Bear Down Wildcats

So this former child actor is publishing a tell-all this week. Her upbringing in Hollywood sounds miserable. Exploited by her mother (hence the title of her memoir) and sexually harassed as a minor by producers on the set of her Nickelodeon shows. In her book she doesn't shy away from raging against the fame she came into:

"I know I've grown bitter. I know I've grown resentful. But I don't care. I feel like that show robbed me of my youth, of a normal adolescence where I could experience life without every little thing I did being critiqued, discussed, or ridiculed. I started to thoroughly dislike fame by the time I turned sixteen, but now at twenty-one, I despise it."

"It doesn't help that I'm famous for a thing I started when I was a kid. I think of what it would be like if everyone was famous for a thing they did when they were thirteen: their middle school band, their seventh-grade science project, their eighth-grade play. The middle school years are the years to stumble, fall, and tuck under the rug as soon as you're done with them because you've already outgrown them by the time you're fifteen."

"But not for me. I'm cemented in people's minds as the person I was when I was a kid. A person I feel like I've far outgrown. But the world won't let me outgrow it. The world won't let me be anyone else."

"I'm aware enough to know how annoying and whiney this all sounds. Millions of people dream of being famous, and here I am with fame and hating it. I somehow feel entitled to my hatred since I was not the one who dreamed of being famous. Mom was. Mom pushed this on me. I'm allowed to hate someone else's dream, even if it's my reality."

The older I get the more I'm glad to not/never be famous, especially in terms of show-biz. But because of the allure of fame, especially for how fame validates our bottomless sense of inner self-worship, it's inevitable that those who end up most seeing through fame are the ones like McCurdy who learned the hard way.

So why don't we see more celebrities this honest when it comes to voicing their misery over the trappings of fame? McCurdy speaks in refreshingly raw terms to two of several reasons (bolded) why fame sucks, the latter of which details reasons why it might be difficult to admit:

-Fame locks your private life into a nearly unchangeable identity, especially if you're young and have since long grown past hearing people say "I see dead people."

-Celebrities often work(ed) very hard for their fame and once they've reached the levels of recognition they've dreamed of, they consciously work against fame's inevitable disillusionment to avoid admitting, not just to themselves, but especially to the commoners, that fame doesn't live up to what they hoped. To interpret McCurdy, a celebrity doesn't want to guilt of rejecting the fame that so many others blindly dream of.

We can't talk about politics in this thread but I thought christians weren't supposed to do these types of things

84Cat wrote: ↑Sat Aug 20, 2022 4:23 pm We can't talk about politics in this thread but I thought christians weren't supposed to do these types of things

Who says we can't talk about politics in this thread? The lower boards are Thunderdome.

UAEebs86 wrote: ↑Sat Aug 20, 2022 4:50 pm

84Cat wrote: ↑Sat Aug 20, 2022 4:23 pm We can't talk about politics in this thread but I thought christians weren't supposed to do these types of things

Who says we can't talk about politics in this thread? The lower boards are Thunderdome.

Annie Get Your Prop Gun

Merkin wrote: ↑Sat Sep 10, 2022 10:37 pm

Another rich right wing asshole corruptly stealing public funds.

Carcassdragger wrote: ↑Wed Sep 14, 2022 10:30 am

Merkin wrote: ↑Sat Sep 10, 2022 10:37 pm

Another rich right wing asshole corruptly stealing public funds.

And he will get less of a punishment than someone not in his position stealing a pack of gum

Or God forbid trying to pass a fake $20 bill.


Cue Dave Chappelle.

It's like our friend Ezra is actively living out his own personal disaster mockumentary rather than facing reality as something that can have lingering consequences; from Vanity Fair:

"What’s clear is that Miller has been endangering not just their career, but also their safety—and allegedly that of others—in increasingly plain sight for the last two years. Since 2020, the actor has been accused of crimes and abuses spanning 6,000 miles and two oceans: throwing a chair that hit a woman in the forehead, threatening a couple in their bedroom and stealing their wallet and passport in Hawaii, on top of the incident at Margarita Village; choking two strangers in Iceland; and breaking into a neighbor’s home in Vermont to steal alcohol, which resulted in a felony charge."

"According to the insider, the actor has grown increasingly narcissistic, often choosing young people for their audience, because they are more malleable: “He’d talk about the metaverse and the medicine and how they’re the Messiah and what his work is here. They say their spiritual practice is to be among the people—which means party. So, when in Iceland, he was out nonstop. His favorite were raves, where he’d go on benders for two or three days at a time.”"

