After reading an entire Quincy Jones interview on the Style.com website, I have a new found respect for this dude.  Finally, a celebrity is willing to speak the truth regarding Michael Jackson.  Jackson was an addict, he didn’t want to be black as evidenced by his skin bleaching and white, adopted kids, and he lied about having conditions that he probably didn’t suffer from.

Q: You were there to witness the strange evolution in Michael’s appearance. Did you ever step in and saying anything about it?
A: Oh, we talked about it all the time. But he’d come up with, “Man, I promise you I have this disease,” and so forth, and “I have a blister on my lungs,” and all that kind of b.s. It’s hard, because Michael’s a Virgo, man—he’s very set in his ways. You can’t talk him out of it. Chemical peels and all that stuff.

Q: Did you believe him about the disease?
A: I don’t believe in any of that bullshit, no. No. Never. I’ve been around junkies and stuff all my life. I’ve heard every excuse. It’s like smokers—”I only smoke when I drink” and all that stuff. But it’s bullshit. You’re justifying something that’s destructive to your existence. It’s crazy. I mean, I came up with Ray Charles, man. You know, nobody gonna pull no wool over my eyes. He did heroin 20 years! Come on. And black coffee and gin for 40 years. But when he called me to come over to see him when he was in the hospital on his way out, man, he had emphysema, hepatitis C, cirrhosis of the liver, and five malignant tumors. Please, man! I’ve been around this all my life. So it’s hard for somebody to pull the wool over my eyes. But when somebody’s hell-bent on it, you can’t stop ‘em. 

Q: But it must’ve been so disturbing to see Michael’s face turn into what it turned into.
A: It’s ridiculous, man! Chemical peels and all of it. And I don’t understand it. But he obviously didn’t want to be black.

Q: Is that what it was?
A: Well, what do you think? You see his kids?

Jones also revealed that he won’t be attending the funeral, because “being there with 10 million people is not my idea of a tribute to somebody you were so close to—who’s got a part of your soul. Our souls were joined, you know. And a piece of it goes with him.”

Karl Malden passed away today at the very ripe old age of 97.

Best known for his television role on The Streets of San Francisco – one of my all-time favorites as a kid – Malden also appeared in Streetcar Named Desire, On the Waterfront, and How the West Was Won.

In my personal estimation, his most admirable accomplishment is that he is survived by his wife of 71 years.  You read that right:  71 years.

Prayers and positive thoughts go out to the entire Malden family.

I don’t know if everyone will remember Karen Mulder but in the early nineties (bottom picture) she was a pretty well-known (super?)model who did a lot of runway and Victoria’s Secret print work.  In the late part of that decade, she suffered from some serious mental issues in which she accused her father of sexually molesting her and Prince Albert of Monaco of using her as a sex slave.  She was admitted to a mental health clinic for several months, emerged, and recanted most of her earlier allegations.

I don’t really know what she’s been up to for the past ten years — the shelf life of a model is about the same as for a head of cabbage — but apparently one thing that’s been filling her days is plastic surgery.  Mulder was arrested on Monday for repeated verbal telephone assaults she allegedly made towards her plastic surgeon.  The model wanted an “unnamed procedure” (AKA boob job regret) reversed, but the female doctor refused her requests.  According to police, Karen’s calls became increasingly threatening in nature.

Karen, Karen, Karen.  You cannot go around threatening your surgeon because she didn’t remodel your deviated septum to your liking.  And by “deviated septum” I mean “D cups.”  But, if you insist on being some sort of crazy stalker, hot mess type, could you please throw a threat or two in the direction of Kellie Pickler’s doc?

Ed: Our fabu NYC sister team of Skipabeet and Sierra is back with another report on a hot new show they recommend. Enjoy!

The Oxygen Network’s new show proves to not only be heartwarming but hilarious.  Sierra and I attended the premier for the new show in NYC on Monday night and absolutely loved it!  It is as if The Biggest Loser and Dancing with the Stars had a hot steamy affair and gave birth to Dance Your Ass Off.  The best part about it is, Loser is too emotional for me and Stars is too cheesy, whereas this show takes the best from both and drops (like pounds) the qualities I so despise about its fraternal shows, but exploits all the good ones.

When I learned that each overweight participant would be accompanied by a (hot) professional dancer, I assumed that I’d be so distracted by the pros’ hot bodies to focus on the contestants, however that is NOT the case.  These 300lb (or more) contestants do head stands, the splits, and some many more moves I can’t even do in the bedroom.  IT’S PHENOMENAL. Dance Your Ass Off can be seen every Monday night on Oxygen at 9/10 central.

Anna Kournikova, the most highly overrated tennis player that we only know of because she’s marginally attractive, got into a brawl this weekend in Vegas. 

At Lavo Nightclub, some drunk chick pushed Anna early in the night and then threw a drink on her later.  When Anna demanded the patron be thrown out, a cat fight ensued that left Kournikova with scratches around her neck.  Instead of resorting to punches, she should have just started doing some of those grunts that the female tennis players do — those things scare the hell out of me.

I think we all have a responsibility to diffuse potentially violent situations.  When some boozy floozy throws a drink on me, I just start sucking my clothes, quite honestly.  Why waste free drinks?

Anyway, Anna’s fine, I don’t care, but I do have a question:  Is she married to, divorced from, or dating Enrique Iglesias?  I’m supposed to know these things and I cannot seem to unravel this mystery!

As if I wasn’t astounded enough to read that Simon Cowell was paid $36M last season for his role on American Idol, his contract for next year offers up a salary of — having paralysis of the fingers trying to type this out — $144M. 

I’m not a faithful AI viewer but doesn’t he just sit there and sigh and make fun of Paula?  Because anyone can do that.  Hell, I do it for free.  Is there some other value-added service he provides that I don’t know about? 

Now that he’ll be making the big bucks maybe he can get his moobs reduced.  Just a thought…

Rihanna looked alternately trashy and fierce in New York City this week.

She cut an impressive figure as she exited the Gramercy Park Hotel last night on her way to 1 Oak.  That’s in pretty stark contrast to earlier in the day when she wore cut-offs, an orange lace bra and an unbuttoned shirt (though thankfully, she did button up while shopping at Barney’s).

Rihanna looks so much happier in really recent pictures.  Now that this Chris Brown court case (and hopefully their relationship) is behind her — save her very stupid desire to have the restraining order removed — she has lots of reasons to smile.