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human nature
When A Superstar Dies, Everybody Gets To Be A Jerk Or A Poet For 15 Minutes
This weekend, I knew it would be impossible to write about Michael Jackson, as most everything has already been said, but that it would also be impossible not to write about Michael Jackson, as his death is dominating the news. More » -
who's loving you
Was Michael Jackson More Normal Than We Thought?
Before the cosmetic surgeries and child molestation allegations overshadowed his musical legacy, Michael Jackson was just a talented kid from an abusive home. But with reports now swirling about his alleged drug abuse, sadly, his troubles suddenly seem…common. More » -
r.i.p.
Jackson Family Spokesman: "This Is A Case Of Abuse Of Medications"
Brian Oxman, the Jackson family attorney, called into CNN this evening. Despite the fact that several sources have confirmed that Michael Jackson is dead, Oxman would not, but he did speak candidly about Jackson's troublesome prescription drug use. More » -
r.i.p.
Senseless, Enraging Acts Of Violence
Very, very sad news: The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum security guard who was critically wounded in this afternoon's attack, Stephen Tyrone Johns, has died from his injuries, MSNBC is reporting. The reported shooter, though injured, is still alive. [MSNBC] -
r.i.p.
Flower Power
Eleanor Perenyi, whose Green Thoughts: A Writer in the Garden is a classic of gardening literature, has died at 91. Oh, and apparently she was also a baroness! [NYT] -
r.i.p.
Bea Arthur's Top 5 Contributions To Pop Culture
Actress Bea Arthur passed away on April 25, at the age of 86, from cancer. While she personally didn't identify as feminist, her career made an enormous impact on the women's movement. More » -
r.i.p.
Author J.G. Ballard Dies At 78
J.G. Ballard, perhaps best known for writing the novelsEmpire of the Sun and Crash (as well as several short story collections) has died at the age of 78 after a long battle with illness. [BBCNews] -
women of letters
R.I.P Judith Krug, Librarian, Free Speech Activist, Founder of Banned Books Week
As mentioned briefly last night, Judith Krug, the founder of Banned Book Week and champion of the First Amendment, died Saturday in Evanston, Illinois. She was 69. More » -
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r.i.p.
Porn Star Marilyn Chambers Dies At 57
Marilyn Chambers—the Jenna Jameson of the '70s and '80s—was found dead in her mobile home on April 12. She was 57. Cause of death is unknown at this time. (Link NSFW.) [AVN] More » -
r.i.p.
Chordettes Singer Nancy Overton Dies At 83
Oh, sadness! Chordettes singer Nancy Overton, who joined the group in 1958, has died of esophageal cancer at the age of 83. A small tribute to her lovely voice, and her group, after the jump. More » -
r.i.p.
Natasha Richardson: Actress, Mother, Wife, Force Of Nature... Dead At 45
Acclaimed actress Natasha Richardson died today of head injuries sustained in a skiing accident. She was 45. More » -
r.i.p.
People We'll Miss In 2009
Newsweek has a roundup of famous people who died in 2008 — here are some of the ones we'll miss the most, along with a few additions from our archives. -
anna nicole smith
Less-Than-Classy Anna Nicole Memorial Unveiled At Grave Site
...featuring quotes from her reality show. (Click to view.) More » -
r.i.p.
Pinup Girl, Pop Culture Icon Bettie Page Dead At 85
Bettie Page, the iconic pinup and cult figure, died yesterday in Los Angeles, at the age of 85. She suffered a heart attack last week and had been in a coma ever since. -
anna nicole smith
Anna Nicole Smith Knew How To Party On Halloween
I literally have not missed a dead celebrity like I miss Anna Nicole Smith. Thankfully, she did a few seasons of reality TV so that we can have more to remember her by than just Playboy spreads, National Enquirer stories, and the occasional TrimSpa water bottle. The clip above is a deleted scene from the Halloween episode of The Anna Nicole Show. Anna, her hanger-on Howard K. Stern, and her assistant Kimmy all went out to party for the holiday, which was also' Kimmy's birthday. In this scene, the trio leaves the party to go to an after-party at Anna's house. The birthday girl gets sick in the limo and is instructed to puke in her hat. Anna's response is a positive one, telling Kimmy that now she can "start over" in getting wasted. -
chef menstrual cycle song
Chef Sings A Song About Menstrual Cycles
As you probably already heard, singer/actor Isaac Hayes died yesterday at his home in Memphis, TN at the age of 65. The baritone singer/composer was probably most well known for creating the theme song for Shaft…that is, until he voiced the character Chef on South Park. He was killed off the show after Hayes became angry with an episode that made fun of his brother in Scientology, Tom Cruise. But before that nastiness, he had a great run of things and contributed lots of sexy songs, including this one, in which he explains the menstrual cycle to Stan. More » -
bernie mac
2-Year-Old Girls Give Bernie Mac The Jitters
I don't tend to cry over the deaths of famous people, but, for some reason, the news that comedian/actor Bernie Mac had passed away on Saturday morning was enough to send me back to bed in tears. (I got no sympathy from my main man or my two cats.) Ten minutes later, I got back up again and starting rifling through my DVDs to find one of my two (!) copies of the 2000 concert film The Original Kings Of Comedy, which first introduced me to Mac's work. Personally, I think his entire set is brilliant, but, in the interest of brevity, I cut a clip of the bit in which he talks about taking care of his drug-addicted sister's daughters and son...the youngest of whom, he explains, is an agent of the devil. Clip (language NSFW) above. More » -
r.i.p.
