Did Britney Spears Do It Again?

WHO: Britney Spears
LOCATION: Tennyson Place, Hermosa Beach, CA
PRICE: $8,585,000 (list)
SIZE: 5,785 square feet, 4-5 bedrooms, 4 full and 2 half bathrooms
DESCRIPTION: Situation on almost half an acre, at the end of the private cul-de-sac, on a bluff overlooking the Pacific, is the beach cities' premier estate property. The property features panoramic ocean views from every level with exceptional privacy and security and is only a short walk from sands of Manhattna and Hermosa. At approximately 5,900 s.f., the main residence includes 4 bedrooms (could be a 5th), 4 baths, 2 half baths, a world class media room, a vintage Irish pub, and incomparable courtyards and view terraces.

YOUR MAMAS NOTES: While that poor Britney Spears gurl remains on lock down in a Los Angeles psych ward on a 72 hour 5150 hold, several tabs and glossies including the National Equirer (no link that we could locate) are reporting that the dissembling pop star has gone and bought herself a new damn house in the unlikely location of Hermosa Beach. While Hermosa Beach is no stranger to celebrity residents, the locals are unlikely to embrace Miz Spears particular brand of celebrity that comes with a battalion of SUV driving and telephoto lens wielding paps who camp outside her houses and follow her around causing all sorts of traffic tie ups.

All the reports gleefully point to a Hill Section house on Tennyson Place that the queen of the bad weave looked at back in October of 2007 (pictured above, more pictures through link). This was before the loony lamb hooked up with that beady eyed Adnan Ghalib dude and started speaking with a faux and not very good British accent. The property in question includes a main house with 4-5 bedrooms, 4 full and 2 half bathroom and a vintage Irish pub. A vintage Irish pub? What the hell does someone need with a vintage Irish pub? Anyhoo, according to listing information the property includes a large sports pool, spa, lush gardens, and a detached guesthouse that rides atop the three car garage.

Here's the thing puppies. Despite the wide reporting that Miz Spears drove a hard bargain and paid around $6,000,000 for the property (which you'll recall from above was priced much higher), Your Mama can not yet verify the a sale. We have searched our databases and contacted several well placed sources who we thought might be in the know about Miz Spears buying a house she doesn't really need and have come up completely empty handed. Perhaps the National Enquirer simply has better sources that Your Mama.

More to come as the whole story surfaces.

Jermaine Dupri's Buckhead "Beauty"

SELLER: Jermaine Dupri
LOCATION: Whitewater Trail, Atlanta, GA
PRICE: $1,500,000
SIZE: 5,523 square feet, 5 bedrooms, 5 full and 2 half bathrooms
DESCRIPTION: An architectural gem nestled on a private estate lot this five bedroom five full bath, features gorgeous window-scapes. Master w/ terrace level, one full bar, two wet bars, recreational room, superb functionality and an artistic sensibility beyond compare. Open flowing plan, three fireplaces, wall to wall carpet, finished terrace, private backyard, stone tile pool, hot tub and three car garage. The exquisite estate represents Buckhead distinction.

YOUR MAMAS NOTES: Music mogul and Janet Jackson love muffin Jermaine Dupri has listed his Atlanta area house for $1,500,000. Located on Whitewater Trail NW in the swanky and suburban neighborhood of Buckhead, the 2.8 acre estate features a 5,523 square foot house that features 5 bedrooms and 7 terlits spread over 5 full and 2 half bathrooms. Other features include a three car garage, sauna, three bars (because it's best never to be too far from a booze cabinet), a full and finished basement, vaulted ceilings, and "an artistic sensibility beyond compare," whatever that means.

Your Mama really does not know much about the Atlanta real estate market so we haven't a clue as to whether this house is well priced or if it's typical for the Buckhead area. However, we are not much impressed with Mister Dupri's digs, and apparently neither was he because he's already moved out. It is Your Mama's humble and meaningless opinion that the paver stone front drive with it's big ol' porte-cochere looks like a damn Holiday Inn or some other middle brow motel, and do not even get us started on that tiled entrance hall with that upsetting built in planter which looks a little too much like Your Mama's dentist's office. And children, Your Mama hates the dentist office.

Moving into the low ceilinged and beige carpeted living room we see that Mister Dupree and his team of "decorators" appear to have been aiming for that special combination of funeral parlor meets tawdry VIP section of a cheap strip club. Dear Jeezis in heaven have mercy on our bitter and snarky soul, but the last time Your Mama saw flower arrangements like that we were burying our beloved Granny in rural funeral home with blood red carpet, may she rest in peace. Word of advice for all you pee-pohl who execute extreme feats of elaborate drapery swagging: Stop it! Stop it right now! Are you trying to kill Your Mama with all that disturbing and fringed fabric swaggery? Seriously folks, stop it because our delicate constitution simply can not bear it.

Out back, curved stairs with miles of pipe railing lead to a swimming pool and spa complex with heaps and piles of stacked stone walls. Here's the best part though, according to the listing for Mister Dupri's property, the terrace is "finished," a quality Your Mama imagines most people look for in terraces.

In truth, most of what's offensive to Your Mama's delicate decorating sensibilities can easily be changed by a new owner, a sledge hammer, a good architect and an even better nice gay decorator. However, we are concerned that Mister Dupri has simply moved on to perpetrate similarly distressing design crimes in whatever home to which he has moved.

Since he's clearly not living up in this crib, Mister Dupri just might be shacked up with Miss Jackson If Your Nasty at her 34th floor condominium at the Trump International Hotel & Tower in New York City. But more likely he's bedding down in the 4 bedroom he recently leased at the Time Warner Center which is basically across the street from Miz Jackson's luxury building. Do these two live in sin? Anyone know?

Property records show that Mister Dupri also owns several other Atlanta area properties including a 7,126 square foot house in Fairburn, GA, a residential building lot in Atlanta, and a 2,936 square foot house in Stockbridge, GA. It's unclear to Your Mama if Mister Dupri occupies any of these properties himself.

Jennifer Aniston Has Flown the Coop

According to a well positioned source in Malibu, a-list ack-tur-uss and former Friend Jennifer Aniston packed her leopard print pillows and pushed off from the itty bitty Carbon Beach cottage she's been renting since she and Mister Pitt split back in 2005.

The 1,531 square foot shingled cottage, reportedly owned by Malee-boo real estate head honcho Larry Ellison and just a few doors from billionaire David Geffen's rather impressive spread about which your Mama hears lurid, unsubstantiated, and not reportable tales, always seemed an oddly accessible choice for a gal obsessed with privacy and security.

To be honest, the ladee has good reason to be concerned to the point of obsession. One morning in August of 2005, a man from Santa Barbara wandered into the 3 bedroom 3 bathroom cottage through an unlocked door. Miz Aniston was not in residence, but the intruder was intercepted by two of Miz Aniston's employees and later arrested. Ever since, the ladee was been accompanied to her Malee-boo getaway by a trio of burly security guards well known for blocking traffic on the PCH while Miz Aniston pulled in or out of the tiny driveway in her huge Range Rover.

Your Mama heard from a very reliable source that the relationship challenged hair icon is holed up in her house on Blue Jay Way while the renovations on her Bev Hills Hal Levitt designed mansion on N. Hillcrest Drive are completed. She's no doubt eager to move into the new digs on N. Hillcrest because it is trés privé and thus an excellent spot for her to quietly rendevous and frolic pool side with that bloated looking Vince Vaughan fellow all the tabs and glossies say she likes to mess around with.

