee to Gaul! Oh, also: "obvious bonus: an accent so hot that they can read the small print on a beer bottle and make it sound sexy."</p> <p>Right, the accent thing. Says poor American Tony in Cahoon's promo vid, "all those guys have to do is say 'My name is so-and-so' and the girls are sold!" Or, you know, .</p> <p>I hate to burst the swoon-y balloon here, but it's probably wise for "single girls" to look past the rolled r's and pay attention to what guys are actually saying. If Cahoon wants some tips on what happens to starry-eyed American girls when they leave their judgment at home, she should check out some Henry James. Or maybe Jude Law:</p> <p></p> <p> [Official Site]<br> [Shine]</p>?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?<p>While straight women and 'mos have already cleared out the spank bank to make room for the visual sexcellence sure to come out of Channing Tatum's upcoming stripperiffic film, Magic Mike, he says straight guys shouldn't overlook it. "People say that women and the gay community will go see it &mdash; knock on wood," he said. "But I know straight guys won't be like, 'Yo, what's up man? You wanna go see the stripping movie after the game tonight?' I doubt they'll have the balls to see it." Though they might be persuaded once they realize the fine piece of ass otherwise known as Joe Manganiello is also in it: "With Joe Manganiello naked in a movie, I think even straight guys are going to be, 'Shit, I need to see that. That man is a specimen.'" Tatum says that when people find out about his stripper past it's the bro dudes who get all kinds of worked up. "What's funny is that the girls don't ask me questions about my stripping days, but straight guys want to know everything," he added. "It's that fantasy element." []</p> <p>If you ever want to rebuff consistent and delightfully detailed gay rumors plaguing your husband, a word of advice: don't follow Kelly Preston's lead. Rather than wisely ignoring it, the actress has decided to publically release the private video montage John Travolta gave her for Mother's Day. A the risk of coming off like a cliche ol' queen myself, I'd just like to draw your attention to the fact that it's set to "That Face" by Barbara Fucking Streisand. Oh, gurrrrl. []</p> <p> we heard that Mark Ronson said that Amy Winehouse was "freaked out" by Adele's success. But the producer wants y'all to know that he was misquoted in the original article. "Some journalist quoted me as saying Amy was ‘freaked out' by Adele's success. jesus Christ," he wrote on Facebook. "i read the interview for the first time just now, and there are so many wrong quotes in there. i can tell the dude was writing whatever he wanted because he uses words and language that i never EVER fucking use in my daily life." []</p> <p>I love Chloe Sevigny &mdash; correction, I love Chloe Sevigny as played by the amazing &mdash; so it saddens me to hear her say that she's worried her latest role as a pre-op transsexual assassin in Hit & Miss might make her less attractive to men. "I was lonely and I felt really unattractive," she says of her costume. "I was confused about my desirability &mdash; was I desirable? &mdash; in having put that on, and having men see me with that on." []</p> <p>Naomi Watts was understandably unsure about playing Princess Diana in Caught in Flight, and wanted to say no when she was first approached to play the part. "I'm looking forward to it, but am absolutely terrified," she said. "It's going to be a tough one. It's a big beast to take on. I just try to do my best." []</p> <p>Loving these soft, black and white behind-the-scenes photos of Rihanna at a photoshoot. []</p>?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?Celebrities and their families came out for the premiere of Cirque du Soleil's "IRIS: A Journey Into the World of Cinema." The looks really ran the gamut, and a pair of pants got me pretty emotional.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?<p>The British Fashion Awards were last night, and while the big winner was Sarah Burton of Alexander McQueen, who took home Designer of the Year, the more surprising news is that industry bigwigs signalled their increasing acceptance of celebrity-designer-WAG-Spice-Girl hyphenate ne plus ultra Victoria Beckham by giving her the Designer Brand Award. (Fashion's establishment is rarely receptive to famous folks who get an inkling they'd like to design; editors who apparently can't tell the difference between a runway show and a 9th grade lunch table and eye-rolled at one of Beckham's shows this year.) Beckham reportedly when she took the stage. She then said, "I'm sorry, I'm so rubbish," and thanked her husband and her "team" profusely. Meanwhile, in the public vote for British Style Icon, Alexa Chung beat out Kate Middleton (who was initially passed over for the shortlist, and then added a day later, after the media noticed the slight). "This is for girls who dress like awkward boys," said Chung. Presenter Kate Hudson recalled feeling "like the coolest, hippest girl in the world" when she wore Stella McCartney to the Oscars in 2001. The next morning, hungover and still Oscar-less, Hudson turned on her TV and learned "I'd made every worst-dressed list known to mankind. Later I called Stella &mdash; and we laughed our asses off." Above is Beckham, Eva Longoria in one of Beckham's dresses, and Hudson in the offending Stella McCartney. [@, ]</p> Chloe Moretz wears barrettes (rhyme!) on the new cover of Jalouse. [] Karlie Kloss, whose recently graced the Dior runway and whose disco-ball-covered ass enlivened the Victoria's Secret show (airing tonight, sigh), shows off some side-ass (is that a thing? it is now!) on the new Vogue Italia. [] Vogue Turkey put Jacquelyn Jablonski on its December cover. [] But our favorite of today's new covers has to be Magdalena Frackowiack on the front of Vogue Latin America. [] H&M has announced that its next designer collaboration &mdash; after Versace for H&M's spring collection reaches stores in the early new year &mdash; will be with the covetable Italian brand Marni. There appear to be some cute signature Marni prints, and some very nice wooden-heeled shoes. It will be at 260 stores in March. [] If you believe this random poster on Fashin who didn't provide a source for the image, this is manufactured indie singer Lana Del Ray in a Prada campaign. UPDATE: As we suspected, it's a fake. The is from a spread in Wonderland magazine. []?Fashion's glitterati came out last night for the CFDA/Vogue Fashion Fund Awards in New York. The style at the event really ran the gamut&mdash;there were some fun looks, some severe looks, some risks that paid off, and some that did not.?The Creative Arts Awards is one of those vague awards shows that no one really knows much about. The awards seem to be respectable - you get, like, Chloe Sevigny, Ira Glass and James Lipton - but also red-carpet fixtures like Kathy Griffin, various teen starlets and reality TV fixtures. The red carpet at LA's Nokia Live Theatre kind of mirrored this confusion - some people, like Jennifer Beals, looked Oscar-amazing; others were less than ready for Prime-Time, a few were just flat-out confusing - so much so that I'm gonna go ahead and ask you to be the judge. After the jump!The Good:?Because it was kicking off New York's Fall Fashion Week, the red carpet of the annual amfAR Gala&mdash;a black-tie event that raised money for AIDS research, prevention and education&mdash;was at once elegant and fashion-forward. Well, for the most part. Lindsay Lohan showed up.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?<p>Ke$ha, what have you wrought? The trend for long, clip-in feather hair extensions has apparently led to such tremendous demand for rooster feathers &mdash; butt plumes make the best hair decorations, apparently &mdash; that thousands of birds are getting plucked each week. Most do not survive the plucking. Such strain is there on the nation's feather stocks that some fishing tackle stores are also refusing to sell their feathers to women, or anyone else they suspect may be not an angler, but a hair stylist. ("She brought a bunch up to the counter and asked if I could get them in pink," reports one shop proprietor. "That's when I knew.") Why can't people copy Ke$ha's relatively benign grooming choices, like bathing in glitter and glue, or the use of Jack Daniels as toothpaste instead? []</p> Ashton Kutcher Tweeted a photo of him and Demi Moore hanging out with Karlie Kloss, as well as modeling mother agents Jeff and Mary Clarke. Kutcher and Kloss were each "discovered" by the Clarkes, in Iowa and in Missouri, respectively. (Full disclosure: they used to be my mother agents, too.) [@] Solange Knowles is looking gorgeous in her new Rimmel London ads. [] Herieth Paul made the cover of Elle Canada. Cover line: "NAOMI...Move Over." Because &mdash; did you forget? &mdash; there can be only one black model in the world at a time. [] Burberry's fall campaign features all British people. [] Just when we thought we couldn't love Tavi Gevinson any more, the girl up and marches in the Chicago Slutwalk against sexual violence and victim-blaming. [, via ]?There were some simple, pretty dresses at the 17th Annual Critics' Choice Movie Awards, as well as some dramatic, with sequins and feathers. Alas, there were also a few boring, blah and meh ensembles.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?<p>"What do you think of these?" I asked my boyfriend, showing him an image of the It Shoes of the season, the Prada sandal platforms that, according to a in today's New York Observer, look "like the work of someone on acid, or at least weed". "I dunno," replied boyfriend. "Guys don't notice shoes." Women, however, do, which is why it is so very odd that this season's most-talked about accessories are the ugliest expensive shit you ever saw. So why are women shelling out the big bucks for things that might turn you to stone for looking at them, if you don't break your back walking in them? Are ugly and overpriced shoes the latest ploy by retailers to create a wealthy elite?</p> <p>Let's face it. If you are a normal person, you do not have close to $800 to spend on a pair of shoes. And even if you did, you would probably be spending it on something you could wear over and over again, or, hell, something you could wear at all. (Forget "if you have to ask you can't afford it", this is "if you have to be mobile you can't afford it.")</p> <p>"I feel horrible when my girls come in here and say, 'I can't spend this much on sandals,' " says one boutique owner, who spoke with the Los Angeles Times regarding the . "They think it's my fault, but I am paying these high prices too." Another LA boutique owner agrees. "When Chloe came on the scene, I remember noticing it. All of a sudden, every line started designing a shoe collection that was more elaborate and more expensive."</p> <p>Why do women do it? Bankrupting themselves, making their tootsies uglier and forcing pain upon themselves for some perverse pleasure gotten from owning something so impractical, so debilitating, and so (we repeat) fug? Let us the sagacious words of our favorite paper, London's Daily Mail, which explains the allure of high heels thusly: "Men like an exaggerated female figure." Yeah, my boyfriend who insists men aren't looking at my feet? Apparently he's right.</p> <p> [NY Observer]<br> [LA Times]<br> [Daily Mail]</p> <p>[Image via ]</p>?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?<p> Gisele Bundchen was clocked doing 70 m.p.h. in a 55 zone while driving on Cape Cod this weekend. Two children were in the Cadillac S.U.V., presumably her son Benjamin and step-son Jack, and Bundchen was let off with a warning. The state trooper's son later Tweeted that she autographed the citation, with kisses. []<br> Coincidentally &mdash; or not &mdash; Bundchen is the star of a lingerie campaign in Brazil, the theme of which seems to be "Gender roles of the 1950s and how they were awesome, with boobs." In one, Bundchen demonstrates the "correct" way to inform one's husband that one has crashed his car (again!): while wearing lingerie. In another, she shows the "correct" way to cop to maxing out hubby's credit cards: also while wearing lingerie. And Betty Friedan wept. []</p> 15-year-old Tavi Gevinson is channeling 14-year-old Tavi Gevinson on the new 90th anniversary edition cover of L'Officiel. [] Abbey Lee Kershaw wears some serious false eyelashes on the latest cover of i-D. [] Katy Perry has pink hair on the cover of InStyle magazine. What will she think of next! [] Lindsay Lohan will be the next face of a designer named Philipp Plein. We've never heard of him, and his last ads featured a model wearing a leather jacket and a bedazzled skull merkin. So this bodes well. [] 19-year-old Karlie Kloss, who started modeling in earnest at age 14, posed for a five-page spread of implied nudes, shot by Mario Testino, in the latest issue of Allure. She covers her breasts alternately with her hands, her arms, a bra top that she holds up, and, as pictured, bubble bath froth. Some people are upset by this. []?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?<p></p> <p>She continues: "I am going to have [Malibu-based psychic and "intuitive healer"] Aiden Chase help manage my new life and career in a very different and positive way with light and love. The time for change is now. Never mix business and pleasure. We are no longer Speidi but Spencer and Heidi." []</p>?<p> Lifetime, the TV network that "," has finally pushed its schadenfreude reality programming too far. After airing an extraordinarily child-sexualizing episode of once, the network pulled the episode from rotation and scrubbed it from the internet. The episode in question? "Topless Showgirls," in which a troop of 8- to 13-year-old girls simulate toplessness and perform a burlesque.</p> <p>The episode two weeks ago. A Lifetime spokesperson confirms that, after airing the episode, the network decided never to air it again and never to make it available on iTunes, Amazon, or .</p> <p>In "Topless Showgirls," Pittsburgh dance instructor Abby Lee Miller teaches her students a "classic" burlesque fan dance, which they are to perform in flesh-toned bras to create the "illusion of nudity." The dance must convey that the children are "hot," "mean," and that men "can't afford" them.</p> <p>Though the girls wince at the prospect of appearing naked onstage and their mothers cringe at the skimpy costumes, the show goes on, and the girls perform at a children's dance competition. "I like to push the envelope," Miller says. "And this is taking it right to the limit."</p> <p>Coincidentally, the yanked episode contains a subplot in which a child is transformed into a literal piece of meat. Starring in an advertisement for "The Sausage King of Canton, Ohio"&mdash;who happens to be a dance father&mdash; must wear the beef jerky version of Lady Gaga's meat dress.</p> <p>Dance Moms is in its second season, and part of a burgeoning genre of maternal schadenfreude reality shows. ("They make us look good," a Toddlers and Tiaras mother of Dance Moms.) The show focuses on Miller's dance studio and a troop of six young dancers and their mothers. No other episode of Dance Moms has ever been yanked after it aired.</p>?The women of Hollywood came out for Elle's 18th Annual Women in Hollywood Tribute. Nearly everyone looked gorgeous, which only further proves that women don't dress for men, we dress for ourselves, and sometimes each other.?Well, it's that time of the year again&mdash;namely, when the Hollywood Holiday-Themed Romantic Comedy Ensemble Movie Industrial Complex tries to convince us that we should go see Zac Efron and Michelle Pfeiffer star in New Year's Eve. Um, no thanks? Anyway, the premiere happened last night in LA. The fashion was mostly predictable with the odd delightful detail here and there. Probably like the movie (oh snap).?<p>Loving Tim Gunn is nothing new. He's just always so Tim Gunn. And during an appearance at NYC's 92nd Street Y last night, Tim did not disappoint. The Project Runway favorite ruminated on his life so far and we fell in love with him all over again. "Every day I pinch myself and say, When am I going to wake up from this phenomenal dream? It's all been a phenomenal dream," he explained as we basked in his glow. More on the event and what he had to say about his childhood, his career, and, of course, Project Runway, after the jump.</p> <p>Childhood: Gunn, raised by a career FBI agent father and a homemaker mother, admits that his parents weren't always sure what to do with their first-born, a boy with a "debilitating" stutter who was painfully shy and preferred the company of adults to his peers. "I became an avid reader, was obsessed with Lego &mdash; which was my passion, studied piano and wrote lots," he said. His father, interestingly, worked directly under J. Edgar Hoover as the director's second-in-command.</p> I don't even know if you need to know this, but here's this FBI guy and here's his first born who is building fantasy buildings in Legos, playing "Mr. Frog Hops" on the piano, and when I got the build-your-own castle for my birthday, I started designing outfits for the soldiers &mdash; you know what I'm saying? He coached all of the neighborhood sports teams, none of which his son played on. My father and I had a difficult relationship, but he was always there for me in a crisis. And believe me, I gave him plenty of crises. The only athletic activity Gunn did get into, and excel at, was swimming, which he loved since it was "solitary and clean &mdash; there is no sweating involved." And yet, Gunn continued to struggle. ("When the teacher announces in front of the class that you had the best English paper, it doesn't help make you more popular with your peers.") In fact, he wasn't forced to conquer his shyness until he took a job teaching a 3-D design course at the Museum School in D.C. &mdash; and he got so nervous before his first day that he "got sick in the parking lot, multiple times." <p><br> Career: When Gunn arrived in New York City in 1983 "running from a crisis," he was still wearing his "D.C. uniform" of "boxy, ample suits." Once in New York, he had "an outer-body experience and realized that no two people on any given street corner are dressed the same. This is a city that accepts you for however you choose to present yourself." (He insists that he didn't have his "real fashion epiphany" until he became the chair of the fashion department at Parsons: "I was 18-months into my time as chair when I had a meeting with Diane von Furstenberg, I'm sure she doesn't even remember this meeting, but I could tell by her quivering eye [that she thought of me] 'I don't know if this is going to work for you in this industry, this particular look.' And I thought to myself, I can't disappoint Diane! So I got a black leather blazer tailored like a suit jacket. That was my solution.") As for how he became chair, well, Gunn, had a bit of a Dick Cheney moment. Tapped to head up the search committee for the top position, he realized that an outsider wouldn't be able to do the job and promoted himself from associate dean.. "The program at Parsons was suffering from dormancy," he said. "The curriculum had been unchanged for 15 years. This was a department in need of love and care." After taking over, he threw out the department's entire curriculum, including its cornerstone program wherein groups of seniors apprenticed to different New York-based American fashion designers and replaced it with a program in which each senior was responsible for creating a collection that would later be presented in a runway show. He says he was vilified for doing so. "I was told by the designers who had worked with students in this program that I was driving the American fashion industry into the ground," he explains. "'Get rid of this man!'," he says the design community exhorted. "He's a bad man! He's a bad influence on the industry!" But the dean at Parsons stood by Gunn &mdash; and the very first senior final runway presentation under Gunn's reign, in the spring of 2002, produced the Proenza Schouler debut collection. Julie Gilhart, women's fashion director at Barneys, bought their entire senior project for the department store.</p> <p>Project Runway: In 2004, Gunn was approached by producers at Bravo about an idea they had to do a reality show about the fashion industry. "I was horrified when they told me what they wanted to do," he said. "I told them, 'This industry is in enough trouble without this!'" But after many assurances, Gunn signed on. As an off-camera consultant. "My having a role on the show wasn't even in the ether" during these early meetings, he recalled. "They said to me, What if we told you we want them to make a wedding dress in two days? And I said to them, So they make a wedding dress in two days! As I tell my students, it will just have to be a make it work moment! But then I qualified my statement and said to them, 'But you should know &mdash; [if they make a wedding dress in two days] it's not going to be a Vera Wang.'" Gunn did put his foot down however, when producers broached the idea of hiring a full crew of pattern-makers and seamstresses who would actually make the clothes the contestants sketched. "But who is Heidi going to off then? The seamstress? Oh no," was his response.</p> <p>The producers worried that the designers wouldn't talk while in the work room, so they asked Gunn to go in there and critique their work and offer advice.</p> I thought while taping season 1, 'No one needs me. No one needs to see me, hear my voice.' I thought I would going to be cut during edited, that they would just show the designers reacting to whatever I had said. I was too embarrassed to go to the premiere party because I thought for sure they were going to cut me... I watched the season 1 premiere from home the same way I watched The Wizard of Oz as a child: curled up in my bed with a blanket over my head. After the show's debut, Gunn says, the fashion industry reacted the same way they had when he took over at Parsons. "I felt the snark from the industry &mdash; they thought the show was silly, and were mad that it exposed the grit of the fashion industry. But then I remember the day the Emmys were announced &mdash; I remember because it was Bastille Day &mdash; and we got nominated and I thought, Takethat fashion industry! We were the only non-network show nominated and we've been nominated every year." <p>As for the shot of energy Project Runway seems to have given to the fashion industry? He's happy. "I'd much rather have people attracted to the industry because of [Project Runway] than because of Sex and the City, which was also a phenomenon," he said of the fact that enrollment in fashion design programs has spiked since Project Runway's debut. And yet he hopes that people realize it's not an easy industry. "Ulli [Herzner, from season 3] called me to lament" the fact that buyers were calling but she couldn't match the demand because, in Gunn's words, "she still insists in having her hand in every part of production. I told her, 'Ulli &mdash; let go!' She needs to let go while her name is still on people's mind." Conversely, of season 2 winner Chloe Dao he says: "I have the utmost respect for Chloe. She expanded her business in Houston and did a diffusion line for QVC. It's success, but in her own way." And yet he realizes the limits of his own success garnered from the show: "I was at the Au Bon Pain by where we were doing casting for season 4 and when I walked in, the woman working there screamed, 'Oh my God! You're on TV! You're that guy from Project Runway!' And I said, 'Yes, yes I am.' And then she screamed, 'Everyone look &mdash; it's Michael Kors!"<br></p>?<p>Elizabeth Cline, the author of new book Overdressed, has some advice for people who want to clothe themselves for not too much money &mdash; without contributing to the waste and supporting the lax labor standards of the global apparel industry supply chain. You know how Michael Pollan advises people concerned about their health and the environment not to eat anything that your great-grandmother wouldn't have recognized as food? Well, most of these clothes shopping tips would probably sound familiar to your frugal great-grandmother, too.</p> <p>First, figure out an annual clothing budget, and shop strategically for needed items to eliminate impulse buys. Consumers also need, says Cline, to accept that a dress needs to cost more than $20 for it to be made under safe and sustainable conditions, and that $20 is in fact a historically low price for a dress &mdash; an artificially low price that is the result of discrete policy decisions undertaken over the last decades by the U.S. government and the W.T.O. to favor outsourcing to countries that lack environmental protections and basic labor laws. A $20 dress represents both a tremendous waste of resources and the mistreatment of garment workers, who are overwhelmingly young women. Even simpler? Buy less. In the U.S., we own more items of clothing now than at any point in history &mdash; yet we pay less for them, and accordingly, we value them less. When you do buy clothing, buy it from companies that respect their workers and support the local economy, or buy from thrift stores. Learn to sew, if only so you can complete basic repairs, or frequent a tailor.</p> <p>Cline sums it up thusly: "Buy what you need, buy things that you love, and take care of what you own." []</p> Lara Stone continues as the face of Calvin Klein, a contract she has held since 2010, this fall. Appearing with her in the latest ads is male model Tyson Ballou. [] Doutzen Kroes is on the cover of Vogue Portugal. The photo is a reprint from Kroes' recent Vogue China spread &mdash; which gives us all the opportunity to look back fondly on the particularly egregious (think missing leg) . [] Yayoi Kusama says of her new collaboration with Louis Vuitton, "Marc Jacobs's sincere attitude towards art is the same as my own...I respect him as a wonderful designer. Louis Vuitton understands and appreciates the nature of my art. Therefore there isn't much difference from my process of making fashion." [] Chloe Moretz is the new face of Aeropostale, which is seeking to improve its performance by associating itself with a celebrity. The chain is also planning to remodel its stores to provide a "shopper-tainment" experience, which sounds hellish and dystopian. Kids these days, etc. [] If you, like us, were a little perplexed by Fashionista's of the "Top 25 Labels Producing Domestically" &mdash; which featured companies like Levi's, which manufactures the vast majority of its clothing in countries that can have atrocious working conditions, like China and Bangladesh &mdash; then this series of posts on designer Natalie Chanin's blog might strike your fancy. Find out about U.S.-made socks, shoes, jeans, ties, bags, shirts, plus sourcing and sustainability information, from companies including Earnest Sewn, Three Dots, and Imogene + Willie. (Patricia Marx also did an for the New Yorker on this topic three years ago.) [, ] New magazine alert: Document, a semiannual fashion and culture glossy, is launching this September. This cover, featuring Liya Kebede, is by Collier Schorr; another, unreleased cover is by artist Francesco Vezzoli. []?<p>Last night's episode of Huge &mdash; the fat camp drama from My So-Called Life's Winnie Holzman &mdash; dealt with Parents' Day, giving us a chance to see painfully embarrassing parents, and how weight plays a part in the family dynamic.</p><p> For starters, we learned that Will's parents wouldn't be showing up for Parents' Day. We also found out that her mom and dad own a luxury fitness franchise called Core. No wonder she's been adamant about gaining &mdash; not losing &mdash; weight: Her parents have this other baby, their company, and Will probably feels like Core gets more attention than she does and is more important. That they didn't bother to visit just proves this point. It's as though they want their goals to her hers, without considering that she may have other ideas. In addition, Will may be going through a if-my-parents-are-into-it-then-I-hate-it phase, which afflicts many a teen.</p> <p> Trent's dad seemed like a typical alpha male, and Trent didn't have the guts to introduce him to his crush, Chloe. When Trent's dad assumed that Trent was into "the blonde," Amber, Trent didn't bother correcting him. It seemed like Trent didn't want to disappoint his dad, but it wasn't clear if he was embarrassed of his father, Chloe, or both. Later in the episode, Chloe was forced to sit through a dinner in which her family and Trent's family shared a table; she dealt with the difficult situation by ordering fettuccine alfredo and eating until her stomach hurt.</p> <p> The conversation Piznarski had with his mom was sooooo familiar: "I can't get over how good you look," she says. "Thanks," he replies. "How bad did I look before?" In that 11-second exchange, there's awkwardness, insecurity, embarrassment, pride, shame, forgiveness and earnestness. The writers really know what they're doing!</p> <p> Amber's mom arrived late, talked to more than one random stranger about her tipped uterus, brought cookies (to a fat camp) and begged, like a child, to spend the night in her daughter's bunk. Amber was anxious and yearning to see her mother, but when Teal showed up, it became clear that while Amber loves her mother, she gets flustered and distressed by her wacky, free-spirit style that borders on flaky.</p> <p>Most interesting? The fact that the parents on the show were a fairly realistic portrayal of what the parents and families of overweight teens look like: Some were slightly heavy, some were svelte, some were dysfunctional and on the verge of divorce, others were completely harmonious. Because, despite what you might see on some other shows, overweight people aren't bacon-obsessed lazy asses. They're complicated human beings, like everyone else.</p> <p>FYI: Next week is the finale…</p> <p>Earlier: <br> <br> <br> <br> <br> <br> </p>?<p>Last night on Huge &mdash; a show from the creator of My So-Called Life &mdash; Camp Victory held a weigh-in. The face of each camper stepping on the scale told a different story: Anxious, terrified, excited, nervous, pessimistic, hopeful.</p><p> Ian refused to look at his weight, explaining: "I don't want to let a number decide my whole view of myself. I I feel good." Alastair lost "a little" weight, but was sad, and sighed, "I don't know why I feel like this." Ian filled in the blanks: "Because it's so freaking hard. And you still have so much left to go."</p> <p>Meanwhile, Will (Nikki Blonsky) was upset that she'd lost weight, since she'd vowed to gain while at the camp &mdash; to spite her parents (and all of Western civilization). Amber (who is not severely overweight but wants to lose so badly that she's paying for the camp herself) only lost one pound. Dr. Rand reminded her: "It's not a race." But Amber felt the need to lie to her friend Chloe and claim to have lost six pounds.</p> <p> Later, Becca, sensing that Will thought she was a sellout, said, "I can't help it. I want to lose weight. Will argued: "If this were the 16th century and everyone thought that this was beautiful, and thin was ugly, would this still be what you wanted?" Becca's response: "This isn't the 16th century."</p> <p>This gutsy show consistently impresses: To have one character preach body acceptance and question why a woman should change her shape to fit in with what society finds aesthetically acceptable, but also include a character who wants to lose weight, as well as a character who loses weight and can't find any joy in it? What other show is touching on this good stuff?</p> <p>Earlier: <br> <br> <br> <br> </p>?<p>Last night, the finale of Huge &mdash; the show from My So Called Life's and her daughter, &mdash; tackled eating disordered behavior, popularity, and what really happens when you lose weight.</p><p> Early in the episode &mdash; which took place at the end of parents' weekend &mdash; Amber and Will sneaked into the kitchen to eat brownies. They were breaking the rules, but Will was also betraying Salty's trust, since she knew where the key was hidden. The brownies started a conversation about childhood: Amber remembered, fondly, how she used to be able to eat a brownie if she wanted, without it being a big deal. Will recalled that she used to raid the kitchen at other people's houses during sleepovers.</p> <p>But Amber's poor eating behavior &mdash; spitting out the brownies she'd chewed, so as not to "swallow the calories" &mdash; really bothered Will, who accused Amber of being like Caitlyn &mdash; the camper send home for "vomiting" in the first episode. Amber was pretty convinced that what she was doing was totally different.</p> <p> Meanwhile, Becca confronted Chloe with a question every high school girl has probably wanted to ask at some point: Why did we stop being friends?</p> <p>The writing here &mdash; including the words spoken and the silences &mdash; is really amazing, because it's clear that Chloe isn't a bitch. At all. And if she is, it's not because she wanted to "be different." It's because she felt she had to ditch her friend to do so.</p> <p> The episode ended with Will asking Dr. Rand, "What were you like when you were fat?" Dr. Rand answered honestly and bluntly: "I hated myself." And after she lost weight? Less. Whether Will thinks that hating yourself less is a noble goal is not the point; the point is that this show &mdash; unlike most on the airwaves &mdash; doesn't treat as a cure-all, or a solution to life's problems.</p> <p>Whether Huge will return is unclear. But it was an engaging, thoughtful, heartwarming show that should have gotten more attention than it did. The program gave us a chance to talk about weight in a different way from Dance Your Ass Off, The Biggest Loser or More To Love. The characters (based on those in the book Huge by Sasha Paley) were not only painted in a human way, but a humane way. The plotlines didn't just explore weight as something to lose, but the despair, optimism, guilt, awkwardness, parents, siblings and everyday baggage that these overweight people carry as they function in the world.</p> <p>In an with KCRW, Winnie Holzman &mdash; who wrote for Thirtysomething, created My So-Called Life, and wrote the book for the musical Wicked &mdash; says that the reason the show is so good is because her daughter, Savannah, "stepped up." Savannah (who is 25 years old) didn't just write the scripts &mdash; she fully realized the characters, including wardrobe choices.</p> <p>Whether Huge will change how fat people are portrayed on TV remains to be seen. (So far, it doesn't look like has the light, subtle, respectful touch that Huge had.) But for one summer, overweight characters lived full and complex lives on screen; a person's body type was not a punchline, tokenism or sideshow, and actors without the traditional superslim Hollywood physique were encouraged to shine. And that is huge.</p> <p>Related: [KCRW]</p>?<p>"I hope the irony isn't lost on you," my sister said to me one day last February, "that this would make for an excellent start to a romantic comedy." I threw a pillow at her and went back to sobbing.</p> <p>It was not lost on me. On the morning of January 3rd, I had started my doctoral research, a feminist analysis of romantic comedies, skipping off to the New York Library for the Performing Arts at Lincoln Center brimming with excitement and pride. And barely six weeks later, on the night of February 13th, the man I was madly in love with, a great guy with ?- it must be said ?- a less than perfect sense of timing, broke up with me. </p> <p>I was a wreck. More than that, I was a wreck whose job it was to watch a minimum of half a dozen rom coms a week. I spent my days at the library, reading about the genre and taking regular weeping breaks that attracted pitying glances from the circulation desk clerks. I spent my nights in bed with my laptop, watching as Kate and Katherine and Meg and Julia and Drew all found true love, taking notes and nursing my very broken heart.</p> <p>My life had very quickly started to resemble the very genre I was studying. A feminist rom com scholar is dumped by her wonderful boyfriend on the night before Valentine's Day and has to spend the next year (or three) studying movies in which love always ?- always -? conquers all? My sister was right: it was a perfect set up for a romantic comedy.</p> <p>Of course, in many ways, my life looked nothing like a romantic comedy. For one thing, in a romantic comedy, I would weigh about thirty pounds less than I currently do. I would be clumsy, in an endearing, humanizing sort of way. My apartment would be impeccably decorated, not to mention unrealistically large for someone living on a grad student's meager stipend. Perhaps I would have a wise Black doorman, and a hilarious gay roommate -? or, to check all the token boxes at once, a sage and sassy gay Black roommate who has no job or love life of his own and no purpose on earth except to comfort and advise me. My wardrobe would be full of flattering dresses and snug designer jeans that, in real life, I could only afford if I eschewed buying groceries and paying my ConEd bill.</p> <p>If this were a romantic comedy, in the aftermath of the breakup, my life would have become a montage lived to the music of Ingrid Michaelson or Sara Bareilles. I would have walked sadly down the streets of New York, in slow motion, watching happy couples canoodling as I walked alone in a chunky knit scarf. I'd have gone to dinner with my friends and faked laughter, or gone to dance or yoga class and gazed miserably at myself in the mirror (this would have been a great chance to demonstrate that, though I was heartbroken, I still looked really good in spandex).</p> <p>Sad montage over, I would get back to work on my dissertation. I would read books about romantic comedies, go to screenings and take copious notes, all the while rolling my eyes at the endless stream of happily-ever-after resolutions, the grand take-me-back gestures, the running through airports to catch The One before he/she gets away. Comparing my own love life to Drew Barrymore's and Reese Witherspoon's, I would become bitter and cynical.</p> <p>And then, one day, as the weather was becoming visibly more spring-like, I would meet a man. Based on my now quite extensive knowledge of contemporary rom coms, I'm pretty sure he would be a boorish, misogynistic film critic ?- played, to quote Tina Fey, by "Gerard Butler or a coat rack with a leather jacket on it." We would keep showing up at all the same screenings, and he would be even more cynical about the genre than I was. He would scoff at how "chicks" are "so lame" and about how romance is for suckers. I would hate him instantly.</p> <p>We all know what would happen next. Misogynist McGee and I would be continually thrown together, and over time I would melt his cold, hard, asshole exterior ?- because in romantic comedies, men who appear to be misogynistic pigs are simply waiting for the right woman to prove to them that women deserve to be treated like human beings. We would fall for each other. My ex would realize the error of his ways, and ask me for another chance. Torn between the two men, I would decide to escape to insert-fantastic-international-destination-here to focus on my dissertation. And then, just as I was about to leave New York… Airport chase, key kiss, etcetera. This thing writes itself.</p> <p>None of this actually happened, of course. Well, I did listen to a lot of Ingrid Michaelson, and I did, with some difficulty, carry on with my research and writing about romantic comedies. And, I do look pretty great in spandex. None of the predictable rom com stuff happened, though, because my life is not a romantic comedy, and neither is yours.</p> <p>But in the aftermath of the breakup, as I carried on with my research, some small part of me allowed for the possibility of meeting, say, a charmingly awkward floppy-haired Englishman, between the shelves of the reference section. I didn't really expect it to happen, of course, but I didn't rule it out completely. And the more rom coms I watched, the more appealing it seemed to become. Despite my cynicism about the genre, despite the fact that I was writing a critical analysis of the romantic comedy, on some level I was expecting my love life to play out like one.</p> <p>It's easy to dismiss romantic comedies as fluffy, mindless cinematic dreck, and some of them are just that. In every genre there are some well-made movies, and many more middling and awful ones. But there is such a thing as a good romantic comedy, even the most ardent chick flick-hater will agree. In fact, some of the most-loved movies of all time are romantic comedies: It Happened One Night, His Girl Friday, Annie Hall, When Harry Met Sally... It is true that in the last few years, the awful rom coms seem to outnumber the good ones, but that's not why people love to hate romantic comedies. They love to hate them because they're "chick flicks," made for and about women.</p> <p>That's not why I dislike romantic comedies. Romantic comedies are made almost exclusively for and about women ?- in fact, they're the only genre that is. I dislike them because regardless of any fluffiness or mindlessness, they are powerful pieces of popular culture. Rom coms furnish us with ideas and expectations about some of the most important things in life: love, work, friendship, sex, gender roles. And some of those ideas are worryingly sexist and regressive.</p> <p>To say that the romantic comedies of the last decade have been noticeably sexist and regressive is an understatement. Movies like The Ugly Truth and The Proposal upped the ante on the well-worn trope of the highly strung and socially incapable single career woman. It is nothing new to suggest that a humbling at the hands of a modern-day Petruchio is the only cure for this particular disease. But in recent years, the shrews have become higher strung, the Petruchios more chauvinistic, and the humbling more humiliating than ever before. Remember how in The Ugly Truth, Gerard Butler's character reduces Katherine Heigl's character, a competent, professional and authoritative adult woman, to curling up in the fetal position in the closet of her office? And how she then she falls in love with him? Tamed, indeed.</p> <p>More recently, romantic comedies have given us a great deal of graphic male nudity. Male nudity is a growing trend in the genre: in the last two years, we've seen the barely-clad bodies of Justin Long (Going the Distance), Jake Gyllenhaal (Love and Other Drugs), Ashton Kutcher (No Strings Attached) and Justin Timberlake (Friends With Benefits). In What's Your Number, Chris Evans' naked butt got more screen time than most of the supporting cast put together. This taste of a future in which we objectify men as we have for so long objectified women is not the kind of gender equality we were hoping for. Furthermore, from the neck down, these men all look remarkably similar ?- white, very lean and extremely muscular ?- and it would not be unreasonable to wonder what repeated exposure to these kinds of images is doing to women's ideas about the ideal male body, and to their expectations of the real men in their lives.</p> <p>Last year's double feature of movies about casual sex -? No Strings Attached and Friends With Benefits -? is perhaps the best example of how romantic comedies tap into larger cultural conversations about gender politics. In the last five years, a vast amount of ink both, real and digital, has been spilled in arguing about whether sexual activity outside of a committed monogamous romantic relationship is bad for young women (no one seems to care that much about the effect on young men). In both these movies, casual sex doesn't work: people develop feelings, people get hurt, and in both instances, people conclude that the best sex happens within a committed, monogamous romantic relationship. Sex and love, they decide, are inseparable, and bad things happen when you try to have sex without love. It is no coincidence that these movies came out when they did, and it is certainly no coincidence that they ended the way they did.</p> <p>You might think you're above the influence of these movies, that you're too savvy and cynical for your expectations and ideas to be shaped by them. I certainly thought I was, and maybe you are - but you're probably not. Romantic comedies shape the beliefs and expectations of even the most cynical and media-savvy among us, especially when they catch us at our most vulnerable.</p> <p>This wouldn't be a problem, of course, if romantic comedies depicted women and men, and sex and love, in a positive and realistic way. But they don't. Romantic comedies teach us that a woman's life is empty and meaningless without a man, and that any woman who believes she is happy being single is simply lying to herself. They teach us that love is only for straight white people ?- skinny, beautiful straight white people, at that. They teach us that men are sex-crazed, commitment-phobic animals who have to be manipulated into romantic relationships, and that when a man really loves a woman, he'll demonstrate his feelings with grand gestures that barely skirt the line between love and stalking.</p> <p>It took my life very nearly turning into a romantic comedy to realize just how powerful this genre is, no matter how much we dismiss and belittle it. I understand now why so many women (and so many more men than will own to it) love this genre, and feel that it speaks to them, even if they know it's shamelessly manipulative or politically problematic. As emotionally grueling as it was, the time between this Valentine's Day and the last has made me a better scholar of the genre.</p> <p>And, as brutal as the irony was, it could have been much worse. I could have been studying slasher flicks.</p> Chloe Angyal is an editor at . She is working on her doctoral thesis on romantic comedies, and on a book on the same topic.?<p>I went to see Kick-Ass yesterday, mostly for the same reason a whole lot of people - including , with whom I agree about 95% of the time - hated it. But I did like it. Here's why.</p><p>I thought I might want to blog about it, but I wasn't sure if A) I could articulate just what I liked about it - because I did like it - and B) I wanted to open that can of worms. Now, I've committed to B in my own mind, so we'll see if A comes together as I go along.</p> <p>One of the main characters, Hit Girl, is a stone cold killer who calls victims cunts and motherfuckers, traits that would be soporifically old hat if not for their belonging, in this case, to an 11-year-old girl. (Also, a lot of people - though Ebert's not one of them - seem a hell of a lot more upset by her language than by watching her eviscerate other human beings or be brutalized herself, which got my "Wow, this culture is fucked up" antennae wiggling.)</p> <p>I was not disappointed. I loved that character, far more than I expected to, even. But I loved her while also recognizing that her approach to life was essentially sociopathic - and worse, that she was not that way naturally, but had been trained/brainwashed by her father (portrayed here as a basically sympathetic figure, further complicating matters) to kill without a hint of remorse or disgust - so if I thought about it too hard, I'd be torn between crying and vomiting.</p> <p>Now, regular readers know I am not one to shy away from overthinking things, and I am a big supporter of . (Short version: "If you really think people should just enjoy the movie without thinking about it, then why the fuck did you 1. click on the post in the first place, and 2. bother to leave a comment? If it bugs you so much, GO WATCH A GODDAMN FUNNY CAT VIDEO.") So I am by no means suggesting that one should avoid any deeper analysis of Hit Girl. In fact, I'm about to do just that. But it's a lot more complicated, for me, than simply saying the whole concept of her is beyond fucked-up and therefore represents a failure of art and/or entertainment. Because the fact that she made me feel squirmy and confused and inarticulate is one of the things I liked about the movie.</p> <p>Before I proceed, I want to make a few things clear.</p> <p>1) There will be spoilers. Big ones. I'll put the bulk of this post behind a cut, but for dog's sake, if you don't want to be spoiled, go away now.</p> <p>2) I am not approaching this as a big fan of comics or superhero movies in general, or Mark Millar (whose name I just had to look up again) in particular. In fact, as for Millar, here is what I know about him: 1) His work has been criticized for egregious race and gender fail by people I very much. 2) He wrote the comic on which the 2008 movie Wanted was based. I saw Wanted. And I would say Wanted was the most unpleasant, misogynistic, gratuitously violent, pointless piece of shit I've watched in the last five years, except I also saw Crank. So any enthusiasm I had going into this movie was categorically not Millar-related.</p> <p>3) I do see a lot of movies that technically belong to various distinct genres but can all be loosely gathered under the umbrella of "Shit blows up and a lot of people die" - hence having seen both Wanted and Crank - and I like many of these movies. So if you just can't stand cinematic violence, I don't blame you and will even stipulate that you are probably a much better person than I am - but I guarantee you will hate Kick-Ass, and I will now gently suggest that there is probably no reason for you to finish reading this post. (And if you can't stomach mentions of specific acts of cinematic violence, please stop reading now.)</p> <p>4) I went into Kick-Ass expecting a Shit Blows Up And A Lot Of People Die movie with a sense of humor, not a comedy with incidental violence, which I'm pretty sure makes a big difference. And I read just enough about it before seeing it to know some of the violence would be beyond what I could tolerate, so I did what I always do: Closed my eyes as soon as I could see it coming. Which, if you've seen enough of these movies, you always can. Perhaps you haven't seen a movie in the last fifteen years, in which case, let me explain: There is no such thing as implied violence anymore. In 2010, if you see a man in danger of getting some fingers lopped off, for instance, you cannot trust the filmmakers to cut away before it's done (much less to forgo following through on the threat). If you hear bad guys describe a microwave oven large enough to treat lumber while they're planning to extract information from a recalcitrant foe, you cannot assume that a short time later you will learn through exposition of said foe's death and enjoy a few inn0cent seconds before it fully sinks in that "Ohhhh… Oh MY GOD." In 2010, if you see a pair of bolt cutters or hear the words "industrial-size microwave," you need to either brace yourself or close your eyes and try to pretend you're back in the good old days, when mainstream movies left at least the goriest details to our imagination. (If you choose the latter strategy, as I do, the time to open your eyes again is a few seconds after the rest of the audience goes, "GEEYAAAAAAH!")</p> <p>(Note: I really wish filmmakers would quit trying to one-up the shock factor of the last hideously graphic movie, and that "torture porn" would remain a discrete genre I can confidently avoid, along with the people who actively enjoy it, instead of sneaking its way into every fucking thing short of romantic comedies and movies about singing animals. And there is a reasonable argument to be made that if I don't like extreme violence, I should really quit spending money on movies like this. But that argument is beyond the scope of this post, which is already too long, and I haven't even gotten near the point yet.)</p> <p>5) Finally, in case all of the above and the R rating haven't tipped you off, let me make this explicit: Kick-Ass is not remotely a children's movie. As Women and Hollywood's Melissa Silverstein , "If your kid wants to see it, say no." Say no and mean it. Since I don't watch TV , I haven't seen ads for it and don't know what the marketing's like. It's entirely possible they're trying to sell this as a comedy and pretend Hit Girl is all about girl power rather than blood lust - in which case, shame on them. But if you take your kid to see this, thinking it's just a superhero movie about a nerdy boy and a plucky tween girl who fights crime with her dad, because you didn't notice the R rating and couldn't be bothered to read even one review - just one, any one, would tip you off to the volume of violence and gore - I basically have no patience for your outrage.</p> <p>With all that out of the way, I really liked Kick-Ass, and I fucking loved Hit Girl. It's not an uncomplicated love, but it's love. Much of it has to do with the actress, Chloe Grace Moretz, whom even detractors acknowledge owned both the role and the film. She is fantastic. As for the handwringing about whether an 11-year-old should be allowed to portray a vicious killer, pretend to get beaten up herself or swear like a longshoreman (or a feminist blogger), even before seeing the movie, I would have said it depends entirely on the 11-year-old. And this one seems to have a terrific head on her shoulders (at least now, at 13) and an involved, thoughtful family, so A) it's not my business to worry about her future therapy bills, but B) if it were, I wouldn't. I am old enough to remember the same basic conversation surrounding Natalie Portman in The Professional - in which she was a bit older than Moretz, but then, that also brought barely-adolescent sexuality into the equation, which is refreshingly absent here - and it sure doesn't seem to have ruined her life. (Meanwhile, Lindsay Lohan was only doing The Parent Trap at that age, and look how that turned out.) Granted, most tween girls, it's safe to say, are not Natalie Portman. But as far as I can tell so far, most are not Chloe Moretz, either. (I did snort a bit at the part in that NYT article where Moretz demands to be referred to as a woman - but her brother/acting coach's compromise in response is one of the things that makes me not worry about her.) We'll have to wait 15 years or so to know for sure, but I'm optimistic about this one.</p> <p>Anyway. That lack of sexualization might be the number one thing I enjoyed about watching the character of Hit Girl, and the sad truth is, I can't imagine seeing a female assassin on film who's not sexualized without her being pre-pubescent. (Or extremely aged, I suppose.) Even the thought of a sequel bums me out because already, Moretz is old enough that a lot of your garden variety squicky old motherfuckers - as opposed to actual pedophiles (and one teenaged boy in the movie) - would find her sexy while doing all of the same stuff, even if they had the decency to be ashamed of themselves for it. Once boobs are involved, it's pretty much game over: You put even a nascent adult female body into this context, and suddenly, the Chicks Kicking Ass Are Hot switch is flipped, and it's a whole different story. And for my money, the fact that this movie has a female character kicking ass without it being the slightest bit hot is a big part of what makes a lot of people so profoundly uncomfortable. It's not that she's too young to be so violent, it's that she's too young to have the sex appeal that's supposed to make the violence not only palatable but titillating. So all you're left to enjoy is a bunch of dead bodies and gore and danger, with a real, simultaneously vulnerable and vicious human character in the middle of it, and you're like, "Wait, why am I supposed to find this entertaining again? Why do I dig it when it's Angelina Jolie or Uma Thurman but recoil when it's a kid young enough to be trendily named Chloe Grace?"</p> <p>Being forced to ask myself such questions is the kind of thing I find entertaining, so that's one reason why I liked it right there.</p> <p>But I also found it entertaining on its surface, just a good ride as long as you don't think too hard (or keep your eyes open the whole time). Sure, I risk violating Moff's Law by endorsing the "don't think too hard" approach, but I don't mean - obviously by now, I should hope - you're better off if you just sit back, let it wash over you, and ignore any concerns it elicits. What I mean is, to get the most out of the viewing experience, you should let yourself think exactly as hard as you would about any other Shit Blows Up And A Lot Of People Die movie - which is not very - and then enjoy picking it all apart later. Ebert liked Wanted a hell of a lot more than I did, for instance, because he took exactly that approach. It is, he , "lacking in two organs I always appreciate in a movie: a heart and a mind. It is mindless, heartless, preposterous." Agreed! However, he adds, "The way to enjoy this film is to put your logic on hold, along with any higher sensitivities that might be vulnerable and immerse yourself as if in a video game." Yeah, sorry, couldn't do it. My higher sensitivities simply would not agree to nap through that one. But they do for some SBUAALOPD movies (which is why I keep watching them), and they did as necessary for Kick-Ass, so I'm with him on the general principle.</p> <p>But the cool thing about Kick-Ass is, it wasn't necessary in a lot of places where it ordinarily would be. Since the anti-hero wasn't really tough - that was the whole point - and the anti-heroine A) wasn't pornified and B) was far more capable of physically protecting herself than just about any other character, a great many of the SBUAALOPD tropes that usually prod my higher sensitivities until they're grumpily awake were absent. For starters, there is not one damsel in distress in this movie. Kick-Ass gets a girlfriend*, but unbelievably, she's never in peril; she waits for him and frets for his safety without also being kidnapped by the bad guys and roughed up and threatened with sexual violence, as that character in these movies almost inevitably is. Hit Girl has to be bailed out by a man with a gun twice, but both times, only after she's killed so many fucking people so efficiently she has more than earned an assist - just like male heroes almost always get saved by a sidekick once or twice, without anyone questioning whether they remain extraordinarily, even absurdly, capable fighters. (You have to put the hero in a bit of real danger and give the tagalongs something to do, after all.) She does take a brutal beating before one of those assists comes along, and it's horrible to watch for a lot of reasons, but if we look at her as the hero of a SBUAALOPD movie - which, title notwithstanding, she basically is - this is also perfectly standard. The asskicker-in-chief inevitably ends up bloodied but unbowed.</p> <p>Wait, I'm getting ahead of myself. In his review, Ebert has a challenge for those who would argue that the movie has to be appreciated in context:</p> <p>A movie camera makes a record of whatever is placed in front of it, and in this case, it shows deadly carnage dished out by an 11-year-old girl, after which an adult man brutally hammers her to within an inch of her life. Blood everywhere. Now tell me all about the context.</p> <p>He's snarking specifically on people who would claim he doesn't understand or appreciate the film because he doesn't know the comic it's based on or can't appreciate satire or something. But I don't know the comic, either (and strongly suspect, for numerous reasons, that I wouldn't be into it), and since Ebert's been a film critic for longer than I've been alive, and Kick-Ass hardly suffers for being excessively intellectual or opaque, I'm going to go ahead and assume he gets it on all levels on which it is meant to be got. The problem is not that he didn't fucking get it, it's that he didn't fucking like it, which is fine. But personally, I found my enjoyment of it was dependent on looking at it within a certain context, so let me tell you all about the context.</p> <p>And that is: You do have to see Hit Girl as this movie's asskicker-in-chief, as the Bruce Willis/Matt Damon/Nicolas Cage (who plays her dad here)/Bankable Tough Guy of Your Choosing in this particular SBUAALOPD movie. There are reasons not to see her that way - primary among those that it's a movie with a titular hero who is not Hit Girl and, oh yeah, 11-year-old girl - but there's a strong argument to be made that that's exactly what she is. 1) She kills way more bad guys than anybody else. 2) She's the only one with the training, ammo and experience to kill way more bad guys than anyone else, except for her dad. 3) Her dad - as the father figure to the hero usually does - mostly steps aside and lets her do the serious Tough Guy shit, is shown teaching her and bailing her out early on but starts treating her as more of an equal over the course of the film, and eventually dies and leaves her to avenge him by killing the head bad guy on her own. (Did I not warn you that there would be big spoilers?) 4) Well, not completely on her own, because that's where the ostensible hero, unremarkable teenaged boy turned crimefighter "Kick-Ass," comes in. But again, he's really acting as the sidekick here, the guy who helps save the day but couldn't have saved 15 minutes of it without the leadership of a much more highly trained and impressively armed hero. Who, in this case, is an 11-year-old girl.</p> <p>So if you accept that this is, in fact, fundamentally a SBUAALOPD movie, and that the 11-year-old girl is the Big Action Hero, then all the horrific violence that happens to and because of her is par for the course. Sure, some of it's more explicit and grotesquely imaginative than previous examples of the genre - though that, too, is now par for the course (see above about one-upmanship) - and the idea of an 11-year-old girl as Big Action Hero is totally fucking horrifying on about a hundred levels, all of which you can and should consider when you're done watching. But if you are the kind of person who enjoys a good SBUAALOPD movie, you have to admit that in terms of what happens - as opposed to who's at the center of it - this one is not particularly unusual.</p> <p>And that's what's simultaneously disturbing and awesome about Hit Girl being the one at the center of it. Because if you're too turned off by all this happening to/being caused by an 11-year-old girl to enjoy the movie, you kind of have to ask yourself why you enjoy watching the same basic shit happen to and around Bruce Willis or Matt Damon or Nicolas Cage or whomever. (And if you don't enjoy that basic shit, you shouldn't be there in the first place. One review, people!) Sure, we're usually watching grown men who can take care of themselves, but Hit Girl is, if not so grown, at least shown to be every bit as capable of fighting off hordes of bad guys. She handles knives, swords and guns as smoothly and confidently (not to mention implausibly) as any adult male action hero, and strategizes just as cleverly.</p> <p>And at least in theory, these are the qualities that make us want to see what the hero does next, that make us think he is so cool, that make us feel so sure he can handle whatever comes at him that we never feel more than a pleasant frisson of fear for him or a brief wince for the pain he endures and elicits along the way. The justification for all the brutality he dishes out is always starkly black and white - he is Good; his enemies are Evil - so we accept that and go along for the ride without counting the bodies or pausing to wonder if this dude feels even a little bit bad about being a fucking killing machine. And we know that one way or another, he will triumph in the end, so while we might cringe a bit as he takes his inevitable lumps, we don't really dwell on what it would feel like, physically or emotionally, to be kicked in the head or thrown across a room or shot in the chest even with a bulletproof vest or get your teeth knocked out or an arm broken, and then get up and keep fighting until you win.</p> <p>Those are the rules. If you can't accept all that - the need for what amounts to a willing suspension of empathy - you are simply not going to be a fan of SBUAALOPD movies. And again, that means you are probably a better person than I am. But I do like those movies as a rule, and so do about a gazillion other people, so it's probably safe to assume that liking them does not actually make you a bad person who struggles to be compassionate and non-violent in real life. It just means you can suspend your better nature for a short time in order to watch a lot of intense, terrifying shit happen to (and because of) a fictional character, provided you know that character has the intellectual, financial and physical resources to wind up safe and triumphant, and that the fictional people who get slaughtered along the way are all A) evil and B) trying to kill the hero first. Hit Girl is clearly shown to be such a character, fighting such characters. So if you can't stomach this well-established formula with her at the center of it, the obvious question is, are you usually willing to suspend empathy because of the character's resources and the good/evil thing and the knowledge that it is fiction, or because the hero usually has a dick and a deep voice?