First Bernie Mac, now Isaac Hayes? [CNN]
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bernie mac
We'd like to think that this — footage from Bernie Mac's appearance on a North Carolina stage in the Original Kings of Comedy — is the sort of reception he got in heaven this morning. -
bernie mac
Original King Bernie Mac, 50, Dies Of Complications Due To Pneumonia
Really sad Saturday news: "A publicist says Emmy and Golden Globe nominated actor and comedian Bernie Mac has died at age 50. Publicist Danica Smith says Bernie Mac died early Saturday at a hospital in the Chicago area of complications due to pneumonia. The comedian suffered from sarcoidosis, an inflammatory lung disease that produces tiny lumps of cells in the body's organs, but he had said the condition went into remission in 2005. He recently had been hospitalized and treated for pneumonia." This man made us laugh like no one else and was a constant reminder that "fun is fun, jokes is jokes." An embed of part of his brilliant Original Kings Of Comedy performance — in which he famously breaks down the word "motherfucker" — after the jump. More » -
r.i.p.
Estelle Getty, Thank You For Being A Friend
Estelle Getty, the actress who won our hearts playing Sophia Petrillo — Bea Arthur's salty Sicilian mother — on The Golden Girls died this morning at the age of 84. She'd been suffering for years from severe dementia. We're huge fans of GG (that shit stands the test of time), and we were so sad to hear about Estelle passing, so we put together this clip show of some of Sophia's best moments. We hope that where ever she is, she's found peace, and that the hereafter is nothing at all like Shady Pines. More » -
r.i.p.
George Carlin: "Pro-Life Is Anti-Woman"
George Carlin was able to make so much sense because he looked at each topic from every angle possible, and then whittled his arguments down to common sense. And anytime a man can spit out common sense about a woman's right to choose, he automatically wins us over. (Carlin was also able to recognize that feminists can be as militant and unreasonable as any other group, and that anyone who attempts to censor a person is the party that's in the wrong.) He'll be missed. More » -
r.i.p.
Top 10 Reasons Why I Miss Anna Nicole Smith
One year ago today, Anna Nicole Smith died in a Florida casino hotel of a drug overdose (the toxicology report, incidentally, read like War and Peace). And while it may seem like a really obvious statement, I have to say that what sucks most about her being gone is that she's not here anymore to make me smile by being drunk at awards shows, having babies in lawless countries and then selling the filmed content to tabloid TV shows, and introducing the world to her toothless cousin... you know, all those huge contributions that she made to pop culture. Anyway, after the jump, the top 10 reasons why I miss her. More » -
heath ledger
R.I.P.
Heath Ledger's death has been ruled as an accidental overdose of prescription drugs by the New York City medical examiner's office. The toxicology report shows that Ledger — who passed away on January 22 at the age of 28 — took a lethal combination of six different painkillers and anti-anxiety medication including oxycodone (generic for Percodan), hydrocodone (generic for Vicodin), diazepam (generic for Valium), temazepam (generic for the sedative Restoril), alprazolam (generic for Xanax) and doxylamine (generic for the sleep aid Restavit). [Us] -
brad renfro
"It's really sad that we've lost not only a great actor, but one who liked our hair." That's from a blog post written by girls who didn't really know Brad Renfro, but hung out with him at a party the night he died. [Serhorn] -
r.i.p.
