Gwyneth Paltrow’s days as Hollywood darling seem to be long gone. The actress, who has been outspoken in her views on healthy living (and criticism of what she sees as everyone else’s bad habits), came in first in Star magazine’s annual poll of most irritating and annoying celebrities in film, television, and music.
“Twilight“‘s Kristen Stewart, notorious for cheating on co-star and boyfriend Robert Pattinson in July, came in second, with Jennifer Lopez, John Mayer, and Katherine Heigl trailing in third, fourth and fifth place.
Paltrow even beat Anne Hathaway, called-out for being too perfect in the aftermath of her “Les Miserables” Oscar win in February.
Rapper Chris Brown, under mass criticism this year for rekindling his relationship with Rihanna — whom he beat up in 2009 — starting a fight with Drake, and his general stance towards women, came in last on the list.
Apparently being a snooty health nut is a bigger crime than being a violent wife-beater. Click here for the full list.
Ever wondered what Toronto at 5 a.m. looks like? The answer is: nothing. The bars are closed, doors are shut, and the city is pretty much deserted. But Drake, being Drake, decided to give you the grand tour anyway, in what he decided is a viral video.
That might be like my first viral video. Doing it for the city this time around. Well every time but this time especially.
ampmdash; Drizzy (@Drake) April 2, 2013
No helicopter cat, eagle swiping a baby, or auto-tuned crime news spot for Drake. No, no. That’s classless. Viral means mood-lighting, empty streets and women playing slow-motion volleyball.
Ok, Drake. You’re cool, we get it.
Check out the video below:
Now that you’ve somehow managed to digest all that Seder matzo, it’s time to re-live it all through the eyes of the rich and famous.
Some were early:
With Passover about to start abroad I want to wish all of you celebrating a happy and healthy Pesach!
ampmdash; William Shatner (@WilliamShatner) March 24, 2013
Signing off for the first days of Passover. I’ll be back on the grid Wednesday night. A sweet feast of redemption to all celebrating!
ampmdash; Mayim Bialik (@missmayim) March 26, 2013
Calm before the storm #passover instagram.com/p/XTOY2ERTZA/
ampmdash; Rachel Zoe (@RachelZoe) March 26, 2013
Drake seems to have a lot of cash to literally throw around. He arrived this past weekend at a Charlotte, NC strip club with a box full of cash in the amount of $50,000. Before long, it was raining money so hard that the floor was covered in bills. That’s $50K that could have gone to a good cause, rather than to Drake’s attempt at buying street cred.
Lenny Kravitz is out and Jesse L. Martin is in on the upcoming Marvin Gaye biopic. When it was originally announced that Kravitz would be playing Gaye, the “Sexual Healing” singer’s son asked Kravitz to back out of the project and even threatened legal action.
Illusionist David Copperfield’s plane made an emergency landing in Illinois en route from Las Vegas to New York. No one was injured.
Joseph Gordon-Levitt will receive CinemaCon’s Breakthrough Filmmaker of the Year Award in April for his debut directorial work on “Don Jon’s Addiction.”
Sasha Spielberg, 22-year-old daughter of Steven Spielberg and Kate Capshaw, stars in Nicole Richie’s first video ad campaign for her House of Harlow fashions.
Barbara Walters is back on “The View” following her recovery from both chicken box and a concussion sustained in a fall back in January.
Catch Aly Raisman in the promo for season 16 of “Dancing with the Stars,” which promises “sexy is back.”
It looks like we might see Daniel Radcliffe playing Igor in the revamped version of “Frankenstein.”
We’re not so into Paul Rudd’s “Anchorman 2” facial hair. Are you?
Fashion designer Diane von Furstenberg hosted a star-studded gathering at her studio in honor of the 20th anniversary of the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum.
Andy and Lana Wachowski are being sued for allegedly stealing ideas for their “The Matrix” films.
The Jewish Canadian singer Drake won a Grammy Award, his first, for Rap Album of the Year.
Also, the indie pop band fun. won Song of the Year with “We Are Young” and Best New Artist at the 55th annual Grammy Awards on Sunday in Los Angeles. Its lead singer, Jack Antonoff, is Jewish, and he thanked all the band’s fans after fun. won in the latter category.
“We’ve been touring for 12 years and we haven’t made money for a very long time,” he told the crowd, extending a shout-out to girlfriend Lena Dunham.
