1a. High: Pretend you like "classic" film. LACMA's
Bertolucci Fest kicks off this weekend with showings of Before the Revolution, The Grim Reaper, and The Conformist.
1b. Low: Admit you like dumb stuff with gratuitous nudity. Porky's Revival/Q&A at the Arclight.
2a. High: Pretend you like the KCRW morning playlist. The Magnetic Fields at the Wilshire Ebell Theatre, Modest Mouse and The Walkmen at the Avalon, and Sonic Youth at the Henry Fonda.
2b. Low: Admit you stopped liking new things after the fraternity initiation. John Mayer at the Verizon Ampitheatre, Hootie and the Blowfish in Costa Mesa, Rooney at the Wiltern.

There's not a lot for us to say about this reader sighting of former Liza Minnelli gimp David Gest, except that it's never right to blame the victim of (alleged) domestic abuse—even if he appears to have incompetently-installed hair plugs. Of course, there's the mitigating factor that after this encounter, the reader is now a victim of sorts; his nightmares, starring Gest as a gay, fashion-impaired vampire, will be punishment enough:

—Hollywood test case for requiring licenses to reproduce?
—We're looking forward to when Courtney Love is transformed into a live-action character. That will be some crazy shit.
—Star mag applies the gossip-standards bitchslap to NY Post for the Britney booze story. But come on, chasing your ginseng shot with a Red Bull is like cleansing your nasal cavity for coke with crystal meth.
—Mira Sorvino is probably knocked up, but didn't we tell you that already?
—Line of the day, re: secret Black iPods: "I think the original iPods were black, and then were later changed to white, just like they did to Jesus."

Ah, fuck. Remember when those oh-so-wackily-painted cows were all over town a couple of years ago? This year they're foisting off hundreds of four-foot apples on us, obstructing our v. v. important navigations to Starbucks and Barnes and Noble. Why? Why do they want to hurt us? Summer is bad enough with the stupid street fairs and the growing explosion of underarm hair. (Have you noticed? Pit hair is back, baby! It's tres European!)
How Do Like These Apples? [Gothamist]

There are three blind items on Page Six today, and they're actually pretty juicy. Let's measure the Zeitgeist together: send your thoughts to tips@gawker.com for publication at the end of the day.
Just Asking [NYP]

—A nasty diet drink, Whoopi Goldberg, "a stream of vulgar sexual wordplays on Bush's name in a riff about female genitalia," and the loss of a sponsorship. All of the elements for comedy are here, but we just can't make ourselves care.
—Go to Disneyland and you die. It's really that simple. [via blogging.la]
—Did we mention that Hasselhoff likes Players Extreme Vodka? How's the rehab going, Dave?
—In an unexpected moment of prescience, we wrote this about the Olsen Twins: "Also, we're not quite sure which one of the set is going to be the Corey Feldman and which the Corey Haim, but the process of figuring it out is sure to be magnificent." Y'all better start listening to us; the twins you save may be your own.

Sister site Gawker posts on a recent legal threat inspired by our recent coverage of the utterly non-hot, totally illegal Cameron Diaz "S&M" tape. The endless threat letter is excerpted over at Gawker. Seriously, if Diaz's publicity people spent one-tenth of the effort that Diaz's legal attack dogs spend on cease-and-desist letters, her ass would've been nominated for its tear-jerking performance in both Charlie's Angels movies.

· Finally, Basic Instinct 2? A sequel whose time has long passed, starring a certified box office killer. Produced by guys who had to be sued into making the damn thing, probably because they realize that a Sharon Stone beaver shot doesn't carry the box-office power of ages yore. They really need a little injection of Lohan, in our humble opinion. [Variety,
sub. req'd.]
· Frances McDormand and Charlize Theron sitting in a tree...the two actresses currently working together on Aeon Flux are looking to pair up again for Class Action, the simply riveting story of the first successfully prosecuted sexual harassment case. A banner day for women's rights, HR seminar-leaders, and the handsy guys in Accounts Payable alike. [THR]
· A Harvard study shows that the MPAA has slowly become increasingly tolerant of swearing, violence, and sex in its rating system. What they have dubbed a "ratings creep" is quickly turning into a full-on invasion, as proven by Lindsay Lohan's exploitative, melon-smuggling omnipresence. [THR]
· Trouble at the TCA's: Are companies buying good reviews? The organization looks to celebrate its 20th anniversary with a souvenir program, paid for by ads purchased by the very networks and studios the group covers. [Variety, sub. req'd]

· Rocco's momma pissed to find strange man in "The Restaurant" kitchen making meatballs. Ink-hungry Rocco and feuding biz partner Jeffrey Chodorow thrilled at the attention. [NYP]
· Conde Nastie gals mack on potential First Stepson Chris Heinz at "very magazine hip crowd" benefit. Do let us know when one of you finally nails Chris, mmkay? [NYO]
· Xtina Aguilera loves strippers — but has a boyfriend. Really? Who's she dating? [NYDN]
· Hue owner Karim Amatullah attempts to play like the NYT hostess expose of his nightclub is good for business. We appreciate his chutzpah in the face of being smacked down like a bitch. [NYP]

Today, Daily News-boy Lloyd Grove trashes NY mag's Intelligencer column, disses Page Six, and calls Cindy Adams a plagiarist. We had assumed, in light of Monday's NY Mag gossip story, that the Lowdown columnist would lay low for a while — the story didn't make him look great (though neither did anyone else, really).

