Justice For The Minogues

Ever since the phantom Hamptons crapper was unveiled as celebrity barnacle Derek Blasberg, Gwyneth Paltrow has come in for quite a bit of flak. Society types are appalled she’d break a cardinal rule of hosting and blab about her guest’s gastrointestinal indiscretion.

But in fairness to Gwynnie, the leak may not have been her.

Gwyneth was lunching with Oprah Winfrey and Jerry Seinfeld when her irate housekeeper called, shouting loudly about the horrors she’d discovered, yelling about how much she hates “that fucking friend” of hers. And – most damning – complaining about the tip that had been left at the scene of the crime.

If you shag Zayn Malik and he spaffs on your norks, it’s not unreasonable to expect there’ll be a chance for you to shop your story to the papers. Not if you’re pals with Kate Moss though.

One of Mossy’s celebrity mates recorded a sex tape with Zayn, but when she tried to shop it to the tabloids, Kate intervened – and blocked it.

She thought it was poor form of her mate to try to sell the story. Not a fan of getting things off her chest, apparently.

Which new Labour MP was known as “Pen Top” at school, as he liked to pop a pen top between his arse cheeks in his personal pleasure time?

Which new Labour MP joined the party as a student, completely unaware that the Tories and Labour are two different parties?

There are plenty of worthy reasons to champion local journalism and despair at its demise. There’s also a handful of other, less-worthy ones too.

For instance, there’s been a story slowly trickling out into the wider media this week about Elton John visiting a high-end sneaker shop in the South of France on Monday and apparently taking a piss in a plastic bottle while there. Then, when finished, buying a couple of pairs of Jordans for his sons and complimenting the owner on his lovely shop.

It’s an excellent addition to the canon of Elton John legends – and were it not for the initial report in the local paper, Nice-Matin, the moment might have been forever lost to history.

[The original report]

We don’t usually tend to dabble in theatre reviews and criticism. However, as Kit Harington’s nudity in the current West End production of Slave Play is such a hot topic we thought we’d pass along this intriguing one-word review we were given of the cast member that everyone’s curious about…

“Slender.”

A proposal has been put to Melbourne Council to dedicate a laneway in the CBD to the city’s proudest daughters: Kylie and Dannii Minogue.

Sadly, Melbourne Council are being wet, saying that living people aren’t eligible to have lanes named after them (even though it didn’t stop AC/DC Lane, or Dame Edna Lane when Barry Humphries was still kicking.)

There’s a petition going round, urging the council to reconsider. Hopefully if it gets enough signatures, they’ll change their mind. But if it helps sweeten the pot, Melbourne Council should know that the Minogue brand is still a licence to print money.

A recent pop-up Kylie held in London to promote her last album made an absolute fortune selling merch. The biggest money spinner? Kylie-branded clothes hangers.

[Sign the petition here]

If Melbourne Council needs further convincing that a Minogue Lane would be good for business, they should talk to the residents of Pin Oak Court.

Pin Oak Court is the actual cul-de-sac used as Ramsay Street in Neighbours. Homeowners there have made a mint over the years leasing out their properties to the show. In retrospect, it would have made more sense to buy up the houses or build bespoke sets, but instead they chose to pay the families to use their homes for filming.

The drawback was that as the show’s ratings increased, so did the amount the families demanded. But it was a fair enough ask.

As a result of Neighbours’ popularity, residents not only had to deal with film crews regularly disrupting their days. They also had to deal with hordes of drunken backpackers shagging on their lawns for the bragging rights at night.

Les Dennis has been performing in Twelfth Night at the Shakespeare North Playhouse recently. One Popbitch reader who caught it was very impressed by Les’s turn – but was somewhat distracted to find they were sat alongside Edwina Currie.

Although she’d apparently turned out to support her friend Les, she remained utterly po-faced throughout the performance and point blank refused to get up and dance at the choreographed audience participation slot.

Despite a cast member pulling desperately on her arm to, ahem, egg her on.

After being a 4-pack-a-day man in the 60s/70s, Donald Sutherland later became an evangelical anti-smoker who banned smokers on set, even when they weren’t smoking.

One cinematographer, hired on the promise that he didn’t smoke, spent ages scouring nicotine stains off his fingers with lemon juice, then carried around mouthwash, wet wipes, and a glove for smoking.

When he met Sutherland, the esteemed actor greeted him with “You’re not a smoker, are you?” The DP replied confidently that he was absolutely not, to which Sutherland replied, “I thought not. I can always tell.”

The DP soon found a place near set where he could enjoy a cigarette in peace.

A couple of months ago, we pointed out how few UK acts were actually propping up the charts these days – singling out a week where only two songs of the entire Top 20 were by British acts.

It’s especially bad at the top of the charts at the minute too. The only UK act to have had a number one so far in 2024 was Wham! – and that was a hangover from Xmas 2023.

Even weirder, the last British act to have a UK No.1 prior to Wham! was… The Beatles.

How celebrity book clubs work
[Read on Esquire]

A Scrabble-y word game where you need to fill the screen with words
[Play Squish]

A hotel in Edinburgh is looking to hire a ‘banter merchant’ to ruin everyone’s breakfasts/lives during the Fringe
[Hideous]

The story of Priscila, Queen of The Rideshare Mafia
[Read on Wired]

The disappearing timeline of Rose Hanbury
[Vulture investigates]

11 minutes of Justin Bieber’s $10 million performance for India’s richest family
[Watch on YouTube]

RIP Pino D’Angio – going right until the end
[See on TikTok]

Still Bored?
The Spinoff tries to figure out who slagged off a ten-year-old Lorde – and inspired her latest lyric…
[“Which One Of You Told Lorde She Walks Like A Bitch?”]