Meta

Originally posted October 13, 2004:

From The Black List, a reader-written feature of (the now defunct) The Black Table, that reviews "the latest media-related crud, new products from Capitalists and odd ideas, concepts or trends."

MAKING BABIES by Emily Gould:

The ickiest part of procreation is that it has become afad. All the weekly gossip magazines are focusing way too much of theircoverage on baby joy, which comes in three flavors. One, speculative("Is Britney/WhitneyHouston/some Reality star you’ve never heardof/Jennifer Aniston Pregnant?"); two, illustrative ("Liv Tyler’s BumpTakes Fashion Week By Storm!"); or three, recuperative ("Debra MessingFinally Loses The Baby Weight").

For more of the article, go to The Black Tableand scroll down until you get to Making Babies. I can’t say I agreewith the rest of her rant as she feels pregnancy is creepy and refersto the fetus as the alien in "Alien."

Now that daughter Grier Henchy is a few months old, Brooke Shields is out bringing home the proverbial bacon.  She is currently appearing as plastic surgeon Christian Troy’s therapist on Nip/Tuck and played a supermodel-whose-husband-cheated-on-her-with-an-18-year-old-girl type character on a recent episode of Law & Order: Criminal Intent. 

And now you may have seen her new Colgate Total commercial in heavy rotation.  In it, Brooke either plays herself or an actress-mom-to-two-girls type who says that a healthy mouth and smile is important to her as an actress and as a mom.  It took a  viewing or two of the commercial before I realized that the kids in the commercial are not Rowan and Grier!

I understand that she wouldn’t want to expose her girls like that, but I also thought it was kind of strange in that it appears she was supposed to be playing herself.  It reminded me of the Bright Beginnings ad that Elisabeth Hasselbeck appeared in, where she too played herself but the "daughter" she nuzzled with was not her baby, Grace.  What do you think?

It seems like half of the celebrity babies born have parents who are not married to each other, but they really aren’t that different from the general (non-celebrity) population of the United States.  According to the Centers for Disease Control (aka CDC), almost 36% of babies born in the US in 2004 were born to unwed women.  (We’re talking about 1.5 million babies.) This number is up 4% from a previous record high in 2003.

Source: CDC (via Babycenter.com)

Britney Spears’ delivery of son Sean Preston was imagined by artist Daniel Edwards in a sculpture he calls, "Monument to Pro-Life: The Birth of Sean Preston."  Britney is portrayed nude posed on all fours, with her back arched, tilted pelvis, clutching a bearskin rug on which she’s kneeling, with Sean’s head crowning.  (Nevermind that Britney had a C-section!)

The artist said, "Britney provides inspiration for those struggling with the ‘right choice.’ She was number one with Google last year, with good reason — people are inspired by the beauty of a pregnant woman."  The co-director of the gallery where the piece is being displayed, Lincoln Capla said, "A superstar at Britney’s young age having a child is rare in today’s celebrity culture. This dedication honors Britney for the rarity of her choice and bravery of her decision."

The artist used as artistic reference a wax figure of Britney pole-dancing which is part of the Las Vegas’ Madame Tussauds and ‘Britney wigs’ characterizing various hairstyles of the pop-princess from a Los Angeles hairstylist. He selected to pose his meta-Britney on a bearskin rug "to convey the commemoration on of the traditional bearskin rug baby picture."

"Monument to Pro-Life" is on view April 7th thru 23rd with a reception for the dedication April 7th from 6:00 pm to 9:00 pm at Capla Kesting Fine Art, 121 Roebling St., Brooklyn, NY. Gallery hours are 1:00 – 6:00 pm Thursday thru Sunday, or by appointment. The gallery can be reached at http://www.caplakesting.com or by phone at 646-932-5687.

Click here to see photos of the sculpture.  (It’s not exactly suitable for work.)

Via Gawker.com

MSNBC is running an Associated Press story called "Celebrity moms making motherhood hot," citing hot new pregnant celebs as proof of what we at the Celebrity Baby Blog all know- that motherhood is hot.  Unlike hemlines, motherhood is not a trend or a fad.  Just because the tabloids are paying more attention to celebrities getting knocked up doesn’t mean that there’s a baby boom!

What do you think?

Thanks to CBB Reader Angela for pointing out the article.

A few readers have emailed me that they saw reports that Angelina Jolie is pregnant with twins and a preliminary Google search shows me that blogs are proliferating the "news."

