Jake Gyllenhaal Once Peed on Someone’s LegThe actor shares his tried-and-true method for how to cure a jellyfish sting. Plus, a Stroke moves to Brooklyn, and Samantha Ronson and Lindsay Lohan continue to move among various restaurants, in today’s gossip roundup.
Mick Jagger Is Friends With Leonardo DiCaprio and Q-Tip Bruce Willis yelled, “I’ve abandoned my son!” four times while dining at Freemans with an exotic dancer the other night, then did shots with the bartender. Mick Jagger, Q-Tip, and Leonardo DiCaprio were all hanging out at Upstairs on Monday night. Kathleen Turner’s Crimes of the Heart castmates can’t tell if she’s drunk or just tired. The Observer’s Spencer Morgan “bitch slapped” Men’s Vogue writer Hudson Morgan at the Beatrice Inn, but they made up soon after. Matthew McConaughey’s chest is at the top of In Touch Weekly’s list of Top Ten hot chests. Jason Bateman and Ricky Schroder are not working on a screenplay of Silver Spoons, although that would be awesome.
in other news
Will Rehab Come Between Eva Mendes and Her Calvins?Well, this is awkward. The same morning that Calvin Klein proudly trumpeted the fact that Eva Mendes would be the face of their new perfume this fall, her reps disclosed that Mendes has been in rehab for, oh, a couple of weeks. “Eva has been working hard for the past year and made a positive decision to take some much-needed time off to proactively attend to some personal issues that, while not critical, she felt deserved some outside professional support,” her rep said in a statement. “Out of respect for Eva’s privacy, we do not wish to discuss further details.” People solemnly informs us that last year, Mendes told reporters that to feel comfortable doing a sex scene with Joaquin Phoenix in We Own the Night she needed a drink. And to think, we thought it was only because he has that funny lip! We’re so naïve. Calvin Klein did not immediately return our call for comment, but we doubt they’ll have a problem with her “problem.” They were one of the first brands to hire Kate Moss back after her coke scandal. But Eva can probably kiss good-bye to any future work with H&M, which fired Moss after her scandal. Everyone knows they only work with supremely balanced individuals, such as Madonna and Karl Lagerfeld.
UPDATE: A Calvin Klein spokesperson offers this comment: “We support Eva during this difficult time and respect her decision to seek professional help.”
Eva Mendes in Rehab [TMZ]
Calvin Klein Fragrances to Feature Actress Eva Mendes in Fall 2008 Global Advertising Campaign [PR Newswire]
gossipmonger
Jessica Simpson Has the Same Crummy Friends As the Rest of UsJessica Simpson got totally pissed at Eva Longoria for hanging out with her ex John Mayer at GoldBar. MSNBC pundit Lawrence O’Donnell, who plays a lawyer on Big Love, bashed Mormonism on The McLaughlin Group on Sunday. Richard Belzer says he’s “hurt” his role on Law & Order: SVU has been cut back. PETA has dubbed the Olsen twins the “Trollsen Twins” because of their affinity for fur. Among the items in J.Lo’s gift registry for her twins are a Balmoral enameled black carriage for a $3,495 and a $289 suede play mat.
in other news
Eliot Spitzer, Silda Wall: The New Billary?As the grim first anniversary of his governorship nears — with Albany as much of a mess as ever — Eliot Spitzer is backing up the steamroller, the Sun reports. According to the paper’s mysteriously high-placed source, the governor is shaking up his staff “at the urging of his wife and one of his closest friends.” The former is, of course, Silda Wall, while the latter is Lloyd Constantine, a mentor figure since Spitzer’s law-school days. Their advice, supposedly: Ditch chief of staff Richard Baum and chief political operative Ryan Toohey, both stained by the Troopergate, as a show of a “clean break” for the voters. Frankly, we had no idea the duo held such sway over Spitzer’s staffing choices; the recent Vanity Fair feature, for example, mentions the governor “turning more to seasoned advisers such as Constantine,” but Silda only rates a cameo as the girl that “made him smile.” If true, this is fairly huge: It means that the governor, like all beleaguered leaders, is getting all Circle of Trust on us — which amounts to a tacit recognition of failure. For his part, Spitzer has “yet to make a move.”