For Drake, his album “Take Care” brought him the Grammy before the televised portion of the show began. He beat out Lupe Fiasco, Nas, The Roots and Rick Ross.
Drake had been nominated 10 times before breaking through this year. He also was nominated for Best Rap Performance for his song “HYFR” and Best Rap song for “The Motto.”
Fun. also performed at the Grammys, playing its hit “Carry On” during a staged indoor rainstorm at the Staples Center.
In his introduction of the group, actor Neil Patrick Harris said, “As legendary gangsta rap icon Katharine Hepburn once said, ‘If you obey all the rules, you don’t have any fun.’ “
Other notable Grammy winners were the English folk band Mumford & Sons, who won Album of the Year for “Babel”; Gotye, whose hit “Somebody That I Used to Know” won for Record of the Year; and Adele, who won her seventh Grammy for her live performance of “Set Fire to the Rain.”
Former Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords has agreed to an interview with Diane Sawyer, which will air on ABC on January 8, the second anniversary of the Tucson shooting that left Giffords severely injured.
Drake decided to honor his grandmother, Evelyn Sher, who passed away over Thanksgiving, by having a huge picture of her tattooed on to the middle of his back. In the image, she is seen hugging her son, Drake’s uncle.
Jeremy Piven told British talk show host Jonathan Ross that the only way he was able to memorize the *haftarah * for his bar mitzvah was to rap it. He even rapped a few lines for Ross, who suggested Piven could be a role model for bar mitzvah boys everywhere.
Courteney Cox shared with Ellen DeGeneres that she still loves ex-husband David Arquette very much, but that they make better best friends than spouses.
Bethenny Frankel has officially filed for divorce from husband Jason Hoppy. On a happier note, Frankel helped a writer friend lose 66 lbs.
Bar Refaeli gave peace a chance as she went out on the town in West Hollywood last Friday night after filming her Super Bowl commercial for Go Daddy.
A glamorous Emmy Rossum graces the cover of the January/February issue of Manhattan Magazine.
There is talk about real-life mother of two Sarah Michelle Gellar possibly returning to TV in a sitcom about a couple of moms’ funny escapades while their kids are in school during the day.
Eliot Spitzer is leaving his job hosting Current TV’s “Viewpoint” now that the network has been sold to Al Jazeera.
The FBI has released its file on Mike Wallace, who died in April 2012. The file contains reports on his trip to Cuba in 1970, as well as an investigation into a threatening letter he received in 1977 accusing him of being a communist.
Lisa Weiss, one of Anthony Weiner’s cybersex partners, has apologized to him on Facebook for “any pain I caused your or the beautiful Huma [Weiner’s wife Huma Abedin].”
What do Gwyneth Paltrow and Kim Kardashian have in common? They now share the same personal trainer, Tracy Anderson, who works with many celebs.
And finally, we have celebrity New Year’s vacation sightings. On the beach were: Lea Michele in a tiny red bikini (with her beau Cory Monteith); Jason Segel well covered up in comparison to live-in girlfriend Michelle Williams and their friend Busy Philipps; and Justin Bartha with a mystery woman in Hawaii. And Mila Kunis enjoyed dinner out with Ashton Kutcher in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.
Drake’s angsty lyrics and bravado laced with sadness have garnered him more than a legion of fans.
Now he has his very own comic book — a superhero story of sorts by Sean T. Collins and Andrew White. On the tumblr “Hottest Chick in the Game,” you can read all of Collins and White’s lengthy, bizarrely gorgeous graphic art about the rapper.
In it, Drake attempts to have his long-repeated wish to go back before all the fame and glamor to the simple days of, um, starring on the teen show “Degrassi.” It includes guest appearances from a Cleopatra-like Illuminati Beyonce, a wheelchair-bound Rihanna, and Lil Wayne, who acts as a kind of shadowy therapist.
But perhaps the best cameo is the enigmatic Blue Ivy, slightly grown. Her rebuff to Drake’s time experiments? No can do. “You’re in the game, silly.”