</p> <p>But wait a minute, Kate, I can hear you saying. It's not just that she's female, it's that she's a fucking child! Perhaps you even like the same basic formula when an Angelina Jolie or Uma Thurman is the anti-/heroine, so it's totally not just about the dudeliness of the lead? But honestly, I'm usually not so into SBUAALOPD movies with adult female asskickers-in-chief. They've never appealed to me much, probably because they tend to be sold on the fuckability of the heroine more than the relatability of her; the primary market is still young, straight and male, after all, so a female lead is drawn to evoke fantasies either of being dominated by such a badass or being such a badass yourself that you could rock her world, neither of which does much for me. And because it's all aimed at the same young, straight, male market, this doesn't really go both ways. While I certainly don't mind looking at Matt Damon or Clive Owen or Jason Statham fighting bad guys, I am generally not thinking, "God, that was so totally badass, I want to fuck you right now." (And I am definitely not thinking that while watching, say, Bruce Willis or even a young Arnold Schwarzenegger or the increasingly vile and crusty Mel Gibson). If I like the film enough that my higher sensitivities are napping comfortably, then I am thinking, much like the young, straight men in the audience, "God, that was so badass, I want to be you right now" ("and also, I would like to fuck you some time just because you are extremely good-looking, but that's incidental").</p> <p>The sexualization of violence against and executed by women is one of the things I usually hate about even the relatively good SBUAALOPD movies. If there are any women to speak of in the movie, then the focus is inevitably on how hot they are while kicking ass, how hot they are while getting their asses kicked, how hot they are while tied up and waiting to be assaulted by the bad guys/saved by the hero, etc. I do not happen to be sexually attracted to women, and I fucking hate that these are nearly always underdeveloped characters who exist only to further the hero's story and whose most lovable demonstrated quality is, in fact, hotness, so I find it all incredibly tiresome and offensive, if basically inevitable, and to me, the mark of a really good SBUAALOPD movie is that there's somewhat less of that than usual, either because the hot chick evinces a glimmer of personality or because the hero has some purpose other than rescuing her sweet ass. And even making a woman the hero doesn't necessarily mean it's going to be a good SBUAALOPD movie, because I'm still supposed to moved by her hotness, and I'm just not, and I'm actually rather creeped out by the idea that the kind of extreme violence I've described above is supposed to come off as sexy when a lady does it (or has it done to her).</p> <p>Which brings us back around to my first point, and why I really dug Kick-Ass. It's got a female action hero whose body and violent acts are completely unsexualized. It's the rare opportunity to watch a girl kick ass - fortunately or unfortunately, an actual girl - without the camera lingering on her tits or all the men underestimating her (nobody does, which is very cool) or the real hero shoving her aside or a bunch of flirtatious mid-fight dialogue and sexy winks. It is the first time I have ever seen a female character doing it all just like the men do it - with physical and mental toughness, cleverness, courage and a shitload of ordnance as her only resources, and exactly zero use of her sexuality to make an easily duped jackass do her bidding. And thanks to elements of our culture that have been well-covered here before, it would frankly be damn near impossible to pull off with anyone much older than 11, because once a female has secondary sex characteristics, Hollywood will never, ever ignore them long enough to tell a completely unrelated story. At least not in a SBUAALOPD movie, and generally not at all.</p> <p>Is it disturbing to watch a child doing all of this, and having all this done to her? Yes, incredibly. But mostly because it should be disturbing to watch anyone doing all this, and having all this done to them; in reality, violence isn't exciting or funny or sexy to watch whether it's happening to a little girl or a grown man or a hot chick. Kick-Ass removes the veil that usually makes it so easy to willingly suspend empathy long enough to enjoy this kind of film, which is woven from a whole bunch of cultural bullshit about Tough Guys and individual heroes and good and evil and hotness that we damn well ought to think critically about more often, even if we are the kind of people who enjoy these movies in between protracted bouts of being compassionate, decent human beings. Especially if we are those kinds of people.</p> <p>One last thing: Al didn't like the movie much. There could be a lot of reasons for that, and he didn't have the patience to try for anything more nuanced than, "It was way too violent and kind of dumb." (THIS FROM A MAN WHO LIKED CRANK!) But here's one guess as to why we had such different reactions. Between the rampant sexism and increasing gore that requires eye-shielding, I am completely accustomed to being made uncomfortable by SBUAALOPD movies and judging them by whether I enjoyed myself despite the disturbing and offensive parts. Al, who's somewhat better at telling his higher sensitivities to put a sock in it, is much more of the "just turn off your brain and go along for the ride" school, even to the extent of flagrantly violating Moff's Law on occasion. (Like when I want to talk about the rape scene in Crank at a party.) So, for starters, I suppose I was kind of dazzled by the novelty of having all new disturbing and offensive shit to analyze instead of just the same old shit. There's that. But also, I really like the fact that Hit Girl makes some people who are usually comfortable watching SBUAALOPD films incredibly uncomfortable. Because if you get past the sputtery "It's a little girl! How could you?" response - which, granted, most people probably won't - then it's the kind of discomfort that leads to important questions about what we'll tolerate watching, and why. I like that I walked out of there with a gut reaction of "That was awesome!" immediately followed by an intellectual reaction of, "Damn, it's fucked up that I thought that was awesome." That tells me I just saw something new, if nothing else. And on further reflection, the new thing for me was not a violent, remorseless, brutalized, potty-mouthed child but a female action hero with all the agency and skill of a man, whom the audience is not supposed to want to fuck. That is a pretty awesome thing, even if it is also frankly pretty fucked up that I thought that movie was awesome.</p> <p>This originally appeared on . Republished with permission. Want to see your post here? !</p> <p>The author of this post can be contacted at .</p>?<p>Welcome back to Midweek Madness, in which Intern Tanisha Love Ramirez assists as we get our hands on the bibles of gossip: In Touch, Us, Ok!, Life & Style, and Star. This week, the magazines are pretty light on actual "news," so they just made some shit up: If Rob and Kristen get married, she might wear glittery sneakers. There's a "game" called Lohanland, which is like Candyland, but with more hit-and-runs. And in a truly sad act of desperation, there's a staged photo shoot starring an Angelina Jolie look-alike and a Jennifer Aniston clone, just so we know what it might look like if they actually met up for a glass of wine. Let the lies begin! </p> <p>Ok!<br> "Teen Mom Shockers"<br> In this week's issue you'll pay for shocking and get nary a spark! Teen Mom Farrah Abraham has broken up with MTV because the network promised her a spin-off but was busy giving it to Maci and Caitlynn, and like a good ride or die friend, the mag reassures Farrah that at least she has a New York Times best-selling book, and those other bitches ain't got nothing. Meanwhile, Amber is set to have her own MTV special, "Amber Behind Bars", to premier October 9th. Teen Moms Leah Messer and Kailyn Lowry are happy in their respective relationships, and Jenelle Evans has broken up with her on-again-who-cares-again boyfriend, Keifer Delp. In the most shocking Teen Mom story, by default, there is a picture of Caitlynn smoking pot out of a bong, but her crackerjack manager has spun it as yet another "teachable moment" of Caitlynn's life. Moving on! Kim Kardashian feels that Kanye West should have learned from her naked "teachable moment" and not have made a sex tape with an 18-year-old married woman. The mag suggests the only foolproof way to get back in Kim's good graces is to throw her a million dollar birthday bash, complete with gaudy custom duds and pink diamonds. Yes, diamonds, the sex-tape antidote! KStew feels "somewhat" responsible for the demise of Rupert Sanders' marriage and is texting him behind RPatz's back, offering him moral support. But she doesn't feel bad because she promised Rob that she wouldn't SPEAK to Rupert anymore, but she never said anything about texting. And finally, a psychic predicts that Katie Holmes and Tom Cruise will play husband and wife to one another again, Kim and Kanye are in the world's longest rebound relationship, Brad and Angie are faking it, and Jennifer Aniston will finally get her happily ever after with Justin Theroux.<br> Grade: F (who cares)</p> <p>Life & Style<br> "Rob and Kristen's Secret Wedding"<br> When there's no news to report, why not make up stories, make shameless plugs and fat-shame celebrities in bulk? In this week's issue, there are impressive imaginative leaps to conclusions after using Kristen's post-cheating statement, in which she states, "I love him, I love him" as solid proof that she is committed to Rob and ready to wed him. Also, Kristen recently took in a fashion show in Paris, which is in a country that happens to sell wedding dresses. The mag even planned Robsten 2.0's make-believe wedding, complete with purple flowers and bedazzled sneakers for the bride, but disappointingly no unicorns were involved in this fantasy! (Fig. 1) The valiant and brave Prince William has vowed to protect his princess, even if he has to hire other men to do it for him! The Duke of Delegating has hired bodyguards to protect his wife, Kate Middleton, because he fears that if a photographer is able to take a picture of them from afar, a sniper could just as easily shoot them dead. Good point? In what seems like a shameless plug for their Chicago-based Italian restaurant, Giuliana and Bill Rancic share that they make time for amore with 45 minute dinner dates at RPM. And lastly, because the editors hate us, they're rubbing it in our faces that our boyfriend, Ryan Gosling, shared a delicious chocolate gelato-topped dessert with Eva Mendes… then we're eased into a four-page spread featuring Kim Kardashian trying to lose love-weight, and Kourtney Kardashian, Hilary Duff and Jessica Simpson's plans to lose their baby-weight. Ugh, pass the gelato, please.<br> Grade: D- (Pinocchio)</p> <p>In Touch<br> "A Wedding & A Split"<br> Emily Maynard and Jef Holm are apparently dunzo after Jef went to speak to fans during an Event in Las Vegas and came back to an angry Emily who was throwing up gang signs &mdash; sorry, "making hand gestures" &mdash; obviously signaling that their relationship is off. Meanwhile, Bachelorette Ashley Herbert and her fiance, J.P. Rosenbaum, have broken the Bachelor curse by keeping their romance low-key and living hum-drum lives in New Jersey. Oh, and agreeing to televise their wedding on ABC for between $700k and $1 million. In what is made out to be the biggest deal of all time, the mag reports that Kate Middleton caused a royal upset when she attended a state dinner in the Solomon Islands wearing the traditional garb of the Cook Islands. In an article titled "Anne Marries her Average Joe" the mag congratulates Anne Hatheway on marrying Jewelry designer Adam Shulman (Fig. 2), but then casts some shade on the pair, passive-aggressively indicating that marrying a jewelry designer and moving to Brooklyn is a downgrade from the lifestyle that she is accustomed to. Next, if a picture is worth a thousand words, then according to the mag the fact that half of the Kardashian Klan have refused to participate in their annual Christmas photo shoot points to the breakdown of this famous family. Next is something freaky: Photos of a Jennifer Aniston doppelganger and Angelina Jolie look-alike, having a friendly pow-wow for cameras in an "In Touch exclusive" &mdash; although the pix were also featured in sister publication Life & Style (Fig. 3). And, in a piece titled "Why won't these stars dress their age?" the mag wishes that JLo would put a flowered muumuu on that forty-something-year-old body, Chloe Grace Moretz would slap on some pigtails and Katherine Heigel would stay out of Joan Rivers' closet.<br> Grade: D (liar liar pants on fire)</p> <p>Us<br> "Teresa's Dirty Secrets!"<br> Brunette ladies have drama. This is basically a recap and a teaser for the reunion taping &mdash; part two of three airs on October 7. What do we learn? Teresa feels she was bullied during the reunion; Jacqueline found the reunion "exhuasting" and Rosie Pierri will join the other ladies on the couch. Oh, and Kathy says of Teresa: "She brings up my marriage to deflect from her own problems." Zzzz. Also inside: Reese Witherspoon's newborn son, Tennessee, is nicknamed "Tenney." Bachelorette Emily is still faking the funk in her relationship with Jef with one F, and now her daughter "has been pulled into their web of deceit." The most fun thing in this issue is the "Lohanland" board game (Fig. 4), in which you can move ahead one space by tweeting about Amanda Bynes and lose a turn after dropping charges against a dude you claim you were assaulted by. Last, but not least: Katy Perry gets her nails done a lot. Like, a lot a lot. (Fig. 5)<br> Grade: C+ (tattletale)</p> <p>Star<br> "Eric Cheats On Jessica!"<br> It's interesting that they use the present tense, "cheats" here, because the claim inside is slightly different. Eric Johnson was with his then-wife, Keri, when he met Jessica Simpson at a party in 2009. The marriage was already on the rocks. Wikipedia says they split in October of 2009; Eric filed for divorce in January 2010; and began dating Jessica in May 2010. But! According to this mag, Eric is a "two-timing cheat" who was still having sex with Keri after he started seeing Jessica. An insider says Jessica found out about this in late September when a friend made a joke about Eric hooking up with his ex while dating Jessica. "After the friends left, Jessica asked Eric if it was true, and she blew up after he admitted to it." Wait, if all the friends left, who is the source on this story? A sofa cushion? Anyway, Jessica took her baby and "stormed off" to her mother's house, because that's the only way angry celebrities can exit a dwelling. Moving on! Miley Cyrus was in Philadelphia where her fiance Liam was shooting a movie with Harrison Ford, and she found the town boring. Han Solo suggested she visit the Betsy Ross house, to which Miley replied, "Who is Betsy Ross?" According to a source, "Harrison thought it was cute." WTF. Anyway, Miley did go to the Liberty Bell. Next up is a correction! Remember that story in which creepy Nicolas Cage stalked costar Vanessa Hudgens? Well, just kidding! The editors apologize. Nothing creepy happened, certainly not a creepy letter from a creepy lawyer representing creepy Cage. (Fig. 6) In yet another Simpson story, Jessica is in a "weight war" with Jennifer Hudson, who thinks she is a "mess" and "lazy" and not taking her Weight Watchers contract seriously. In Kim Kardashian news, she only got a kitten for the attention and to make herself seem relatable and "doesn't love Mercy at all." Can you picture the pitch meeting: "How do I get women to like me?" "Well… ladies like cats? Like, are crazy about cats. Crazy cat ladies." "Hmm, okay. Do they sell them at Nieman Marcus?" And scene. Kristen Stewart has a "rebound body" now. It's just like a regular human body, except she's stopped smoking and drinking and does Bikram yoga. Bradley Cooper and Zoe Saldana are back on because she is "the only girl in Hollywood who shares his interests in politics and the economy." The only one. In other couples news, Dancing With The Stars's Karina Smirnoff is dating The Bachelorette's Arie Luyendyk. C-Listsplosion! Lastly, the mag has a huge expose on Breaking Amish star Jeremiah, who, on the show, acts like he's never seen technology or been around cars. His ex-wife Naomi says: "We had both already left the Amish sect when we began dating in 2002, and I had to laugh when he claimed's never owned a cell phone. He's had one for as long as I've known him." She also says he loves Guns N'roses and Eminem, frequents strip clubs and "was always known as the guy with the coolest cars." (Fig. 7)<br> Grade: C (possible perjury )</p> Addendum <p>Fig. 1, Life & Style</p> <p>Fig. 2, In Touch</p> <p>Fig. 3, In Touch</p> <p>Fig. 4,Us</p> <p>Fig. 5, Us</p> <p>Fig. 6, Star</p> <p>Fig. 7, Star</p>?<p>Chloe Sevigny is on the cover of the new Out. And she has some strong words for comedian Drew Droege, of "Good evening America, I'm Chloe Sevigny..." fame:</p> <p>"At first I thought, Oh, they're funny. They're not even really me, they're these weird art pieces. But I've turned a little. I'm slightly offended because he's calling me pretentious, and I'm not."</p> <p>Oh, Chloe "TO-AST" Sevigny, that is the most pretentious thing you could have possibly said. Not familiar with Droege's oeuvre? Take a gander:</p> <p> The actress also says that she's not a total borrowed-clothes-horse. In fact, she sometimes has trouble even calling in samples to wear to film premieres:</p> <p>For the British premiere of Hit & Miss she requested about 20 dresses for consideration, but only received two. "Aren't I one of the top searches on Style.com, for crying out loud?" she says with mock disgust. "How hard is it to get a fucking dress from Valentino?"</p> <p>[]</p> Four people fainted during Dolce & Gabbana's first couture show &mdash; which was a two-day affair that included a private opera performance, a firework show in front of Mt. Etna, and some 80 clients flown to Sicily via private jet. The Telegraph, along with Corriere Della Serra and Le Figaro were the only press organizations that agreed to attend under the following muzzle of conditions: no tweeting, filming or publication of any unauthorized photographs of the show or its guests. First, two clients fainted from the heat on Sunday. <p>Then, when the event began with a launch of Bellini's Bel Canto opera Norma in the ancient Roman amphitheatre, the fashion editor toppled, too. She fell (elegantly) to the floor just in front of the orchestra pit. First aid was provided by a doctor dressed as a druid who happened to be in that evening's chorus. He prescribed ice-cream, and she soon recovered. Later, on a terrace facing Mt Etna, guests picked at a 30ft long trestle table heaped with Sicilian sweetmeats, watched an outrageous firework display set to Verdi's Valzer Brillante, and danced.</p> <p>A fourth unlucky person fainted on Monday, at the beach. []</p> Marion Cotillard bagged the August cover of Vogue Paris. [] Here's the campaign video for Yayoi Kusama's collection for Louis Vuitton. Yesterday, the elderly artist rolled up to the New York Louis Vuitton flagship to fete the collection in a polka-dotted wheelchair. [] Archie Comics is launching a makeup line with M.A.C. next spring. The theme will be "Archie's Girls" &mdash; Betty and Veronica &mdash; and this will be the logo. [] Dior Homme designer Kris Van Assche is on the cover of Manifesto. []?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?<p>Am I the last person to find this out? Oh my god, it's perfect. Oh my god. Oh my god. Oh my god, it's perfect!!! OH MY GOD. It's perfect!!!!! Apparently Katy Perry and John Mayer have been spotted hanging out together and now they're having "sleepovers" at his house (LIKE INTERCOURSE ONES). </p> <p>"She has been having sleepovers there," says a source. "It is very private and they've been sneaking in and out. It has been going on for a while."</p> <p>This is the most perfect celebrity couple since .</p> <p>They probably only have eyes for each other, but should these rumored lovebirds want some companionship, Mayer's house is just down the road from E!'s own Kris and Bruce Jenner's Hidden Hills home.</p> <p>Ugh. Way to make it weird, E!. []</p> <p>Michael Phelps's new girlfriend is a total fame-seeker, say tabloids! She has been photographed with other celebrities, including Zach Braff, and sometimes tells people she's a model and attends "VIP events"!!! But FIE, says Michael Phelps's girlfriend's dad, Wayne! She is already hella successful and famous and doesn't need shit from the likes of a Phelps OR a Braff! Let grown-ups live their fucking lives, says me! (Nobody listens to me.) [] []</p> <p>After learning that Gabby Douglas is a big Vampire Diaries fan, Nina Dobrev 'n' company made a video wishing the USA team good luck in the finals.</p> <p>Nina Dobrev, a former artistic and rhythmic gymnast, was behind the group effort. "Forget sleep. It's all about the Olympics right now. I'm obsessed. Like, it's actually a problem. They're starting to tell me I'm looking tired on set, and it's because I'm up until, like, two in the morning watching the Olympics and going to work at 5 a.m."</p> <p>CUTE. [I'm behind deadline, so write your own Degrassi inside joke here. Something about being a single mom. I don't know. Follow your heart.] []</p> <p>Marvin Hamlisch, the Oscar-, Grammy-, Tony-, and Pulitzer-winning composer behind a billion songs you don't know you know but you know, has died at age 68. Among other things, Hamlisch wrote the score to A Chorus Line and The Sting and composed "Nobody Does It Better" for Carly Simon. He will be missed by all kinds of people. []</p>?<p></p> <p>Snooki is not. "I'm an East Coast girl," she says. But Ronnie is hoping to go Hollywood as well: "Hopefully, I'll get a comedy career out of this," he says. "Just do something. Ride it out. There's a lot of opportunities out there, you know. I'd like to be a part of them." If these people end up having some kind of showbiz longevity what does it mean for our culture as a whole? []</p> <p>[Image via ]</p>?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?<p> Not only is Jessica Seinfeld a , she's also a possible pusher. MediaPost wonders if "Mrs. Moneybags is pushing a gateway brownie," because toddlers who grow up "with their brownies spiked with spinach grow up with an affinity in their later years for the kind of brownies that come with stronger roots &mdash; like seeds and stems." Just think about that next time you're trying to slip little Grayson and Chloe some illicit kale. []</p>?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?<p></p> <p>Reportedly, Travolta wanted the ambulance to drive his son to an airport so he could be flown back to the US for treatment &mdash; instead of to the island hospital, 45 minutes away. [, ]</p>?<p> When we first saw a photo of Johnny Depp as Barnabas Collins in Dark Shadows, we were worried: It looked cheesier than a fondue pot. But in the trailer for the Tim Burton flick, it's obvious that that's the point: He's a weirdo surrounded by weirdos! He goes from 1752 to 1972 and finds that his estate is in ruins, and his heirs &mdash; played by Michelle Pfeiffer, Jonny Lee Miller and Chloe Moretz &mdash; are completely dysfunctional. Oh, and the witch who turned him into a blood sucker &mdash; Eva Green &mdash; is still in the picture. Fun!</p> <p>One beef I have? Tim Burton always takes beautiful brunettes and forces them to be blonde. Eva Green is , but not in that wig. The same thing happened to in Edward Scissorhands, in Sleepy Hollow, in Alice In Wonderland. Anywhoozle, this film should answer the burning question: What's more terrifying, a vampire or polyester?</p>?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?<p>When Milla Jovovich and Carmen Hawk launched Jovovich-Hawk in 2003, they just wanted to design clothes for "funny" and "creative" women so that consumers could "look great" even if they "[felt] bad." Now, their vintage-inspired, playful, California-girl clothes are available &mdash; at much more affordable prices, I should add &mdash; via Target's GO International line. Images of the full collection and an unrepentant fan's not-so-critical take on it, after the jump.</p> <p>L to R: For when you have nothing to wear upon moving to Laurel Canyon; wee, more cool jeans at Target; how I love a good chevron stripe.<br></p> <p><br> L to R: Ooh baby: cute babydoll; I want this right now ; she wears shorts shorts and now I want to, too.<br></p> <p><br> L to R: Who doesn't need another tee?; paging Chloe Sevigny in Big Love; also must have this one.<br></p> <p><br> L to R: Ok, I don't wear bikinis &mdash; but you might; a chic beach cover-up, me thinks; easy, breezy, beautiful.<br></p> <p><br> L to R: Could be trashy if not played right; so so so chic!; um, is this from the juniors department? Ca. 1992?<br></p> <p><br> L to R: Polka dots and vests, two of my favorite things; it's not a cover-up if it's sheer; um, except for this, which I love.<br></p> <p><br> L to R: Sweet suit; so Serena van der Woodsen; too many layers for my taste.</p> <p> [Target]</p>?<p>Finally! After months of mental prick and clit teasing, Julianne Moore has finally, officially, signed on to play the tyrannical mother in the highly anticipated remake of Carrie. It's not the first time she's taken on the classics &mdash; playing Lila Crane in Gus Van Sant's 1998 take on Psycho &mdash; and if Chloe Moretz in the lead wasn't proof enough that they're going to do a good job of it then Moore's signature certainly seals the deal. But what can we expect? Well, not the apparent cakewalk that was the original, says Moretz, this one is going to get darker. "It's darker and much more psychological. More Black Swan," she said. "You're really looking into her mind and it really looks into the relationship of Margaret and Carrie. It's set in modern time, so it's a lot different." []</p> <p>Mariah Carey is just the best. Rather than whore her twin babies out to the highest tabloid bidder she launched their very own website called Dembabies.com. Featuring an intimate family album of her playing with Morocco and Monroe, everything looks totally cute and normal &mdash; except for the fact that Mariah's wearing a formal dresses and shitloads of diamonds. Celebrities are just like us! []</p> <p>Man, someone needs to remind Charlize Theron to take her ginkgo biloba. Showing the early stages of what is commonly referred to as Mommyitis, the actress says she can't even recall what life was like before adopting Jackson and getting hit with the memory erasure of motherhood. "I feel like I can't remember anything prior to him," she said. "I feel like it was always just meant to be what it is." []<br> Charlize and Kristen Stewart were clearly given the same memo when it came to dressing for the London premiere of Snow White And The Huntsman: "Sheer. Black. No, sheerer." []</p> <p>Considering her drug and baby doll-clad past it was probably more like a real-life flashback than pedestrian anxiety attack, but Courtney Love freaked the fuck out at the scores of "identical blond models in pink nighties" who were "taking pills, writhing on a couch or smoking cigarettes" at interactive play Sleep No More's latest spinoff, The Forgotten. "You'd turn a corner and suddenly there'd be another girl up against the wall. Walking through, Courtney started saying, ‘Get me out of here. I have to get out of here!'" said an onlooker, another adding, "She bolted for the exit, albeit the wrong one &mdash; mid-performance &mdash; which did nothing to calm her anxiety. All these models acting like pill-crazed lunatics then came out of character to console her. She felt trapped and claustrophobic." It sounds genuinely terrifying. []</p> <p>If she has her way, Barbra Streisand is going to be the chart-topper of your grandchildren's generation. Proving you can't keep an icon down, there is talk she's going to duet with the likes of Rihanna and Adele. Which would just be the best. []</p>?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?<p>The Hot Topic-friendly cat-loving anti-social cartoon character found in 35 countries is getting her own , and Chloe will star. Emily's creator says: "When I first met Chloe I knew I found my Emily."</p>?<p>Kick-Ass has been hotly debated since the trailer debuted, featuring 11-year-old assassin calling bad guys "cunts." Critics still disagree about her character, but say the film may do for superhero movies what Pulp Fiction did for crime films.</p><p>Though Hit Girl has gotten all the attention, she isn't actually the star. The film, which opens today, is about Dave Lizewski (Aaron Johnson), an average comic book nerd who buys a wetsuit on the Internet and starts fighting crime. He winds up in the hospital, but video of one of his altercations goes viral on YouTube. He starts doing freelance crime fighting, but discovers he isn't the only amateur superhero in New York City. Former cop Damon Macready () and his daughter Mindy (Chloe Grace Moretz) have transformed themselves into the costumed vigilantes Big Daddy and Hit Girl to take on a mob boss (Mark Strong) who framed Macready years ago. The mob boss' son () is also posing as Red Mist, Hit Girl's arch-nemesis.</p> <p>The meaning of Hit Girl's character, and the fact that Moretz was only 11 during filming, was the focus of most reviews, but critics were generally more concerned by the extreme acts of violence she commits than her cursing. The film features gratuitous Kill Bill-style violence: "human bodies are microwaved, crushed in trash compactors, skewered, bazookaed, and burned alive." While the Macready's have a "genuinely touching" father-daughter relationship, they are never shown discussing the consequences of violence. Hit Girl is unaffected by what she does, and one critic remarked that, Moretz is "still playing dress-up, and the sneakier parts of the character elude her." She doesn't keep up with Nicolas Cage, whose performance critics found surprisingly nuanced, even though he's doing an Adam West impersonation throughout.</p> <p>The film's central question about what happens when ordinary people try to become superheros was already addressed in last year's Watchmen, which like Kick-Ass was based on a graphic novel, but critics say director Matthew Vaughn did a better job adapting his material into film. There are some clever insights in the film about celebrity culture and the appeal of violent superhero stories, even if some, like Roger Ebert, still find using a young girl to examine those themes, "morally reprehensible."</p> <p></p> <p>In a profile of Moretz in the Sunday New York Times, the director, Matthew Vaughn, pointed out the hypocrisy of those who criticized his movie's use of profanity while ignoring its violence: "I was like, 'Does it not bother you that she killed about 53 people in this film?' … I'm like, 'Would you rather your daughter swore, or became a masked vigilante killer?' They're going, 'Yeah, I don't know.' "<br> Cogently put, sir. But this critic, for one, is going, "Yeah, it does bother me that Moretz's character, Hit Girl, and her fellow amateur superheroes rack up a body count in the high dozens." In the course of this zany romp made for the high-school set, human bodies are microwaved, crushed in trash compactors, skewered, bazookaed, and burned alive. And, yes, it's comic-book violence and deliberately over the top-but since Kick-Ass' whole premise is that comic-book violence, when enacted in real life, has real consequences, it seems a strange choice to layer Tarantino-style splatter onto the Y.A.-novel setting and play the whole thing for laughs.</p> <p></p> <p>[Hit Girl's] language is so astonishingly crude that it has taken people's attention away from all the killing she does, which is mind-boggling as well. Yet at the same time as we're unnerved by someone so young acting this way, what makes this film so intriguing is that, largely due to the terrific spirit and skill of young actress Moretz, if you are any kind of action film fan it's difficult to deny the live-wire pulp energy that plays out on screen. It's as if all the arguments about these hyper-violent films - why they are so popular, what they have done to our culture - are open for business in one convenient location. It may or may not be the end of civilization as we know it, but Kick-Ass certainly is Exhibit A of the here and now.</p> <p>Sentences I never thought I'd write: Nicholas Cage gives the most nuanced performance in this movie. Cage, now firmly entrenched in his late-mannerist phase, turns a neat vocal trick whenever he dons his Big Daddy mask and cape: His speech rhythms lurch into the odd staccato delivery of Adam West, TV's original Batman. As Damon McReady talking to his daughter, Cage sounds completely different, his voice a soothing paternal wheedle. Cage's studied, campy performance doesn't really fit the movie's tossed-off, casual tone, but you have to admire the amount of thought he put into details that so few younger viewers will notice. A man who names his son Kal-El is a man who takes his comics seriously.</p> <p></p> <p>Hit Girl, trained by a daddy (Nicolas Cage) with rubber-suited-vigilante ambitions of his own, turns out to be the most ass-kicking character in the film. The reason that's a good joke is that the way she turns villains into cannon fodder is really no more preposterous than, say, Bruce Willis doing the same thing. Yet is it a problem that Kick-Ass is by far the most violent movie ever to feature kids as heroes? Parents should consider themselves warned, though personally, I just wish that the film had ended up a bit less of an over-the-top action ride. It didn't need this much slam-bang when it had us at real-life superheroics.</p> <p></p> <p>To apotheosize the cliches of the genre while subverting them is a neat trick, but the Kick-Ass cadre pulls it off. This is a violent R-rated drama that comments cogently on the impulses - noble, venal or twisted - that lead people to help or hurt others. Kick-Ass kicks beaucoup d'ass, in some of the dandiest, most punishing stunt work this side of Hong Kong, but it forces the grownups in the audience to acknowledge that the action is as troubling as it is gorgeous. (Preteens should definitely wait a few years before seeing this.) The result is a work that spills out of itself to raise issues about all superhero characters, all action pictures. Millar isn't boasting when he writes in the making-of book that Kick-Ass could "redefine superhero movies in the same way Pulp Fiction redefined crime movies."</p> <p></p> <p>Here and there, Kick-Ass offers some genuinely clever observations about the creation of celebrity in a world where viral video clips and latenight talkshow quips can turn attention seekers into overnight sensations (and inadvertent role models). Pic also takes a few potshots at not-so-innocent bystanders who refuse to get actively involved in anyone else's emergencies. For the most part, however, "Kick-Ass" is less concerned with social commentary than slam-bang outrageousness. Hit Girl's increasingly escalating mayhem is a running joke that somehow gets funnier as the pic progresses, and Moretz's deft mix of girlish sincerity and steely ferocity only increases the laugh quotient. Of course, that won't be enough to keep some professional moralists from taking issue with her onscreen activity.</p> <p></p> <p>Although 's foul-mouthed portrayal of the plucky Mindy has already drawn fire in the blogosphere, Mindy's self-reliance and confidence result in a weirdly reassuring portrait of a young girl who's able to defend herself. What's more, her relationship with her father isn't cynical but genuinely touching (and Nicolas Cage, in his Big Daddy persona, delivers a pretty funny Adam West imitation as the caped Big Daddy). Too often, movies as besotted with violence as Kick-Ass simply ratchet up the action at the expense of everything else. To his credit, Vaughn (best known for the graphic novel adaptation Stardust) makes sure that the stylized, progressively more fantastical set pieces here are leavened with compensatory humor, a gratifyingly playful tone and characters blessed with smarts and lovability. What's more, he stages Kick-Ass with the fluidity and flutter of a comic book itself: The film's penultimate shootout, filmed in flashes of darkness and strobe-lit mayhem, looks like a series of pen-and-ink panels brought to outrageous, outsize life.</p> <p></p> <p>In schizoid fashion, I both spluttered and enjoyed myself. Moretz has aplomb, and when Cage underplays the monomania, he reminds you what a droll comic actor he can be. Director-panderer Matthew Vaughn fetishizes the little girl and her virtuosic scissor-knife work, the hyperbolic weaponry, the can-you-top-this carnage. There's even a teen-sex angle: Johnson's nerd superhero pretends to be gay so he can have "nonthreatening" sleepovers with a luscious classmate. Kick-Ass is a compendium of all sleazy things, and it sings like a siren to our inner Tarantinos.</p> <p></p> <p>There's something about the killer schoolgirl that turns some filmmakers on, and audiences, too - who knows what further dangers lurk beneath that kilt? However chastely, Mr. Vaughn plays on that unsettling image, which shores up the false impression that because Hit-Girl is a powerful figure she's also an empowering one. Ms. Moretz certainly walks the walk and jumps the jump, loading a new gun in midrun like a baby Terminator. But as her deployment of a four-letter slur for women indicates, and as the cop-out last blowout only underscores, Hit-Girl isn't a wee Wonder Woman. She's not even a latter-day Lara Croft, who, however absurd, works on screen because of Ms. Jolie's own outsize persona. A supergimmick, Hit-Girl by contrast is a heroine for these movie times: a vision of female might whittled down to pocketsize.</p> <p></p> <p>If you have a particularly delicate stomach and object to seeing seeing heads lopped off, limbs getting hacked, bodies exploding and being crushed, you might have a problem with Kick-Ass. Especially because much of that mayhem is committed by an 11-year old girl. But while it's violent, it's also a heck of a lot of fun as it upends the tired formula for superhero films. It cleverly dissects the superhero phenomenon even as it celebrates it. It's smart and it's a hoot and that's a winning combo. As he proved so handily in Layer Cake, director-cowriter Matthew Vaughn knows how to give a lively goose to the oldest and most hackneyed of movie cliches. There is a final, extended shootout scene here that references one of Quentin Tarantino's in Kill Bill and then tops it, deploying violence and humor to dazzling effect. It will have you gasping in shock &mdash; Hit Girl is central to it &mdash; even as you're laughing. Would I want to see an 11-year kid, male or female, whacking folk in real life? Of course not. But Hit Girl and Kick-Ass are so removed from reality that a viewer can appreciate the character for the clever conceit that it is. The critics need to chill.</p> <p></p> <p>An 11-year-old girl swearing is not the end of the world, just one more jokey coarsening in the fabric of life in our 24/7 googolplex. I'm more concerned that Moretz can't keep up with Cage, who's a past master of serious wack. This time out, the actor has swiped Adam West's diction from the old Batman TV series as Big Daddy grudgingly accepts Kick-Ass into his and Hit-Girl's gruesome revenge plot. For all the flying masonry and stuntwork, Cage remains this movie's most special special effect. Moretz is game, but she's still playing dress-up, and the sneakier parts of the character elude her. Is there an extra Fanning sister stuck at home with nothing to do? Maybe she could have taken this role into truly transgressive realms while convincing us of the character's humanity - the power charge Hit-Girl gets from wasting bad guys and the price she pays in losing her childhood.</p> <p></p> <p>Kick-Ass comes closest to inspired, unsettling lunacy when it lets Moretz loose on a bunch of bad guys who aren't expecting death to arrive wearing pigtails. But elsewhere, Vaughn struggles to put his own stamp on some familiar action beats, unless spotlighting a billboard featuring his wife, Claudia Schiffer, counts as a personal touch. A film about wannabes who use attitude and bluster to emulate their inspirations, this ersatz blockbuster ends up seeming a little too much like its heroes.</p> <p></p> <p>Shall I have feelings, or should I pretend to be cool? Will I seem hopelessly square if I find Kick-Ass morally reprehensible and will I appear to have missed the point? Let's say you're a big fan of the original comic book, and you think the movie does it justice. You know what? You inhabit a world I am so very not interested in. A movie camera makes a record of whatever is placed in front of it, and in this case, it shows deadly carnage dished out by an 11-year-old girl, after which an adult man brutally hammers her to within an inch of her life. Blood everywhere. Now tell me all about the context.</p> <p>Earlier: <br> <br> </p>?<p>What's the most shocking thing about Hit Girl in the forthcoming Kick-Ass? Is it that she's a young girl committing violence? Or is it that word &mdash; cunt? Maybe it's just how easily the filmmakers have played us all.</p><p>Even though the film isn't called Hit Girl, Chloe Moretz's character has dominated all accounts, even . Here he is in The Los Angeles Times:</p> <p>"The temperature just rises and rises as soon as she comes up on the screen," Vaughn said. "I'm sitting there and in weird way I'm just counting the minutes until she shows up because I know when Hit Girl is on the screen we have the audience, we've got them. And people that see her know what she's accomplished. She wasn't sexualized, it wasn't gratuitous, it was fun and she comes off as a great, fully realized female heroine."</p> <p>The producers of the movie are helped by the fact that Moretz is herself unfailingly self-possessed and mature, that she insists she would never say that word herself, and that this is all pretend. (Let's call it the Dakota Fanning paradigm.) She USA Today, for example, "People shouldn't get so upset. It's all pretend. I still like slumber parties and popcorn fights."</p> <p>Of course, Moretz being a smart kid and seeming fresh-faced and well-adjusted, not to mention being white and blonde, actually helps make the film's case: It accentuates the uncomfortable contrast between her character's appearance (innocent girl) and her actions (potty-mouthed, violent.)</p> <p>Fair enough. But there is something rather unconvincing about Vaughn's line to The Daily Beast:</p> <p>"It's more astonishing that people talk about [her saying "cunt"] than about a young girl who kills people...I was told that the difference between England and America is the sense that if I said to you, ‘I want to fuck you tonight' in a sexual manner, you'd get an R," he continued. "But if I said, ‘I want to fuck you up and blow your head off,' you'd get a PG-13. In England, it's the other way around… I associate with the European attitude. I think sex is far less disturbing than violence."</p> <p>This is pretty disingenuous. Flashing the "Americans are so uptight about sex and I'm European" card may be technically accurate, but it's also irrelevant &mdash; Vaughn has repeatedly said that the film doesn't sexualize Chloe, and that this is actually about action and violence. So what does sex being more or less disturbing than violence have to do with it?</p> <p>In fact, plenty of people who have seen the movie have objected to its violence. Here's David Edelstein of New York, quoted in The Daily Beast:</p> <p>"The level of violence, the garishness of the violence, was even more shocking than what Chloe said," said Edelstein, who's the father of a 12-year-old girl. About one particularly brutal moment, Edelstein said, "I've never seen anything like that."</p> <p>As far as the movie's language, "I was weaned on Mamet," he said. "And I hear kids, when I walk around the neighborhood, I hear little kids use some of those words. I think the genie's out of the bottle."</p> <p>And Roger Ebert "Shall I have feelings, or should I pretend to be cool? Will I seem hopelessly square if I find "Kick-Ass" morally reprehensible and will I appear to have missed the point?" For him, it's the image of a child committing violence without consequence or feeling that makes him "sad." He doesn't even mention "cunt."</p> <p>But it's so fun to debate what it means! We've been for . And it can be an interesting debate. But when the filmmakers protest so much and express such surprise at how uptight everyone is, you have to wonder at what a cynical ploy it all is.</p> <p> [LAT]<br> [Roger Ebert/Chicago Sun-Times]<br> [USAT]<br> [USAT]<br> [Daily Beast]</p> <p>Earlier: <br> <br> </p>?<p>Kim Kardashian flew to Australia not only to "escape" media scrutiny following her announcement that she was divorcing her husband of 1728 hours, Kris Humphries: she also went there to her Kardashian Kollection handbag line. Which includes the Kardashians' versions of some of the world's most knocked-off bags: Balenciaga's "Part Time," Chloe's "Marcie," and Foley + Corinna's "City Bag." Earlier this year, the Kardashian Kollection a well-known Botkier bag. In the graphic above, each Kardashian Kopy is on the left. Kim kapitalized on the konfusion between kopy and kreation by karrying an actual Balenciaga at her first Australian public appearance.</p>?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?<p>In a crappy economy, some women are picking up some freelance work: Fetish and dominatrix gigs.</p> <p>These kind of jobs don't usually involve actual sex, Tracy Quan (a former call girl) for The Daily Beast. "The sector is poised for expansion as more unemployed and underemployed women begin looking for extra cash." And it doesn't matter if you're not really "into" the scene. Writes Quan:<br></p> Because many of these freelance pro-dommes are just supplementing their incomes and don’t plan on staying in forever, they may not be as erotically hardcore in their outside lives. “I wasn't really that interested” in S&M, says Chloe. “I got involved because it was easy money. The strap-on? I'm OK with it, but it's not really a personal interest of mine.” <p>Maybe you're thinking, why spank a businessman or let some dude suck your toes if you're not even into it? But the same could be said of answering phones, making a latte or cleaning someone's house. (In Mumbai, are finding that sex work on the side helps them earn a decent living.)</p> <p>On the other hand, unlike being a receptionist or a barista, working in the is an occupation some women might be reluctant to talk to friends and family about. Chloe, the art student Quan interviewed for her piece, says her mother "would probably cry" and be "very upset" about her fetish gigs, although Quan speculates: "some parents would be secretly proud of a daughter resourceful enough to hack the increasingly rigid class system that permeates New York life."</p> <p>Still: Do you believe a job is a job? Do you believe extra money is extra money? If there's no kissing, no sex, just spanking or foot worship, is there any harm in freelance fetish work? Quan puts it this way: "Even if you’re bossing your client around in a pair of thigh-high boots, you’re still working in a service industry. And after an hour, your feet hurt."</p> <p> [The Daily Beast]<br> [Hindustan Times]</p>?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?<p>And the show begins! Come on in, we've got Mo'Nique's speech and lots of commentary.</p><p>11:00 GOOD NIGHT! Thanks for hanging out with us!</p> <p>10:57 Well. Blue aliens beat illiterate black teens and Iraq war thrillers. These are the times we live in.</p> <p>10:55 Julia Roberts: Drunk? Man, I wish Kathryn Bigelow would win and not her ex-husband. Sigh.</p> <p>10:51 Behold: Emily Blunt, looking pissed.</p> <p> <br> <br> </p> <p>10:48 Jeff Bridges is looking very Dude. His wife is SPARKLY.</p> <p>10:46 The Winslet looks divine. Sophia Loren, we all saw you eating.</p> <p>Good speech, RDJ.</p> <p>10:39 Best Actor, RDJ. "If you start playing violins, I am going to tear this joint apart."</p> <p>10:36 Sandra Bullock, Best Actress? I honestly thought maybe Gabby or Carey.</p> <p>10:35 Arnold: "This. Is Avvadar."</p> <p>10:30 It's a good thing we had Mo'Nique and Drew and Meryl… This is turning into a boys' night. Oh: Best Actress/Drama is coming up.</p> <p>10:27 This category is dumb. The Hangover against Nine against It's Complicated? Weirdness.</p> <p>10:19 A win for Glee. The kids are cute.</p> <p>10:15 Boo, I wanted Kathryn Bigelow to win. She has to watch her ex-husband give the speech. Boo. BOO.</p> <p>10:14 Jeremy Renner was SO GOOD in The Hurt Locker.</p> <p>Here's the Chloe clip:</p> <p></p> <p></p> <p>Marty: Short, fast-talking New Yorker. Pure kinetic energy.</p> <p>What I mean is: He feels like home.</p> <p>10:03 WAIT WHAT. Shutter Island commercial? It was made like 2 years ago and keeps getting pushed back. Not a good sign.</p> <p>I totally recreated that Sharon Stone Casino moment with poker chips at a party once.</p> <p>I love Bobby D. And I love Marty Scorcese. Lots of love!</p> <p>Here's Chloe's name spelled wrong:<br> </p> <p></p> <p>And here's Chloe's face re: the dress fiasco:<br> <br> </p> <p>9:47 Chloe: "I can't believe he just ripped my dress!"</p> <p>Anna says they spelled Chloe's name wrong?</p> <p>I don't like the mascara on her bottom lashes, not that anyone cares.</p> <p>9:45 OH HAI Buff Werewolf. Shut up people, Taylor's talking!</p> <p>9:38 HAMM. Mad Men. EVERYONE SHOULD GO ON STAGE SO WE CAN GET A GOOD LOOK.</p> <p>9:36 The best foreign-language film I saw last year was Sin Nombre. HIGHLY RECOMMENDED.</p> <p>9:34 Sophia Loren's GLASSES. the new hot shit.</p> <p>9:30 Oh! The updates are working again! Thanks TECH!</p> <p>9:26 So when I worked at a teen magazine, I interviewed Matthew Morrison; he was in a BOYBAND called LMNT. True story.</p> <p>9:23 Kathryn Bigelow The Hurt Locker didn't win, and that annoys me.</p> <p>9:20 Cammie D looks… different?</p> <p>9:14 Drew Barrymore's earrings are astounding.</p> <p>9:12 Morgan Freeman boozin' it up!</p> <p>9:09 You go ahead and be a stone cold silver fox, Helen Mirren. I'll just be sitting here in my pajamas.</p> <p>9:05 I feel like I haven't seen Cameron Diaz in a long time.</p> <p>9:02 T-Bone Streep is my new band name.</p> <p>9:01 Meryl!!! Of course. Like Sandy Bullock in The Proposal could beat her?!?!</p> <p>9:00 Colin Farrell hasn't been around lately, huh?</p> <p>8:55 My post is not updating! I want to say that I heart Drew and she looks sooo pretty!</p> <p>8:53 Amy Adams, your dress is bad. Sorry.</p> <p>8:46 Has anyone seen Crazy Heart?</p> <p>8:43 CHER! XTINA! I am psyched for Burlesque. Christina's hair looks amazing.</p> <p>8:40 Are we having fun yet?</p> <p>8:36 Not that she cares, but I like when Julianna Margulies wears her hair curly.</p> <p>8:33NPH still making fun of his face.</p> <p>Here's Mo'Nique's speech:<br> <br> </p> <p>8:23 Everyone in the Feria commercial looks like they've been stretched vertically.</p> <p>8:21 Best Animated Film is a tough category! Up was awesome, but I also loved The Princess & The Frog and Coraline.</p> <p>8:18 John Lithgow thanking his wife: Sweet!</p> <p>8:17<br> Best Supporting Actor TV… I am rooting for Ben Linus for some reason.</p> <p>8:16<br> Did you see Julia Roberts dis NBC? Clip . Also, Neil Patrick Harris showed off his Botox .</p> <p>8:12 "Cheers! Have a great night!"</p> <p>Okay, so I am thinking that I'll drink every time there's an NBC joke. Be afraid for me.</p> <p>8:10 This category is STACKED. Go Toni Collette, even though I do not watch your show. And go Diablo Cody.</p> <p>8:09 The first speech has set the bar HIGH. That was perfect.</p> <p>8:07 She's shaking. She's genuine. The Hollywood Foreign Press loves her!</p> <p>8:06 Well. Mo'Nique!!</p> <p>8:05 Nicole Kidman's nipples.</p> <p>8:03 Good to know Kiefer Sutherland can laugh off jokes about his violent temper.</p> <p>8:02 "Penis reduction."</p> <p>8:01<br> Ricky Gervais starts immediately with the Steve Carrell jokes.</p>?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?<p>Marc Jacobs turns 49 today. He's down in Brazil celebrating with the porn star who's been calling the designer "boyfriend" on Twitter, where we hope nobody is giving him a birthday present in trade. In honor of the momentous date, British Vogue has a look back at how his style has changed over the years. Here's Jacobs in 2005 and 2006. []</p> The aforementioned porn star Harry Louis &mdash; who is neither the first porn star (Erik Rhodes) nor the first Brazilian (Lorenzo Martone) the designer has dated, but may in fact be the first Brazilian porn star &mdash; Tweeted the designer a happy birthday message. []<br> Jacobs and Louis, who first got in December, have been hitting the scene in Rio de Janeiro this week. [] Jacobs' new perfume, Dot, has a bottle (ladybug-ish), a price ($48-$89), and an ad campaign (Codie Young by Juergen Teller). Jacobs says: "I asked myself, What would this Dot be? And for me, it would be something that was chic, something that was charming. A dot is timeless and a pattern I always love, and round shapes are always beautiful." [] Carine Roitfeld's new magazine will be named CR Fashion Book, CR for short. This is a mock-up cover. The first issue will be 288 pages and will cost $9.95; the magazine will have no front-of-book section, no standalone ads (only spreads), and will publish only long-form writing and fashion and beauty editorials. Included in the mock issue is a story about Patti Smith, accompanied by Bruce Weber photos, pictured. That is so great we hope it's real. [] Arizona Muse rocks asymmetrical hair and a big smile on the cover of Vogue China. [] Here are the characters of Final Fantasy XIII-2 wearing current season Prada men's wear. Photoshopped for Arena Homme Plus. []?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?<p></p> <p>Worried that Alexander McQueen's show, a tribute to his friend and champion, Isabella Blow, was going to be bathed in bathos? Well it turns out that McQueen, who showed in Paris over the weekend, had the collection of the season, or so sayeth the critics. Those same critics were less kind to Nina Ricci and Chloe - except for Suzy Menkes, who seems to love everyone except sworn enemy Marc Jacobs. Below, the major fashion critics take on McQueen, Ricci, Chloe and John Galliano.</p> McQueen:<br> "McQueen seemed to almost dare anyone to match him for know-how and imagination" "command performance" "you could [not] take your eyes off the clothes" "alluringly severe dresses" "he pushed his modern identity and cutting out ahead of those forms, lightening them, softening them. It made for thrilling fashion" &mdash;Cathy Horyn, The New York Times <p>"[Isabella] Blow is now with the angels" "emotional sensitivity of the show brought some beautiful homages" "unique pieces" McQueen's harsh attitude to women has not changed. Models struggled down the runway on teetering platforms. It is an inevitable part of his oeuvre that a woman will appear caged - even if the dress underneath is divine" &mdash;Suzy Menkes, International Herald Tribune</p> <p>"[A] collection of outrageous beauty" "all a vivid reminder of Blow's eccentric, stylish wardrobe." &mdash;Hilary Alexander, The Telegraph</p> <p>"McQueen mustered the clarity to dispense with smoke and mirrors and show his capabilities in cut, drape, and feathered flourish to an audience near enough to inspect every detail" "his romantic fairy-goddess chiffons put him back in the game of current trend" "McQueen honored his mentor by striving to bring out the best in himself" - Sarah Mower, Style.com<br> <br> <br> Nina Ricci:<br> "[A] listless collection that didn't suggest a clear plan" "he achieved... wreckage" "dirty colors" "jackets that looked lifted from a mud room" "stringy hair dangling with feathers" "[b]ut other designers have done the same" "isn't very far from what a cool girl is wearing now" &mdash;Cathy Horyn, The New York Times</p> <p>"Nina Ricci has never been so beautifully realized" "a perfume of a collection that hit a modern spot between romantic and sugary" "combining a youthful stride" &mdash;Suzy Menkes, International Herald Tribune</p> <p>"[A] particularly poetic state of dishevelment" "smudged by the murky first light of a city day" "a reassertion of his Belgian identity" "deciding to take the path of underground edginess rather than Parisian chic" "what he's doing for day is the thing to watch" - Sarah Mower, Style.com<br> <br> <br> John Galliano:<br> "Mr. Galliano's style is romantic and narrative, typically with an impoverished muse at the center" "for once the models looked happy in their outfits and nobody complained that they were too thin" "looked fresh" "light and friendly" &mdash;Cathy Horyn, The New York Times</p> <p>"Everything in John Galliano's garden was lovely" "However much the designer plants new ideas and changes the landscape (this time it was a carousel and fairground) the effect is always much the same" "this was just Galliano light" "sweet but never cloying" &mdash;Suzy Menkes, International Herald Tribune</p> <p>"Here all was softness, frills, retro bias-cuts and gentle pastels, with the emphasis on roses; printed on chiffon, appliqued in silk and half-hidden within the folds of a ruffled peplum." &mdash;Hilary Alexander, The Telegraph</p> <p>"[A] gamely dizzy performance of typical Galliano-esque high jinks" "Galliano is motoring on reinterpretations of his classics" "it happens that this is a season in which that looks right" "the narrative wasn't a groundbreaker, merely a device for trotting out Galliano's standard pretty, printed, flouncy dresses" "Galliano is still in the game" &mdash;Sarah Mower, Style.com<br> <br> <br> Chloe:<br> "But could Mr. Andersson have starved his hungry audience more? The shapes in the collection were so undefined, so indistinct that you had the feeling the same dress was going by again and again" &mdash;Cathy Horyn, The New York Times</p> <p>"It seemed smart to take Chloe back to its roots - while still pushing forward. It has most recently been pitched as a brand for women who want to stay forever innocent on the cusp of maidenhood and maturity" "...this season proved that [designer Paulo Andersson] is not trapped in that vision." &mdash;Suzy Menkes, International Herald Tribune</p> <p>"[R]etro-cuteness cauterized by an intrinsic graphic modernity" "something fresh" "a few rare thoughts about how to make transparency passable on a daily basis" "there was a lot of repetition" "reverted, in a contemporary way, to the old-time Chloe of the early seventies, when Karl Lagerfeld [designed it]" - Sarah Mower, Style.com</p>?<p>Taking all celebrity gossip as gospel ? as we should, even just for kicks ? mean girl Kim Kardashian outed herself as a complete piece of shit by making fun of Demi Moore's Whip-It-related seizures at Elton John's Oscar party. She requested Devo's "Whip It" in front of the crowed room and said it was "dedicated to Demi" before cackling up a storm with Gretchen and Karen. The reason why she was being such an unbridled asshole? Some non-feud that started via Twitter a couple of years back wherein Demi accused Kim of being immature for glamorizing a pimp lifestyle &mdash; which she has clearly not gotten over, as evidenced by the fact she was overheard saying "she called me immature!" before requesting the track. Well, that classy and sophisticated move sure showed her. []</p> <p>It's official! Blue Ivy is going to achieve world domination in our lifetime, according to Gwyneth Paltrow. Having met the two-month old, she says that there's no question she'll grow to become our entertainment overlord. "For sure, she is going to be an entertainer. She just has this glow around her like her mother," she said, adding that Beyonce is doing well despite the fact she knows she'll eventually be usurped by her daughter. "Beyonce is doing great. She's just a natural at being a mom. And Blue Ivy is stunning, she has the most beautiful eyes." []</p> <p>Now, I don't know about y'all but this is one potential relationship that I'd happily co-sign &mdash; and I'm sure Elizabeth Olsen and Alexander Skarsgard will be happy to hear that because my opinion clearly shapes their world. Anywhoozle, the two hot stars of the moment, with Elizabeth being beautiful and of the moment while Alex is just plain hot, were spotted deep in sexy conversation at Vanity Fair's post-Oscar party at the Sunset Tower. "They were talking in a corner, for a long time," said some nosy thing. Alex broke up with Kate Bosworth last year. []</p> <p> It's a dark day when Madonna has to bow down to Joe Francis over Girls Gone Wild/"Girls Gone Wild" copyright issues. The sleaze lord sent the icon a cease and decease letter asking that she not play the song during her Super Bowl half-time show and she complied. Now she's had to change the title to her just-released song to the singular, "Girl Gone Wild." But Joe is still not happy. "Clearly her label was trying to avoid legal action surrounding the song," he said. "But, this is still infringement as far as the law is concerned and we have been in touch with Madonna's representatives in an effort to resolve this issue." []<br> UPDATE: Madonna, via her manager Guy Oseary, says that she changed the title because she wanted to and not because some dick asked her to. []</p> <p>Add Valentine's Day director Garry Marshall to the list of people who think that Jessica Biel and Justin Timberlake's marriage may not work out in the long-term. He said he hopes "it all works out" despite the fact that Jessica would get all excited when speaking about it. "We talk about it a lot. I hope it all works out &mdash; they are terrific kids," said the not-so-cryptic maestro. "I love them both. I'm happy for her." []</p>?<p><br> If every shopping mall gave you a farewell as adorable as the ones given by Chloe at the Copley Place Mall in Boston, we would be out shopping, recession and mall headache be damned.</p> <p>[]</p>?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?<p></p> <p>In a statement, the couple says: "We ask for consideration and respect for our family as we go through this difficult period." They have two kids from the marriage, and Melissa has two children from a previous relationship. Sigh. []</p>?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?<p> When our girls won the national title in last week's episode, you might have thought it was the shining moment for the the students of the Abby Lee Miller dance school. But what's a national title when you could be shimmying around in neon feathers and hair extensions for a music video? Welcome to the Dance Moms finale. Abby, the dancers, and the moms packed up and went to Los Angeles, where they would participate in a music video for some unknown singer (okay, her name is Lux) who wanted to have a music video filled with little girls.</p> <p> But one only one of them could be the lead, and the girl had to both look like Lux and be able to dance. And so, it was time for auditions. First of all, when did "Pretend you're on a catwalk" turn into "Prance around like you're a stripper at a night club?" And when did these girls learn such overtly sexual moves? Once I got over how awful it was to see little girls dancing sexually while their mothers cheered them on from the sidelines, I had to admit it was oddly gratifying to see Chloe win the lead role instead of Maddie.</p>?<p>The US Social Security Administration released a list of the most popular baby names from 2011, and each of the top 5 girls' names ends with the letter "a." You know, like your privates.</p> <p>While Labia, Vulva, Vagina, Areola, Ova, Crura, and Vaginal Corona have yet to crack the list of the top 10 most popular baby names for girls, other hyper feminine names did. The kindergarten class of 2017 will be teeming with Sophias, Emmas, Isabellas, Olivias, and Avas. Rounding out the top 10 were Emily, Abigail, Madison, Mia, and Chloe.</p> <p>About half of the boys' names sound like names given to boys that a teenage Mitt Romney would have punched in the stomach&mdash; Jayden, Mason, Ethan, and Aiden. The other six most popular were pretty similar to what people might have named baby boys in 1910&mdash; Jacob, William, Noah, Michael, Alexander, and Daniel. Jacob has topped the list for the 13th year in a row. Soon, the world will be run by an army of Jacobs.</p> <p>None of the popular names are that much of a surprise; since about 3/4 of my high school class and half of my college class has reproduced in the two years or so, I feel like my Facebook feed gives me a pretty good handle on what parents of all stripes are naming their kids nowadays. But what my idle social network browsing didn't give insight to was the least popular names, which are way more awesome/interesting than the most popular names.</p> <p>Unfortunately, the SSA doesn't let users browse the names so rare that they were only given to one or two kids last year, but rounding out the top 1,000 are some pretty interesting syllables and spelling variations. Like Kohen, a name given to only 194 boys last year. Or Damaris, which was only given to 250-odd girls born in 2011. Other unpopular girl baby names in 2011 include Malaysia (with 262 incidents), Esme (258 babies), Kyndal (273), Regan (276), Yaritza (276), and, surprisingly, Ann (252). Rare baby boys were named Cayson (194), Major (196), Maxx (203&mdash; and yes, that's with two x's, to denote the baby's future exxtremeness), Bridger (205), Crew (208), and Keyon (193).