Anyhoo, now that slim and trim Miz Aniston is without a beach house of her own, we imagine she'll be popping in on best Friend Courtney Cox and her huzband David Arquette at the Malee-boo estate they purchased last year. Fortunately for Miz Aniston (and for Mister Arquette), the Cox/Arquette crib (scroll down) includes a detached guest house.

Photo: Pacific Coast News

UPDATE: Micheal Jackson

By now, all the children know that Your Mama finds former super star turned tabloid train wreck Michael Jackson fully fascinating. Over the last few months we've frequently discussed his ongoing real estate saga regarding the possible foreclosure of the 2,700 acre Neverland Ranch in the Santa Ynez Valley. The ranch was scheduled to go into foreclosure on January 19, but all the gossips and tabloids have been curiously quiet on the subject. Except Mister Roger Friedman over at Fox News, who yesterday dished all the latest juicy dirt about the financially strapped and essentially homeless Mister Jackson.

According to Mister Friedman's sources, The White Lady's loyal and long time spokesperson, that poor ka-razy talkin' Raymone Bain, has been booted from the inner circle. Apparently she denies it, so who knows. But Your Mama called that one. We just knew that Mister Jackson would throw that ladee under the bus when the money ran out. Also out of the inner circle, according to Mister Friedman, is the children's long time nanny Grace, who may in fact only be sick and staying at her own dee-luxe condo in Las Vegas rather than at the Palms casino where The White Lady is currently holed up with his three white children.

Now here's the real estate stuff...According to Mister Friedman, The White Lady is out looking to spend a little bit of his recent cash infusion on a new house in Las Vegas. Which would be a good thing, because let's be honest, raising them three kids in a damn casino can only lead to tears and trauma. Las Vegas real estate is currently in the terlit, so The White Lady can prolly get himself a big ass home in a gated development at a good price. We just hope there's a staff room back behind the kitchen for that poor Miz Bain.

As for the once beloved Neverland Ranch, well, Mister Friedman's sources whispered to him that supermarket magnate Ron Burkle might have intervened and convinced the fine folks at Fortress (Mister Jackson's eager to be paid creditor on the $23,000,000 loan secured by Neverland Ranch) to provide an extension which would allow Mister Jackson to scramble a while longer looking for someone, anyone, to step in and help him refinance the debt.

Your Mama can't tell the children how we know this or we'd have to kill you, but we understand from a secret source that Mister Jackson's people are actively seeking an entity to step in and save the day. But here's what Your Mama really wants to know: Why doesn't billionaire Burkle just carry the loan on his rather large financial back? Twenty three million is pennies to him. What does Mister Burkle know that we don't?

The Billion Dollar Behemoth

27 damn floors. Indoor parking for 168 cars. Helipad. 600 full time servants. All for one mega-rich family of 6.

1. Architectural Record
2. Mumbai Mirror
3. ABC News
4. World Architectural News

Discuss.

Let's Talk About Ashley Olsen For A Moment

By now all the children know all about the modest little Hancock Park adjacent home that mogulette Ashley Olsen recently purchased for $1,575,000. (All you Hancock Park boundary snobs please note the "adjacent.")

However, Your Mama has lately received dozens of emails and contacts about Little Miss Ashley Olson also buying a humongous house in Malee-boo. The real estate related gossip started to churn when the teeny tiny tycoon was photographed (see below) outside a not yet completed and monolithic mansion on the bluffs overlooking the Pacific Ocean.
But it just didn't make sense to us. So, being the no-zee bitch we are, Your Mama got on the horn to pick the brains of a few folks in our vast spider web of contacts. We emailed Mighty Mouse in Malee-boo, we contacted Jim Nasium, who knows a lot about a lot of things, we touched base with Mirakle Mike and we grilled the always well informed Lucy Spillerguts.

We combed the sold properties, we looked at aerial maps and we poured over the assessor records for Malee-boo. For quite some time we came up empty handed. Then it all shimmered into view. We're not ashamed to say that it was not Your Mama who located the exact property at which Little Miss Olsen was photographed, but rather one of our newer tipsters who we call The K-Man who pointed us in the right direction.

So here's what we know: The house at which the itsy bitsy high heeled fashion bug was photographed appears to be the old Mark Hughes mansion located way up the Pacific Coast Highway, beyond the Robert Meyer State beach, and near the ocean front compound owned by Madame Cindy Crawford and the palatial, royalty worthy Michael Eisner beach pad. Y'all know who Mark Hughes was, right? He was the four times married and fantastically rich founder of Herbalife who died in 2000 at the tender age of 44 from what was reported as an accidental overdose of prescription anti-depressants and large amounts of alcohol. In fact he died in the master bedroom of his Malee-boo monster mansion.

Property records show that in December of 1999 the perfectly coiffed and usually tan and blinged out Mister Hughes had paid a record breaking $27,000,000 for the 19,340 square foot house. Mister Hughes purchased the house from the widow Verna Harrah, a former cocktail waitress who acquired a considerable fortune when her hotel and casino magnate mate William Harrah passed over. Sadly, shortly after buying the gargantuan house, Mister Hughes met his big diet supplement supplier in the sky in the master bedroom of his Malee-boo manse, and property records reveal the house was next sold off to big time venture capitalist Howard Marks and his wifey Nancy. Since buying the property, they have embarked on a total gut renovation which has maintained the basic shape of the original house but completely altered the style and articulation of the facades.

Mighty Mouse in Malee-boo told Your Mama that he's heard, but can not confirm, that the place was going to be used as a corporate retreat and given it's multi acre parcel with hundreds of feet of beach frontage, the property would likely be valued in the $80,000,000 range. So while the usage of the property seems to be in question, what is not, at least according to current and accurate property records, is that mega-moneyed mini mogulette Ashley Olsen has not purchased this house.

And really, think about it kids, neither of the Olsen gurls seem the type to buy a monstrous and ridiculously expensive estate like this. A look at their real estate history shows they prefer to shack up in more low-key and modest digs. Yes, they did share Hal Levitt designed digs in Bel Air, and they are trying to unload that big place in the ass uglee Kostas Kondylis designed Morton Square in New York, but they intended to share that place too while they attended NYU (a folly they've both since given up).

If we're being honest, Your Mama does not know about all the properties these pint sized and filthy rich gurls own and/or lease. What we do know is that fashion risk taker Mary Kate leases a private but modest house in the Bird Streets in LA as well as a loft on Mercer Steet in New York's former artist 'hood SoHo. Previous to her recent purchase of a small house in Hancock Park (adjacent), Miss Ashley leased a not so big Nichols Canyon abode, and we think she's got a place she leases in the West Village in NYC, but don't quote us on that. According to Mighty Mouse, the teensy power players together leased a tiny house on Escondido Beach in Malibu last summer. There are undoubtedly other places in the mix that Your Mama doesn't know anything about. And certainly all that real estate costs a fortune to own, lease and maintain. But given these chicklets behemoth bank accounts, they could certainly afford much more expensive and lavish properties to crash and store their vast collections of Balenciaga boots and vintage furs.