Hollywood PrivacyWatch sightings are sent in by readers. Send yours to tips@defamer.com and let the famous know that if they didn't want to be noticed, they'd have dinner delivered.

· Fox plans reality channel consisting of programming ideas stolen from bite-sized NBC-Universal honcho Jeff Zucker, NBC-Universal plans channel consisting only of Jeff Zucker bitching about Fox. [THR]
· Tony Danza promises new talk show will be great. Um, who's Tony Danza? [THR]
· Paramount considers making the Ten Commandments. This seems to violate Commandment 5 1/2: Thou shalt spend ten seconds thinking of an original idea before making a movie for the third fucking time. [THR]
· The X-Files Chris Carter returns from obscurity to join another supernatural sounding project. Don't go stretching yourself, Chris. [THR]
· David Letterman's Worldwide Pants is on board to produce Amy Sedaris's Strangers With Candy movie. This is the best idea we've seen since some crazy person signed the deal for the Kids in the Hall movie. It's fun when someone spends millions to please fifteen Comedy Central viewers! [Variety,
sub. req'd.]
· Crash the Highlands and get a glimpse of this year's Project Greenlight premature has-beens, before they get a chance to make a million dollar film that grosses twenty bucks. [Variety,
sub. req'd.]

Seriously: worst gossip day in the tabloids ever. We're gonna have to make some shit up later.
· Model Sophie Dahl falls down in the Hamptons, skins her knee. I guess that monkey kidney transplant she had in Mexico isn't taking. (Yeah, we made that up, but it still doesn't help. Hmm. Is it gonna be like this all summer? Should we just kill ourselves now?) [NYDN]
· Matt Damon claims that Ben Affleck sacrificed his career and privacy to remain with his Latin Lover Jennie Lopez. That is so sad! [NYP]
· Pete Townshend thinks Michael Moore is a prick. [NYP]
· Why is Al Sharpton all up on publisher Jason Binn at Hamptons mag party? Also: why are either of them appearing in the paper? [NYDN]
· Unsourced internet job posting for Trump Magazine: now hiring interns for $50 bucks a week. (We got a copy too, and, in a weird moment of pretending to be reporters, didn't print it because we couldn't find a source.) [NYP]

—Paris Hilton double-shot: Is she putting the sex tape behind her or not? She gives the porn money to charity, but also poses for the cover of a magazine with a feature entitled "Doggy Styles." Can't have it both ways, Par. Oops, actually we have seen her have it both ways. (via The Absurdist)
—Kevin Federline baby mama Shar Jackson comes out of hiding at an LA charity event. Hope she didn't hear what Kevin's in for on the honeymoon.
—Yes, we're well aware that Courtney Love seems a bit troubled these days. She probably just needs a vacation.
—We blame Diane Keaton for the upcoming middle-aged dangly parts coming to a theater near you.
—We would never have guessed that Madonna could be trouble on a movie set.

↑ Courtney Love dragged off to Bellevue after bottle-throwing, obscenity-screaming, post-abortion incident. Just when ya think the old girl can't bring the tabloid magic, she really pulls through. Bless you, Courtney! Happy birthday!
↑ Haley Binn and husband, Gotham publisher Jason Binn, take Aspen and Manhattan. High society + high anxiety = high barfability.
↑ A nasty peek under the cover of the garbage bin in which New York's gossip columnists work — starring Daily News boy Lloyd Grove as Oscar the Grouch.
↑ Looking for a talking head for your TV show? Try sampling from our ever-growing list of available black pundits!
↑ They didn't respond to requests for comment (we pretended to be reporters for you!), but the Society of Publication Designers has evidently secretly fired executive director Bride Whelan. Allegations be flying!
↑ Ed Needham, free from Rolling Stone, is the happiest editor in New York.
↓ Someday the NYT will print the four-letter words that my grandmother uses every day.
↓ Is Cargo editor Ariel Foxman's happy family a dysfunctional nightmare? For the record, it's been brought to my attention that the business end staff is very happy in their jobs, although the word from editorial is sad all around.
↓ A long week for the NY Post. Oddly, after your blaring huge-type front-cover exclusive is incredibly wrong, people start to think that you behave fast and loose with facts. How 'bout that?

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A very quick shout-out to this week's sponsor, who keeps us from a life of detailing Michael Eisner's Bentley with Barbie's toothbrush. Can you tell we didn't sleep much last night? For information on becoming one of Defamer's advertising angels, see this.

· Elite models president Gerald Marie is finally soooo fired. [NYP]
· Madonna, despite only having half a menstrual cycle, is prepping for a third baby. [NYDN]
· In retarded celebrity land, this is how they get married. According to Popbitch's Friday email, Nick Carter and Paris Hilton "recently went to a LA tattoo parlour where Nick got Paris' name on his wrist and Paris got Nick's on her butt." [Popbitch]
· Who says working for minimum wage doesn't pay off? NY Observer editor's assistant is getting all up on mega-heir Jamie Johnson. [NYP]

How we do love movie studio marketing departments. Keira Knightley must have proven a little flat for focus group tastes, as she's apparently been enhanced for this promotional photo (origin of this side-by-side comparison unknown, posted by our pals at JJB). This time, the marketing geniuses may have gotten it right, at least for LA: We know that if we step outside and see anything less than a C-cup, we laugh, point, and offer the offender a return bus ticket to Nowheresville in the name of Flatty Boombatty.

David Patrick Columbia, our favorite socialite sycophant diarist (diagropher? diagrophant? sycochronographer?) has totally broken down today over this week's NY Post blind items. High society is shrieking! Socialite marriages are in tatters!