</p> <p>Surprisingly high on the list? Brooklyn, clocking in at the 19th most popular baby girl name in 2011. The other boroughs weren't as well represented; apparently no one wants to name their kid Manhattan, Bronx, Queens, or Staten Island.</p> <p>[]</p> <p>Image via /Shutterstock</p>?<p>The between Donald Sutherland and Julie Christie in the 1973 Nicholas Roeg classic Don't Look Now always makes the top ten lists of best cinematic nookie ever. And for good reason, as the Guardian's Mark Lawson points out: the scene is "an extended, fragmented, ecstatic encounter." But Lawson , and other "soft-porn" scenes from the 70s, to prove a point that I don't necessarily agree with.</p><p>"When Don't Look Now was released, the big screen was the only place that people might expect to see sex scenes in which they were not personally involved," Lawson argues. "Now, any act involving any actors - animal, child, living, dead - is available online. Philip Larkin, a poet subsequently revealed to be keen on porn, immortalised the view that 'sexual intercourse began in 1963'. But, for cinema at least, sexual intercourse ended in about 2005, when the most explicit images possible became as readily available as television." Sex in cinema still has erotic power in my mind because of the medium more than the message.</p> <p>Sure, you can download any sort of DIY banging you want from the confines of your own home. But there is something powerful, and transgressive, about sitting in a room with a bunch of other people witnessing an explicit act of sex. Because the end game (unless you're ) isn't the consummation of your own sex act, you can appreciate the artistry of the director, the bond between the actors, and the reactions of the people around you.</p> <p>I saw the Brown Bunny in a theater with a platonic dude friend. The explicit blow job scene between Chloe Sevigny and Vincent Gallo was, in person, shocking and sort of funny. It comes out of nowhere in the context of the movie, which is largely ponderous and dialogue-free. Sitting in a room full of people, shifting in our seats and giggling nervously, made the viewing of that cinematic BJ an experience. Had I seen some XTube clip of that same scene, divorced from the rest of the film and viewed from my couch, I'm pretty sure I would have just thought, "Huh. The Sev's giving a BJ to some greasy looking dude. Gross."</p> <p>I agree with Lawson that there has been a "sexual desensitisation" since the days of Don't Look Now, and perhaps there is something "passe" about the sex in Roeg's new release, Puffball. But as someone who never had a chance to see Don't Look Now on the big screen, there's still something transgressive about watching sex on the big screen.</p> <p> [Guardian]</p>?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?<p>There comes a time in in the Hollywood lifecycle when the grizzled, aging heartthrobs totter away, and the new young whippersnapppers step up. Move over, Taylor Lautner. Hit the road, Justin Bieber. It's Booboo Stewart's turn.</p><p>Who is Booboo Stewart?</p> <p>He's an actor.<br> He's a singer-songwriter.<br> He's a dancer.<br> He's a model.<br> He's a stunt double.<br> He's a martial artist.<br> He's a film producer.<br> He's part Japanese.<br> He's part Chinese.<br> He's part Korean.<br> He's part Native American.<br> He's part Russian.<br> He's part Scottish.<br> He's 16.</p> <p>And one tween site, it's Booboo, not Boo Boo, BooBoo or PooPoo. Booboo.</p> <p>You may have seen Booboo playing Seth Clearwater &mdash; the newest young werewolf &mdash; in The Twilight Saga: Eclipse earlier this year. His character apparently becomes more important in Breaking Dawn, the first part of which (yes, two movies, that is a different ridiculous issue) hits theaters next year. Booboo has , a over on the TNA Wrestling website, and was once on the cover of something called Inspire.</p> <p> <br> <br> <br> <br> <br> </p> <p>Right about now you're thinking, damn, does he look way too young? Or am I getting old?<br> The answer is: Both!</p> <p>The paparazzi have begun to follow Booboo, and snap him and his sisters Fivel and Sage on and off the red carpet. You read that right. FIVEL. And Sage.</p> <p> <br> </p> <p>The teen sites have been on the Booboo beat for a while; a story about Booboo getting punched in the face at a mall (sample comment: "i wanna kiss his booboo and make it all better"); Booboo denies dating someone named Chloe Bridges; in-depth piece is about Boooboo getting a haircut; and is a post simply titled, "Check out Booboo's Hot Bod!"</p> <p>Here's Booboo being coerced to take his shirt off on Australian television.</p> <p><br> <br> Remember, it's not just the Britneys and the Lindsays and the Mileys who get objectified and placed upon a pedestal. America loves her boytoys. You heard it hear first: Booboo is the heartthrob of 2011.</p> <p><br> <br> [Wikipedia]<br> [4tnz]<br> [Official Fan Site]<br> [OceanUp]</p> <p>Earlier: </p>?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?<p></p> <p>A source says they're not worried, because chances are, the pix will end up in all the mags: "They'd rather be on page 50 of Us, People, In Touch or Life & Style than be on the cover of a magazine like OK! that isn't going to sell. They need to make money, and so does the magazine. The formula is changing," spills a source. []</p>?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?<p>Veterinary Pet Insurance compiled a list of the most popular names for dogs and cats in 2008 from its database of 466,000 pets and found the most unusual names while they were at it.</p> <p>"People" names were the most popular, with Max coming in first for both cats and dogs and Bella, Lucy, and Chloe making both top 10 lists. But some people clearly prefer more creativity in their , judging from the unusual names Edward Scissorpaws, Sir Lix-a-lot, Snoop Kitty Kitty, and Admiral Toot. []</p> <p>[Image via .]</p>?<p>Earlier today, we noticed the anorex-positive Teen Vogue were mysteriously disabled, so Jessica called up the company to see what the problem was. "Technical difficulties," she was told, and commenters, praise Christ, have commenced weighing in &mdash; see what we did there?? &mdash; on such questions as "" (Answer: NO.) But that was a close call... and what timing, guys! It's Thanksgiving! Where would your audience turn for thinspiration if not to your trusty website? Oh right.</p> <p>Your magazine:<br> Hey, check out that chick modeling resort wear on page 202 of the December/January issue! You can totally play the "arm? or leg?" game with her limbs! And just so you know, the coat is Chloe and they don't give you the price, but you can get the Missoni bikini bottoms for the low low price of "about $390." Whatevs, at least you won't be spending money eating!</p>?<p> Chloe Lattanzi, 25-year-old daughter of Olivia Newton-John, is clearly going through a rebellious phase: This video is surely the antithesis of her Mother's portrayal of the squeaky-clean Sandy in Grease. Graphic images ahead.</p> <p>In "Play With Me," Chloe acts out killing herself in a multitude fo ways: by electrocution in the bathtub, slitting her wrist, by shooting herself in the head, and another time by snorting cocaine. Each time, she's next to a man who we presume is to be her lover (but, um, why is he dropping a deuce on the john while she's in the tub?). We have no idea what's going on here, but we don't like it.</p> <p> Chloe has taken to YouTube with a video response, where she suggests her reason for the violence is because "it's an artist's job to challenge ideas. So that's what I'm doing." She continues, "As you can see, I'm a very well-adjusted person. We have morals, and values, and respect life. It's quite obvious." Why all of the death? "It's purely just for artistic value: I don't want to kill myself, I don't want to die, I don't want to kill anybody." To her critics, she asks them to "bring on the negativity because I am a good person." Sure you are, but are you a good songwriter? Eh.</p> <p> [HuffPo]<br> [YouTube]</p>?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?<p>Chloe Marshall, aka Miss Surrey 2008, the first ever plus-size contestant in the Miss England beauty pageant, appeared on Tyra today for an episode about "embracing your big fat ass." (Those are TyTy's words, not mine.) Chloe says that in the pageant, which takes place next month, she will be wearing a bikini for the swimsuit competition. Tyra was a little more interested in talking about what kind of food Chloe eats. Then Tyra asked her how people say "throw up" in England…where they speak English. Clip above.</p>?<p> She's 176 lbs. and she just might become the next Miss England. 17-year old Chloe Marshall says she entered the world of pageants to teach people that "big is beautiful." Surely with her winning smile and an attitude that's as gorgeous as her body, she'll go far. And if she doesn't? Well, Chloe says she'd love to make a career out of being a professional waxer. Dream big, Chloe. Watch a CNN piece on the amazing Miss Marshall, above.</p>?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?Last night's episode of Project Runway wasn't just the season finale. It was the end of an era. With the show (maybe) moving to Lifetime, an association with Marie Claire instead of Elle and a move to L.A., it will never be the same. It was interesting that there were three ladies as finalists, since there's only been one female winner in the previous four seasons: Chloe Dao. Most of the episode was actually rather dull: Model castings, dog poop, hair, makeup. Then the runway shows, which Bravo peppered with fake applause: Trust me, no one was clapping during each show, for any particular garment. And if you watched carefully, you could hear applause but see the crowd just sitting. In any case, the judges &mdash; Michael, Nina, Heidi and J. Lo-replacement Tim &mdash; had high praise for all three remaining designers. Clip above; collections after the jump.(Click on any image to begin galleries) Kenley's collection was first. The judges liked the bright color palette and the fact that each piece was unique and different. Michael Kors said it was "full of charm" and had "a lot of personality." Tim Gunn pointed out Kenley's "impeccable construction." Nina Garcia was worried that the floral dress was very Balenciaga and Kenley admitted: "I realized now maybe I need to do some research." Finally: Something got through that hard head! That said, I reluctantly admit that I liked Kenley's the best. It was whimsical and made getting dressed look like fun. Oh. But. At the runway show, when Kenley said, "No one touches my clothes," I was quoting Nell Carter. Gimme a break! Korto's collection was inspired by nature. Michael Kors declared it "great." Tim Gunn said she "hit a bullseye." Heidi Klum thought some pieces were "overworked." My mom said she was the only one who made clothes women who are not stick figures could wear. I love Korto, but I didn't love this collection. I did feel awful when Korto did not win, and said, "My heart is bleeding." Leanne, the slinky little Leanimal, was named the winner of Project Runway. Michael Kors said her "workmanship looked divine." Nina Garcia appreciated that her collection had diversity, showing skirts, jackets and long dresses. And honestly? Leanne created stunning, innovative pieces. Congrats, Leanne! And thank you, Project Runway, not only for being entertaining, but for showing the passion, craftsmanship and artisanal skills involved when people really love fashion. Get your shit together and come back in January.<br> <br> <p>Photography by .</p> [Bravo]?<p>Yup, it's the night we've been waiting for: By 11 p.m. we'll all know who won Project Runway season 4. And I don't know about you, but I've been a wreck ever since I saw the final collection in Bryant Park but a mere 4 weeks ago, replaying them over and over again in my minding, tormenting who will be in, and who will be out. Will Rami make all Christian Palestinians from Jerusalem proud of his draping abilities? Will Christian utilize the secret powers of Ferocia Coutura to pull the hair and blind his competition with his pageant of puffy sleeves? Will Jillian's monotonous Long Island accent seduce the judges like a siren song? Jesus Christ, I can't take the questions anymore! Thank God the finale (with special guest judge Victoria Motherfucking Beckham!!!!) starts....now.</p><p>10:58: Awwwww: Tim is gonna cry. I think Tim really does feel very close to Christian. This is the sweetest, most genuine winning ever.</p> <p>10:57: I am gonna cry! This is so sweet and heartfelt.</p> <p>10:56: Don't let it be Rami. Don't let it be Rami. Don't let it be Rami.</p> <p>AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH IT'S CHRISTIAN. He is crying.</p> <p>Aw, and Rami is being so sweet and gracious. Holy fucking shit, did I just see tears in Posh's eyes????</p> <p>10:54: Ugh, why is Heidi again going on about Rami?!</p> <p>Jillian is OUT. That's sad. I am heartbroken that they think RAMI is better than JILLIAN.</p> <p>10:53: Okay, and we're back from commercial. I am sweating bullets. Seriously.</p> <p>Ed note: Hey guys, it's Jen, not Jess, who is live-blogging.</p> <p>10:49: Oooooh but Nina thinks Rami has a bad sense of color! Interesting!</p> <p>Ahhhhhh! It's time!</p> <p>10:48: Nina is such a hater when it comes to Jillian. I wonder if Nina just hates women. But Nina's in love with Christian. And so is Posh, but we all knew that. Thank God Kors is there, the voice of reason.</p> <p>Kors called Rami cerebral?! I take it back about him being the voice of reason.</p> <p>10:47: Heidi loved Rami? If he wins, I cry. And not tears of joy.<br> <br> If he wins, it will be even worse than when Chloe won over Daniel in season 2. UNACCEPTABLE.<br> <br> DO NOT DISAPPOINT ME JUDGES. Jesus, do they have anything mean to say to Rami????</p> <p>I like how Posh's accent is sorta hick. Ha.</p> <p>10:46: Oooh Kors said looks monotonous?! And Nina agrees?! Whoah.<br> <br> I did not see this coming. Why I love Posh: It was monotonous, but it was my style, so I was ok with that.<br> <br> Um, that's fucking brilliant.</p> <p>10:44: Ooh &mdash; good for Heidi for commending Jillian for trying new shapes.<br> <br> Oy, Nina's the only judge who didn't like. But I do agree with Nina and Michael, Jillian is the queen of knitwear.</p> <p>10:43: I like how they all say "Bravo," echoing the name of the channel on which they air.</p> <p>Totes obvious that Jillian stuck with inspiration from Met challenge. Ooh Posh liked it! I swear I get excited just hearing Victoria speak.</p> <p>10:42: Wow &mdash; Nina seems genuinely impressed. I worked with her. I don't think she could fake it if she actually wasn't impressed. (Which is a strength, I think.)</p> <p>10:41: I love how Heidi always puts things in a question: "How amazing was the show?"</p> <p>10:38: Uh, Elizabeth Berkley is hosting some pole-dancing competition reality show? She can't be serious.</p> <p>10:37: Jay McCarroll thinks Rami's going to win? Um, this is why Jay's career has gone nowhere. Oy, so does Uncle Nick?! What is wrong with them???</p> <p>10:36: Posh is eating this up. She's like a pig in shit. She and Christian should collaborate together.</p> <p>10:35: His collection is amazing. And I can totally see Posh in all of it. He may do the same thing over and over again (puffy sleeve jacket, skinny pants), but he does it really well. I wonder why he never got called out for that...</p> <p>Ugh this pants with zipper crotch are bad though. And how come they never call his stuff costume-y?<br> <br> It's not exactly, ahem, "street" wear.</p> <p>10:34: Aw, Christian is so cute and casual. And that was sorta cute how he said to the crowd "everybody looks fierce". Shameless plug: The music for Christian's show is by friend-of-Jezebel Brad Walsh!</p> <p>10:32: Rami's collection looks so, so bad on TV. His family looks proud though. And that gold dress is amazing. But the separates are rubbish. That man from Jerusalem can only do eveningwear. He's this season's Austin Scarlett.</p> <p>10:30:Rami's little speech about celebrating women is just as dumb this time around.</p> <p>And so is his collection. It looks dated and weird. Don't like.</p> <p>10:25: And seriously, I wouldn't wear that ruffled miniskirt, but I would wear almost everything else.And the insane hats are, well, sorta insane. But also sorta awesome. It's so much fun seeing this again! I love her evening look, with the corset. Want.</p> <p>10:24: Aw Jillian: Love her little sweater dress. Seeing her collection on TV, I feel you get a more nouveau Ralph/Perry Ellis sensibility. I think she really has what it takes to be the new face of American sportswear.</p> <p>10:23: Heidi is so cute and...babbly Her Kate Moss haircut is so hot.</p> <p>10:22:And yet, he still finds time to hairspray his hair one last time.<br> <br> Sigh. This is why I've grown to love him. When the going gets tough, use more hairspray. It's all so....Steel Magnolias.</p> <p>10:21: Holy shit &mdash; two missing models for Christian. How is he staying so calm when two of his models haven't shown? They would be scraping me off the floor. Hell, my heart is racing just watching it.</p> <p>10:20: The way Rami styled his models' hair is FUG. What the fuck is up with that weird braid twisting round their skulls? Egads, as Tim would say.</p> <p>10:19: Haha, the camera just showed the seat I sat in. Empty, mind you, but my seat.</p> <p>10:18: Tim just said they are an inspiration to him. Life goal: Be an inspiration to Tim Gunn.</p> <p>If Jillian's curling iron and Christian's flat iron had a battle, who would win? Discuss.</p> <p>10:17: One last "gather round" with Tim. I might cry. I think Tim is going to cry! If Tim cries, I will bawl.</p> <p>10:16: Jillian is ensuring her models' hair gets curled &mdash; she really is going to style them like herself. Um, does Jillian realized she sounds a little racist? Saying how she's going to have to learn to accept diversity? That ain't good. This breaks my heart because I was pulling for her. And now...now I might have to root for Ferocia Coutura.</p> <p>10:13: Um, how cute is Uncle Nick from Season 2 in his Saturn commercial? Just saying. Jillian has gone off the deep end. She is like Norman Bates as his mom at the end of Psycho, the way she's talking to herself.</p> <p>Whoah! Rami just turned on his hag Jillian! He called her annoying! No he didn't!!!</p> <p>10:09: Jillian is _seriously_ having a meltdown. Maybe this is Ferocia Coutura's real power: Rendering other designers unable to successfully cast a runway show?</p> <p>10:08: Oh God: That is so Christian &mdash; "It's not about comfort, ladies!" I think Christian wants to torture women. And by torture I mean....make them look like him. But snaps for his confession that he wore the heels he got for his models around his apartment.<br> <br> <br> <br> 10:07: I am worried about Jillian: If she can't handle the sight of two models in the same room how will she ever go on to, y'know, have a career? And, um, function in society?</p> <p>10:05: Christian wants "dark-skinned girls." Is he trying to end the white out??? God bless that little fashion imp! Also, love that he continues to style his models to look like himself. For that matter, Jillian is doing that to her models too.</p> <p>10:04; Ooh: Fighting during model casting?! I can only hope.</p> <p>10:03: Tim is oddly silent with Christian. Christian is nervous. I am nervous.</p> <p>10:02: Tim just hated on that crazy stripe-y sweater with pom-pom sleeves that I loved so much at the runway show. OH MY GOD &mdash; does Tim think I have bad taste? If so, I can't live with myself. And Tim likes Rami's collection? God is dead.</p> <p>10:01: I love that Jillian asked Christian and Rami to approve her hair. That was cute; it's why I love Jillian. Ha &mdash; Rami thinks Christian looks afraid. As if! Christian ain't afraid of no one! He's Ferocia Coutura, bitches!</p>?<p>Sorry, but you would have to be batshit insane not to think that Daniel Vosovik was robbed in Project Runway Season 2. (Chloe Dao only won because Nina Garcia wanted a woman to win. Seriously. Did the judges not see the same Dynasty-esque collection Chloe showed that we did?!) Anyway, we had big hopes for Daniel V. After all, it's not like the Project Runway winners have exactly gone on to launch illustrious careers or anything. So we were intrigued that Daniel was putting out his own clothing line. Perhaps, we thought, this was his chance for singular success? Not quite. Daniel's new line, it turns out, is a series of hotel uniforms. (For a chain called "Nylo"). Our thoughts (with images) after the jump.</p> <p>For the Ladies:<br> <br> First off, what's with the obvious Prada knock-offs with the knee socks and shoes? (Or, uh, are those just actual Prada socks and shoes?) And though we like the look on the left, well, isn't it a little, well, done. Can you not hear the voice of Tim Gunn sighing, desperately, "Don't bore Nina!" when you look at it? And the look on the right is way too school girl uniform (and not in a fun way).</p> <p>For the Gents:<br> <br> Say what you will about Daniel, but unlike this season's contestants, at least he knows how to make a pair of fucking pants. Love the little button detail on the zippy pullover on the left (even if the trousers seem a tad snug), and the suit on the right puts the lady-pants Uncle Nick made for Daniel in the makeover challenge to shame.</p> <p> [Blogging Project Runway]</p>?<p>Here is an internal document that lists the brands to feature in upcoming editorial spreads, ranked according to priority &mdash; and helpfully divided between "Advertisers" and "Non-Advertisers." This is how your ladymag sausage gets made.</p><p>A careless staffer left this brand list (click to enlarge), along with call sheets for three shoots, on the desktop of an L.A. hotel's public computer, where a Racked tipster . It's not exactly a shocker that ladymags are in thrall of their advertisers &mdash; the "editorial" that was comprised only of clothes from , Ralph Lauren, and Ralph Lauren? &mdash; but it is rare that concrete proof of these relationships emerges.</p> <p>Everyone knows that editors, especially editors at fashion magazines, take into account the views of advertisers when planning their editorial content. But a list of 14 advertisers to include, vetted by Harper's Bazaar editor-in-chief , ranked by their respective ad buys, shows precisely to what extent fashion magazines (which are largely coextensive with women's magazines) have allowed their editorial judgment to be corrupted by the luxury brands that shower them with advertising money.</p> <p>In a subsequent post, Racked printed the call sheets for the magazine's shoots, but forgot in one instance to redact the magazine's name. (Although the documents were swapped out for fully redacted versions, Racked editor confirmed the magazine was Harper's Bazaar in .)</p> <p>So: this spring, look out for Harper's Bazaar spreads featuring , , , , Chloe, Versace, Akris, , , Celine, , Hermes, and . (Givenchy might be there, too &mdash; once someone is doing "checking" their advertising money merits inclusion.) Not because the editors of that magazine necessarily think those brands have the most beautiful, most interesting, or well-designed garments and accessories, but because those companies are the biggest spenders.</p> <p> [Racked]</p>?<p>Three members of the Russian feminist punk band were found guilty of hooliganism Friday for performing a political protest song against Vladimir Putin on the altar of Moscow's Christ the Savior Cathedral. After the verdict was read, Nadezhda Tolokonnikova, 23, Maria Alyokhina, 24, and Yekaterina Samutsevich, 29 were made to stand in court during sentencing as Judge Marina Sirovaya droned on for two hours and a half hours, reading aloud the evidence against them, which includes how they "engaged in homosexual propaganda," were "motivated by religious enmity and hatred," behaved "provocatively," and that their clothing was not acceptable, making repeated references to their neon-colored tights and noting the shortness of their dresses. The three women smirked and occasionally laughed.</p><p>The band members&mdash;who have after being arrested in March 2012&mdash;faced up to seven years in prison. However, earlier this month, President Putin said that the women shouldn't be punished for their civil disobedience. They were sentenced to the minimum two years in prison.</p> <p>In what seemed like an attempt to make the reading of the sentencing torturous, the entire court had to stand in place as Judge Sirovaya monotonously read a recap of the case, starting with the evidence list, then a very long summary of witness testimonies, incredibly detailed descriptions of the convicted women's looks (height 165 cm, round face, etc.) and even a thorough description of the Christ the Savior Cathedral, its icons and its altars. A filibuster of this type might go beyond typical court procedure.</p> <p> The noted that "Orthodox believers often stand for long periods at religious services," implying that the court was adding some sort of passive aggressive punishment for the women's disrespect of the church. (The protest for which the women were arrested was captured in the video to the left.)</p> <p>Meanwhile, activists have marked August 17 as , with protests against the verdict scheduled in over 60 cities, worldwide. Supporters of the women are , with some even placing the masks on . Russian police several pro-Pussy Riot supporters today&mdash;including world chess champ Garry Kasparov&mdash; after hundreds of protestors began shouting "Russia without Putin!" outside the courthouse when the verdict was read.</p> <p>And Alicia Silverstone has been doing her part, as well. In a to Putin, the vegan actress begged the Russian president for "assurance" that Maria Alyokhina will have access to vegan food in prison. "I'm sure you can agree that everyone has the right to show compassion and refrain from hurting animals by being vegan," Silverstone wrote, perhaps missing the point that the women were on trial to begin with because of the country's lack of basic rights for its citizens.</p> <p>Even with the support celebrities like Silverstone, , , and , a global protest effort, and the backing of Amnesty International, it isn't likely that the members of Pussy Riot will benefit from any of it. According to a poll, only 7% of women in Russia are feminists, and 45% of men in Russia "detest" feminists. Only 3% like them. To add to the dilemma, two of the women Tolokonnikova and Alyokhina, have from whom they've already been separated.</p> <p>But that doesn't seem to deter them. In her statement made in court Alyokhina said:</p> <p>I am extremely angered by the phrase ‘so-called' which the State Prosecutor uses to refer to contemporary art. I would like to draw attention to the fact that during the trial of Brodsky exactly the same phrase was used. His poems were referred to as ‘so-called poetry', and the witnesses hadn't even read them. Just as a number of our witnesses had not actually seen what had happened……And if that's how it is, then for me at least this trial is just a ‘so-called' trial. I am not afraid of you. I am not afraid of you and I am not afraid of the thinly veneered deceit of your verdict at this ‘so-called' trial. My truth lives with me. I believe that honesty, free-speaking and the thirst for truth will make us all a little freer. We will see this come to pass.</p> <p>You can read the English translations of the women's full closing statements . You can learn how you can get involved .</p> <p> [Guardian]<br> [Guardian]<br> [MPT]<br> [WSJ]<br> [Kathleen Hanna]</p>?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?<p>Did you guys forget that Sarah Jessica Parker can do more than make weird constipated/thinking faces and stare at the computer screen of an outdated Mac? She's a triple threat, y'alls!</p> <p>The singing n' dancing wife of weirdly ageless fellow Broadway vet Matthew Broderick will appear on the upcoming season of Glee as a Vogue online editor who meets Chris Colfer and Lea Michele in New York and sings "Come Little " to them: from Mr. Big to Mr. Gay and Ms. Loud. Hilarity is sure to ensue, as her character has been described as "frazzled, eccentric and hilarious" by the show's producers. Sounds like Carrie, but hopefully with better puns.</p> <p>Like I am sure at least one person's mom always says, "There's nothing like an ill-advised romp in Abu Dhabi to put things in perspective."</p> <p>[]</p> <p>Madge has released a statement on her website about what it's like to have a concert hall full of Parisians revile you. She blames it on a few lone "thugs:"</p> <p>Playing the Olympia was a magical moment for me and it was real treat to do this special show for my fans and be so close to them. Unfortunately at the end of the show - after I left the stage - a few thugs who were not my fans rushed the stage and started throwing plastic bottles pretending to be angry fans. The press reports have focused on this and not the joyous aspect of the evening. But nothing can take away or ruin this very special evening for me and my fans. When I looked out in the audience, everyone I saw had a smile on their face. I look forward to having this wonderful experience again.</p> <p>[]</p> <p>Olivia Munn has revealed that she suffers from trichitillomania, an anxiety-based impulse control disorder that causes the afflicted to compulsively pull out hair, usually from the head or face. Munn says that she rips out her eyelashes and has to wear fake ones daily. It doesn't hurt, she said, it's just "annoying." []</p> <p> Ashes to ashes, dust to dust. Light a candle today for Nadya "Octomom" Suleman, for her relationship with 23-year-old bodybuilder Frankie G has come to an end after three months of glory when she realized he was unable to handle her "fast-paced lifestyle," To be fair, she does wear a lot of hats: adult film actress, stripper, house forclosure-ee, dementor, America's nihilistic mascot, etc., and clearly needs a man who can keep up with her and whatever else will come out of her vagina. No word on what Frankie G's future holds, except maybe finding the rest of his last name. []</p> <p>And although she was able to make enough money stripping to get off welfare, she's still going to lose her house unless you&mdash;yes, YOU&mdash;give her $150,000. I just imagined this request in Ira Glass's voice and LOLed heartily. []</p> <p>If you haven't already learned more about this than your own extended family, the Kristen Stewart Infidelity Boogaloo may have had something to do with Robert Pattinson's close friendship with Emilie de Ravin, with whom he starred in 2009's Remember Me. They hung out all the time in New York while K-Stew was languishing in Los Angeles by herself and it was apparently a very hard time for everyone. The article then goes on to clarify that it's unlikely that anything happened because R-Patz is "against cheating." But, uh, who's pro-cheating? I don't think that's how cheating works. []</p> <p>And supposedly K-Stew has been sneaking around with Rupert Sanders for over a year. []</p> <p></p> <p>This is a little teaser commentary clip by the Wachowski siblings for their upcoming movie Cloud Atlas, which also happens to be the first onscreen appearance of Lana Wachowski, formerly Larry, after sex reassignment surgery and a decade of hormone therapy. Cloud Atlas will also be the first film credit that features Lana's name. []</p>?<p>She gets up to some sister act antics on Ringer and now Sarah Michelle Gellar's daughter Charlotte Grace can make like her mom because Buffy is expecting a second child. That's right, adding another adorable sproggin' to our grossly underpopulated planet, the actress and her gay porn star material husband Freddie Prinze, Jr. are pretty stoked. "She and Freddie are thrilled," said a blabbermouth friend. "They're amazing parents." The pregnancy suits Prinze, Jr. just fine as it means he can now enjoy some stay-at-home dadness. "He loves it. We fight over who gets to stay home," said Gellar. "You'd think it would be the opposite, that the parents would be like, 'No, I'll go to work!' but he's like, 'You stayed home for two years! It's my turn!'" []</p> <p>There's a nude shot doing the rounds of such classy websites as The Dirty and Media Takeout that's supposed to be of a young Kim Kardashian. Meh, I don't see it. It looks more like Malaya Rivera Drew, that actress from The L Word. []</p> <p>More on the Kim front. There was a bit of a kerfuffle in the threads yesterday over the fact that Lindsay Lohan was invited to the White House Correspondent's on Saturday, but get those fingers ready for a typing frenzy because kween Kardashian has also been extended an invitation ? by Fox News. It's a pretty great combo. []<br> For those that haven't seen the live episode of 30 Rock yet, this article covers Kim's surprise appearance. []</p> <p>It's shocking to hear, but apparently alcohol can make you act like an immature jerk. Crazy! Well, now she's knocked up and isn't supposed to drink, Snooki says she's mellowed. "I guess [pregnancy] just made me more mature," she said. "It's different because now I'm not drinking. I'm usually partying and going to clubs but pregnancy made me grow up a lot." []</p> <p>If I was Sharon Stone I'd walk into a modelling agency's men's division and order directly from their books like a menu, but the actress prefers her guys free-range and left a Vogue Brazil party with model Martin Mica. Oh, to have her life. []</p> <p>Quentin Tarantino's new film Django Unchained seems like the same delightfully deconstructed mess as all the rest of his movies. But, while the plot of the pre-Civil War South spaghetti western may seem convoluted, it has Leonardo DiCaprio with a cigarette holder and an actress with the best hairbow ever, so things are looking up. []</p>?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?<p>Some women are obsessed with scrapbooking, making the hobby a $2.6-billion industry. Built around, you know, cutting and pasting. But it's serious business, as you know if you've heard about the . According to a story in the Los Angeles Times, it all started when 28-year-old "scrapbooking rock star" Kristina Contes won a contest sponsored by Creating Keepsakes (?!?) magazine. Ms. Contes' entry &mdash; pages featuring pictures of her feet and of her hairless terrier, Chloe &mdash; included a photo that &mdash; gasp! she didn't take herself. Ms. Contes actually called the magazine to request that her friend receive a photo credit. And when a "Hall Of Fame" book came out in October, with the photo credit, "disgruntled scrapbookers" caused an uproar, threatening to cancel subscriptions, boycott and sue. (On scrapbooking messageboards, a comment thread about "KC" reached 1,250 posts.) Because, you see, the rules stated that submissions had to be solely the contestant's work. Whoops!</p> <p>As the positive attention turned negative, "I, seriously, was like the Lindsay Lohan of scrapbooking," Ms. Contes says. But she was in the new generation of scrapbookers: young women who used the books like diaries; to express their feelings and document their lives. Old-skool scrapbookers, who usually documented children's birthdays or weddings, found the new kids to be narcissistic and hi-falutin'. As one blogger says: "We didn't consider ourselves 'life artist[s]' or 'designers.' We were just plain ol' scrappers." In any case, eight months after she'd won, Ms. Coates was disqualified from the Creating Keepsakes Hall Of Fame. She got depressed and didn't feel like scrapping for a while, but she's back at it, phew.</p> <p>But what is with these crazy scrapbookers? Isn't scrapbooking supposed to be, uh, fun? Something you turn to when you'd like to alleviate stress, relax, unwind, etc.? What's the point of having a hobby with rules and infuriating scandals? (And I'll admit, I've made a scrapbookish thingy or two in my day. And non-original material was the point! I saved postcards, ads from magazines, pictures from friends, funny quotes, fortune cookie slips. Pasting crap in a book gives you a bizarre sense of accomplishment; you feel you've captured and documented inspiration and a certain zeitgeist. Or maybe that's just me. Anyone? Anyone?)</p> <p> [LA Times]<br> [UPI]</p>?<p>Every October brings the World Gymnastics Championship, and every October this former gymnast greedily scours YouTube for every available piece of video footage of the competition. I spent six years eating and breathing the sport, spending up to twenty hours a week in a chalk-covered leotard. Those six years in the gym shaped me as a person, teaching me discipline and focus and how rewarding it can be to throw yourself &mdash; literally &mdash; into the things you care about. They also shaped me physically, leaving me with a royally messed up spine that precipitated my retirement from the sport. But that wasn't the only thing that was messed up. <br> ?<br> When I tell people about how bad my back is (three herniated and desiccated discs, for those of you who know about these things) they sometimes ask: if you could go back in time and change your mind, would you still choose to be an elite gymnast? I want to say yes, unequivocally: the sport gave me so much that having the spine of a sixty-year-old by the age of sixteen doesn't seem like too high a price to pay.<br> ?<br> But I can't say yes, unequivocally. Because I know too many gymnasts who paid a much higher price than a bad lower back.<br> ?<br> Late last month, news broke that a former US Olympic coach had been accused of sexually abusing three of his former gymnasts. Don Peters was the head coach of the American Olympic team in 1984 ? the year in which American gymnastics came of age, with Mary Lou Retton's historic all-around gold medal performance ? and is currently the owner and director of a gym in Southern California.<br> ?<br> Such stories aren't uncommon: earlier this year, was in court on charges of sexual assault, and in 2010, was placed on USA Gymnastic's "permanently ineligible" list for allegedly abusing ten of his former gymnasts. Nor are they restricted to the US: in 2002, was accused of sexually assaulting an 11-year-old gymnast, and in 2008, was charged with assaulting a 12-year-old gymnast.<br> ?<br> In the years after I quit gymnastics, I would tell people how lucky I had been to have the coaches I had. Unlike the coaches at other clubs, they didn't yell at us. They didn't bother us about our weight. They pushed us, but they never pushed us too far. They were great. At least, that was my experience. It wasn't until several years after I quit that I discovered that during the very years that I had been having this great experience, some of my teammates were allegedly being sexually abused by one of our coaches.<br> ?<br> It happened, apparently, right under our noses. I had no inkling until years later, when the police opened an investigation and one of my former teammates was called in for questioning. Like me, Sylvia*, who was one of top gymnasts in the club and in the country, had never witnessed any untoward behavior from our head coach. Like me, she had the utmost respect for him, looked up to him, and never imagined him capable of preying on the girls with whose care he had been entrusted. But as more and more of our teammates started coming forward, a different picture of him began to emerge.<br> ?<br> One gymnast said that he used to jokingly pull the back of her leotard away from her body so that he could look down it. Another said he had offered her presents and tried repeatedly to get her on her own outside of the gym. Two others said that on an outing away from the gym, he had touched them inappropriately. On and on it went, each story worst than the last.<br> ?<br> When Sylvia and I found out about the allegations against our coach, we had similar reactions: we felt betrayed by someone we had respected and trusted, we felt lucky that he had never preyed on us, we felt guilty that we had had such positive experiences with gymnastics while our teammates were being abused. And more than anything, we felt horrified by his alleged behavior, and more horrified still that it could have happened right in front of us, unbeknownst to us.<br> ?"I just remember being so, so disappointed," Sylvia says. "It was shattering. I basically felt like the four years that I was at that gym became a lie to me."<br> ?<br> And what of the nearly dozen gymnasts who were allegedly abused by our coach? They got their day in court, but the records of what happened during the trial are closed to the public. None of them would speak on the record about the investigation or the trial, but my former coach was found not guilty. He is still coaching in Sydney.<br> ?<br> When Don Peters's gymnasts went public with their accusations, they criticized USA Gymnastics for its inaction on the issue of sexual abuse by coaches, accusing the organization of putting the reputation of the sport above the well-being of its athletes. The same might be said of the state and national gymnastics governing bodies to whom my club reported. But then again, Sylvia and I were training in the very same gym, and we never suspected a thing.<br> ?<br> This kind of abuse doesn't happen in every gym, and it happens in other sports, too. However, the number of reported cases in gymnastics suggests that it happens more in this sport than in others. Parents need to know, before they sign their kids up, about that correlation. Governing bodies need to be better about accountability and prevention.<br> ?<br> It's for this reason that I hesitate to say, unequivocally, that I love this sport, that I would do it all again given the chance, that I would let my hypothetical future daughter try gymnastics if she wanted to. And it's for this reason that every October, I watch the World Championships with awe and envy, but also with a modicum of discomfort. Gymnastics, for everything it gave me, has a dark side.<br> ?<br> The sparkly leotards and pointed toes can make it easy to forget that these young women are athletes, as physically and mentally tough as any football player or boxer. As a retired gymnast, I know a thing or two about the grit and strength that people sometimes don't see behind the ponytails and the hair ribbons. But in light of what allegedly happened at my gym, I have to wonder: what else aren't we seeing?</p> <p>* Not her real name.</p> is a writer, blogger, and an editor at .?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?<p>Even though last night's episode of Huge (created by My So-Called Life's and her daughter, ) was one of the weakest yet, it still managed to be insightful, funny and really heartwarming.</p><p> In the woods on a Spirit Quest, the campers were encouraged to choose a name. When Alastair chose Athena, one of the other kids pointed out, "that's a girl's name." Alastair replied, "I know."</p> <p> It's vague whether Alastair is gender-confused, gay, eccentric, a drag queen in the making, or all of the above. But what's great about the character is how unapologetic he is; when asked by the camp jock, "why'd you pick the name Athena?" Alastair argues: "Why should I pick a boy's name just because people expect me to?" You get the feeling that Trent, the jock, might be gay too. And also: that he ate a perfectly ordinary mushroom, not a trippy one. Anyway, at the end of the episode, he said, casually, "Athena, toss me the bug spray," in a way that would warm the barnacles of the coldest heart.</p> <p>It's amazing how this show touches on incredibly specific teenage emotions. The scene in which Becca remembers how she and Chloe were friends, the previous summer at camp, was great: We learned that Chloe used to be heavier, with glasses, and realize now that she's dropped weight and gotten contacts she hangs with a different, more popular and social crowd, leaving old friends like (slightly nerdy) Becca behind. It's a scene ripped right out of your own youth, when growing and changing happened so rapidly it was hard to keep track, and the people you related to and wanted to be around changed from month to month and year to year. How you went from not caring what people &mdash; especially the opposite sex &mdash; were thinking or saying about you, to hoping they'd see you in a specific light.</p> <p>By the way, if we learned one lesson from this episode, it's this: Doughnut prayer? Works every time.</p> <p>Earlier: <br> <br> <br> </p>?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?<p>Saturday night brought one of the events that, in my youth, I anticipated as anxiously as the winter holidays: The Nickelodeon Kids' Choice Awards. Lots of celebs! Lots of slime! Jack Black hosted the frenetically-paced activities and lots of celebrities brought the pretty. See: America Ferrera, left. Does she ever look bad? I also like how she played the pretty dress all casual with the wooden wedges, but that's neither here nor there. Also in attendance: Abigail Breslin, Cameron Diaz, Jordin Sparks, Jodie Foster, Amy Poehler, Ashlee Simpson, Hayden Panettiere, Rihanna and Miley Cyrus, who is looking less like a tween of late and more and more like a 50-something who's spent too much time in the tanning booth. Miley, and the other Good, Bad and Ugly, after the jump.</p> <p>The Good: Yay for Abigail Breslin: She looks age appropriate and looks like she dressed herself. In other words, nothing really matches, but I'm totally down with it. Cameron Diaz might be sporting a silly Samantha Jones haircut, but her dress is, like, cute. Aw, Jordin Sparks turned Chloe orange into Nickelodeon orange!</p> <p>The Bad: Oh Amy Poehler, the contrived irony is killing me. Ashlee Simpson wins herself a "bad" award for appearing totally unrecognizable. (And wearing Chanel accessories.) I'm convinced that Hayden Panettiere owns 12 of the exact same dress in different colors. Sadly, none of them are tailored quite right. Go ahead and hate on me: I just prefer Jodie Foster looking a little more polished. And not in a bootcut jean.</p> <p>The Ugly: Miley Cyrus? Or one of the Real Housewives? Rihanna had her fucking legs insured: Why must she hide them in such unflattering pants?!</p> <p>[Images via .]</p>?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?<p></p> <p></p> <p>"I wanted you to come in and be transported back to the way you felt when you were a teenager," explained Sevigny after the show, fanning herself with a press release. "Even little tiny things - the cinder blocks, . Anything that would trigger the senses to that time when you're questioning everything."</p>?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?I can't help feeling that when your premiere wattage is Gary Busey and Dane Cook, a film's not in good shape, and so it was last night for the Hollywood premiere of the blatant Kevin Costner-Kelsey Grammer cash-in Swing Vote, I felt so bad for them all, in fact, that rather than sending Paula Abdul and Mary Hart and various children to "the Bad" I installed a kinder, gentler "Pros and Cons" system for the day, so that everyone wins. And loses, of course - after the jump!?<p>Awesome Chicago resident Tavi Gevinson talked to awesome Chicago exile Ira Glass about one of her upcoming publishing projects. No, not the book, not the freelance contributions to various publications, not the other book, not the website she's apparently launching with Jane Pratt: Gevinson revealed more details of her other forthcoming website "and occasional print magazine." It has a name! Rookie, and the site will be like a magazine in that the content will follow a different theme each month. Though she said she's not necessarily seeking what Glass called "alternative" girls, Gevinson said, "it will be subversive just in its honesty and the tone." And Miranda July is writing something for it. []</p> Lady Gaga did a sketch on Jimmy Kimmel Live about launching a children's line called "Gaga Googoo." Jimmy Kimmel: reaching for humor's low-hanging fruit since 2003. [] Karlie Kloss (who may or may not be one half of the hot new couple known as J.K. JoeKlo) is on the cover of the new Harper's Bazaar Australia. Patrick Demarchelier shot the photo. Back in February of 2008, Demarchelier shot the St. Louis-raised supermodel for her first major magazine cover: Teen Vogue, which she graced alongside Chanel Iman and Ali Michael. [] Constance Jablonski is the new face of Sonia Rykiel. [] Chloe Moretz and Hailee Steinfeld &mdash; just like Elle Fanning &mdash; are also crying on the new cover(s) of LOVE. [] Vogue Turkey's August cover is a vision in orange, with Milly Simmonds, Egle Jezepcikaite and Yana Sotnikova. []?<p>"The kids don't seem to be able to stop reading, even if people are saying terrible things about them," one adult told the Times for today's on Formspring.me as a new front for cyberbullying. Why opt in for abuse?</p><p>Formspring, for the uninitiated, is a usually-anonymous question-and-answer site that can be linked to Facebook, Tumblr, or Twitter. Questions aren't posted to your Formspring site until they're answered, "leading parents and guidance counselors to wonder why so many young people make public so many nasty comments about their looks, friends and sexual habits," as the Times puts it. Good question!</p> <p>The Times admits that it might be a little late to the Formspring.me party &mdash; it quotes some kids saying they're already over it &mdash; but that doesn't mean it isn't still being used to torment the younger generation. (I am trying to avoid the word "tweens" here, but it appears inevitable.) In March, Long Island teenager Alexis Pilkington committed suicide, and though her parents , there was plenty of evidence that she'd gotten abusive messages over Formspring.</p> <p>We all know anonymity can be a prompt for cruelty, and a glancing acquaintance with the Internet reveals that a woman of any age often gets the worst of this &mdash; regardless of the substance of the engagement, anonymous comments easily turn to gendered namecalling (cunt, bitch), comments about her looks (approving or disapproving) or how often she gets laid. Are these comments coming from other girls or women, or are they the cliche of the angry, rejected guy typing with one hand? Hard to know.</p> <p>Most of the examples in the story concern girls being bullied, but I wanted to find out for myself whether this was actually how the site trended. Formspring doesn't easily allow you to find active users, so I spent some time plugging common male and female names into the search function, trying to see all this in action.</p> <p>If I looked hard enough, I could find stuff like this, on one girl's profile:</p> <p></p> <p>Asparagus and virginity: the juxtapositions of adolescence. I could also find a guy subjected to sexual questions:</p> <p> <br> </p> <p>Boys seemed marginally more likely to be asked questions like What's Your Favorite Video Game? or If You Had To Eat At Only One Restaurant What Would It Be? (Popular answers: Applebee's, Chipotle.)</p> <p>The Times indicates that some kids deflect aggressively sexual questions with impressive aplomb &mdash; though of course, by answering them at all, they ensure that the topic will be on the table. I saw that with an example of that with a profile belonging to one 14-year-old girl, who had by far the most active page I saw, one that fulfilled all the cyberbullying prerequisites:</p> <p><br> <br> <br> </p> <p>This young woman, whoever she is, may be testing boundaries of her sexuality, but she for one seems to have it under control.</p> <p>She may be atypical in more ways than one. The vast majority of profiles &mdash; under names like Jessica, Jennifer, Michael, Matthew, and Chloe &mdash; were empty. No one had asked, and no one had answered. I did see one girl asked about when she'd first read Twilight. The response: "Someone asked me a question!! WOO HOO!"</p> <p>Some of the adults quoted in the Times piece touch on this point: "It seems like even when it's inappropriate and vicious, the kids want the attention, so they post it," one says. And maybe that's the thing. Who even needs anonymous questions when everyone is already sharing so much of themselves? There are far more producers of personal media than there are consumers. There may be some untapped mysteries or taboos yet, but that would require someone else being curious about what they are for that particular person. Judging from all the question-free profiles, not that many people are.</p> <p>So again, why is anyone, young girls especially, subjecting themselves to this? Because they want someone to care enough to ask about them, and to validate that they matter. And unfortunately, for young girls, too often mattering means whether or not boys want to fuck them, or how much girls think boys do. And there's not much out there in the world to tell them any differently.</p> <p> [NYT]</p>?<p>There are a lot of reasons that I kind of wish I'd grown up in the '90s &mdash;and I don't mean that in a 'cereal boxes and legos' way, I mean in a 'hanging out with Chloe Sevigny in NYC in the '90s' growing up&mdash; and this video is one of those reasons.</p> <p>X-Girl was a 1990s indie fashion label started by Sonic Youth's Kim Gordon and stylist Daisy Von Furth &mdash;and loved by the likes of Sofia Coppola, Spike Jonze, and Kathleen Hanna (and possibly "our friend Marc Jacobs").</p> <p>Sure, it was plain and simple, but that was all part of its charm. And you have to love Von Furth's enthusiasm for thrift store prices and the importance of a ringer tee &mdash;"If you have a ringer, you're an indie rocker, period"&mdash;, and A-lines that leave "room for your thighs."</p> <p>P.S.-If all that sounds like the cat's meow, the brand is in Japan.</p>?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?<p>Maybe you were out enjoying the cooler temperatures all week and couldn't check your favorite Gawker Media sites. Or maybe you're about to leave for the weekend and need one last visual fix. Well, whatever the case, we've got you covered. Here are some of the most amusing and entertaining videos we watched during the week that was. </p> <p>During a June 18 baseball affair, somebody had the bright idea to call it "Blue Balls" night. This included Eugene Emeralds mascot "Doug Fir" playing musical chairs with the ball boys, which ended when one of them kicked Doug square in the balls. </p> <p>Crushing glowsticks for their oozy neon contents and spraying it all over the place in a room filled with paint and loud music sounds like a wonderful way to conclude a drug bender. It's also a super yogurt commercial! </p> <p>Lady Gaga was a guest judge on SYTYCD. Naturally, she was over-the-top. Watch Gaga's transformation from blubbering mess, to body language expert, to hip hop historian, to choreography connoisseur, to shoe-throwing self-promoter. </p> <p>It turns out The Stig doesn't like it when you tell him halfway through a hot lap of Top Gear's UK test track, "I think Schumi was faster through here." How do I know? Because I told him just that. The result? He tried to scare me to death. Watch and see for yourself. </p> <p>Forget Daniel Craig, Harrison Ford and Olivia Wilde, this parody has ten times the star power of Cowboys & Aliens. Pikachu, Charmander and Jigglypuff all make cameo's in X-Play's Cowboys & Pokemon. Ash Ketchum has no memory, a price on his head and one question - who's that pokemon? </p> <p>From the You Think You're So Smart's to the My Mother Was Right About You's, these two actors reenact practically every fight you've ever had with your significant other in a little under two minutes. </p> <p>Bravo has released a trailer for the second season of their hit show Real Housewives of Beverly Hills and it's bizzonkers! I mean, if you're into that sorta thing. If you're into meth and shrieking and dinner party nervous breakdowns. </p> <p>A YouTube user set up a time-lapse video in downtown Los Angeles in hopes of capturing something cool. Instead, he found this guy who weirdly walks at a snail's pace. The video is actually five minutes of real time. Slow rollin'. </p> <p>Please, world, let us be done with planking. It has gone too far. People are now falling off of the top of golf carts and then nearly getting run over by said golf carts. A person has actually died. Soon, our pets' heads will be falling off. </p> <p>What are you doing this summer? This dude is having his robot friend Darwin pick up Dance Dance Revolution. Beats cutting grass! </p> <p>Mariah Carey hasn't been seen much since giving birth to twins in April, so people were especially curious on Sunday night ahead of her appearance on HSN to hawk everything from her fragrances to her jewelry. And by God, she delivered. </p> <p>The 73 turns of the Nurburgring Nordschleife make up one of the great tests of driver skill. Proving that skill in perfect conditions requires caution; showing it in an open-wheeled car in the rain while taking corners sideways is nearly incomprehensible. </p> <p>Chloe Lattanzi, 25-year-old daughter of Olivia Newton-John, is clearly going through a rebellious phase: This video is surely the antithesis of her Mother's portrayal of the squeaky-clean Sandy in Grease. Graphic images ahead. </p> <p>It's not the violence of this video that's offensive, not even when a third fair maiden jumps in and takes her foot to someone's face a couple of times. It's the unladylike profanity that speaks to societal degradation. (Somewhat NSFW) </p> <p>On Sunday, Sandy McMillin visited a Wal-Mart in Eugene, Oregon to buy chips, sour cream and coffee creamer. But since it was 90 degrees outside, she traded her normal ensemble for a turquoise string bikini top and some red shorts. But then... </p> <p>El Bulli: Cooking in Progress is a documentary about the most insane&mdash;and one of the most influential&mdash;restaurants in the world, El Bulli, which is closing this month. </p> <p>Angry Birds is not just a game. See, the birds are angry because the pigs took their eggs&mdash;eggs the birds worked for. Redistribution of eggs, Nazi Germany, and comparing the police to pigs, all in a snippet from Glenn Beck's talk show. </p> <p>Americans in the throes of one of the hottest summers on record can stop worrying about rising utilities prices. Turn off the stove and start cooking breakfast inside your car. This should be a no-hassle adjustment&mdash;well, if you eat breakfast at about 5:00 PM, that is. </p> <p>Here is the saddest movie ever made, according to science: The Champ, starring Jon Voight. Watch it! A guy dies! In front of his son! After winning the, uh, boxing... trophy! Are you crying? Are you sobbing? </p> <p>This makes me thankful for two things: First, that my brother went along when I insisted he stand in for the groom in my stuffed animal bridal party. Second, that there's no video evidence of this to play on a loop during my wedding reception. </p> <p>This young man named Jayden makes the type of running-dive catch that gets major leaguers on a slow day's top-plays countdown and lands kids on a top-prospects blog. </p> <p>Now that we've got preorder information and details on the $150 collector's edition, all that's left for BioWare is getting people excited about playing Star Wars: The Old Republic. Does this do it for you? </p> <p>On August 11, Lifetime will premiere Russian Dolls, about a bunch of unruly Ruskis traipsing around Brighton Beach in Brooklyn. We got our first look at the show today, and unfortunately it looks like it'll be a cheap Jersey Shore ripoff. But with more techno music. And vodka. </p> <p>How good are you with chopsticks? Probably good enough to pick up sushi but probably not even close to Miyagi-ing a fly, right? Well check this out, this guy managed to pickpocket a phone with chopsticks. </p> <p>A Boeing 737 taking off from Ibiza, Spain heading to Manchester, England, with 186 souls had to divert last week after a minor engine problem, namely fire belching from an engine, recreating for witnesses the opening scenes of Lost. </p> <p>Baseballs are the most important thing on earth. It's time we stopped pretending they aren't. And if you need some inspiration to do so, this video will surely do the trick. </p> <p>Jon Stewart brought up the effort by Fox News to push a narrative painting liberals as bullies who do nothing but victimize innocent Christians. Then he played clips of conservatives using bullying tactics against liberals, and it all fell apart. </p>?The annual Costume Institute Gala at the Metropolitan Museum of Art is the biggest, fanciest, most fashion forward red carpet event on the East Coast. If there was one go-to look for the night, it was the "witchy woman," a mix of black feathered dresses, dark lipstick, cloaks, and talons.?<p>My Blueberry Nights is a film about love lost and love found starring Jude Law, Natalie Portman, Rachel Weisz, David Strathairn, and, most interestingly, jazz chanteuse Norah Jones. But romance wasn't in the air at the New York screening of the film last night &mdash; bad fashion was. Jones paired an old-lady haircut [Ouch! I think it's awesome. -Ed.] with a juniors dress, and Chloe Sevigny (left) also took a page from middle-school, wearing boots more commonly seen on disgruntled teens. Also there and not looking their best? Agyness Deyn, Susan Sarandon, Erin Fetherston, Zoe Kravitz, and others. The full Good, Bad, and Ugly of My Blueberry Nights, after the jump.</p> <p>The Good: I'm not gonna lie: Chan Marshall (aka Cat Power) is on my 'Good' list simply because I'm obsessed with her music. Wearing horizontal nautical stripes, Marchesa designer Georgina Chapman hopes to distract from the girth of her husband Harvey Weinstein. She fails. Norah Jones looks like she's on her way to a middle-school dance.</p> <p>The Bad: Susan Sarandon looks like she's chaperoning that dance. Will someone please tell Zoe Kravitz that she's not in middle school? The holes in her tights do not make her look cool or edgy. It's a sad day indeed when Agyness is the best-dressed person on the 'Bad' list. Enough already, Erin Fetherston. Kelly Bensimon looks like a bad throwback to the early '90s. Those boots! That dress! That belt! Clearly this is the reason she is no longer married to ELLE's Gilles Bensimon or editing ELLE Accessories. Dear Ziyi Zhang: "No" to the sequined beret.</p> <p>The Ugly: Thanks a lot, Irina Pantaeva, for triggering my vertigo this early in the day.</p> <p>[Images via .]</p>?<p></p> <p>[London, September 19: Sir , he of Topshop fame, and daughter Chloe attend the Erdem show during London Fashion Week. This spring, expect strong Erdem influences in Topshop's latest offering. Image via .]</p>?<p>What, you mean you weren't aware that there was a major rift between these two style stars? Well, read on til truth makes all things plain.</p><p>Here's what happened. Chloe Sevigny gave (first odd thing) in which she declared that she hated modern "It" girls.</p> <p>Today the term is used to describe, say, Peaches Geldof - a girl who doesn't do anything but is just sort of around...The original It girl was the 1920s movie star Clara Bow; then in the 1960s, with Edie Sedgwick and (Andy) Warhol, It girls turned into socialites, ladies of leisure, people who had it just for being fabulous. But Edie was just a rich drug addict, and when I got called the It girl everyone thought I was that too... I felt I was doing stuff, not just being a socialite.</p> <p>Peaches, understandably, took this amiss, and the It Girl author/designer took to Twitter to give Chloe a schooling in classy restraint.<br> <br> <br> But what of the rest of us? What real reason, Peaches?<br> <br> </p> <p>Tempting as it is to ascribe the rift to a major disagreement over #mooreandme, MM is probably Matthew MacCaulay of A.R.E. Weapons, Chloe's boyfriend of 8 years and...I guess?...somehow connected with Peaches in some way we'd probably be better aware of if we kept up with her love life! But in the end, she's philosophical.<br> <br> <br> That's telling her. We'd have thought she'd have a thicker skin about the whole "does nothing" charge, but Chloe is a major Cool Girl so the slight must hurt. The bigger question is why no one's jumping to Edie Sedgwick's defense...at the very least, Sienna Miller.</p>?<p>Two hundred years ago, two brothers wrote a book. Well, "wrote" is the wrong term. Jacob and Wilhelm collected dozens of stories, some well known and some obscure, some from their homeland and some from abroad. The compendium was first published in 1812; a second volume followed two years later. By the seventh edition, the pair had assembled 211 stories, some of which would go on to have great and lasting influence on Western culture. The official title of the book was "Children's and Household Tales," and Jacob and Wilhelm, of course, were the Brothers Grimm.</p> <p>Two centuries later, much of the English speaking world grows up hearing the stories Jacob and Wilhelm compiled. It is largely thanks to them that fairytales like Snow White, Little Red Riding Hood, Cinderella and Rapunzel have survived until 2012, where they can be found in every child's bedroom from Seattle to Sydney.</p> <p>The ubiquity of fairytales has caused concerns for some parents, especially parents of girls. Peggy Orenstein, author of Cinderella Ate My Daughter, was dismayed to find that her little girl's fixation on princesses, particularly the Disney Princess clique, was part of a larger trend toward "princess culture."