So what was Miss Ashley Olsen and her big black Geländewagon doing at that big ass estate in The Boo-Boo? Who knows? But if Miss Olsen or any of her people would like to clue your Mama in, on or off the record, be sure to give us a ringy-dingy.

Cindy and Rande Rent Rooms

OWNER: Rande Gerber and Cindy Crawford
LOCATION: Pacific Coast Highway, Malibu, CA
PRICE: $22,500/month
SIZE: 2,413 square feet, 4 bedrooms, 3 bathrooms
DESCRIPTION: Furnished beach front rental. Panoramic ocean views from this impeccable beach house located on a sandy beach just north of Broad Beach. Gated private street–perfect beach retreat. Office could be fourth bedroom.

DESCRIPTION: Thanks to the always helpful hand of Our Fairy Godmother in Bel Air, Your Mama has learned that moletastic moe-dell Cindy Crawford and her nightclub impresario huzband Rande Gerber, himself a former male mannequin, don't you know, are looking to lease an ocean front property they own in Malee-boo.

While most children will never get to frolic and freak with a nearly six foot tall woman who's blessed with the face of an angel and the bahdee of a porn hussy, but some reasonably deep pockets might help soothe a shriveled ego by coughing up considerable coinage to live in an ocean front house owned by a walking talking slice of American good looks and the picture of American capitalism at its finest. Where else can a gurl from Dekalb make bazillions of bucks just by allowing famous photogs to take pictures of her? Ah, America.

Anyhoo, listing information for the Crawford/Gerbers 4 bedroom and 3 bathroom house indicates that the comely couple are totally flex on lease terms (month to month, short term, long term, 1+ years all okay). They are asking $22,500 per month (furnished) for a long term lease and $35,000 per month (furnished) for a short term lease. All things considered, these prices are not that crazy compared to some of the many wildy high priced rental pads in the Boo. So grab your checkbooks and haul ass to Malee-boo to scoop this place up, because if you're rich and in the market for a rental in Malee-boo, it's practically a bargain.

Property records reveal that Mister Good Lookin' Gerber purchased the property back in April of 1998 for $1,850,000, right about the time that he and his cover gurl/Playboy poser became legally hitched. While the house sits cheek by jowl with a couple other ocean front houses, it is accessed down a gated and private street off the Pacific Coast Highway that ensures renting famous folks that looky loos and paps won't have an easy time watching them unload groceries or sunbathe topless (and/or bottomless) on the back deck.

If we're being critical, we'd say Mister and Missus Former Models need to ring up one of their nice gay decorator friends to do this place over proper. But realistically, it's set up just about the way Your Mama and the Dr. Cooter might set up a beach rental...stuffed full of odds, ends, and mixed and matched items we don't actually want in our own residence and don't care if they get ruined. Why provide the renters nice decor their party posse can vomit all over, allow their cats to claw or their loud children to put their scungee feet all over?

Although Your Mama isn't sure if Mister and Missus I'm Better Looking Than All of You ever lived in this house or not, but we do know that this property is definitely not the Malee-boo getaway the Mister and Missus Gerber currently occupy. Oh no puppies, when the super rich super model, her bizness man husband and their couple of loud children head north on the congested Pacific Coast Highway to their sandy hideaway, they park their fancy whips here:
Uh, yeah. Can you believe that shit? That's four damn mini houses that make up the Crawford/Gerber compound, which sits a few miles up the PCH from the available rental. Don't let anyone tell you that looking good won't get you nothing but a heartache and too much attention from pervy men, because they're lying and they're probably just bitter and uglee people. So all you bitches who wannabe America's Next Top Model, well, lookee what real estate pornography cold be in your skinny ass future if you make it big on the catwalk and marry a man who makes butt loads of money.

Lower photo: Pacific Coast News

Did Scott Baio Fake It?

WHO: Scott Baio
WHAT: an uglee 5 bedroom and 5.5 bathroom house
WHERE: Strawberry Drive, Encino, CA

YOUR MAMAS NOTES: Although Your Mama and the Dr. Cooter will watch just about any reality television program that just about any television executive will dare to air, we confess to never having seen Scott Baio's little slice of reality T.V. called Scott Baio is 45...And Single.

However, Your Mama has been getting all sorts of emails wanting to know about an Encino property the program shows Mister Baio buying and moving in to. So not knowing a thing about Mister Baio other than his work on Happy Days, Charles in Charge and later on Arrested Development, we had to take to the internets to sort out the what's what.

Interestingly, it would seem from our wee bit of research, Mister Baio is not, nor was he single during the taping of the "reality" program. Yes, he was unmarried, but not single. He did not frequent meat market bars and try to date young Hollywood hussies. He tried to come to terms with whether he wanted to marry his ladee friend Renee, who he indeed married just after the birth of their baby Chachi.

Next we got on the horn to Lucy Spillerguts and Valley Dude and a few other contacts Your Mama has in the San Fernando Valley to see what we could suss out. What we found is that Mister Baio and his wifey, reportedly a former Playboy Playmate and erstwhile body double for Pammy Anderson and whose name is actually Peaches Renee Sloan, still occupy the 4,403 square foot house on Royal Oak Road in Encino that property records show Mister Baio purchased back in 1994 for $1,345,000. We can't tell you how we know this or we'd have to cut your tongue out and sliver you ears off, but Your Mama is quite certain the couple have not decamped from Mister Baio's single story, 4 bedroom, 4 bathroom, 1+ acre estate on Royal Oak Road to the uglee house (pictured above) squeezed onto a tiny triangular shaped lot on Strawberry Drive.

So what happened on the television show then? Apparently, the couple "bought" this crazy looking McMansion on Strawberry Drive in Encino and Mister Baio moaned and groaned about the big mortgage payments. But children, it appears they were just making television.

Your Mama has included a few pictures of the Strawberry Drive house the Mister and Missus Baio fake bought. But we're simply not up to digging our claws into the architectural aberration, partick because the Baio's don't live here and there are no records that (yet) indicate they purchased this or any other home as far as we know. Mister Big Time? Any thoughts?

This is certainly not the first time that reality shows have depicted something not real and it's not even the first the a reality program has indulged in real estate fakery. Remember when that kooky Kimora Lee Simmons pretended to buy a house different than the one she actually bought on her Life in the Fab Lane reality television publicity vehicle. And let's not forget when Missus David Beckham "lived" up in that big glass contemporary house on her reality special when in fact she and Sexy bought a $22,000,000 freshly built Bev Hills style Mediterranean.

P.S. With the help of a very resourceful cohort, Your Mama located an online listing for the Strawberry Drive house, which no longer appears to be active. The list price was $3,199,000 and Your Mama thinks it would be both unfathomable and inexcusable that Mister Baio would exchange his very private and gated home Royal Oak Road for this monstrosity that is pushed up to the very edges of the property.

UPDATE: Olivia Newton John

The children will recall that Australian singer/actor Olivia Newton John's 5 bedroom and 6 bathroom Malee-boo Mediterranean, located up in the guard gated Serra Retreat die-rectly next door to the former love shack of that poor coming apart at the seams Britney Spears and her Fed-ex, recently swept onto the market with a $14,000,000 asking price.

