Burning Q’s: When to Boo & the Walk of Fame Game
What happens at a movie premiere if the movie just totally sucks? Is there awkward silence and booing? Thunder Wolf
People booed at the Berlin premiere of J.Lo’s bomb Bordertown. There was also cackling, but that was by me, when I read about it way back here in my office. Now, onward with your blistering Burning Q’s!
Why did Randy Quaid get a Walk of Fame star in 2003, but three-time Oscar nominee Michelle Pfeiffer didn’t get hers until 2007? More importantly, why did Randy Quaid get a star at all?Jen
The Walk of Fame is a publicity game. A movie studio or, sometimes, a fan club, applies for those plaques on the celebrity’s behalf. The Hollywood Chamber of Commerce then meets in secret once a year to consider applications, and much of the selection process is also never disclosed.
Once the honorees are picked, the celebrities or, more likely, their studios or fan clubs, must pay a $25,000 “sponsorship fee” to the chamber before the star can be installed on the Walk of Fame. In other words, a celebrity’s level of achievement can easily be trumped by an ambitiousand richpublicity campaign.
Oh, and Randy Quaid? Got his first Oscar nom 16 years before Pfeiffer.
Do contestants on reality shows (specifically American Idol) receive any payment for, say, the Idol Tour?Jason
Yep.
Are Eric Stein and Jessica Hughbanks, who met last summer on Big Brother 8, still together and maintaining their long-distance relationship? Please update me about this cute couple. Kent
A Big Brother spokeswoman tells me this: “Some people tell me they’re not together, other people tell me they’re together.” That work for you? Yeah, me neither.
Would love to hear your remarkable insight about one of the most fabulous celebrities of all time, Elizabeth Taylor. Your thoughts?Tyra, Montgomeryville, Pa.
Wait, she’s that older version of Jennifer Lopez and Angelina Jolie, right? The one in the muumuus? Why do you ask? Has she adopted a Zimbabwean refugee child and tattooed its name on one of her million-dollar ankles as she poses in her cream-and-gold-leafed baby nursery for People while her man performs his feverishly rehearsed adoring gaze, terrified that he might get another shock stick to his eardrum if he fails? No? Then I have nothing to add.
Oh, and be my fan on Facebook, ’kay?
Should Mariah Carey Be Worried?
No doubt the queen of divas, Mariah Carey, doesn’t like everyone proclaiming that hot young upstart Leona Lewis is on the verge of knocking her off her music superstar throne.
Ms. Lewis, on the other hand, definitely doesn’t mind being compared to greats like Carey and Whitney Houston.
“It’s amazing,” the “Bleeding Love” hitmaker tells James Brady in Sunday’s Parade magazine. “It’s exceedingly gratifying, because they’re so great.”
Not so great, however, are the possible pitfalls of celebrity…
Lewis, 23, is doing her best not to cross over to the dark side à la Amy Winehouse.
“You can’t make your mistakes in private,” Lewis says of the fame game. “I have the advantage of a great support structure. I get honest opinions from my family and friends. They aren’t always telling me what I want to hear, but the truth helps keep my head straight.”
And for all you die-hard Lewis fans out there, you’ll be happy to know, Lewis has written more that 100 songs. She says, “I may sing some of them on a future release.”