</p> <p>Fairytales are ubiquitous in contemporary popular culture for adults, too. This year, we have been treated to not one, but two Snow White movies. Last year, Twilight director Catherine Hardwicke revamped Little Red Riding Hood. ABC's Once Upon a Time imagines what would happen in fairytale plotlines played out in present-day Maine.</p> <p>But the corner of popular culture where fairytales are the most influential is the contemporary romantic comedy. Romantic comedies are, in fact, grown-up fairytales, complete with Cinderella transformations and hideous beasts who are revealed to be handsome princes.</p> <p>You can draw a direct line from the fairytales collected by the Brothers Grimm two centuries ago to contemporary rom coms. Without Cinderella, for example, there would be no Sabrina and ? heaven forbid! ? no Pretty Woman.</p> <p>As adults, viewers relate to and understand romantic comedies because of the foundations laid by fairytales; when it comes to shaping our ideas about love and romance, rom coms simply pick up where fairytales left off. As a result, some of their messages about gender and relationships seem to be stuck in the seventeenth century. You might say that the depiction of gender in romantic comedies looks pretty damn Grimm.</p> <p>The fairytale plotline most commonly found in contemporary romantic comedies was not included in Children's and Household Tales. Beauty and the Beast was first written down by Gabrielle-Suzanne Barbot de Villeneuve in 1740, and its messages about gender and love are accordingly archaic.</p> <p>The moral of the Beauty and the Beast story, we tell children, is that looks can be deceiving. A man who is outwardly ugly might actually be a handsome prince in disguise, and the power of requited love will melt his hideous exterior to reveal the true self within. That is a fine and valuable moral to be teaching kids.</p> <p>But in its romantic comedy incarnations, the Beauty and the Beast story ? and that moral in particular ? get twisted. In popular contemporary rom coms like The Ugly Truth, As Good As It Gets, You've Got Mail, we stop teaching girls to look beyond beastly appearance and start teaching women to look beyond beastly behavior.</p> <p>The Ugly Truth, which came out in 2009, is the best ? or rather, worst ? and most recent example of this troubling twist. The hero is a man whose beastliness expresses itself in the form of open and virulent misogyny, and the heroine a woman who learns to see past that behavior to the sensitive, wounded, loveable man within. Hear that, ladies? That blustering sexist pig is secretly the love of your life (I suppose this means we should all get off OKCupid and start looking for love in the US House of Representatives).</p> <p>Scholars of the romantic comedy call this kind of story a "cold-hearted redemption plot," a story about a person ? usually a man ? whose cold, hard exterior is melted by the love of one special woman. Barbot de Villeneuve isn't the only one to blame for this idea, of course, because you could just as easily call it "The Mr. Darcy Myth." Many of the stories we tell ourselves, as a culture, perpetuate this idea that if a man treats you badly, the correct course of action is to stick around, love him, and wait for the power of your love to change him.</p> <p>The Mr. Darcy Myth is a problem, because some of the things men in romantic comedy cold-hearted redemption plots do are downright awful. At worst, they come dangerously close to abusive behavior. In You've Got Mail, the hero tries to put the heroine out of business, endangering her livelihood and her last tangible connection with her late mother. And then they end up together. In As Good As It Gets, the hero is in fact verbally abusive. And then they end up together. But before a happy ending is possible, these men have to change, and the only thing that can change them is the love of the right woman.</p> <p>The promise of these movies is that the love of the right woman is transformational. It will turn the beastliest of men into a modern-day Prince Charming. Even if he treats everyone around him like rubbish ? you included ? hang in there, because that's not who he really is. If you endure the rudeness, the cruelty, even the violence, for long enough, you'll be rewarded with the love of a handsome prince and the contemporary equivalent of a gorgeous castle full of talking furniture servants.</p> <p>Contemporary romantic comedies build on the foundation laid by fairytales and on that admirable moral about where true beauty lies, and use them to romanticize unhealthy relationships. The fairytale moral is, "don't judge a book by its cover." The romantic comedy version is, "don't judge a man by his behavior."</p> <p>Study after study has found that the media we consume shapes the way we think about the world around us. So it's time we took a good, hard, critical look at how romantic comedies are shaping our attitudes about love. And we need new grown-up fairytales, ones that model gender equality in relationships. We shouldn't be encouraging women to stick around to show misogynists and abusive men the power of One True Love. The only thing we should be showing such modern-day beasts is the door.</p> Chloe Angyal is an editor at . She is working on her doctoral thesis on romantic comedies, and on a book on the same topic.?<p>Do people get confused by Harper's Magazine and Harper's Bazaar? After all, the luxury goods industry is not so different from Halliburton &mdash; shameless, ubiquitous, and sooo fucking talented at charging more for less. So again, we're taking things to their (ill)logical end with our own "Harper's (Bazaar) Index", inspired by Harper's famous feature, which parses the world of big oil, big money, big politics and Big Pharma and puts it into easily-digested numerical form. After the jump, Anna and I look at the May issues of both magazines and juxtapose co-sponsored Senate bills among presidential candidates with their sense of style; compare the KKK to luxury design house Lanvin; and "discuss" federal subsidies for American airlines with respect to the chic summer vacations of Chloe Sevigny, Lake Bell and Isabella Rossellini's daughter Ellettra.</p> <p><br> <br> <br> <br> <br> <br> <br> <br> (Images created by Cheryl Campbell; click image to enlarge)<br> <br></p> <p><br> [Harper's]<br> [Harper's Bazaar]</p> <p>Earlier: <br> ?<br> ?<br> ?<br> ?<br> ?<br> ?<br></p>?<p> has helpfully compiled quotes from 10 celebrities on the meaning of life.</p> <p>Hidden amongst the vapid muck are a few genuine pearls of wisdom, like this quote from :</p> <p>As you get older, you're not afraid of doubt. Doubt isn't running the show. You take out all the self-agonizing.</p> <p>And Eminem’s secret to a happier life:</p> <p>If you don't overlook the fact of what you look like, then no one else will.</p> <p>And then there’s this little gem from :</p> <p>Facts are good things to have when making decisions. If Sarah Palin didn't know that Africa was a continent, I think that's information that people could have used.</p> <p>While does not offer any significant insight about the meaning of life, she does hit on something that has bugged us before:</p> <p>I always found it distracting to be watching a movie and there was a love scene and the girl had her bra on.</p> <p>On the other hand, we have :</p> <p>The best thing I've ever bought with money is my house. I call it my Paris Palace. It's beautiful. Every room has beautiful crystal chandeliers and amazing moldings from Italy. When people come over they say, "Hey, this looks just like you."</p> <p>And :</p> <p>The best thing that's happened in my brother's eight years in office is that since September 11, 2001, we haven't been attacked on our soil. Given the fact that there are a lot of well-financed people in groups whose organizing principle is to destroy America, I would say that's a pretty good accomplishment.</p> <p>But the wisdom of Dwight Shrute (why is he on this list? Does Esquire think is reality TV?) falls into a category of its own:</p> <p>The difference between sex and love can usually be complicated, but I think I've found a way to keep them straight in my head: You love your parents, but you sex your girlfriend. I have it written down in a couple of places.</p> <p> [Esquire]</p>?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?<p> The actress, whom you may have seen in Kick Ass, Let Me In, or Hugo, turns 15 today. The character of Hit Girl in Kick Ass was controversial for her ultraviolence and foul language, but in an , Chloe said: "I've been raised to think, and I know, that cussing isn't cool; it makes you look unintelligent and stupid. That's how I've been raised. So I can actually say I've never uttered a syllable of a curse-word in my life. Behind closed doors with my friends, they might do it, but I don't." Enjoy a few clips of Chloe: One from an Interview photo shoot, a snippet of Chloe as Hit Girl, and a Skype video in which Chloe lip-syncs "Don't Stop Believin.'" And a bonus video of the PS22 Chorus singing Rihanna, just cuz. This here's your open thread, guys. Have a fantastic weekend. See you Monday! </p><p></p>?<p>There aren't many times when I go to a movie and I leave speechless.? But it happened after I saw the film Kick Ass.?</p><p>For those of you that don't know, the film is about an average to slightly nerdy comic book loving kid who decides that he can be his own type of superhero. He dresses up in a wet suit and heads out into the street to save some people. The film is based on the comic book by Mark Millar, is written by Jane Goldman and Matthew Vaughn (the pair the brought us the underappreciated Stardust) and directed by Vaughn.</p> <p>Now you ask why did Melissa Silverstein of Women & Hollywood a) want to even see this film; and b) what about it could have made her speechless?</p> <p>The answer is Hit Girl. (Alert: there will be spoilers below)</p> <p>First, let's be clear. This is a movie for adults. If your kid wants to see it, say no.</p> <p>Hit Girl is a character that I have never seen on screen before. She is an 11 year old girl assassin. This girl played amazingly by Chloe Grace Moretz is a walking destruction machine. She shoots, she stabs, she bayonets. She does things on screen that literally left my mouth agape. FYI- no studio would touch this movie. They loved it but said you gotta take out Hit Girl. No one would finance a film with an 11 year old girl killer. Those movies are just not made in Hollywood.</p> <p>The thing about Hit Girl is not just that she is a brutal and ruthless killer. She enjoys it. Way. Too. Much.</p> <p>And the language. I really thought there were language limits but Hit Girl pushes those boundaries, and quite frankly, after this movie I don't think there are any language barriers left. They've been trampled by an 11-year-old girl. Never before have a heard the c-word (yes, that word) uttered by a girl describing men. While I was horrified at the moment I have to admit that I smiled at the same time because she was doing something onscreen I never thought I would see. A girl kicking ass. Literally.</p> <p>So I am conflicted. The thing about Hit Girl as Jane Goldman said to me in an interview (which I will publish tomorrow) and I agree with, is that because she is 11 the violence is not sexualized. So much of violence we see in films is perpetrated on women because they are women. Hit Girl kills because that's what her daddy (Nicholas Cage) taught her to do (let's not get into the bad parenting here.) You know your into different territory when the first scene you see of your heroine is her father teaching her take a bullet in a vest.</p> <p>The question I've been asking myself since I saw the film is does Hit Girl movie us forward or backwards? I don't really have a final answer. The pros are that she is actually the hero of the film. She saves everyone and kills all the bad guys. The last time I saw that was…well…never. The actress who plays Hit Girl Chloe Grace Moretz wanted to play an Angelina Jolie type action role. This is the type of part she told her agents to find according to a in the NY Times: "You know, like an action hero, woman empowerment, awesome, take-charge leading role." It warms my heart that young actress are interested in playing these kinds of parts, that they want to for lack of a better word, kick ass is cool. Also, the fact that all these guys are destroyed by a girl never becomes an issue. There's no sexist bullshit about guys being killed by a girl. She comes and reeks havoc and all these guys want to do is survive.</p> <p>The cons are the language and the fact that she uses her "girlness" to disarm people (because, really who would think a little girl could kick your ass?)</p> <p>We would never be having this whole conversation about Hit Girl if the character would have been Hit Boy. No one would care in the same if a 11-year-old boy said the c-word. I'd probably just dismiss it as another sexist movie and character and move on.</p> <p>I'm still very conflicted about this. I don't know if this is progress or if this is setting up girls in a very bad way. But one thing I do know is that with all the buzz about the film surrounding the film I am hoping that the sequel will be called Hit Girl instead of Kick Ass 2.</p> <p> (NY Times)</p> <p>This post on the blog . Republished with permission.</p>?<p>Thank God it's Friday; today marks not only the end of an exhausting series of fashion shows but what is easily the most anticipated event (sorry Marc Jacobs) of Fashion Week itself: The Project Runway finale fashion show. After the jump &mdash; and live from Bryant Park &mdash; I liveblog the runway fashions of the remaining three (or four?) Project Runway contestants.</p><p>8:20: Waiting outside - Kit and Jeffrey are here together and chatting. Kit looks much older in person. Jeffrey is smoking cloves and has grown his hair out.</p> <p>8:25: Just asked Jeffrey who he likes from the current season; he says Sweet P is his favorite: "Sweet P and Hillary in 08 all the way."</p> <p>8:35: We're in a holding area now; they've taken the photographers in and I'm just sitting in a press line. Of course, everyone in the press line is not dressed up at all; we're all wearing jeans.</p> <p>8:45: I think I see the woman wrestler that Chris March costumed; she's wearing a leopard print coat. Of course.</p> <p>8:55: Jay McCarroll and Uncle Nick arriving together; They are being escorted in by security. I only saw Jay for a minute, but his hair is short except for the front, which is in a pseudo-pompadour and it's all dyed black. Except for the poof, which is white. Uncle Nick is wearing a tailored blue suit.</p> <p>9:00: Ugh we have been standing in the passageway between the main foyer and then tent for a while now; I am growing faint. But I've befriended some gays.</p> <p>9:05: Security just made an announcement that everyone needs to throw out their coffee before entering.</p> <p>9:07: Ooh, Laura Bennett; Bad Mommy. Gonna go talk to her.</p> <p>9:09: Laura says she's gonna be on QVC on Feb .24, selling 7 garments [Shameless plug! -Ed.] Chloe gonna be on too. Also she can't wait to see Jillan and Chris March and thinks Christian will win.</p> <p>9:10: She thinks this season was boring; no drama. However, in regards to drama, she says she is scared of the Jezebel commenters; she calls the Jezebel readers "salty New England dogs." She says she wants to respond to the commenters who railed at her for calling her nannies "the girls", explaining that, in the South, you're either a "girl" or an "old bag". And she says she can't believe someone commented about her letting her kids run around at the airport: "Wouldn't you rather them run around at the airport than on the plane?"</p> <p>9:15: More Laura: She thinks Christian will win. But she'll be a little disappointed if he does. She says she agreed with the Project Rungay guys that he's "princess puffy sleeves" and that she wants to slap him across the face every week and that she screams at her tv telling him he needs to behave.</p> <p>9:18: Ooh, I'm gonna try to grab Tyson Beckford.</p> <p>9:20: Tyson wants Christian to win. Or, as he called him, "That guy with the funny hair and glasses."</p> <p>9:25: Okay, they told everyone to take their seats - time to start, they say. I just had to throw some bitch out of my seat and have her unhand my swag bag. Inside the bag: The new issue of Elle, some Tresemme curl spray, a Hershey bar, Tresemme hair spray, L'Oreal lip gloss, a key ring. Person behind me just said of new Elle, "I love Amy Adams but ugh that is the worst picture of her."</p> <p>9:33: Oooh, lights dimming. Stragglers are being told by security to take seats NOW.<br> <br> There is minor hollering. Where oh where is Tim Gunn?</p> <p>9:38: Padma just took her seat. She is so fucking hot. Ted Allen and Gail Simmons sitting beside her. Seats next to the judges are saved for Niki Taylor and Mary Louise Parker. Ooh, Nina and Michael are in the house! Michael's wearing his shades; Nina has bangs.</p> <p>9:39: Victoria motherfucking Beckham is here!!!!!!!! She just entered down runway with Heidi; wearing an almost neon orange dress.</p> <p>9:40: Posh is the motherfucking guest judge!!!! Everyone is waving and cheering for her. Heidi's wearing jeans; I wonder if they're Jordache? Okay, it's starting!</p> <p>9:45: Heidi made her entrance: "Hello everybody!" (Clapping) She says lots of super-fast beating hearts backstage. Now she's introducing the judges. And she also made big point of telling everyone that Harvey Weinstein here too.</p> <p>9:47: I wonder if I would look hot or dumb in Heidi's haircut.</p> <p>9:49: Okay Sweet P has entered; she says she hopes we love her collection as much as she does. She is crying.</p> <p>9:50: First look: it's like a metallic-y suitish thing? Gold shirt. Purple metallic flecked top with bustle and pencil skirt. Second look: tube dress in the purple material; so much more sophisticated than anything she ever did on the show. Now a crazy stripe skinny suit with ruffle shirt. Now a skirt suit in stripe print with ruffle bell sleeves, and ruffles down the back. An olive green felt cape over bronze tiered ruffle halter dress. Tartan tube dress with exaggerated hips. Tartan high-waisted trousers, with a striped peasant blouse. Ooh pretty tailored purple coat, with navy detailing. Maybe it's supposed to be a dress? Fits like a glove. Blue silk dress with sheer black top and back. Gold dress with exaggerated hips.</p> <p>9:55: Black and gold deco looking dress, above knee, very cool. How did sweet p make this??? Black velvet exaggerated jodphurs with white silk sleeveless top with velvet bow and felt big hat. That was the closing look. I was strangely impressed! Sweet P is crying while taking her bow.</p> <p>9:57: Now it's...Chris March. And crowd goes WILD. He is crying. I am starting to tear up too! "Go Chris" the crowd is shouting; the whole place is clearly pulling for him. He says "I never knew that living my life one day at a time for many days would lead me to this hour, this moment."</p> <p>10:00: First look: blue silk screened dress with a Botticelli face on it; applause from crowd. And a black model wearing it! Second look is a suit. Oh lord there is pony hair fringe. Blue velvet skirt and tapestry jacket. Next is long jacket in the tapestry, also with the pony hair. Now a red Grecian gown, also silk screened. Now a suit in velvet: red velvet jacket, black velvet pencil skirt. Next is a rather awful red velvet dress: short, spaghetti straps, lots of applique. Now a long dress: Red velvet with a red velvet belt and a red silk panel down middle. Now another dress getting applause: A black and red dress with another large scale image silk screened on. Now a black velvet full skirt with black silk top and patent belt. Third look to get applause: a suit in black velvet with exaggerated pony hair collar and bottom. Flapper dress with furry fringe bottom. One more look! Long black stretch velvet dress with giant stole and knit panel down center. That's the closer. Applause from crowd: It definitely looked more like a collection than Sweet P's. Chris is crying and screaming "thank you" and hugging "his" model, who is also black and was incidentally my year at Tufts, if I remember correctly.</p> <p>10:06: Next w have Jillian: place goes insane again. She is sosososo cute!<br> <br> She says she's so proud to be here, showing very first collection, she hopes we see her inspiration and feel inspired as well.</p> <p>10:07: First look: wow this is awesome. Applause from crowd. Greenish pinstripe jacket with big collar and knit hood underneath. Next look is a mini skirt with architectural pleats and a knit hat, black turtleneck. Next are jodpuhrs and a knit jacket. Next is a gold minidress with sheer black overlay. Next is a olive velvet jacket with a ruffled mini skirt. Next look gets applause; a knit black and white striped top with a deep scoop neck and these crazy pom pom sleeves paired with an olive tweed skirt. Next is a hooded jacket and flouncy long skirt. Now a knit sweater with cutouts and skinny pants. Now this cool armor jacket with knit tights.</p> <p>10:10 AM: More applause for dress with this silvery bottom with tulle overlay<br> <br> Next: velvet blue draped dress. Next is a corset top dress with pleated metallic black long skirt; it's the closer and it's awesome. Big applause from crowd I hope she wins. "Most wearable", says woman next to me.</p> <p>10:13: Now is Rami. He looks smug. He's "very excited to be here with us as we experience this moment". He says his collection is a celebration of women. He says women should be cherished and treated as muses every day of their lives. Now he is coughing. But not crying.</p> <p>10:14: First look: its teal and draped, but it has a corset built-in. It has puffy shoulders a la Christian. Next teal suit with a mini skirt and draping where the jacket comes in at waist. Next is a strapless graphic black and white dress: it is, of course, draped, but it got applause. Now we have skinny hot pink pants and a big blouse with black vest. Now a hot pink draped tent dress with puffy sleeves. Now a hot pink skirt, mini lots of detailing with shiny black blouse. High waisted pants with obi belt get applause. That's with a pink blouse with built in cape. Olive green pants and a one-shoulder draped top. Final look is a gown in olive: combo of draping and weave work gets applause. Ah one more look! Gold draped goddess gown: Beautiful. Shit wait one more!. Big applause for this really intricately constructed gold dress. With this beautiful trumpet skirt. And one more! [Oy. -Ed.] Black dress with trumpet skirt and all these crazy little tags of fabric layered upon each other. The eveningwear he showed was very impressive. I could do without his separates and day wear, on the whole.</p> <p>10:20: And last but not least we have Christian and his stupid haircut. He says thank you for coming: this collection means a lot to him. He says everyone looks fierce. His first look is so perfect for Posh: A full black to the knee skirt that literally blossoms, and a metallic black turtleneck. Next is skinny pants and black hip-length skirted jacket; next is another short very architectural jacket. More black: Another jacket and pants combo.</p> <p>10:23: I can't believe I'm saying this: his collection rocks. Now a sheer black blouse and skinny pants. Now this full felt jacket hat got big applause, built-in layer like his couture dress. Now skinny black pants and a truly couture-looking ruffled white high blouse so high it covers her face. Now a cream Christian jacket and trousers. More skinny pants with a giant sleeved cream blouse with a maroon felt full jacket belted over. Now a top that looks like his couture dress. Huge applause. HugER applause for a gown that has cream on one side, brown on other and is intricately layered. Finally, a long feathered gown: layers upon layers. He really went all out, says woman next to me. No way can't he win. He was the best by far. Wow: the kid's got talent. And I can imagine Posh in all of it!!!!</p> <p>10:25: He is now posing on the runway and his model is laughing at him.</p> <p>10:28: Okay, Heidi back out: she says best finale ever. She says she knows judging is going to be hard and says thanks to fans and media for covering, and told us all "Auf Wiedersehen - you can go now!"</p> <p>10:30: Niki Taylor is telling me she has no favorites; she says they were all amazing, and she's really glad she doesn't have to do the judging!</p> <p>10:35: Trying to get to Heidi now. . Reporters are just tossing questions<br> <br> She says she's never had to fight for one of her choices; that it's Sheits pretty diplomatic and there's usually a consensus. She also says that Victoria called Bravo and asked to be a judge on the show</p> <p>10:40: Kara Janx: She thinks finale was so not amateur, so professional; she says toss up for her between Jillian, Christian and Rami, that she loved all three and thinks they were equally strong in different ways. Ted Allen: Leaning towards Sweet P. He says he's classic in that way. He says he's never left the finale saying he loved everyone's collection.</p> <p>10:45: Okay, headed home; pics will be up shortly.</p> <p><br></p>?<p>By now, the basic claim &mdash; that men's aspirations seem to have diminished as women's ambition has increased ?- is familiar. What's less obvious is another byproduct of the man crisis: the frustrating degree to which so many young men increasingly turn to the women in their lives not merely for emotional reassurance, but for direction, order, and stability. While there's nothing new about women nurturing their boyfriends and husbands, in the past -? at least among the American middle class -? that emotional encouragement was part of an explicit quid pro quo. However imperfectly the ideal was lived out in practice, the goal was usually the same: men provided, women soothed. For a host of reasons, guys are providing less financially than ever before. At the same time, men's yearning for comfort, reassurance, and direction from women seems to be getting louder and more urgent. </p> <p>If the "guy crisis" wasn't already placed at the center of the national conversation, Hanna Rosin's Atlantic article-turned-strangely-punctuated bestseller has certainly done the trick. Pundits across the political have embraced Rosin's basic : boys and men are falling behind academically and professionally because guys are less "flexible" than women, less capable of adapting rapidly to an economy that's increasingly "indifferent to brawn."</p> <p>Whether or not this masculine malaise is as widespread as Rosin claims is debatable; whether men are comparatively more rigid and less adaptable than women is at least partly contradicted by historical experience. (During the industrial revolution, for example, countless men made the rapid and difficult from an agrarian to a factory economy with varying degrees of ease.) One thing is indisputable: Rosin's book strikes a powerful chord with women who are exasperated by the aimlessness, the uncertainty, and the absence of urgency that seems to infect so many young (and, sometimes, not so young) men.</p> <p>In a rebuttal to Rosin's claims that the end of men has also heralded an unprecedented era of female empowerment, Chloe Angyal argues in the that the hit HBO series Girls reflects "a fuller picture of what it might mean to be a young American woman in the age of the end of men." Angyal's point is that the young women on the show are also "floundering… lacking the tenacity and follow-through that Rosin sees." To the extent that Girls accurately reflects the culture, that's a valid criticism. But there's another aspect of the series that supports Rosin's thesis: the troubling ineffectualness of so many of the male characters.</p> <p>Men may not be at end, but in Girls their psychological dependency is on display like never before. Think of Charlie, Marnie's boyfriend. While having make-up sex in his painfully neat apartment, Charlie starts begging "don't abandon me, okay, don't make me feel safe and then abandon me." Marnie ?- who wanted Charlie back -? is so horrified by his desperation that she breaks up with him mid-coitus. We laugh in both disbelief and uncomfortable recognition at Charlie's childlike, frantic craving for safety. We empathize with Marnie's disgust with this hopeless man-child who decorates -? and verbalizes &mdash; like a woman but who crumbles like a thoroughly modern dude.</p> <p>That same male need not only for validation, but for rescue and direction, is on full display in 2010's critically-acclaimed Blue Valentine. Ryan Gosling and Michelle Williams play a young couple whose marriage is failing; in the film's wrenching penultimate scene, Gosling's Dean pleads with Williams' Cindy (script ) :</p> <p>The look of sheer desperation across Dean's face…</p> <p>DEAN<br> I don't know what ?to do, I don't know what else to do. Tell? me what to do, tell me what to do.?</p> <p>CINDY<br> ?I don't know what to do.?</p> <p>DEAN?<br> Tell me how I should be.?</p> <p>CINDY<br> ?I don't know.?</p> <p>DEAN<br> ?Just tell me, I'll do it, I'll do it.</p> <p>?CINDY<br> ?I don't know what to say, I'm so sorry, I? don't know what to do anymore.?</p> <p>DEAN?<br> Just tell me and I'll do it.</p> <p>"Tell me what to do." "Tell me how I should be." Dean's entreaty is both heartbreaking and utterly familiar; more than an appeal not to be abandoned, it's a forlorn male plea for an instruction manual that wives and girlfriends can't be expected to possess. Like Marnie in Girls, Cindy knows just enough to know that for her sanity's sake, she's got to get away from that sweet, suffocating, neediness.</p> <p>This masculinization of emotional dependency doesn't just show up in films and on TV. In his most column, Good Men Project founder Tom Matlack slams Rosin's "End of Men" thesis, arguing that men aren't "over", merely suffering from a "yearning for love and meaning (that) is at epidemic proportions." In a phrase as garbled as it is instantly descriptive of a certain masculine mindset, Tom writes that most guys are struggling to figure out what "it means to be a man and to be good and to try to do things that are impossible despite the long odds." Give these flailing young (and not-so-young) men a break, he writes; let's "stop pitting men and women against each other." Men crave connection with other guys and with women, Tom says. He's right, of course. But his op-ed reads like a variation on Charlie's plea to Marnie: women (starting with Rosin and others who peddle the "man crisis" trope) need to stop being so hard on men ?- and start doing more both to appreciate them and to make them feel safe. It's not quite Dean's "just tell me and I'll do it," but it's a close cousin to that plea: "if you only understood how hard I'm already trying, you'd lay off."</p> <p>Rosin writes that men "theoretically can be anything these days." What they lack, she argues, are qualities that they once had ?- and that women now seem at least more likely to possess: "flexibility, hustle, and an expansive sense of identity." Chloe Angyal is surely right that Rosin oversells the expansiveness of that self-confidence among young women. Even so, one key missing piece of the "end of men" narrative is not just the degree to which men have ceded "flexibility" and "hustle" to the women in their lives, but the extent to which men now turn to women not merely for partnership, but for mentoring, inspiration, and direction. What makes characters like Charlie, Dean, and the subjects of Rosin's book so recognizable is that mix of people-pleasing and passivity that is designed to force young women to take the initiative and give instruction to the men they love.</p> <p>Men, writes Matlack, are filled with yearning: to talk, to be understood, to be accepted. Men, he suggests, have more emotional depth than we give them credit for having. What he doesn't say is that guys today have so much less emotional resilience than we need them to possess. The contemporary female version of "male yearning" isn't just ambition, it's exhaustion. Part of that exhaustion may be due to the "feminization of success" that Hanna Rosin describes. But surely a hefty chunk of that weariness comes from the reality that even as many women do surpass men educationally and financially, they're still expected to play the traditionally feminine roles of sympathetic listener and constant encourager. Pay the rent. Make him feel safe. Tell him what to do and how to be. And make it all look hot.</p> <p>The problem isn't just that men may have a harder time adapting to a rapidly changing economy. The problem is ?- as both Hanna Rosin and Lena Dunham (the creator and star of Girls) seem to understand ? a growing number of men expect women to serve as perpetually available emotional beacons in their struggle to navigate the transition to adulthood and self-sufficiency.</p> Jezebel columnist Hugo Schwyzer teaches history and gender studies at Pasadena City College, and is a nationally-known speaker on sex, masculinity, body image and beauty culture. He also blogs at his . Follow him on Twitter: .?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?<p> Last night's brand-new episode of Dance Moms reiterated the fact that the stars here are, in fact, the moms. (If they weren't, the show would be called, I don't know, Dance Kids?) So is it any surprise that when the girls won the National Talent Competition, the mothers made it all about themselves?</p> <p>The Mother most guilty of this was Kelly, who told Abby that she could take the crown her daughter recently won and "shove it up [her] ass!" after Abby told her that her daughters were "mediocre." The fight (above) set the tone for the rest of the episode.</p> <p> But when you're putting all of your eggs in one basket &mdash; a basket that's desperately trying to be Black Swan with children &mdash; how can you expect the great Abby Lee to bother with the "difficult to work with" children of a pain-in-the-ass mom? Nevertheless, Chloe and Maddie's performance was pretty impressiveo.</p> <p> Not-so-impressive, on the other hand, was the dance that Kelly's daughters cooked up with little-to-no practice. After seeing the fantastic Black Swan routine, Kelly was furious about the lack of attention her daughters received, terrible choreography of their dance, and the Raggedy-Ann-looking costumes their she had to buy them. Frustrated by the injustice of the situation and yet another win by Maddie, Kelly goes off on a rant to the cameras: "It's like I'm purposely sticking my kids on stage to be made fools of!" Exactly.</p>?<p>Every Wednesday we're plagued by Midweek Madness, the malady that comes from exposure to the weekly tabloids. This week, the covers are all over the place: Britney and Angelina are trying to get pregnant; Trista's body looks great now that she isn't pregnant; Kevin Federline's got a tell-all book and Heidi Montag and Spencer Pratt continue to stage photo-ops reminding the world that they exist. Someone's buying this crap: In Touch, OK!and Life & Style . After the jump, we risk social diseases from OK!, In Touch, Life & Style, Us and Star. Editorial assistant Maria assists!</p> <p><br> <br> <br> <br> OK!<br> "Britney's Shocking Decision: Trying To Get Pregnant" Brit thinks having Adnan's baby will show the court, her sister and the world that she doesn't need them. She's considering converting to Islam. (Actually, if she moved to Riyadh and wore a burka, she might actually find peace.) Also inside: Amanda Bynes and Chloe Sevigny in the same Narciso Rodriguez dress? Seriously? And 100 New Yorkers think Amanda looks better? When she was seven, Angelina was a brat and threatened a classmate who didn't invite her to a birthday party. Yawn. At her New Year's Eve party in Colorado, Katie Holmes dressed guests in Ralph Lauren outfits that she personally put together. And when TomKat move into their new house, the staff will be dressed in Gap, Banana Republic and Polo. Vive Le Preppy!<br> Grade: D- (smallpox)<br> <br> <br> Us<br> "How I Got My Body Back" Someone named Trista has diet advice for y'all: "There is absolutely no reason to eat fried food," she says. She's relieved to put on a bikini again five months after giving birth. Also inside: In a reader poll, Do you miss Elisabeth Hasselbeck? 70% said "No." (Too bad, she's back already!) Audrina Patridge has a new dude! His name is Bernard Steimann and is "hideous," according to Maria. "JustinBobby was so gorgeous." Anywhoozle, Bernard is LC-approved. Oooh, exclusive interview with Alli Sims. Britney's cousin by marriage says "She's not crazy." Alli also says "When we go out guys don't even come up to our table. Seriously." Alli also says, "I don't think Adnan is a good person. I think he only has bad intentions." Damn straight!<br> Grade: D (tuberculosis)<br> <br> <br> Life & Style<br> "The Only Way I'll Marry Spencer": Heidi Montag says of Spencer Pratt: "I feel like I'm dating a preschooler sometimes. It's always play time with him." An insider says, "He's always looking for ways to make money but never actually working." Oh, and the couple is planning to go to Africa with the United Nations. Haven't the people of Africa suffered enough??? Also inside: Angelina is trying to get pregnant; she's been eating a lot of fatty foods to gain weight and even had &mdash; dun dun dun &mdash; McDonald's! (Trista would not approve!) Is Jessica Simpson's dad ruining her love life again? He meddled when she was with Nick Lachey and John Mayer, and he's doing it again with Tony Romo.<br> Grade: D+ (hepatitis C)<br> <br> <br> In Touch<br> "Pregnancy News": Apparently, since she was seen drinking water at an event and people think her boobs look bigger, Angelina is pregnant. Cuz, you know, there's no reason to drink water unless you're knocked up! Other people who may or may not be pregnant include Gwen Stefani, Avril Lavigne and Pamela Anderson. And you! Also inside: Britney's suicide note has a poem about death and says she is sorry for never making her life what everyone else wanted. Katie Holmes is too skinny and "her clavicles could poke your eyes out," says a random doctor. The mag claims she is 5'9" and 110lbs and starting to look like Posh. Burn! Lindsay had dinner at the Polo Lounge at the Beverly Hills Hotel with Adrian Grenier and it was "definitely a date," says a source. She made the reservation! Lauren Conrad bought a house in Hollywood but might keep Audrina as a roommate: "I would never live alone in a house by myself," she says. "It's so scary! I don't even think my parents would let me." There's a page of wall-to-wall photos of the many many instances in which Lindsay has been photographed wearing leggings, hilarious. "The List" this week is "Top Ten Plastic Surgery Nightmares" including Tara Reid's stomach, Kathy Griffin's near-death lipo, and Kanye West's mom, RIP.<br> Grade: C (malaria)<br> <br> <br> Star<br> "Kevin's $10 million Tell All!" Kevin Federline might write a book about his life with Britney Spears. A random publisher in San Francisco says a book like that could get $10 mil. Kevin's "been writing things down for a long time about his tempestuous time with Britney," says a source. Apparently Britney would call Kevin in a panic claiming a stranger was in the house or that she'd broken her leg. Kevin would rush over and she would act like nothing had happened. Also, there are 15 surveillance cameras in Britney's house and the footage could show stuff like Britney flying into a rage and whacking Kevin with a frying pan. Please let the nonexistent book be published! Also inside: Lindsay Lohan is hooking up with Luke Walton, a player for the Lakers &mdash; a witness says they went out and she asked him to stay over. Score! American Idol finalist Trenyce is seeing R. Kelly! They were "affectionate" with each other at Roscoe's House of Chicken & Waffles. Sarah Jessica Parker's son James might be in the Sex And The City movie: He's in a scene in Central Park, but it's so short it may get cut. Audrina Patridge of The Hills did a skanky photo shoot for Unico Exotic Wear in 2005 and Star has the pix! She's wearing a three-inch Catholic school girl skirt in one image. Nicole Richie's baby delivery wasn't completely smooth: After her water broke she begged for an epidural; then the baby was blue when it first came out. Everything turned out fine now; she's just exhausted and "cries at the drop of a hat." Meanwhile Christina Aguilera pushed for 24 hours &mdash; while wearing red lipstick &mdash; before docs did a C-section. Soon-to-be-divorced Pamela Anderson isn't doing well: She "walks around like a zombie..." then "breaks down and cries," says a source. So Page Six reported that Britney and Adnan were in a dressing room at Betsey Johnson for 45 minutes making "weird noises," which sounds like hanky-panky. But a shopper tells Star that Britney was in there "crying loudly." Sigh. Justin Timberlake and Kate Hudson were seen making out in Hollywood club Villa. Scandalous! Jessica Biel is in London filming a movie: When the cat's away... Eva Longoria and Tony Parker were at a party when someone said something about oral sex. Tony said, "What's the difference? A mouth is a mouth." Then Eva hit him.<br> Grade: B- (chickenpox)</p> <p><br></p>?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?Reader: piratabeata "This is me (piratabeata) and my best friend from high school circa 2003. My sister gave me those pleather pants from Hot Topic when I turned sixteen, and you better believe they were a staple of my early aughts wardrobe, along with the cat collar choker. I wore them so much they cracked. You also probably never saw me without pigtails for the better part of 2000-2004. I kind of wish this was a full length picture so you could see the ridiculous Spice Girl-esque platform shoes that I was rocking, too. I like how my best friend was trying so hard to look like a Catholic schoolgirl. We knew we were awesome."<br>?<p> The campaign to free the West Memphis Three, the men convicted of the 1993 murder of three 8-year-old boys in Arkansas, drew a lot of support from Hollywood, so perhaps it isn't surprising that in the next year or so we'll see not one, but two new films about their case. Both of these projects have been in the work for years, but now those behind the films have the very happy task of retooling the endings.</p> <p>As Damien Echols says in the chilling trailer for Paradise Lost 3, which was released this weekend, if it hadn't been for the two previous HBO documentaries, there's a very good chance that he would have been executed long ago. The third installment was already scheduled to premiere next month at the Toronto Film Festival, then run on HBO in November. Filmmakers Joe Berlinger and Bruce Sinofsky say that they were editing the movie when they got the news that Echols, Jason Baldwin and Jessie Misskelley Jr. were being released in a strange plea agreement that involved pleading guilty while maintaining their innocence. After a quick trip to Arkansas, they're now back in New York frantically trying to put together a new conclusion. "What better gift to a filmmaker than to see all this work come out like this," Berlinger TheWrap. "It's an amazing moment."</p> <p>Presumably Berlinger and Sinofsky are mostly excited about seeing justice (sort-of) served in a case they've documented for 18 years, but for the filmmakers there's an added benefit to the release of the West Memphis Three: The film could now be an Oscar contender. HBO has rescheduled the premiere for January, and it will have a limited theatrical run this fall. the Hollywood Reporter, this allows Paradise Lost 3: Purgatory to qualify for an Academy Award. There's reason to think it could be nominated, as Paradise Lost won and Emmy and a Peabody Award and Paradise Lost 2: Revelations was nominated for an Emmy.</p> <p>In addition to the documentaries, there's also a dramatic film based on investigative reporter Mara Leveritt's 2003 book, which is set to start filming this spring. Deadline:</p> <p>Devil's Knot is an under $20 million feature that has The Sweet Hereafter and Chloe director Atom Egoyan aboard to direct a script that was originally written by Scott Derrickson and Paul Boardman, the team behind The Exorcism of Emily Rose.</p> <p>Having someone familiar with horror films is probably fitting, considering not only what the West Memphis Three endured, but the fact that we still don't know who actually did commit the crime. Berlinger says:</p> <p>"We shouldn't forget three families lost three 8-year-old children, and the decision to insist these guys are guilty means the police consider this case closed, which also means they're not looking for the real killer ... So we have an unsolved crime now and the state of Arkansas is washing its hands."</p> <p> [The Wrap]<br> [Hollywood Reporter]<br> [Deadline]</p>?<p>A reports that the average woman will spend $25,000 on 469 pairs of shoes in her lifetime. Say what?</p><p>I'm not sure how much to make out of this (the circumstances of the 3,000 women surveyed should be considered), but the thing I want to know is, why shoes? I was thinking about it the other day (Deep Thoughts: "It's Summer and I'm Tired" Edition) before the study even came out. Why are shoes such a "thing" among women, coveted by Carrie Bradshaw more than any other clothing article or accessory, lined up on display in the homes of many a subjects, and frequenters of popular street style blog ? When it comes to status, shoes win approval in ways shirts cannot &mdash; the Daily Express study stated that four out of every 10 women judge other women based on their shoes. It Bags had only a moment, and it's not like there's a Tumblr devoted to pants. What makes shoes so special?</p> <p>Not that I have any real statistics to base this off of, but perhaps part of it is that shoes are so object-y (Colorful Adjective Usage: "It's Summer and I'm Tired" Edition). Whether you want to invest in something special or are simply yearning for a quick fashion fix, a good, chunky thing is more satisfying than fabric. They stand on their own, they're more 3D, and while other accessories have these qualities, none of them are quite as trophy or collectible-like. Advertising genius and fashion obsessee Cindy Gallop has hers showcased alongside an entire wall of her apartment, framed by twinkling lights. Jane Aldridge, of the popular fashion blog , owns around 85 pairs, and has said the fun in collecting comes from their art-like, sculptural quality. I have to agree &mdash; my pair of Miu Mius sit on a shelf in my room, next to a foot-tall Stephen Jones hat and a rare early Warhol book.</p> <p>Another possible explanation is that shoes are easy. As Browns founder and owner Joan Burstein once said, "Feet don't have fat days or bad hair days, which is part of the reason women are so obsessed with them." True! Plus, a good pair of shoes can improve a lazy or boring outfit in ways other accessories can't. If I had the energy, I'd make a chart: T-shirt and jeans...with Chanel flats! Tank top and cut-offs...with Chloe platforms! Simple suit...with YSL heels!</p> <p>And, of course, a lot of the staple quality comes from their roles in the lives of fictional characters. Like, maybe they weren't really that big a deal, but then Carrie Bradshaw was like, DUH THEY'RE A BIG DEAL, EVERYONE KNOWS THAT! (Obviously Carrie Bradshaw was not the first or only to declare this, but she's one of the most advocating shoe-hoarders out there.)</p> <p>I find that, for me at least, there's a bit of comfort in shoes, even the 4-inch shapeshifters that always elicit a shake of the head from my mom. For some reason, a pair of shoes brings back memories more intimately than an article of clothing. If I'm having a bad day and hang my head, it's soon back up and facing forward if my eyes were met with a pair of my favorite platforms. And on a shitty day, I don't even care how materialistic that is, because they're just so pretty.</p> <p>So we have the object quality, ease and flattery, and status. Any other theories? Also, shoe-stocking shops everywhere, you may pay me using cash or check. Or, shoes.</p> <p> [Daily Express]</p>?<p></p> <p>[New York, March 15. Image via ]</p>NEW YORK - MARCH 15: Actress attends the premiere of 'Chloe' at Landmark's Sunshine Cinema on March 15, 2010 in New York City. (Photo by Jemal Countess/Getty Images)?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?<p>Model Chrissy Teigen, who made her Sports Illustrated: Swimsuit Edition debut last year, can't actually swim. Asked about her worst photo shoot, she says: "I honestly don't have any. Let's face it ?- it's not that difficult to be a swimsuit model. I was a backside model for Victoria's Secret's website and it ended up being the most painful thing I have done. It's the four little pictures of different angles if you click on a picture of a bottom &mdash; they have people come in and do that. No face involved, just butt. I had to pop my butt out the entire time and I remember that my back was in the most pain of my entire life." </p> <p>Is it just us or is she pretty awesome? Further evidence of same: for Halloween, Teigen is dressing up as a child pageant star from Toddlers & Tiaras. Her boyfriend, John Legend, is going to go as her creepy stage dad. Teigen is pictured here in an for Vegas magazine, and a behind-the-scenes photo she from the shoot. []</p> Philipp Plein, the designer nobody had ever heard of before he paid Lindsay Lohan &mdash; a former face of Miu Miu (!) just sayin' &mdash; $500,000 to be the "face" of his line and attend his fashion show in Milan is now threatening, via an intermediary, to cancel Lohan's contract because she had her probation revoked. [] Versace for H&M, which launches November 17, will range in price from $19.95 for some costume jewelry to $299 for a leather jacket and a leather dress. Other dresses are $149 and $249, the women's boots are $149, and a silk purse will set you back $199. Printed silk scarves &mdash; which, forgive us, in this product range look perhaps like the least hideous option &mdash; are $29.95. []<br> See the whole collection here. [] Here's the trailer for the Tom Ford special that's airing on OWN this Sunday. In it, the designer talks about his perfectionism, workaholism, the "terrible low" he experienced after leaving Gucci, and the making of A Single Man. You can also catch a glimpse of Ford shooting Crystal Renn for Vogue Paris and Beyonce walking on Ford's runway. [] Arizona Muse nabbed the cover of Vogue Paris' November issue, which is all about beauty. [] Um, you guys. Kaiser Karl's Number One Boy Toy and Jezebel's Official Male Model Turned Pop Star, the one and only Baptiste Giabiconi, is on the French version of Dancing With The Stars. Dance like the wind, Baptiste! [] Solid gold shoelaces, delivered and "laced for you anywhere in the world" &mdash; $19,000. The feeling of wordlessly advertising your gold bug status with every step &mdash; priceless. Also available are Sterling silver shoelaces &mdash; $3,000. [] Rihanna and her record label have settled the lawsuit brought by photographer David LaChapelle over the similarities between Rihanna's "S&M" video and LaChapelle's work. [] Women's Wear Daily made a random Occupy Wall Street protester its "Man of the Week." The trade gives the protester an overall A- for his "Rick Owens-esque skater" style, noting approvingly the military jacket and the rolled-up jeans. But black socks and high-top Chucks are "too trendy for an idealist," apparently. [] A man with two different sized feet special-ordered a size 14.5 left slipper from a Chinese factory. A decimal point was misplaced. This is what arrived. []?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?<p>So the other day I'm walking down the street with Dodai, strategizing as to how we were going to pee with those crazy plastic "shenis" things, and it's really sunny and as a rule I lose every pair of sunglasses I buy within the first 36 hours of owning them, so of course I have no sunglasses so I ask to stop at a shop to buy a pair, when suddenly the J.Lo-Ja Rule song "I'm Real" gets into my head and I realize, "OMG, what happened to those glasses no frames and the little rhinestone hearts? Where did those go?" And Dodai says, "I think those where Chloe." And I say, "Um, the ones I had were not Chloe..." And then we shared a moment of nostalgia over that whole bygone era, when everyone went by their abbreviated hip-hop nicknames a la &mdash; like my friend Jason Fagone was "J-Fag" &mdash; and indecipherable Murder Inc. anthems ruled the airwaves, and every car had chrome rims, and then I bought the November Vogue last night and realized "OMG ANNA WINTOUR AND I ARE TOTALLY HAVING ESP"</p> <p>Yup, Manolo Tims. It doesn't get classier.</p>?<p>Here's the redband trailer for Movie 43, the upcoming ensemble comedy starring Emma Stone, Kate Winslet, Hugh Jackman, Halle Berry, Chloe Moretz, Anna Faris, Chris Pratt, Richard Gere, Kristen Bell and pretty much any other actor that you can imagine. Apparently, it's a Garry Marshall style tale of intertwining storylines, although I don't remember Valentine's Day having quite so many jokes about disabled people.</p> <p>Movie 43 could turn out to be an fantastic dark comedy, but judging by this trailer, it's looking more Scary Movie than Fargo.</p>?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?In Ladymag Land, the biggest issues of the year are the September issues. And this year, Vogue, Queen of the Ladymags, had its biggest issue ever. Nine hundred sixteen pages: Absolutely GIGANTIC. But all of the Ladymags celebrated the fall season in a huge way, and we could not let this momentous occasion pass without critiquing their efforts. With ten titles to choose from, thousands of pages to flip through and epicly large headlines screaming from the newsstands, it's tough to know which editors, if any, actually produced something worthwhile. And so, in the spirit of Midweek Madness, this is Ladymag Lunacy: The September issues, rated and graded. Grab yourself a diet soda and get comfortable: The show's about to begin.?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?<p>Rethinking virginity, as a few of our favorite ladies recently, means unpacking the twin sister of the virgin: the slut. One of the panelists, Chloe Angyal, has on that front.</p><p>She writes on Feministing that slut has an ever-slippery meaning:</p> <p>Sady, who was the first to offer a definition, was careful to note that being labeled a slut can happen to anyone, even to people who have never had any sexual contact of any kind. Slut-shaming is often the result of perceived, rather than proven, sluttiness. As Therese then noted, sluttiness itself is entirely relative: In some cultures or among some social groups, she said, having slept with ten people over the course of your life is considered a pretty tame sexual history. In others, it makes you a dirty, untouchable slut. I added that, with definitions of what's acceptable and what's slutty being so malleable and poorly defined in our own culture, you often don't know where the line between the two is until you've crossed it. And then - poof! - it's too late: Other people have decided that you're a slut, and you're stuck with this damaging, divisive and damn stubborn label.</p> <p>Of course, we also have the lovely inverse of slut &mdash; the prude or the frigid virgin.</p> <p>As Therese has discovered as she's traveled around the country talking to people about virginity, the same culture that scorns women for being sexual also scorns them for not being sexual! Just as you can be slut-shamed, you can be prude-shamed or virgin-shamed! Shame for everyone!</p> <p>There's more than enough to go around.</p> <p> [Feministing]<br> Earlier: </p>?Baz Luhrmann &mdash; know for his vivid, colorful, theatrical films like Romeo + Juliet and Moulin Rouge &mdash; is tackling F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby next, and the female lead, Daisy Buchanan, has not been cast.?<p>Hey kids, how about a Terry Richardson profile? You're in luck! And in this version of the Terry Story, he's a lovable, propriety-challenging scamp. In actuality, however, Richardson is a serial sexual predator who uses his position of power to coerce young models into performing sex acts with/on him. And this is a problem that reaches far beyond the walls of Terry's studio. </p> <p>This past weekend, the New York Times a softball profile of the photographer (title: "The Naughty Knave of Fashion's Court"), written by Laura Holson, most notable in its cavalier treatment of a serious subject matter: allegations of sexual misconduct. How serious? My is that he got naked and persuaded me to give him a handjob (or "perform a sex act," in Times euphemism-speak) while several adult employees of his egged me on, took photos, handed me a cum rag and then saw me out. I also told Holson that he groped my breast without asking.</p> <p>Although I agreed to talk to Holson on the phone about my experiences with The World's Most Fucked Up Fashion Photographer, I was wary &mdash; in these "fair and balanced" accounts, the accuser often comes off unfavorably. But I hoped that by cooperating with her, I could provide these crucial details to the story, as I am to date one of just two people willing to go on the record non-anonymously about a negative encounter with Terry. (The other, Coco Rocha, is understandably , as she currently makes her living in the fashion world.) In 2010, Danish model Rie Rasmussen also about his treatment of young women.</p> <p>Unfortunately, hardly any specific complaints appear in the article. Instead, Holson focuses weirdly on the red herring of his nudity, which he confidently refutes:</p> <p>One woman who did sign her name, Jamie Peck, said that Mr. Richardson disrobed during her second visit to his studio in 2004 when she was 19, and asked her to take nude photographs of him. In a recent interview, Ms. Peck, now 26, said she agreed, but didn't feel comfortable and later regretted her actions.<br> […]<br> Mr. Richardson, who declined to discuss Ms. Peck's comments, said that while he may take his clothes off when working on personal projects like "Terryworld," he stays clothed while taking commercial and magazine shots. "It's not like I'm doing a professional shoot and it's like, ‘Excuse me, do you mind if I get naked when I take pictures because this is how I like to work,'" he said. "I'm not a nudist."</p> <p>Yeah, well, nobody was accusing him of being one. (And unlike Terry, nudists aim to de-sexualize the naked human body.)</p> <p>Aside from discussing my personal experience, my point was and is that this and much worse happens all the time, and nobody in a position of power seems to care. Needless to say, this didn't make it in, either. Instead, Holson went with this:</p> <p>"If you are Barack Obama, you probably don't need to be worried," Ms. Peck said, referring to the 2007 Vibe photo Mr. Richardson shot of the president. Young models, though, she added, should "know what the boundaries are."</p> <p>Remember what I said about being wary? I told Holson this with the caveat it should not be the model's responsibility to keep herself from being sexually harassed in the workplace.</p> <p>The way the industry is currently structured, a model has zero recourse if a photographer is behaving inappropriately &mdash; other than to walk out, lose the job and damage a relationship, plus risk being reprimanded by her agency. Does that sound fair to you? Terry's behavior is emblematic of this, but he is by no means unique. I'm going to venture that most of the Times' readers are not fashion insiders, so a bit of critical background might be of use.</p> <p>Then there's the way Holson makes Uncle Terry sound like a cute and quirky fashion world character, like Zooey Deschanel if she were an older, hornier man. The article is heavily weighted with quotes from people like Chloe Sevigny and Richardson's editor at Taschen Dian Hanson, who think the things he does are cool and adorable and not at all criminal. And yet, even when people praise him, their words are somewhat revealing. "Maybe it is manipulative, but when you are with him, you don't feel it," says Chloe Sevigny. Yes, Chloe. You don't feel it. That is the whole point of being manipulative. If people realize you're doing it, you've failed.</p> <p>Even the people defending Terry do not deny the facts behind these allegations of misconduct. They only disagree with Terry's detractors in that they think his models are making a truly uncoerced choice. Of all the people who commented, Terry Richardson and his publicist are the only people willing to straight-up call those of us who've spoken out liars. Here's the hilariously wounded quote:</p> <p>"Of course it was hurtful," he said. "Yes, I was upset. It's not nice for all these people to make up stuff about you. The flip side is, I just stopped reading it and I kept working."</p> <p>Something here obviously doesn't add up. I'm also given pause by the fact that </p> <p>Was there some sort of understanding in place here, or is it simply a failure of journalism? Either way, it doesn't look good. Holson, for her part, responded to my request for comment:</p> <p>The profile was about Terry's whole career, not just one aspect of it. Within it, we were trying to explore how the fashion world perceives him, in spite of (or because of) his reputation. Complaints and opinions regarding his behavior were included at length, and we linked to Rie and Coco's public comments so readers could read their words for themselves. You, of course, were interviewed and we discussed your comments before publication. I could not find lawsuits filed against him and, if you know of any, please let me know. […] Ultimately, my feeling is that we should present the information we find to readers and let them decide what they think of him.</p> <p>Fair enough, but I think the lack of context and specific details is a game-changer. Terry's actions do not exist in a vacuum, and as such, he shouldn't be presented in one. But from what I've seen so far, a sea change &mdash; for how models are treated, for the media's coverage of fashion &mdash; is not likely to happen any time soon. Not that we should stop trying.</p> <p>Earlier: <br> </p> Jamie Peck is a contributing editor at .?<p>I first spotted these $2,975 Balenciaga gladiator boots in the March issue of Teen Vogue. Little did I know I would be seeing them again and again and again and again and again! Because, you see, they are so practical. A real wardrobe staple! No seriously, I immediately thought, "I do not get it." And by "it," I mean "shoes." I do not get why anyone would want, or even aspire to want, to attempt to affix all these fragile, elaborate, intricately constructed and dare I say totally ugly and oh yeah also multi-thousand dollar sculptures onto the body parts responsible for their very mobility. Am I not a woman? Sometimes I wonder this. Dodai and Maria both claimed to like these Balenciaga things. Am I alone in my bafflement? A in the Times of London this week claimed that "A woman who really is tired of fashion is a woman who is tired of life." Oh, is that it? After the jump, a photo essay culled from some recent magazines pondering my ennui re the season's most coveted footwear.</p> <p><br> Oh look, here they are again, in some issue of Vogue.</p> <p><br> Okay, yeah, at this point I am making a point. This is a whole other issue of Vogue. Still ugly. So what could possibly replace the Gladiator boots?</p> <p><br> Hey, these look like the shoes that little Japanese schoolgirls used to wear, and then DIE. On the plus side, they're all under $735.</p> <p><br> These five-inch Chloe numbers would be eminently practical if only I could figure out what season they were for.</p> <p><br> Oh, here it is! Balenciaga again. Is there a person you know who could get their $3,495 worth from these tarantula-esque black...um, boots? Of course, for the less-cultured masses they have these python Miu Miu slingbacks. They are only $945. Hey, like my rent! Okay, you get it...Betch.</p> <p> [MySpace]<br> [Times Of London]<br> [Independent]<br> [The F Word]</p>?<p>Chief executive of Alloy Entertainment Leslie Morgenstein's name may sound potentially female, but the person responsible for shows like "Gossip Girl," "The Vampire Diaries," and "Pretty Little Liars" reaching 12-to-24-year-old eyeballs is in fact a 44-year-old man.</p> <p>Because as we all know, sometimes the best teenage girl for the job is actually a man.</p> <p>"They have their finger on the pulse of the millennial audience," said Michael Riley, president of ABC Family, which broadcasts Alloy's "Pretty Little Liars" and two of its latest shows, "The Nine Lives of Chloe King" and "The Lying Game." (The third, "The Secret Circle," will have its premiere on CW in September.)</p> <p>Despite his abundant output, Mr. Morgenstein, 44, maintains a low profile in Hollywood. So much so that Gina Girolamo, his senior vice president for television, didn't know that her future boss was a man until they met last year. "I thought Leslie Morgenstein was a lady, based on the credits of my favorite shows, ‘Gossip Girl' and ‘Vampire Diaries,' " Ms. Girolamo, a former NBC executive, said.</p> <p>Regardless, Mr. Morgenstein, a married father of two sons who is based in New York, seems to know what girls want. "Because we are middle-aged Jewish guys," he said of the company's management team, "we hire a lot of creatives who are young women, who are much closer to the audience."