For those of you new to AGC, our patron anti-saint is Gwyneth Paltrow. We bear no ill-tidings or harm to her, we just for the most part don't like her. Since the majority of the group feels the same way, we started a list to present to those of you who are new and keep asking, "why don't you guys like Gwyneth Paltrow?"....well listed below are the reasons we've compiled. I started the ball rolling, with the following post:
Am I the only one who hates Gwyneth
Paltrow?
Author: PUSSSYKATT <pusssykatt@aol.com>
Date: 1998/01/24
Forum: alt.gossip.celebrities
Excuse me....but this gal is really a bitch. Not only did Brad allude to the fact that she may have cheated on him, which caused their breakup, but while staying at "friend" Winona Ryder's apartment, reads a script sent to Winona, and applies for and gets the part. Now after double dating with Matt Damon and Minnie Driver, she decides to pair up Matt with Winona. Now I know no one made Matt choose Winona, but Gwyneth just seems to be a very devious person....and I've decided that she is a major spoiled bitch. Who's with me?
Billie
\
AGC DECIDED:
1. She cheated on Brad Pitt!
2. She was instrumental in getting Matt Damon to dump Minnie for her friend Winona Ryder (she and Ben Affleck were double-dating with Minnie and Matt at the time, and decided he would like Winona better, which he did...it has nothing to do with the fact that he DID like Winona better, it's just the way she did it).
3. She was living in Winona's apartment after the Brad breakup, and while Winona was away filming, a script came for Winona to read (we now know that is the Oscar winning "Shakespeare in Love")....Gwynie read it, liked it, auditioned, and got the role.
4. She had to have Brad hold her hand while she got that atrocious haircut.
5. In order to get back at Kate Moss who was dating Johnny Depp (who had broken Winona's heart), she approached Calvin Klein about being his spokesmodel, which would have put Kate out on the street.
6. She's basically spoiled! A rich man's Melanie Griffith.
7. Her jaw bone could crack a walnut if she put it between her jaw and shoulder.
8. She put down Bradley's fans at every opportunity.
9. She never acted like she was the luckiest woman in the world.
10. She called that photographer and told him where she and Bradley were staying. Oh, wait, that's something positive. Forget #10.
11. She continued to get movie role after movie role, even after they all flopped. Would you rather see another angst ridden movie featuring 'The Bitch' or one featuring Angela Bassett?
12. Because her pussy payments have expired, but the bitch pretends not to notice.
13. Because she acts like she's owed something because her parents are famous.
14. She takes herself WAY too seriously.
15. Showed her true colors by being very blasé about the "break-up".
16. She actually believes the press when they call her a 'beauty' >snicker<
17. Name drops all the time; even if the subject is tampons.
18. Pretends Ben Afleck is straight.
19. Is kicking herself for not insisting Ben take her to the Oscars instead of his mother.
20. Is making plans to get *rid* of his mother.
21. Is making plans to fuck Joel Silver. (psst...she needs a scarf)
22. Is wondering why there is a room 'just for Matt' in Ben's new house.
23. Mentioned that 'of course 'SHE' turned down Kate Winslet's role in 'Titanic".
24. Acted like a professor but has less education than Brad Pitt.
25. Is getting rather chummy with Matt Damon now (even if he and her friend are through-this is really bad form).
26. Has actually said that she snubs people she runs into from High School if they weren't her special friends.
27. Went after Mark Wahlberg before Affleck when he got raves for 'Boogie Nights'
28. Most recently, is reported to have got on a private plane sent by Calvin Klein and whisked a bunch of friends out to a wedding in the Hamptons.
29. Has never been reported to date or associate with ANYONE who could not feather her nest.
30. Was invited to "guest edit" Marie Claire magazine, spent a day on a desert island with a camera and a journal and wrote horrible, pseudo-profound thoughts on life. I pray she does not attempt her hand at "literary fiction" a la the equally horrid Ethan Hawke, whose book The Hottest State was laughably amateur. Attempts to look and act highly educated and cultured, and fails miserably.
31. She is a lousy actress, IMO. I was just in Athens, Greece, where her ' Sliding Doors' film was being hyped all over. Ugh. Stupid premise for a film, horrid cast. Why bother promoting and showing something no one will see?
32. Her holier than thou attitude.
33. Her history of 'revolving door' romances. The fact that she would seduce her father's best friend, a man old enough to be her father, Michael Douglas. This man would have sex with a lamp post, which is exactly what she looks like. The woman is all bones and no hips or breasts. She has no figure. Basically a clothes hanger, and a not-so-beautiful one as the media hypes, at that, IMO.
34. Was it on the list about the shoe incident? For those who don't remember, Gwyneth did an interview where she said she was looking for a certain pair of shoes that were discontinued and a woman had some and called to see if Gwyneth wanted to buy them for something like $60 and Gwyneth's assistant said that Gwyneth doesn't pay for things.
35. Oh, I'm also going to add giving that pathetic, tear-jerking GG speech...over a truly ill grandpa, and a father who had his TONSILS removed.