"The house in Vermont contains an altar that’s home to bullets, weed, sage, and Flash figurines, according to two people who visited this year. “A lot of times he makes the women put their cell phones on the altar when they come in, and other offerings,” says a longtime friend. “Ezra freaked out recently…demanding that Susan Sarandon come pay tribute to his altar because she didn’t invite Ezra to a dinner party.”"

"By the time Miller was in Hawaii this spring, the actor no longer resembled the style icon with chiseled cheekbones who once wore daring looks to Met Galas. Miller was emaciated and unshowered, subsisting on energy drinks spiked with rum, gas-station snacks, and “medicine,” according to a witness."

UAEebs86 wrote: ↑Sat May 21, 2022 7:48 am I had heard for years that behind the scenes she's a pretty bad person, the complete opposite of her phoney upbeat excited show host schtick. Guess it finally caught up with her.

Greyson Chance, the young musician who became famous after his YouTube-posted performance of Lady Gaga's "Paparazzi" went viral in April 2010 and was invited to appear on The Ellen DeGeneres Show, said in a new interview that he felt trauma over the way the host treated him.

"I've never met someone more manipulative, more self-centered, and more blatantly opportunistic than her," he told Rolling Stone in a story published Thursday, as he released his new album, Palladium.

Chance, who's now 25, was just 12 when he became the buzz of the internet. DeGeneres called a week later, and he took his first plane ride from Oklahoma to Los Angeles, Calif. where he said that DeGeneres assured him and his mother, Lisa, that they were "going to do this together."

But Chance told the magazine that DeGeneres "became domineering and way too controlling." For example, she stipulated what he wore, and what he didn't; no leather, since she's a vegan. "She would come in and look at a rack, yell at stylists, berate people in front of me and say, 'This is what you're wearing on the show,'" Chance said. "She was just degrading to people."

UAEebs86 wrote: ↑Sat May 21, 2022 7:48 am I had heard for years that behind the scenes she's a pretty bad person, the complete opposite of her phoney upbeat excited show host schtick. Guess it finally caught up with her.

Greyson Chance, the young musician who became famous after his YouTube-posted performance of Lady Gaga's "Paparazzi" went viral in April 2010 and was invited to appear on The Ellen DeGeneres Show, said in a new interview that he felt trauma over the way the host treated him.

"I've never met someone more manipulative, more self-centered, and more blatantly opportunistic than her," he told Rolling Stone in a story published Thursday, as he released his new album, Palladium.

Chance, who's now 25, was just 12 when he became the buzz of the internet. DeGeneres called a week later, and he took his first plane ride from Oklahoma to Los Angeles, Calif. where he said that DeGeneres assured him and his mother, Lisa, that they were "going to do this together."

But Chance told the magazine that DeGeneres "became domineering and way too controlling." For example, she stipulated what he wore, and what he didn't; no leather, since she's a vegan. "She would come in and look at a rack, yell at stylists, berate people in front of me and say, 'This is what you're wearing on the show,'" Chance said. "She was just degrading to people."

Is it a surprise Brad Pitt turns out to be enemy #1 amongst his own family, to the point his adult children won’t speak to him? Pitt’s carefully curated public image sure went a long way in granting him the benefit of the doubt against years of rumors that are now confirmed.

It's a joke but still made me chuckle.

The drama with Tom Brady is by no slight part more fascinating because this is a guy who up to this point has had EVERYTHING in life go wildly right for him. Athletic, tall/handsome/ageless, marries a super model, esteemed by adoring fans and media as the GOAT - all for TWO decades now.

And now that we're seeing the first self-inflicted cracks, Brady is NOT handling it well. (Divorce and child custody battles seemed something SO beneath his image.) Take last Sunday screaming like an entitled brat at his OL. Yea, it's Tom Brady they are taking it from, but how many of those guys were also reminding themselves that Tom was the one (not them) blowing off several practices earlier in the week, partly to play guest celeb at Robert Kraft's wedding in NYC?

As an aside, Tom looking/acting pissed is made all the dumber looking by that ridiculous, oversized camo ballcap.

