As Janet Jackson herself predicted in 2001: Maybe we’ll meet at a bar / He’ll drive a funky car / Maybe he’ll be a Qatari-born retail billionaire / And I’ll convert to Islam. Sure enough, rumor has it that Jackson has retired from show business for good and adopted the religion of her husband Wissam al-Mana, who she secretly married back in 2012.
One insider confirms: ““She’s gone. She married a billionaire. They’ve got houses in three countries. She’s spending time in the Middle East. She’s become a Muslim.” And here she is wearing a hijab that does not lend itself to wardrobe malfunctions.
Naturally, this wouldn’t be complete without some kind of scandalous twist: in al-Mana’s salad days, he dated a pole dancer and Playboy Playmate named Gwen Rogers, a chapter of his past that Jackson apparently doesn’t know about. Rogers told the National Enquirer via Bossip: “I met him when he was a student. He was very religious. I wish him and Janet all the best and that’s all I want to say about him.”) [Bossip, The Blemish, Radar Online]
- NBC has cancelled the Eva Longoria-produced Ready For Love. [Ace Showbiz]
- The network also pushed back a particularly grisly episode of Hannibal in the wake of the Boston tragedies. [Vulture]
- A website called “Right or Rude” draws on personal interactions with celebrities for their verdicts. (Spoiler alert: Hugh Grant = rude.) [Page Six]
- Kim Kardashian admits that she is “like, a hypocrite” for once lecturing Kourtney Kardashian for having a baby without being married. (Also, can we, like, ban the phrase “out of wedlock” forever?) [Us Weekly]
- The woman who tossed her pube-filled razor at Hugh Jackman at the gym has been indicted. [Yahoo News]
- This is Lauren Side Braid Conrad’s $3.7 million new house in Brentwood. [People]
- Nick Lachey and Vanessa Minillollololollo Lachey will raise their kid in Lachey’s native Ohio. [Gossip Cop]
- Brangelina and their brood are moving to Sydney because they’re attached to 20,000 Leagues Under The Sea. [News.com.au]
- Jennifer Love Hewitt’s grandma likes The Client List: “She ignores the parts that she doesn’t like and pretends like they’re not happening but she calls me her ‘little TV ho.’ But, she does it, like, out loud to people. She’ll be like, this is my ‘little TV ho.’ She’s from Texas. I’m like, ‘Grandma, not aloud. Like on the phone with me, family joke, funny.'” [Contact Music]
- Fun anecdote about JLoHew: I went to college with a boy who is now her personal assistant, and the two were photographed together in a tabloid with the caption “Who’s Her New Man!?!??!!” and she responded, “He’s just an old friend.” Because her brand is “Relatable.”
- Kristen Wiig felt “a little lost” after leaving SNL. [Access Hollywood]
- One Direction will tool around America in a stupid-expensive replica of Scooby Doo’s Mystery Machine van. [The Mirror]
- Gerard Butler on Bruce Willis: ”We were at an Oscars party this year and this incredibly annoying woman would not shut up. He came over and grabbed me and said he had something to tell me. Of course, I was thinking, ‘Wow, Bruce Willis! This is going to be really important.’ But he said, ‘I was just coming to rescue you from that girl.’ I said, ‘You are the fucking dude, man! I love you.'” [Contact Music]
- Ke-money sign-ha; Instagram; naked; smoke machine filter? [NYDN]
- Lauryn Hill has been “squatting” in her New Jersey home. [Page Six]
- Ryan Lochte is ready to find the woman of his dreams and settle down in a nice ranch-style house at the bottom of a pool. [Entertainment Wise]
- Sienna Miller and her fiance Tom Sturridge are the new uber-symmetrical faces of Burberry. [Page Six]