Now puppies, y'all know we loved Miz Newton John looking flawless and ridiculously thin in her shiny black lycra pants in Grease, and of course we loved ev-er-ee-thing about Xanadu. Your Mama even loved her in that crazy leo-tard outfit when she got all Physical on us. (Not to mention all the muscled mens squatting, thrusting, and stretching in their bikini underwear.) But we are not loving the decor, or rather lack of, in Miz Newton John's Malee-boo mansion.

Your Mama loves a down stuffed white sofa as much as the next big-assed couch potato with an unhealthy addiction to candy and reality television. So one might think we'd be in sofa heaven with all Miz Newton John's white divans. But we're not. At all.

The problem, in our ever so humble and meaningless opinion, is not specifically the profusion of white sofas and chairs, but rather that the house looks like no one actually lives in it. It looks dead inside. Perhaps Miz Newton John has already vacated the premises? And if she did, who could blame her? Who could live more than 3 days up in a house with dining room chairs desperate to look like the damn garden?

Although in the main we like the wide lawn and tucked away swimming pool complex, one area of outdoor concern is that crop circle thing in the backyard. Is she asking for all the ETs to land in her back yard?

Otherwise this is a lovely house in a highly desirable location. We'd just love to see some upsettingly rich Hollywood type come in here with a team of nice gay decorators and do the place up in a manner worthy of a $14,000,000 home.

But don't worry Miz Newton John, Your Mama loves you bad decor and all. But seriously gurl, give us a call when you get moved so we can hook you up with someone to work all your white sofas into something spectacular.

The Frank McCourts Do It Again In Malee-boo

BUYERS: Frank and Jamie McCourt
LOCATION: Pacific Coast Highway, Malibu, CA
PRICE: around $19,000,000
SIZE: 1,620 square feet, 3 bedrooms, 3 bathrooms

YOUR MAMAS NOTES: Along with an item or two that had been previously reported, celebrity real estate high priestess Ruth Ryon revealed in her most recent Hot Properties column that Boston biznessman turned LA biznessman and owner of the Los Angeles Dodgers Frank McCourt and his accomplished wifey Jamie dropped another massive wad of cash on a second oceanfront house right next door to the one they already own on uber exclusive Carbon Beach in Malee-boo.

The children will recall that in July of 2007 the stinking rich McCourts dropped an impressive $27,250,272 to acquire Courtney Cox and David Arquette's loopy, swoopy and gorgeous John Lautner designed house on Carbon Beach. And according to Miz Ryon (and confirmed with property records), they've coughed up another impressive chuck of change to buy the 1,620 square foot 1940s beach cottage next door. Records Your Mama accessed do not yet reveal the purchase price, but Miz Ryon reports the carpet bagging couple paid "close to $19,000,000" for the 3 bedroom and 2 bathroom house. (FYI: listing information for the property indicates 3 bedrooms and 3 bathrooms while Los Angeles County tax records show 4 bedrooms and 2 bathrooms.)

This recent Malee-bee purchase is not the first time the McCourts have purchased a high priced property adjacent to one they already own. When the couple moved West in 2004, they paid a widely reported $21,500,000 for a Charing Cross Road estate across the street from the Playboy Mansion in hoity toity Holmby Hills. They purchased the 11,637 square foot house from Kenneth "Babyface" Edmunds and his then wifey Tracey. (Yes puppies, the very same unlucky in love Tracey who recently split from that fickle Eddie Murphy). Just five months later, the McCourts quickly snapped up the 8,385 square foot house next door. Your Mama imagines they house the staff there, but really, we haven't got a clue why they needed the extra 8 bedrooms and 10 bathrooms in that house.

Now then, let's have a look-see at the recent history of the McCourt's new acquisition, which Miz Ryon says is already under-going and extensive renovation. In November of 2006, entertainment executive and Hollywood scion Casey Wasserman, grandson of the famously bespectacled and hugely powerful Lew Wasserman, sold the house to man named Peter Kleidman. The who's and what's of this Mister Kliedman are a bit of a mystery to Your Mama, but a wee bit of searching the internets comes up with some phun bits. In the Spring of 2007 Mister Kleidman rankled his high-fallutin' neighbors nerves when he threw open the doors to his property and offered the Malee-booan masses public access to one of the most notoriously difficult to access stretches of beach on the West Coast. You'll recall that Miss David Geffen threw all kinds of hissy fits and law suits about having to provide public access to the beach via an accessway that runs next to his rather impressive oceanfront digs, so you can imagine the Carbonites were not thrilled.

Mister Kleidman futher irritated the neighbors when he leased the teeny tiny property to the swag mistresses at The Silver Spoon who decked out the interiors, did up the outdoor spaces all beach club like, dubbed it "The Silver Spoon Beach House," and sub-leased it out at $65,000 per month to celebutants like actor/singer/whatevers Hilary and Haylie Duff and new-nosed and supposed it girl Ashley Tisdale, who leased the petite property for her 22nd birthday.

So perhaps it's no wonder or surprise that the McCourts once again reached into their seemingly endless real estate investment funds to purchase the problematic property next door. Because, let's be honest, what atrociously rich gajillionaire wants to spent nearly $30,000,000 on a beach house only to have a bunch of quasi famous skinny bitches and tabloid princesses throwing paparazzi friendly parties next door? Uhm, none of them.

There's no need to rip apart the interiors, because they did not belong to anyone in particular and are long gone with the McCourt's renovation. Now, Your Mama and the Dr. Cooter are off to the movies so be quiet and don't fight amongst yourselves.

Desert Hot Springs PreFabulosity

SELLERS: Leo Marmol and Alisa Becket
LOCATION: McCarger Road, Desert Hot Springs, CA
PRICE: $1,850,000
SIZE: 2,100 square feet interior space (approx.), 3 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms

YOUR MAMAS NOTES: According to the newish, well informed, and gaining speed LA based blog Real Sedated (via Mister Peter Viles at the LA Times), another piece of Coachella Valley architectural splendiferousness has come the real estate market. Leo Marmol, partner of starchitectural firm Marmol Radziner, and his wifey Alisa Becket have put their sleek, sexy and solar powered pre-fabulous Desert Hot Springs getaway on the market for $1,850,000, which is a lot of damn money for a house in dumpy but increasingly desirable Desert Hot Springs. But children, just look at what you get for just under two million of your hard earned clams.

Of course, not everyone will appreciate the look and emotional feel of a pre-fab and factory built collection of minimal-ish boxes sited on a dirt road looking over the scrubby desert towards the dramatically craggy San Jacinto Mountains. But Your Mama does. Oh yes children, we would happily sell half of you snot nosed bitches into prostitution for this house, even if it is in Desert Hot Springs.

Sitting on five acres of desert dryness 10 or so miles north of Palm Springs, Mister Marmol and Miz Becket (herself a scion of a noted architect), practiced what they preached out there in the desert. The art and design oriented couple utilized a system of factory built, pre-fabricated modules designed by Marmol Radziner Prefab to create a visually stunning and aggressively contemporary prototype perfect for people with a little bit of money who prefer not to live in a cape, a colonial or a crappy and characterless tract house.

With 2,100 square feet (approx.) of interior space and roughly 2,400 square feet of exterior space, the house wraps around a central courtyard and forms a sort of new-fangled and high class campground. There are three bedrooms and 2 bathrooms in the main section of the compound and a guest wing and separate studio space are accessed via a long, outdoor covered walkway, perfect for fashionista friends who like to pretend they're working the catwalks in Paris after a few pitchers of gin and tonics, and you know Your Mama has got a few friends like that.