gossipmonger
Heath Ledger Has a Supermodel in His SightsHeath Ledger has been stalking Gemma Ward around town and also tried hitting on (taken) Heather Graham. The server who brought Chelsea Clinton the wrong appetizer at Irving Mill may or may not have been fired. Calvin Klein is vandalizing his Houston Street billboard for the opening of the New Museum on the Bowery. NBC honcho Jeff Zucker doesn’t want the strike to end because retail advertisers have already bought up ad space, and now production costs are zero. Kimora Lee Simmons was overheard saying that the reason she invited Russell Simmons’s new girlfriend, Porschla Coleman, to meet the “major players” at Simmons’s birthday last month is because she “wants this stupid bitch to get a clue.” Seagram heir Edgar Bronfman Jr. just bought an $18.75 million condo in the Carhart mansion on East 95th Street.
gossipmonger
Calvin Klein and Donna Karan’s Bentley Accident: Hilarious!Donna Karan rear-ended Calvin Klein’s Bentley while in her own Bentley. And get this, she was actually driving herself! Don Imus will have a co-host for the first time in his career when he returns to the air on December 3. Bryant Park charges the crew of Sex and the City $100,000 for each day they film there. (Also, the film’s ending is supposedly not yet written.) NBC Universal Jeffrey Zucker bought Kitty Carlisle Hart’s East 64th Street co-op for $12.3 million, “Page Six” reports, making us happy to see that they’re catching up on two-month-old Daily Intel posts. More Secret Service guards have been hanging out on Barbara Bush’s West Village block, perhaps because Janeane Garofalo gabbed on Bill Maher’s show that she’s Bush’s neighbor. Downtown promoter Ivy Supersonic spent a night in jail after being accused of stealing $7,000 by the owner of the Plumm. ‘Mocialite Kristian Laliberte hosted a party with BlackBook magazine for Carlos Campos at Upstairs in Soho.
company town
The Union Club Is Like an Adult Frat, But Not in a Fun, ‘Old-School’ WayMEDIA
• Yesterday at the Union Club, reporters specifically invited by the Manhattan Institute to hear Mayor Bloomberg and Jeb Bush speak were instructed to leave the room before the speeches began. “The police are right outside,” one club worker told them. “If you don’t leave, we’re going to call them in.” You have to wonder if this was merely an administrative fumble, or the old-guy version of that frat-party game where dudes invite fat chicks to parties so they can make fun of them. [NYS, NYO]
• However! The Manhattan Institute has since apologized to the press for the Union Club’s behavior, and they put Bush’s remarks online. It’s only audio, though, we wonder why? We can only assume it’s because at the Union Club, all speeches are done naked. [Manhattan Institute via NYO]
• Janice Min: “It’s off-putting when a junior employee tells you they want to be editor in chief.” Instead, just try to make yourself indispensable: “I was the easy solution. Make yourself the easy solution.” Or just make yourself easy. [WWD]
gossipmonger
Kelly Klein Finally Nabs That BabyGisele Bündchen showed up at the haunted house on Suffolk Street sans costume and cut the line. Hunter S. Thompson’s widow is pissed at Jann Wenner because he portrayed Hunter in his book as an “awful beast of a man” after he left Rolling Stone . Calvin Klein’s ex, Kelly, finally has a daughter, via surrogate mother. David Brooks, a.k.a. the guy who was recently busted for using company cash to fund his daughter’s $10 million bat mitzvah, also used his employees’ pension funds to pay for his son’s bar mitzvah. Hillary Clinton backed out of a Vogue photo shoot being shot by Annie Leibovitz because she felt it would be “too glamorous.” Sting and some buddies went to Scores. Bono and Damien Hirst dined at Lever House. Law & Order’s Richard Belzer had to get his driver to walk his poodle during a screening at Core Club because he wasn’t allowed to bring it in.