</p> <p>In this case, Morgenstein does seem to be doing a bang up job when it comes to selecting shows women will go crazy for &mdash;as these shows are incredibly popular&mdash; but it causes me to wonder why in 2011 we're still relying so heavily on men to figure out what women want.</p> <p>Surely in previous years it was virtually unheard of to see female executives of any kind &mdash;television included&mdash; but now that we're seeing more , do you think it's possible to one day seem a boom of for-women-by-women programming?</p> <p>That said, who's to say that a woman actually a better judge of what women want to see any more than a man would be a better judge when it comes to gauging what men want to see?</p> <p>As more female executives rise to power and the lines of gender continue to blur, it will definitely be interesting to discover the answers.</p> <p> [NYTimes]</p>?<p>There's a crucial difference between a straight slut and a queer slut, and it's the shame factor. But it's not shame in the way you might think.</p><p>Presumably, queer women who are cool with calling themselves a "slut" base their queer-sluthood on number of partners -? such is the case in Jaclyn Friedman's recent heat-scoring piece in which Friedman assesses her straight-slutting on the same terms she does her casual sex with women -? in her estimation, it all adds up to one big slutty statistic. But I'd argue that when it comes to gauging one's overall sluttiness, volume of sex is secondary to what those partners are packing.</p> <p>The issue isn't one of moralistic shading; I'm all about pussy in the same way I'm all about dick, albeit in different amounts, and as a non-idiot I'd never suggest that a girl who goes both ways should grow up and "choose already." What I will suggest is that this thing of "slut" &mdash; so easy now to take on and cast ourselves as, to very simply describe the activity of a lot of fucking &mdash; be reconsidered or clarified, because "slut" doesn't exist as an idea without its association with shame. This is why there's no original analog for a "male slut," why we have to dredge up horrible jargon like "himbo" and "man-whore." These all provocative-on-purpose jokes cannot be taken as seriously as to call a woman a "slut." They're less sincere, more ironic, somewhere along the lines of Megan Fox saying, "Suck my dick." (And we only say that because there's no good way for women to casually communicate their own aggression without bringing male genitals into it. But that's another discussion).</p> <p>A slut without shame is not a slut at all, and a queer slut is, mostly, freed from all of the still-in-effect stigmas and judgments of straight straight-up sluts. This is because the shame of "slut" is specifically about the fear and subsequent judgment of women making themselves available and in some ways vulnerable to men. But we're not so much worried about a so-called slut's emotional well-being as we are afraid of her being used up, spoiled, pregnant with a fatherless baby &mdash; because all of that stuff is bad for women, individually and collectively.</p> <p>But these fears don't &mdash; can't, really &mdash; translate to the lesbian community. And perhaps it's because of that that gay and bisexual women are "allowed" more than the straight girls. The virtue and bodies and numbers (the numbers!) of straight women are still &mdash; errantly and irrationally &mdash; made to be everybody's business. But in the canon of queer-girl narratives (be them public or amongst friends or within a community), a lot of sex with a lot of people is understood to be normal and important, a dominant rule of self-discovery.</p> <p>Unlike the heterosexual slut, representations of queer sluts are understood to be sexy, uncomplicated and explorative (Laurel Canyon). Or just brutally masculine (Shane on the L Word). Or just there for faux-artistic boner-making (Chloe). It's understood that there's pleasure happening throughout all of this, but it's safe, educational, and importantly not destructive in the way that girl-on-guy slut-stuff always will be to the shamers. And so any busy queer girl is not a slut. Because no matter how readily we reclaim words like dyke or whore or cunt or whatever, there are other people who say these words and mean them, and they mean them not for us. They mean these words in another way, a way that is hard and unforgiving and reserved for a different kind of girl. And there's still a lot more of them than there are us.</p> <p>Kate Carraway is the Senior Writer at . Follow her on Twitter at .</p> <p>Want to see your work here? !</p> <p>Earlier: </p>?<p>Pretty dress after pretty dress went by on the red carpet outside the Metropolitan Museum of Art last night &mdash; and it was all pretty damn unimpressive.</p><p>At left, Giselle at the ball in 2008. At right, her appearance last night. Click to enlarge.</p> <p>The nice outfits were pretty in unoriginal ways, and the bad ones were generally not so much ugly as they were suffering from certain technical difficulties &mdash; mistaken placement of a bow, an error of proportions.</p> <p>The palette tended heavily towards the neutral &mdash; beiges, tans, eggshells, whites, creams, greys, blacks &mdash; and what colors there were, were muted. (Christina Hendricks' breast-binding cerulean gown and Rachel Weisz's cutesy hot pink one were among the few exceptions.) Prints? Almost none to speak of, and when they did occur. Interesting textures? Carey Mulligan and that reliable fashion trickster Chloe Sevigny each tried lace; their mileage varied. Ralph Lauren paired too-perfectly whiskered blue jeans with his tuxedo jacket, and made himself an example of the kind of high-low look that has become utterly trite. (His wife, Ricky, looked amazing as always in a proper tux, while Alexa Chung's attempt at men's wear fell into overwrought urchin territory.)</p> <p>Where were the stand-out dresses? Where were the gowns we will remember seeing for years to come? Gisele Bundchen's Versace dress from the 2008 Met ball (above left), was and is and ever shall be stunning; I'm also thinking here of an Yves Saint Laurent dress in a purple print that Elettra Wiedemann wore in 2007, and Kate Bosworth's from the same year, and even of that that Claire Danes wore, which transformed suddenly into a vivid red-orange around the waist. Even the unappealing outfits have often been entertaining or at least interesting &mdash; last year, we had in bunny ears, and in a tunic made from a print fit for a couch out of The Ice Storm. (And matching leggings.) The whole shebang this year seemed very tame by comparison. Like a slow-speed procession of the pretty, the safe, and the conservative, as though the worst thing that could happen would be for any dress to be Too Much. This year, Gisele wore a leather-strap contraption by Alex Wang (above right). She looked about as boring as a supermodel can.</p> <p> Many stars clung predictably to the brands they represent. Anne Hathaway wore Valentino, Sarah Jessica Parker wore Halston, Marion Cotillard wore Dior, Diane Kruger wore Calvin Klein; while some of them looked nice, this contractual quality quashed any element of surprise. Though we can more or less presume that Eva Mendes has been replaced as the face of Calvin Klein jeans are true on the basis of her wearing Dolce & Gabbana. Jessica Alba's Sophie Theallet gown was a beautiful and assured take on the 1930s, but the fact that she is a disappointment. Amanda Brooks wore something cool, but then again maybe it just stood out because it had sleeves.</p> <p>Lady Gaga, who should by rights have wowed us all with something fascinating, didn't even bother to walk the red carpet. That left Katy Perry to fly the flag for fashion creativity &mdash; and she did it by wearing a battery-powered light-up dress that looked as if it belonged to a raver bride. In 1996. She turned it off before eating dinner.</p>?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?<p>Having a long name is annoying for many reasons&mdash;introductions are complicated, filling out forms is a pain in the ass&mdash;but one woman in England purposefully gave herself an incredibly cumbersome name in order to help a charity she started after her son died. And in the process she ended up breaking the record for the longest name in the world. Okay, you'll need to set aside a few minutes to fully mull over this insane moniker:</p> <p>Red - Wacky League - Antlez - Broke the Stereo ? Neon Tide - Bring Back Honesty ? Coalition ? Feedback ? Hand of Aces ? Keep Going Captain ? Let's Pretend ? Lost State of Dance ? Paper Taxis ? Lunar Road - Up! Down! Strange! ? All and I ? Neon Sheep ? Eve Hornby - Faye Bradley ? AJ Wilde ? Michael Rice ? Dion Watts ? Matthew Appleyard ? John Ashurst ? Lauren Swales ? Zoe Angus ? Jaspreet Singh ? Emma Matthews ? Nicola Brown ? Leanne Pickering ? Victoria Davies ? Rachel Burnside ? Gil Parker ? Freya Watson - Alisha Watts ? James Pearson - Jacob Sotheran-Darley - Beth Lowery ? Jasmine Hewitt ? Chloe Gibson - Molly Farquhar - Lewis Murphy ? Abbie Coulson ? Nick Davies - Harvey Parker - Kyran Williamson - Michael Anderson - Bethany Murray - Sophie Hamilton - Amy Wilkins - Emma Simpson - Liam Wales - Jacob Bartram - Alex Hooks - Rebecca Miller - Caitlin Miller - Sean McCloskey - Dominic Parker - Abbey Sharpe ? Elena Larkin ? Rebecca Simpson - Nick Dixon ? Abbie Farrelly ? Liam Grieves ? Casey Smith ? Liam Downing ? Ben Wignall ? Elizabeth Hann - Danielle Walker - Lauren Glen - James Johnson ? Ben Ervine - Kate Burton - James Hudson - Daniel Mayes - Matthew Kitching ? Josh Bennett ? Evolution ? Dreams</p> <p>Wow, that is a mouthful&mdash;actually more like ten mouthfuls. (Also, why aren't more of us naming our children "Up! Down! Strange!"?) But it's all in service of a good cause. The woman, who originally had the much simpler name of Dawn McManus, set up the charity after her son Kyle died. She wanted to raise money and awareness for the group, which works with kids to help them channel their creative energies, so she vowed to change her name to include the name of anyone who donated until the group raised enough to meet their goal. It worked, and now here she is with a brand new, incredibly complicated name and a world record. She'll no doubt be getting a lot of lazy well wishes, like "Congratulations, you old so-and-so" and "Great job, girl." And she's not stopping here, so if you want to force her to take on your name too, you can go .</p> <p> [Daily Express]</p>?<p> Much unlike many a magazine editor who recommends you buy all sorts of crap that they most likely got for free, your Jezebel staff doesn't get jack shit (other than books, unsolicited). And that's how it should be. But on our own time, in our personal lives, we still buy stuff. So this is Worth It, our recommendation of random things that we've actually spent our own money on. These are the things we buy regularly or really like, things we'd actually tell our friends about. And now we're telling you.</p> <p>My friends always joke that I'm like a kooky hippie aunt when it comes to my taste in jewelry; I'm a sucker for rough-cut stones, dangling crystals, and anything resembling a dreamcatcher. But although I like to think of myself as a special snowflake, "kookie hippie aunt" accessories are apparently very popular right now, which means they're also outrageously expensive: every pair of amethyst earrings or gigantic turquoise ring I come across costs almost half my rent.</p> <p>That's why the Etsy store "" is a geode-studded godsend. Chloe, the store's owner and a recent creative writing MFA grad, has excellent taste and told me she "loves" making custom orders: for example, she made me this even though it was already sold. I bought it along with these , which I gave to my mom for Mother's Day (I also ordered a pair for myself), and a made out of a 1920s men's pocket watch that I gave my roommate for her birthday.</p> <p>Another fantastic thing about Chloe is that she'll give you a discount on her already reasonable wares (most items cost between $24 and $50) if you order a few at a time. So what are you waiting for? Some of my favorite pieces on sale right now include a that would definitely cost four times the $48 price in any boutique, and these $18 . Chloe's so sweet (I swear I don't know her personally, although now I feel like I do after the many emails we've exchanged about gems and stones) that you'll feel great about giving her your hard-earned money. Everybody wins!</p> <p>, at Etsy.com.</p> <p>Worth It only features things we paid for ourselves and actually like. Don't send us stuff.</p>?In order to view comments on jezebel.com you need to enable JavaScript.<br> If you are using Firefox and NoScript addon, please mark jezebel.com as trusted.?<p>There's a good chance you're familiar with Randy Pausch, a computer-science professor who delivered a poignant speech in September 2007 while he was dying of . It resulted in an incredible 2008 bestseller, "The Last Lecture," and a video that has racked up nearly 15-million views on YouTube.</p><p>It's no surprise why so many people have been touched by Pausch. In the lecture and book, he exhibited incredible optimism, humor, courage, wisdom and charm in the face of an illness that took his life 10 months later.</p><p>But Jai Pausch's memoir of her husband's death at 47 and its aftermath, "Dream New Dreams: Reimagining My Life After Loss," shows us another side as well: Randy could be irritable, argumentative, self-absorbed, controlling, even condescending.</p> <p>Is this supposed to shock us? No. Jai Pausch doesn't tarnish his memory, but what her memoir shows readers is that, in his sufferings, her husband was like any of us.</p><p>Her book gives us something else as well: A heartfelt plea for understanding and compassion when it comes to the patient's family.</p><p>"Patients need and deserve support," she explains, "but it's time for us as a community to understand the suffering that is shouldered, sometimes silently, by our family members, neighbors, friends and co-workers. We need to offer help to these people&hellip; we need to care for the caregiver."</p><p>The Pausches were probably better prepared for a catastrophic illness than most families. With his diagnosis, like the scientist he was, Randy kicked into "engineer mode" almost immediately, Jai says, and together the couple devised a battle plan, found good doctors and picked the most potent treatments in the period of time when other families are still in shock.</p><p>"[W]e were now on cancer time," she recalls, "in which each minute of every hour counted as never before.&hellip; If we had remained paralyzed with fear or chosen not to act, we could have lost traction in the fight against the cancer and lost precious time."</p><p>Randy worked furiously on a future financial scenario for Jai and their three children, all younger than 5 when he fell ill. Carnegie Mellon, where he taught, was highly supportive, and there was the considerable boost produced by that bestselling book. He appealed directly, firmly to their entire family for help with baby-sitting and grocery shopping, matters large and small. Randy even suggested that the couple give up their 4-month-old baby girl, Chloe, for adoption. Why? To ease the burden on Jai, who says the words "struck me like a punch in the gut." Well, scientists are known for brainstorming ideas; not all of them are good ones.</p><p>It seemed the Pausches had their bases covered. But nothing is ever simple with cancer, and no diagnosis goes exactly as the medical books say. Surgery and powerful failed to stop the disease even though Randy had been hopeful, emailing his family that the "median age for this disease is 66 and so there is some reason to believe my odds will be better than the typical patient's (I'm 45 and in good physical shape)."</p><p>Everything changed so quickly: treatment shifted to , the success of Randy's final lecture became a media whirlwind, and all the while Jai looked at her young children wondering, what do I say to them? And just as important: What will happen to me after?</p><p>The book doesn't end with Randy's death in July 2008. There are still many pages to go as Jai shows how she answered both questions for her family. She describes her pain and grief, and her children's grief, which even now "seems to recur at different times, flaring up and then quieting down again. A developmental milestone or being overly tired can trigger their feelings, causing tears to stream down their little faces."</p><p>She writes of the challenges of being a single parent, of loneliness and the discomfort of facing the dating scene (Pausch has since remarried), but also of finding a new sense of purpose in the world at large: Today she is an impassioned advocate on behalf of research into pancreatic cancer.</p><p>This book, like most cancer memoirs, hits on the absurdity that cancer produces. Yes, patients and their families do enter a vast community of fellow sufferers, but rarely can one feel so isolated, so surrounded by high walls, as after a diagnosis. And yet Pausch's vital message for all caregivers &mdash; that life will go on because it must &mdash; is more than capable of scaling these walls.</p><p></p>?BEST COMEDY SERIES<br><br>"Curb Your Enthusiasm" (HBO)<br>"Glee" (FOX)<br>(Winner) "Modern Family" (ABC)<br>"Nurse Jackie" (Showtime)<br>"The Office" (NBC)<br>"30 Rock" (NBC)<br><br>BEST COMEDY ACTOR<br><br>(Winner) Jim Parsons ("The Big Bang Theory")<br>Larry David ("Curb Your Enthusiasm")<br>Matthew Morrison ("Glee")<br>Tony Shalhoub ("Monk")<br>Steve Carell ("The Office")<br>Alec Baldwin ("30 Rock")<br><br>BEST COMEDY ACTRESS<br><br>Lea Michele ("Glee")<br>Julia Louis-Dreyfus ("The New Adventures of Old Christine")<br>(Winner) Edie Falco ("Nurse Jackie")<br>Amy Poehler ("Parks and Recreation")<br>Tina Fey ("30 Rock")<br>Toni Collette ("United States of Tara")<br><br>BEST SUPPORTING COMEDY ACTOR<br><br>Chris Colfer ("Glee")<br>Neil Patrick Harris ("How I Met Your Mother")<br>Jesse Tyler Ferguson ("Modern Family")<br>(Winner) Eric Stonestreet ("Modern Family")<br>Ty Burrell ("Modern Family")<br>Jon Cryer ("Two and a Half Men")<br><br>BEST SUPPORTING COMEDY ACTRESS<br><br>(Winner) Jane Lynch ("Glee")<br>Julie Bowen ("Modern Family")<br>Sofia Vergara ("Modern Family")<br>Kristen Wiig ("Saturday Night Live")<br>Jane Krakowski ("30 Rock")<br>Holland Taylor ("Two and a Half Men")<br><br>BEST DRAMA SERIES<br><br>"Breaking Bad" (AMC)<br>"Dexter" (Showtime)<br>"The Good Wife" (CBS)<br>"Lost" (ABC)<br>(Winner) "Mad Men" (AMC)<br>"True Blood" (HBO)<br><br>BEST DRAMA ACTOR<br><br>(Winner) Bryan Cranston ("Breaking Bad")<br>Michael C. Hall ("Dexter")<br>Kyle Chandler ("Friday Night Lights")<br>Hugh Laurie ("House")<br>Matthew Fox ("Lost")<br>Jon Hamm ("Mad Men")<br><br>BEST DRAMA ACTRESS<br><br>(Winner) Kyra Sedgwick ("The Closer")<br>Glenn Close ("Damages")<br>Connie Britton ("Friday Night Lights")<br>Julianna Margulies ("The Good Wife")<br>Mariska Hargitay ("Law & Order: Special Victims Unit")<br>January Jones ("Mad Men")<br><br>BEST SUPPORTING DRAMA ACTOR<br><br>(Winner) Aaron Paul ("Breaking Bad")<br>Martin Short ("Damages")<br>Terry O'Quinn ("Lost")<br>Michael Emerson ("Lost")<br>John Slattery ("Mad Men")<br>Andre Braugher ("Men of a Certain Age")<br><br>BEST SUPPORTING DRAMA ACTRESS<br><br>Sharon Gless ("Burn Notice")<br>Rose Byrne ("Damages")<br>(Winner) Archie Panjabi ("The Good Wife")<br>Christine Baranski ("The Good Wife")<br>Christina Hendricks ("Mad Men")<br>Elisabeth Moss ("Mad Men")<br><br>BEST TV MOVIE<br><br>"Endgame" (PBS)<br>"Georgia O'Keeffe" (Lifetime)<br>"Moonshot" (HISTORY)<br>"The Special Relationship" (HBO)<br>(Winner) "Temple Grandin"(HBO)<br>"You Don't Know Jack" (HBO)<br><br>BEST MINISERIES<br><br>(Winner) "The Pacific" (HBO)<br>"Return to Cranford" (PBS) <br><br>BEST LEAD ACTRESS IN A MINISERIES OR MOVIE<br><br>Maggie Smith ("Capturing Mary")<br>Joan Allen ("Georgia O'Keeffe")<br>Judi Dench ("Return to Cranford")<br>Hope Davis ("The Special Relationship")<br>(Winner) Claire Danes ("Temple Grandin")<br><br>BEST LEAD ACTOR IN A MINISERIES OR MOVIE<br><br>Jeff Bridges ("A Dog Year")<br>Ian McKellen ("The Prisoner")<br>Michael Sheen ("The Special Relationship")<br>Dennis Quaid ("The Special Relationship")<br>(Winner) Al Pacino ("You Don't Know Jack")<br><br>BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS IN A MINISERIES OR MOVIE<br><br>Kathy Bates ("Alice")<br>(Winner) Julia Ormond ("Temple Grandin")<br>Catherine O'Hara ("Temple Grandin")<br>Brenda Vaccaro ("You Don't Know Jack")<br>Susan Sarandon ("You Don't Know Jack")<br><br>BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR IN A MINISERIES OR MOVIE<br><br>Michael Gambon ("Emma")<br>Patrick Stewart ("Hamlet")<br>Jonathan Pryce ("Return To Cranford")<br>(Winner) David Strathairn ("Temple Grandin")<br>John Goodman ("You Don't Know Jack")<br><br>BEST VARIETY, MUSIC, OR COMEDY SERIES<br><br>"The Colbert Report" (Comedy Central)<br>(Winner) "The Daily Show With Jon Stewart" (Comedy Central)<br>"Real Time With Bill Maher" (HBO)<br>"Saturday Night Live" (NBC)<br>"The Tonight Show With Conan O'Brien" (NBC)<br><br>BEST VARIETY, MUSIC, OR COMEDY SPECIAL<br><br>Bill Maher "...But I'm Not Wrong" (HBO)<br>"Hope For Haiti Now" (Tenth Planet Productions and MTV)<br>(Winner) "The Kennedy Center Honors" (CBS) <br>"Robin Williams: Weapons of Self Destruction" (HBO)<br>"The 25th Anniversary Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Concert" (HBO)<br>"Wanda Sykes: I'ma Be Me" (HBO)<br><br>BEST REALITY-COMPETITION PROGRAM<br><br>"The Amazing Race" (CBS)<br>"American Idol" (FOX)<br>"Dancing With the Stars" (ABC)<br>"Project Runway" (Lifetime)<br>(Winner) "Top Chef" (Bravo)<br><br>BEST REALITY PROGRAM<br>"Antiques Roadshow" (PBS)<br>"Dirty Jobs" (Discovery Channel)<br>(Winner) "Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution" (ABC) <br>"Kathy Griffin: My Life On The D-List" (Bravo)<br>"MythBusters" (Discovery Channel)<br>"Undercover Boss" (CBS)<br><br>BEST HOST FOR A REALITY OR REALITY-COMPETITION PROGRAM<br>Phil Keoghan ("The Amazing Race")<br>Ryan Seacrest ("American Idol")<br>Tom Bergeron ("Dancing With the Stars")<br>Heidi Klum ("Project Runway")<br>(Winner) Jeff Probst ("Survivor") <br><br>BEST GUEST ACTOR IN A COMEDY SERIES<br><br>Mike O'Malley ("Glee")<br>(Winner) Neil Patrick Harris ("Glee")<br>Fred Willard ("Modern Family")<br>Eli Wallach ("Nurse Jackie")<br>Jon Hamm ("30 Rock")<br>Will Arnett ("30 Rock")<br><br>BEST GUEST ACTOR IN A DRAMA SERIES<br><br>Beau Bridges ("The Closer")<br>Ted Danson ("Damages")<br>(Winner) John Lithgow ("Dexter") <br>Alan Cumming ("The Good Wife")<br>Dylan Baker ("The Good Wife")<br>Robert Morse ("Mad Men")<br>Gregory Itzin ("24")<br><br>BEST GUEST ACTRESS IN A COMEDY SERIES<br><br>Christine Baranski ("The Big Bang Theory")<br>Kathryn Joosten ("Desperate Housewives")<br>Kristin Chenoweth ("Glee")<br>Tina Fey ("Saturday Night Live")<br>(Winner) Betty White ("Saturday Night Live")<br>Elaine Stritch ("30 Rock")<br>Jane Lynch ("Two And A Half Men")<br><br>BEST GUEST ACTRESS IN A DRAMA SERIES<br><br>Mary Kay Place ("Big Love")<br>Sissy Spacek ("Big Love")<br>Shirley Jones ("The Closer")<br>Lily Tomlin ("Damages")<br>(Winner) Ann-Margret ("Law & Order: Special Victims Unit")<br>Elizabeth Mitchell ("Lost")<br><br>BEST VOICE-OVER PERFORMANCE<br>H. Jon Benjamin ("Archer")<br>Dave Foley ("Disney Prep & Landing")<br>Seth Green ("Robot Chicken")<br>Dan Castellaneta ("The Simpsons")<br>Hank Azaria ("The Simpsons")<br>(Winner) Anne Hathaway ("The Simpsons") <br><br>BEST ANIMATED PROGRAM<br>"Alien Earths" (NGC)<br>(Winner) "Disney Prep & Landing" (ABC)<br>"The Ricky Gervais Show" (HBO)<br>"The Simpsons" (FOX)<br>"South Park" (Comedy Central)<br><br>BEST SHORT-FORM ANIMATED PROGRAM<br><br>"Adventure Time" (Cartoon Network)<br>"Chowder" (Cartoon Network)<br>"Disney Kick Buttowski: Suburban Daredevil" (Disney Channel)<br>"The Marvelous Misadventures of Flapjack" (Cartoon Network)<br>(Winner) "Robot Chicken" (Cartoon Network)<br>"Uncle Grandpa" (CartoonNetwork.com)<br><br>BEST ART DIRECTION FOR A MULTI-CAMERA SERIES<br><br>"The Big Bang Theory" (CBS)<br>"Hell's Kitchen" (FOX)<br>"How I Met Your Mother" (CBS)<br>"The New Adventures of Old Christine" (CBS)<br>"Rules of Engagement" (CBS)<br><br>BEST ART DIRECTION FOR A SINGLE-CAMERA SERIES<br>"Glee" (FOX)<br>"Heroes" (NBC)<br>"Lost" (ABC)<br>"Modern Family" (ABC)<br>"True Blood" (HBO)<br>(Winner) "The Tudors" (Showtime)<br><br>BEST ART DIRECTION FOR A MINISERIES OR MOVIE<br><br>"Georgia O'Keeffe" (Lifetime)<br>(Winner) "The Pacific" (HBO)<br>"Return to Cranford" (PBS)<br>"Temple Grandin" (HBO)<br>"You Don't Know Jack" (HBO)<br><br>BEST ART DIRECTION FOR VARIETY, MUSIC, OR NONFICTION PROGRAMMING<br>(Winner) 82nd Annual Academy Awards (ABC)<br>"American Idol" (FOX)<br>"Saturday Night Live" (FOX)<br>"The Tonight Show With Conan O'Brien" (NBC)<br>63rd Annual Tony Awards (CBS)<br>The Who Super Bowl Halftime Show (CBS)<br><br>BEST CASTING FOR A COMEDY SERIES<br>"Glee" (FOX)<br>(Winner) "Modern Family" (ABC)<br>"Nurse Jackie" (Showtime)<br>"30 Rock" (NBC)<br>"United States of Tara" (Showtime)<br><br>BEST CASTING FOR A DRAMA SERIES<br>"Big Love" (HBO)<br>"Dexter" (Showtime)<br>"Friday Night Lights" (DirecTV)<br>"The Good Wife" (CBS)<br>(Winner) "Mad Men" (AMC)<br>"True Blood" (HBO)<br><br>BEST CASTING FOR A MINISERIES, MOVIE OR SPECIAL<br><br>"Emma" (PBS)<br>"Georgia O'Keeffe" (Lifetime)<br>(Winner) "The Pacific" (HBO)<br>"Temple Grandin" (HBO)<br>"You Don't Know Jack" (HBO)<br><br>BEST CHOREOGRAPHY<br><br>82nd annual Academy Awards (ABC)<br>"Dancing With the Stars" (ABC)<br>"Dancing With the Stars" (ABC)<br>"So You Think You Can Dance" (FOX)<br>(Winner) "So You Think You Can Dance," Mia Michaels (FOX)<br><br>BEST CINEMATOGRAPHY FOR A HALF-HOUR SERIES<br><br>"Gary Unmarried" (CBS)<br>"Hung" (HBO)<br>"Nurse Jackie" (Showtime)<br>"30 Rock" (NBC)<br>"Two and a Half Men" (CBS)<br>(Winner) "Weeds" (Showtime)<br><br>BEST CINEMATOGRAPHY FOR A ONE HOUR SERIES<br><br>"Breaking Bad" (AMC)<br>(Winner) "CSI: Crime Scene Investigation" (CBS)<br>"FlashForward" (ABC)<br>"Mad Men" (AMC)<br>"The Tudors" (Showtime)<br><br>BEST CINEMATOGRAPHY FOR A MINSERIES OR MOVIE<br><br>"The Pacific" (HBO)<br>"The Pacific" (HBO)<br>"The Prisoner" (AMC) <br>(Winner) "Return to Cranford" (PBS)<br>"You Don't Know Jack" (HBO)<br><br>BEST CINEMATOGRAPHY FOR NONFICTION PROGRAMMING<br><br>"America: The Story of Us" (History)<br>"Deadliest Catch" (Discovery Channel)<br>(Winner) "Life" (Discovery Channel)<br>"The National Parks: America's Best Idea" (PBS)<br>"Whale Wars" (Animal Planet)<br><br>BEST CINEMATOGRAPHY FOR REALITY PROGRAMMING<br><br>"The Amazing Race" (CBS)<br>"Dirty Jobs" (Discovery Channel)<br>"Man Vs. Wild" (Discovery Channel)<br>(Winner) "Survivor" (CBS)<br>"Top Chef Masters" (Bravo)<br><br>BEST COMMERCIAL<br><br>Anthem (Absolut)<br>Coke Finals (Coca-Cola)<br>Game (Mars Snack Food US/Snickers)<br>Green Police (Audi)<br>Human Chain (Nike)<br>(Winner) The Man Your Man Could Smell Like (Old Spice Body Wash)<br><br>BEST COSTUMES FOR A SERIES<br><br>"Glee" (FOX) <br>"The Good Wife" (CBS)<br>"Mad Men" (AMC)<br>"30 Rock" (NBC)<br>(Winner) "The Tudors" (Showtime)<br><br>BEST COSTUMES FOR A MINISERIES, MOVIE OR A SPECIAL<br><br>"Emma" (PBS)<br>"Georgia O'Keeffe" (Lifetime)<br>"The Pacific" (HBO) <br>(Winner) "Return To Cranford" (PBS)<br>"You Don't Know Jack" (HBO)<br><br>BEST DIRECTING FOR A COMEDY SERIES<br><br>(Winner) "Glee," Ryan Murphy (FOX)<br>"Glee," Paris Barclay (FOX)<br>"Modern Family," Jason Winer (ABC)<br>"Nurse Jackie," Allen Coulter (Showtime)<br>"30 Rock," Don Scardino (NBC)<br><br>BEST DIRECTING FOR A COMEDY SERIES<br><br>"Breaking Bad' (AMC)<br>(Winner) "Dexter" (Showtime)<br>"Lost" (ABC)<br>"Mad Men" (AMC)<br>"Treme" (HBO)<br><br>BEST DIRECTING FOR A MINISERIES, MOVIE OR DRAMATIC SPECIAL<br><br>"Georgia O'Keeffe" (Lifetime)<br>"The Pacific" (HBO) <br>"The Pacific" (HBO) <br>(Winner) "Temple Grandin" (HBO)<br>"You Don't Know Jack" (HBO)<br><br>BEST DIRECTING FOR A VARIETY, MUSIC OR COMEDY SERIES<br><br>"The Colbert Report" (Comedy Central)<br>"The Daily Show With Jon Stewart" (Comedy Central)<br>"Late Show With David Letterman" (CBS)<br>(Winner) "Saturday Night Live" (NBC)<br>"The Tonight Show With Conan O'Brien" (NBC)<br><br>BEST DIRECTING FOR A VARIETY, MUSIC OR COMEDY SPECIAL<br><br>"In Performance at the White House: A Celebration of Music From the Civil Rights Movement" (PBS)<br>The Kennedy Center Honors (CBS)<br>63rd Annual Tony Awards (CBS)<br>The 25th Anniversary Rock And Roll Hall of Fame Concert (HBO)<br>(Winner) Vancouver 2010 Olympic Winter Games Opening Ceremony (NBC)<br><br>BEST DIRECTING FOR NONFICTION PROGRAMMING<br><br>"The Amazing Race" (CBS)<br>"By the People: The Election of Barack Obama" (HBO) <br>"Monty Python: Almost The Truth (The Lawyer's Cut)" (IFC)<br>(Winner)"My Lai" (PBS)<br>"Terror In Mumbai" (HBO)<br><br>BEST SINGLE-CAMERA PICTURE EDITING FOR A DRAMA SERIES<br> <br>"Breaking Bad" (AMC)<br>"Dexter" (Showtime)<br>(Winner) "Lost" (ABC)<br>"Mad Men" (AMC)<br>"Mad Men" (AMC)<br><br>BEST PICTURE EDITING FOR A COMEDY SERIES<br> <br>"Curb Your Enthusiasm" (HBO)<br>"Curb Your Enthusiasm" (HBO)<br>(Winner) "Modern Family" (ABC)<br>"Modern Family" (ABC) <br>"30 Rock" (NBC)<br><br>BEST SINGLE-CAMERA PICTURE EDITING FOR A MINISERIES OR MOVIE<br> <br>"The Pacific" (HBO) <br>"The Pacific" (HBO) <br>"The Pacific" (HBO) <br>(Winner) "Temple Grandin" (HBO)<br>"You Don't Know Jack" (HBO)<br><br>BEST SHORT-FORM PICTURE EDITING<br><br>82nd Annual Academy Awards (ABC)<br>82nd Annual Academy Awards (ABC)<br>"American Idol" (FOX)<br>"Jimmy Kimmel Live" (ABC)<br>"Jimmy Kimmel Live" (ABC)<br>(Winner) "Late Night With Jimmy Fallon" (NBC)<br><br>BEST PICTURE EDITING FOR A SPECIAL<br><br>"Kathy Griffin: Balls of Steel" (Bravo)<br>The Kennedy Center Honors (CBS)<br>"Robin Williams: Weapons of Self Destruction" (HBO)<br>The 25th Anniversary Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Concert (HBO)<br><br>BEST PICTURE EDITING FOR NONFICTION PROGRAMMING<br><br>"America: The Story of Us" (History)<br>(Winner) "By the People: The Election of Barack Obama" (HBO)<br>"Deadliest Catch" (Discovery Channel)<br>"Life" (Discovery Channel)<br>"Whale Wars" (Animal Planet)<br><br>BEST PICTURE EDITING FOR REALITY PROGRAMMING<br><br>"The Amazing Race" (CBS)<br>"Extreme Makeover: Home Edition" (ABC)<br>(Winner) "Intervention" (A&E)<br>"Survivor" (CBS)<br>"Top Chef" (Bravo)<br><br>BEST HAIRSTYLING FOR A SINGLE-CAMERA SERIES<br><br>"Castle" (ABC)<br>"Glee" (FOX)<br>(Winner) "Mad Men" (AMC)<br>"Tracey Ullman's State of the Union" (Showtime)<br>"The Tudors" (Showtime) <br> <br>BEST HAIRSTYLING FOR A MULTI-CAMERA SERIES OR SPECIAL<br><br>82nd Annual Academy Awards <br>(Winner) "Dancing With The Stars" (Winner) (AMC)<br>"How I Met Your Mother" (CBS)<br>"Saturday Night Live" (NBC)<br>"Two And A Half Men" (CBS)<br><br>BEST HAIRSTYLING FOR A MINISERIES OR MOVIE<br><br>(Winner) "Emma" (PBS)<br>"Georgia O'Keeffe" (Lifetime)<br>"Return To Cranford" (PBS)<br>"Temple Grandin" (HBO)<br>"You Don't Know Jack" (HBO)<br><br>BEST CREATIVE ACHIEVEMENT IN INTERACTIVE MEDIA -- NONFICTION<br> <br>The Biggest Loser Digital Experience (NBC.com)<br>(Winner) The Jimmy Fallon Digital Experience (NBC.com)<br>Top Chef: Las Vegas (Bravo Digital)<br><br>BEST CREATIVE ACHIEVEMENT IN INTERACTIVE MEDIA -- FICTION<br><br>Dexter Interactive (Showtime.com)<br>Glee Hyperpromo And Superfan (FOX.com)<br>(Winner) Star Wars: Uncut (StarWarsUncut.com)<br><br>BEST LIGHITNG DIRECTION FOR VARIETY, MUSICAL OR COMEDY<br>82nd Annual Academy Awards (ABC)<br>"Dancing With The Stars" (ABC)<br>"Saturday Night Live" (NBC)<br>(Winner) Vancouver 2010 Olympic Winter Games Opening Ceremony (NBC)<br><br>BEST MAIN TITLE DESIGN<br><br>(Winner) "Bored To Death" (HBO)<br>"Human Target" (FOX)<br>"Nurse Jackie" (Showtime)<br>"The Pacific" (HBO)<br>"Temple Grandin" (HBO)<br><br>BEST MAKEUP FOR A SINGLE-CAMERA SERIES, (NON-PROSTHETIC)<br><br>"Castle" (ABC)<br>"Glee" (FOX)<br>"Glee" (FOX)<br>(Winner) "Grey's Anatomy" (ABC)<br>"Mad Men" (AMC)<br><br>BEST MAKEUP FOR A MULTI-CAMERA SERIES, (NON-PROSTHETIC)<br><br>82nd Annual Academy Awards <br>"The Big Bang Theory" (CBS)<br>"Dancing With The Stars" (ABC)<br>(Winner) "Saturday Night Live" (NBC)<br>"So You Think You Can Dance" (ABC)<br><br>BEST MAKEUP FOR A MINISERIES OR MOVIE, (NON-PROSTHETIC)<br><br>"Georgia O'Keeffe" (Lifetime)<br>(Winner) "The Pacific" (HBO)<br>"Temple Grandin" (HBO)<br>"You Don't Know Jack" (HBO)<br><br>BEST PROSTHETIC MAKEUP FOR A SERIES, MINISERIES, MOVIE OR A SPECIAL<br><br>"Castle" (ABC)<br>"Grey's Anatomy" (ABC)<br>"Nip/Tuck" (FX Networks)<br>(Winner) "The Pacific" (HBO)<br>"True Blood" (HBO)<br><br>BEST ORIGINAL DRAMATIC SCORE FOR A SERIES<br><br>"Batman: The Brave and The Bold" (Cartoon Network)<br>"FlashForward" (ABC)<br>"Lost" (ABC)<br>"Psych" (USA)<br>(Winner) "24" (FOX)<br><br>BEST MUSIC COMPOSITION FOR A MINISERIES, MOVIE OR SPECIAL<br><br>"Blessed Is The Match" (PBS)<br>"Georgia O'Keeffe" (Lifetime)<br>"The Pacific" (HBO)<br>(Winner) "Temple Grandin" (HBO)<br>"When Love Is Not Enough: The Lois Wilson Story" (CBS)<br>"You Don't Know Jack" (HBO)<br><br>BEST MUSIC DIRECTION<br><br>82nd Annual Academy Awards (ABC)<br>"Andrea Bocelli & David Foster: My Christmas" (PBS)<br>"Celtic Woman: Songs From The Heart" (PBS)<br>"In Performance at The White House: Fiesta Latina" (PBS)<br>The Kennedy Center Honors (CBS)<br>(Winner) Vancouver 2010 Olympic Winter Games Opening Ceremony (NBC)<br><br>BEST ORIGINAL MUSIC AND LYRICS<br><br>"Family Guy" (FOX)<br>"How I Met Your Mother" (CBS)<br>(Winner) "Monk" (USA)<br>"Rescue Me" (FX Networks)<br>"Saturday Night Live" (NBC)<br>"Treme" (HBO)<br><br>BEST ORIGINAL MAIN TITLE THEME MUSIC<br><br>"Human Target" (FOX)<br>"Justified" (FX Networks)<br>(Winner) "Nurse Jackie" (Showtime)<br>"Parks and Recreation" (NBC)<br>"Warehouse 13" (Syfy)<br><br>BEST SPECIAL CLASS PROGRAM<br><br>ABC's LOST Presents: Mysteries of the Universe - The Dharma Initiative (abc.com/lost)<br>82nd Annual Academy Awards (ABC)<br>Avatar: Enter The World of Pandora (HBO)<br>The Daily Show: Ask a Correspondent -- The Meaning of Life (thedailyshow.com)<br>30 Rock: Webisodes (NBC.com)<br>(Winner) 63rd Annual Tony Awards (CBS)<br>Vancouver 2010 Olympic Winter Games Opening Ceremony (NBC)<br><br>BEST CHILDREN'S PROGRAM<br><br> Hannah Montana (Disney Channel)<br>iCarly (Nickelodeon)<br>Jonas (Disney Channel)<br>Wizards of Waverly Place (Disney Channel)<br>(Winner) Wizards of Waverly Place: The Movie (Disney Channel)<br><br>BEST CHILDREN'S NONFICTION PROGRAM<br><br>(Winner) Nick News With Linda Ellerbee -- "The Face of Courage: Kids Living With Cancer" (Nickelodeon)<br>"When Families Grieve" (PBS)<br><br>BEST NONFICTION SPECIAL<br><br>"Believe: The Eddie Izzard Story" (EPIXHD)<br>"By the People: The Election of Barack Obama" (HBO)<br>"Johnny Mercer: The Dream's on Me" (TCM)<br>"Saturday Night Live in the 2000s: Time and Again" (NBC)<br>"The Simpsons: 20th Anniversary Special -- In 3-D! On Ice!" (FOX)<br>(Winner) "Teddy: In His Own Words" (FOX)<br><br>BEST NONFICTION SERIES<br><br>"American Experience" (PBS)<br>"American Masters" (PBS)<br>"Deadliest Catch" (Discovery Channel)<br>"Life" (Discovery Channel)<br>"Monty Python: Almost the Truth (The Lawyer's Cut)" (IFC)<br>(Winner) "The National Parks: America's Best Idea" (PBS)<br><br>EXCEPTION MERIT IN NONFICTION FILMMAKING<br><br>"Brick City" (Sundance Channel)<br>"My Lai" (PBS)<br>(Winner) "Nerakhoon (The Betrayal)" (PBS)<br>"Patti Smith: Dream of Life" (PBS)<br>"Pressure Cooker" (BET)<br>"Sergio" (HBO) <br><br>BEST SOUND EDITING FOR A SERIES<br><br>"Breaking Bad" (AMC)<br>"Fringe" (FOX)<br>"Lost" (ABC)<br>"True Blood" (HBO)<br>(Winner) "24" (FOX)<br><br>BEST SOUND EDITING FOR A MINISERIES, MOVIE OR SPECIAL<br><br>"Alice" (Syfy)<br>"Moonshot" (HISTORY)<br>(Winner) "The Pacific" (HBO)<br>"Temple Grandin" (HBO)<br><br>BEST SOUND EDITING FOR NONFICTION PROGRAMMING<br><br>"The Amazing Race" (CBS)<br>(Winner) "America: The Story of Us" (History)<br>"Life" (Discovery Channel)<br>"The National Parks: America's Best Idea" (PBS)<br>"Teddy: In His Own Words" (HBO)<br><br>BEST SOUND MIXING FOR A ONE-HOUR COMEDY OR DRAMA SERIES<br><br>"Dexter" (Showtime)<br>(Winner) "Glee" (FOX)<br>"House" (FOX)<br>"Lost" (ABC)<br>"24" (FOX)<br><br>BEST SOUND MIXING FOR A MINISERIES OR MOVIE<br><br>(Winner) "The Pacific," Part 2 (HBO)<br>"The Pacific" (HBO)<br>"The Pacific" (HBO)<br>"The Pacific" (HBO)<br><br>BEST SOUND MIXING FOR A HALF-HOUR COMEDY OR DRAMA SERIES AND ANIMATION<br><br>(Winner)"Entourage" (HBO)<br>(Winner) "Modern Family" (ABC)<br>"The Office" (NBC)<br>"30 Rock" (NBC)<br>"Two and a Half Men" (CBS)<br><br>BEST SOUND MIXING FOR A VARIETY OR MUSIC SERIES OR SPECIAL<br><br>82nd Annual Academy Awards (ABC)<br>"American Idol" (FOX)<br>"American Idol" (FOX)<br>"Dancing With the Stars" (ABC)<br>(Winner) The 52nd Annual Grammy Awards (CBS)<br>(Winner) The 25th Anniversary Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Concert (HBO)<br><br>BEST SOUND MIXING FOR NONFICTION PROGRAMMING<br><br>"The Amazing Race" (CBS)<br>(Winner) "Deadliest Catch" (Discovery Channel )<br>"Life" (Discovery Channel )<br>"The National Parks: America's Best Idea" (PBS)<br>"Spectacle Elvis Costello With ..." (Sundance Channel)<br><br>BEST SPECIAL VISUAL EFFECTS FOR A SERIES<br><br>"Caprica" (Syfy)<br>(Winner) "CSI: Crime Scene Investigation" (CBS)<br>"Stargate Universe" (Syfy)<br>"Stargate Universe" (Syfy)<br>"V" (ABC)<br><br>BEST SPECIAL VISUAL EFFECTS FOR A MINISERIES, MOVIE OR SPECIAL<br><br>"Ben 10: Alien Swarm" (Cartoon Network)<br>(Winner) "The Pacific," Part 5 (HBO)<br>"The Pacific" (HBO)<br>"Virtuality" (NBC)<br><br>BEST STUNT COORDINATION<br><br>"Chuck" (NBC)<br>(Winner) "FlashForward" (ABC)<br>"House" (FOX)<br>"Human Target" (FOX)<br>"24" (FOX)<br><br>BEST TECHNICAL DIRECTION, CAMERAWORK, VIDEO CONTROL FOR A SERIES<br><br>"The Big Bang Theory" (CBS)<br>"The Daily Show With Jon Stewart" (Comedy Central)<br>(Winner) "Dancing With The Stars" (ABC)<br>"Late Show With David Letterman" (CBS)<br>"Saturday Night Live" (NBC)<br><br>BEST TECHNICAL DIRECTION, CAMERAWORK, VIDEO CONTROL FOR A MINISERIES, MOVIE OR SPECIAL<br> <br>82nd Annual Academy Awards (ABC)<br>The 52nd Annual Grammy Awards (CBS)<br>The Kennedy Center Honors (CBS)<br>"Robin Williams: Weapons of Self Destruction" (HBO)<br>(Winner) The 25th Anniversary Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Concert (HBO)<br><br>BEST WRITING FOR A COMEDY SERIES<br><br>"Glee" (FOX)<br>(Winner) "Modern Family" (ABC)<br>"The Office" (NBC)<br>"30 Rock" (NBC)<br>"30 Rock" (NBC)<br><br>BEST WRITING FOR A DRAMA SERIES<br><br>"Friday Night Lights," Rolin Jones (DirecTV)<br>"The Good Wife," Michelle King & Robert King (CBS)<br>"Lost." Damon Lindelof & Carlton Cuse(ABC)<br>(Winner) "Mad Men," Matthew Weiner & Erin Levy (AMC)<br>"Mad Men," Robin Veith & Matthew Weiner (AMC)<br><br>BEST WRITING FOR A MINISERIES, MOVIE OR DRAMATIC SPECIAL<br><br>"The Pacific" (HBO)<br>"The Pacific" (HBO)<br>"The Special Relationship" (HBO)<br>"Temple Grandin" (HBO)<br>(Winner) "You Don't Know Jack" (HBO)<br><br>BEST WRITING FOR A VARIETY, MUSIC OR COMEDY SERIES<br><br> (Winner) "The Colbert Report" (Comedy Central)<br>"The Daily Show With Jon Stewart" (Comedy Central)<br>"Real Time With Bill Maher" (HBO)<br>"Saturday Night Live" (NBC)<br>"The Tonight Show With Conan O'Brien" (NBC)<br><br>BEST WRITING FOR A VARIETY, MUSIC OR COMEDY SPECIAL<br><br> 82nd Annual Academy Awards (ABC)<br>"Bill Maher ... But I'm Not Wrong" (HBO)<br>The Kennedy Center Honors (CBS)<br>(Winner) 63rd Annual Tony Awards (CBS)<br>"Wanda Sykes: I'ma Be Me" (HBO)<br><br>BEST WRITING FOR NONFICTION PROGRAMMING<br> <br> "America: The Story of Us" (History)<br>"Anthony Bourdain: No Reservations" (Travel Channel)<br>"The Buddha" (PBS)<br>"Life" (Discovery Channel)<br>(Winner) "The National Parks: America's Best Idea" (The Last Refuge)<br><br>?<p>Week of: April 3 - April 10, 2012</p>"American Idol" vs. "The Voice": Our judges (and you) sound off on the best performances of the week.<p>Will stars emerge out of this season's "American Idol" and "The Voice"?</p><p> for the top performers each week, and see how readers' choices stack up against rankings from Times music and television writers.</p><p>Roll over the photos below to watch the performances and read what our judges had to say. Tell us whom you . Your comments could end up featured alongside our expert panel.</p><p>Full coverage: </p>?<p>The temperature had soared to nearly 100 degrees by late morning in Palos Verdes Estates, making it a fine day to cool off at the beach or a water park.</p><p>Instead, Chloe Solandt, her face pink from heat and sun, was sanding boards and stomping through dirt as she and 150 or so other volunteers built an edible garden on a one-acre hillside plot at Valmonte School, an early learning center.</p><p>"I'm really interested in agriculture and food sustainability," said Solandt, 17, a senior at Palos Verdes High School. "I'll be going to each station."</p> <p>She had plenty of sweat-inducing tasks available to her. At the various stations, volunteers of all ages wielding paintbrushes and battery-powered tools could assemble redwood picnic tables, construct an arbor or a small-scale red barn, fill wheelbarrows with wood chips or plant fruit trees.</p><p>The occasion was a "community garden build day," and a community indeed turned out to create the Valmonte Farm and Nature Garden. Dave's Tree Service kicked in a mini-mountain of mulch. Kellogg Supply sent heaps of soil amendments and compost. The Palos Verdes Peninsula Land Conservancy donated native plants.</p><p>And Tomas O'Grady good-naturedly assumed the role of project foreman.</p><p>O'Grady, 45, who grew up working his family's small farm in western Ireland, immigrated to the United States 20 years ago and retired about five years later after making a fortune in real estate. Last year, O'Grady unsuccessfully challenged incumbent for his Los Angeles City Council seat.</p><p>Fourteen months ago, in an effort to give back to the society that enriched him, he started Enrich LA. The nonprofit group's mission is to establish school gardens, primarily in low-income areas. The aim is to help youngsters learn about where food comes from and about environmental stewardship, conservation and nutrition. Enrich LA gardens demonstrate that "home-grown" can be as tasty as burgers and fries.</p><p>"We've done gardens at schools along the 110 corridor where the chain-link fences are topped by barbed wire, an extra touch to get that prison vernacular," O'Grady said. "In most cases, we're ripping up asphalt to put in gardens."</p><p>His first project was at Thomas Starr King Middle School, a Los Feliz magnet, which his daughters Eireann, 13, and Lauren, 11, attend. "After I built the garden, I saw the changes it brought," he said. "It was a visual announcement that the school was mending itself." O'Grady helped found an environmental studies magnet program at the school, where student activists two years ago kicked off an effort to ban plastic foam trays in the cafeteria. In August, the switched to money-saving recyclable paper trays for all its schools.</p><p>Palos Verdes Estates is hardly an economically challenged area, O'Grady acknowledged, but Diana Heffernan-Schrader, a parent activist, "called us up and insisted." Once O'Grady saw the site, which years ago had been a garden but had been long neglected, he was on board. Heffernan-Schrader, whose two daughters attend Valmonte, said she envisions edible gardens at every school in the Palos Verdes Peninsula Unified School District.</p><p></p>?<p>For your next trip to San Diego, forget the &ldquo;I&rsquo;m so hungry, let&rsquo;s just stop here&rdquo; method of choosing a restaurant. While you&rsquo;re at it, forget the &ldquo;wherever my finger lands&rdquo; technique for menu selection.</p><p>Acclaimed restaurateur Tracy Borkum not only runs two of the area&rsquo;s best restaurants, she&rsquo;s also brimming with generous enthusiasm for the &ldquo;competition.&rdquo; And she agreed to take us on a tour of her favorite local eateries.</p><p>Borkum owns the award-winning Cucina Urbana and Grill in San Diego, as well as the brand new Cucina Enoteca in Irvine &mdash; all known for their distinctive d&eacute;cor and creative cuisine at moderate prices.</p><p>Here are the restaurants she&rsquo;s passionate about (including her own, of course) &mdash; from hidden gems to culinary luminaries.</p><p>FABULOUS AND AFFORDABLE</p><p>In 2011, San Diego Magazine named Cucina Urbana the &ldquo;Best Italian Restaurant.&rdquo; Executive Chef Joe Magnanelli&rsquo;s stuffed fried squash blossoms are a crowd favorite. Borkum&rsquo;s weakness is the porchetta and brie panini for lunch and ricotta cavatelli and duck conserva for dinner.</p><p>The magazine&rsquo;s &ldquo;Best Neighborhood Restaurant&rdquo; and &ldquo;Best Small Plates Menu&rdquo; award went to Kensington Grill, where Chef J.C. Col&oacute;n puts a gourmet spin on American standards. Borkum loves the mac &rsquo;n shrooms that, for a mere $1.50 more, can include truffle oil. &ldquo;That takes it to a whole other level,&rdquo; she said. Or try the hog bar, a pork sampler with treats like sun dried tomato and pistachio sausage.</p><p>Azuki Sushi does a stunning modern take on Japanese. &ldquo;It&rsquo;s very unknown and should be very known,&rdquo; Borkum said. What to order there? Her emphatic answer: &ldquo;Anything!&rdquo; But press her and she&rsquo;ll confess a weakness for the superb sashimi or the R U Kidding Me? roll.</p><p>Caf&eacute; Chloe is a little taste of Paris in the East Village, where you can spend hours chatting with friends. The menus change seasonally, but look for the smoked trout salad or mussels belgique with pommes frites.</p><p>For some nighttime pizzazz, head out to the Little hot spot Craft &amp; Commerce for artisan cocktails and old-school American food done to perfection. Borkum&rsquo;s choice is the fried chicken with buttermilk slaw.</p><p>FAST FOOD FEASTS</p><p>A lunch run to Lucha Libre in Mission Hills is worth the 10-minute drive for Borkum and her staff. She usually orders the &ldquo;vegy taco.&rdquo; &ldquo;But the guys in my office go all out with the big guns,&rdquo; she said. That&rsquo;s the surf and turf burrito with steak, shrimp and avocado. And lucha libre wrestling fans will dig the d&eacute;cor.</p><p>At The Kebab Shop in downtown San Diego, Borkum can&rsquo;t resist the d&ouml;ner kebab wraps with a side of cucumber dill salad. &ldquo;Seriously, it is so addictive,&rdquo; she said. &ldquo;Ialways swear there isn't any way I can eat a whole wrap, but somehow I always do.&rdquo;</p><p>BURGERS AND BEEF</p><p>The Lodge at Torrey Pines serves a &ldquo;drugstore-style&rdquo; hamburger that&rsquo;s phenomenal, said Borkum. &ldquo;You can enjoy it poolside, dipping your toes and watching a few rounds of golf.&rdquo;</p><p>The historic Waterfront opened in 1933, just after the repeal of Prohibition, and it serves what she calls &ldquo;the perfect hangover cure&rdquo; &mdash; a gem of a hamburger and a Bloody Mary.</p><p>For amazing hand-cut steaks, settle into a leather booth at Cowboy Star in the East Village. &ldquo;I don&rsquo;t eat a lot of meat but I love the rib-eye here.&rdquo;</p><p>LUSCIOUS IN LA JOLLA</p><p>&ldquo;Brilliant&rdquo; is what Borkum calls the $9 prix fixe lunch at Chedi Thai Bistro in La Jolla. Executive Chef Sutharin Pia Kampuntip offers dishes that are &ldquo;absolutely amazing,&rdquo; like the green papaya salad or any of their curries.</p><p>George&rsquo;s at the Cove is home to two restaurants and a bar. At the moderately priced Ocean Terrace, enjoy a spectacular view of the blue Pacific while you savor grilled Mexican shrimp with tabbouleh salad and a glass of crisp white wine (or two). Downstairs, there&rsquo;s fine dining at the California Modern. Borkum finds it impossible to narrow down the choices on Executive Chef Trey Foshee&rsquo;s menu. &ldquo;His seafood is spectacular and his vegetarian is amazing.&rdquo; </p><p>SUPER SPLURGE</p><p>If you&rsquo;re one of the one percent &mdash; or just want to live like it for a night &mdash; doll up and dine out at Addison at The Grand Del Mar. Executive Chef William Bradley is masterful, and Borkum is particularly excited about their new chef de cuisine, Anthony Secviar, who&rsquo;s just arrived from the world-renowned French Laundry in the Napa Valley. &ldquo;I&rsquo;m eager to see him work his magic,&rdquo; she said.</p><p></p>?<p>Since the 1970s, the books of Judy Blume have prepared generations of girls for the emotional and biological hurdles on the way to womanhood: The sting of first love, those mysterious undergarments and the harsh reality that not even divine intervention can save you from puberty.</p><p>In honor of Blume's legacy, the Cavern Club Theater in Silver Lake hosts "Are You There God? It's Me, ," a musical parody that mashes up memorable moments from Blume's coming-of-age classic "Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret" with two dozen hits by . It's 75 minutes of teen angst meets 1970s soft rock &mdash; live onstage.</p><p>"You remember how thrilling and horrifying and hilarious it is to be a pre-pubescent teen," said Carey Peters, who dons a plaid jumper and loafers while channeling Karen Carpenter's husky vocals in the musical's title role as Margaret. "But once you learn to be yourself, everything opens up."</p> <p>The show's theme &mdash; like the soundtrack &mdash; is familiar fare for both genders, said the show's creator and director Dane Whitlock. "As a man, I can't relate to buying a bra," he said. "But what I can relate to is being 12 years old and a new person at school and meeting new friends and having a crush on the cool kid."</p><p>Like the book, the musical follows 11-year-old Margaret as she moves to New Jersey, makes friends, falls in love and eventually becomes a woman &mdash; this time around singing tunes like "Close to You" to the boy next door and "We've Only Just Begun" to her not-quite-A-cup brassiere.</p><p>The nine-person, mostly female ensemble features a lineup of Groundlings alums, with some added Y from sketch veteran Drew Droege, who dresses in drag as a trio of stereotypical '70s mothers.</p><p>"I play Margaret's mom who has this bad, Bonnie Franklin delivery," Droege said, referencing the star of the '70s sitcom "One Day at a Time." "A crazy pill-popping shut-in who's expecting hanky-panky all the time from the kids and a swinging key-party mom," he adds.</p><p>Droege is quickly becoming the patron saint of parodies. He created the video series "I'm ," co-directed the musical reality show spoof "Jersey Shoresical" and starred in a stage adaptation of another of Blume's novels, "Forever," which is about a girl losing her virginity.</p><p>"I think her books are ripe for parody because we all read them as kids, and they're so earnest and the characters are so serious," he said. "It's fun to make comedy out of them."</p><p>Droege and Whitlock first conceived of "Are You There God, It's Me, Karen Carpenter" two years ago with the idea of pairing Blume's book with the decidedly different coming-of-age story: "Go Ask Alice," an anonymous 1971 dairy of a drug-addicted girl. "It was not exactly the most uplifting story so we decided to scrap it, but I thought the book would make a really funny musical," said Whitlock.</p><p>After sampling a variety of '70s pop voices, including who co-wrote the '70s feminist anthem "I Am Woman," Whitlock decided on the Carpenters. "When emotions get so high in this play and they have to sing about it, what better songs than 'Rainy Days and Mondays' and 'On Top of the World'"? he said.</p><p>Expect to see Margaret and her pre-teen posse performing bust-augmenting exercises and bra checks, along with other embarrassing coming-of-age moments. Along the way, Karen Carpenter (played by Libby Baker) swoops in like the fairy godmother to wave her magic drumsticks and sing a solo backed by sock puppets made from feminine hygiene products.</p><p>"We don't take ourselves too seriously &mdash; we are doing a musicalized version of a Judy Blume book," said Whitlock. "But the show also has heart because along the way our little heroine, Margaret, gets her heart broken. It's girl gets boy, loses boy, gets boy."</p><p>The show premiered at Attic Theatre in March and sold out its two-week run. In August, the musical opened for a limited engagement at the 70-seat theater in the basement of the Silver Lake's kitschy Casita del Campo restaurant.</p><p>"We're doing it in a big Mexican restaurant with margaritas flowing so it's a little wilder, which I love," said Droege.</p><p></p>?"Tales of the City" may have introduced author Armistead Maupin and , the most memorable face from the three television miniseries adapted from the books. But American Conservatory Theater, the venerable resident theater on Geary Street led by artistic director Carey Perloff, is what keeps bringing them back together.<br><br>A few weeks ago, when Dukakis was performing in Morris Panych's play "Vigil" at A.C.T., where she serves on the board of trustees, the theater announced that a musical of Maupin's beloved chronicle would have its world premiere there at the end of next season.<br><br> This confluence suggested a reunion, so I invited them to lunch at the Four Seasons to talk about "Tales," San Francisco and old friendship. The presence of a third party was hardly necessary to get the conversational ball rolling, though someone would eventually have to sort out the dizzying cross talk, ricocheting aper&#231;us and resounding confirmations ("That's exactly how I felt!") of two people who may not see each other much but who share a bond that is easily renewed.<br><br>"We live on different coasts, but one of the handy things about A.C.T. is that it brings Olympia back here periodically," Maupin dapperly pronounced, ever the Southern gentleman (raised in Raleigh, N. C.), even if a transplanted and infamously naughty one.<br><br>"That's when we get to see each other," Dukakis concurred, looking sporty in a black leather jacket, a boa-like scarf and white hair smartly coiffed. She had a matinee to perform after lunch, but gave no sense of fret or haste. One could say that she makes a gift of her attention, except that her interest seems too genuine to be mere courtesy.<br><br>"Tales," the phenomenon that started in 1976 as a serial in the San Francisco Chronicle when Maupin was on staff there and has evolved into a pop cultural phenomenon that has come to define a San Francisco era and ethos, obviously occupies a primary place in his world. Dukakis acknowledges that playing Anna Madrigal, the wise transsexual landlady with a flexible and nonjudgmental sense of family, was a special event in her life too.<br><br>The gig spanned nearly a decade, with "Tales of the City" (1993) begetting "More Tales of the City" (1998) and "Further Tales of the City" (2001). Maupin never seems to run out of comparative adjectives, and audiences never grow tired of watching characters attempt to define themselves rather than being defined by society.<br><br>"Younger generations see &#8216;Tales' and come up to me and talk to me about it, and thank me for it," she says. "And I take all the credit," she adds, with the instinctive timing that won her a supporting actress Oscar for "Moonstruck."<br><br>"The beautiful thing was that Olympia already embodied all of those qualities celebrated in the book and still does," says Maupin. "She's an earth mother, a spiritual, animated, loving soul &#8212; it didn't have to be faked."<br><br>A saga about adults in the throes of identity crises, set in a hilly city of Victorian architecture and un-Victorian morality, "Tales" is a natural for musical adaptation. The overstuffed narrative will require telescoping, but Anna Madrigal's tenants, Mary Ann, Mona, "Mouse" and Brian (originally played on TV by Laura Linney, Chloe Webb, Marcus D'Amico and Paul Gross, respectively) seem as born for the stage as their pot-smoking surrogate mother.<br><br>A lover of musicals himself (as if we didn't know), Maupin is visibly elated that after a few aborted attempts and passing collaborative flirtations (the list seems to include everyone but ), the show is finally set. The current creative team features two of the people behind "Avenue Q," book writer Jeff Whitty and director , as well as Scissor Sisters members Jack Shears and John Garden, who are composing the score, their first for the theater.<br><br>Maupin says he's mainly serving in an advisory role. "Carey Perloff has been nagging me in a teasing way to finish my new novel so I can get to work on the musical, because she wants it to be imprinted with the original spirit. But it's very much the job of these younger talented people."<br><br>San Francisco has changed quite a bit in the intervening decades. Old money has been dwarfed by dot-com money, foodies outnumber hippies and "cruising" has moved from the Castro to . Has the successful assimilation of the gay and lesbian community rendered "Tales" obsolete?<br><br>Maupin says the heart of the book is still relevant. When pressed to characterize this quality, he responds with one word: "Tolerance." For him, this is more than a preachy message &#8212; it's the central tenet of a life that, from its start in the conservative South, has known stigma and shame. Fortunately, he had the example of an independent-minded grandmother, who was a model for Anna's character. An English-born actress and suffragist who opened up the world of the theater to him, she once told him, "Any woman who is all woman and any man who is all man is a complete monster unfit for human company."<br><br>Her words hit the right ear. Maupin took strength from them, and he shared that strength by extolling this deeper morality in his fiction.<br><br>Politics continue to be achingly personal for him. He wed his partner, Christopher Turner, two times &#8212; once in Canada ("after we got tired of waiting for our country to become civilized") and once during the window of time in 2008 when same-sex marriage was legal in California.<br><br>The only thing Maupin seems to have no tolerance for is intolerance. His voice grows heated when he talks about the ongoing "organized hate campaign by the churches of America against the notion of homosexuality." "Coming out" may not longer be a cultural "taboo," he says, but in many quarters it continues to exact a hefty penalty.<br><br>"In some ways, I was luckier as a young man because no one ever talked about homosexuality," he says. "I sensed from the few things I had seen that there was something terribly wrong with me, but my parents weren't telling me that I was an abomination or sending me off to some horrible camp to learn how not to be gay. "<br><br>If there's one figure that embodies the encompassing acceptance prescriptively depicted in "Tales," it's Anna Madrigal. And in this respect, the TV role couldn't have been better cast, because along with a kind of Mediterranean earthiness, Dukakis radiates an empathetic wisdom as an actress. Even her humor &#8212; deadpanned or punched &#8212; comes across as homage to the human .<br><br>"The characters in &#8216;Tales' don't know which way they're going, sexually, professionally," says Dukakis. "&#8230;.That dilemma doesn't scare Anna Madrigal. She's been there already. To be helpful, she puts her little marijuana sticks on their doors. That's how you get over the humps."<br><br>"The line that sums up the character and Olympia," Maupin says, is the one Anna says to Mary Ann soon after her arrival from Ohio: "Dear, I have no objection to anything."<br><br>"Like ' &#8216;Nothing human disgusts me,' " Dukakis offers. Later, she lets slip that there's a reason Williams is on her mind: There are plans for her to star in "The Milk Train Doesn't Stop Here Anymore" next winter in New York, a play she did in 2008 at in Connecticut. It's one of this indefatigable 78-year-old actress' many projects, and listening to her tick them off (one is "a kind of lesbian road picture" with , called "Cloudburst"), you begin to understand how she managed to co-found the Whole Theatre Company in Montclair, N.J., with her husband, actor Louis Zorich.<br><br>For all Dukakis' personal levity, there's a seriousness to her, a concern with the weight of other people's experience. When she was preparing the role of Anna Madrigal, she immersed herself in research, which included a fateful encounter with a therapist who was herself a transsexual.<br><br>"It was very painful to read about," Dukakis says. "Physically and emotionally, there is a lot of pain. This woman came in, 6-foot-3, 6-foot-4, big hands, small voice. I said, &#8216;Tell me what it was that you wanted that made it possible for you to go through this.' She said to me, &#8216;All my life I yearned for the friendship of women.' That for me was the key. There was an aspect of herself as a woman, and she wanted it to emerge. And I don't think there is any woman that doesn't feel that way about herself, that there are aspects of themselves that are silenced."<br><br>"Olympia told me that beautiful line when we were on the set, and I incorporated it on the spot in a scene," says Maupin.<br><br>Whitty is apparently adapting the first two books, starting with Anna's revelation, proceeding to the desert whorehouse of Mother Mucca (played on TV by Jackie Burroughs), and ending at the Christmas reunion scene. The kitsch dangers are obviously high &#8212; the new stage version of "The Addams Family" should serve as a cautionary tale for the creative team. But Maupin is impressed with "how much they were able to get in, and how smoothly they could get everyone into bed with a song."<br><br>After hugs are exchanged and Dukakis heads off to her matinee, Maupin ponders the alchemy that occurs when gifted actors personify something you wrote. He confesses that he used to envy his late friend 's unparalleled success with "The Berlin Stories," which gave rise to "Cabaret," both the Tony-winning musical and Oscar-winning film.<br><br>"I thought that was the greatest compliment &#8212; to have your mythology be made into these wonderful forms of entertainment," he says. "I'm so grateful for every stage of &#8216;Tales' &#8212; from the newspaper series, to the novels, to the television series. This is my last act in the best kind of way. I feel so lucky at 65. Some people my age think it's all over for them, and I get to sit back and watch a musical rise up out of my work."<br><br>?Roll over Beethoven. At the School of Rock, studying the classics means learning the Ramones' "Blitzkrieg Bop" and "Another Brick in the Wall," not "Moonlight Sonata."<br><br>On Nov. 13, the nationwide chain of music schools opened its 60th location, in West Los Angeles, to teach 7-to-18-year-olds how to jam on guitar, bass, drums, keyboards and vocals. The Wilshire Boulevard outlet is the second area location for the school, joining the 4-year-old School of Rock in North Hollywood. And there may be more coming.<br><br> "Los Angeles can easily support three times as many schools as we have now," says School of Rock Chief Executive Chris Catalano.<br><br>It has been a dozen years since , apparently an inspiration for 's character in the 2003 movie "School of Rock," opened the first academy in Philadelphia. (Green left the company earlier this year and has started a music education program in rural New York for 18-to-25-year-olds.) In 2009, private investment firm Sterling Partners bought a majority stake in the Teaneck, N.J.-based company and has shifted the short-term focus to franchising schools. The West L.A. location is the last of the 22 company-owned schools scheduled, but franchise plans call for at least 300 new locations to open over the next five years in North America.<br><br>Regardless of the locale, the mission is the same: "We offer a musical sanctuary for kids who have a fire about music &#8212; a place for them to learn from professional musicians, not from professional full-time teachers," says Carl Restivo, the music director for the North Hollywood and West L.A. schools.<br><br>Restivo isn't just playing the part of a wannabe rocker. The songwriter-guitarist-producer is in Tom Morello's Street Sweeper Social Club, has worked with and , and co-wrote a song on the multi-platinum "Twilight" soundtrack. He's far from the only rocker on the roster: Teachers at the North Hollywood location include Al Pahanish Jr. from Powerman 5000, Tracey "Spacey T" Singleton from Fishbone, Pablo Sebastian from Malbec and Jody Delli Santi from Supercreep.<br><br>The L.A. schools bring out the famous parents too. Producer and former Eurythmic Dave Stewart's two younger daughters have taken classes at the North Hollywood school. He likes the discipline that studying music requires. "People think rock music is just a lot of people jamming and having fun, but when you break down how did Pink Floyd make this particular track, some parts of it are almost mathematical."<br><br>Stewart is so taken with the School of Rock concept that he and Catalano are talking about launching a program that teaches students how to make a living as a musician. There are also discussions about a reality show, as well as possible franchises in Stewart's native England.<br><br>At School of Rock, kids who have never picked up an instrument start with Rock 101, which comprises a weekly 45-minute private lesson and 90-minute group jam. On a recent Saturday, three pint-sized players, all with furrowed determination, noisily thrashed through &#8211; what else? -- Deep Purple's "Smoke on the Water" in the Zappa Shack, a stand-alone guest cottage at the North Hollywood location.