Chris Brown and Drake, the sparring pair of musicians as synonymous with “feud” as Capulet and Montague or Hatfield and McCoy, has just received that most American of official recognitions: a lawsuit. W.i.P., the New York nightclub where the two entertainers had a doozy of a dust-up earlier this summer, is suing Brown and Drake (ne Aubrey Drake Graham) for “compensatory and punitive damages” to the tune of $16 million, according to E! Online. Neither has been arrested for the incident, which occurred around 4 a.m. on June 14 over a romantic rivalry involving R&B singer Rihanna, but the club insists that the guys should’ve known their “notoriety and celebrity would ensure that their acts had far-reaching and devastating effects.” Yikes.
The 8-page lawsuit levied against Brown and Drake and the 40-some “John Does” in their entourages uses amusingly staid legalese to describe the early-morning fracas, beginning as “some or all of Defendants proceeded to become intoxicated” and ending when “shattering the handles of bottles of spirits to use as makeshift knives […] Defendants filled an already packed nightclub full of flying glass shrapnel,” as “terrorized patrons ran for cover […] using banquettes and tables as improvised shields.”
The beleaguered hip-hop star Drake, already embroiled in the aftermath of his club brawl with Chris Brown, has another lawsuit on his hands.
James Prince, the Texas scout who “discovered” Drake’s rapping talent, is taking Drake’s managers to court over failure to cough up royalties. According to the New York Daily News, Prince’s attorney is insisting on an accounting of Drake’s recent chart-busting sales, and keeps getting shuffled around by various members of Drake’s label.
Usually it’s the other way around: First rap artists hurl insults at their opponents, and then they throw punches. But after the fracas at a SoHo club in early June and the subsequent police investigation, rumor mill churning, and various attempts to capitalize on the biggest Billboard star fist fight of the summer, Chris Brown is hitting back, at least lyrically. Brown jumps in for a verse on a remix of Chief Keef’s “I Don’t Like” to list all of his least favorite things about Drake. Specifically, his generous brow: “Them eyebrows?/Man that sh-t’s yikes.”
Brown’s dis includes a direct reference to the club fight, though not one that seems particularly accurate: “They throwin’ bottles/I’m throwin’ models.” Whatever the case, the rap community is waiting with bated breath for Drake’s next move. But some, like Tyga, a rapper on Lil Wayne’s Young Money label, viewed the whole thing as childish. He offered some advice to Drake and Brown at the carpet of the 2012 BET awards: “At the end of the day, they got to handle that like men.”
The fallout from the club feud between Drake and Chris Brown continues to spread. A fourth victim of the melee stepped forward to blame Drake for getting violent, and the SoHo club where the fight went down is suing New York City for damages after city officials shut down the club.
But every celebrity battle has a silver lining — the potential to make money off lon-running hatred, and not just in court. According to the New York Daily News, Damon Feldman, a boxing promoter that Philadelphia Magazine crowned “King of the D-list” is trying to entice Drake and Chris Brown to duke it out in the boxing ring.
A hip-hop beef went from the airwaves to the front page this week after rapper Drake and R&B crooner Chris Brown and their entourages got into a very public bar fight. At around 4 a.m. on Thursday at club W.I.P. in SoHo, the two chart-topping singers came to blows over Rihanna, with whom both have been romantically connected. According to The Daily News, the fight began over a gesture of goodwill.
Both stars were celebrating the birthday of Ne-Yo’s manager Javon Smith when the famously ill-tempered Chris Brown sent over a bottle of champagne to Drake’s table as a peace offering. Drake reportedly sent the bottle back with the note: “I’m still f—ing Rihanna.” The ensuing melee left Brown with a chunk of skin torn off his chin. His bodyguard and an Australian tourist were also injured. Reports differ on what actually happened. Drake denies involvement in the fracas, but today Brown claims that he has physical evidence against the Jewish rapper. Video has emerged of the fight as well, though the play-by-play remains inconclusive.
When it comes to sex appeal, it looks like Jewish pop stars have it. How else can The Shmooze account for the fact that three out of the 10 men on Billboard’s “sexiest men in pop” list are members of the tribe?
Billboard polled 600,000 readers, who let it be known that the sexiest male musician out there is — get ready for it — Adam Lambert. The guy is on fire these days, what with being the sexiest singer du jour, plus having recently made it to the number one spot on the Billboard chart when his new album “Tresspassing” sold 77,000 copies in its first week (beating out Adele, no less).
Mazel tov, Benjamin “King Bibi” Netanyahu. You’re officially the most influential Jew in the world, according to the Jerusalem Post’s just-released ranking of the world’s 50 most significant Semites.