gossipmonger
Renée Zellweger, Not on FireRenée Zellweger’s neighbor called the FDNY on her because she had a fire going in her fireplace. Jennifer Lopez and her mom don’t talk anymore, perhaps because of Marc Anthony. Mary Louise Parker took her adopted (and Brat Pitt–approved) African baby to a doctor’s appointment in New York. Blackstone chairman Steven Schwarzman’s charitable foundation has only $63,424 in assets and is holding just $991 for charitable purposes. Kelly Klein is expected to make $3 million by selling jewels ex-hubby Calvin bought her for $200,000 in 1987. Kanye West went to Blue Ribbon with a leather-clad dominatrix and some models. George Clooney was jokingly slapped by “a really hot girl” at Bungalow 8’s New York branch. Kim Kardashian and Terrence Howard were caught making out at Butter and Tenjune.
intel
Heath Ledger Enjoying Open Season
Is Heath Ledger already on the prowl? It’s been just days since the actor’s split with Michelle Williams was made public and already we’ve seen him hit the town for two marathon nights. The first was on Sunday, when he attended a Dazed & Confused magazine dinner at Bowery Hotel with five friends and ended up getting squired around the city by Amy Sacco, who took him to Narciso Rodriguez’s tenth-anniversary party on the roof of the Gramercy Park Hotel, then to the Rose Bar downstairs, and finally to the Box, where he spent quality time in a banquette chatting up a chicly dressed blonde who looked like a taller Sienna Miller.
party lines
Antonio Sabato Jr. Doesn’t Pad His Dating Résumé, Underpants
“I’m the only single guy I know!” says former tighty-whitey model Antonio Sabato Jr., surrounded by male admirers at the Calvin Klein underwear party. Does he mind all that same-sex attention? “Someone asked me, ‘Are you all right with gays liking you so much?’ And I was like, ‘Why wouldn’t I be? It’s good to be loved!’” says Sabato, right before getting fawned over by Mario Cantone. So what is he looking for? “My ideal girl is somebody who’s pretty much willing to do anything: skydive, scuba dive, ride motorcycles,” he says. She’ll also have to be an early riser. “She’d be willing to get up in the morning and go to the U.S. Open with me after a night like this. A lot of girls like to sleep in. I’m ready to go in the morning.” Also, “Don’t drink, because I hate drinking.” She’d have to be willing to deal with his being a single dad of two kids. But he is willing to try long distance, since he lives in L.A. One other thing: “I don’t stuff my pants. What you see is what you get.”—Jada Yuan
For more pictures and quotes from the Calvin Klein underwear party, including Kimora Lee Simmons, Djimon Hounsou, and Agyness Deyn, read Party Lines.
party town
Alek Wek: Still Smiling, Trying• Glamour Fashion Gives Back. Aglow Studios, 421 Broome St., nr. Crosby St., 8 p.m. Scheduled guests include Amanda Peet, Emily Mortimer, Ginnifer Goodwin, and Catalina Sandino Moreno. Quite a collection of actressing talent… you could probably get a one-hour family drama picked up on a major network based entirely on footage of conversations that take place tonight in the women’s bathroom.
the morning line
Three Punished for Deutsche Deaths
• More than a week after the Deutsch Bank blaze killed two firefighters, three FDNY honchos have been reassigned for failing to regularly inspect the building or come up with a plan to fight a fire there. [NYT]
photo op
Second Avenue Subway: Actual, Real Work Begins, Almost
Never mind announcements and plans and ceremonial ground-breakings and wall-tappings; construction on the Second Avenue Subway is now, finally, actually, really here. Two lanes of Second Avenue in the Nineties will be closed to allow the MTA to drop the massive tunnel-boring down to subway level, and, as our compatriots at Curbed noted yesterday, work on the hole is beginning. In the above Curbed photo, what that low-Nineties stretch of Second is going to look like for the next decade or so. Fun!