A Glimpse Into Brad Renfro's Life Via MySpace
We still don't really know exactly how Brad Renfro died, but we didn't really know how he lived either. Apparently he had a kid, and he stars in Bret Easton Ellis' The Informers with Winona Ryder, which is set to come out later this year. None of that is listed on his MySpace profile though. But the profile still gives some insight as to what his personality was like off-camera. (He's kinda funny. Under "Who I want to meet" he lists "your mom.") This video, also from MySpace, shows Brad hanging out with some girls, drinking, joking around, and watching football. It's eerily reminiscent of the Larry Clark movie Bully he starred in. He looks really different from the last time we saw him in something and it's really hard to believe he was only 25. More » -
r.i.p.
Heath Ledger Found Dead
Heath Ledger was found dead this afternoon in a SoHo apartment from an apparent drug overdose. The 28-year-old actor left behind one daughter, 2-year-old Matilda, with his former fiancĂ©e Michelle Williams. [PageSix] More » -
nesting into hibernation
A Look Back At Blueprint, A Magazine That Dared To Be Pretty
Today Martha Stewart's fashion/lifestyle glossy for the Grey's Anatomy generation, Blueprint followed Jane, House & Garden and Vibe Vixen into magazine heaven. Wherefore the untimely death? What can we learn from its tasteful, cheerily minimalist time on this earth's newsstands? Right now Blueprint is probably wishing it had never been born, which is why it's the job of Moe and Guardian Editorial Angel Maria to peruse the November/December issue to remind the world what Blueprint achieved in its short eighteen-odd months in publication.
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r.i.p.
The Suicide That Proved We Are Still A Nation Capable Of "Shock"
In the 13 days since we first heard word of the case of Lori Drew, the mother whose Myspace hoax drove 13-year-old Megan Meier to suicide, pretty much every major news outlet seems to have covered — including Doctor Drew himself, who appeared pretty disgusted by the whole thing on Monday night's Anderson Cooper 360. Today the New York Times weighed in, and it quickly shot to the top of the newspaper's Most Emailed list. The story itself hasn't gotten much more complicated since — Megan had been fighting with her formerly close friend; she switched schools and cut off the friendship; the friend's mother set up a fake MySpace account under the guise of a cute boy named Josh and went to work befriending Megan only to suddenly de-friend her with random assertions that she was a "shitty person" without whom the world would be a better place; it all checks out; it all ended up being in a police-penned account Lori Drew herself gave an officer. What has changed since the world learned about the story, according to the Riverfront Times, are the lives of Curt and Lori Drew:
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r.i.p.
House & Garden Buys The Farm. But They Had Their Own TV Channel And Everything!
THIS JUST IN from someone who gets memos:
More »After considerable thought, we have decided to cease publication of House & Garden, effective with the December 2007 issue. The website, houseandgarden.com, will also be shut down. I would like to thank Dominique Browning and the entire staff for their award-winning efforts throughout the years. House and Garden's intelligent and graceful editorial attracted a loyal readership. We were proud to publish it.
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r.i.p.
Today we mourn the passing of one Robert Goulet, Broadway legend, who died yesterday at the age of 73. He was perhaps best known for his role as Lancelot in the musical Camelot. We have seen Camelot more times than we are willing to confess. Lancelot, and in turn Goulet's, signature song was "If Ever I Would Leave You." For those of you who are not musical theatre dorks, the lyrics go "If ever I would leave you / How could it be in spring-time? / Knowing how in spring I'm bewitched by you so? / Oh, no! not in spring-time! / Summer, winter or fall! / No, never could I leave you at all!" Sigh. Who doesn't want to hear that? You will always be remembered, Mr. Goulet. [NYT] -
r.i.p.
Anita Roddick, founder of The Body Shop, died of a brain hemorrhage. She was 64. Roddick, who was named a Dame in 2003, pioneered ethical and environmentally conscious beauty products decades before they became fashionable. Since beauty products are often all about packaging, she introduced a biodegradable plastic bag and, in 1985, she told a newspaper, "You buy something, get it home then throw away mountains of cellophane, paper, cardboard, ribbon and other junk before you get to the product." Roddick worked closely with Greenpeace and various human rights and fair trade organizations. She also criticized the male-dominated cosmetics industry for playing on women's insecurities, saying "No ingredient can take off grief, anger and 20 years of industrial pollution. No moisture cream does more than another. Every moisture cream works." [Guardian, The Star] -
r.i.p.
Ex-Mrs. Ronald Reagan and screen legend Jane Wyman passed away today at the age of 93. Best known for her role on the TV series Falcon Crest, Wyman possessed a sort of tact and class notably absent from today's tabloid stars. On her policy of not speaking about her former husband, she once said: "[I]t's bad taste to talk about ex-husbands and ex-wives, that's all. Also, I don't know a damn thing about politics." [CNN]
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