<br><br>In the main house, the advanced kids ran through private instruction in the school's six lesson rooms, all named after famous musicians, including Eddie Van Halen, Keith Moon and John Bonham. They also participate in a three-hour weekly rehearsal. The cost is $350 per month.<br><br>After 12 weeks of lessons, the students are cast in a rock show &#8212; don't call it a recital &#8212; held at a local club, like the Whiskey or the Mint, that focuses on a particular artist's repertoire. One of last season's performances featured "Physical Graffiti" and "Houses of the Holy."<br><br>On this Saturday, Brian Rector's 13-year-old son, Waylon, who studies bass and guitar, is in one lesson room, while Brian's 16-year-old daughter, Chloe, bashes the drums in another. The best part, Brian Rector says, is "the satisfaction [they get] from performing before live audiences and the feeling of achievement. They just want to get better at everything all the time." Rector would love for his children to become professional musicians but admits that his wife has different ideas. He looks at his 10-month-old daughter, Soraya, who's standing with daddy's help, and says, "She's going to be a doctor."<br><br>Waylon Rector, along with other top players from the North Hollywood and Vista, Calif., schools, often perform at area events such as the School of Rock All Stars. On Oct. 26, they played "School's Out" and "We Will Rock You" on " ."<br><br>All Stars bassist Max Bouvrie, who studies at the North Hollywood school, worried about smudging "the make-up the lady put on me" before the ABC taping but afterward was all smiles. "School of Rock puts a huge emphasis on respect," the 15-year-old says. "When someone else is talking, you don't play. When someone else is playing solo, you step back.... All these things blatantly play a role on stage, but even more so in the real word. It's how you should act in school or when you walk down the street."<br><br>The new West L.A. site resides in a one-story, stand-alone stucco structure, shadowed by office towers due west of the Wilshire Corridor. Daniel Leanse, the executive director for the Westside school, is a former New Christy Minstrel who was most recently the cantorial soloist at Village Temple in New York City. "I coached hundreds of kids for B'nei Mitzvah," says Leanse, who studied at Boston's Berklee College of Music and has always kept a hand in the secular music world. "When I saw School of Rock, I thought, I've had all this fun and success teaching kids something they don't really want to do; how much fun would it be to teach them to play ?"<br><br>With budget cuts slashing into music programs, the School of Rock has unintentionally found itself fulfilling an instructional role once provided by public schools. "We're trying to find ways we can be more integrated into the schools around our schools because we think it's the logical thing to do," Catalano says. The School of Rock also hopes to formalize some kind of scholarship program. "There should be a way for kids who can't afford us to get the same experience. We have a commitment to the shareholders, but also to the community."<br><br>?The night belongs to "Avatar."<br><br>The sci-fi blockbuster -- the most expensive movie ever made and on track to become the highest-grossing film ever made ? won the tonight for best dramatic film and best director for .<br><br> was Cameron's first film since 1997's phenomenon "Titanic," which also won Globes in those same categories. "It's sure an exciting evening," Cameron said, looking at the crowd. "This is the best job in the world." He echoed the message of the film about a planet of nature-loving blue people and remarked that "everything is connected, all human beings to each other, and us to the Earth" and urged everyone to "appreciate this miracle of the world we have right here."<br><br>When he won the directing award earlier, Cameron said he was ill-prepared to give an acceptance speech because he thought ex-wife was going to win for and said she richly deserved it, "but make no mistake, I'm very grateful." Cameron took full advantage of the free-wheeling spirit of the Hollywood Foreign Press awards ? where celebrities sit at dinner tables, eating and imbibing spirits during the ceremony ? when he added that he was keeping his speech short because he had to "pee something fierce."<br><br> "Avatar" shared the spotlight at the 67th annual ceremony with which won trophies for score and , and the small independent "Crazy Heart," which won best actor in a drama for and song.<br><br>Until tonight, Bridges has always been the bridesmaid but never the bride. In accepting the award for playing a washed-up country singer, Bridges, nominated three previous times for a Golden Globe, cracked, "You're really screwing up my underappreciated status here."<br><br>Among those he thanked was his late father, , who he said "loved show business so damn much" that he encouraged his kids to come along. "I'm so glad I listened to you, Dad," he said, looking up to the heavens. "Glad I paid attention."<br><br>The Golden Globes were broadcast live on NBC from the International Ballroom of the Beverly Hilton. Celebrities had to walk a soggy red carpet and suffer through frizzy hairdos, drenched evening gowns, designer shoes and tuxes. The night was hosted by acerbic British comic , and many wondered whether he would cross the line ? and he did. At one point, he suggested that he's rather be home, um, enjoying himself and his newly reduced penis. But audiences finally got a real zinger from Gervais, as he swigged a glass of beer that he kept at the podium and introduced the next presenter: "I like a drink as well as the next man. Unless the next man is ."<br><br>Gibson, no stranger to a DUI, took it in stride, even briefly pretending to be drunk as he prepared to introduce the director nominees.<br><br>While there was a lot of levity to kick off the show, there was also a solemn moment at the start of the show. Actress ? wearing a ribbon to recall the victims of the ? urged audiences to donate money for disaster relief and to tune in for Friday's Hope for telethon organized by actor .<br><br>On the film front, it was elementary, my dear Watson, that won best actor in a or musical tonight for playing famed super sleuth in "Sherlock Holmes." In a self-deprecating speech, he said he had no one to thank and then proceeded to thank everybody, including producer Joel Silver who jumpstarted his career "at least 12 times," and his wife, Susan, the film's producer. If it wasn't for her, Downey said, he would be bussing tables at the Daily Grill.<br><br> won her first Golden Globe, for best actress in a drama for "The Blind Side." Known mostly for her comedic roles, Bullock thanked the for honoring her stepping over to "the other side" with this drama inspired by the true story of a wealthy white Southern family that adopts a homeless African American teenage boy who later becomes a pro football player. She said the film shows that a family is more than who you're born to but who has your back. In an aside to her husband, Jesse James, she said it was no coincidence that her on-screen work improved after the two met. Because, she said, until then she didn't know what it was like for someone to "have my back."<br><br>The Globes also tossed taste out the window, honoring the raucous R-rated hit with best comedy or musical motion picture.<br><br>The director, Todd Phillips, said he was shocked that the film ? the highest-grossing comedy of all time, about a bachelor party that goes horribly awry in Las Vegas ? beat out such fellow nominees as and "It's Complicated." "We didn't expect this," he said of the film, which was filled with nudity, foul language, and even a cameo by brawler .<br><br>Visionary filmmaker , who has directed such classics as "Taxi Driver," "GoodFellas" and "The Departed," was honored with the Cecil B. DeMille award, presented to him by two of his most frequent collaborators, and .<br><br>Scorsese used the moment to talk about the need for film preservation. He praised the Hollywood Foreign Press Assn. for donating money to the Film Foundation to preserve movies, quoting saying, "The past is never dead," and added that making films and preserving films are one and the same. "We are walking in the footsteps of the people who came before us," he said.<br><br>As expected, Christoph Waltz won supporting actor for a motion picture as a nefarious Nazi in " ." The actor has received the shares of accolades in that category this season, making him the front runner for an Academy Award. Though he was ruthless and brutal in the movie, onstage he was a soft-spoken pussy cat and seemed slightly nervous.<br><br>Other films awarded: and Sheldon Turner won a screenplay trophy for T-Bone Burnett and Ryan Bingham won best song for "The Weary Kind (The Theme from 'Crazy Heart')" and an ultra-excited Michael Giacchino received the award for best score for the Disney / hit "Up," which also won animated film. ( presented the award for animated film, saying the genre is not only for kids but also for "adults who take drugs.") When Giacchino walked past McCartney on his way onstage, the legendary rock star wished him well.<br><br>"I can't believe Paul McCartney said 'Go, Michael!' " Giacchino exclaimed as he grabbed his Golden Globe, adding that after that highlight, there was nothing else to say.<br><br>?'s Emmy-free and too long under-appreciated &rdquo; came out of its yearlong, writers-strike-created hiatus like the buffed-up guy tired of eating sand.<br><br>But instead of going for fireballs and kidnappings (OK, there were a few of those, but they were totally incidental), cancer scares and intra-cast murder attempts (well, yes, there were those too, but again, not the point), creators Mark V. Olsen and Will Scheffer took their strange and startling American fable to new heights, and depths.<br><br> All of which came to a DefCon 1 "conclusion" in the season finale Sunday night. Oh, there were several moments of "closure" in the final minutes, but that was just the writers handing a bit of narrative Xanax to keep viewers from developing unsightly nervous tics while they wait to see what will really happen next season.<br><br> And not just in terms of plot. "Big Love" has become richer in tone and message. What had been quaint -- the mob-like machinations of the compound at Juniper Creek -- grew dark and murderous; what had been solid and structured -- the Henricksons' prefab polygamous corner of the universe -- collapsed into chaos.<br><br>While last season examined the complexities of marriage and family and love, this season dealt more with the separate, perplexing and often lonely lives each one of us leads amid all the noise and haste of modern daily life.<br><br>In episode after episode, the writers and actors pried apart the multihued twist of characters with the precision of bomb squad technicians. Margene (Ginnifer Goodwin) moved from arm candy to entrepreneur; Barb () admitted her deep attachment to church and community even over the bonds of family; Sarah () had a miscarriage and teetered on the verge of collapse before righting herself.<br><br>And Nicki (), poor Nicki, the buttoned-down sociopath everyone has loved to hate. Finally she, and we, came to grips with what lurked beneath it all -- she was born to parents with "murder in their hearts," parents who forced her to give up a child in a desperate attempt to flee the compound. Meanwhile, Bill () watched the fortress of women he had so carefully constructed around him morph into an opposing army of righteous indignation.<br><br> It wasn't a perfect season. The story line involving Ana (Branka Katic) joining the family as a fourth wife fizzled into the world's quickest divorce -- she just walked out of the house never to be seen again. A reprise of the sexual tension between eldest son Benny (Douglas Smith) and Margene was a dud, and Teenie (Jolean Wejbe) seems to have just vanished into thin air.<br><br>Even so, "Big Love" is like no other show on television, possibly ever, and polygamy, though fascinating, is not the reason. Instead, it simply provides the odd and irregularly sized frame, the only thing big enough to accommodate a portrait so complicated that, left to its own devices, it would soon claim the entire wall, the entire room.<br><br>Where else do you see characters regularly engaged in sincere and supplicant prayer? What other show respectfully portrays the soul-rattling fear that a transgression from religious belief can cause in a modern American? Where else are the power struggles of marriage examined without apology or laugh track, or the contrast between male and female friendship portrayed without sentimentality or agenda?<br><br> What other show consistently examines the sticky and complicated mess of love and fear, loyalty and ennui, generosity and spite that holds most families together?<br><br>Oh, and it was nice to see pick up a guitar again, if only for a minute.<br><br>?<p>"Ballet," the legendary dancer Jacques D'Amboisesaid, "betters both the dancer and the audience." That cannot be said, however, of "Breaking Pointe," the network's new reality show set at Ballet West in Salt Lake City. "Breaking Pointe," whose opening credits tell us it's about the side of ballet that "no one ever sees," follows eight dancers as they rehearse and room together, break up and make up, practice and, of course, perform.</p><p>In the show, a great deal of emphasis is put on perfection. It's the dancers motivating force: "We do it for that one perfect moment where everything comes together," says one dancer. "We do it to be perfect."</p><p>In many ways, the emphasis on perfection puts up a mirror for what it's like to be a high-achieving woman &mdash; not just in ballet but in modern life.</p> <p>The show seems determined to demonstrate that although they spend their days intensely, obsessively honing an elite skill, ballerinas are just regular people. "Breaking Pointe" is distinctly soapy, emphasizing the love stories, friendships and rivalries between dancers. But if ballerinas are, as the show insists, just like us, what does that say about us?</p><p>Anything done well looks easier than it really is. But in ballet, apparent effortlessness is required. Most women who have taken ballet classes will remember being chastised for landing jumps "like a herd of elephants!" (or cows, or rhinoceroses &mdash; the anecdotes vary, but it's always herd animals). Ballerinas are expected to jump high, their legs split at a 180 degrees &mdash; and then float back to earth like a feather. It's an awful lot to ask.</p><p>And yet, there are myriad equivalents facing women who haven't chosen the rarefied world of ballet. In fact, when Duke University surveyed its undergraduate women, it found that one phrase echoed dangerously throughout the interviews: "effortless perfection." These young women wanted to make life look as if the struggle didn't exist. They not only aspired to achieve at the highest levels but to make that aspiration invisible. Their grades, their beauty, their talents, their pitch-perfect sense of humor &mdash; all performed like a perfect, light-as-air pirouette.</p><p>In ballet, the Herculean effort to appear effortless may contribute to the beauty of "Swan Lake" on stage, but it may also create some of the soul-killing undercurrents we saw in the dark thriller "Black Swan," especially when it spills over to real life. Hyperbolic as it was, the 2010 film revealed some of what grows up in the cracks of a perfectionist project: jealousy, self-hatred, alienation and disease.</p><p>Most people know that the prevalence of in the ballet community is worryingly high &mdash; and in that, at least, ballet dancers are indeed not that different from the rest of us. According to the National Assn. of Anorexia Nervosa and Associated Disorders, as many as 24 million Americans suffer from eating disorders. Millions more engage in "disordered eating" &mdash; behavior that is not serious enough to be diagnosed as an eating disorder but that nonetheless disrupts their lives and degrades their heath.</p><p>To its credit, "Breaking Pointe" raises the contradiction of effortless perfection. One dancer acknowledges the paradox, praising a dancer who "is the ultimate performer. It's amazing to watch her because she works hard but you'll never know. It's like, she's wincing in pain inside, but you'll never see it on her face. I think that's amazing."</p><p>Still, that dancer, and the show itself, glamorize the pursuit of effortless perfection. Yes, it shows us the sweat and the blisters, and the sexual intrigue and social hierarchy &mdash; the side of ballet that no one ever sees. But it doesn't linger on the tyranny of the contradiction: You must work incredibly hard toward perfection, an impossible goal, and you cannot even grimace in pain as your muscles beg for a break.</p><p>Ultimately, effortless is an impossible pursuit. There is a breaking point: You don't get a spot in the company, or an anxiety disorder debilitates you. Sometimes the body rebels against the dehumanizing idea that it should be without flaws: a bone breaks or you simply can't stay well. Sometimes, the work of maintaining perfect control &mdash; and of hiding the effort it requires &mdash; is just exhausting. Our complex constitutions were not meant for flawlessness.</p><p>In her 1999 commencement address at Mount Holyoke College, author Anna Quindlen advised: "The thing that is really hard, and really amazing, is giving up on being perfect and beginning the work of becoming yourself. This is more difficult because there is no zeitgeist to read, no template to follow, no mask to wear."</p><p>She could have said "no tutu to don." It's not that the art and sport of ballet isn't beautiful, or a worthwhile endeavor, but living life as if it were being staged at is dangerous and delusional.</p><p>"Breaking Pointe" is one more reminder that women, especially, must shift our expectations for modern life &mdash; from achievement to fulfillment, from appearance to pleasure, from perfection to joy.</p><p>The energy we expend making our achievements look effortless is energy wasted. And it does a disservice to other women to pretend that it all comes easily and naturally. Our aspirations, and the hard work that turns aspiration into reality, are things in which we should take pride. For all but a select few, the perfect pirouette is not worth bleeding for. Starving oneself is no way for anyone to go through life. But surely the only thing worse than starving and bleeding is smiling through the pain.</p><p>Chloe Angyal is an editor at Feministing.com. Courtney E. Martin is the author of "Perfect Girls, Starving Daughters: How Perfection Is Harming Young Women."</p>?Chlo&#233;, the French luxury house, is devoted to casual separates with enough edge to appeal to young women. Its casual looks, what the French refer to as "day wear," are Los Angeles day-to-night wear. As a matter of fact, the line looks so right for an L.A. woman's closet -- sheer blouses paired with shorts, one-shoulder dresses -- that you wonder why Chlo&#233;, which just opened its first proper Los Angeles boutique on Melrose Place, took so long to get here. <br><br>Founded by Gaby Aghion, Chlo&#233; introduced luxury pr&#234;t-&#224;-porter to the masses 57 years ago and was the springboard for designers in 1966, Stella McCartney in 1997 and Phoebe Philo in 2001. Philo's former assistant Hannah MacGibbon stepped in last year as creative director and has been toughening and updating the brand's trademark gauze, ruffles, trousers and pastels with menswear fabrics and boxy shapes. <br><br> The Chlo&#233; boutique, nestled between and Temperley in a row of faux French chateau-style white bungalows, was designed by Sophie Hicks Architects, a London firm, and incorporates such elements as skylights and laser-cut abstract panels. The street-facing unit houses accessories, while a separate two-story building in the rear carries the collection, using its veranda to frame the fashions.<br><br>The spring/summer collection, in colors influenced by the desert, fills out the store until MacGibbon's well-reviewed fall lineup, including hot, thigh-high pirate boots, lands. Styles include a $1,550 boyfriend blazer, meant to be worn over a $575 gauzy gray silk blouse, and $775 leopard print shorts. Chlo&#233;'s trademark scalloped hemline shows up on a $1,795 navy polka-dot mini-dress with three-quarter-length sleeves, a $2,495 white linen coat and a $595 tan sling-back heel. <br><br>Accessories are the main focus, including the buzzed-about new pebble-embossed leather $1,995 Sally bag that is structured rather than slouchy and the multi-strap $995 Carrie suede wedge that embodies Chlo&#233; -- classic design tweaked into hipness but eminently wearable. <br><br><br><br>8448 Melrose Place, Los Angeles. (323) 602-0000. 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Monday to Saturday. <br><br>SALES <br><br>Zvezda Starting today: The travel-themed boutique holds a Spring Prep sale on current and previous season looks for men and women. Men can find William Rast jeans for $195 (regularly $234) or blues from People's Liberation for $188 (regularly $226). Women's designer looks are priced from $170 to $500 from labels Blumarine, Betsey Johnson and . Zvezda ("star" in Bulgarian) is also reducing by 50% to 60% its exclusive Bao Tranchi collection, with deals such as a $325 halter dress ($1,050), $500 cocktail dress ($1,350) and $725 silk bolero ($1,900). <br><br>604 Santa Monica Blvd., Santa Monica. (310) 917-2223. 11 a.m. to 6:30 p.m. Tuesday to Saturday. <br><br>2nd Street Beauty Today: Irvine's mini beauty department store at the Woodbury Town Center celebrates two years in business with a storewide 25%-off sale. The discount applies to skin care by Murad, Perricone MD and Dermalogica, makeup by Smashbox and hair care by Paul Mitchell. <br><br>6286 Irvine Blvd., Irvine. (949) 653-0220. 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. Monday. 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. Tuesday to Saturday. Noon to 6 p.m. Sunday. <br><br>Madison Gallery Thursday through April 5: Malibu luxury boutique throws an "in your dreams sale" featuring 75% off past-season looks from European houses. Deals on hand include: $90 Stella McCartney jeans (regularly $358), $863 Balmain dress ($3,450), $898 Nina Ricci leather jacket ($3,590) and $298 boots ($1,195).<br><br> 23410 Civic Center Way, Malibu. (310) 317-8787. 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. Monday to Saturday. Noon to 5 p.m. Sunday. <br><br>Junior Drake Sample sale Friday through April 5: L.A. manufacturer of stylish, affordable leather handbags and accessories is having a warehouse sale with past-season designs up to 75% off retail and prices from $60 to $200 (regular price $300 to $500). Spend $150 or more and receive free handbag. A DJ will spin for entertainment and desserts will be served<br><br>740 E. 60th St., Los Angeles. (323) 231-4116. 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. Friday. 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Saturday and Sunday. <br><br>EVENTS<br><br>A Soolip Wedding Today: Prospective brides and wedding planners are invited to this 10-year-old event at Vibiana showcasing high-end bridal resources plus a fashion show featuring gowns by Kirstie Kelly. See invitations by host Soolip Paperie & Press and try delicious Vietnamese-fusion bites by Crustacean's AN Catering. You can set up a registry with Bloomingdale's or California-based Heath Ceramics, schedule a skin-care consultation at Kate , learn about updos at Sally Hershberger or book a honeymoon suite at San Ysidro Ranch. Admission is $45. <br><br>210 S. Main St., Los Angeles. (310) 860-1300. 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. <br><br>La Perla Wednesday: Italian luxe lingerie brand throws a charity shopping event hosted by Perrey Reeves (Mrs. Ari on "Entourage"). This evening only, take 25% off new lingerie, such as a $224 teal chemise ($299), $192 demi-bra ($257) and $114 matching brief ($153) and 10% of the proceeds will benefit Clothes Off Our Backs (which supports international children's charities). View a cocktail exhibition of La Perla's celebrity red carpet gowns that will be auctioned off the following day, also to benefit the charity. Guests must be 21 and older and must RSVP to to attend with one other person.<br><br>?<p>Hammer-wielding Avenger and wife Elsa Pataky have a new baby girl, India Rose. And since this is the daughter of Thor and a human, the baby, logically, would be a demigod, correct?</p><p>Now, don't answer too fast. Stop to consider: Thor himself was called a demigod in "The Avengers," and that caused a few ripples in the superhero-fan pond. Lovers of also may have quirked an eyebrow.</p><p>Common definitions of demigod do include "the offspring of a god and a mortal," and Thor is the son of the god Odin and (by many accounts) a giantess who represents Mother Earth (Gaea for the Marvel version, according to ).</p> <p>Chloe asked on the discussion board Yahoo! Answers: "Is Thor called Demigod in the Avengers movie because of Christians?" Responses were mixed: There was the argument that Thor is a lesser deity, as well as the argument that some Christians are uptight.</p><p>In this case, the most important factor to consider is that Thor is a fictional character, and that as well as India's dad might swing a hammer, he's merely an actor. (His blue-eyed, blond-haired good looks may have caused a fan or two to mutter, "Oh my God," but that doesn't count.) India won't be going to Asgard to visit any relatives.</p><p>Aussie Hemsworth, 28, and Spanish-born Pataky, 35 and an actress, married in December 2010. This is , notes USA Today.</p><p>Hemsworth veers away from the hammer and picks up an ax for his new film, " &amp; the Huntsman," with and . Here's a of the Aussie actor storming the castle.</p><p>ALSO:</p><p></p><p></p><p></p>?<p>NBC and its beloved but low-rated received a bit of a boost Tuesday morning when the nominations for the second annual Critics' Choice Television Awards were announced and both the show and its network led all other nominees.</p><p>"Community" was the most nominated individual show, with six nods, while NBC led all other networks with 14 nominations. It even beat out Emmy favorite , which had 12 nominations and led all cable channels.</p><p> received 13 nominations and received 12. and were also favorites, with five nominations each.</p> <p>The winners, selected by the Broadcast Television Journalists Assn., will be handed out at the awards dinner on June 18 at the Beverly Hilton Hotel.</p><p>The full list of nominees:</p><p>Best Series</p><p>&ndash; </p><p>&ndash; </p><p>&ndash; HBO</p><p>&ndash; CBS</p><p>&ndash; </p><p>"Mad Men" &ndash; AMC</p><p>Lead Actor in a Drama Series</p><p> &ndash; "Breaking Bad" &ndash; AMC</p><p> &ndash; &ndash; Starz</p><p> &ndash; "Mad Men" - AMC</p><p> &ndash; &ndash; </p><p> &ndash; "Homeland" &ndash; Showtime</p><p> &ndash; &ndash; FX</p><p></p>?All My Firsts<br><br>Madeline, 6<br><br> Laurel Hall School<br><br>North Hollywood<br><br>The first thing I ever saw was the face of my careful mom shining down, looking at me. The first thing I ever heard was the rustling of the winds blowing gently on berry bushes. The first thing I ever smelled was the smell of my mom's delicious salmon cooking with delightful seasoning. The first thing I ever loved was you.<br><br>Mother's Day<br><br>Zayan, 7<br><br>Roosevelt Elementary<br><br>Santa Monica<br><br>It would be a great joy if Mother's Day would be every day. We're going to give her presents, but is she going to give us presents too? She gives us presents every second of my life. It's really nice to have Mother's Day and , but can't we also have Children's Day!? I hope we do. But now, let's celebrate Mother's Day. If you didn't know me, let me tell you all that I looove to read books. There's a book called "100 Inventions who shaped World History," and I think they should add one more invention&#8230;Mom&#8230;greatest invention of all by God. This is what I think of my mom.<br><br>Happy Mother's Day to every mother!<br><br>My Mom<br><br>Rebecca, 12<br><br>Thurston Middle School<br><br>Laguna Beach<br><br>Her hair is like golden waves of happiness. Her smile is brighter than the summer sun. Her laugh, like the song of a bluebird. She smells like love and chocolate. Her kisses taste like sweet mangos. Her hugs are my blanket of love.<br><br>My Teacher: Mrs. Walls<br><br>Chloe, 7<br><br>Santiago Hills Elementary<br><br>Irvine<br><br>I love you so much. You can teach math. You are the best math teacher at school. I know you a lot. You taught us how to write. You taught us how to stand in line. You can show us how to do art. You rock.<br><br>My Mom<br><br>Michelle, 8<br><br>Cornerstone Elementary<br><br>Rancho Palos Verdes<br><br>My mom is clean. She likes the color green. She is lazy. And her favorite flower is a daisy. My mom's favorite animal is a kitty. And she is very witty.<br><br>For more Kids' Reading Room, visit . Be sure and check out Creativity Corner in the Activity Center for more poems about moms.?<p> creator Anthony E. Zuiker's latest opens with a bad guy threatening his victim &mdash; with a laptop. Computer screens reveal how an international cyber crime ring has obtained the victim's bank account, his wife's driver's license and even photographs of his two children.</p><p>"I know everything about you. I own your life," declares the crime boss, played by . "I can take it away with the push of a button."</p><p>Hackers and cyber crime are at the heart of "Cybergeddon," a nine-part Web series that premiered this week exclusively on Yahoo. The drama follows "Rookie Blue's" as Chloe Jocelyn, an agent on the trail of seemingly unrelated cyber attacks, who finds herself falsely accused of treason. She enlists the help of a master hacker to track down the person who framed her and prevent the global computer calamity of the title. The 90-minute movie unfolds in 10-minute Web-only installments.</p> <p></p><p>Zuiker said he chose to release "Cybergeddon" digitally because he believes the format represents the future of storytelling.</p><p>"The relationship between Silicon Valley and Hollywood needs to be figured out &mdash; and figured out fast," Zuiker said. "And I want to be the one to do this."</p><p>"Cybergeddon," which cost about $6 million to make and promote, premiered simultaneously Tuesday in 25 countries and 10 languages.</p><p>A red-carpet premiere Monday at the Pacific Design Center lent the film a mainstream Hollywood sheen. A-lister (and Martinez's fiancee) and actress of "Friday Night Lights" fame joined the party, along with series costars Manny Montana () and Kick Gurry ().</p><p>Ever since the success of the "CSI" television franchise, Zuiker has been dabbling in cross-platform storytelling, recounting a single narrative across multiple devices. His book series "Level 26," which chronicles the exploits of a former FBI agent pulled out of retirement to hunt down the world's worst serial killers, contains Web-based "cyber-bridges" that enable the reader to unlock cinematic scenes that delve into the minds of the murderers.</p><p>Zuiker adopted a similar approach with "Cybergeddon."</p><p>A microsite on Yahoo features character biographies, behind-the-scenes videos that offer glimpses into Peregrym's wardrobe room, explanations of special effects shots and chase scenes, and news articles about cyber crimes. Zuiker also developed what he calls "zips," one-minute clips that explore the characters' back stories in ways that inform the narrative.</p><p>"You can watch these zips, binge and binge and binge on narrative stories that are shot at the same level as the movie," said Zuiker, adding that these snack-size videos serve another purpose. "It'll draw you into the movie, back to 'Cybergeddon.' These are little PR soldiers. They can live all over cyberspace."</p><p>Erin McPherson, head of original video at , said, "We're really stretching out, spreading our wings and starting to provide other experiences, premium experiences, for our users."</p><p>One facet of the old-media world that Zuiker has brought to the new is brand integration that goes beyond product placement.</p><p>Norton anti- software shares title credits with Zuiker's production company, Dare to Pass, and Dolphin Digital Media, which helped finance the production. The software company provided technical advice to lend credibility to the series, much as it has with other movie projects such as the 2002 spy "The Bourne Identity."</p><p>In "Cybergeddon," one scene re-creates the Norton Security Operations Center and its "Pandora's Box," a security room where viruses are analyzed in isolation. One of the movie's main characters, Winston Chang, is inspired by Norton's expert on cyber crime and digital security issues, Kevin Haley.</p><p>"We gave [Zuiker] true stories of how, as an example, there can be spyware on your phone and you won't even know it. It's taking pictures. It's listening in," said Rhonda Shantz, Norton brand marketing vice president. "We just gave him the facts and let that inspire what you see."</p><p>Norton also participated in the marketing push, displaying a promotion for "Cybergeddon" on boxes of its software and using its desktop application to inform consumers of the movie's launch &mdash; employing the alerts typically reserved to warn a user that his or her computer has contracted a virus.</p><p>"Never have I seen a brand step up and be so aggressive and be such a part of our process," Zuiker said at the film's premiere.</p><p>That kind of branding might make creative types uneasy. But Zuiker said in a phone interview from Paris, where he was promoting "Cybergeddon," that he enjoyed ultimate creative control over the project &mdash; including which brands were chosen as sponsors.</p><p>"Freedom to an artist is a great, great thing," Zuiker said. "We are in the golden age of entertainment in a technological revolution and we have to champion the artist. That's how this is going to survive."</p><p></p><p></p><p><br></p>?America has long trafficked in the idea that so long as you have a sound mind, a strong work ethic and maybe a connection or two, the sky is the limit, and dreams can come true. Most of the time this idea is mythology, its metaphorical streets littered with broken souls who never came close or were within tantalizing reach of everything they wanted. And yet, the country still keeps this myth alive thanks to the scant few who do make it happen and the thousands, if not millions, panting for success.<br><br>Nowhere is the dichotomy between mythos and reality more prominent than in Hollywood, where nubile young things and those with serious acting and filmmaking chops flock to assert their right to a sliver of glory &#8212; or, if they are lucky, much more than that. So what if the price of fame means getting plastered on the cover of a tabloid or being abandoned by the moneymen when your ability to make money is compromised? Those are just painful ends justifying the striving needs of those with stars in their eyes. For some, they are attractive choices compared to more violent alternatives.<br><br> For Hugh Waters, the nominal star of Elizabeth Brundage's acid-dipped "A Stranger Like You" (Viking: 255 pp., $25.95), luck seemed to smile on him like the lady 's gangsters invoked while playing their permanent floating crap game. How else to explain a fat contract for a violent action-thriller script (written in a film class in Montclair, N.J.) that gets him around a dead-end job and a simpering, whimpering wife he feels little empathy for anymore? But the big break ends up cracking the wrong way when Hugh's 70-something, would-be studio boss champion drops dead of a . The boss' replacement &#8212; Hedda Chase, far closer to Hugh's own age of 38 &#8212; puts the project in turnaround because "she didn't like the premise."<br><br>The script is too violent for Hedda, and that has Hugh seething, to the point that he commits the proverbial no-no: He shows up at her house to give her the what-for. The scene plays out with absurd brio, both of them unconsciously mirroring aspects of the seemingly offensive script in question. As Hugh transforms from literary observer into active participant of a game he created, Brundage pans between a host of other fascinating figures, such as the veteran now working as a parking attendant at ; the runaway teenager who manages to hang onto errant dreams of stardom as it becomes ever clearer she's nowhere near that pinnacle; a filmmaker with ties both to Hedda and a young woman who understands the brutality of the war all too well. For each of these well-drawn figures, life is most definitely not a movie &#8212; and yet, none of them are able to depart from a script beyond their control.<br><br>"A Stranger Like You" operates at the highest tension point, and every now and then Brundage slips up and nearly falls off the wire (a second-person perspective point, for example, misses more than it hits). But truer words were never spoken than when Hedda, at a critical point, wonders, "they say if you think about something enough you are actually channelling the universe to make it happen." What was once "too violent," it turns out, is nowhere near violent enough, as fantasy and reality blur even more.<br><br>Unbearable tension of an entirely different stripe dominates the hearts and minds of the characters in "Chosen" (Harper: 310 pp., $25.99), Chandra Hoffman's unflinching and suspense-filled account of the pleasures and perils of domestic adoption. Instead of stardom, the dream here is a baby, but the same sorts of stakes, financial obligations and emotional rollercoasters apply to those obsessed by the dream. It's also why Chloe Pinter, the young caseworker for an adoption agency in the Pacific Northwest, is told again and again that she can't be good at her job if she has a child of her own. The pressure would be too much, and already she's feeling the weight of expectation imposed by many parties.<br><br>Instead, she's at the mercy of a poor biracial couple whose impending newborn is like catnip for a wealthy white couple, who've spent untold money and seen their desperation grow more pronounced as salvation and heartbreak are an equal phone call away. There's another duo who've run the same course of premature adoption syndrome only to be surprised by a child of their own, and there's also Chloe's longtime boyfriend Dan, finding far-flung ways to avoid commitment and its fertile extension.<br><br>As Hoffman switches between perspectives, building up portraits of Chloe and the couples she works for and against, what emerges is a wrenching portrait of the commoditization of babyhood and the caste system it perpetuates. When one country closes a door on their babies, another opens, and if there are local babies available to adopt, they become trophies, not living people.<br><br>No wonder Chloe is left to ponder "all of the connections, all of the lives she has touched in the last three years," thinking about "the things she said, the half-truths and omissions, the phone calls she made, or didn't make, at crucial moments." Because when the price of emotional well-being is a new baby, no wonder, as Hoffman reveals with a deft touch, the costs prove to be incalculable &#8212; and criminally catastrophic.<br><br>Weinman blogs about crime and mystery fiction at . "Dark Passages" appears monthly at latimes.com/books.?and Tim Burtonare longtime collaborators, having worked on eight films together. Their latest, follows in the quirky, comedic vein of many of their movies, with Depp starring as an 18th century vampire awakened in 1972.<br> <br> Because of their familiarity with one another, the eccentric filmmaker and actor sometimes appeared to be in their own world on set.<br> <br> "You can kind of tell that they seem to have a shorthand," Depp's costar said at the film's premiere in Hollywood on Monday evening.<br> <br> <br> <br> "It's fun watching them clown around late at night when they kind of get tired and a little bit giddy. They start cracking up and telling stupid little jokes, and pretty soon the entire crew is doing it."<br> <br> <br> <br> So what does one of the most famous men in the business find funny? Fart jokes, apparently.<br> <br> "[Johnny and Tim] are like best schoolyard chums in a way. They bring out this very excitable, boyish quality in each other," explained Seth Grahame-Smith, who wrote the screenplay for the film, based on the 1960s soap opera of the same name. "They become 10-year-old boys and laugh and make jokes."<br> <br> Depp seemed anything but boyish at the movie's premiere, where the leading man graciously greeted legions of fans on Hollywood Boulevard for the better part of an hour. Later Monday evening, the actor elicited screams from a different crowd at the after-party for the premiere, where he joined rockers and Steven Tyler on stage as they performed.<br> <br> Cooper, 64, plays himself in "Dark Shadows," which takes place during the year his group was at the apex of its popularity.<br> <br> "They decided that they were going to do a computerized thing where they make me [look like I'm from] 1972," the musician said on the carpet. "And I said, 'Well, don't make me look younger. In '72, I was a mess. I looked 20 years older in '72 than I do now.'"<br> <br> <br> <br> Also spotted: Director Tim Burton and actresses , Bella Heathcote, and Chloe Grace Moretz from the new "Dark Shadows" cast, plus Lara Parker, and Kathryn Leigh Scott from the TV series.<br> <br> The movie opens Friday.<br> <br> RELATED:<br> <br> <br> <br> <br> <br> Follow Amy Kaufman on Twitter <br> <br>?You wouldn't know it from her most noteworthy roles, such as the buttoned-up, warm-hearted caretaker in or the fragile and worn-looking prostitute in "Hustle and Flow," but is a self-proclaimed "fashion and shoe" girl and she's got the contents of her newly built closet to prove it.<br><br>Dressed in a pair of body-hugging G Star jeans and an olive-green T-shirt with platinum-colored epaulets from Bebe, Henson bounds into her closet with a wide smile, loads of energy and what seems like endless excitement to show off her most coveted sartorial possessions. She can pinpoint the first time she wore most of them, how she felt and how many heads she turned. But no matter how many boxes and Vuitton bags are perched around her, she is completely passionate about each and every piece. FOR THE RECORD:<br> Fashion timeline: In Sunday's Image section, a timeline of the history of wardrobes said that Princess Diana donated 79 dresses for a charity sale at Christie's in 1979. The year was 1997. &#8212;<br> <br><br>Henson, 39, recently moved from a Spanish bungalow in Glendale to a newly built Moroccan-style home in the Hollywood Hills. Her closet space increased along with the overall square footage. "I now have space. I can see everything," she says. "I don't even know how I was fitting everything in my other house. Closet space was at the top of my list when looking for a new house, along with the view." She got what she was looking for: Besides unobstructed views from west to east, Henson gained a large closet in her master suite as well as one in her "glam room," where she get dolled up for appearances and houses her longer red-carpet gowns and fancier attire.<br><br>But it's her master closet that revs her up for getting creative with her clothes and letting her exuberant personality loose. "Even before I became an actress, I used to wake up and dress according to characters," she says. "It was all a theme to me. One day I'd have long down to here with an exotic look, and the next day I may be ghetto Betty with big bamboo earrings, Converse and little shorts. I think that speaks to me as the kind of artist and actress I am. I'm very expressive and this helps me in developing characters. I ask myself, 'What does she look like? What would she wear?'"<br><br>The flow of her closet is a work in progress. Not everything is perfectly uniform, not all the hangers match and smell of cedar, nor is there a Jetsons'-style catalog system in place. But this seems to suit the actress who references her closet like a giant (and high-end) dress-up chest.<br><br>From stacks of skinny jeans to shoes in the original boxes (categorized by color and style), Henson's 7-by-12-foot walk-in closet, complete with a built-in vanity, is a girly girl's sanctuary. Among other things, it's stocked with sexy skirts, tokens from abroad (such as , where she spent three months filming ) and numerous pairs of shoes in styles suitable for walking the red carpet or walking her dog, a silky terrier named Willie.<br><br>"These are my walk-the-dog shoes," she says, pulling out a pair of caramel-colored, fleece-lined boots festooned with two tiers of fringe that shimmy like a mini-dress. They are just one of many pairs of furry and cold-weather boots. " gave me these," she says of some white, cable-knit boots with pompom tassels (the actress just wrapped the film "Larry Crowne," starring and directed by Hanks). "And I wear these [bubblegum-pink Timberland boots] if I go up to Big Bear. I have a ski suit with pink stitching, and my goggles are pink. See, everything is about fashion for me!"<br><br>Her collection of flat, furry boots are but a minor blip in the well-stocked closet. It's the heels, nay stilettos, tall supermodel-meets-superhero shoes that not only stand out like shiny little trophies, but that Henson is obviously the most jazzed about. Shoe boxes stacked according to style, color and print are marked with photographs of the box's contents. YSL, Guiseppe Zanotti, Louboutin and plenty of her favorite Gucci shoes fill up closet compartments to heights that would make any girl first drool, and then seethe with envy.<br><br>"Oh! I have to show you the shoes that go with the cage dress!" She is referring to a pair of black Gucci heels that she wore &#8212; with a Mandalay cocktail dress with a cage-like corset around the waist &#8212; when hosting this year's BET Awards after-party with . "Let me tell you something about these shoes," she says. "They are showstoppers." She is equally if not more excited to pull down a box containing shoes she calls "mad hunt" shoes, meaning she saw, she found, she bought, she conquered. Henson has more than a few pairs of mad hunt shoes.<br><br>"These Chloe booties were a mad hunt," she says. "I saw the runway show online and needed this color [a deep forest green suede]. They're like artwork, you can tie them up, slouch them down, they're so incredible. I'll really go nuts for some shoes and if you get good shoes, they are forever. I'll have these forever." She ensures that the structure of her shoes lasts as long as her adoration for them by reinforcing the soles and heels of every pair (even her sandals) before wearing them. "I have the bottoms put on all my shoes," she says "When you're spending that kind of money on shoes, you've got to take care of them and I do."<br><br>She fawns over a pair of thigh-high Guiseppe Zanotti boots with bondage-esque buckles and straps. "These are really my rock star boots," she says of the shoes that make her look as if she's about to get on stage and do a duet with . "When I want to feel like a model, I put on these Gucci sandals," Henson says plucking a pair of metallic sandals with giant platforms out of their box. "These make me feel 10 feet tall and these just go with everything, like this new piece I just added [a leopard-print Dolce &amp; Gabbana shift dress]. I talk to my clothes too! Hey girl! Who am I gonna wear today? I know I'm a nut," she says breaking into her characteristic whole-hearted laugh.<br><br>Besides her shoes, Henson's love of handbags shows in her collection. There is a black Gucci tote bag that she plans to pass on as an heirloom someday because, as she says while stroking the buttery leather, "this will just get better with age." A grapey purple Gucci hobo that "pops" any outfit, pairs well with some purple Gucci d'Orsay pumps that are stowed away in a shelf. And the piece de resistance &#8212; and here Henson cautions that an onlooker may want to sit down, because the bag is that good &#8212; a crimson Valentino shoulder bag with cascading ruffles. Henson can't help but give it a little smooch.<br><br>She moves on to a few sentimental items, such as the silk cheongsams she brought back from China, several pairs of shoes worn during press events surrounding her supporting actress Oscar nomination for "Benjamin Button" and her first pair of designer shoes as well as the first designer bag she purchased herself when she started gaining success as an actress in Hollywood. Henson says she was "woozy and sweating" while taking the plunge and purchasing such big-ticket items, but she is quick to add, "These are things I'll keep forever."<br><br>And since most days Henson is inspired to don a different look depending on her mood or destination, it's a good thing she has an ample closet with lots of "forever" items to fuel her fantasies.<br><br>?, a former film critic who became one of most respected filmmakers and was internationally known for movies such as "My Night at Maud's" and "Claire's Knee," died Monday in Paris. He was 89.<br><br>Rohmer's death was announced by his producer, Margaret Menegoz. Relatives said he was hospitalized a week ago but offered no further explanation, according to Agence France-Presse.<br><br> President called the writer-director a "great auteur who will continue to speak to us and inspire us for years to come."<br><br>"Classic and romantic, wise and iconoclast, light and serious, sentimental and moralist, he created the 'Rohmer' style, which will outlive him," Sarkozy said in a statement.<br><br>A former editor of the influential French film journal Cahiers du Cinema, Rohmer was a member of the French New Wave of filmmakers who began emerging in the late 1950s and included , , Jacques Rivette and .<br><br>Rohmer, who made his first short film in 1950, was still editor of Cahiers du Cinema when his first feature film, "The Sign of Leo," was released in 1959 to little notice.<br><br>It was not until "" an art house hit released in the United States in 1970, that Rohmer was established as a major force in cinema. The film earned Academy Award nominations for best foreign language film and for Rohmer's screenplay.<br><br>"My Night at Maud's" was the third installment in what Rohmer called "Six Moral Tales," a series of two shorts and four features that included "Claire's Knee" and "Chloe in the Afternoon."<br><br>The series, Christian Science Monitor writer David Sterritt wrote in 2001, focused with "good-humored intensity on dilemmas of life, love, and the penchant of well-meaning people to find themselves in ethical quandaries."<br><br>Film reviewer Kevin Thomas said Monday that Rohmer, whose films were known for their long conversations between characters, "made his mark getting us to pay attention to what people said to each other."<br><br>"He made adult conversation witty and, above all, cinematic," said Thomas, a former Times staff writer, noting that "talk on the screen is so often merely static.<br><br>"He could have his characters engaged in talk for hours and yet it was completely involving. You never were watching a filmed play but rather the continual revelation of characters through what people said to each other and how they said it and how each person reacted to what was said to them."<br><br>It was, Thomas said, "a breath of fresh air that people talking could actually hold your attention without resorting to conventional action and dramatic conventions. It was very French in tone, very civilized. But that didn't mean things couldn't turn nasty or romantic.<br><br>"I would say he was one of the most distinctive of French filmmakers. . . . You could always spot a Rohmer film pretty quickly."<br><br>Rohmer often said that many of his films consisted of a "story that deals less with what people do than with what is going on in their heads while they are doing it."<br><br>Not everyone was a Rohmer fan.<br><br>In director 's 1975 movie "Night Moves," 's private detective says: "I saw a Rohmer film once. It was kind of like watching paint dry."<br><br>Despite the focus on talking in his films, Rohmer told The Times in 1999 that words aren't everything in his work.<br><br>"I've often said that I became a director because of watching silent films," he said. "They talked a lot in silent films, even if we didn't hear it. But it's not only the words. I think that my characters must have a grand presence, a physical presence."<br><br>?<p>Every fall, college campuses swarm with women wearing all kinds of leather flats, but there are always a select few brave enough to walk across the quad in stilettos. Those risk-takers might look great, but who can realistically trek to class in high heels? There's a different breed of shoe popping up in storefronts around Los Angeles that could prove the perfect solution. The high-top wedge sneaker is a heel and sport shoe hybrid, providing a middle ground for chic tomboys and girlie-girls who love their heels.</p><p>"I always wanted to be able to wear sneakers and create a whole cool tomboyish look, but I couldn't seem to achieve that with plain old high-tops," says designer Monika Chiang, who has a new line of high-top wedge sneakers. "When I created my high-tops, I added a hidden wedge to give the leg a longer look and a more stylish feel."</p><p></p> <p>The color combinations, materials and styles of this season's high-top wedge run the gamut. Mesh panels, white leather-cap toes and Velcro are all nods to traditional, sporty sneaks. But with lush suede, metal studs and labels including , and , these kicks definitely classify as high fashion.</p><p>Monika Chiang Artemys sneaker in pewter, $385, available at http://www.monikachiang.com.</p><p>The metallic leather shines, a throwback to the cool kids of the '80s. "I love incorporating something unexpected like a metallic leather or all-over studs, to give it a bit of attitude," Chiang says.</p><p>Corte wedge sneaker in wenge, $428, available at Gregory's Beverly Hills, 147 N. Robertson Blvd.</p><p>The simple Velcro straps and rich color palette make this style a fall staple to wear with coats and skinny jeans.</p><p>Koolaburra Kenny sneaker wedge in red, $239, available at beginning in September.</p><p>This deep red sneaker with silver studs makes a bold statement and can easily transition from day to night.</p><p>Ash Eagle nappa leather sneaker, $225, available at and , Intermix, Madison and American Rag.</p><p>The style is a sort of dressed-up version of a Chuck Taylor, with a white leather toe and trim.</p><p>See by Chloe lace-up wedge sneaker in gaucho rust, $375, available at http://www.neimanmarcus.com.</p><p>If you're looking to try out the trend without screaming "I'm wearing sneaks," the See by Chloe lace-ups make a good starting point. The soft rust color and smooth lines are subtle but still fun.</p><p></p>?SEPT. 9<br><br>All's Faire in Love<br><br> A college football star has to make up for his many absences by working at a Renaissance fair, where he falls for an aspiring actress. With , Owen Benjamin, and . Written by R.A. White, Scott Marshall and Jeffrey Ray Wine. Directed by Marshall. Hanover House<br><br>Bucky Larson: Born to Be a Star<br><br>A grocery bagger going nowhere in a small town discovers that his strait-laced parents used to be adult-film stars and heads to Los Angeles to follow in their footsteps. With , Christina Ricci, and . Written by Swardson, and . Directed by . Columbia Pictures<br><br>Contagion<br><br>When a lethal airborne virus causes a pandemic, the medical community races to find a cure as ordinary people struggle to survive in an unraveling society. With , , and . Written by Scott Z. Burns. Directed by . In Imax. <br><br>Inside Out<br><br>A newly released ex-con who served time for manslaughter is determined to live a quiet, crime-free life, but his mobster friend gets him involved in an accidental shooting within hours of his release. With Paul "Triple H" Levesque, and . Written by Dylan Schaffer. Directed by Artie Mandelberg. Films<br><br>A Kiss and a Promise<br><br>In a quiet Canadian town, a small bed-and-breakfast boarded by an aspiring writer and run by a married couple holds the key to ghastly secrets. With Mick Rossi, Natasha Gregson Wagner and Sean Power. Written by Rossi and Phillip Guzman. Directed by Guzman. Moonstone Entertainment<br><br>Love in Space<br><br>A mother and her three grown daughters try to juggle their various love lives in China, Australia and outer space (aboard a shuttle). With Aaron Kwok, Rene Liu and Eason Chan. Written by Tony Chan and Lucretia Ho. Directed by Tony Chan and Wing Shya. In Mandarin with English and Chinese subtitles. China Lion<br><br>Mr. Nice<br><br>This biopic tells the story of Howard Marks, a Welsh-born student turned international drug smuggler. With , Chlo&#235; Sevigny, and . Written and directed by Bernard Rose. MPI Media Group<br><br>My 's Bride (Mere Brother Ki Dulhan)<br><br>A man searching for the perfect Indian bride for his brother living in finally finds the ideal woman, then falls in love with her. With Imran Khan, Katrina Kaif and Ali Zafar. Written and directed by Ali Abbas Zafar. In Hindi with English subtitles. Yash Raj Films<br><br>One Fall<br><br>A man who miraculously survives a fall from a great height struggles after discovering he has the power to heal others. With Marcus Dean Fuller, Zoe McLellan and Seamus Mulcahy. Written by Fuller and Richard Greenberg. Directed by Fuller. Paladin<br><br>?<p>Shopping centers, department stores and boutiques all over Southern California are gearing up for the fourth annual observance of Fashion's Night Out, the worldwide shopping event created by Vogue editor in chief to stimulate sales in the fashion industry.</p><p>The designated night of special activities and promotions is Sept. 6. But those who act fast enough to purchase the limited tickets can attend an intimate pre-event dinner and private fashion show Sept. 4 at Saam at the Bazaar by Jos&eacute; Andr&eacute;s at the SLS Hotel, Beverly Hills. Tickets are $200 and can be purchased by calling (310) 246-5555. Proceeds from the dinner will go to the Art of Elysium, which encourages artists to dedicate their talent to workshops for children with serious medical conditions. The get-together, attended by fashion industry insiders and guests, is only a precursor to what Fashion's Night Out has in store.</p><p>A complete listing of events, organized by city and store or type of event, can be found at FashionsNightOut.com &mdash; and is far too extensive to be repeated here.</p> <p>But here are a few notable things to know about what is &mdash; and isn't &mdash; happening in the greater Los Angeles area. (And if none of what follows is nearby, don't worry. Just about every major shopping venue in the greater L.A. area has something fun and fashionable planned.)</p><p>At the Beverly Center, traditionally an epicenter for the local festivities, Fashion's Night Out will be hosted by "Pretty Little Liars" star Lucy Hale.</p><p>Los Angeles Mayor will make a video appearance to kick things off at 6:30 p.m., introducing Vogue's West Coast fashion editor, Lisa Love. Later on, retailers' fall merchandise will be featured during fashion shows at 7 and 9 p.m. Kendall Jenner &mdash; who is the celebrity face of the Beverly Center's FNO marketing campaign &mdash; is expected to appear, along with her sister Kylie Jenner, Jaimie Hilfiger, Francesca Eastwood and Peta Murgatroyd.</p><p>Rodeo Drive will not be the circus-themed spectacle that it was last year, with a Ferris wheel and costumed stilt-walkers. "As the economy has started to recover, we have had to reprioritize our focus with limited dollars," said Rodeo Drive committee spokeswoman Ashley Wong. Instead of an overall, coordinated extravaganza, 30 to 40 stores are expected to host individual events.</p><p>Bottega Veneta, for instance, plans to introduce a new line of eco-friendly handbags, available on a first-come, first-serve basis, and will present a new Fashion's Night Out collection of matching lip and nail duos. The two retailers are among numerous labels with special merchandise created for the event.</p><p>Robertson Boulevard will replace Rodeo Drive's street party with its first official street celebration of FNO. An anticipated 2,000 guests will be treated to live music, art-inspired activities, surprise celebrity guest appearances and a chance to experience fall's latest trends as they stroll through the stores.</p><p>Santa Monica Place plans to step up with a roster of in-store events, including two beauty lounges. Entertainment onstage starts at 7 p.m., featuring a performance by "American Idol" contestant and a fashion show hosted by Linda Immediato, style editor of Los Angeles magazine.</p><p>Farther along the coast, the celebration at the Malibu Country Mart is scheduled to be led by Gill and Jill Bumby, New York performance artists who famously rate guests' appearances on a scale from 1 to 10, issuing witty, typed-out, personal assessments of their style.</p><p>Malibu will pick up on last year's circus theme, with carnival-style red carpets and entertainment stations, including henna tattoos and magic shows.</p><p>The store in Malibu's newest shopping area, the Malibu Lumber Yard, plans to host an in-store party, featuring palm readings, manicures, hair-braiding stations and charm-bracelet design stands.</p><p>At Fashion Island in Newport Beach, more than 40 stores plan to host fashion and beauty events and giveaways as keep music pulsing throughout the center.</p><p>Jillian Barberie-Reynolds, co-host of "Good Day L.A." on Fox Channel 11, and fashion designer David Meister are scheduled to emcee the night. At 5 p.m., Reynolds is to provide commentary for a presentation on fall's top trends, concluding in a runway show featuring Meister's eye-catching new collection of dresses and gowns.</p><p>South Coast Plaza in Costa Mesa plans to feature a runway show at 6 p.m., along with special offers at more than 100 stores.</p><p>Rounding off the evening is West Hollywood's official after-party at the Standard on Sunset, complete with DJ. The party is slated for 10 p.m. to midnight, with a complimentary cocktail hour till 11 p.m.</p><p></p>?Born in northern and raised in Beijing, Sally Liu came of age in the 1990s and dreamed of becoming a filmmaker. With the world's most populous nation swelling with thousands of new cinemas, big-budget productions proliferating and box-office grosses multiplying, the movies in China aren't just glamorous, they're a serious growth industry.<br><br>When it came time to apply to film school, though, Liu didn't look to most prominent institution, the Beijing Film Academy. The competition is fierce &#8212; the academy accepts only 500 students each year from among 100,000 applicants, making it about 140 times harder to attend than .<br><br> "If I applied to a film school in China, I probably wouldn't have gotten in," said Liu, 28, who just completed her masters in fine art at . "It's super-competitive."<br><br>Yet it isn't just ease of admission that's luring Liu and an increasing number of Chinese writers, directors and producers to study filmmaking at some of America's most elite campuses. It's also the practical curricula, creative environment and the freedom of speech.<br><br>Even if they might struggle with English, Chinese film students enrolled in U.S. institutions find that they can develop a new creative voice here, freed from government censorship and storytelling strictures that favor period epics over modern character . When one film student at USC traveled back to her homeland to make a short film about her family's emigration from China over freedom of expression concerns, Communist authorities seized her equipment, shut the production down and asked her to leave the country.<br><br>Although China has come a long way from the days when film was seen almost exclusively as a medium for propaganda, the nation's film schools still tend to emphasize theory and history. Their American counterparts, in contrast, offer more hands-on and practical training.<br><br>"You don't really have much of a chance to make movies in China," said Lingxia Song, a 2006 MFA graduate in play and screenwriting program who is from Shanghai. Even if you get a shot to direct, she said, cameras, lights and editing bays are hard to come by. "You're competing for equipment &#8212; it's too many people in one class."<br><br>Xue Yin, a 24-year-old from Qingdao working toward an MFA degree at the American Film Institute, said she came to the Los Angeles campus "because I wanted to learn more about how to tell stories." Her next AFI production, a drama about Palestinian-Israeli relations, would be unthinkable where she was born. "I could never tell that story in China," she said. "It's very difficult for young filmmakers in China to make political films."<br><br>Although precise numbers are hard to come by, Chinese enrollment in American film schools is clearly booming, with women making up a significant portion of the students.<br><br>For the fall class at 's School of Theater, Film and Television, graduate applications from mainland China were up about 59% from the previous year. At USC's School of Cinematic Arts, 23 of the current graduate students are from China, and Chinese enrollment at the School of Film/Video at the California Institute of the Arts doubled from four a year ago to eight in the current academic year. Film schools at Northwestern University, Columbia University and Chapman University as well as AFI also report a steady growth in Chinese students.