As y'all know, the desert sun will cook you like a Thanksgiving turkey, so one and all can surely appreciate the generously sized covered decks that provide necessary shade and extend the somewhat modestly sized interior living space outdoors through sliding walls of floor to ceiling glass. Gigantic perforations in the facade act as windows framing long vistas over the desert.

Inside, Marmol Radziner have debunked the notion that prefab has to be anything but fabulous. The concrete floors are stained to match the color of the desert floor and the kitchen is deelishuslee wrapped in teak. Your Mama imagines this teak material is an upgrade that will cost future prefab buyers some serious scratch. But hunnies, it is worth whatever it cost. Imagine running your nekkid bahdee up against that wall while you're heating up a Lean Cuisine in the built in microwave.

Mister Viles reported that Mister Marmol and Miz Becket are selling off this house in order to build a new prefabricated residence for themselves in Venice. Venice, California that is. Their loss can be your gain children, so act quickly before some other design queen with a little bit of money snatches this property out from under you.

Tobey Maguire To Build in Brentwood

Looks like Tobey Maguire and his wifey Jennifer Meyer are indeed planning to spin a web for their little family in Brentwood. Your Mama knew the actor and the jewelry designer were looking for a place to live in Brentwood, which we mentioned earlier this week in our discussion about the purdy Brentwood digs that chat king Conan O'Brien recently purchased. However, little did we know the young couple had already plunked down a wallet full of cash for a vacant .93 acre lot on N. Carmelina in the flats just above Sunset Boulevard.

There's little we can add that wasn't already well covered by Mister Big Time in his big reveal about the Maguire/Meyer purchase. So rather than try to be witty, clever or even thorough, Your Mama will sign out so we can get ourselves properly put together for a dinner party honoring our boozy, foul mouthed, and often nekkid friend Falsetta Knockers and her sharply talented and somewhat well known novelist huzband.

Your Mama Hears...

...that Garfleck or Jenben, or whatever it is all the tabs and gossip glossies call Hollywood it-parents Ben Affleck and Jennifer Garner, were out house hunting the other day. It was whispered in our big ear that along with a couple other pricey pads, the couple had a look-see at duck-billed single mommy Meg Ryan's Stradella Road property in Bel Air. Yes kids, this is the very same house that all the real estate gossips once thought Sexy and The Spice Gurl were gonna buy.

One of our well informed sources, a gentleman we call Kenny Kissentell, tells Your Mama that interested rich people gotta pay Miz Ryan $20,000,000 for the privilege of up living in her purdy tile-roofed house that sits next door to smoldering sexpot fashionista Tom Ford's Neutra designed digs. Kenny says the house is lovely, a real movie star home. However, says Kenny, there is simply no room to turn a limo around in the driveway, which of course is a real consideration for all the red carpet walkers in Los Angeles.

The a-list actors have spent considerable time and money building a not yet finished family house in lower Mandeville Canyon. So, does this mean we might see them to flip the newly built house and sell off their current crib on N. Tigertail in Brentwood? Only time will tell. For now it's just rumor and gossip.

Harvey Fierstein Takes a Loss in Putnam County.

SELLER: Harvey Fierstein
LOCATION: West Hollow Road, Brewster, NY
PRICE: $749,900
SIZE: 3,640 square feet, 4 bedrooms, 4 bathrooms
DESCRIPTION: Perfect Center Hall Colonial set on 4+ acres in private cul-de-sac. Home welcomes you with dramatic 2 story entry, which opens to great rm with fireplace. Lovely formal dining rm. Office, parlor, well appointed kitchen any gourmet would love. Full bath & laundry. 2nd level boasts lavish master bedroom suite + 3 add'l bedrooms, finished bonus rm & two full baths. Additional highlights include back staircase, full walkout basmt with high ceilings.

YOUR MAMAS UPDATE: Although he does own it, it's very possible that Mister Harvey Fierstein does not actually occupy this house. Hence all the wacky statuettes and folk art figurines may in fact not belong to the big and bigger than life actor. If anyone would like to clear that up, please give us a shout. In the meantime, we leave the discussion unchanged.

YOUR MAMAS NOTES: We are running way behind so we are going to try to be brief today. Your Mama has learned from Westchester Willy that cross dressing Broadway icon Harvey Fierstein has put his Putnam County country pad on the market for $749,900. For the mapless few, Putnam County sits just north of swanky Westchester County, which is of course just north of New York City.

Property records indicate that gravel voiced Mister Fierstein purchased the 3,640 square foot house in December of 20o5. Records also reflect that the Tony and Emmy winning diva paid $790,000 for the 4.31 acre property on West Hollow Road, so it looks like Miss Thing will be losing some money on this transaction. A local realtor that Your Mama communicated with thinks the house and location are "fierce" and should sell quickly despite the "festive" decor.

Listing information indicates the house, which sits in a small development of like minded houses, has 4 bedroom, 4 bathrooms, a parlor (of course Miz Fierstein has a parlor!), dining room, office, eat in kitchen and a full walk out and windowed basement. A back staircase makes it easier for weekend guests to squirrel tricks in and out without disturbing the ladee of the house.

Harvey hunny, all due respect to you because Your Mama really does hold you in the highest esteem as an actor and an activist. However, Your Mama confesses that we are terribly disappointed with the interior decor of this house. We are certain that what we are looking is an extensive collection of folk and outsider art. However, all those figurines and doll like things standing, sitting, leaning and gesturing throughout the house give us the heebie jeebies. Seeing those crazy things lurking in the corners, with their strange faces, thrusting arm and legs all akimbo would scare the skin right off our body as we walked bleary eyed through a shadowed room after a long night reality television and a tall pitcher of gin and tonics. Seriously Harvey, how do you keep from coming through that front door without shrieking out your big lungs in fright because it looks like there is a skinny scarecrow burglar sitting in wait with his legs though the rails on the balcony thing in the entrance hall?

Don't misunderstand, we like folk and outsider art as much as the next art appreciator, and there are indeed a good number of pieces in there that we like quite a bit, such as the big colored light bulb arrow in the front hall and the kooky Magritte-ish painting in the parlor where you've installed a vintage jukebox perfect for Saturday night singalongs. We also enjoy that mod plastic dinette set in the kitchen, however it's unpleasantly and unhappily juxtaposed with an oil painting of President Abraham Lincoln. We can just about tolerate the red faux suede sectional (due in part to the fact that it looks comfortable), and we can even get behind the collection of oil portraits and gold gilded frames. But those dancer dolls are a real problem for us and we are deeply concerned those red and white flowers on the coffee table might be plastic, or even worse, silk. And the bed spread. Oh, Harvey. Hunny. Please. No. How about swapping that overly bizzy thing out with a nice, simple navy duvet?

Here's the thing dollies, we love that the decor of this house has a personality and a point of view even if the middle brow architecture does not. And we love that Mister Fierstein collects. Collections are fantastic. However, Your Mama would gently and respectfully suggest to Mister Fierstein that he do a little bit of editing. He's a tip for Mister Fierstein and all the childen, it's simply not necessary dto show everything in a collection at the same time, particularly if it's a large collection.

