Jessica waits in line? Tell us more
A friend asked if I was looking forward to the Oscars. I said, “No.”
He looked at me as if I had just belly-bumped his mother.
“You don’t care?” he asked, not quite believing my lack of interest.
“Right,” I said. “I don’t care. That is not to say that I am insensitive to the plights of those who act. I wept when Jen and Brad split. I cheered when Angelina Jolie (who now has Brad) announced that she had adopted a baby in Ethiopia following her adoption of a baby in Cambodia. And now, look here” -- I held up a copy of People magazine -- “Meg has adopted a baby in China!”
That would be Meg Ryan. Hollywood people flock like geese to be a part of whatever seems to be in. Scientology. Kabala. Pilates. Anorexia. Addiction. Pregnancy. And now adoption.
“Look at me! I have a baby from Nepal!”
“I have one from the Mongolian Plateau!”
“Lucky you, they’re so rare! I’m getting one from Machu Picchu!”
“Oh, my God, how cool! Do they have any extras?”
And now, good gosh, Angelina is announcing she’s pregnant!
We eat that stuff up. Who’s sleeping with whom? Does it matter? Why, of course. This is Hollywood, folks. Everything matters if it has to do with a skinny blond and a guy with a waxed chest and beard stubble. Or a sloe-eyed brunet with impressive dimensions.
It matters to my friend. He has memorized the names and movies of every smiling face in every celebrity magazine on the market. He works at it. He has flash cards with faces on the front and names on the back. I tested him one day.
Flash: “Scarlett Johansson.”
“Right.”
Flash: “Jessica Simpson.”
“They look like the same person,” I said.
“They’re not. Look on the back. One is Scarlett, one is Jessica.”
He was right. But it’s remarkable how, if one looks quickly, they blur into a single face, as though they shared the same father or the same mother or purchased the same beakers filled with the same DNA.
Flash: “Cameron Diaz.”
“Right.”
Flash: “Charlize Theron.”
“Bingo.”
He paused. “No one says ‘bingo’ anymore.”
I had no idea that we had ceased to say “bingo.” “Do we still say ‘gangbusters’?” I asked.
He sneered. “ ‘Gangbusters’? What’s that?”
In the issue of People that I had in hand, they took a poll. “Should Brad and Angelina Wed?” Sixty-five percent of the respondents said yes. Thirty-five percent said no. I said I didn’t care.
My friend said somberly, “It’s a tragedy what happened to Brad and Jen. They were so right for each other.” Jen is now with Vince Vaughn.
My friend shook his head. “He’s not right for her.”
“I’m sorry.”
I flipped through the magazine. There are two pages of pregnant stars. Not Britney, silly. She’s like yesterday, home tending last year’s baby. Or watching a nanny tend last year’s baby. “Maria! Come here please. Baby has poo-pooed.”
This year’s pregnancy lineup, in addition to the ubiquitous Angelina, includes Brooke, Gwen, Gwyneth, Mariska and Katie. They are pictured wearing proud smiles of accomplishment, as though achieving a state of pregnancy required years of study and the passage of several difficult tests.
But strip away their Gucci gowns, and movie stars, like deli waitresses and Omaha housewives, are ordinary people. They don’t require special treatment. Take Jessica Simpson. Out nightclubbing, she needed a bathroom. “There was no VIP bathroom,” People notes, “so Simpson even queued up for a 20-minute bathroom wait. ‘She was just like any other girl in line,’ says an observer.”
“Wow,” I said to my friend. “A big star like that, holding it even as you and I. A real person. Salt of the earth.”
“No one says ‘salt of the earth’ anymore,” he said. It doesn’t matter. I don’t even know what it means.
I’m so out of it, I thought Reese Witherspoon was Jenna Elfman when, in truth, she was LeAnn Rimes. Or Heather Graham. Or Heidi Klum. Whoever.
My friend reflects a current obsession with Hollywood. With make-believe. With staged reality shows. With animation. With awards. We seek relief from Iraq by wondering if Jen can cope without Brad. The faces of pretty little blond girls whirl through our lives like ponies on a merry-go-round.
I guess I’m still rooted in the generation that cared about matters other than what Paris Hilton is thinking, or even if she is able to.
I’m just not interested in what Felicity Huffman will be wearing to the Oscars or who they thank for their talents, their breaks and their abs. But my friend will care. And all of his friends. And their friends. And we’ll all keep on buying People magazine and wondering when the Olsen twins will get pregnant and by whom.
Or maybe they’ll just adopt. I hear they have a special on babies in Kuala Lumpur.
Al Martinez’s column appears Mondays and Fridays. He can be reached at al.martinez@latimes.com.