<br><br>"They are extremely passionate &#8212; among our most creative and hard-working students," said Steve Anker, dean of CalArts' film and video school.<br><br>"They bring an earnestness and wide-eyed wonder," added Mark Harris, the head of USC's production course. "These are some of the brightest students in all of China &#8212; they have an incredible work ethic."<br><br>The trend in U.S. film school enrollment mirrors what is happening across American higher education.<br><br>U.S. graduate schools saw applications from China grow 21% from a year ago, according to an August report by the Council of Graduate Schools. The Institute of International Education, which tracks undergraduate, graduate and non-degree programs, said last November that 127,628 Chinese students were studying in the United States, an increase of nearly 30% from 2009, as China passed India as the source of most foreign-born American college students.<br><br>Although the IIE does not break down film school attendance, it did find that overall foreign interest in fine and applied arts grew 14% last year, with nearly 3% of all Chinese students selecting that area of study (business and engineering each account for more than 20% of the fields of study chosen by Chinese students).<br><br>The steady growth of applicants presents American film schools with both opportunities &#8212; such as expanding global perspectives within their campuses, while opening doors for reciprocal visits from U.S. students to China &#8212; and practical problems, chiefly language comprehension. Chinese students wanting to study at Columbia's film school must be interviewed over the phone to test their fluency. "We don't take people if they don't speak English &#8212; it's that simple," said , the school's film chairman.<br><br>But the real language issue is learning Western narrative structure.<br><br>American movies are wildly popular in China; even though pirated DVDs and downloads of most Hollywood films are readily available in China, audiences still swarm multiplexes showing U.S. studio blockbusters. grossed more in China &#8212; in excess of $200 million &#8212; than in any other territory outside of North America.<br><br>Yet Chinese film students say that instruction about flawed heroes, fantasy settings and computerized visual effects &#8212; the very elements that pushed "Avatar" into the stratosphere &#8212; does not anchor film curricula in their country's film schools. Professors in China, furthermore, need to be members of the Communist party "and have to watch what they say," said Liu, the Columbia graduate. "Here, you can do whatever you want."<br><br>?He's been called the godfather of Rodeo Drive. And it's not all hyperbole. Before Beverly Hills was the land of designer logos, before it was teeming with tourists and rolling with Rolls-Royces, the city was home to Fred Hayman, the proprietor of the Giorgio Beverly Hills boutique. Hayman was an architect of luxury in Los Angeles, bringing high fashion, a social shopping atmosphere and white glove service to what was still a sleepy main street when he went into retail in 1967 at the age of 38.&#182;During the 31 years he ruled the retail roost from his perch under Giorgio's signature yellow and gold awnings, he cultured relationships with designers and celebrities and set a new standard for fashion parties, helping to promote Los Angeles as an international style center. Among his most noteworthy creations was the Giorgio Beverly Hills perfume, a bottling of "Dynasty" and "Scruples"-era excess and one of the most successful fragrances in history, with more than $100 million in sales in its first four years.<br><br>And now, at age 86, he is getting his due, as the 15th recipient of the Rodeo Drive Walk of Style Award (an award he created), and the subject of the new book "Fred Hayman The Extraordinary Difference: The Story of Rodeo Drive, Hollywood Glamour and the Showman Who Sold It All" by fashion journalist Rose Apodaca, former Women's Wear Daily West Coast bureau chief.<br><br> FOR THE RECORD:<br> Fred Hayman: In the June 12 Image section, an article about Giorgio Beverly Hills proprietor Fred Hayman incorrectly said he was 38 when he went into retail in 1967. He was 42. &#8212;<br> <br><br>The lavish coffee table book chronicles Hayman's life, including his childhood in Zurich and Paris, and his early career in the hospitality industry. He rose through the ranks at the in New York City, "a boot camp of a genteel kind," Apodaca writes, and eventually moved west to become director of banquets at the Beverly Hilton, where he would help make a home for the .<br><br>With hundreds of historical photos and dozens of interviews, Apodaca takes readers from the 1960s, when the fashion retail scene on Rodeo Drive was just beginning to take shape, through the boutique boom of the 1970s and '80s, and into the 1990s, when Hayman was on the cutting edge in a different way, selling a line of branded fashion and accessories on what would become the .<br><br>Throughout, Apodaca puts Hayman in the context of L.A.'s movers and shakers, including shop owners Jerry Magnin, Jack Hansen, Charles Gallay and Herb Fink, hair cutters Gene Shacove and Vidal Sassoon, model Peggy Moffitt, and writers Caroline Graham and Judith Krantz.<br><br>"Rodeo Drive would just be another district if not for Fred's marketing vision," Beverly Hills Mayor Barry Brucker said last month, during the Walk of Style Award ceremony, referring to Hayman's creation of the Rodeo Drive Committee in 1977 that helped beautify the street and elevate its retail tenants.<br><br>Apodaca, who now, with her husband, runs her own store &#8212; A &amp; R on Abbot Kinney Boulevard in Venice &#8212; has been working on the book off and on for the last six years, meeting with Hayman at "his canteen" &#8212; Spago &#8212; or at his Malibu beach house, where he has a memorabilia room stuffed with Giorgio Beverly Hills logo wear, including sweatshirts, scarves, teddy bears and sunglasses. She also accompanied him to the opera, where she met his friends, including such old school Los Angeles personalities as and the late .<br><br>When Hayman arrived in the early 1950s, Southern California was still the wild frontier in terms of society, Apodaca says. "There was a new moneyed class learning how to entertain, how to dress and how to live. And that allowed for individuals with a sense of European flair, like Fred Hayman, [restaurateur] Michael Romanoff and [designer] Don Loper, to reinvent themselves here and teach the new society."<br><br>But it was not all smooth sailing for Hayman. In a matter of years, he was fired from the Beverly Hilton, left his job as general manager of the Ambassador Hotel, and oversaw three failed restaurants. By 1967, all Hayman had left was Giorgio, an existing store at Rodeo Drive and Dayton Way, an investment he had taken over from two other partners in 1962. "He didn't invent Giorgio &#8212; or the perfume, that credit goes to his third wife, Gale," Apodaca says. "Fred's strength has always been in recognizing an opportunity."<br><br>After leaving the restaurant business, he turned his attention to retail. Neither Fred nor Gale Hayman knew much about selling clothes, but they learned fast; and Fred used his background in the hospitality industry to woo the chic set, sending personal notes to potential customers, and entertaining them when they came in.<br><br>Indeed, Giorgio became a hangout, with a mahogany bar, cocktails served in crystal goblets, a newspaper rack, pool table and personal valet to deliver customer purchases by Rolls-Royce. , , , and became Giorgio regulars in the 1970s. would bring her pet chimpanzee Candy in to visit.<br><br>But people also came to shop, thanks to Gale's eye for fashion. She brought 's flowing chiffon gowns to the West Coast for the first time, along with pieces by , , Giorgio di Sant' Angelo, Thea Porter, Zandra Rhodes, , Kenneth Jay Lane and .<br><br>Hayman produced and sold his own branded merchandise in Giorgio yellow, with the Giorgio crest, so customers who couldn't afford a $5,000 dress could buy something. "Even though some of the items are kind of tacky, the funny thing is now, luxury brands do their own versions of them," Apodaca says, referring to entry level logo products from brands such as and .<br><br>The Haymans' legacy was in creating "retail-tainment," she says. "The idea of<br><br>creating an environment that's about more than shopping."<br><br>Hayman also played an important role in forging a relationship between fashion and Hollywood. You could even say he was the original celebrity stylist. In 1989, he was named the first fashion coordinator for the , a position he held for a decade. He hosted annual pre-Oscars fashion shows for the media and persuaded skeptical designers to participate. And he was always on call to help dress nominees. His efforts helped make celebrity dressing an industry of its own.<br><br>In addition, he revolutionized the beauty industry with the 1981 launch of the Giorgio Beverly Hills fragrance. "We forget now because everyone and their dog has a perfume," Apodaca says. "But in the not too distant past, Paris and New York ruled the industry. It was radical that they thought they could come out with a perfume."<br><br>The launch party was one of Rodeo Drive's most over-the-top events, held under a yellow-and-white-striped tent in the parking lot that was where Via Rodeo is today. More than 70 pounds of caviar were served, and the trunk of a Rolls-Royce was filled with bottles of perfume given to departing guests.<br><br>Hayman made millions with the fragrance, which he sold to Avon in 1987 for $165 million, and the continued success of Giorgio and other independently owned fashion boutiques through the 1980s and early 1990s made Rodeo Drive an enticing destination for designer nameplate-driven brands such as and .<br><br>As more designer retail palaces opened, Rodeo Drive began to lose some of its local charm &#8212; and rents started climbing. Family-owned businesses moved out. "The designer names became more important than the store names," says Jerry Magnin, who owned the Jerry Magnin store and the franchise for the store on Rodeo Drive in the 1970s and '80s.<br><br>In 1997, Hayman received an offer he couldn't refuse from Louis Vuitton to lease the 10,000-square-foot landmark. Giorgio closed its doors the next year.<br><br>In the book, Hayman says he would have stayed on longer if the offer had not come along, but Apodaca isn't so sure. "When he was in business, there was no paparazzi. And having a back door for celebrities to come in like they do today, he shudders at that idea," she says. "Times were changing in terms of service, and independent boutiques were suffering, and not just on Rodeo Drive. Retail is a fast-moving game."<br><br>Hayman divorced in 1983, and was married for the fourth time in 1995, to Betty Endo, a former celebrity assistant. Since his retirement, he still visits his office on Canon Drive a few times a week, and holds court during lunchtime at Spago &#8212; like a godfather should.<br><br>?If you spent Black Friday fighting hordes at the mall, or if you haven't started holiday shopping yet because you're dreading it, consider: When was the last time someone told you that all you had to do was shop to make the world a better place?<br><br>Buying goods made in developing countries can help the artisans there, stimulate local economies and be a creative way to fill out your holiday shopping list too.<br><br> It can be hard to gauge if buying goods made in developing countries is actually ethical or if you're just enabling companies to make products using shamefully cheap labor. So all of the companies listed here either have fair-trade certification or have otherwise established that they pay their artisans a living wage.<br><br>Their products meet Western standards of taste and quality too, which hasn't always been the case with artisanal goods from the Third World. These companies were all founded by women who locate artisans, help them understand what consumers in the industrialized world want to buy, and pay them fairly.<br><br>Pippa Small<br><br>The hip-luxe jewelry designer Pippa Small had a master's degree in anthropology before she ventured into fashion. Having lived with San Bushmen, Rwandan pygmies and Kuna Indians, Small's goal was to revive indigenous craftsmanship and lift artisans out of poverty while catering to the exacting taste of high-end Westerners. Today, she has collaborated with , Chloe and Nicole Farhi and sells jewelry sourced and made in , India, Bolivia, Panama and Kenya. She gets her gold from the world's only fair-trade gold mine and hunkers down in places like Kabul and the slums of Nairobi to train artisans to create exquisite, collectible pieces. She ended up in Kabul after seeing a film on post-Taliban Afghanistan and vowing to lend a hand. Turquoise Mountain, a nonprofit that trains Afghan artisans (partly funded by Britain's ), invited Small to Kabul to create a line now for sale in her new L.A. store.<br><br> or e-mail <br><br>Pippa Small Shop Los Angeles, Brentwood Country Mart, 225 26th St. Santa Monica. (310) 260-9222.<br><br>Afghan Love Poem Necklace, $1,205.<br><br>Glass necklace for the Made Collection, $330.<br><br>Global Goods Partners<br><br>Formerly fieldworkers for development agencies, Catherine Lieber Shimony and Joan Shifrin, friends from college, saw firsthand women struggling in poor countries. Observing women creating beautiful, organic handicrafts, they recognized the artisans had no market. The two quit their jobs and founded Global Goods Partners, working with women in Africa, Asia and the Americas to provide the fair-trade market that these women needed. They harnessed volunteer designers to refine the jewelry, accessories and home products, and they were off.<br><br><br><br>Hand embroidered Peruvian purse, $88<br><br>Embroidered Peruvian belt, $42<br><br>Mercado Global<br><br>While at Yale, Ruth DeGolia spent a summer volunteering in the highlands of Guatemala and fell in love with the indigenous women's handiwork. She returned with suitcases full of traditional Mayan designs to sell on campus. Selling out instantly, she did it again. And again, until she graduated and decided to make it official, founding a nonprofit to bring the designs up to Western standards and sell them, employing 400 indigenous women in the process. By 2006, two years after she started the company, DeGolia was on the cover of Newsweek with , both of them Giving Back award winners.<br><br><br><br>Lidia hammered vermeil earrings, $44.<br><br>?The modern guy's golfing gear shouldn't look like it was pilfered from dad's closet.<br><br>Enter Sub70, a collection of colorful golf duds made for young guns (think ) that also works when worn off the green.<br><br> The line was hatched in and is making its U.S. debut at the Ron Robinson boutique in Los Angeles this weekend, courtesy of a licensing agreement between the British brand and stateside entrepreneur Randy Gordon, formerly responsible for bringing the Milan-based ToyWatch brand to the U.S.<br><br>Ranging in price from $30 for a leather belt with a logo-emblazoned enamel buckle to $90 for a lean fit, flat-front micro-fiber trouser, the collection boasts a slim, Euro fit and retro 1960s-inspired aesthetics.<br><br>Tartan-print trousers (in a slightly stretchy polyester-spandex blend) and button-up polo shorts with collars and pockets in contrasting colors are more reminiscent of 's day than '.<br><br>"I think [the collection] fills a void, both style-wise and price-wise," Gordon said, adding, "I also feel it has strong crossover appeal in the lifestyle market, appealing to the fashion customer as well."<br><br>Pants and shorts feature flat-fronts and a dropped back yoke with angled pockets for a sportswear-influenced fit. Fabrics for shirts and pants are athletic &#8212; wicking away moisture and keeping the wearer cool &#8212; but not so sporty that they couldn't be worn to a barbecue after you've killed it on the golf course.<br><br>The Sub70 collection is available on the company's website and at Ron Robinson at Fred Segal, 8118 Melrose Ave., Los Angeles. (323) 651-1800. 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. Monday through Saturday; noon to 6 p.m. Sunday.<br><br>sub70usa.com<br><br>OPENING<br><br>Jack Spade Saturday: Just in time for , men's fashion and accessories brand Jack Spade has opened its first Orange County store at Fashion Island. The shop features classic sportswear, wallets, key chains, travel kits and its famously pared-down man-satchels, including brief cases, messenger bags, computer cases and duffles.<br><br>401 Newport Center Dr., Newport Beach. 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. Sunday; 10 a.m. to 9 p.m. Monday through Friday; 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. Saturday.<br><br><br><br>H&amp;M Thursday: Swedish fast-fashion retailer H&amp;M debuts its newest SoCal store at Westfield West Covina shopping center. The two-floor location will stock women's, men's and children's clothes, and will feature distinct sections for lingerie, maternity, athletic wear and accessories. In celebration of opening day, the store will offer the first 100 shoppers in line an H&amp;M T-shirt and a gift card valued from $10 to $300.<br><br>1480 Plaza Drive, West Covina. (626) 962-6053. 10 a.m. to 9 p.m. Monday through Saturday; 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. Sunday.<br><br>/<br><br>Charlotte Russe: Fashion retailer Charlotte Russe recently opened a new location at the Irvine Spectrum Center, offering its signature mix of low-priced, trend-right clothes, shoes and accessories for teens and twenty-somethings.<br><br>71 Fortune Drive, Irvine. (949) 727-1417. 10 a.m. to 9 p.m. Monday through Thursday and Sunday; 10 a.m. to 10 p.m. Friday and Saturday.<br><br><br><br>?Imaginary Girls<br><br>A Novel<br><br> Nova Ren Suma<br><br>Dutton: 348 pp., $17.99ages 14 and older<br><br>Sisterly bonds are complicated, none more so than those of teenagers whose parents are, in effect, absent. Having a barfly for a mother and fathers who fled the confines of domestic life, the half sisters at the center of the young-adult novel "Imaginary Girls" turn their relationship into a surrogate mother-daughter pairing that begins as idol worship and evolves into something even less healthy.<br><br>Unbeknown to either character, Ruby and Chloe are desperately codependent &#8212; a natural byproduct of two girls who are essentially raising themselves. As the book opens, Ruby is 19 &#8212; a gorgeous, manipulative brunet who works her womanly wiles to obtain anything and everything she wants. Fourteen-year-old Chloe is "a pencil drawing of a photocopy of a Polaroid of my sister," she writes in a book that is swathed in sibling adoration and told from the younger sister's point of view.<br><br>There are ominous undertones to Nova Ren Suma's poetic young-adult debut, which takes place in upstate New York in a small town situated along a reservoir. The reservoir sits on top of the drowned town of Olive, which, almost a century earlier, was flooded to provide drinking water to New York City.<br><br>This body of water is almost its own character in the book. It's a point of congregation for the town's teens, who go there to drink beer and get high during the summer. It's also the incentive for a dare, when Ruby urges Chloe to swim across it in the dead of night &#8212; a dare Chloe accepts but falls short of accomplishing when she finds a dead body in a rowboat.<br><br>The trauma inspires Chloe's dad to resurface and relocate his daughter to Pennsylvania, but that doesn't last long. Chloe has two other half siblings, but she isn't as devoted to them as she is to Ruby, who is Chloe's mentor and protector. "Blood is meaningless," Chloe believes. "Family connections are a lot like old gum. You don't have to keep chewing. You can always spit it out and stick it under the table."<br><br>In Chloe's case, the old gum is her dad and his kids, from whom Chloe runs away to be with the one person in the world she truly loves: Ruby, a young woman so beautiful she inspires police officers to tattoo their bodies with her image and other women to emulate her style.<br><br>That's when "Imaginary Girls" enters the realm of magical realism. The dead girl in the row boat is actually alive when Chloe returns home, forcing readers to reevaluate the story and question Chloe's reliability as a narrator. Is Chloe one of the imaginary girls referenced in the book's title, or is it the now-alive dead girl?<br><br>The surprising twist puts readers in a position almost as precarious as Chloe's, as they attempt to sort out what's real and see Ruby, and the sisters' relationship, for what it really is. With "Imaginary Girls," Suma offers an atmospheric and creepy take on the life-and-death desperation of dysfunctional sibling love.<br><br>?<p>Today the L.A. Times announced the appointment of Joy Press as Books and Culture Editor. The memo about the appointment, from L.A. Times Editor and Assistant Managing Editor for Features Alice Short, follows.</p><p>We are delighted to announce that Joy Press, who has had a distinguished career as a writer and editor on a variety of cultural and entertainment topics, is our new Books and Culture Editor. Her presence will allow us to expand our coverage of publishing and literary culture, with a special emphasis on ramping up our digital content.</p><p>Joy has been Calendar&rsquo;s pop culture and deputy television editor for 2 1/2 years. During her tenure, she developed a Sunday TV page and played a major role in growing our successful Show Tracker blog, which doubled its readership and has become a key site for television news and series recaps.</p> <p>As an editor she expanded our television coverage, with stories on topics including the rise of Web television, the profusion of female TV creators, the suicide of a &ldquo;Real Housewives&rdquo; husband and the afterlife of a reality TV star.</p><p>In addition to her editing duties, Joy has written about some of the talked-about shows on TV, including &ldquo;Girls&rdquo; and &ldquo;Game of Thrones.&rdquo; She has profiled , and &ldquo;Enlightened&rdquo; creator , and recently reported on the art activities that preceded the London Olympics.</p><p>Joy brings a wealth of experience to the job.</p><p>She worked at the Village Voice as arts and culture editor, overseeing all of the weekly's coverage in those areas. She had previous assignments there as television critic, book critic and editor of the Voice Literary Supplement (VLS). While at VLS, she oversaw the section's transformation into a stand-alone national supplement. She created the annual Writers on the Verge issue, spotlighting authors at the start of their literary lives, names such as Aimee Bender, Colson Whitehead, Steven Johnson, Alice Sebold and Aleksandar Hemon.</p><p>Before she came to The Times, Joy was culture editor at Salon, where she edited the book section along with culture and lifestyle coverage. She supervised a staff of 10 and developed a variety of blogs, reviews and features for the website.</p><p>She started her own writing life as a rock critic at Melody Maker and as a contributing editor at Spin Magazine. Joy is the coauthor, with her husband, , a British rock critic, of "The Sex Revolts: Gender, Rebellion and Rock 'n' Roll," and edited the anthology &ldquo;War of the Words: 20 Years of Contemporary Writing in the VLS.&rdquo;</p><p>Joy will report to Alice.</p>?<p>How do you let know you're there when you're in a crowd of thousands at the ?</p><p>You ditch school early and persuade your mom or dad to leave work to drive you.</p><p>You wear purple because purple is Justin's favorite color. You write SWAGGY in gold sparkle on your T-shirt because Swaggy is Justin's special, made-up word. On your left sneaker, in Puffy Paint, you draw a fat red heart. On your right sneaker, you put the silver initials JB.</p> <p>You stand in front of the arena's still-locked doors hours before you'll be let in. And you join other true Beliebers singing his songs &mdash;"You are my love, you are my heart, and we will never, ever, ever, be apart" &mdash;only you really mean it, and you know he'll know it as soon as he steps outside long enough to lock eyes with you.</p><p></p><p>You are 5 maybe, or 6 or 10 or even 17 &mdash; and you carry the sign you spent all weekend making that says that you are his "one less lonely girl." Or maybe you and your friends declare your love together, proclaiming on poster board, "Lindsey Lilly Violet Chloe Sophie all Love U."</p><p>If you are Amelia Erichsen, 13, of San Diego, you try to go the extra mile.</p><p>You glow-in-the-dark outline every letter on your "Be my boyfriend" sign so that he still can read your message when the lights go down. On your left arm, you write "I &hearts; Justin!!" in ballpoint pen. And you get your mom, who has paid $250 for the tickets, to cut fringe in the bottom of your T-shirt and fake-sign his name on the back.</p><p>You also get her to make one quick stop after she picks you up at school midday, just before you head north on the freeway &mdash; so the orthodontist can switch out the blue rubber bands on your braces for purple ones.</p><p>You've been to a concert before. You've seen the cast of "Glee" live and the Cheetah Girls.</p><p>But this is the first time you'll see him, even if he's far away. And maybe, just maybe if you wave your sign high enough, he might see you back.</p><p>If you met him, you say, you would faint at first. Then you'd smile wide to let him see the purple.</p><p>Asked what you would say, you squinch your freckly cheeks.</p><p>"I love you," you say.</p><p>"Or maybe, will you marry me?"</p><p>You smile shyly. By your side, your mother raises her eyebrows and laughs.</p><p></p><p>You can follow Lelyveld's City Beat on Twitter http://twitter.com/LATimescitybeat and on Facebook http://www.facebook.com/latimescitybeat.</p>?<p>Kate Upton has appeared in all kinds of places -- and pictures and videos -- wearing teensy bikinis ever since she made a big splash on the cover of 's swimsuit issue earlier this year. So it's almost a surprise to see her in a dress -- albeit it a low-cut, micro-length one -- on the November cover of Cosmo. </p><p>At , Karl Lagerfeld showed he can still bring it at . Los Angeles Times fashion critic Booth Moore writes that the show on Tuesday morning was "a demonstration of the power of the original Chanel design codes and the energy and creative output Lagerfeld has put into sustaining the behemoth luxury brand since he took over in 1983." </p><p></p> <p>As the Paris fashion shows continued, eschewed the runway drama, posting her collection via Instagram. </p><p>, known for its stunning red carpet gowns, has designed a limited-edition top beaded with Swarovski crystals and inspired by the . The top is available for $110 at jetshop.com beginning Wednesday. And plans are in the works for tops for fans of the Steelers, Saints, Ravens and more. </p><p>Chris Burch reportedly has sued ex-wife , board members of Tory Burch LLC and the Mexican holding company that has a stake in her brand in Delaware Chancery Court, saying they've interfered with his running his own business, C. Wonder, and impeded his attempts to sell his shares in the Tory Burch company. </p><p>, and Bruno Mars are slated to perform at this year's , scheduled to air on CBS on Dec. 4. </p><p>Felicity Blunt wore a simple white gown by when she and had a formal wedding ceremony with friends and family on Saturday in London (they had a private ceremony a few weeks back). Bridesmaids, including sis , also wore white dreses by Lepore that were similar to the bride's gown in all but a few details. </p><p>ALSO:</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p></p>?"A Series of Unfortunate Events, Book 3: The Wide Window or Disappearance!"<br><br>Lemony Snicket<br><br> Violet, Klaus and Sunny Beaudelaire have many exciting and unpredictable adventures. The children are at the docks, waiting for their new caretaker, Aunt Josephine. They wait and wait and she never comes. But Mr. Poe comes to load them into a taxi to take them there.<br><br>As soon as they get there they meet Captain Sham. But the children think it is a trick. They try to tell Aunt Josephine, but she doesn't believe them. What do they do now?<br><br>Reviewed by Chloe<br><br>10<br><br>Third Street Elementary<br><br> Los Angeles<br><br>"Cam Jansen and the Birthday Mystery"<br><br>David A. Adler<br><br>Cam Jansen's parents are having their birthday celebration since both of their birthdays are in the same week. All of their guests they invited show up &#8212; except the father's parents. The father, Barry or Mr. Jansen, receives a call from his parents who are at the airport. They tell him that someone robbed him. So, Mrs. Jansen, Mr. Jansen, Cam, and Eric, Cam's friend, jump in the car to go to the airport. Because Cam has a photographic memory, she "clicks" away at any suspicious person or car that might be the robber. Cam and Mr. Jansen see a big van loaded with luggage. Cam thinks there is something suspicious. When the driver of the big van starts driving, Mr. Jansen starts going in front of it so they can tell one of the workers to call the police. If you want to know what happens next, please read "Cam Jansen and the Birthday Mystery."<br><br>Reviewed by Carina, 10<br><br>CAVA San Diego?<p>Los Angeles isn't just the City of Angels, it's also the city of style!There is no better place to be for shopaholics than in Southern California. Whether your style is beach bohemian, edgy rock, classic professional or even uptown sophisticate, Los Angeles offers the best shopping and the best style to suit everyone&rsquo;s taste and budget. Take a stroll down the artsy Abbott Kinney in Venice, stroll West Third Street&rsquo;s specialty boutiques, shop in the sunshine at the famous in Pasadena or even find your inner barganista in Downtown Los Angeles&rsquo; Santee Alley. <br> <br> For stylists, Southern California can't be beat. Maxfield, a stylist favorite, is a sight to be seen, along with the celebrities the store attracts. American Rag is another favorite, carrying unique brands and vintage duds fit for every closet. Hit up Melrose Place for a dose of Chloe, and , then do some serious damage at the Barneys warehouse sale. After that swing by Loehmann&rsquo;s to get the best bargains in town.Could you do this all in one day?Absolutely!</p><p>And what would shopping be without a shout to some our favorite men&rsquo;s shopping spots? Go for Confederacy cool in Los Feliz or grunge hip at Wasteland resale shop. Both offer great ways to stay styling in the California sunshine. High, low, classic or contemporary, Southern California reigns shopping supreme because here, anything goes!</p><br><br> About Laurie Brucker<br><p>Laurie Brucker is an image consultant and stylist who loves helping people find a style that is uniquely theirs and a confidence they never knew they had.</p><p>She worked as a fashion designer in New York City for seven years, then received a degree in image consulting from the Fashion Institute of Technology before settling in Los Angeles.</p><p>Aside from working with her private clients, Brucker partners with Style for Hire and Westfield Malls for Westfield Style Mall Tour alongside Stacy London. Brucker&rsquo;s expert tips have been featured in , Westfield US, Bespoke magazine, Houston Weddings and other publications.</p>?<p></p><p>I do understand the points about "perfection" made by Chloe Angyal and Courtney E. Martin, but as a professional dancer, I'd like to remind the authors that a dancer's pursuit of perfection is just that: a pursuit.</p><p>Dancers know we'll never be perfect. Every dance can be executed better, and not just with more pirouettes, higher jumps or seeming effortlessness, or being thin. It is being better married to the music or expressing emotion more clearly.</p> <p>Male dancers must also appear effortless. A man whose jumps land with a thud learns to land lightly. And though an Olympic weightlifter can grunt all he wants, the male dancer better not grunt or grimace when he lifts the ballerina.</p><p>Michele Hart</p><p>Los Angeles</p><p>ALSO:</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p><br></p>?A shared spirit of wonder<br><br>Lynn Lively's story of three friends celebrating 65th and 70th birthdays by backpacking to, over and down Mt. Whitney ("On Top of the World," May 9) would make the late Colin Fletcher, the backpacker and writer, smile. The narrator and her pals combine a grand sense of adventure with a goodly amount of planning. This is exactly the way Fletcher empowered a generation of young men and women to walk away from the car and the French fries and to carry what they could of their world of food and comfort into wild places with confidence and a spirit of wonder.<br><br> The piece also had enough detail (bear canisters and down versus synthetic jackets) to see that their six-day trip was not a lark.<br><br>It's no small detail that the three women had a wonderful time &#8212; and treated us to an exhilarating holiday, we who have trudged the mountains and those who haven't yet.<br><br>Tom Sloss, Fountain Valley<br><br>Keeping fee-free when abroad<br><br>Regarding "Stash the Cash" (On the Spot, May 9): You should have mentioned that the Capital One Visa has no foreign currency conversion fee (and dollars can be used to reimburse for certain air tickets, among other things). We have one to use just for our foreign travels.<br><br>J. Peter Rich, Los Angeles<br><br>One option the article failed to mention: Check to see if your bank has any agreements with banks in the countries you will be traveling to that would allow you to use those banks' ATMs without paying a fee.<br><br>This allows you to get cash as needed without those extra charges.<br><br>Gerald Kelly, Santa Monica<br><br>In tune for a G-rated flight<br><br>Regarding "Young Fliers and Violent Films" [Letters, April 25]: The next time you find yourself in a situation where your children are being exposed to adult or inappropriate material, fight back.<br><br>Bursting into a loud, lively chorus of "The Wheels on the Bus Go Round and Round" is sure to draw the attention of the cabin crew as well as other parents and kids on board. You can agree to quiet yourself and your children when the other passenger agrees to change the channel.<br><br>Chloe Reid, Lakewood<br><br>Kudos to cruise lines' response to <br><br>We were cruising on the Viking when the volcano erupted in Iceland. We were three days into our journey, and the news of no flights in or out of Europe was spreading fast.<br><br>Passengers were anxious about what to do when they disembarked. Viking River Cruises took the position that, if we could not fly out, it would transport us back to the Viking Europe, and we would begin the journey again (free). When the flights returned, it would bus us to the airport.<br><br>This was such a relief and helped all of us enjoy the rest of our cruise. We think Viking River Cruises made a very wise decision and eased the anxiety of its passengers. It deserves a big thank you.<br><br>Frank Yost and Lynn Mattice-Yost, Riverside<br><br>I must commend Grand Circle Small Ship Travel for its handling of problems caused by the Icelandic volcano. We weren't going to be able to get home, so they called the 120 or so passengers aboard the Rhapsody to explain the situation. The company kept us aboard ship in our original cabins, fed us gourmet meals and planned two optional trips to keep us occupied. The staff was constantly on the phones trying to get plane reservations changed and even get medications for those who did not bring enough for an extended stay. Ultimately, we were taken by bus to Amsterdam or Brussels for our flights. All of this and other amenities were provided at no charge to any passengers. This was my ninth trip with Grand Circle, and I would ask anyone seeking group travel to strongly consider this company.<br><br>Marilyn Van Aken, Los Angeles?<p>Jen and I met at Ohio University and started dating while she worked in Chicago and I worked in Washington. We came to Los Angeles in 2001 (her) and 2002 (me). Then, like all couples who move to Los Angeles, we broke up. After two years together, the "L.A. era" of our relationship lasted two months. We parted ways mutually, following an otherwise nice dinner at Bossa Nova on Sunset Boulevard. I drove past it for years thinking, "That place with the surprisingly affordable entrees is where we went the night it ended."</p><p>For a few months we didn't speak. That's what you're supposed to do. You're supposed to let the other person move on, because anything else is torture. But there's no denying chemistry.</p><p>Jen and I gradually wove our way back into one another's lives. I directed a charity variety show that she choreographed and produced at West on Hollywood Boulevard. She appeared in a sketch comedy show I wrote. Our friends befriended each other. I became the unofficial godfather of her Swiffer-sized mutt, Chloe.</p> <p>For seven years we went to each other's birthday parties. We bought each other Christmas gifts. We hung out together when we went home to visit our families in Cleveland. I went to her book launches and public-speaking events. She came to my shows. We hiked the trails at Runyon and Fryman canyons and Griffith Park. We took each other to weddings. We had an easy friendship that was based on love and respect. Our friend Mike called us "the real-life Jerry and Elaine."</p><p>Like Jerry and Elaine, we dated a cast of characters after we broke up. Unlike Jerry and Elaine, during our yadda-yadda-yadda years we discovered that no one else matched up.</p><p>One night at the Power House on Highland after a concert at the Hollywood Bowl, Jen, possibly under the influence of Chardonnay, said she still loved me. I had feelings for her too, but I was unsure how strong they were, and I didn't want to lead her on and waste her time. I told her, while possibly under the influence of Guinness, that I still &mdash; and I can't believe how stupid this sounds now &mdash; needed to kiss a few frogs.</p><p>I know. Someone punch me in the throat.</p><p>The more frogs I kissed, the more I appreciated Jen again as a loving, smart and funny woman. After her confession, over time, I began to think of her more. I actively looked for reasons to spend time with her.</p><p>I wanted to see if we still had it.</p><p>In March, 2010, I was invited to attend a game. A burger chain was promoting its chocolate chip banana shake (which as president I would make available from public drinking fountains) and invited me, as a member of the media, to watch the game from a suite. Jen was my plus-one.</p><p>There are nights that are just perfect, when it all clicks. This was one of those nights. We talked and talked while the Kings did everything in their power to lose to Dallas, and everything Jen said and did hit me in the right way. I remember we were given promotional Snuggies, which we agreed made me look like a cult leader and made her look like a sorceress. Someone in the suite mistook us for a couple. It wasn't the first time during our seven-year timeout this had happened. We ate free popcorn and made the jumbo video screen with Bailey, the Kings' mascot. Jen's smile flashed brighter than the ice on the floor.</p><p>After the game (the now world champions lost, 4-1, by the way), we went to the Red Lion Tavern in Silver Lake for a friend's birthday party. I bought a boot of beer to share because if you love America and you're at the Red Lion that's what you do. Our friend Bill told Jen, "You guys belong together," and in an awesome mixed metaphor that Jen still repeats, "He needs to lasso his princess."</p><p>Like I said, there was a boot full of beer involved.</p><p>We left the party in search of the Nana Queens food truck &mdash; our favorite. We drove around for an hour but were unable to find it. After determining that we would not get our fill of hot wings and banana pudding and that the Nana Queens Twitter account had possibly been hijacked by the Grilled Cheese Truck, I dropped Jen off at her place.</p><p>That Kings game, while we ate popcorn and modeled Snuggies and celebrated the precious rare miracle that is an goal, was the first time I pictured us getting back together, just as Jen did at the Power House.</p><p>We married 18 months later in Cleveland. The Los Angeles Kings were not mentioned during our wedding mass or during any of the speeches at the rehearsal dinner or wedding reception, but they will always have a special place, as will boots of beer, lassoing princesses and missing food trucks.</p><p>Joe Donatelli is a journalist in Los Angeles. He is the managing editor of DAME Magazine and publishes the Humor Columnist.</p><p>L.A. Affairs chronicles dating, romance and relationships. Past columns are archived at latimes.com/laaffairs. If you have comments to share or a story to tell, write us at .</p>?, N.C. -- and Paul D. Ryan, his new running mate, were exuberant after their first public appearance together as ticket-mates, saying they were feeding off the energy from the large crowds they saw Saturday and felt like their fight with and Vice President was on more equal footing.<br><br>&ldquo;Exciting day, exciting day,&rdquo; Romney told reporters in the back of his private plane on its way to Charlotte, N.C. &ldquo;A lot of energy, a great day. It&rsquo;s now two-on-two instead of two-on-one. This is good -- they&rsquo;ve got someone else to pick on too.&rdquo;<br> <br>Ryan said he was stunned by the outpouring of support. He said when he received the offer, his first thought was: &ldquo;It&rsquo;s gone from the surreal to the real.&rdquo;<br><br><br><br>He held up his cellphone and said, &ldquo;This thing is about to get short-circuited.&rdquo;<br><br>&ldquo;I was amazed by the energy in the crowd, the people who just want to see us take the budget in the right direction. It was very exciting,&rdquo; Ryan said. &ldquo;We&rsquo;ve got the wind behind us.&rdquo;<br><br>The crowds were among the largest Romney has seen on the campaign trail, and the people were palpably excited by Romney&rsquo;s selection of Ryan. At the final rally of the day, in , about 8,000 people braved sweltering weather to get into an outdoor rally, while many more listened from outside.<br><br>&ldquo;You saw the response of our crowds, being very excited to meet Paul Ryan, get to know him,&rdquo; said Romney, whose 11-year-old granddaughter Chloe accompanied him to the back of the plane. &ldquo;A lot of them know him pretty well already by virtue of the things he&rsquo;s fighting for, but it just means one more person to drive a very strong message. Because for us, this is a campaign of ideas and a direction for America &ndash; what&rsquo;s America going to be? What kind of nation are we going to be?&rdquo;<br><br>?Cue the flappers, the fringe, the beads and the bobs.<br><br>The Roaring '20s are back in fashion &#8212; on the runways and on-screen.<br><br> It started in September at the spring 2012 fashion shows, with 's "Great Gatsby" gowns, 's sportswear inspired by and 1920s Deauville, and Frida Giannini's Art Deco black-and-gold fringed flapper dresses at .<br><br>Those clothes won't be in stores for another month or so, and 's film adaptation of 's Jazz Age novel "The Great Gatsby," sure to be a costume extravaganza, isn't due out until next Christmas.<br><br>But the trend has already hit Hollywood, with the films and both of which are set in the late 1920s to early 1930s.<br><br>So why is that time period resonating in 2011?<br><br>Sandy Powell, the costume designer for "Hugo," cites the popularity of HBO's "Boardwalk Empire," which is set in 1920. "It's been pretty influential," she says. "It's funny how these things turn around and suddenly a certain look becomes fashionable and it's in every film. It's bizarre. It's the zeitgeist."<br><br>When it comes to retro fashion, the 1920s look is "simple and sexy and romantic at the same time," says Mark Bridges, costume designer for the silent film "The Artist." "It's easy to wear but exclusive in that you need to be slim. And because the shapes are so simple, they are a blank slate for embellishment. It covers all the bases one wants for a successful fashion moment."<br><br>The 1920s were the beginning of the modern age in fashion, when women ditched their corsets, cut their hair and started wearing shorter, body-conscious dresses and skirts that allowed them the freedom to kick up their heels. It's also when women started to turn to Hollywood for fashion cues.<br><br>Whereas "The Artist" is about Hollywood glamour, "Hugo" is about the everyday glamour of ordinary people. The film, based on Brian Selznick's 2007 book "The Invention of Hugo Cabret," tells the story of an orphan boy named Hugo (Asa Butterfield) living in a Paris train station, who unlocks the mystery of an abandoned automaton and discovers a forgotten filmmaker. His tale is intertwined with the stories of the everyday visitors to the train station &#8212; the florist, cafe owner, cafe patrons, bookseller and station manager.<br><br>"[Hugo] was set in 1931, but it really has the look and feel of Paris in the late 1920s," says Powell, who scoured the Paris flea markets for inspiration pieces, such as an Art Deco-style evening gown that was remade into the striking rose-colored dress worn by Hugo's friend Isabelle (Chlo&#235; Grace Moretz) in the final scene.<br><br>Director "also had 'The Lavender Hill Mob' screened for me &#8212; the old 1951 Ealing comedy with &#8212; and that was really about the level of stylization within the costumes for each of the characters," she says. "Because, although this is about real people in real-life situations, everything is sort of seen through the eyes of a child, so you have to heighten it a little bit. Even the views of Paris are a little bit storybook, so I tried to do that with the costumes."<br><br>This was Powell's first 3-D film, and she found the medium enhanced her work. "You have to be careful that there's no loose thread hanging &#8212; off a button or a cuff for example &#8212; or it's going to look like a rope. And you need to be careful about woolly textures and the way wool goes a bit nubbly or furry. In 3-D, it can look hairy. But in general, 3-D makes things a lot more beautiful &#8212; especially textures and patterns like a tweed, which filmed normally, would disappear completely."<br><br>"The Artist" puts '20s fashion on display in black and white, which posed a different set of challenges for costume designer Bridges ("," Boogie Nights").<br><br>The film takes place in 1927, and centers around silent movie star George Valenti (), who must cope with the arrival of talkies, and the possibility of being<br><br>replaced by a new generation of talent,<br><br>epitomized by young dancer Peppy Miller (B&#233;r&#233;nice Bejo).<br><br>"With costumes, you're always trying to tell the story subliminally," says Bridges, who was nominated for a Critic's Choice award for his work on the film. "So in the medium of black and white, we used a lot of textures and high contrast when the characters were at their pinnacle and more monochromatic looks when they were down on their heels. It was all about whether there was enough separation in tone because once it goes to black and white, it's mush. You lose definition."<br><br>In an early scene, George is on top of the world &#8212; arriving on the studio lot with his car and driver like the movie idol he is, dressed in a perfectly tailored, wool tweed three-piece suit with a jacket that has a half-belt in the back. The look was inspired by a similar scene in the 1928 film "Show People," featuring actor (who suffered a career fate similar to George's with the dawn of the talkies) driving onto the lot. Bridges also drew inspiration from , , 's 1928 film "Spies" and F.W. Murnau's 1930 film "City Girl."<br><br>Meanwhile, Peppy is fresh off the bus and hoping to make it in Hollywood. The first time we see her, she's wearing a flapper dress and cloche hat that look "medium-value gray" in the film but are actually coral-colored. To help make her stand out from the other Hollywood fans, Bridges put a large bow on the bodice of the dress.<br><br>As the story progresses, Peppy's star rises and George's falls. In one pivotal scene (shot at the Bradbury Building in downtown L.A.), they meet on a staircase. She is walking up, and he is going down. After that moment, George's look becomes flatter and grayer, and Peppy's more sophisticated with lots of shine, jewelry and furs.<br><br>When Peppy visits George's house in the middle of the night in a rainstorm, she is dressed in a waxed cotton raincoat, copied from a 1920s original. He is in despair, a broken-down man, and she represents the sparkling promise of the future, her flower-lined umbrella in hand. "I wanted Peppy to seem like flowers to George," Bridges says.<br><br>Los Angeles proved to be a great resource for Bridges, who found research pieces at several old costume houses, including Western Costume, which celebrates its 100th anniversary in 2012. Most of the looks in the film were reproductions, because the originals could not stand up to filming.<br><br>Peppy's beaded dresses were made by L.A.'s LeLuxe Clothing Co., which specializes in 1920s looks for parties and weddings. "I was surfing EBay early on to see what was available and found this great source right in L.A.," Bridges says.<br><br>But the most standout costume in the film is the black satin dress Peppy wears while giving an interview to a journalist at a fancy restaurant, with George sitting at another table but within earshot. (The scene was filmed at Cicada restaurant, an Art Deco landmark in downtown L.A.) "That's my favorite," says Bridges, who found the trim &#8212; a 45-square-inch panel of gold lam&#233; and black satin brocade &#8212; at Mood Fabrics in West L.A. He worked with his cutter to copy a black satin dress from 1920, and used the brocade as a border. "We went back and forth about how to make [the costume] feel like she's putting on airs," he says. "The dress worked perfectly for the moment."<br><br>For Bridges, it was important to reflect the passage of time in the film, even if it was just a few years. During the second-to-last scene, when Peppy and George are dancing for the studio head, she wore a copy of a 1930s crepe de chine dress. Bridges added a vintage collar with embroidery that reminded him of the crown design on the Chrysler Building, built in 1930, which became a symbol of the Machine Age. The costume, Bridges explains, "said it all about where we were."<br><br>?-- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- --?It's the throwback '60s style as much as the story lines that has made a success. The series, which enters its fifth season in 2012, ushered in a ladylike trend in fashion that has reverberated all the way to the Paris runways and inspired a collaboration with retail chain , and a book and collection for the show's costume designer Janie Bryant. So is it any wonder that the big three networks are looking for their own fashion gold? Many of this season's new shows, whether they be contemporary or retro, are amping up the style quotient in a big way. Here's a rundown.<br><br><br><br> Thursdays at 8 p.m. on . Premieres Thursday.<br><br>FOR THE RECORD:<br> TV style: In the Sept. 18 Image section, an article about new fall TV shows and style incorrectly said that "Mad Men" costume designer Janie Bryant had an HSN collection. Last year, Bryant had a collection, Janie Bryant MOD, on . &#8212;<br> <br><br>Costume designer: Roemehl Hawkins, who started her career as an intern with L.A. designer Richard Tyler.<br><br>Setup: This new take on the campy, 1970s action series is set in present-day Miami with three new angels.<br><br>What to look for: Fashion from high-end designers such as , , and ; designer name-dropping in the dialogue; and wacky Angel disguises.<br><br>Fun fact: Hawkins uses her creative license in an upcoming episode, dressing the Angels in re-creations of prison costumes from the original series.<br><br>Biggest challenge: Scoring the hottest fashion items. "That Alexander Wang silver loafer I was following in Vogue for months. When it finally landed in my office, it was like light shining down from heaven on that shoe."<br><br>Real-world fashion potential: Good, at least for the kind of women who aspire to look like they live in Miami. "When I was working on I had women from Oklahoma calling my cellphone and asking me what kind of jeans ] was wearing," Hawkins said.<br><br><br><br>Sundays at 10 p.m. on ABC. Premieres Sept. 25<br><br>Costume designer: Ane Crabtree, also the costume designer for the F/X series <br><br>Setup: series set in 1963 follows the glamorous adventures of a Pan Am crew.<br><br>What to look for: Retro 1960s fashions inspired by everything from the Kennedys to Sears catalogs.<br><br>Fun fact: Crabtree based the crew's uniforms on L.A. designer Don Loper's original designs for Pan Am, but she raised the armholes and slimmed the skirts to make them better-fitting. The original Pan Am blue was too gray when they tested it on-screen, so the color was tweaked.<br><br>Biggest challenge: Transcontinental story lines &#8212; Rio de Janeiro, Berlin and London in one episode, for example. And finding actors with curves. "I tell the boys and girls, don't work out! A little bit of softness is good."<br><br>Secret source: Right to the Moon Alice Vintage Clothing, a 20,000-foot barn full of clothing in Cooks Falls, N.Y.<br><br>?Daniel Cat&#225;n, an composer and librettist whose works including "Il Postino" and "Florencia en el Amazonas" have been praised for their lyrical romanticism and humane generosity of spirit, died suddenly Saturday in Austin, Texas. He was 62.<br><br>Cat&#225;n's death was announced by the Butler School of Music of the University of Texas, where he was a visiting artist. The cause has not been determined. A South Pasadena resident, Cat&#225;n had been commissioned by the Butler School to adapt 's 1941 classic film " for the operatic stage.<br><br> Cat&#225;n's most recent opera, "Il Postino" (The Postman), which was adapted from the popular 1994 film based on Antonio Skarmeta's novel about a fictional friendship between a mail carrier and the great Chilean poet , had its world premiere last fall at L.A. Opera. "Florencia en el Amazonas," inspired by the writings of the Colombian author , was co-commissioned by L.A. Opera and performed there in 1997, after premiering in Houston in 1996.<br><br> Times music critic Mark Swed noted the "rich instrumental colors" of the work, which co-starred , L.A. Opera's general director, as Neruda. "Domingo has never had a better role tailored for him," Swed wrote.<br><br>In a statement issued Monday, L.A. Opera Chairman Marc I. Stern expressed shock and grief at "this terrible loss."<br><br>Like Cat&#225;n's other works, "Il Postino" deals with several themes central to the composer's creative outlook: the redemptive power of love and art, and the capacity for heroic action that ordinary people possess.<br><br>"The subject matter of this opera, like all my other operas, really, is the place that love and art hold in the context of our lives," before the opening of "Il Postino." "Love and art are the vehicles to self-realization as a human being in the full sense of the word."<br><br>"Il Postino" also expressed Cat&#225;n's gift for composing broadly accessible works that occasionally drew on folkloric and popular 20th-century musical styles, as well as the passionate theatricality of the late Romantic period.<br><br> "He was able to translate abstract musical concepts so that they would be brought down to very simple levels," said Bernardo Feldman, a former student of Cat&#225;n's and chairman of the music department at College of the Canyons in Santa Clarita, where the composer taught for many years. "Every single piece of music that he wrote was beautifully crafted and profound, with a subtle sense of humor."<br><br>Born April 3, 1949, in , Cat&#225;n was descended from Russian-Turkish-Jewish immigrants and grew up in . He studied philosophy at the University of Sussex, England, and music at with . Following his studies, he served from 1983 to 1989 as music administrator at Mexico City's Palace of Fine Arts.<br><br>Cat&#225;n cited , , and among those who had most influenced his music. His first opera, "La Hija de Rappaccini" ("Rappaccini's Daughter"), a 1991 symbolist work inspired by an play based on a story, with a libretto by Juan Tovar, was performed in San Diego in 1994. The Spanish-language work was billed at that time as "the first fully professional production of an opera by a Mexican composer to be staged in the United States."<br><br>The success of that work led to the commissioning of "Florencia en el Amazonas," loosely based on Garcia Marquez's magical realist novel "Love in the Time of Cholera."<br><br>To mark its 50th anniversary, the Houston Grand Opera commissioned Cat&#225;n's third opera, the darkly humorous "Salsipuedes, A Tale of Love, War and Anchovies." A reviewer in the Spanish newspaper El Pais commended Cat&#225;n's works for "incarnating the image of the Spanish language sung in the United States, far above that of any other creator."<br><br>The composer, who later became a U.S. citizen, was pleased to have contributed works in his native language to the operatic repertoire. But he also believed that the time had come to recognize Spanish-language compositions as being part of the fabric of American culture.<br><br>"At what point," he asked The Times in an interview, "are we going to start thinking of these as enriching our culture, rather than being examples of some exotic other culture?" "Meet John Doe," about a down-on-his-luck former baseball player who gets cast in the invented role of a social crusader, was being written in English.<br><br>Cat&#225;n said that when he first saw the movie "Il Postino" he had identified with the character of the young postman. But when he began working on his opera a few years ago, the by-then middle-aged composer found himself empathizing more with Neruda, "looking at a new generation that is going to come after me."<br><br>Cat&#225;n is survived by his wife, Andrea Puente; three children, Chloe, Tom and Alan; and four grandchildren.<br><br>?Harry Jackson, an acclaimed Western artist who created the bronze equestrian sculpture of cowboy movie legend that was installed in front of what was then the Great Western Savings &amp; Loan office building on Wilshire Boulevard in Beverly Hills in the 1980s, has died. He was 87.<br><br>Jackson died Monday at the VA Medical Center in Sheridan, Wyo., after dealing with a number of health issues over the last year, said his son Matthew.<br><br> The Chicago-born artist was considered one of the most promising New York Abstract Expressionist painters in the early 1950s before he turned to realism and became a highly successful Western artist in the tradition of and Charles Russell.<br><br>"Harry Jackson, in my opinion, was one of the finest sculptors of his day," said Bruce Eldredge, executive director and chief executive officer of the Buffalo Bill Historical Center in Cody, Wyo., which contains the largest museum collection of Jackson's work in the United States.<br><br>The bearded artist, a self-described "old cowboy saddle-tramp," divided his time between Cody and Camaiore, Italy, where he had a studio and foundry.<br><br>By the early '80s, Jackson was one of America's highest-paid artists, his work was collected in museums and three presidents &#8212; Lyndon Johnson, and &#8212; had selected his sculptures as gifts to heads of state.<br><br>"The Marshall," Jackson's multicolored sculpture of a hard-riding, Winchester-brandishing Wayne in his Oscar-winning role as Rooster Cogburn in "True Grit," appeared on a 1969 cover of Time magazine.<br><br>After his friend Wayne's death in 1979, Jackson was commissioned by Great Western to create the landmark sculpture of the actor, who had appeared as the S&amp;L's spokesman in a series of Western-set commercials during the last two years of his life.<br><br>Before the sculpture's debut, however, the Beverly Hills Architectural Commission insisted on a number of changes, including stripping the multicolored paint off it and disconnecting a motor in its base that would have allowed horse and rider to rotate once or twice an hour.<br><br>Jackson called the rulings "arbitrary and capricious" and referred to the commission members as "those twerps."<br><br>The 6-ton, 21-foot-tall bronze monument &#8212; 3 1/2 years in the making and called "The Horseman" &#8212; was dedicated in a ceremony at the 10-story, smoked-glass Great Western building in 1984.<br><br>"The statue is more than a likeness of John Wayne," James F. Montgomery, board chairman of Great Western, told The Times a week before the statue's unveiling.<br><br>The sculpture, he said, reflects the independent spirit of the Old West and the ideal of the great American cowboy.<br><br>"The final piece was a spectacular rendition of my dad," told The Times last week. "Obviously, it was larger than life, but there was just an aura, a sense of my dad. Harry Jackson did a very commendable job."<br><br>Wayne said his father owned a number of Jackson's Western sculptures and was "really very fond of his work.<br><br>"When Harry created the piece for Great Western, he set it on a base that included two of my dad's favorite works by him": high reliefs depicting a cattle stampede and a cowboy burial on the prairie.<br><br>The bronze Duke is still sitting tall in the saddle of what is now the Flynt Building, the Hollywood symbol of the Old West today greeting visitors to Publications and other tenants.<br><br>Jackson was born Harry Shapiro Jr. in Chicago on April 18, 1924, and was given his mother's maiden name after his parents divorced. He developed an early interest in drawing and attended Saturday classes at the .<br><br>An admirer of the cowboys who ate in the lunchroom his mother ran across from the Chicago stockyards, Jackson was fired up by a Life magazine photo spread about cowboy life in Wyoming and ran away from home in 1938 at age 14.<br><br>After hitchhiking to Wyoming, he found work as a ranch hand in Cody and then worked on the Pitchfork Ranch near Meeteetse, which he later called his "spiritual birthplace."<br><br>Jackson, who sketched the ranch life around him and continued to take art classes, enlisted in the Marines during . While on combat intelligence duty in the Pacific, he did reconnaissance sketches and was seriously wounded during the battle for Betio on Tarawa atoll and on Saipan.<br><br>After being sent back to Los Angeles, he became an official Marine artist &#8212; and discovered modern art. After his discharge, he moved to New York City, where he became a friend and protege of , the leading Abstract Expressionist.<br><br>As a result of his wartime head wounds, Jackson experienced grand mal , his son Matthew told The Times.<br><br>"He also had and had a difficult time," he said. "He lived like he was on the battlefield. Whether he was happy or angry, it was a life-or-death intensity. That was definitely challenging to be around and grow up with. He was our father and we definitely have love for him as our father. But it's a complex thing, not something that's 'Leave It to Beaver.' "<br><br>As he wrote on his father's website, this week: "He was a force of nature, full of rage, love, humor and madness."<br><br>Jackson was married and divorced six times.<br><br>In addition to Matthew, he is survived by his other sons, Jesse and Luke; two daughters, Molly Keating and Chloe Lear Jackson; and four grandchildren.<br><br>?<p>PARIS -- Was the runway show going to be a wind-powered statement by designer Karl Lagerfeld on alternative energy and global warming? It certainly looked like it from the 13 enormous white rotating wind turbines erected underneath the glass ceiling of the Grand Palais for the spring-summer 2013 runway show held Tuesday morning at .</p><p>But alas, it wasn't a themey collection in the vein of Lagerfeld's polar iceberg, faux fur extravaganza from a few seasons back, but rather a demonstration of the power of the original Chanel design codes, and the energy and creative output Lagerfeld has put into sustaining the behemoth luxury brand since he took over in 1983.</p><p></p> <p>With all the attention this week focused on new designers at Dior and Yves Saint Laurent, perhaps Lagerfeld felt like flexing his muscles.</p><p>The scene: brought daughter Emme (not bad for a 4-year-old) and her beau Casper Smart. was also front row. But this is a show where it's easy to miss people, famous or otherwise. More than 1,000 guests were there.</p><p>The look: Carefree Coco Chanel as if she were still haunting the cafes of the Riviera today. Nods to 1960s style and bold graphics, but with a modern twist. The most dominant silhouette was a cropped jacket over a miniskirt or dress. The Chanel suit was remade as a boxy, rounded-sleeve white tweed jacket and short full skirt trimmed in gobstopper-sized pearls. A blouson top and bubble skirt came in rainbow confetti boucle tweed. Graphic grid check knit chemises and miniskirts nodded to the 1960s. A cropped denim jacket and denim shirt dress with pearl buttons added a casual air. For evening, a black windowpane-sequin cocktail dress with transparent top layer touched on the spring trend of transparency. And white sequin columns came with sweet, garden floral embroidery down the fronts. Floor-sweeping gowns were trimmed with rows of pearls. For accessories, it was all about chunky clustered pearl necklaces and bracelets. Fabulous Hula Hoop bags of quilted leather came with giant circular handles. And the spectator shoe was redone in see-through plastic.