No word on why Mister Fierstein has decided to unload this place at a huge loss, however property records show he owns another house in nearby Ridgefield, CT. as well as a duplex apartment on a high floor of a West 83rd Street building in New York City that records suggest he has owned since at least November of 1987.

Pete Sampras' Home Court Up For Grabs

SELLER: Pete Sampras
LOCATION: Loma Vista Drive, Beverly Hills, CA
PRICE: $25,000,000
SIZE: 10,376 square feet, 6 bedrooms, 12 bathrooms
DESCRIPTION: BH English Manor Masterpiece. Recently expanded & remodeled to absolute perfections. Exquisite detailed finishes throughout. Walled & gated, the estate is set on over an acre of magnificently landscaped grounds that include N/S tennis ct. Putting green, play areas, pool, & complete privacy. Det. GH & separate gym. Interiors include prof. theater. Office/library, & maids. Master ste. w/ sitting room, his/hers baths & sundeck boasting city light views.

YOUR MAMAS NOTES: Thanks to Lucy Spillerguts and Our Fairy Godmother in Bel Air, Your Mama has learned that heavily hirsute tennis legend Pete Sampras has dropped his Bev Hills estate on the open market with a blistering $25,000,000 asking price. Located on the dee-luxe and desirable lower section of Loma Vista Drive, the one plus acre property includes a 10,376 square foot "English Manor Masterpiece" with 6 bedroom and 12 damn terlits. No wonder he's selling the place. Who needs the expense and bother of two gurls up in the house 24/7 scrubbing all twelve of them damn poopers?

Property records indicate Pistol Pete purchased the estate in December of 2001 for an undisclosed sum of money, although Your Mama is going to guess it was between nine and tell million big ones. Just a guess kids, so don't go reporting that to your friends and enemies like it was the truth...we're guessing. According to listing information, Mister Sampras and his blond wifey Bridgette remodeled the place to "absolute perfection." And absolute perfection costs a lot of cash so we're quite sure that whatever Mister and Missus Sampras paid for the reverse "L" shaped house, they have spent a fortune on the property.

Current listing information does not include photos (actually it does not, see below), so Your Mama does not know if Missus Sampras did up the interiors on her own or if she had a team of nice gay decorators to assist her.

Listing information indicates the interior spaces include living and dining rooms, den, library/study, eat in kitchen, wine cellar, a professional theater set up, and a staff bedroom. Your Mama just hopes it's a properly sized staff room with decent sized closets, a window and it's own terlit. We have been appalled at the squalid living conditions the uber rich foist upon their live in staff, but given that Mister Sampras is universally seen as a decent and nice fellow, we don't imagine he's stiffed the staff on square footage.

Outdoors we find a double gated driveway, a north/south tennis court, natch, a putting green, children's play areas, and a lovely oval shaped heated swimming pool. Also on the property are a detached guest house and a separate gym.

Nearby neighbors include super producer Irwin Winkler, who produced the Rocky film franchise and the 27,000 square foot behemoth next door is owned by shopping mall magnate turned philanthropist Guilford Glazer Celebrity decorator Kelly Wearstler and her huzband Brad Korzen's massive and newly redone estate is just around the corner on N. Hillcrest Road and Christina Aguilera and Jordan Bratman are tucked into the big house they bought from the Ozzy Osbournes just to the north on Doheny Road.

Property Records show that Mister Sampras also a smallish house in Palos Verdes, where the tennis tycoon grew up and learned to swing the ol' racket. The Benedict Drive house he owned formerly was sold off for $3,000,000 in August of 2004 to Babs Streisand's former hairdresser turned super producer Jon Peters and his much younger wifey Mindy.

YOUR MAMAS UPDATE: The pictures of Pistol Pete's Bev Hills mansion have popped up and while Your Mama is not a big fan of the Tudor style nor do we care much for the kitchen and it always gives us the shivers to see a pool table in a private home, this appears to be a speck-tack-u-lar Bev Hills estate. Look at that wood paneled entrance hall children. That room has us weeping with glee. If celebrity real estate agent Kurt Rappaport can get Tom Crooz to cough up $32,500,000 for that big ol' mansion on Calle Vista, the listing agent for Mister Sampras, well known for working with big name sports figures, can surely get $25,000,000 for this place.

Aaron Sorkin Settles In Above the Sunset Strip

BUYER: Aaron Sorkin
LOCATION: Devlin Place, Los Angeles, CA
PRICE: $6,100,000 (sale)
SIZE: 3,700 square feet, 4 bedrooms, 5 bathrooms
DESCRIPTION: At the end of a secluded cul-de-sac in prime Sunset Strip. Dramatic, stylish & private. Completely redone sprawling contemporary with explosive head-on views. Designed by John Bersci, 4 bedrooms (including maids), 4 baths. 55' living/great room, opening to spectacular pool, spa, and major outdoor entertainment areas. Light, bright, and open. Gourmet commercial kitchen, incredible master suite overlooking pool and amazing city views. Impeccably done to the last detail.

YOUR MAMAS NOTES: There are property flippers and then there is John Bersci, who quite frankly makes anal retentive real estate re-habber Jeff Lewis look like trailer trash. Don't misunderstand Your Mama kids. We love us some Jeff Lewis and look forward to seeing him mince his way across our television screen snapping at his assistant Jenni and firing his staff for bringing Styrofoam into the house. However, Mister John Bersci, the man responsible for the renovation of this house, plays in an entirely different league than the lovable Miss Lewis.

The other day Your Mama as gabbing with a source we'll call Property Pimp. In the course of chatting about a Bird Street house being sold to the daughter of a billionaire for a surprisingly large sum of money (more on that on another day), he casually mentioned the Sunset Strip house that television and film writer/executive producer Aaron Sorkin (Sports Night, The West Wing, Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip, Charlie Wilson's War) recently purchased for $6,100,000.

Our big ears popped up started digging for more information. Your Mama checked the property records, followed up with the Property Pimp, and gave our Our Fairy Godmother in the Sunset Strip a ring-a-ling. Sho enuf, the deep pocketed writer had indeed plunked down $6,100,000 for a freshly redone house on Devlin Place by primo property developer John Bersci.

Property records indicate that Mister Bersci, through one of his property holding companies, purchased the house in February of 2006 for $2,450,000. The place was wreckage. We've seen pictures. A real piece of shit children. But a great location for those that can tolerate the drive past the apartment buildings that line N. Clark Street. Mister Bersci worked his renovation hocus-pocus, squeezed some blood from a turnip and turned this broken down old Pontiac into a mint Maserati.

Now we know not everyone will like all the grey with yellow accent staging...but that's just staging children. All that somber stuff was surely moved out long before Mister Sorkin signed on the dotted line and Your Mama imagines the man has done hired himself a nice gay decorator to get in there and work some furniture magic. Let's move past the furniture then and have a look-see at the architecture and design of the physical space.

The front facade of the house presents like so many of the flat roofed residences that line the twisty turny roads that snake up into the Hollywood Hills above Sunset Boulevard. Inside, we find lots of sand blasted green glass walls and an almost disturbingly long 55-foot living/dining room space. A wall of floor to ceiling glass panels slide open to turn the entire space into a dee-luxe covered porch with stunning (if not jetliner) views over the city. Your Mama and the Dr. Cooter's housekeeper Svetlana would sooner slit our throats that be constantly wiping all that glass clean of fingerprint smudges and dog nose trails. So we hope that Mister Sorkin warned his cleaning team that extra Windex and newspaper were gong to be required on a regular basis.