Don’t bother reading every line of the motherlode of degeneracy that is Andy Dick. Instead, blurring your eyes while scrolling through provides an effective enough experience of his endless rap sheet. How did this guy last in Hollywood for so long? Ultimately he didn’t, though given this list, I’m surprised he’s still alive:

--Reputation as a known public drunk since the 90s
--Attended the 1997 Christmas party hosted by his sitcom costar Phil Hartman, where he supplied cocaine to Hartman's wife, causing her to relapse after ten years of sobriety. While high on cocaine five months later, she murdered Phil before taking her own life. Andy Dick is widely blamed for prompting the mental crisis which led to the Hartman's murder suicide.
--After Hartmann was replaced by John Lovits on said NBC sitcom, the two routinely feuded on the set, especially over the subject of Hartmann's death
--Andy Dick, as the angel of death he is, was soon involved in a second celebrity death. After partying with sitcom actor David Strickland and supplying him with cocaine, Strickland wandered off to an off-Strip hotel with a hooker where he later found to have hung himself with bedsheets.
--In May of 1999, arrested after crashing his car into a telephone pole and trying to flee the scene. When police caught up with him, they found marijuana and cocaine, for which he plead guilty.
--In 2004, arrested for yanking down his pants in the dining area of McDonalds
--In 2005, removed from stage at an Edmonton comedy club after pulling down his pants
--In 2005, faced backlash for excessively groping Pam Anderson during Comedy Central's live celebrity roast event
--In August of 2006, Andy Dick was invited back for Comedy Central’s roast of William Shatter, where, as part of his act, he licked and slobbered on the faces of Fara Faucet, Carrie Fisher, and Patton Oswalt
--That same evening, sexually harassed a New York Post journalist backstage by groping, biting her hand, urinating on the carpet, and offering her cocaine
--In December of 2006, while performing standup in LA, Andy Dick called the audience racial slurs as a callback to Kramer a few weeks earlier getting into a lot of trouble for using those same racial slurs during his standup
--In February 2007, forcibly removed from a late night talk show when he started rubbing Ivanka Trump’s legs
--In 2007, cited for urinating on a sidewalk while inebriated after a comedy performance at an Ohio nightclub
--In 2007, assaulted at bar by John Lovits over teasing comments Andy Dick made about Phil Hartman’s death
--In 2008 at a chicken wing place, arrested for exposing himself and sexual battery. The victims were minors and upon being searched by police marijuana and Xanax were confiscated. Sentenced to 3 years probation.
--In January 2010, Andy Dick was arrested in West Virginia bar for groping a bartender; sentenced to a drug diversion program
--In July 2010 Andy Dick crashed a party where he groped several guests before exposing himself; his “handlers” arrived to take him away before the police could arrive
--In January 2011 Andy Dick was kicked out of the Adult Video Movie awards after groping pornstar Tera Patrick and drag queen Chi Chi LaRue backstage
--In April 2011, exposed himself at an Orange County film festival and urinated on a festival display booth before destroying the backdrop
--In May 2011, arrested for drunken disorderliness in a restaurant
--In August 2011, went on an anti-Semitic tirade against Howard Stern while a guest on a radio show
--Finally, after staying out of trouble for several years, in early 2017 Andy Dick was kicked off the cast of the movie Raising Buchanan over sexual harassment on set
--In October 2017, fired from his second movie role that year, due to “multiple, flagrant acts of improper conduct and inappropriate contact with several cast and crew members.”
--In March 2018 Andy Dick’s ex wife filed for a restraining order against him, attributing broken windows to Andy arguing with his son
--In April 2018, charged with sexual battery after groping a woman he was passing by on a sidewalk, for which he was sentenced to 14 days in an LA County jail
--That some month an investigation into sexual battery is opened against Andy Dick for groping his Uber driver
--In August 2019, punched out on a New Orleans sidewalk after groping a man outside a night club. A concussion and brain bleed kept him in the hospital for two nights.
--In October 2019, assaulted an Uber Eats driver after trying to take somebody else’s order, resulting in getting body slammed onto the pavement
--In June 2021, arrested for felony assault with a deadly weapon, after getting drunk and beating a an ex boyfriend with a metal folding chair
--In October 2021, assaulted the same ex boyfriend with an iron skillet after an argument over whether Andy Dick had burned down the ex boyfriend’s house
--Later that year, arrested for felony domestic battery after striking another boyfriend with a liquor bottle
--And earlier this year, Andy Dick, possibly homeless by now and a full on junkie, joins a streamer community dedicated to livestreaming their degeneracy day and night
--In April 2022, Andy Dick is mugged and has his face beaten in in Las Vegas, only to show off his injuries on live stream the following week
--To recover from his injuries, Andy Dick moves in with a fellow livestreamer who promptly uses the moment to steal donations sent to Andy’s livestream channel, spending it on vodka and weed
--While still recovering from his injuries, the same fellow livestreamer, during an argument, pulls a gun on Andy Dick during livestream, prompting viewers to call police for a welfare check
--At this point it is known that after Andy Dick was evicted from his apartment earlier in the spring, he moved near an area where evictions would be difficult to enforce – Skid Row, where his drug and alcohol abuse has accelerated this year
--As is the case with livestreaming communities, it becomes difficult to tell whether the drama involves real or staged danger, but apparently Andy Dick has been on-and-off held hostage by fellow livestreamers. Other livestreamers have tried to rescue him; at one point the police arrived and removed Andy Dick from a livestreamed apartment.
--Now free, Andy Dick winds up with a new set of livestreamers in an RV. His intoxication continues and his old habits of groping and violence resurface, this time for a streaming audience. All this culminates in Andy Dick getting arrested one morning on livestream after police were called after Andy Dick is suspected of sexually assaulting a fellow RVer while they were blacked out.
--This past month Andy Dick was charged with first-degree residential burglary after allegedly stealing power tools, to which he pleaded not guilty.
--And just last week, with previous legal troubles finally reaching the courts, Andy Dick was sentenced to 90 days in jail and registered as a sex offender over his 2018 assault of an Uber driver:

Fresh off a prison sentance, guess who wastes no time getting arrested AGAIN?

"The disgraced funnyman was thrown in jail again after a caller reported him drunk or possibly high on a lakeside street in the Los Angeles suburb of Lake Elsinore, Calif., at around 12:30 a.m., according to the Riverside County Sheriff’s office. Cops did a routine records check and found that Dick, 57, wasn’t up to date on his sex offender registration, which stemmed from the groping in April 2018."

I imagine the New Mexico film industry workers are all slapping their foreheads in unison.

Merkin wrote: ↑Fri Jan 20, 2023 8:09 pm I imagine the New Mexico film industry workers are all slapping their foreheads in unison.

The reported reactions of film workers in NM have been mixed, with most that I've seen being supportive of the charges.In fact, before the incident, people in New Mexico's tightknit film industry who worked on the "Rust" set had walked out in protest of poor working conditions.

I think Baldwin's role as producer is the focus of his liability more than his role as an actor who was handed a loaded weapon.

Safety is a big concern, and not exclusively with guns, on sets.

Our friend Armie Hammer was in the news over the weekend for doing his first interview since his “cannibalism scandal” broke two years ago, when “claims of sexual abuse and cannibalistic fetishism were made against Hammer, including rape, physical and emotional abuse, and sexual violence masquerading as BDSM” (quote from wiki).

I didn’t pay much attention, then or since, but an older detail (from last summer) that really caught my attention was how Hammer’s fallout and dismissal from Hollywood reduced him to such a level of financial ruin that he was selling timeshares in the Cayman Islands. Sources stated Hammer had been completely cut off from his very wealthy family and took the job simply to support his estranged family. (For a bit of context, Hammer spent his grade school years living in Cayman.)

Good for him, I guess? I can’t picture most anyone else in Hollywood having the humility to take up much 9-to-5 work. For all the headliner movies I’ve seen Hammer in, to know he’s already that broke is NUTS! Wouldn’t he be getting residual income from recent movies? It was only last year that Death On the Nile was released, where he had a leading part.

Merkin wrote: ↑Mon Feb 06, 2023 10:12 am

Not necessarily bad celebrity behavior but it was announced a few weeks ago that Dr Phil’s daytime show will end this Spring after 21 seasons. Figured since already touching on The Ellen Show’s unceremonious finish after 19 seasons it’s worth noting two of daytime TV’s most prominent pillars will be gone after two decades of cultural prominence.

It turns out Dr Phil’s joint decision with CBS to call it quits has a lot to do with sponsors bailing – from Ny Post:

“After years of Dr. Phil McGraw staging dramatic “interventions” with wayward teens and squabbling families — and in some cases being accused of exploiting the troubles of celebrities like Britney Spears and Shelley Duvall — CBS insiders were concerned that viewers and advertisers alike were lumping in Dr. Phil with other “quack doctors” who have left TV in recent years…the show had become radioactive for many sponsors, according to sources close to the situation. “The advertising queue was all but dead,” one insider said. “The show was relying on CBS to book ads as opposed to relying on Dr. Phil’s brand.”

