Sept. 28 @ 3pm [Submit your own Gawker Stalker sightings to stalker@gawker.com] Walking down the street in each others arms. They looked very happy and smitten. Flanked by what I assume were 2 bodyguards.
Gossip types are absolutely atwitter over the news that Weeds star Mary-Louise Parker has a new boyfriend, singer Charlie Mars. But not everyone's celebrating. In an email entitled "Cougar Goes Too Far," one irate tipster claims Parker's a man-stealing tart.
Bee Shaffer turns 22 today. Manhattan District Attorney Robert Morgenthau is turning 90. Billionaire financier Leon Black is 58. Harry Potter author J.K. Rowling is 44. Wesley Snipes is turning 47. Muckraking defense attorney Ron Kuby is 53. Another muckraker, entrepreneur Mark Cuban, is 51. Theater director Oskar Eustis turns 51. Ezra Zilkha is 84. The Office's B.J. Novak is 30. And actor Dean Cain is 43 today. Below, the birthdays of some people celebrating this weekend.
• Alex Rodriguez has a new, more age-appropriate celeb to spend his lonely nights with. The Yankee was spotted with Kate Hudson at a UES restaurant and outside 15 Central Park West, the apartment building where he rents. And they seem happy, too, which may be because she doesn't force him to wake up early on Saturday mornings to attend Kabbalah classes. [P6]
• Scarlett Johansson and Gwyneth Paltrow are reportedly butting heads on the set of Iron Man 2. Gwynnie is supposedly mad that Scarlett's been "hogging the limelight" and demanding too much attention from the crew. [Sun]
• It looks like Mel Gibson's new girlfriend is pregnant, after all. [MSNBC, P6]
• Estée Lauder CEO William Lauder and his wife Karen have split up. [P6]
• Penelope Cruz missed a scheduled appearance with Harvey Weinstein in Cannes this week because of food poisoning, although Harvey says she's expected to recover in time for the premiere of their new movie tonight. [Us]
• Mary Louise Parker was the center of attention at the Roundabout Theatre on Sunday for the opening night of her new Broadway show, Hedda Gabler. Parker and her co-stars, Michael Cerveris, Peter Stormare, and Paul Sparks, and the play's director Christopher Shinnas were joined at the play and after-party by Liza Minnelli, Joan Rivers, Blythe Danner, Mamie Gummer, Amy Irving, Billy Stritch, and Tovah Feldshuh. [PMc, Wireimage, GoaG]
The Nederlander Organization, one of the biggest theater owners and producers around, has acquired the rights to Michael Jackson's "Thriller" video. The one with the zombies. Plus, Mary-Louise Parker's very bad Hedda Gabler reviews.
Wispy British actress Sienna Miller is heading to Broadway next season to star in Patrick (Closer) Marber's After Miss Julie. She joins an increasingly steady stream of movie types heading to the stage. What gives?
Let's take a look at the week in theatre!
· Mary-Louise Parker will star opposite Michael Douglas in Solitary—a May/Whatever-Comes-Three-Facelifts-After-December romance. Jenna Fischer, Susan Sarandon, and Danny DeVito round out the cast. [THR] · Defamer favorite Natalie Portman, meanwhile, will star in Love and Other Impossible Pursuits, based on a book about "a young woman who finds the key to recovering her marriage in her relationship with her precocious stepson." Don Roos will direct. [Variety] · David "Bud Bundy" Faustino will produce a loosely autobiographic web series for Sony's Crackle.com called Star-ving, which instantly raises the question: Can the web cancel a series? [Variety] After the jump: Why is Gus Van Sant about to drop gobs of acid?!· Jennifer Lopez has signed a two-year deal with Universal Media Studios, which will develop "a wide variety of Jennifer Lopez-related TV projects" for the studio. [Variety] · Milk writer/director team of Gus Van Sant and Dustin Lance Black will re-pair for an adaptation of the The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test, hopefully to feature Emile Hirsch as an LSD-induced, gayfro'd gnome in Ken Kesey's imagination. [THR]
I sort of loved how most of the actors Dan Winters photographed for New York's "New York Actor" photo essay looked basically like hell. This is not freaking Santa Monica. If someone invented indulgences for all the sins we commit against our skin we'd be the Avignon Papacy. But enough wishful thinking: Liz Smith reports today "some big name stars" were "not amused" by the harsh realism of his portraiture, which Smith credits to his past shooting spreads for Texas Monthly, "where they like things rough and tough." (This assertion appears to have no basis in fact, but it was fun checking out his portfolio.) So: who's the vain aging diva/o who told Liz she wasn't the only one who was put off by Mr. Winters' verisimilitude schtick? Let's examine the evidence:
Well I think we know who it's not:
Ryan Seacrest preparing to board a helicopter at the Chelsea heliport ... Michael Lohan catching a flight at LaGuardia ... Mario Cantone walking through the Village ... Aubrey O'Day and Ashley Parker Angel signing autographs outside their Broadway show ... Rufus Wainwright walking near Lincoln Center ... Mary Louise Parker walking with her kids downtown ... Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes heading inside Lincoln Center to catch a show ... Ethan Hawke shopping in SoHo with his daughter ... Jon Stewart caught in a traffic jam in the Flatiron district ... and John Mayer en route to the airport.