Your Mama normally loves a sleek kitchen and we pee our pants over miles of Carrara marble counter tops (red wine stains be damned). We very much appreciate the built in cappuccino machine, because Your Mama requires a caffeine injection first thing in the a.m., and we'd pull our own teeth for a refrigerator like the one we see tucked at the back. However, we're not thrilled with the grey color on the cabinets and we are concerned that the long narrow island looks a little like a slab for chilling bodies in a very high class morgue.

The bedroom, with its corner of sliding glass walls that give out to the pool deck, is dee-voon. The addition of the warm and glossy wood behind the bed was a good call on Bersci's part for warming up the place and injecting a much needed bit of organic material.

Out back the sunken spa sits above the modestly size swimming pool and the pool deck has been extended over the hillside with some gorgeous decking. Although we imagine Svetlana would huff and puff and ask for a considerable raise in order to keep that glass railing dog snot free, we love it anyway. And for the record, Your Mama loves the lack of foliage in the back yard. Just think how much money Mister Sorkin will save on his landscaping bills not to mention the water bills when water in California becomes as scarce as Paris Hilton's sense of decorum.

The children will recall that Devlin Drive is the same street super-mannequin Giselle Bundchen recently sold a house for $4M and former child star Fred Savage recently flipped a Steve Hermann designed house (sans swimming pool) for $3,500,000. It's also the same street where durty new mommy Xtina Aguilera parked her glistening white Rolls Royce until she and music executive huzband Jordan Bratman dropped $11,500,000 in May of 2007 on the Ozzy Osbourne mansion on Doheny Road.

D'OH!

Here we are just one day after the Razzie nominations got it right, and the Oscar Nominations have come out, and gotten it wrong, wrong, wrong! (As usual.) Let's start with the most egregious (look it up) and outrageous snub of all. Here's how it was announced to the funniest family in America not occupying the White House:

Yes. Impossible as it is to believe, The Simpsons Movie was not nominated for Best Animated Movie, in favor of Ratatouille, a revolting movie about vermin running a French restaurant (Albeit, certainly true to life. They serve garden pests as a delicacy! Rats serving snails. Yum.), Surf's Up, a computer animated bore about surfing penguins that no one went to see, and weirdest of all, Persepolis, and artsy-fartsy critic's darling French animated movie set in Iran, about a girl who doesn't like being subjected to fundamentalist Muslim repression (Who does?), which isn't even in color! Who on earth besides a film critic would ever see that? For these, The Simpsons were frozen out?

The poor Simpsons Movie was merely the funniest film released all year, featured gorgeous animation far beyond what's done on their TV show, artfully satirized enormous chunks of American culture, and - what? Oh yes - Made about $500,000,000 world wide. This must be the first time the Oscars penalized a movie for making money. (And what do you want to bet that Ratatouille, which was also a big hit, and probably made more money than the other two nominees combined, wins?) But then, one can see how confused one gets when one goes to McDonald's, and has to wait to get served behind all the hoards of little schoolgirls clamoring for their Ratatouille Happy Meals of Breaded Rat Droppings (How lucky that, after serving them for years, they finally have a legitimate movie-tie-in to create a demand for them.), and to get their Persepolis black & white action figures, with the whole line of Barbie Fashion Bhurkas.

Homer Simpson is merely one of the great comic characters of the 20th Century. Of course, he's learned from the greats, as he does here:

There's just no understanding the Academy. Is it any wonder that I have nothing but contempt for these silly trinkets? I almost hope the WGA strike does continue long enough to torpedo their silly ceremony. (Almost! I still want the other 8 episodes of this season's LOST.) They deserve it for snubbing Homer. Gil Cates was sounding off on the TV today about how The Oscars will have a show, no matter what! An Oscar show with no SAG members? That will be a lot of laughs. Who will host? Carrot Top or Galleger? Because, if the WGA pickets, the only stars you'll see will be in the Dead Stars Montage. ("Accepting the award for Laura Linney will be the ghost of Suzanne Pleshette.") I see even Hal Holbrook and Ruby Dee saying "I can wait another year." Cates said we need the Oscars to feel like we're a part of something bigger than ourselves. Wouldn't it be eaier just to have sex with Rosie O'Donnell?

Could this be an x-ray of the brains of the nominating committee members? Or the mass x-ray of the brains of the AMPTP?

Let's talk about a couple nominees. Yesterday the Razzies nominated multi-semi-talented Eddie Murphy in all five acting categories: Actor, Actress, Supporting Actor, Supporting Actress, and Couple, for playing both men and women in Norbit, all of them badly. Apparently Cate Blancett is not to be outdone by Murphy, and has been nominated for Best Actress for playing a woman, and Best Supporting Actress for playing a man. (Well, for playing Bob Dylan, but that's close enough.) Shouldn't her nomination for I'm Not There have been as Best Supporting actor? Who does she think she is, Linda Hunt? Incidentally, if the WGA strike isn't settled before the ceremony, I'm Not There will be her acceptance speech as well as her winning title.

Of course, Little Cate, a wonderful actress, won just a couple years ago for playing Kate Hepburn. How flattered, I wonder, would Kate be to know that an actress who would win an Oscar for playing her, would shortly thereafter be nominated for an Oscar for playing a man? Not that anyone who knew Kate would be at all surprised. They'd have expected a man to have won for playing her!

Cate hasn't a shot at winning Best Actress though. Her Best Actress nomination is just a retread. She was already nominated for playing Queen Elizabeth, a decade back. If they didn't give it to her for that performance then, they won't now. Besides, they gave The Oscar for that role shortly thereafter to Sir Judy Dench, so clearly the increasingly-gender-confused Academy prefers men playing queens. (Who doesn't?) Besides, they just gave the Best Actress Oscar to Helen Mirrin for playing Queen Elizabeth last year, and they never give the Oscar for the same role two years in a row.

However, her Supporting Actress win is probably a lock. After all, she just won a Golden Globe for playing Bob Dylan (And heaven knows, she sings better than he does.) and successfully hiding her Golden Globes. None of the other Supporting Actress nominees convinced anyone they had a penis with just acting! Her only real competition is Ruby Dee, who could get the sympathy Quick-Before-She-Dies award. I think transvestism is the way to go in the future for Cate, combined with her penchant for playing only real people. Fictional characters apparently aren't whom she plays best. I see her future nominations already:

(Cate is wearing prosthetic mantits in her Brando outfit, I hope.)


The Quick-Before-He-Dies award could go to Hal Holbrook, of course, but then, he is a few months younger than Ruby Dee, so she has the edge there. Phillip Seymour Hoffman is nominated in Best Supporting Actor against Hal, for his patented Horribly Obnoxious Guy portrayal we've all seen him trot out a dozen times before. (Remember Matt Damon clubbing him to death in one of those performances back in The Talented Mr. Ripped Abs? Did anyone not cheer? Is killing one of Hoffman's slimeballs a crime?) I think the whole reason he won an Oscar for Capote was that, for once, he was playing a charmingly obnoxious - ah - person. ("Guy" just never seems like the right word to describe Truman Capote.) Casey Affleck is nominated simply for not being his better-looking-but-less-highly-regarded-for-acting-these-days brother. No chance. As it is, they all now regret giving an Oscar to Ben (Albeit for Best Original Screenplay, a minor, unimportant category, like Best Live Action Short Subject.); they're not about to risk giving one to another Affleck. But I think Javier Bardem is a shoe-in. I'd vote for him for ANYTHING, as he is a Sex God! Best Supporting actor? Check out this yummy picture of Bardem. If nothing else, he is the Best Supported Actor, as look at the support his tighty whitey is giving him, despite his clearly having a lot to support! WOOF!

