By Moe, 12:45 PM on Fri Mar 21 2008, 7,171 views (Edit, to draft, Slurp)

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The Wall Street Journal profiles Lauren Conrad today in a story that has all the soul-deadening detail about celebrity artifice you'd get in a New Yorker profile with none of the irritating little literary flourishes. Perhaps the best part is the accompanying video of "celebrity branding expert" Ryan Schinman explaining the intricacies of the Conrad-Kardashian-Jenner axis of vapid to the Journal-reading fogeys. See it, and our favorite lines from the story including the MOST RIDICULOUS STATEMENT by Cosmo editor-in-chief Kate White, by clicking the pic. [WSJ]
Great timing on that conversation, guys!

When Ms. Conrad turned 21, her publicist, Nicole Perez, sat down with her client to discuss responsible drinking. "It's the same conversation you'd have as a parent with a child," she says. Ms. Conrad's parents watch over her, too, by logging on to gossip blogs. If their daughter appears too tipsy in a photo, she hears from them. "We will tell her to ratchet it back," says her father, Jim Conrad.

She is a target for hangers-on because of her fame. Yet many guys in Los Angeles won't date her for the same reason, she says. Stars of other reality shows are often contractually barred from showing up on rival programs, and aspiring actors don't want to jeopardize their credibility by appearing on those shows. An off-camera boyfriend is not explicitly forbidden by her contract with MTV, she says, but it violates the spirit of her deal. "This is what I signed up for," she says. Ms. Conrad says that she and Brody "have an odd relationship" but she is happy to have him in her life. "He's a cute guy who's OK with filming," she says.

It was "just something fun for Lauren to do," says her father from the living room of his cliffside home in Laguna Beach. Mr. Conrad, a 48-year-old architect and real-estate developer, now helps manage his daughter's career. He does not take a fee.

Of all of her commitments, she says, "I spend the most amount of time on the line, and it's the thing that makes me the least amount of money."

Earlier this year, Kitson, a boutique in a Beverly Hills shopping district, offered to host a party to celebrate the collection. Kitson parties are known for attracting a lot of press. Ms. Conrad preferred to have the party at Intuition, a smaller boutique in an area with less foot traffic. Her publicist, Ms. Perez, says she pushed for Kitson, telling her client: "Lauren, we could make it huge — every magazine would cover it." The party was at Intuition. "It didn't get a lot of coverage," Ms. Perez says.

"Playing yourself on reality television isn't to our reader the level of accomplishment that you need to have on the cover of Cosmo," says Kate White, the magazine's editor in chief.