Second Avenue Subway Scene: Barriers, Fences, Dismay [Curbed]
gossipmonger
The Continuing Education of Mrs. Ross ContinuesCourtney Sale Ross, founder of the Ross School in the Hamptons and the new Ross Global Academy charter school in the Tweed Courthouse, is not the easiest person to work for (as Phoebe Eaton reports in this week’s New York.) Construction on Ann Curry’s townhouse on West 71st Street has led to four lawsuits from angry neighbors. Bruce Willis got a make-out session with Courtney Love on his 52nd birthday. Michael Jackson is in talks to build a 50-foot robotic replica of himself in — where else? — Vegas. Governor Eliot Spitzer is liberal with the compliments. Former Studio 54 busboy and current Nobu managing partner Richie Notar will run Ian Schrager’s Asian fusion restaurant in the Gramercy Park Hotel. The former chef at 44 used to serve Calvin Klein McDonald’s French fries for lunch, and Klein was none the wiser.
company town
Barbarians at the Energy GridFINANCE
• A group led by Kohlberg Kravis is taking energy giant TXU private for $45 billion, besting the Blackstone record by $6 billion. But can Kravis beat Schwarzman’s party? [NYT]
• Gary Crittenden named Citigroup CFO. Job description: Fix CEO Charles Prince’s mistakes. [NYT]
• Goldman media banker Sebastian Grigg may defect to Credit Suisse. [DealBook/NYT]
it happened this week
Figure It Out
As the number of shopping days till Christmas dwindled, the ten magi of the Baker-Hamilton commission told Bush 43 that he had “one last chance” to get Iraq straightened out and suggested that most troops come home within fifteen months. Other surprising figures popped up: The Senate confirmed Defense Secretary-nominee Robert Gates by a vote of 95 to 2 after he said that Saddam Hussein had no 9/11 connection. (The president called Gates the right man to tackle “the emerging threats of the 21st century,” leaving some to wonder where he’d been six years ago.) Hillary Clinton seemed ready to commit 110 percent to a 2008 presidential campaign, planning strategic visits to Iowa and New Hampshire and telling one pol, “I’m really going to go for this.” Meanwhile, her potential rival, Barack Obama (and many Dems’ No. 1 fantasy), gave at a $2,500-a-plate Manhattan charity dinner.
gossipmonger
Paul Once Had a Girl, Or, Shall We Say, She Once Had HimWas Heather Mills — Paul McCartney’s one-legged ex-wife-to-be — once a high-priced hooker? She says no, an alleged client says yes. Ron Perelman and Tory Burch are dating, but not exclusively. Chris Cornell’s stalker may be British, which may be a problem if he goes to London for the new Bond movie premiere. Paris Hilton is also in London but, oddly enough, not staying at the Hilton. Calvin Klein’s daughter just sold an apartment for a lot of money; she bought a new one for slightly more. Katie Holmes declines a possible Oscar nod for her role in Thank You for Smoking, presumably because Tom told her to. By the way, they’re getting married soon, and not even Liz Smith is invited. Queen Latifah got into a tiff with Law & Order’s Billy Burns at an airport, unless she didn’t. Jude Law and Sienna Miller split yet again, but this time Jude did the dumping. Peter Cook and Christie Brinkley finally agree on visitation rights for their kids. Eddie Murphy’s sweetie, the artist formerly known as Scary Spice, is pregnant, and he’s still going out on dates with other women. Naomi Campbell (accidentally) hits someone with her purse. Oprah’s non-lesbian lover, Gayle King, told Will Smith she was married to a cheater. Sayeth Lindsay Lohan: “I feel like I’ve lived five lives and I’m only 20.”