Oh my God, that photo should be nominated for Best Picture! Who cares about No Country for Bloody Old Men? (Shouldn't Hal Holbrook be nominated for that?) And as for Atonement; it's based on a novel by Ian McEwan, who is no relation to Little Dougie McEwan, my amanuensis, but obviously, Ian has been trying to capitalize on Little Dougie's name and literary reputation for years, and I think the academy will see through this ploy and not reward him for trying to fool people into thinking Atonement is just an unauthorized film adaptation of Dougie's book, which is also my book. For shame, Ian McEwan! As for Juno, who wants to see a movie adaptation of my Internet service?

In Best Actor, Johnny Depp is nominated for playing Harry Potter in Harry Potter and the Demon Barber of Fleet Street, which I reviewed a few columns back, in Harry Razorhands. This nomination makes no sense to me. If you play a role that is almost entirely sung, and you don't sing very well, how can it be considered for Best Performance by an Actor? I know that Rex Harrison won an Oscar for playing Henry Higgins in My Fair Lady when he couldn't sing at all well, and Yul Brynner won an Oscar for The King and I when Marni Millhouse Nixon had to dub all his singing for him, but in neither case were the roles all-singing. They had mostly dialogue to deliver, in Harrison's case, a lot of dialogue written by George Bernard Shaw. But Depp's Harry Potter only speaks about four words in the whole movie; it's all singing, and no one is going to be buying a CD of Johnny Depp Covers the Classic Ballads anytime soon. Frankly, not only would he never make it past Simon Cowell, but Randy Jackson would say, "Sorry bro, it ain't happ'nin' for me, dawg." to Depp as well. Paula, of course, would spread her legs and slur "Welcome to Hollywood, Johnny."

Tommy Lee Jones is finally nominated, after having been snubbed a few years back, for his magnificent, subtly-nuanced, underplayed performance as Two-Face, one of the tiny handful of truly great screen performances, back in Batman Endlessly, or whatever that awful movie was called. I'm sure that all academy voters who remember that performance will be marking their ballots --- for George Clooney.

Actually, Tommy Lee Jones aside, look at the other nominees in this category: George Clooney, Daniel Day-Lewis, Johnny Depp, and Viggo Mortensen. This category should be renamed Dreamiest Actor! Hubba! Hubba!

In Best Direction (Much as I love West, North, and Up, I prefer "Down" for Best Direction, as I am always happiest when going down!), should No Country For Bloody Old Men win, the big question will be, who will win: Joel or Ethan Coen? Nominating brothers against each other for the same film; this should spark some nasty sibling rivalry. My pick for this award is Paul Thomas Anderson. Oh, I haven't seen There Will Be Bloody Old Men (Make up your minds, guys!), but Anderson's father was Ernie Anderson, and among his other gigs (Such as his years as the guy no one had heard of whom Carol Burnett pointed out in her TV audience each week.), Ernie was a TV horror host. Back in 1963, when Ghoulita was entertaining Little Douglas on Jeepers' Creepers in Los Angeles, Ernie Anderson was Ghoulardi in Cleveland, Ohio. So all power to Ghoulardi Junior. And also, back in his film Magnolia, he actually made me forget how insufferable I find Tom Cruise for a bit, and that takes a Master Director. Stanley Kubrick sure didn't manage it back in Nose Clamped Shut.

I'd discuss the screenplay categories, except that 1. They're all on strike, so they won't be there anyway, and 2. There's nothing less important in a movie than a writer.

How's this for destroying The Oscars's illusion of honoring quality? Norbit has a nomination! And it's for make-up, when we all know Eddie Murphy did it all with acting!

Best Song has three nominees from Enchanted, none from Sweeney Todd or Hairspray. Maybe if Johnny Depp had starred in Enchanted, those songs wouldn't have sounded quite so good. Speaking of Hairspray, that delightful musical received no nominations at all, not even a Best Actress nod for John Travolta, although he's not as convincing as a man as Cate Blancette is. What about poor Zac Efron? The boy has managed the impossible; he's become considered a heart throb to teenage girls and taste-free gay boys despite the hideous bangs he insists on wearing. He's done everything he could to win favor. In fact, just this month, he had an emergency appendectomy just because Barry Humphries had just had one, and Zac wanted to jump on the Gigastar-appendectomy bandwagon. Zac darling, what you really need is a bangsectomy.

Maybe I'm missing something, but aren't the nominees supposed to be current? Peter and the Wolf is nominated for Best Animated Short. Excuse me? Disney made that animated short in 1946. Keep up.

Well, this year, if there are no SAG members participating (Unless some SAG members are so hungry for glory that they will cross the picket line and become industry pariahs just to accept their Oscar.), and Seat Fillers are elevated to Award Acceptors, what the show consists of will be vastly more interesting than who wins.


But to raise interest in this increasingly irrelevant award show, I propose adding a new category. We're all agreed, aren't we, that the above photo of Javier Bardem is the Best Picture, but I think we should add the category Best Pecture, and there's no question who the 300 nominees should be: the greatest, if the goriest, softcore gay porn movie ever made, 300, which should also be the winner. I'm going to enjoy a fifth of vodka now, and then watch my DVD of 300 again, while touching myself inappropriately. Busy hands are happy hands.

__________________________

About Heath Ledger: If you've clicked onto my flog to read some snarky, insensitive jokes (Admittedly, my stock-in-trade) about the sudden death of this talented and beautiful young man, you've clicked in vain. Unlike the death of Brad Renfro, which everyone saw coming miles down the highway, this is a total shock, and no aspect of it is anything less than tragic.

This summer we will have one more performance from this gifted Australian actor. He joins the line of actors who have brought to life Bob Kane's bizarre psychovillain The Joker.

But we will always remember his Oscar-nominated Ennis Del Mar (Yes, if this were a different posting, on a different day, I'd probably wring some sort of variation on the joke that name screams) in Brokeback Mountain. He truly touched our hearts in a way that his earlier, more boisterous, exuberant performances in A Knight's Tale and 10 Things I Hate About You never suggested he could do. He was in other Oscar-bait movies, such as the acclaimed Monster's Ball, and his Terry Gilliam movies, The Brothers Grimm and the unfinished The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus (Good Heavens, that title. Terry darling, do you want your movies to fail? That would explain a lot! Are you trying to be confused with that unwatchable Dustin Hoffman bomb?), not to mention Brokeback Mountain, showed that Heath was willing to make daring, risky choices. And here's an odd irony; he is also in I'm Not There. Maybe Cate Blancett can win that Oscar for him.

So we have all suffered a terrible loss, though none more so than his two year old daughter Matilda, whom he clearly doted on. There are no jokes to be made here.

Farewell Heath, farewell Ennis. You will live on in our hearts. Sorry you couldn't stick around longer.

Sad Cheers darlings.