To work on revamping the show’s reputation: “The show turned to more substantive topics like “medical gaslighting” rather than interpersonal drama…Nevertheless, bookers for the show have had trouble lining up big-name panelists…It’s a dramatic turn from just a few years ago, when Dr. Phil’s programming was focused on helping troubled teens like the now-famous “cash me outside” girl and helping women leave toxic relationships.”

Howard Stern has reached Late-Stage Fame, and isn’t a fan.

The way Stern revolutionized talk radio no longer has traction and can’t be aired across today's entertainment environment. His 90s mainstreaming of the shock jock radio personality sexually harassed his female callers, badgered his (female) in-studio guests to take their clothes off, bragged about cheating on his first wife and his absentee (non-)fathering to their child, and fat shamed and made a mockery individuals with stuttering and mental handicaps. None of which could air on today’s terrestrial radio.

So what’s one way celebrities who are past their prime cope with their decline? They shamelessly pander for the attention of currently relevant celebrities. And in Howard Stern’s case, unselfconsciously whine about their waning status, especially when the new generations don’t care who is:

“Stern went on a strange rant complaining that Black NBA players have largely ignored him when sitting courtside.
“They put me courtside! And the Black players won’t come over and say hello to me,” Stern said. “But they go over to Spike Lee.”
“They don’t acknowledge you at all?” Quivers asked.
“No. I’ll be sitting next to Tracy Morgan or Chris Rock. You know, they seat you where they seat you. And a lot of times when I’m there, I’m next to Tracy Morgan, who is so funny. And he’s sitting there and like, a couple of the players will come over. They like give him that bro shake and stuff. And I’m like — these guys should hug me too,” Stern continued. “I mean, what am I? I grew up in a Black neighborhood, you know what I mean? I mean they should know that. But I get ignored.”
Quivers asked him to surmise why that might be the case, to which Stern assumed it’s because he’s a “white guy.”

Fuck the CoS and almost all organized religions.

Was reading up on Masterson's conviction yesterday and, though I knew he was a Scientologist, I had no idea his church was so aggressively involved in protecting Masterson against the consequences of the clear and obvious harm he caused unfortunate women. From the Hollywood Reporter:

"The Church of Scientology played a crucial role in the trial. Allegations against the church were allowed to be considered to explain why the accusers, all of whom are former Scientologists, didn’t contact law enforcement immediately after the alleged assaults. They testified that they feared being labeled a “suppressive person” within the church, which would lead to their expulsion and isolation from other members, and were told that the accusations would be internally handled."

"The accusers are also pursuing a civil case against the church, which has been paused until Masterson’s criminal proceedings are finished. They claim that they have been harassed by members after reporting their alleged rapes to law enforcement. Last year, the Supreme Court turned down a bid by the church to handle the case in arbitration."

I hate reality shows with a passion.

Guess dad is going to have to take over again.

CatsbyAZ wrote: ↑Thu Jun 01, 2023 9:00 am Was reading up on Masterson's conviction yesterday...

Masterson today sentenced to the FULL 30 YEARS

I'm going to go out on a limb here but I think most of us know that putting a pillow over someone's face and then raping them isn't a very good idea. I do feel bad for his family though

Is anyone going to explore how Scientology contributed to Masterson’s belief that he was above the law and could do what he wanted to those women with impunity?

Jimmy Fallon joins the behind-the-scenes horribleness of Ellen and James Corden.

To reference a quote I came across: "between Ellen, Corden, and Jimmy Fallon, it really should be a huge tell that the "I'm nice! I appeal to all sides! Let's play some silly games!" hosts are more often than not a front for a shockingly mean persona"

I recall reading about the early days of SNL and what an asshole Chase was to everyone except Lorne Michaels.

Not sure if he is high on Jesus, high on meth, or both.

He was in one of my all time favorite films: The Usual Suspects. It's the only time he hasn't nauseated me. In fact I liked him in it.

^^^ Is he mentally ill?

He was funny for about 2 minutes in Fred Claus. "That's not Alec!!!"

What's the point of all these really personal items coming out into the open?

UAEebs86 wrote: ↑Sat Oct 07, 2023 9:55 am ^^^ Is he mentally ill?

He was funny for about 2 minutes in Fred Claus. "That's not Alec!!!"

When I think of Stephen Bladwin I think of how he absolutely nailed the role of Barney Rubble in Flintstones Viva Rock Vegas: