Jake and Natalie co-star in the upcoming film Brothers and it's clear from the interview that they're both geeky in every sense of the word. At various points in the excerpt of the interview online, they discuss their favorite planetarium shows, obsess about '80s toys, and plot a time machine journey back to the beginning of civilization. They actually shift from high-brow to low-brow pretty easily, such as when Jake tries to psychoanalyze Natalie based on her revelation that she used to be scared of Gargamel, the bad guy on The Smurfs.

GYLLENHAAL: Looking at all these things that you've done and contributed to the world so far, I would have thought that the evil wizard Gargamel would've been something you could have very easily stepped over.

PORTMAN: Thank you for saying that, but I'm far from fearless. I'm afraid of everything. But maybe when you're afraid of everything, it sort of seems like you're scared of nothing.

GYLLENHAAL: Well, there's no courage without fear, so you must have great courage because you're afraid of everything.

PORTMAN: That sounds like something from a Batman movie: "There is no courage without fear..."

But as Natalie says, Jake is also, "really good at getting out the dark secrets." He asks her what song reflects her current state and she says all she's been listening to recently is "dirty rap."

GYLLENHAAL: Your affection for dirty rap is something that people really don't know about you, which I think is fascinating. You do incredible things for the world, and then you listen to just completely obscene hip-hop music.

PORTMAN: Really, really obscene hip-hop. I love it so much. It makes me laugh and then it makes me want to dance. Those are like my two favorite things, so combined . . . I've been listening a lot lately to "Wait (The Whisper Song)" by the Ying Yang Twins, where the lyrics are like, "Wait 'til you see my dick"-which is just amazing because it's whispered. [whispers] "Wait 'til you see my dick . . . " [laughs] Crazy. So I just listen to it like I'm a five-year-old, like, "Oh my god! I can't believe he just said that!"

GYLLENHAAL: It's interesting that you think the lyric "Wait 'til you see my dick" describes your current state. I think people are learning more about you right now then they ever have in an interview. I'm proud of that.

It's true. Now we've all learned that SNL skit probably wasn't a joke after all.

Natalie Portman By Jake Gyllenhaal [Interview Magazine]
Natalie Raps [NBC.com]

Weaver has previously talked to Joe Biden, Dwayne Wade, and Oprah, among others, and started off this interview with questions about education. The President gave what may be a preview of his upcoming Sept. 8 speech on the issue, saying that the federal government, state governments, and parents need to come together to improve kids' performance. They also discussed school lunches, which Obama promised to make healthier. He deemed Weaver's suggestion — french fries and mangoes for everyone — to be tasty but perhaps impractical, as mangoes don't grow well in northern climes.

Obama looks pretty graceful throughout — especially when he answers a question about whether he gets "bullied" a lot as President — but Weaver obviously steals the show. His charm and self-possession have been on display since the beginning of his campaign to interview Obama, and he comes off as smart as well as adorable. Some of this interview is pure cuteness — like when Weaver sums things up by saying Obama is very "tall and nice" — but Weaver is also an apt spokesman for some real issues. Coming from struggling Pahokee, Florida, Weaver asked Obama what he would do to help schools in poor neighborhoods. And in an earlier segment on 20-20, Weaver says, "I worry about what's happening to my community," and "that's why I'm telling you my town's story, so more people don't die."

Weaver is a passionate advocate for his family and his home, as well as living proof of the promise that exists in kids all over the country, not just in places with money. He dreams big — in the 20-20 segment, he says he wants to be "a journalist, and a football player, and a pilot, and a person who trains whales, and President, and a senator, and a commissioner." He's already the first one — but Obama and America have the responsibility to make sure that he, and his brothers (one says he wants to be "a football player, or if that doesn't work I'll be a lawyer or a doctor"), and the other kids in his town, have the opportunity to achieve all of their dreams. In his remarks on education, Obama says "setting a really high standard for kids" is important. Damon Weaver is doing just that.

Student Reporter Damon Weaver Interviews President Barack Obama [YouTube]
Reporter, 11, Grants Obama Homeboy Status [CBS]
Young Pahokee Journalist Interviews Obama [ABC]

• Michelle Obama may have skipped the CFDAs, but she'll celebrate the National Design Awards at the White House on July 24. The winners, chosen by the Smithsonian and including Francisco Costa, will participate in events around Washington. [WWD]

• The Supreme Court has agreed to hear a case involving Chicago apparel manufacturer American Needle and the National Football League. American Needle contends that the league ran afoul of antitrust laws when its 32 teams canceled their individual apparel licenses to manufacture exclusively with Reebok in 2001; the NHL says that it is, in fact, a single entity entitled to do business with whomever it likes. [Breitbart]
• U.S. Customs and Border Protection had a banner week, seizing $10 million worth of counterfeit goods. Six different intercepted shipments included fake Nike sneakers, fake Coach bags, fake Gucci shoes, and fake Louis Vuitton purses. [WWD]
• Victoria Beckham is bringing in an all-new team to design and produce her dVb denim line ahead of its relaunch, expected for next year. "Victoria makes out she's hands-on, but she doesn't sit there cutting patterns," explains an anonymous friend. Not that there was much misunderstanding on that count. [Daily Mail]
• Ed Westwick — from that show about high schoolers with credit cards — posed for K Swiss shoes, and boy does he talk about the experience as one itching to be re-hired! "They know who they are," the actor said of the company, before casually mentioning that he'd just love to do another campaign. [WWD]
• Riccardo Tisci of Givenchy talked to New York about his Spring 09 couture collection, and his just-presented Resort 09 collection. Tisci, who ascended to his position five years ago, at the age of 28, calls himself the youngest couturier in history, despite the fact that both Yves Saint Laurent, who took the reins at Christian Dior at the age of 21, and Hubert de Givenchy himself, who founded his namesake line at 25 back in 1952, were younger. [The Cut]
• Model Chanel Iman's inability to distinguish between "their" and "there" has not hampered her ability to snag an internship at Teen Vogue. In a sweet touch of near-authenticity, the Condé Nasties had her clean out the styling closet. [Twitter]
• Urban Outfitters now sells its clothes via mobile phone, for those occasions when you yearn to smell of Vincent Gallo's ballsweat and early 90s desperation, but can't find your way to a store or a computer. [WWD]
• Of course American Apparel would market its new bedding with a bunch of "Oh hai Dov, this your bed? Tee hee!" shots. [AmApp]
• In other news of products that signal the apocalypse, you can now buy an Oscar de la Renta dress for your three-year-old. [W]
• These fashion-show-throwing Manhattan middle schoolers, on the other hand, seem self-sufficient enough to never be heard wailing, "But Mommy I want an Oscar noooooooow!" [Reuters]
• Valentino's owner, the U.K. private-equity firm Permira, is in talks with the fashion house's primary creditors to relax the terms of its €2.5 billion debt. Permira bought Valentino for €5.3 billion in 2007, when such buy-outs — and the easy credit they were financed with — were common. Head designer Valentino Garavani retired within months of the deal, and the house has struggled to express a coherent creative vision since his departure. [ToL]
• Madonna's wholesale transformation of her boy-toy, Jesus Luz, into a real runway model is proceeding apace. After his exclusive appearance on the Dolce & Gabbana runway for Milan's men's wear week, he headed to Paris — unburdened by any exclusive deal — and promptly racked up a spot in Givenchy's lineup. His outfit included studded gladiator sandals, harem pants, and a very busy floral/plaid shirt. [The Cut]
• Esteban Cortazar and Mounir Moufarrige, the C.E.O. of the house of Ungaro, continue to do the will-they-won't-they dance around rumors of designer Cortazar's departure. Cortazar was at the Ungaro men's wear show in Paris and, when asked about his differences with management, said "For now I am here." Moufarrige, for his part, when asked if he would be retaining Cortazar's services into the future, said, "He's here," and pointed at the runway. [WWD]
• The rumor that Pierre Cardin's Chinese shoe and leather goods licensee was in talks to take over the French brand outright has been denied by both Pierre Cardin and the shoemaker. [Reuters]
• American retailers just can't catch a break. If it's not the recession, the rising unemployment rate, or the precipitous drop in consumer spending, it's the risk of tornadoes and unseasonal torrential rain keeping the customers from their stores. [WWD]
• Versace saw a 13.4% decline in revenue during the first quarter of this year, but its sales results were stronger during the months of May and June, company chairman Santo Versace reported. [Reuters]
• Maybe part of the reason that Aéropostale is outperforming competitors like Abercrombie & Fitch to such a large degree is due to the fact that the company spends 80% of its marketing budget online, online being where most of its customers are? [WWD]

• Kanye West and Amber Rose hit up the American Apparel in NoHo for hoodies and sunglasses. "He was really nice about getting his photo taken for our blog," said the store manager. Doesn't he look it! [AmApp]

• Last week, Kanye apparently stood up Agyness Deyn. [Mirror]
• Uh oh. Tim Gunn's Tide commercials were truth-squadded by Consumer Reports, who found that not only was his claim that Tide Total Care doesn't fade clothes after 30 washes untrue, but that another Tide product, Tide 2x Ultra Coldwater, performed just as well as Total Care, for half the price. [CR]
• Stephen Colbert's camouflage suit: custom made by Brooks Brothers. [The Cut]
• Is Vera Wang really going to Dancing With The Stars? [E!]
• Recent Columbia grad Bee "fashion is a really weird industry" Shaffer, everybody: "Right now I am looking for a job, but I also want to study acting." Because if there's one industry where all the people are well-adjusted and normal, it's acting! [FWD]
• Stella McCartney has announced a new partnership to create one-off collections for Gap Kids and Baby Gap. It's the first time the designer has ever done children's wear, and the clothing will hit stores late this year. [WWD]
• Clairol's Nice 'n' Easy at-home hair color is apparently in for a big relaunch, with The Office's Angela Kinsey. In the year to March, Procter & Gamble already spent 97 million on Nice 'n' Easy ads, almost double what it spent on advertising for the brand in the whole of 2008. As for Kinsey, it sounds like she'll play a sort of underminey girlfriend who tells women things like, "Remember when your friend Kelly said she liked your hair color? She lied!" [AW]
• Well, somebody must still have money: Stefano Pilati's "New vintage" collection for Yves Saint Laurent is all but sold out after one day on Barneys' sales floor. [WWD]
• New Yorkers stuck for Father's Day gift ideas, take note: designer John Bartlett's first collection with Liz Claiborne will be sold for four days starting June 18th at a pop-up store at 143 Seventh Avenue South. Shorts will be $55, polos $39.50, and sport coats $89.50. We imagine there'll be some nice socks and hankies, too. [The Cut]
• Pieces from Yigal Azrouël's current Spring/Summer collection, along with Alternative Apparel t-shirts hand-screened with woodblock-esque prints by the designer, are currently for sale on eBay. The items are offered at fixed prices, and while they are below retail ($215 for a cardigan), they're not exactly sample-sale affordable. But all proceeds go to the Natural Resources Defense Council. [eBay]
• Fashion blind item: "Which design collaboration's not actually going so smoothly? Major licensing and financial problems mean the summer-turned-fall launch is now looking like late winter. And if that's not enough drama the designer now 'despises' the collaborator." We'd say famously difficult Jil Sander and Uniqlo fit the bill here, except that line was always supposed to launch this Fall. [Fashionista]
• Net-a-Porter increased its sales by 47.8% in the year to January 31, to a volume of £81.5 million. [FT]
• Versace has named a new chief executive after the hasty departure of Giancarlo di Risio following tensions with the Versace family: the new guy is Gian Giacomo Ferraris, who led Jil Sander since 2004 (the year Sander herself was finally forced out of her design position by owners Prada). [WSJ]
• Jewelry can be a notoriously unethical business — and we don't just mean blood diamonds. Conditions in gold mines are often unsafe for workers, the chemicals used in mining, such as cyanide, can wreak havoc on local ecosystems, and the trade in precious gems like rubies and emeralds is often under the control of third-world strongmen. "Most gems are found in the poor parts of the world and they end up on very rich people's fingers and it's complicated," says jeweler Stephen Webster. The industry is taking a variety of voluntary measures to change its ways. [Telegraph]
• Things are head-spinningly complicated at Interview magazine — still. Fabien Baron and Glenn O'Brien used to be co-editorial directors; then, five months ago, Baron was fired, and O'Brien retained his position while a new creative team was brought in by Brant publications. Now, as of Friday, O'Brien is out — and Baron is back in his old job. [WWD]
• Shares in Men's Wearhouse gained 16% to $20.70 in trading on Tuesday, after the announcement that an affiliate of the company would buy the bankrupt Filene's Basement discount department store chain. Despite same-store sales that fell 5%, Men's Wearhouse still posted a first-quarter profit, and expects earnings of 50 to 60 cents a share in the next quarter. [TS]
• But another bidder in the Filene's auctions says the Men's Wearhouse bid should be invalidated because the auction was "a sham." [Crain's]
• Eddie Bauer might declare its bankruptcy as soon as the end of this week. [WSJ]

• Miley Cyrus might make you want to puke: Hannah Montana Chocolate Granola Bars have been recalled due to suspected salmonella contamination. [Perez]

• Natasha Richardson suffered a serious head injury in a ski accident and has been hospitalized in Montreal. Husband Liam Neeson has rushed to her side. [People]
• Oh, no: Natasha Richardson is in critical condition. As you may know, she is the eldest daughter of Vanessa Redgrave; her sister Joely Richardson is also an actress, best known for Nip/Tuck. Natasha Richardson has been in A Month in the Country, Nell, The Parent Trap and Maid in Manhattan. [Yahoo News via AP]
• DJ AM is seeking $10 million in medical costs, lost earnings and damages, plus $10 million for mental and physical pain after the September plane crash in which he and Travis Barker were the only survivors. [People]
• Psychiatrist Khristine Eroshevich turned herself in to police Monday, facing charges of excessively prescribing drugs to Anna Nicole Smith. she's out on bail. [AP]
• Fox's Roger Friedman on Julia Roberts: "She was rude, downright nasty, and dismissive. She snubbed me in front of other people to make her point… Her behavior was unexpected and chilling." Apparently she knows Friedman as "the man who writes bad things about me." [Fox 411 ]
• Mickey Rourke is in a Russian prison… Doing research for his Iron Man role. [Daily Mail]
• If you didn't get a chance to audition for ANTM because of the stampede in NYC on Saturday, don't fret! Tyra says: "We are doing everything we can to make sure that ALL the girls who weren't seen get an opportunity to audition — we'll update you on our plans very soon." Sorta hoping they call it America's Next Top Model Who Can't Reach The Top Shelf. [US Magazine]
• Amy Winehouse is planning a "heart-to-heart" with estranged husband Blake Fielder-Civil. Her dad says: "I want her to get divorced." Tell us how you really feel! [The Star]
• Amy Winehouse's dad also says: "Amy wants to resolve the situation. She's guilty of loving him, stupid girl." That's her own father, calling her stupid. [The Sun]
• Since Amy Winehouse has visa issues which ban her from coming to the U.S., she is headed back to the Caribbean. She'll headline the 18th Annual St. Lucia Jazz festival in May. The Minister of Tourism is thrilled and says "She's welcome to stay as long as she wants to." [Yahoo News via E!]
• But uh, Amy Winehouse is still facing an assault charge from back in September, so she needs to deal with that first. [Mirror]
• The Daily (Hate) Mail has printed pictures of Jesus Luz's ex-girlfriends and pointed out that they are "younger and prettier" than Madonna. Rude! [Daily Mail]
• By the by, Guy Ritchie had dinner with Elle Macpherson. [Daily Mail]
• Here is a photograph of Prince William helping out in a kitchen at a homeless charity, "following in his mother's footsteps." He looks genuinely happy. [Daily Mail]
• Clive Owen was asked who would win in a battle of wits: Himself or Julia Roberts? "She would, because she's very smart," he said. She agreed: "I would. It's just me," Julia said. "I have my tricks." [USA Today]
• There's a naked Lithuanian model on top of Zac Efron in the new Interview magazine, FYI. Zac and the young lady rolled around in dirt for the photo shoot and Zac says, without irony: "I got pretty dirty by the end of it, so that was fun. It was definitely different from anything I had ever done before." [Just Jared]
• Cops are going to interview Calum Best after a woman claims she was raped by his friend while he slept just a few feet away. [The Sun]
• Heath Ledger directed two music videos before his death; one for Modest Mouse and one for Grace Woodroofe. Both will be released this year. [Hollywood Reporter]
• Steve-O is the latest contestant to be injured on Dancing With The Stars. Does the show pay medical bills? [UPI]
• Portia de Rossi is still not pregnant, and not trying, despite what the weeklies are saying. [People]
• Sacha Baron Cohen tricked the Alabama National Guard into giving him a military uniform and letting him train — possibly for a scene for Bruno. A young cadet recognized him — maybe when he exposed his thong while changing — and alerted superiors. A staff sergeant is calling the incident an "embarrassment," but it sound like a security risk. [AP]
• Carson Daly's girlfriend Siri Pinter has given birth to their son, Jackson James Daly. [UPI]
• Guy Ritchie will direct a remake of The Wild Geese, "with a budget that will buy him some real star names." The original flick had Richard Burton, Richard Harris and Roger Moore; who will be the new trio? [Telegraph]
• Will Matt Damon be Jason Bourne again? Signs point to yes. [Guardian]
• Naomi Watts and Liev Schreiber are both playing spies, but in different films. [Telegraph]
• Brad Pitt's film company, Plan B, is producing a flick based on John Le Carré's book The Night Manager. [Variety]
• Alex Rodriguez is seen kissing himself in a mirror in the new issue of Details. [NY Post]
• Jon Stewart's brother — who is head of US Markets & Global Technology at NYSE Euronext — helped him kick Jim Cramer's ass. [Page Six]
• No one is watching Kings or Celebrity Apprentice. [AdAge]
• Creators of Family Guy won a lawsuit which made it okay to turn the song "When You Wish Upon A Star into "I Need A Jew." [Reuters]
• It's tough to believe that villagers are living in fear of Pete Doherty moving to their town, but that is the headline here. [The Sun]
• There seem to be "two strapping young lads locking lips" on the cover of Bob Dylan's new album. This paper calls the photo "controversial." A commenter writes, "ha ha ha whats the issue?" [The Sun]
• Speaking of Bob Dylan, "Malibu residents say wind-borne odors from a portable toilet at the singer's compound are making them ill." [LA Times]
• Tons of Elvis stuff has gone up in an online auction — bids as low as ten bucks! [Reuters]
• "Tori is my daughter, and I love her. I wish her all the best with the publication of her new book… I never read her first one because my friends and family advised me against it. They said it would hurt my feelings, so I decided to pass. I won't read her new one either." — Candy Spelling, who moved the publication date of her book up two weeks so that it wouldn't hit stores on the same date as Tori's new book. [Us Magazine]
• "She's a little dictator. Definitely the most colorful person I've ever met. I feel so connected to her, but at the same time, we are completely different. I discover something new about her every day." — Salma Hayek, on her daughter, Valentina. [Mirror]
• "It's so sad that there's such an invasion of privacy, with camera people, cops and paparazzi outside their home. I mean, when have you not thrown something when you're mad? Everyone has to admit that at one time in their life, they've gotten so mad that they've thrown something, but maybe not necessarily breaking a window. Can't people have an argument without everyone watching? Just because she had an argument, I don't think it means that she's off track and that everything is crazy. It's really just messed up that everyone blames her. I think everyone needs to let her breathe." — Kim Kardashian on Lindsay Lohan. [People]

The Los Angeles Times:

It also must be emphasized that even though director Howard had all these first-class elements to work with, "Frost/Nixon" wouldn't have succeeded as well as it does without his experience, his professionalism and his skills. He's successfully opened the play up without pushing anything too hard, and he's deftly avoided the sentimentality that, with the exception of the underrated "The Missing," has often been a quality of his films.

The result is involving, engrossing cinema — more thrilling, in fact, than Howard's "The Da Vinci Code" — filmmaking of a type rarely seen anymore and sorely missed.

Wall Street Journal:

What Ron Howard gets, to a degree that's astonishing in a two-hour film, is the density and complexity, as well as the generous entertainment quotient, of Peter Morgan's screenplay. (Mr. Morgan previously wrote "The Queen," in which Michael Sheen played Tony Blair, and "The Last King of Scotland.") "Frost/Nixon" does more than dramatize the high points of the TV interviews. In the frantic run-up to the recorded interviews, and during the early videotape sessions, the film gives us the collateral drama of a talk-show host, accustomed to celebrity chatter, trying desperately to play the role of a serious journalist.

Salon:

But by the time the Frost-Nixon interviews wound to a close — in real life, the 29 hours of taped footage were edited and aired over five nights — Frost, thanks to some wiliness and a little bit of luck, had coaxed his slippery subject into a tacit admission of guilt in the Watergate scandal. And right there, I've gone ahead and given away the ending to "Frost/Nixon" — but this is a story in which what happens is far less interesting than how it happens. Howard has made a picture for grown-ups, a well-constructed entertainment that neither talks down to its audience nor congratulates it just for showing up. That's particularly refreshing around holiday time, when the studios roll out all their big Oscar-bait pictures, bestowing upon us their most boring, stately and somber works — anything that spells "quality" with a capital "Q," even if genuine craftsmanship is sorely missing.

The New York Times:

And devour Mr. Langella does, chomp chomp. Artfully lighted and shot to accentuate the character’s trembling, affronted jowls, his shoulders hunched, face bunched, he creeps along like a spider, alternately retreating into the shadows and pouncing with a smile. That smile should give you nightmares, but Mr. Howard, a competent craftsman who tends to dim the lights in his movies even while brightening their themes (“A Beautiful Mind”), has neither the skill nor the will to draw out a dangerous performance from Mr. Langella, something to make your skin crawl or heart leap. Unlike Oliver Stone, who invested Nixon (a memorable Anthony Hopkins) with Shakespearean heft but refused to sentimentalize him, this is a portrait designed to elicit a sniffy tear or two along with a few statuettes.

Slate:

Frost/Nixon's emotional climax is, in my view, the script's weakest moment. On the eve of those last two crucial interviews, Nixon makes a drunken late-night phone call to Frost in his hotel room and feeds him the oldest line in the serial-killer-vs.-cop playbook: Deep down, you and me, we're the same. Langella makes the most of this booze-sodden monologue, but its central premise—that Nixon and Frost shared an insecurity about social class that fueled their drive to succeed—seems more British than American: Wasn't Nixon's persecution complex far too vast to be reduced to class anxiety? If our 37th president has proved such an enduring subject for on-screen fictions (see Mark Feeney's 2004 book, Nixon at the Movies), it's precisely because we can never finally fathom his bottomless pathologies. If we did, we wouldn't have Nixon to kick around anymore.

USA Today:

Howard establishes a mounting sense of tension, interspersing interviews with talking-head-style analyses from each camp. Oliver Platt, Matthew Macfadyen and Kevin Bacon are excellent in these roles.

Morgan seamlessly blends actual interview dialogue and imagined conversations.

The film convincingly conveys how uncomfortable the 37th president was in his own skin.

NPR:

Happily, director Ron Howard takes a quasi-documentary approach that has the effect of giving Frost more heft on screen — there's news footage, plus behind-the-scenes shots of TV monitors, all conspiring to make it clear that he's better at using this emotionally cool medium than Nixon, especially in the interview's big showdown.

Entertainment Weekly:

With the transcript as his guide, Morgan explores psychological terrain: how Frost found the chutzpah to land the interviews; how Nixon played cat and mouse with his interlocutor when asked to admit wrongdoing and apologize; how both men of humble beginnings felt stung by the scorn of those born with more 
privilege; and how both were superb manipulators. But Sheen (who played the very model of a modern British go-getter as Tony Blair in The Queen, also written by Morgan) and Langella (operating at the peak of his powers) are disciplined enough to crop their performances to close-up size. (The sizing echoes the look of the 
 actual interviews.) And Howard is smart 
 to enhance the one-on-ones with journalistic context, weaving archival Watergate-era 
 footage into his fictionalized re-creation.

The New York Observer:

Mr. Howard and Mr. Morgan have very astutely established Frost’s mercurial personality in advance by having him brazenly pick up Rebecca Hall’s all-too-willing Caroline Cushing on a Concorde flight from Australia to California. Indeed, the impression is given that Mr. Frost habitually makes passes at any lone and attractive woman on his many worldwide flights.

The New Yorker:

“Frost/Nixon” offers considerable insight into the Nixon mystery, without solving it; the movie is fully absorbing and even, when Nixon falls into a drunken, resentful rage, exciting, but I can’t escape the feeling that it carries about it an aura of momentousness that isn’t warranted by the events. Why is it meant to be so important to us whether David Frost revives his career? Frost and Reston did finally goad Nixon into saying that he let the American people down, and that he believed that “when the President does it, that means it’s not illegal,” and they have extracted a considerable amount of copy out of the broadcasts (including two books). But it’s possible that both journalists and playwright have confused a media coup (and a less important one than that of Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein) with a cleansing act that forever chastened the Presidency. It was anything but that: after all, twenty-four years later, George W. Bush and Dick Cheney entered the White House.

Newsweek:

Langella and Sheen originated these roles on stage, and it's impossible to imagine anyone else playing them. Sheen, who was Tony Blair in Morgan's "The Queen," dazzles as the debonair media high-wire artist holding on for dear life when the slippery Nixon ducks all his early-round punches. More presidential than the real president, Langella gives Nixon a stature and poignancy that the man himself rarely displayed: it's a towering, witty performance that reaches its peak in the drunken late-night phone call he makes to Frost, sizing him up as a man, like himself, with a fiercely competitive chip on his shoulder. The scene is Morgan's invention, but it's an illuminating, inspired fiction. Not everything in "Frost/Nixon" happened in real life, but both sides would probably agree it should have.

Frost/Nixon:

A totally mesmerizing battle of the wills between the occasionally charming yet wily Nixon and the increasingly desperate Frost. Supporting roles are bolstered by Kevin Bacon as Nixon’s ex-military pitbull Chief of Staff and Platt and Rockwell as the crackerjack researchers dying to crucify Nixon.

'Frost/Nixon' opens today in theaters nationwide.

• It's a pretty well-known fact that Stella McCartney is vocally anti-fur. So you gotta wonder what the management at London boutique Hockley — known for its furs — were on when they draped a model in a full-length mink coat and Stella McCartnety lingerie and then ran the ad in Vogue. ‘Stella went absolutely ballistic when she saw it,’ a source at Ms McCartney’s store in Mayfair told The Mail on Sunday. ‘I have never seen her so angry. She hit the roof and said that she planned to sue. She allows her accessories to be lent to shoots all the time, but she would never ever allow anything of hers to go to a fashion house that deals exclusively with fur.' Hockley, not surprisingly, has pulled the ad. [Daily Mail]
• Lauren Conrad's fashion show — apparently her and two models in what looks like a mall — is the most cringe-inducing video you will ever watch. No, seriously, it's painful. [TMZ]
• Shockingly, despite her having, um, said she wanted to, Victoria Beckham is not showing at New York's fashion week. [Fashion Week Daily"]

• Candace Bushnell defends the use of label-porn in her adaptations on the slimmest of pseudo-feminist pretexts: "'I don't think fashion is part of my work for the sake of it," she insists. "Fashion for many women is a weapon. It's comparable to men's suits. There's the salesman in the shiny suit and then certainly in New York, successful men wear hand-tailored Italian suits. So, as you get older, your clothes express your status as opposed to, 'I found the right handbag, this is my weapon, get back'." [VogueUK]
• A missing male model's body was found in England a year after his disappearance; two men have been charged in the murder of Andre Nunes, which is believed to have arisen from mistaken identity. [Independent]
• Lots of color in the menswear collections. Tangerine pants, fellas? [FT]
• Six months after the founder's death, beauty pioneer Shu Uemura's company is stronger than ever. [Independent]
• Kelly Osbourne models "Jeans for Genes" tee designed by fashion student. "By supporting the campaign I hope I'll encourage everyone to get involved by buying a T-shirt, or donating a couple of pounds and pulling on their denim for Jeans for Genes Day on October 3," says Osbourne. "The money raised changes the world for those children born with genetic disorders. The difference you can make for them is really in your jeans." [VogueUK]
• Middle-aged New York Times writer works as a Nike sneaker tester for a day; is winded. [New York Times]
• Interview's September fashion issue will feature "a new logo, layout, paper stock and trim size and even a special foil and ink-treated cover." Also a Kate Moss interview in which - I'll save you the new $3.95 price — she probably says something asinine. [WWD]
• Korto's was way better. Everyone hates the Bridgehampton Polo look of Ralph Lauren's opening ceremony outfits. I'm guessing it would have been an, "if I've called your name congratulations you are safe" rather than a final two situation, if you know what I'm sayin'. [Gawker]
• Um. Daily Mail discovers Louboutins are expensive. [Daily Mail]
• Venerable Western-shirt maker Rockmount makes custom shirts for Colorado delegates to wear to the DNC. [AP]
• Iem>InStyle China promotes home-court talent. "On Tuesday, In Style China will provide a guide to Asian fashion when it will host a fashion show on NBC's "Today" show from Beijing. The segment will showcase looks from six leading Chinese designers." All will be shown by Chinese models. [WWD]
• Yeah, it's true, Sheryl Crow launching an "Americana-inspired" fashion line. Who's next, Don Knotts? [People]
• As opposed to the usual vogues for clogged pores and acne, "flawless, glowing skin" is all the rage for fall. Laura Mercier gives tips. [ElleUK]
• Katrina survivors manufacture new shopping bags that are green, bouncy, awesome. "Unlike other canvas or cotton bags that don't stretch, its-laS-tik uses flexible fabrics that take the shape of its contents and move with you as you walk. You can double the load per bag but never feel the extra heaviness." [FabSugar]
• Online accessories market is huge. [WWD]
• G-Star: global ambassadors of rawness, peace. "G-Star is joining forces with the United Nations in support of the Millennium Campaign. The organization strives to raise awareness for the Millenium Development Goals, which include fighting extreme poverty, halting the spread of HIV/AIDS and providing universal primary education—all by the target date of 2015." [Fashion Week Daily]

• For the love of God, please let Dolly Parton get her own makeup line. [Chic Report]
  
• The Pope hates expensive shit. [WWD, sub req'd]
  
• "We're one of her favorite stores," says a spokeswoman for Henri Bendel of Shopaholic Isla Fisher. [WWD, 1st item]
  
• WTF? The New York Ranger's Sean Avery is interning at Vogue this summer? Maybe Anna Wintour can teach him some fashion closet cross-checking techniques. [WWD, 1st item]

• Pete Wentz on his favorite stores: "I love H&M and Urban Outfitters. I'm so not above shopping there or anything. They have such cool stuff and it's not expensive." [WWD, 5th item]
• For every one of Lauren Bush's FEED bags you buy at your local Whole Foods starting May 1, 100 kids in Rwanda can eat. Anya Hindmarch could learn a thing or two from Ms. Bush. [WWD, 2nd item]
• No, women really don't need special accessories to cover up their bulging belly buttons while pregnant. [LilSugar]
• Stephanie Seymour isn't just the new fashion editor at Interview, but the new face/body of Chantelle undergarments too. [Yahoo]
• Speaking of spokesmodel panty raids, Melanie "Scary Spice" Brown has signed on as the new face/body of Ultimo underwear. [a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2008/04/22/nmel122.xml">Telegraph]
• The latest trend for Australian boys? Wearing women's clothing. [News.com.au]
• D-list designer Anand Jon, who was charged with numerous counts of sexual abuse and rape has two new (female) defenders. [Hindu Times]

• "I go to the same Starbucks every day in Beverly Hills and they're like, 'Can you please tell them that we want to have new outfits?'...I sit in American Airlines, same thing. I get it all the time. Those chains or big companies, they always come to me." Imagine: the entire American service industry remade in the image of Heidi Klum! [Sassybella]
  
• Every time we read an interview with Kate Bosworth, she talks about high school and sort of ups the ante in terms of the profound alienation she supposedly felt there. Here's the latest installment. [Vogue UK]
  
• "Four kids later, I'm a 32D, but my entire life I was told I was a 34B." And there you have things we never wanted to know about model-cum-Interview fashion director Stephanie Seymour. [Chic Report]

• Best protest sign outside of the new John Varvatos store in the old CBGB's space: "$1,600 used jackets destroy communities." [Does someone still care about CBGB closing, is that the issue here? Because guess what, guys, there's a global food crisis on and Al Qaeda is bombing countries you've never heard of, stagflation is upon us and we're in danger of electing a president who doesn't know the difference between Sunni and Shiite, so get over it, thanks. -Moe] [Fashion Week Daily]
• Fun contest! Giorgio Armani is sponsoring a contest where the little people can pitch him concepts for the new ad campaign for his latest fragrance. Ten finalists get to meet Mr. Armani, though only one will have their ideas usurped for the perpetuation of Mr. Armani's own wealth. [Vogue UK]
• Why isn't one of the options for this "Do You Wear Religious Symbols" poll "Only as tattoos"?! [FabSugar]
• "Wow! It just seems like the next step to our larger goal. Every time we conceive a collection, we try to think of all the elements that would go along with our designs. And bags are next! We want to conquer that next year," says Proenza Schouler's Lazaro Hernandez. Oh really, bags! What a novel idea. [Fashion Week Daily]
• Says Duckie Brown co-designer Steven Cox, "I've always had this fantasy of making a dress out of bricks." Aren't you just ill that Duckie Brown only does menswear? [Washington Post]
• Apparently there is no "right" hemline this season, but if there were, it would involve pairing a long skirt with a long sweater. We don't make the news, we just report on it! [Guardian]
• The color blue: It's important. [Washington Post]
• Showing off your baby bump is so totally out of fashion. Duh. [IHT]
• Crocs is shutting down its factory in Quebec City, meaning 669 people now are out of work. Which also means there is a whole new demographic of people who really hate Crocs! [NYT]
• I actually don't believe anything I read about ELLE's fledgling reality show (which may or may not be titled Fashionista) anymore, but some say that editors at the mag are calling in sick to avoid having to work on it. [Jossip]

• How did Christina Ricci respond when someone from Interview magazine asked how she likes being the face of Louis Vuitton? "Well, I'm not anymore. I was one of four actresses that they used in a campaign once and it was really fun. I liked it. I would like to be the face of Louis Vuitton. I am not, however. You know who is? Scarlett Johansson is the face of Louis Vuitton. Wrong interview." Awkward. [WWD, 4th item]
  
• Back in 2007, Harvey Weinstein said of NBC Universal top dog Jeff Zucker (who is, you know, now suing Weinstein for taking Project Runway from Bravo to Lifetime), "You can only have in your life five true friends, and I consider you one of my five friends." All together now, once more, with feeling: Awkward. [Page Six]
  
• We're guessing that Nina Garcia is turning down that editor-at-large gig at Elle since she was seen eating lunch yesterday at Bergdorf Goodman. Working fashion editors don't eat. [Page Six]
  
• How surprising: Prada isn't going public come June, as previously announced. (Actually, no one's surprised about this at all.) [NYT]

• Simon Doonan on why he loves Amy Winehouse: "I strongly disagree with her drug taking — I mean it's insane — but when I was that age I was a mess, too. I think she's triggering a whole movement of eccentricity where people don't want to look like everyone else. She says it's groovy to look completely different and insane; she pulled that beehive out of no where and has her own look. She should be applauded. Because everyone was getting the Kelly Clarkson makeover, everyone ended up looking like pop princesses. What's that about?" [FabSugar]
• The blueprints have been revealed at last for the new Prada art museum in Milan. Miuccia+Rem 4Eva. [WWD, sub req'd]
• Aw, Vicky Beckham: "I'm still a mom and a wife and I must be up at seven in the morning to get my boys ready for school!" [Fashion Week Daily]
• "It's got to be English — we're not going to give it an American twist," says Sir Philip Green of the soon-to-open first-ever American branch of Topshop. Does this mean they'll be taking pounds instead of dollars? [WWD, 7th item]
• I'm obsessed with Ginnifer Goodwin on Big Love so I'm happy enough, I guess, to hear that she's being honored with MaxMara's Women in Film Face of the Future award. [Fashion Week Daily]
• Chanel: Wants you to wear gold makeup for fall. Dear Chanel: how about you just give us some gold instead? [WWD, sub req'd]
• Stella McCartney: Now doing sunglasses. [Vogue UK]
• Balenciaga: Opening its first e-commerce site on May 15. A new place to impulse-buy expensive shit from the comfort of your own home while drunk! [WWD, 1st item]
• Oh! Gucci and Giorgio Armani are also upping their web presences. [WWD, sub req'd]
• Hubert de Givenchy, Roberto Cavalli, Giorgio Armani, Gianfranco Ferré, Alberta Ferretti, Antonio Marras, Emilio Pucci and Sonia Rykiel have all donated items from their personal closets for a charity auction to benefit children with leprosy in India. It's just. So. Fashion. [WWD, 4th item]
• The shareholders at Escada think the new CEO is being paid way too much. Yawn. [WWD, sub req'd]]

• Who will win the Council of Fashion Designers of America's Womenswear Designer of the Year award, the "Best Picture" of fashion? The nominees are: Marc Jacobs, Francisco Costa of Calvin Klein, and Lazaro Hernandez and Jack McCollough of Proenza Schouler (who tied last year with Oscar de la Renta.) Bets? [WWD, sub req'd]
  
• Oooh and Fran Lebowitz will emcee the awards themselves on June 2. [Fashion Week Daily]
  
• Ok, so now Waris Dirie is saying she was abducted and assaulted while she was missing in Brussels. And treated like "prostitute" by police. She originally said she was just, like, lost. Her manager says she was in shock. [Telegraph, Yahoo]
  
• And what is Erin Fetherston's latest short film about? "Zooey [Deschanel] plays a tramp who eats a magic mushroom and finds herself with a group of fairies." Of course she does. [Fashion Week Daily]
  
• Whoah is Posh going to guest-design for Roland Mouret? Whoah. [Fashionista]

• Model Erin O'Connor sprained her ankle! Why God created blogs: "The thought of not being able to wear teetering heels for a sustainable period fills me with dread! Think of a vicar without a dog collar...a bus driver without a bus??? Eek, you know elevation and a well-turned ankle are all essential requirements in this job. I suppose, to look on the bright side one doesn't need one's heels to write one's blog on the laptop." [Vogue UK]
• Another woman takes the reigns at a fashion design house: Hannah MacGibbon, 38, will debut her first collection as lead designer for Chloe this October in Paris. [WWD]
• ELLE's creative director Joe Zee is getting his own column in the ladymag, entitled "Style A to Zee." Ha ha ha how terribly clever! But yet, also familiar! Oh, right. [Fashion Week Daily]
• Victoria Beckham: Frowns on skinny jeans for men. [DNR]
• Helena Christensen is going to be "designing" for Tocca. And by that they mean she's going to "recreate" an old design of theirs and put her name on it. [WWD, sub req'd]
• What did Donna Karan give her daughter Gaby for her birthday? A bicycle! How...Donna Karan of her! [Fashion Week Daily]
• This month Madonna is styled as a boxer for the cover of the new, improved Interview magazine...and she's also styled as a boxer for the cover of Dazed & Confused. Huh. [Chic Report]
• Victoria's Secret latest beauty line seems to be aimed at teens. Um, as opposed to everything else they sell? [BellaSugar]
• Ksubi denim founder George Gorrow thinks the internet is "kind of a crock." Cosign. [Sassybella]

• Marianne Faithfull on that giant Chanel jacket sculpture thingy parked outside their couture show: "phallic." How long before someone brings Hillary Clinton's gender into this, ya think? [Fashion Week Daily]
  
• J.Crew's new, hipper, and less-expensive line, Madewell, has just tapped someone from the land of magazines for the brand new position of Director of Brand Marketing. Gigi Guerra was formally an editor-at-large at Lucky, and a senior editor at Jane before that. So it turns out that writing for women's magazines does train you for something, and that something is selling pretty shit to women. [WWD, sub req'd]
  
• Madonna's stylist, "B,' on Madonna's next style incarnation: "Madonna's look is going to be more edgy, more fresh — with no more disco." [WWD, 4th item]

• Poor Julianne Moore! Seems she had nothing to discuss with her fellow attendees of the Boucheron 150th anniversary dinner on Monday night, "When I asked if anyone knew who won the Packers-Giants game, you could have heard a pin drop." [WWD, 2nd item]
• L'Oreal has agreed to buy Yves Saint Laurent Beaute for $1.68 billion. [WWD]
• Viktor & Rolf: Now making $109 faux eyelashes for the Shu Uemura brand. [WWD, 1st item]
• People are buying fewer luxury goods. Here's a theory as to why! [FT]
• Taking a page from the Brit handbook — who isn't these days, really! — Jimmy Choo CEO Tamara Mellon is suing her mom. [Reuters]
• Vera Wang's newest fragrance launches in April. It is called Vera Wang Flower Princess. Not to be confused, of course, with her past fragrance, Vera Wang Princess. [BellaSugar]
• We never knew that we had to worry about putting our tongues through detox. [BellaSugar]
• Rebecca Romijn is the new face of Bebe, but frankly we can't stop thinking of her as a tranny ever since she joined the cast of Ugly Betty as a man-turned-babe. [Sassybella]
• Not at the final Valentino couture show yesterday? Watch a video of it here. [Sassybella]

Q: How surprised were you that women would want to start relationships with the guy who raped them? Did you understand it on an intuitive/emotional level or did you only come to understand it on an intellectual level?

A: Well, I think a lot of this has to be considered within a larger context. Firstly, remember that this whole thing begins with — begins on — Match.com. So, off the bat this is a situation where one's suspending disbelief, in terms of accepting that the things the other person, whom you've never even seen in person, is saying about himself are true. To these women he wasn't just "the guy who raped them"; he was also a smart, seemingly successful, good-looking trauma surgeon. Now, for some, that will bring up the question of whether these women had reason enough to accept the things he was saying about himself, namely that he was a doctor (or, to some, a CIA agent, and an astronaut); about that, I suspect it's reasonable to be dubious. But the point is, you're not just waking up in the morning to some random loser or some frat boy in college — you're waking up to a guy whom you met in person for the first time the night before and found likable and drank at least moderately with and believe to be a trauma surgeon, and whom you're now looking at smiling at you across the pillow, contemplating that he might also have just raped you. I mean, for most of us this does not fit the profile: good-looking trauma surgeons who live in fancy high-rises are not rapists. So I think it's possible to understand pretty easily how in the cloud of the next morning her intellectual self might overtake her instinct. And since he for the most part did not really betray any overt violence after the initial night, for those who allowed him into their lives subsequently one can see how these women might convince themselves they were initially wrong, that the memory was flawed. One other thing I want to add is that he fooled some very intelligent women. His former longtime girlfriend/fiancee, a respected lawyer and intelligence analyst for the military, believed for the few years that they were together that he was all these things: that when he'd gone away for some time after September 11 he was in the caves of Afghanistan he said he was in; that when she met him for a meal in the cafeteria of the Center City hospital, he in his white coat and scrubs, that they were in fact sitting in his place of employment; that he was not dating and fucking hundreds of other women. These scenarios he presented were fairly elaborate.

Q: I don't know if you've read all about it on my blog, but I was date-raped in Philly in an incident I never could have in a million years gotten prosecuted. I was resentful in large part because I'd only had sex with two other people at the time, and sex, in my mind, was this muddled concept that was supposed to involve affection, warmth, some element of commitment, etc., which I think is why I so desired, after I chewed the guy out, to semi-befriend him and make the experience somehow "meaningful." At the same time, it probably hastened my adoption of the "oh who cares, whatever, it's just sex" philosophy of fucking that now, given the same situation, would have made things much clearer in my mind, like: "Did I want to have sex with this person? Is this person going to get me off? Is this person going to even try?" Thoughts that didn't occur to me at the time. Anyway! So I couldn't help but notice that a lot of the victims you spoke to were Catholic. Not that I blame that! But, um, did you talk to any of the victims about whether Jeffrey got them off?

A: Hmmm. Shit. That's a question.

I guess I'd say first that your story seems to demonstrate what I was trying to say before: that women apparently often attempt to befriend their abusers after the fact, to convince themselves that their belief is wrong and they could not possibly have been raped, or, continuing to blame themselves here, to elevate the sex to something more meaningful/morally acceptable than "casual sex" (not to mention than "rape"), because you're right, at least some of these women had not really had many partners. (I guess I'd say here, too, that, at the risk of sounding like a dick, not every woman who says she's been date-raped is necessarily ight about that, in an objective sense, particularly when there's alcohol involved, because actions at the time and recollections after the fact are not always what they'd be were it not for alcohol. So we agree that not every claim is necessarily fact, and I mention this because it plays a role in this conversation, in terms of a woman's reaction to an incident.) At the same time, some of these women were sexually empowered, they had had many partners, they were sexually experienced, it was not beyond the realm of possibility that they would have had sex with a guy they'd only just met. So I think that that added sometimes to their confusion about what had happened — remember that many had not conjured that they could have been drugged until much later — and I know that that affected the jury; the jury was not of the mindset that women are chaste, that single women couldn't possibly desire sexual satisfaction, too — the fruits of Sex & The City, I'm told.

As to getting off, it stands to reason that at least some of the women who maintained relations with him after the fact — some for some time — might not have always hated the sex (one told me it was only good, though, "once or twice").

And I should probably mention, too, and this is often really tragic, that sexual assault victims can climax spontaneously during their attacks, even under the most difficult circumstances. It's anatomical, and a fact that tortured many young boys assaulted in the Church abuse scandal. So it's really irrelevant.

[GOOGLE: This turns out to be true. I'd never heard that before! It's like, guilt/fear makes it really easy to get off. Confusing!]

Q: Your last page was about a woman Marsalis met while skiing in Idaho just over a week before his first criminal trial started. She went with him to a bar and saw something granular in her drink and before she knew it she was getting raped. She reported it immediately; she also happened to be gay. The last paragraph is particularly powerful:

Which is to say that should K. be telling the truth, and should a jury believe her, one woman will finally succeed in doing what some 30 others did not. She will have convinced herself, immediately and independent of the influence of anyone else, that the position she awoke to that morning was not of her choosing or consent. She will have convinced herself that she bore no guilt in the matter and had been horribly violated. And she will have convinced herself that the person sleeping beside her, the good-looking, safe-looking man she'd only just met, the kindly paramedic from a few hours earlier, was for her at that moment as he lay there one thing and one thing only: the rapist she could not avoid confronting.

A: I think the Idaho case is really just extraordinary. First of all, I'm not a lawyer, but it's my understanding that the case was not admissible here because it was at that point — and remains still; the case is still probably a few months from beginning out West — still only an allegation, not fact. A person needs to be convicted of something for it to be potentially admissible. This is the same reason his first rape case in Philly was inadmissible in the second, final trial; he had been acquitted of all the charges the first time, so the fact that he'd been accused was immaterial. Having said that, his two sexual assault convictions from that second trial here could be admissible in Idaho.

But about the Idaho case ... That he would be accused of drugging and raping a woman out there just a week or so before his initial trial was scheduled to begin in Philadelphia is really unbelievable. The court records indicate, as well, that that case seems strong, with more evidence, an accuser — who happens to be a lesbian — who went to police within hours of the alleged assault, eyewitness testimony that the woman was severely intoxicated and Marsalis was all but carrying her, and what would appear to be a starker jury pool to decide the case. It seems to put whatever questions linger about the actions of some of the accusers here in Philaladelphia into a different kind of perspective.