And good on you, (Jon Stewart #7). The Post thinks you’ve got more juice than Reps. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (#9) and Eric Cantor (#19) —and all of you rate higher than Shimon Peres (#22) and George Soros (#38).
But the Post’s choices — Canadian rapper Drake at #16? Natalie Portman at #36? — have sparked some good-natured hand-wringing in the blogosphere.
Gwyneth Paltrow might be the public face of Hugo Boss’s new Boss Nuit Pour Femme perfume, but that doesn’t mean she’s lost her sense of humor. The other day, when she wasn’t busy with an official photo shoot, Paltrow took time to goof around with her pal Rashida Jones. The two ditched the professional make-up chair and did their own make-up and photography. But who knew these actresses would be so purrrfect at it?
When they were finished, Jones tweeted a photo of Paltrow posing in full blue cat-face make-up, with the caption: “At callbacks for Cats: The Movie…” Paltrow then tweeted a picture of her friend’s feline look. Paltrow, pretending to be competitive with Jones, started a faux Twitter catfight. Tweeting about Jones’s more natural red-orange tabby look, Paltrow wrote: “This bitch is hot on my tail for rum tum tugger @iamrashidajones #catsthemovie”.
As part of what he’s calling a “re-commitment to the Jewish religion,” Drake has released a video featuring bagels, the Torah, Manischewitz, Lil Wayne in a panda mask and a whole lot of rapping in the synagogue. Is this guy for real? Watch him reading from the Torah and decide for yourself.
WARNING: THE FOLLOWING VIDEO CONTAINS GRAPHIC LANGUAGE AND MAY BE OFFENSIVE TO SOME
Watch Drake Celebrate His ‘Re-Bar Mitzvah’:
This past Saturday night, SNL’s Andy Samberg scored an interview — or more like a series of interviews — with Drake, who was the musical guest for the show. It might have been a good conversation between a nice Jewish boy from Northern California and another from Toronto, but it wasn’t. How could it have been with the hilarious Samberg doing the questioning?
If you think you are going to learn something new or personal about Drake from this, you are going to be disappointed. But that’s okay. You’ll be laughing too hard to care.
Watch Andy Samberg Interview Drake on SNL:
Former NBC CEO Jeff Zucker threw his son Andrew a lavish bar mitzvah at the Four Seasons this weekend — complete with sushi, a celebrity guest list that included Katie Couric and customized Converse sneakers handed out to Andrew’s pals as party favors.
But if there was one thing missing from the bash, it was an appearance by Kanye West, who demanded a staggering $1 million when the family asked if he would perform at the event. The New York Post reports that Zucker briefly considered offering West a mere $800,000 — but then came to his senses and offered the gig to Jewish rapper Drake instead (who accepted, presumably for a more reasonable price).
“A biracial Jewish former child star from Canadian television who’s a multimillion-dollar selling artist? You couldn’t create a better Canadian in a science lab.” That’s how one wag described rapper Drake, who made his debut as host of the Juno Awards — Canada’s Grammys — in Toronto last night. And from Drake’s red-carpet kiss with his kvelling Jewish mother to an appearance by a Semitic rock legend, the evening boasted a few Hebraic moments.
After escorting her son through the red-carpet gauntlet, Sandi Graham got a shout-out from Drake, who name-checked “my Jewish mother” in his opening monologue. Drake — nee Aubrey Drake Graham— was raised Jewish, bar mitzvahed and even went to Jewish day school, as the Forward has reported.
Hasidic reggae musician Matisyahu has challenged rapper Drake’s status as “the best Jew to ever do it,” in a recent video posted on gossip site TMZ.
Responding to the question of who of the two rappers is more kosher, Matisyahu responds: “Drake is a pretty good man. He’s got his thing, but it’s different than what I do.”
Continuing, he says of Drake: “He’s Jewish, but he’s not representing Judaism. He happens to be Jewish just like Bob Dylan happened to be Jewish, but what I’m doing is really tapping into my roots and culture, and trying to blend that with the mainstream…[Drake’s] being Jewish is just a by-product.”
Matisyahu, born Matthew Miller, was brought up as a Reconstructionist Jew and attended Hebrew school. His music often addresses traditional Jewish themes, and occasionally contains Yiddish and Hebrew lyrics.
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