Sam Mendes turns 43 today. Rapper (and now radio host) Chuck D. is 48. Other folks celebrating: Al D'Amato is 71. Model agency owner Scott Lipps turns 39. Hairspray's Ashley Parker Angel is 27. Hedge fund honcho Ray Dalio is 59. Real estate agent Elizabeth Stribling is turning 64. Adam Duritz is turning 44. Most importantly, Coolio celebrates his 45th today. Celebrating tomorrow: Mary Louise Parker will be 44. Jeffrey Kalinsky will turn 46. NRDC president Frances Beinecke will be 59. And financier Henry Silverman will celebrate his 68th. On Sunday, Martha Stewart will celebrate her 67th with what we're guessing will be a meticulously planned party. Other Sunday celebrations: art world staple Adam Lindemann, Tom Brady, Isaiah Washington, and Martin Sheen.
Adriana Lima leaving the set of CW11's Morning Show ... Lindsay Lohan and Sam Ronson shopping at the Chanel store in SoHo and then having lunch at Bar Pitti a few hours later ... Naomi Watts and a friend shopping with Watts' son, Alexander, in tow ... Kirsten Dunst shopping with a friend in SoHo ... British actor Simon Pegg leaving his hotel ... America's Next Top Model winner Whitney Thompson on the set of a photo shoot in the West Village ... Sheryl Crow, son Wyatt, and the nanny walking home from a shopping excursion in SoHo ... America Ferrera posing with Blake Lively at the premiere of their new movie, Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants 2 ... Mary Louise Parker and Richard Simmons leaving The Late Show set.
For the first time in our Weeds-watching experience, we actually worried we’d gotten a contact high from watching last night’s Bizarro World episode. As soon as we realized this would be the only time we’d seen the show open without “Little Boxes” setting the carefree tone, replaced by an opening sequence set at the Mexican border, Nancy uneasily waltzing around high as a kite on a beach, it became clear that our Weeds is even more potent than usual. Though we still haven’t accepted the fact that much of this highly-rated season will take place in Mexico as the Botwins run from the law, we were finally able to shake our rising paranoia upon seeing the indefatigable Elizabeth Perkins appear looking nothing like the Celia we’ve loved, hated, then loved again. Imagine a young Bette Midler dressed up as little orphan Annie, styled by Mexico’s answer to Rachel Zoe, grab the nearest pillow in the likely instance you find yourself needing to scream, and get high on this clip (no substances required).
What wasn’t there to love about last night’s Season Four premiere of Weeds? Albert Brooks as Andy’s disapproving father calling Nancy “Francie”! Silas finally entering dangerously hot boy territory! The absence of Mary Kate Olsen as the trippy hippie “sexy” guest star! And as THR reports today, we’re not alone. With 1.3 million viewers tuning in to find out Nancy’s fate with the high-level hard drug dealers (so realistically frightening for even a comedy as dark as this one), Mary Louise Parker and her merry marijuana-scented series premiere broke Showtime’s record as the most-viewed season premiere in history, topping Dexter’s second-season debut which lured 1 million. For a taste of the action warranting this kind of attention, see this clip from last night involving Parker’s adorable attempts at child rearing, dead grandmothers discovered by prepubescent boys, and our introduction to the Botwins’ omniscient neighbor named, of course, Rad.
Former Gawker editor Doree Shafrir wonders today about the Jeffrey Dean Morgan/Mary Louise Parker split. Specifically, the sentence: "A source close to the couple tells the Associated Press they had differing lifestyles." What would these "differing lifestyles" be? Geighness? Drug use? Who knows! No matter how you parse it, though, MLP has had some nasty luck. Sure Weeds is a hit and all, but remember the whole Billy Crudup debacle? (Billy is, incidentally, one of the top searches in Google Trends today). When will one of my favorite actresses find happiness? More importantly, when will I stop giving a shit? [Doree Chronicles]
"Mary-Louise Parker tried to get out of this interview. She said so halfway through. Not in a confrontational way, just matter-of-factly, as if she were saying she hadn't ordered those fries but had started to eat them anyway." [NYT]
Parker is the film, TV, and stage actress who has made a name for herself by passing on commercial rom-coms in favor of edgier indies.
