2006-07-14

This week in celebrity news

(AP) Pamela Anderson may have a stripper pole in her bedroom, but she's a soccer mom at heart.

"I go to every game!" says the 39-year-old actress, discussing her young sons' sports schedules in an interview in the August issue of House & Garden magazine.

Anderson has two children, Brandon, 10, and Dylan, 8, from her marriage to now ex-husband Tommy Lee.

Her Malibu, Calif., home is featured in the magazine, which describes Anderson's cozy bungalow as "hippie-chick-meets-Miss Havisham." The former "Baywatch" star would not let House & Garden show her bedroom, which has a stripper pole.

Er, exactly at what point did Pam think that House & Garden Magazine would be including the stripper pole anyways? And if she already told them it existed, what was the point of refusing them entry? This sounds like somebody trying to build her own mythos.

Meg White fans, prepare to have your little hipster hearts broken: the White Stripes won't be returning any time soon as Jack White is busy working on a second Raconteurs album, Contactmusic.com reports.

"I think [we'll do it] as soon as we get a chance. We're going to make another record," White said. "We've been talking about where rather than when. We've got some songs ready to go."

Although he had originally planned to take a short break from his main project, Jack was reportedly inspired by the huge response to Broken Boy Soldiers and by the chemistry he found with his new bandmates, who, we hate to say it, play a hell of a lot better than Meg.

In other Raconteurs news, on July 31, the quirky rockers will be releasing "Hands" as their next single — which will feature B-sides of David Bowie's "It Ain't Easy" and live tracks "Intimate Secretary," and "The Zane Rendition."

White Stripes on hold? Could this have anything to do with the fact that Jack and Meg haven't had enough time lately to listen to old obscure albums to steal hit singles from?

Coldplay doesn't want to impose its political beliefs on others, says frontmanChris Martin,but band members feel an obligation to use their celebrity for a good cause.

Coldplay supports Oxfam's fair trade campaign, which lobbies against trade policies that hurt developing countries, such as the influx of goods from developed countries.

"We don't want to be preachy, we just say those words (fair trade) and make sure people look it up themselves," Martin said at a news conference ahead of a concert Thursday.

He said the British rock band wants to put their name recognition to good use.

"When one or two people take pictures of us, we feel like we could start advertising something we care about," said Martin, 29, who has the Oxfam campaign's twin-striped logo tattooed onto his left hand.

At least Coldplay is going through the motions. The fact is that these left-leaning celebs always have a "good cause" to promote (or more commonly with rock and punk acts, a "bad U.S. President" to villify) but usually do so less out of some deep rooted concern for the planet and more for the good publicity and "anti-authority street cred" it generates. As somebody (Neil Boortz?) once mentioned, if these kids really wanted to say something radical and anti-establishment they would say that mothers who had abortions should be sent to prison for murder. (As an aside, the New Zealand Herald reported on Wednesday that celebrity causes are never particularly popular with actual people, as Bob Geldof had to cancel a benefit concert due to lack of interest.

(KP International) Paris Hilton has supposedly decided to give up some of life's enjoyable indulgences: wearing and ingesting meat and having sex.

Apparently the hotel heiress was shown a video about animal cruelty by Heather Mills, animal activist and estranged wife of Paul McCartney, which changed not only Hilton's diet but her fashion sense as well. "From that point on I've never worn fur and I never will," said the socialite. "I also haven't eaten any meat since. I just survive on pasta and stuff like that. I was grossed out. It was disgusting."

Also, there will be no Night in Paris 2 anytime soon as Hilton has supposedly made a vow of celibacy for a year. "I'm doing it just because I want to," said the 25-year-old. "I feel I'm becoming stronger as a person. Every time I have a boyfriend, I'm just so romantic and I'll put all my energy into the guy, and I don't really pay attention to myself."

I'll leave you with just two thoughts: Paris Hilton has gone out of her way to extend her 15 minutes of undeserved fame and keep her vapid useless self in the media spotlight so that we have to hear about her every 45 seconds or so. And she thinks eating meat is a cruel thing to do to a species? Secondly, the only part of Paris Hilton worth two shakes is apparently her vagina, and now she's not even going to be using it.