Currently, the rumor is coming from a few outlets.  UK tabloid The Sun who are quoting a source as saying, "Angelina is overjoyed. Getting pregnant with one of Brad’s children would have been God’s precious gift to her. Now we believe she is carrying twins. Angie is in seventh heaven."  The quote is backed up by another source saying that Angelina underwent fertility treatment to become pregnant.  (And as we all know, fertility treatments can lead to twins, triplets, quadruplets, etc. but not all the time!) 

The Globe is riffing on the reports that Angelina collapsed and was treated for cuts on her head due to the fall.  However, they are managing to turn the news around by saying that she is now being considered a high risk pregnancy.  She is currently shooting The Good Shepherd and chances are, the collapse was due to the exhaustion involved in a rigorous schedule while in the second trimester. 

We at the Celebrity Baby Blog are absolutely certain that Angelina is NOT carrying twins.  First of all, there is no credible source confirming any of this, and second of all, this is such a transparent ploy by questionable media outlets to generate buzz and grow readership because a A-list celebrity is pregnant. It doesn’t help when said celeb is treated for an unrelated medical issue or starts showing early.  Most recently, it happened with Britney and how many babies did she have? 

On top of our gut feeling, a source confirmed to me that this twins rumor is absolutely not true.

Media running this bogus story include FemaleFirst, Krone.at (Austria) and RTL TV.  You can tell that a story is not true when only foreign media are breaking the story. 

In case you were ever wondering what the infrequently used category Meta refers to, this is it.  Fashion photographer Steven Meisel staged and photographed an entire feature for Italian Vogue comprised of faux stalkerazzi shots. 

Obviously the stylist doesn’t have kids because there are a number of errors in the baby shots.  As Daddytype’s Greg points out, "Bwah! They’re carrying that car seat around with the base attached!"

For all of the photos, go to TheFashionSpot.com.

PS Meta means self-referential, referring to itself or its characteristics, especially in a self-parodying manner.

There are so many gossip magazines on the newsstand. What’s the difference? Which should you buy or, heavens, subscribe to? Well, the New York Post, queen of the tabloids breaks it down for you.US Weekly, which has won some Magazine of the Year award, is packed with lots of photos and is a good choice for subway/airplane reading. I cancelled my subscription when I discovered…In Touch has more in terms of gossip and speculation. However, as the NY Post article says, it’s “low budget fluff,” pointing out that in the current issue, “two stars share the cover, and in typical In Touch fashion, they interview neither one.” For a while I was subscribing to both In Touch and…Star, which is what I’m currently subscribing to, is the best trashy magazine because, as my boss Sheril says, “they get everything first.” They also have Victoria Gotti as a gossip columnist, which may or may not be a good thing.People manages to cover celebrity gossip and feel-good stories about normal people who have overcome adversity. My mother has subscribed to it for years but I still don’t care for it. I don’t need all the human interest angle- I want 100% trash!Life & Style is a new offering from the publisher of In Touch in order to compete with Star, US and InStyle. I haven’t seen it yet so I’ll tell you what the New York Post said. “Modeled after the slicker InStyle and US…, the new offering falls short, despite its crisp and uncluttered pages.”Still can’t make up your mind? They all pretty much have the same dirt and the same photos, and even similar features. For example, all three have a “fashion police” feature, photos of stars behaving like you and me, in and out lists, and a wrapup of similar styles stars are wearing. Of course, it’s also a matter of taste. I happen to find US Weekly’s punny fashion disses funnier but you may prefer Star’s Goumba Johnny and Angela Lagreca’s insults.What do you prefer?

From The Black List, a reader-written feature of The Black Table, that reviews of the latest media-related crud, new products from Capitalists and odd idea, concept or trend.MAKING BABIES by Emily Gould:

The ickiest part of procreation is that it has become a fad. All the weekly gossip magazines are focusing way too much of their coverage on baby joy, which comes in three flavors. One, speculative (“Is Britney/WhitneyHouston/some Reality star you’ve never heard of/Jennifer Aniston Pregnant?”); two, illustrative (“Liv Tyler’s Bump Takes Fashion Week By Storm!”); or three, recuperative (“Debra Messing Finally Loses The Baby Weight”).

For more of the article, go to http://www.blacktable.com/blacklist041012.htm and scroll down until you get to Making Babies. I can’t say I agree with the rest of her rant as she feels pregnancy is creepy and refers to the fetus as the alien in “Alien.”