Life Imitates Art, or, The Downfall of Ben Affleck.

While we're waiting for the last few Secret Sketch entries to come in (deadline is Tuesday night, y'all) here is a bit of celebrity-related nonsense to amuse you!


Apparently this guy, Big Lips McGee*, I mean Chris Pine, is in talks to reprise Harrison Ford's famous role as CIA agent Jack Ryan.


Hey wait... it says that Ben Affleck played Jack Ryan too. Does anyone even remember that movie coming out? I sure don't.

Poor old Ben Affleck. I guess when your career pretty much starts with winning an Oscar there's no place but down... No wait, that doesn't work because (a) he was in movies before Good Will Hunting and (b) his good buddy Matt Damon has gone from strength to strength since then.

Remember that scene in Good Will Hunting when Affleck says to Damon that the best part of his day is hoping Damon won't show up because it means he's moved up to a better type of life? I'm starting to think maybe that happened in real life. Damon saw his friend through the whole Bennifer thing, maybe he even still returned Ben's calls after Daredevil, but once he started hanging with Clooney and Pitt he realized that he was never going to truly succeed in life with the Affleck millstone tied around his neck. So he cut his best mate loose, and now Steven Soderbergh is hanging entire movies on him - and Time Magazine is writing about it.

Meanwhile, Affleck is where? At home making babies with Jennifer Garner.

... Well, I guess that's probably not actually that bad of a life. Carry on, Affleck.


*I mean come on. I spent the whole of the new Star Trek movie thinking about two things: how freakishly giant his lips are, and hot damn Leonard Nimoy is old!

Gingernuts.

It's well documented around these parts that red-headed ladies are extremely attractive and highly sought-after. There are more flame-haired vixens saucing up the blogosphere than you can shake a stick at*.

In the world of celebrity, Lindsay Lohan and Nicole Kidman were notable gingers, but have lost most of that cachet through love affairs with the peroxide bottle. Julianne Moore and Bryce Dallas Howard enjoy the porcelain skin that comes with copper tresses, and it's no coincidence Jessica Rabbit's locks were crimson-tinted. Red hair is flaming hot on the ladies.

But what about the menfolk? Are there any attractive Titian-coiffed gentlemen?

Discuss.

*I was going to make a bunch of links there, but I knew I'd miss someone and y'all know it's No More Tears time lately in S&C land, so feel free to identify yourselves in the comments, carrot-tops!

I don't want to hear it.

As everyone knows, famous people have been dropping like flies this past week.

Celebrity is an odd thing; we feel like we know these people in some way, even though in reality we are complete strangers. We note their deaths, we may even feel some form of grief, or at least have some kind of emotional reaction to the news of their passing.

I'm not gonna lie, I laughed at pretty much all the sick, sick too-soon jokes floating around the blogosphere. I laughed at the title "Celebrity Death Week". I jokingly suggested the possible next celebrity to go. I laughed at the idea of Billy Mays Oxy-Cleaning the robes of the heavenly host.

Then today on a "news" channel, I heard something I fervently wish I could un-hear.

I heard the shaky, tearful, terrified voice of Billy's wife on the 911 call when she found him dead. No one deserves to have such an utterly devastating, utterly personal moment broadcast for everyone to hear*. My heart absolutely breaks for that woman.

Imagine finding the person you love most in the world still and cold. Try to imagine how you would feel in that moment.

Then imagine knowing that any and every stranger you pass in the street could have potentially heard that moment unfolding, heard your life collapsing, heard your heart breaking.

Why would anyone want to hear that? Who would think that was a thing that needed to be broadcast?

There is something seriously wrong with humanity.


*and that's why I'm not linking to anything to do with it.

Rihanna

From the LA Times website (article here):

Rihanna made it clear through her lawyer at Thursday’s hearing that she didn’t want a “stay away” order barring Chris Brown from communicating with her.

It's none of my damn business and I can never be sure that I will know what really happened between the two of them.

But every judgmental bone in my body (i.e. all of them) is aquiver right now.

If he did what it appears he did, I hope that someone close to her can get through to her and make her realize that no one deserves that, and that she will be better off cutting him out of her life for good.