</p><p>The verdict: Light and fun, even if it did blow in a lot of different directions. As evidenced by the tweed fan club that turns up enthusiastically for every show, Chanel is a brand that must appeal to a lot of different people.</p><p>ALSO:</p><p></p><p></p><p></p>?<p>PARIS -- is having a moment here at , where an exhibition celebrating 60 years of the French house just opened at the Palais de Tokyo museum.</p><p>Founded by Gaby Aghion in 1952, the brand was a forerunner to the kind of effortless, high-low, dressed-up/dressed-down style that defines the way women dress now, particularly on the West Coast. Many designers, including Karl Lagerfeld, and Phoebe Philo, have taken turns designing for Chloe, which has been helmed by Clare Waight Keller since 2011.</p><p></p> <p>Keller showed her spring-summer 2013 collection on Monday afternoon under a clear tent revealing sunny skies in the Tuileries gardens.</p><p>The inspiration: The words of Chloe founder Aghion, "I don't explain anything, I have lived...I lived the life I wanted."</p><p>The look: Cool, casual femininity. Softly sculptural volumes. Play with transparency and proportion. Nubby linen, sharp V-neck coat paired with rounded pants. Oversize T-shirts, some with a long sheer layer revealing a hint of midriff. Bermuda shorts and flippy pleated skirts, some adorned with floral cut-outs. Crisp cotton sunburst pleat tops and dresses with easy volumes. Fluid silk evening suits with sparkly embroidered arrows down the sides. Diaphanous sheer pleated dress over white shorts. Palette of white, black and navy blue with blush pink and coral.</p><p>The verdict: Playful yet real. Keller tapped into a lot of the trends of the season, namely modern femininity, sheer layers and ruffles, in a down-to-earth way.</p><p>ALSO:</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p></p>?<p>PARIS -- A bevy of starlets showed up for Miuccia &rsquo;s spring-summer 2013 fashion show on Wednesday, the last day of . Emma Stone, , Berenice Bejo and current Miu Miu campaign model sat along the sculptural wood runway at Paris&rsquo; Environmental Council building for one of the last shows of the season.</p><p></p><p>The look: Fittingly, the look was evocative of Hollywood femme fatales with a modern twist. Mid-calf-length pencil skirts, bustiers, swing jackets and coats in crinkled cotton, dark denim with fraying edges and a splatter-print satin that conjured images of explosive gunshot residue. Skirts and jackets slit high in the back. Backward tops (and some skirts) fastened with giant jeweled buttons. Furs, yes furs, for spring, with sooty splatter motifs. Jeweled flat sandals or killer pumps. Flat satchel bags.</p> <p>The verdict: Some strong ideas, but the show was a tad repetitive. And the loose-fitting bustiers and backward-fastening skirts could be a tough sell.</p><p>ALSO:</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p></p>?<p>PARIS -- It was a &ldquo;&rdquo; moment by way of Rome and Paris on Tuesday afternoon when designers Maria Grazia Chiuri and Pierpaolo Piccioli showed their spring-summer 2013 collection during . The designers, who have been at the helm of the fabled Roman fashion house since 2008, turned out a graceful collection of demure frocks that brought to mind the ladies of "Downton."</p><p>Inspiration: Nostalgia for female sensuality, not sexuality.</p><p></p> <p>The look: Modest. Ladylike. Dresses that skim rather than cling, leaving something to the imagination. Silhouettes that hit below the knee with slightly fitted waists. Dresses with rows of lattice-like stitching designed to show a hint of skin. Jumpsuits with lacy layers underneath. Exquisite lace dresses with long sleeves and delicate buttons. Lace suits with short capelets instead of jackets. Floral tea dresses with puffy sleeves. High-neck gowns painted with flowers. A clear trench edged in studs or python added a slight edge. Wedge sandals and sling-backs came with jeweled Lucite heels. A powdery color palette of blush, ivory, beige, rose and black.</p><p>The scene: You had to forget trying to be a lady when fighting through the scrum of photographers angling for shots of Valentino, who was there himself, as well as and her beau, Casper Smart.</p><p>The verdict: Sweet success, gorgeous craftsmanship. The designers have taken Valentino&rsquo;s fiercely feminine DNA and softened it, making it their own, and tweaking it ever so slightly each season.</p><p>ALSO: </p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p></p>?<p>British television writer Paul Abbott has created and written series as diverse as "Touching Evil," "State of Play" and His new miniseries "Hit &amp; Miss" premiered last week on DirectTV and stars as a transgender contract killer who inherits a family. Abbott talks about the new show and how his rocky upbringing inspired his work.</p><p>Have you put any facets of your personal life into your shows?</p><p>"Shameless" derives from my personal life, as it is based off of my family. The Gallagher family in "Shameless" is meant to parallel the stories of my childhood. I am one of eight kids. When I was 9, my mother left home for another man. Two years later, my father left us too. My siblings and I were then left in the care of my pregnant 16-year-old sister. There is a source from my childhood linked to every single story in "Shameless."</p> <p></p><p>Where did the idea of "Hit &amp; Miss" come from?</p><p>"Hit &amp; Miss" was originally two separate show ideas. The first idea was about a transgender mother and the other was about a hit man. Both of the ideas bored me, so I decided to slam them together.</p><p>Did you initially think of Chloe Sevigny?</p><p>No, I did not originally have Chloe in mind for this project. But selling a series like "Hit &amp; Miss" that was going to cost about a million an episode made an international name appealing. And Chloe is so wonderfully androgynous and perfectly enigmatic; she's such a splendid fit for the role.</p><p> Do you feel the need to push established boundaries?</p><p>Yes, we do feel the need to push boundaries. We push right through them. We knew what the response from network executives would be like so we tried to present the transgender character responsibly. The producers interviewed loads of transgender people in Manchester and researched the transgender process thoroughly.</p><p>"Hit &amp; Miss" is running here in its original version, but both "Shameless" and "State of Play" were adapted here. What was it like seeing your work "Americanized"?</p><p>I think that "Shameless" is a fantastic adaptation. They did a much bigger job of making it fit, and it's done with such a major, splendid confidence.</p><p></p><p><br></p>?<p>Russian band Pussy Riot, which is awaiting the verdict in a trial of its three members on hooliganism charges, has over the last six months generated worldwide attention after a clip of the group protesting connections between the Russian Orthodox church and Vladamir Putin's administration drew the ire of powers that be. In the process, Pussy Riot has become a symbol not only of defiance in the face of authoritarian power but also of the ongoing vitality of the three-chords-and-a-voice template of punk rock.</p><p>The act's plight has prompted a number of artists to work on the band's behalf to bring awareness -- and money -- to its cause. On Thursday night at Liberty Hall in New York, artists including, Eileen Myles, Karen Finley, Johanna Fateman and Mx Justin Vivian Bond will gather to read the writings of the three accused members of Pussy Riot,Maria Alekhina, Nadezhda Tolokonnikova and Ekaterina Samucevich. (The reading will be streamed live at 7:30 p.m. EST .)</p><p>As well, musician-performance artist Peaches has gathered like-minded peers such as the Hives, Wayne Kramer (MC5), Kate Nash, JD Samson (Le Tigre, Men), Nick Zinner (), , , Peter Bjorn &amp; John, and the Knife, among others, to represent the outrage via a for Peaches' song "Free Pussy Riot!."</p> <p></p><p>In a statement, Peaches wrote: "As a musician who has spoken out against political figures, I am deeply troubled that the Russian government is punishing its citizens for voicing their opinions through music. Music is an essential tool for voicing opinions about everything from gender to oppression. To outlaw the free expression of these ideas is to embrace tyranny. Letting artists speak is the hallmark of a free society."</p><p>Indeed, the free expression inherent in punk is a perfect vehicle for protest, and not just in Russia. A few years ago, when I was traveling through Myanmar with Los Angeles band Ozamatli, which was touring as cultural diplomats for the , whispers of a punk scene became known via a few strategically placed bits of protest graffiti in the country's most populous city, Yangon. This was before the country began the process of relaxing its military rule, allowing for free elections and the release of Nobel laureate from house arrest. But little cracks were starting to appear in the junta's facade.</p><p>The most prominent was a simple declaration spray-painted in black on one of the city's most prominent boulevards: It read, simply, "Punk's Not Dead," and though it certainly wasn't proof of a crumbling regime, the phrase, and all the meanings within the simple statement, suggested unrest.</p><p>Whether Pussy Riot's trial in Moscow is evidence of something bigger at work is yet to be seen, but the seriousness with which the judicial system has pursued the case suggests that governments continue to fear the power of punk expression. And that despite the Hot Topic-ification of American punk rock, in other parts of the world the defiant undercurrent of those three chords can carry powerful messages far more vital than simply protesting Mom and Dad's new curfew dictate.</p><p>ALSO:</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>Twitter: </p>?<p>It must be quite a feeling to be 17 and realize your band is really, really good. That's probably what drove Chloe Chaidez to climb on top of the Bootleg's bar top and howl at the moon while her band tore off another round of shoegazy post-punk during its packed Monday night residency.</p><p>While most hyper-young artists are working at the bleeding edges of dance music, Kitten's rich and atmospheric rock is surprisingly ageless. The quintet's sound pulls from the punk-funk rhythms of Public Image LTD with Smiths-y yearning and the blissfully brutal distortion of Ride and Slowdive. As influences go, it'd be harder to be more tasteful, but that's all aesthetic window dressing.</p><p>The real draw is Chaidez, as sure a shot to be a rock star as L.A. has produced recently. Onstage she's a dervish, flailing and writhing and bashing her bassist about the chest with a tambourine. Those antics belie her age, but her voice eclipses it -- a huge instrument that can veer from feral yelp to ethereal falsetto.</p> <p>The band's catalog is slim but promising: Though Chaidez has precociously kicked around the eastside for a few years, the band's EP for Atlantic, "Cut It Out," is its first representational release. Songs such as the single "G#" and the EP's title track had an immaculate sense of ambiance and space, but always punctuated with clever production twists and played very, very loudly.</p><p>There's a wide audience sweet spot here -- fans of will dig the electro tinges and Chaidez's take-no-guff presence; M83 fans will fall over themselves at the narcotic sheets of guitar effects. Kitten has booked dates with Charli XCX and Paramore, and that seems like a fair approximation of what it's up to -- poppy, emotional and sonically ambitious all at once. It's quite a trick to have the vigor and intensity of youthful feeling, but deploy it with the craft of a '90s UK studiophile. If we could do it, we might just climb on bar tops as well.</p><p>ALSO:</p><p></p><p></p><p></p>?Like fellow Brits and before her, model and TV host Alexa Chung is known as much for her enviable personal style as she is for her professional accomplishments. And her penchant for boyish, effortless-looking getups makes her a fitting collaborator for Madewell, a brand steeped in classic casual clothes tweaked slightly for the trendy set.<br><br>The British beauty has teamed up with the niche fashion retailer for a capsule collection launching Saturday in all Madewell stores.<br><br> The cutesy-cool line, which is heavy on hot pants, easy-fitting dresses and super-skinny jeans, looks like it could have been pulled directly from Chung's closet. "Madewell totally got my aesthetic," she said. "They're also a brand that's in keeping with my tomboy, comfortable style."<br><br>The retailer's temperate prices (tees start at $19.50; leather coats are $395) were also a lure for the 26-year-old fashion plate. "I didn't want to rip anybody off," she said. "I wanted to make an affordable collection. And the types of things they sell are staples that could be in your wardrobe for years to come."<br><br>Standout looks in the line include a boxy double-breasted gray wool coat, an engineer-striped overall mini-skirt jumper, a flowing, cream-colored skirt that hits below the knee (the new "it" skirt silhouette) and a long-sleeved tunic-style dress made from rust-hued crushed velvet.<br><br>The collection "was made with my friends in mind," Chung said, "so I guess [it's for] women my age who like to be comfy but also like to look chic." But really, "it's for everyone or anyone who likes to dabble in hot pants," she added, somewhat cheekily.<br><br>To celebrate the launch, Madewell is inviting shoppers to make appointments before store hours on Saturday to shop the collection before the stores open. A traditional British breakfast for some &#8212; butter cookies and tea &#8212; will be served in homage to Chung.<br><br>And with each Alexa Chung for Madewell Collection purchase made before store hours, shoppers will receive a customized ribbon from Chung, emblazoned with one of her favorite quotes &#8212; written in her own hand. And the first 25 shoppers will receive a Chung-designed pouch that's not being sold in the collection.<br><br>Call one of the two Madewell stores in the Los Angeles area to make an appointment.<br><br>Madewell, at the Americana at Brand shopping center, 716 Americana Way, Glendale. (818) 243-1096. 10 a.m. to 9 p.m. Monday through Thursday; 10 a.m. to 9 p.m. Friday; 10 a.m. to 10 p.m. Saturday; 11 a.m. to 8 p.m. Sunday.<br><br>Madewell at the Westfield Century City mall, 10250 Santa Monica Blvd., Space No. 98, Century City. (310) 772-0428. 10 a.m. to 9 p.m. Monday through Saturday; 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. Sunday.<br><br><br><br>OPENINGS<br><br>Free City Supershop Supermat Wednesday: Free City has moved from Malibu to L.A. and plans to have its grand opening Wednesday. The store, where everything is made in-house or customized in a workshop nearby, will carry the brand's signature graphic T-shirts and hooded sweatshirts (embellished with slogans such as "Life Nature Love" and "Neighborhood") along with shoes, jewelry, customized bikes, almond milk, bread and more. Exclusive merchandise includes Vans Vault Free City high-top sneakers made from used tent material ($125). Another shoe collaboration to look for is the Quoddy ring boot with Free City patches also made from green tent fabrications ($460). Scosha charm jewelry features the Free City's motifs of bikes and hummingbirds on brass charms for $80 to $1,200. The graphic shirts range in price from a special $75 hooded sweatshirt to a "Sparrow Life Nature Love" hand-painted T-shirt ($138). There are also vintage army jackets or sweatpants ($148) and a $2,500 Riga turntable that is covered in fabric for a lo-fi look. Customized bikes range from brightly colored Schwinn beach cruisers ($900) to Mission Bikes fixed-gears ($1,500 to $2,000).<br><br>1139 N. Highland Ave., Los Angeles. 11 a.m. to 6 p.m.<br><br><br><br>Zero + Maria Cornejo: Cult favorite New York label Zero + Maria Cornejo, which counts and among its fans, has opened a 2,000-square-foot boutique on Melrose Place to house its sophisticated &#8212; and often avant-garde &#8212; apparel and footwear for women and men. Peppered with sleek furniture from German company E15, the elegant space was designed by New York's Work Architecture. Prices for apparel and footwear range from $250 to $2,000; accessories range from $400 to $900.<br><br>8408 Melrose Place, Los Angeles. (323) 782-4915. 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. Monday through Saturday; noon to 6 p.m. Sunday.<br><br><br><br>?The new Devon store in Beverly Hills feels less like a fashion boutique and more like an airport hangar. But the striking 10,000-square-foot space &#8212; which features concrete-and-steel d&#233;cor, lighted up by huge graphic glass panels &#8212; is the first outpost for one of fashion's most distinctive lifestyle brands.<br><br>FOR THE RECORD: The headline on an earlier version of this article misspelled Devon as Devvon.<br><br> Founded by Scott Devon &#8212; a lifelong student of architecture, art and design &#8212; the 3-year-old company was originally formed to create next-generation products in industrial design. Its first offering, in 2007, was the Devon GTX supercar, which set the one-lap world record at Laguna Seca. Innovative custom motorcycles followed, as did the Tread 1, a $15,000 watch that uses a system of moving belts to display digital numbers.<br><br>Devon Motorworks led to the creation of a high-end leather driving jacket. And as with his cars, watch and cycles, Scott Devon tapped a highly lauded (but slightly underground) talent, leather designer Agatha Blois &#8212; who's known for her custom leather pieces worn by numerous music stars, including Billy Idol and .<br><br>Devon was so pleased with the collaboration that he asked Blois to design a selection of one-off leather jackets, along with a comprehensive denim collection &#8212; the latest release for the multifaceted brand. The aesthetic for all Devon-branded clothing is sports-car-sleek, from its tailored-to-the-teeth silhouettes to its top-of-the-line fabrications, which include selvedge denim and black leather covered in swishes of actual tar.<br><br>The new denim line, which is priced from $240 to $350, features sexy rocker shapes (i.e. low-rise cropped styles for women and dark and tight jeans for guys), and bold details such as brass buttons on the fly and waistband, decorative stitching, exaggerated belt loops and a proprietary fabric that allows a plaid pattern to bleed through the textile.<br><br>9378 Wilshire Blvd., Beverly Hills. (310) 432-0490. 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Monday through Saturday; 12 p.m. to 5 p.m. Sunday.<br><br><br><br>OPENING<br><br>Vans by Surf Shop: Iconic SoCal brand Vans has partnered with cutting-edge surf boutique Thalia Surf Shop on a new store concept, Vans by Thalia Surf Shop, now open in Laguna Beach adjacent to Thalia Surf Shop. The vibrant store carries Vans' surf footwear and apparel &#8212; including the Vans of Surfing collection and signature Joel Tudor apparel &#8212; as well as special merchandise created especially for the outpost.<br><br>911 South Coast Highway, Laguna Beach. (949) 497-3292. 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. seven days a week.<br><br>vans.com or thaliasurf.com<br><br>Feal Mor: This new menswear boutique &#8212; owned by brand designer J.P. Plunier, 's manager for the last 15 years &#8212; stocks the six-year-old Feal Mor menswear collection (designed by Plunier), which is steeped in classic Breton-striped sweaters, long-sleeved T-shirts, fitted pea coats, button-front shirts, slim-cut trousers and cycling-inspired knit caps. Prices range from around $90 to $900 for the Feal Mor line. The boutique also features vintage U.S. and French military parkas with fur-lined hoods, custom-made Gato Heroi surfboards, vintage restored bicycles and Amsterdam wetsuits, among other offbeat gems.<br><br>165 S. La Brea Ave., Los Angeles. (323) 939-6600. 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. Monday through Saturday; 12 p.m. to 5 p.m. Sunday.<br><br><br><br>Blood is the New Black pop-up: L.A. T-shirt brand Blood is the New Black, which is famous for its collaborations with edgy artists, has launched a holiday gift-centric pop-up shop featuring tees, zines, flannel shirts and toiletries by Portland General Store, art books, jewelry from Species by the Thousands, Dark Matter and Alex &amp; Chloe and kids fashions from Izzy Wolf.<br><br>1825 W. Sunset Blvd., Los Angeles. 3 p.m. to 11 p.m. Thursdays through Sundays through January 1.<br><br>bloodisthenewblack.com<br><br>EVENTS<br><br>?As summer heats up, we've learned to slather SPF 15 or higher all over our bodies and faces in an effort to prevent and . We've also been told to recite our ABCs when checking for unusual : asymmetry, border irregularity and uneven color. Unfortunately, our scalps are often neglected. Sunscreen is transparent on , but who wants to go to work with greasy roots? How many people wear a hat during their lunch break? And who can see a mole on top of her own head?<br><br>Skin of the is not as common as on other areas of the body. But it poses its own set of challenges. "The problem is that the hair can obscure a skin cancer so that the diagnosis is delayed," says Dr. Ronald Moy, president of the American Academy of .<br><br> Although those with thick hair have less to worry about &#8212; the hair acts as a barrier to the sun and protects the scalp &#8212; those with balding or thinning hair are more susceptible to developing skin cancer. "Skin cancer is very common on the scalp in thinning individuals &#8212; males and females &#8212; since it usually stands out to get direct ," says Dr. Paul McAndrews, clinical professor at the USC School of Medicine.<br><br>Lighter skin and the total accumulation of sun exposure to the scalp pose the biggest risk factors. "Fairer individuals have less in their skin to block ," McAndrews says. "Balding persons will have less hair to block the UV rays, which leads to more exposure to the damaging effects of UV rays."<br><br>Using a zinc oxide or titanium oxide sunblock, such as Blue Lizard Australian Suncream ($11.99 for 3 ounces; ) or a sunscreen that absorbs both UV-A and UV-B rays &#8212; and reapplying every few hours &#8212; can reduce sun exposure and reduce risk. Balding individuals can easily apply sunscreen to their scalps, but those with hair find it trickier to protect the scalp without resorting to a greasy style. "The problem with sunscreens for the scalp is they tend to leave hair a little on the lank side," says Philip Kingsley, founder of the Philip Kingsley Trichological Centre in New York.<br><br>Many hair-care manufactures offer SPF products specially formulated to help protect scalps from the sun. For daily use, Kingsley recommends a lighter spray formula. "Spray at the roots, and then smooth fingers over the scalp," he says. The key is to lightly rub the product into the scalp because if you just spray it over the hair it will absorb into the follicle and offer little protection to the skin. Try Phyto Plage Protective Beach Spray ($22; ) or Smart Girls Who Surf Care for Hair Sun Protector ($8.50; http://www.smartgirlswhosurf.com).<br><br>Also, change your part often so one area of the scalp is not consistently exposed to the sun: "I have removed skin cancers on the part-line and the 'cow-lick' area of people's scalps," McAndrews says.<br><br>If you're at the pool or beach, Kingsley recommends a cream formula such as his Kingsley Swim Cap Cream (which he developed for the 1984 Olympic synchronized swimming team). Slather it over hair and into scalp, then style hair back into a slick ponytail.<br><br>In 1999, Scottsdale, Ariz., hair colorist Monica May Sanders lost her mother, Chloe, to skin cancer that had originated on the scalp. "I had noticed she had a mole on the top of her head, but I had no idea it was even possible to have melanoma on the scalp. Looking back, that was pretty ignorant," she says. The diagnosis led her to pay closer attention to her clients, taking notice of unusual-looking moles.<br><br>Sanders also embarked on developing a multipurpose product to protect the scalp while addressing other style needs too. She worked with Amour Cosmetic to develop a product called Hair Shadz. The powder formula contains zinc oxide and comes in eight shades to blend root regrowth in those who color their hair, to act as a dry shampoo and to protect the scalp. Sun Shadz is a translucent version of the product for those who seek only scalp protection. The products offer an SPF 15 protection, according to AMA Laboratories, a clinical testing facility.<br><br>One caveat: Zinc oxide is an effective sunblock, but its efficacy in a powder form is unknown, McAndrews says.<br><br>Of course, a hat offers the best protection against skin cancer of the scalp. Pay attention to the weave &#8212; the tighter the weave, the less exposure to damaging UV-A and UV-B rays.<br><br>Also, hats with ultraviolet protection can offer additional coverage, such as Coolibar hats (starting at $18, ) made out of Suntect fabric, rated as UPF of 50+ and recommended by .<br><br>?Spring merchandise has officially hit the stores, and one trend should be immediately noticeable: bright colors. They were everywhere on the spring-summer 2011 runways, including at the show, where candy colors managed to look minimal when shown with crisp white shirts or layered with sleek black coats, and at and Burberry, where various tones of shocking aqua and cobalt were paired for a cool (and somehow punchy) look. Color blocking, as seen on the runway, is another major trend.<br><br>Other designer and contemporary brands explored the color wheel as well. "For spring we bought a lot of color, from acid pinks to orange-red to cobalt blue to tangerine," says Jeannie Lee, owner of 3rd Street's Satine Boutique, which stocks lines from designers including , , and .<br><br> Retailer Hillary Rush, who owns her eponymous boutique, also on 3rd Street, has already starting seeing the color craze take effect with customers. " The oversized raglan shirt from Monrow has totally sold out in the hibiscus color," a coral-orange Rush says. "When a bright color like that sells out before the black or white, it's always a statement that people are wearing color that season."<br><br>On the other end of the spectrum, shoppers are likely to encounter lots of white. The natural, yet luxe look of an all-white ensemble (which also works in winter, but is a lot more practical in the warmer months) looked fresh in the runway collections of , and .<br><br> is also turning out a number of white items, from easy button-downs to wide leg trousers, all in shades of white and off-white and in stores this summer. And there's no shortage of white jeans, which are showing up in the spring and summer lines of J Brand, MIH and 7 for All Mankind.<br><br>Shoppers may also notice a '60s and '70s aesthetic dictating the shape of denim this season.<br><br>"Denim flares are really hot," says Caprice C. Willard, vice president-regional planning manager for Macys, where brands such as and Levi's have incorporated the style. Flared and wide-leg jeans are also big sellers on the boutique level; Satine's Lee says wide-leg jeans have been flying off the shelves.<br><br>On spring-summer 2011 runways such as 's, models wore wide-leg jeans with tucked-in white button-downs and chic wedge sandals. On the street we're bound to see a more relaxed version of the look, with women wearing bell bottom-style jeans with T-shirts and sandals or perhaps flared jeans with a tucked-in tank top and a blazer for evening.<br><br>The other denim trend for spring is a gamine, '60s crop. The pant leg ends at least 2 inches above the ankle. The jeans look great with ballet flats or a low-mid wedge sandal.<br><br>The '70s vibe also includes versions of the maxi-length skirt and dress. Floor-grazing styles were featured in the collections of and Jil Sander and are showing up in stores such as the Gap, and Club Monaco.<br><br> "The maxi-dress is really important this season and we are seeing a resurgence with it," Willard says. "The maxi length actually stays important in Southern California all year long."<br><br>?May 4<br><br>The Avengers<br><br> A team of superheroes including Iron Man, Captain America, the Hulk and Thor unite to save the world. With , , and . Written and directed by . In Imax 3-D. Walt Disney Pictures<br><br>FOR THE RECORD:<br> Movie listings: The April 29 Summer Sneaks list of films gave the name of a documentary about Iraq and Afghanistan war veterans as "Higher Ground." The Aug. 17 release is called "High Ground." &#8212;<br> <br><br>The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel<br><br>A group of British retirees travel to to spend their golden years at a newly restored hotel but find the accommodations to be less than palatial. With , , and . Written by Ol Parker. Directed by John Madden. Fox Searchlight Pictures<br><br>First Position<br><br>This follows six young dancers as they prepare for and compete in the Youth America Grand Prix, a prestigious ballet competition. Directed by Bess Kargman. Selects<br><br>Jannat 2<br><br>A smooth-talking gun runner and a maverick cop take down a network of criminals. With Emraan Hashmi, Randeep Hooda and Esha Gupta. Written by Shagufta Rafique. Directed by Kunal Deshmukh. In Hindi with English subtitles. Fox International<br><br>Last Call at the Oasis<br><br>A documentary exploring the potential causes and consequences of a global water crisis. Directed by Jessica Yu. ATO Pictures<br><br>A Little Bit of Heaven<br><br>A lively but commitment-averse young woman has her life changed, in more ways than one, by a visit to the doctor. With , Gael Garc&iacute;a Bernal and Rosemarie Dewitt. Written by Gren Wells. Directed by Nicole Kassell. Millennium Entertainment<br><br>Mother's Day<br><br>After purchasing a foreclosed home, a young couple and their guests are taken hostage by the sadistic sons of the previous owner, who soon shows up herself and raises the stakes. With . Written by Scott Milam. Directed by Darren Lynn Bousman. Anchor Bay Films<br><br>The Perfect Family<br><br>A suburban wife and mother is nominated for the Catholic Woman of the Year Award at her local parish and must face the truth about her imperfect nonconformist family, whom she has to introduce to the church board. With , and . Written by Paula Goldberg and Claire V. Riley. Directed by Anne Renton. Variance Films<br><br>?<p>Well, who knew Miss Southern Belle was really a "West Virginia hood-rat" in disguise?</p><p>Gawwww-lee,did we get to see a different side of our bachelorette Monday night. Because the second you mess with Ricki Tick, Emily will go "back woods" on your behind.</p><p>That's right -- one of our silly suitors, luxury brand consultant Kalon, was foolish enough to express serious doubts about the responsibility of becoming a father. He referred to Emily's daughter Ricki as -- dun, dun, dun -- "baggage."</p> <p>Oh, no he didn't.When single father Doug got wind of Kalon's comment, he couldn't keep the news to himself, rushing to divulge the gossip to Emily.</p><p>"I want to go out there and rip his limbs off and beat him with them," the Barbie-turned-Hulk fumed.</p><p>Instead, Emily daintily took off her leather jacket and proceeded to chew Kalon out in front of the rest of the dudes on a group date, telling him Ricki was a blessing and accusing him of not even having the tiniest of hearts. When Kalon had no more to say for himself, Emily promptly told him to "get the... out."</p><p>That's what I like to see, girlfriend! It's too bad it took anger to draw Emily out of her perfect shell, but at the very least, I loved seeing her feisty side.</p><p>"I'm worried about my own judgment," she lamented after Kalon departed. "How could I let someone that terrible slip through the cracks?"</p><p>Um, I'm not sure. Because his arrival via helicopter really should have been the first and final red flag.</p><p>Nonetheless, Kalon and his child-bashing began to taint Emily's "Bachelorette" experience, which had so far otherwise been entirely pure and upstanding. With Kalon's words clouding her head, it seemed Emily quickly forgot about her date with Sean, whom she appeared to be utterly smitten with.</p><p>Judging from the reaction on Monday night, "Bachelorette" nation is loving Sean, which I have to admit, I really don't get. Dude is bland. Like, blander than Emily bland. This is a man who uttered the words "London's calling, and I'm going to answer it!" A man who let Emily play tour guide in London -- a woman whose favorite tourist spots included the place where got married, and another where Prince William and theformerkissed after they wed.</p><p>Emily was dropping historical wisdom like she was some U.K. expert -- especially when she and Sean went up to the Tower of London. There, she revealed, King Henry the 8th once locked up all his wives and beheaded two of them. Totes romantic.</p><p>Moments later, Sean told Emily it had been the best day he'd ever had in his life -- "Easily. By far."</p><p>So, just ruminate on that for a second, folks.</p><p>While Sean doesn't have much of a personality, at least he's not full of it, like Ryan, who is slowly winning Emily over with his gift-giving skills good looks and charm. Ryan finally got his first kiss with Emily during a group date, when the guys had to read Shakespeare and I wanted to kill myself. I understand some of the old-school language is difficult to decipher, but really, Arie? You don't know what the word "jaunt" means? I'd suggest you look that up, or your time with Emily may not end up being much more than a jaunt. (I went there. I'm sorry.)</p><p>Anyway, Ryan got to smooch Emily during a scene, which he was beyond jazzed about.</p><p>"The stage kiss? That was the best part of my acting, is that I made it come off real -- because it kind of was."</p><p>Yep. I'm just going to present that one with no comment.</p><p>Later that evening,Ryan pulled Em aside to tell her he wanted to make sure the pair shared more than just a physical attraction, and said he wanted her to know he was taking a "real approach to this." Then he gave her a necklace. Apparently, money can buy love, since Emily acknowledged later that she'd turned a corner with Mr. You-Can't-Get Fat-If-We-Get-Married.</p><p>Thankfully, Jef and his pompadour got the second and final one-on-one date, and I think he is totally adorbs. He looks 18 and talks way too much when he's nervous, but his lack of pretense is refreshing.</p><p>Emily showed up for her date in one of her 49 trench coats, and the pair ended up ditching a lame, staged etiquette class for a pub. There, Jef tried to let Emily know that he certainly didn't view Ricki as baggage -- and if she was, she'd be "a handbag that I want to have forever."</p><p>Emily said Ricksters was more like a vintage Louis Vuitton. This, my friends, is the stuff dreams are made of.</p><p>RELATED:</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>Follow Amy Kaufman on Twitter </p>?<p> </p><p></p><p></p> <br>SERIES<br><br>Duets: In this new episode the songs are chosen by the celebrity singers (8 p.m. ).<br><br>The Choice: , , professional football player Ndamukong Suh and Dr. Robert Nettles appear on the season finale (8:58 p.m. Fox).<br><br>Big Brother: The reality favorite returns for another season with host (9 p.m. CBS).<br><br>Saving Hope: In this new episode a hypnotized man is brought into the hospital with severe injuries, but he can't remember who he is. The doctors call in the hypnotist who put him under, and while he's there, he's able to help Alex (Erica Durance) connect with Charlie () (9 p.m. NBC).<br><br>Swamp People: Troy searches for one more monster gator to make a statement in the season finale (9 p.m. History).<br><br>Rookie Blue: Andy and Swarek (, Ben Bass) respond to a noise complaint at an illegal warehouse party, where they find two surprises: a squatter who has been stabbed and Shaw's (Matt Gordon) 15-year-old daughter(Chloe Rose), who saw it happen (10 p.m. ABC).<br><br>Wilfred: Ryan tries to stop Wilfred from waging war against an unlikely foe in this new episode (10 p.m. ).<br><br>The Real L Word: Cameras follow lesbians in Los Angeles as they go about their lives as the unscripted series returns for a new season (10 p.m. Showtime).<br><br>Top Spot: In this new series, soon-to-be travelers check out potential vacation spots &ndash; including luxurious beachfront hotels in Florida and cultural hot spots in London &mdash; to find out which of three getaways best suits their style and their budget (10 p.m. Travel).<br><br>Suits: Travis Tanner () is back in town with Harvey () in his sights, forcing Harvey and Jessica () to hide the ball from Hardman (David Costabile) (10 p.m. USA).<br><br>Louie: Louie (Louis CK) heads to Miami in this new episode (10:30 p.m. FX).<br><br>Polyamory: Married &amp; Dating: This new series looks into the lives of people in relationships with more than one person (11 p.m. Showtime).<br><br>SPORTS<br><br>Golf: U.S. Senior Open (Noon ).<br><br>WNBA basketball: The Sparks visit the Indiana Fever (4 p.m. ESPN2).<br><br>Basketball: Dominican Republic vs. U.S. (6 p.m. ).<br><br>Tour de France: Stage 12: Medium Mountains (3:30 a.m. NBCSP).<br>?<p>An official list of the nation's top 10 baby names for 2011 is out from the Social Security Administration, and the following names did not make the cut: Bear Blu, Moroccan and Zuzu.</p><p>Those celebrity-offspring nameslikely will remain one-of-a-kind for some time to come.</p><p>Jacob -- the baby-name equivalent of comfort food -- was No. 1 for boys, and Sophia was tops for girls. (See complete list below.) By decade, Jacob was the top name in the 2000s, but for the four decades prior to that, it was Michael all the way. Michael, Mr. Popular, fell to No. 2 in the 2000s.</p> <p>In fact, over the last 100 years, according to the SSA, Michael has held the top spot most often -- 44 times. In the female column, Mary held the No. 1 spot 44 times over the course of a century.But in the 2000s, she took a major dive, falling to No. 65.</p><p>The administration also has created lists of the top baby names by state.</p><p>In California, Hollywood trendsetters sometimes make headlines -- if not the most-common-names list -- with the birth of their new children simply for the naming imagination required. and wife Emma Heming just named their new daughter Mabel; his children with : Rumer, Scout and Tallulah. and Jay-Z famously have Blue Ivy. And and Nick Cannon have twins Moroccan and Monroe (Roc and Roe).</p><p>Then there's 's Kal-El, Jason 's Pilot Inspektor and and 's Kyd.</p><p>But California remains traditional, on the whole. In 2010 (the most recent year for which the SSA had results by state), California's topfive boy names were: Jacob, Daniel, Anthony, Alexander and Angel, appropriate perhaps for the state that has the City of Angels. For girls, it was Isabella, Sophia, Emily, Mia and Emma.</p><p>The complete :</p><p>Boys: Jacob, Mason, William, Jayden, Noah, Michael, Ethan, Alexander, Aiden and Daniel. Girls: Sophia, Isabella, Emma, Olivia, Ava, Emily, Abigail, Madison, Mia and Chloe.</p><p>ALSO: </p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>Join Amy Hubbard on </p>?<p>Seeking a quintessential Los Angeles fashion experience? Here are our picks of the top boutiques where you can have one.</p><p>Elyse Walker</p><p>The vibe: Beachy casual with a metropolitan edge, a shop that includes evening gowns and flip-flops.</p> <p>The goods: The 6,500-square-foot store has everything a woman needs to take her from carpooling ( jackets, Inhabit sweaters and Mother jeans) to a business meeting ( suits, separates) to a museum gala ( and gowns). Owner Elyse Walker, whose family was in the shoe business, puts a huge focus on accessories, including bags by Nancy Gonzalez, and , shoes by Christian Louboutin and Pierre Hardy, and jewelry by Husam el Odeh and Lanvin.</p><p>The back story: Walker opened her store in 1999 with 800 square feet of selling space, gambling that women in Malibu and the Palisades would rather shop with her than trek to Beverly Hills. Personal shopping services are a specialty, and sales associates can text or email clients photos of styles they might like or deliver rolling racks of clothes to their homes.</p><p>Where to find it: Just off Sunset Boulevard at 15306 Antioch St., Pacific Palisades, (310) 230-8882, http://www.forwardbyelysewalker.com.</p><p>American Rag Cie</p><p>The vibe: Southern California high-low style and culture in all its glory &mdash; vintage mixed with denim and workwear, contemporary clothing and streetwear, plus books, DVDs and housewares, and a see-and-be-seen sidewalk cafe.</p><p>The goods: American Rag is really three stores in one. The main shop features designer clothing (Cynthia Vincent, Funktional, Free People, Comme des Gar&ccedil;ons Play) and shoes (Dr. Martens, Toms, Creative Recreation) alongside a superbly edited selection of vintage clothing and accessories. The World Denim Bar has work wear and denim (Denham, PRPS, Levi's Made &amp; Crafted, Ksubi), and the housewares store features outdoor furniture, glassware and accessories with a French Mediterranean twist to match the restaurant's menu.</p><p>The back story: Since opening on La Brea in 1985, founder Mark Werts has grown American Rag Cie from a modest vintage business into a mega boutique with locations in Los Angeles and Newport Beach.</p><p>Where to find it: 150 S. La Brea Ave., Los Angeles, (323) 935-3154, http://www.amrag.com.</p><p>Freecity Supershop</p><p>The vibe: The antidote to cookie-cutter fashion. Hippie chic-meets-Pop Art-meets commune.</p><p>The goods: Unisex T-shirts, sweat shirts, sweat pants, cargo pants and knit caps, as well as cases and Quoddy moccasins hand-printed with doves, rainbows, bicycles and other feel-good graphics, and slogans such as "Share Food," "Basic Goodness" and "Life Nature Love." The shop-cum-art gallery, which has a different theme each year (now it's bikes), also sells patchouli perfume, brown bread, ceramic pots and books on subjects like Oscar Niemeyer, Corita Kent and Yoko Ono.</p><p>The back story: Nina Garduno, the former menswear buyer for Ron Herman at Fred Segal, opened the Freecity Supershop in 2005. Her goal? Put the focus back on the art and craft of fashion.</p><p>Where to find it: 1139 N. Highland Ave., Los Angeles, (323) 461-2226, http://www.freecitysupershop.com.</p><p>Fred Segal</p><p>The vibe: The godfather of the L.A. fashion scene, nearly every designer and stylist in town has worked here at one time or another.</p><p>The goods: High-end designer clothing by , Proenza Schouler, , Carven, , Raquel Allegra and A.L.C., mixed with more affordable stuff by L'Agence, Current/Elliott, and Elizabeth &amp; James, shoes, accessories, beauty products and housewares at the Melrose location. Mauro Cafe, also at the Melrose location and open since 1994, is still one of the most fashionable lunch spots in town.</p><p>The back story: What started as L.A.'s first high-end jeans bar in 1960 has grown into a community of boutiques including Ron Herman, Ron Robinson, Conveyer, Madison and Zero Minus Plus, under the Fred Segal umbrella in two locations.</p>?There was a luxe trashiness to many of the collections for fall that's curious when everyone is in survival mode. Between Alexander Wang in New York, Pucci in Milan, Balmain and Givenchy in Paris, I was left with a distinct morning-after feeling. But why, especially now, would you want to wear a mini-dress the size of a postage stamp that makes you look like a street walker? I suppose it would get you noticed.<br><br>This is the cutting edge of fashion, the thing that's making magazine editors giddy. And there were more measured takes on the tough chic look -- black leather leggings worn with a long boyfriend blazer, the black leather bustier or bomber jacket. I guess if nothing else, sex always sells.<br><br> Other designers leaned on their heritage (Burberry's checks, Missoni's layered knits, 's manor style and Chanel's -like kits of Madame's iconic accessories), or the heritage of others (Balenciaga's ode to ), offering the kind of tweedy coats, cozy sweaters and pretty evening looks that store buyers were referring to as "investment pieces."<br><br>There was a lot to wear: Prada's earthen-hued skirt suits, , and Marc Jacobs' sportswear classics with flashes of neon, Lanvin's elegant, bias cuts, the everyday jackets and pants at DKNY, Derek Lam, Etro, Dries Van Noten, Chloe, YSL and Stella McCartney.<br><br>Now we just have to wait and see if anyone's going to buy. Here, a rundown of the season's top trends:<br><br>Most likely to already be hanging in your closet: A black leather jacket. If not, they were everywhere, the best with a subtle, studded collar at Yves Saint Laurent.<br><br>Outta my way: Power dressing manifested itself in strong shoulders, leg o' mutton sleeves and one-sleeved dresses.<br><br>Sandals aren't just for summer anymore: If it's cold, wear them with tights. If it's slushy, try the season's other big footwear trend, over-the-knee boots.<br><br>To shop for at the vintage stores: Anything 1980s, especially long boyfriend blazers in geometric prints and sparkly mini-dresses.<br><br>New "it" color, besides black, that is: Jade green as seen at Chanel and Louis Vuitton. Wear it sparingly or risk looking like a leprechaun.<br><br>If money is no object: Go for the look at Balmain, the crystal-studded jackets and disco mini-dresses. Or buy the real thing at the Jackson memorabilia auction in Beverly Hills next month.<br><br>Most dubious trend: Capes, especially Marc Jacobs' neon, crossing-guard versions.<br><br>Trend that refuses to go away: Leggings. For a newer look, try high-waisted, pleated and peg-legged pants.<br><br>Trend we thought would never come back: Exposed bras, as seen at Balenciaga and Miu Miu.<br><br>Most timeless trend: Classical draping, as seen at Balenciaga, Viktor & Rolf, Versace, Bottega Veneta, Derek Lam and .<br><br>Most ingenious invention: Lanvin's knit-backed fur stoles, which can be pulled down over jackets, sweaters or coats.<br><br>Most annoying beauty habit: Hair crimping, which was responsible for at least one late runway show start.<br><br>Recession, what recession? Nadia Swarovski, sixth-generation member of the Swarovski family, which has built an empire by supplying crystals to fashion designers, sprinkled fairy dust on nearly every runway collection. She is the season's biggest winner.<br><br>?Jen Meyer met husband here, bought her first Stella McCartney for Chloe dress here, and Shoshanna Lonstein Gruss worked here for a summer.<br><br>The memories are still fresh for retailer Tracey Ross, who last week closed the doors of her boutique, another casualty of the recession.<br><br> "I can't believe it's been 18 years," she said Monday night, stacking the last few pairs of Indian toe-ring sandals on the floor in her near-empty shop. "] and ] stopped in yesterday. I'm just telling people to come by and give me a hug."<br><br>Ross, a look-alike who's Hollywood thin, grew up in Long Beach. She opened on Robertson Boulevard in 1990, before moving to Sunset Plaza in 1996, selling high-end clothes by McCartney, and Derek Lam alongside such L.A. lifestyle necessities as "Trust Me I'm a Yoga Teacher" T-shirts, Shamballa bracelets, Slim Aarons photography books and her own Tracey Ross-branded sugar scrubs and body butters.<br><br>More than a retail store, her boutique was a hangout for celebrities such as , and , who came by to shop and talk, and to grab a latte at the Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf next door. Ross even had a manicurist in the back.<br><br>A "boutique hostess," as The Times called her in a front-page profile in 1998, Ross was perfectly positioned to capitalize on the growing celebrity culture in the 1990s. Her store appeared in an episode of "Beverly Hills, 90210." People came in to shop and to see who was shopping.<br><br>The Coffee Bean closed in 2005. The landscape was shifting in other ways too. It wasn't just L.A. that was feeding on celebrity culture anymore, it was the whole world. Several boutiques like Ross' opened, many on Robertson Boulevard. And unlike some other prominent boutique owners, Ross wouldn't sell and tell, meaning she wouldn't violate customers' privacy by telling reporters what they'd bought, or turn paparazzi on to who was there.<br><br>Also, the fashion world began catering directly to celebrities. Designers opened their own L.A. boutiques at a fast clip -- McCartney, Miu Miu, Alberta Ferretti and Balenciaga. Now, Lindsay and Kate can shop at those places with a hefty discount, or designers send them clothes for free in hopes that they will be photographed wearing them.<br><br> The deep-discount climate of the recession wrote the story's final chapter, putting Ross in competition with department stores such as Saks that were offering as much as 90% off. At the end, everything at Tracey Ross was 70% off.<br><br>"But I appreciate a garment," Ross said, arranging fashion books on top of one of the store's remaining leopard-print tuffets.<br><br>Her departure from the scene makes a person wonder about the future of the boutique culture in Los Angeles, once so integral to the far-flung fashion scene here. All Purpose, Presse, Diabless, Medak, Twenty Two Shoes, Meg, Danmark and Magenta have all recently closed. Even a few branded stores have shuttered, including Sergio Rossi on Melrose Place and Agnes B. on Robertson.<br><br>"Retail isn't what it used to be," said Ross, who plans to spend a few weeks at the Ashram in Calabasas before deciding what to do next. "I was working 50 times harder for nothing. When I opened, it was me, Maxfield and Fred Segal. But now, with all the sales, it's too hard. I can't make a living."<br><br>A saleswoman to the end, she stopped to help a customer with a vintage Chloe bag.<br><br>"There are all these people who grew up here, and that's the hardest part," she said. "This is my life. But all the love and support I felt during the past few days has validated me."<br><br>?<p> </p><p></p><p></p> <br><br>CBSThisMorning ; ; . (N) 7 a.m. KCBS <br><br>Today Venus Williams; Bryan Cranston; Shawn Johnson; caffeine; stress; ; underwear. (N) 7 a.m. KNBC <br><br>KTLA Morning News (N) 7 a.m. KTLA <br><br>Good Morning America Dr. Mehmet Oz; James Carville; Stan Greenberg; The Wiggles. (N) 7 a.m. KABC <br><br>Good Day L.A. (N) 7 a.m. KTTV <br><br>Rachael Ray Competitors try to impress an all-star judge; . 8 a.m. KCAL <br><br>Live With Kelly Matt Bomer; Allison Williams; Lawrence Zarian gives makeovers; co-host . (N) 9 a.m. KABC <br><br>The View ; author James Carville. (N) 10 a.m. KABC <br><br>The Talk Linda Gray; and Carnie Wilson. (N) 1 p.m. KCBS <br><br>The Doctors Solutions for body annoyances; a fix for cellulite; concealing foot veins; lipstick. (N) 2 p.m. KCBS <br><br>Dr. Phil Aspiring child-stars. (Part 1 of 2) (N) 3 p.m. KCBS <br><br>The Dr. Oz Show A triple bypass; warning signs of . 3 p.m. KABC <br><br>The Ellen DeGeneres Show ; ; . 4 p.m. KNBC <br><br>Piers Morgan Tonight (N) 6 and 9 p.m. <br><br>Tavis Smiley . (Part 1 of 2) (N) 11 p.m. KOCE <br><br>?<p>While they adjust to a new name for the long-running performance series anchored at &rsquo;s Royce Hall, audiences may be reassured by the selection of major names that Kristy Edmunds, the new director who tweaked the title, has included in her first season of picks.</p>The 2012-13 season announced Tuesday for the re-branded (formerly UCLA Live) has some top stars of avant-garde or genre-blending performance in , Hal Willner, Meredith Monk, guitarist Bill Frisell and the Dance Company.<p>A roster of American roots music, jazz and art-pop talent features and the (Feb. 12, 2013), (Oct. 2), the Ron Carter Quartet with the Robert Glasper Trio (Oct. 27), the Brad Mehldau Trio and the Bad Plus with Joshua (May 4, 2013), and his country-singer wife, Allison Moorer, with the Living Sisters (Jan. 12, 2013), and twin bills of the Sextet with David Lindley (Nov. 2) and Michelle Ndegeocello with James &ldquo;Blood&rdquo; Ulmer supported by former Living Colour guitarist Vernon Reid (Dec. 7).</p><p>Siblings Rufus and Martha Wainwright will preside over two Christmas shows (Dec. 21-22), keeping up a family tradition begun by their late mother, Kate McGarrigle, when she teamed with her sister, Anna. David Sedaris, a series regular, will continue to spin stories under the new CAP-UCLA banner (May 1).</p> <p>Anderson will offer &ldquo;Dirtday!&rdquo; (Oct. 26), a new piece consisting of songs and stories that she has begun to tour. It&rsquo;s a prelude to offerings that will be forthcoming in future seasons under a recently announced three-year fellowship sponsored by CAP-UCLA, in which Anderson will visit the campus periodically to incubate and present new work. The other CAP-UCLA fellow, stage director , is expected to contribute to series programming starting next season.</p><p>Monk and her vocal ensemble will premiere a new work, &ldquo;On Behalf of Nature&rdquo; (Jan. 18-20 at Freud Playhouse), described as a Buddhist-influenced &ldquo;evening-length &hellip; poetic meditation on the environment.&rdquo;</p><p>The Trisha Brown Dance Company (April 4-7) will offer a retrospective of its leader&rsquo;s choreography in several venues. Two separate main programs will be performed at Royce Hall: &ldquo;I am going to toss my arms &ndash; if you catch them they will be yours,&rdquo; &ldquo;Set and Reset&rdquo; (with score by Laurie Anderson and costumes and sets by ) and the solo piece &ldquo;Watermotor&rdquo; will be seen April 5, and &ldquo;Les Yeux et L&rsquo;ame,&rdquo; &ldquo;Foray Foret,&rdquo; &ldquo;Spanish Dance&rdquo; and &ldquo;Newark&rdquo; on April 7.</p><p>Also on tap are a ticketed performance of Brown&rsquo;s &ldquo;Astral Converted&rdquo; April 4 at UCLA&rsquo;s Sunset Canyon Amphitheatre, and free performances of several other works that dancers from her company will teach to the UCLA students who will perform them. They include &ldquo;Roof Piece&rdquo; on April 6 and &ldquo;Floor of the Forest,&rdquo; which calls for erecting a sculptural set piece in the courtyard of the Hammer Museum.</p><p>Other dance offerings are the Akram Khan Company&rsquo;s &ldquo;Vertical Road,&rdquo; based on mystic poetry by Rumi and Sufi authors (Oct. 5-6) and Belgian company Ultima Vez and choreographer Wim Vandekeybus&rsquo; revival of the 1987 piece &ldquo;What the Body Does Not Remember&rdquo; (March 15-16).</p><p>The theatrical peformances that had stopped the last two seasons because money was short will resume, led by a staging of Eugene Ionesco&rsquo;s absurdist classic &ldquo;Rhinoceros,&rdquo; performed in the original French, with supertitles, by Theatre de la Ville-Paris (Sept. 21-22 at Royce Hall).</p><p>Britain&rsquo;s Cheek by Jowl company, which performed &ldquo;Othello&rdquo; in the 2004 UCLA season, will be back with another Elizabethan classic, &rsquo;s blood-soaked &ldquo;&rsquo;Tis Pity She&rsquo;s a Whore&rdquo; (Jan. 9-11 at Freud Playhouse).</p><p>Australia&rsquo;s Back to Back Theatre, an ensemble composed mainly of actors with mental disabilities, will perform its company-generated touring production, &ldquo;Ganesh Versus the Third Reich,&rdquo; in which the elephant-headed Hindu god goes on a quest through to reclaim the swastika, the sacred symbol from ancient India purloined by Hitler and his minions (Jan. 24-27 at Freud Playhouse).</p><p>Another Australian import is &rsquo;s Circus Oz (Feb. 7-10, 2013) whose acrobats and onstage band dress in neo-Victorian steampunk fashion.</p><p>Edmunds&rsquo; first season at UCLA bears some traces of her own past as an impresario. In addition to the two Australian acts, which underscore her mid-2000s tenure as director of the Melbourne Internatinoal Arts Festival, the season will include a performance by actress-writer-filmmaker , who sprang from the Portland scene that Edmunds fostered in the 1990s, when she founded the city&rsquo;s Institute for Contemporary Art. July&rsquo;s piece, &ldquo;The Auction&rdquo; (Oct. 18 at Freud Playhouse), includes her own stories and interviews with volunteers from the audience who will put up personal items to be sold over the course of the show.</p><p>More recently, Edmunds has served as consulting artistic director in charge of programming at Manhattan&rsquo;s Park Avenue Armory, and her first UCLA season includes a new work that premiered there in February &ndash; Willner&rsquo;s staging of &ldquo;Kaddish for Naomi Ginsberg (1894-1956),&rdquo; Allen Ginsburg&rsquo;s poem about his mother&rsquo;s madness and death. Willner and actress will perform the poem (April 17, 2013), with a score written and conducted by Frisell, and projections of paintings by artist Ralph Steadman.</p><p>Frisell's gig with Willner will be his second of the UCLA season. He'll also present &ldquo;The Great Flood&rdquo; (Oct. 13), a collaboration with filmmaker , in which Frisell wrote and performs the score to accompany the on-screen portrayal of the devastating 1927 flooding along the Mississippi River. &ldquo;The Great Flood&rdquo; is part of the multi-venue Angel City Jazz Festival, as is the Oct. 14 Royce Hall concert by pianist Vijay Iyer, who&rsquo;ll perform in trio, quartet and sextet combinations, with saxophonist Steve Coleman sitting in with the trio. Also on the jazz list are the Robert Glasper Experiment (Oct. 25), saxophonist Rudresh Mahanthappa (March 2) and Medski Martin &amp; Wood (April 26).</p><p>Poet, playwright and novelist Carl Hancock Rux will read from his book &ldquo;The Exalted,&rdquo; with piano accompaniment (March 9 at the Glorya Kafuman Theater).</p><p>Departing from a basic tenet of showbiz theory, Edmunds has decided to sell only half of Royce Hall's seats for the classical vocal group Anonymous 4&rsquo;s performance of &ldquo;love fail,&rdquo; composer David Lang&rsquo;s setting of the story of Tristan and Isolde and modern love stories (Dec. 1). She thinks it will resonate more deeply with audiences &ndash; and that the acoustics will be more suited to the material &ndash; if listeners occupy every other seat.</p><p>&ldquo;The more bodies, the more absorptive it is acoustically, and there&rsquo;s something about having a generosity of acoustical air around you that is worth exploring,&rdquo; Edmunds said. &ldquo;I&rsquo;m trying to leave seats in between everyone so they can have this little world that&rsquo;s just theirs.&rdquo; As for couples who simply can&rsquo;t bear to be a seat&rsquo;s width apart, she said, &ldquo;if they want to scoot over, they can.&rdquo; Anonymous 4 will give a free performance of &ldquo;love fails&rdquo; Nov. 30 in the rotunda of UCLA&rsquo;s Powell Library, where space will be limited.</p><p>Classical violinist Hahn-Bin performs &ldquo;Till Dawn Sunday&rdquo; (Jan. 10), an episodic program drawing on various composers. The rest of the classical programming comes from the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra. Instead of presenting seven Royce Hall performances independently, as it has in the past, the orchestra will move them under the CAP-UCLA umbrella. Benjamin Wallfisch is guest conductor Nov. 11 for a program including Elgar, Beethoven and the world premiere of his own violin concerto; music director Jeffrey Kahane conducts Oct. 7, Dec. 9, Jan. 27, March 24, April 21 and May 19.</p><p>Global music headliners are Bebel Gilberto (Sept. 28), Bajofondo (Oct. 12), Grupo Fantasma and Chicha Libre (Nov. 9), Yemen Blues (Nov. 15) and &rsquo;s tribute to his father, Ali Farka Toure (Feb. 1, 2013). Soul singer performs Nov. 29, and and Robert Randolph leads an evening of blues and gospel pedal steel guitar (Feb. 23, 2013).</p><p>The number of ticketed performances for the season rises to 51 (not counting the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra concerts) after having fallen to 43 and 36 during the two seasons in which theater was dropped.</p><p>RELATED:</p><p></p><p></p><p></p>?<p> </p><p></p><p></p> <p><br>SERIES<br><br>America's Lost Treasures: Hosts Curt Doussett and Kinga Philipps travel to 10 U.S. cities and invite locals to bring in their artifacts to find out what they're really worth in this new series (9 and 10 p.m. National Geographic).<br><br>Hollywood Heights: In this new episode, Chloe tells Eddie that Tyler has been stalking her (9 p.m. ).<br><br>Dallas: With tension mounting between the newly married Christopher and Rebecca (, ), family ties begin to unravel when the deed to Southfork is revealed. and also star in this new episode (9 p.m. ).<br><br>Final Witness: This new episode that ends in tragedy tells the story of a troubled young couple in New Orleans' French Quarter who fell in love just weeks before (10 p.m. ).<br><br>SPECIALS<br><br>2012 Hot Dog Eating Contest: From Coney Island, N.Y. (Noon and 7 p.m. ; 1 p.m. ).<br><br>MOVIES<br><br>Independence Day: heads an all-star cast in this 1996 edge-of-your-seat sci-fi thriller about an alien armada on a mission to invade Earth. Directed by , the film also stars , , , , and (8 and 11 p.m. ).<br><br>SPORTS<br><br>Baseball: The Angels visit the (1 p.m. FSN); the visit the (4 p.m. ESPN); the visit the (4 p.m. WGN A); the visit the Dodgers (6 p.m. FS Prime).<br><br>Soccer: The Philadelphia Union visits the Galaxy (7:30 p.m. KDOC).<br><br>Tennis: Wimbledon: Women's Semifinals (5 a.m. ESPN).<br><br>Tour de France: Stage 5 (5 a.m. NBCSP).</p>?Fourteen years ago, the gender breakdown for behind-the-scenes employment in the top 250 films was 83% men and 17% women. By last year, women had improved their representation -- ever so slightly.<br> <br> In 2011,the division of labor in the same number ofmovies was82% men and 18% women, according to a San Diego State University study looking at directors, writers, executive producers, producers, editors and cinematographers.<br> <br> "The shocking underrepresentation of women in our business" is how Oscar-winning actress described the "dreadful" statistics Tuesday night during Women in Film's 2012 Crystal and Lucy Awards ceremony at the Beverly Hilton hotel.<br> <br> Hollywood's heavy tilt toward men in the executive suites, and among those selecting which films get made, was lamented frequently during the star-studded gala that honored performer and NBCUniversal executive , among others.<br> <br> During the last five years, "five little movies aimed at women have brought in over $1.6 billion in worldwide box office," Streep told the ballroom crowded with women.<br> <br> Streepstarred in three of those five films -- "," "The Devil Wears Prada" and for which she won a best actress Oscar this yearfor her portrayal of British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher. The other two successes she mentioned were and<br> <br> Those films "cost a fraction of what the big tent-pole failures cost," Streep said, not mentioning by name movies geared toward men that turned out to be spectacular disappointments at the box office. Walt Disney Co. took a $200-million write-down on its bomband Universal Pictures'underperforming "Battleship" left top executives at the studio and its parent company,, more than a little seasick.<br> <br> "The Iron Lady" cost $14 million to make, Streep said, and generated $114 million in global ticket sales. "Pure profit," Streep said, noting that despite the strong showing, studios continue to make few movies specifically targeted at women.<br> <br> "Why? Why? Why? Don't they want the money?" Streep asked the crowd, who broke into laughter.<br><br> <br> Davis, who was nominated for for her role in "The Help" (but lost to Streep's "Iron Lady" performance) was honored by Women in Film for achievement and contributions to the industry, including breaking through Hollywood's gender and color barriers.<br> <br> Hammer, chairman of NBCUniversal Cable Entertainment, who is in charge of such cable networks as USA, , E! and G-4, received the group's Lucy award. The award is named for , a pioneer on the business side of television as well as onscreen.<br> <br> The group bestowed its humanitarian award on ("Up All Night"), and 15-year-old Chloe Grace Moretz received the Max Mara Face of the Future award. Anette Haellmigk, the lead director for three years on 's "Big Love," was honored with the Kodak vision award.<br> <br> Five Fox movie executives -- Nancy Utley, president of Fox Searchlight Pictures; Emma Watts, president of production for ; Elizabeth Gabler, president of production for Fox 2000 Pictures; Claudia Lewis, president of production atFox Searchlight; and Vanessa Morrison Murchison, president of Fox Animation, were recognized for professional excellence.<br> <br> RELATED:<br> <br> <br> <br> <br> <br>?Go for gloss<p>Traditionally, we all reach for the bleach (or at least a few well-placed highlights) during the summer months, but for spring/summer &#039;09, it&#039;s all about the brunette. A colour tint can really bring out the shine for natural brunettes; just make sure you use the appropriate products in-between trips to your colourist to keep your gloss. We like Kerastase Bain Chroma Riche, &pound;13, which promotes shine and radiance in coloured hair.

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