THANKS TO KATY LINDERMANN for this
email:
I stumbled across your anti-Gwyneth page with glee, and thought that you
might find this titbit about Paltry interesting (apologies if you already
know this) One of my favourite, slightly off-the-wall shows is a UK chat
show presented by the wonderful (gay) comedian Graham Norton, called "So
Graham Norton....". Anyway, his guest last Friday was Billy Zane (who was
a really good sport, and totally got into the spirit of the show). Graham
discussed his past works, joking about his pop video with Sheena Easton (!)
and stated that Zane had "punched Nicole Kidman in Dead Calm, slapped Kate
Winslet in Titanic" and then asked if he had "any plans to work with Gwyneth
Paltrow?" The audience cheered very loudly, and Norton said that we as a
nation had just turned on her. Zane asked why, and Norton said it
was the boo-hoo-ing - Billy agreed it did go on a bit too long, and Norton
said "Well we were all ready to cry by the end!"
Thanks to Annica for providing this insightful
article:
Details Magazine 1995/10
STEPHEN SABAN: Describe yourself as if you were writing a personal ad.
GWYNETH PALTROW: Tall blonde female. Thin, blue eyes. Enjoys smoking, reading, and art museums.
STEPHEN SABAN: What question from journalists do you hate most?
GWYNETH PALTROW: "Tell us about Brad Pitt." The other day I was asked a question I found really offensive: "Is it hard for you to go from being the daughter of so-and-so to the girlfriend of so-and-so?"
STEPHEN SABAN: Nasty. You're the daughter of actress Blythe Danner and TV producer Bruce Paltrow. What's your favorite memory of childhood?
GWYNETH PALTROW: One of my all-time favorite times was when we lived in Beaufort, South Carolina, while my mother was doing The Great Santini. The trees were covered in Spanish moss and we would play in the marshes after school. It was completely different from being in New York or Los Angeles. My dad used to read me Eloise, my favorite book, at night. And my mom and I used to lie in bed and harmonize, make up songs.
STEPHEN SABAN: Who do you go to for advice?
GWYNETH PALTROW: I always ask my boyfriend. And if it's something more complicated or sticky, I ask him and then I ask my dad.
STEPHEN SABAN: Do you mean a boyfriend in general or this particular boyfriend?
GWYNETH PALTROW: This particular boyfriend.
STEPHEN SABAN: Who shall remain nameless.
GWYNETH PALTROW: I don't think anyone knows who I'm going out with. This particular boyfriend happens to be unbelievably perceptive and wise.
STEPHEN SABAN: When you went to the Legends of the Fall premiere in London with this particular boyfriend, there was this great brouhaha. Were you surprised?
GWYNETH PALTROW: It was so surreal, sort of terrifying. I mean, it was like the Beatles or Elvis...
STEPHEN SABAN: All that reaction just for the two of you?
GWYNETH PALTROW: Not for me! Are you high? For him.
STEPHEN SABAN: Was it like when Hugh Grant and Elizabeth Hurley went to the Four Weddings and a Funeral premiere in London and she wore that Versace safety-pin dress?
GWYNETH PALTROW: No -- they were definitely after my man, like in full-throttle insanity.
STEPHEN SABAN: If you were going to get married, would you release a statement?
GWYNETH PALTROW: If you were going to pick your nose, would you release a statement?
STEPHEN SABAN: No, but it's not really the same thing.
GWYNETH PALTROW: Yes it is! Anything we do is news -- it's completely pathetic. What's the latest?
STEPHEN SABAN: You were spotted in a loose-fitting outfit -- so you're pregnant. Did you wear that to arouse suspicion, or was it just fashion?
GWYNETH PALTROW: It was fashion. I have a contract with Calvin Klein -- he's one of my favorite designers -- that he'll give me stuff and I'll wear it when I go out. But next time I'm gonna put a pillow on my stomach and wear a tight dress -- and end the speculation.
STEPHEN SABAN: Brad's baby?
GWYNETH PALTROW: I heard it was an alien love child.
STEPHEN SABAN: You smoke cigarettes, and I read that you smoke pot. Any other vices?
GWYNETH PALTROW: No. I love a good vodka tonic once in a while. I really do.
STEPHEN SABAN: What was your worst hangover?
GWYNETH PALTROW: This past New Year's Day. I went a tad overboard in terms of substances I ingested. Lots of liquor, and something illegal.
STEPHEN SABAN: I'm sure it was research, in case you have to play an addict.
GWYNETH PALTROW: Exactly. Look at what happened to me. (indicates the bottom button of her jeans) I broke my buttonhole. I have no secrets. Anyway, my hangover lasted for three days.
STEPHEN SABAN: What should happen to men to even the score for periods?
GWYNETH PALTROW: Oh, their balls should be like flicked for one week.
STEPHEN SABAN: Ouch! Excellent.
GWYNETH PALTROW: Everybody says you get this shooting pain in your stomach area.
STEPHEN SABAN: And down the thighs.
GWYNETH PALTROW: Well, there you have it.
STEPHEN SABAN: Would you rather be repulsively ugly and universally loved, or breathtakingly beautiful and hated by everyone?
GWYNETH PALTROW: Repulsively ugly and universally loved. Is that nerdy?
STEPHEN SABAN: What's your novel about?
GWYNETH PALTROW: The very strange adventures of a girl who's all by herself and traveling around because she pretends to be other people. She's sort of a sociopath.
STEPHEN SABAN: What's your favorite movie?
GWYNETH PALTROW: Annie Hall.
STEPHEN SABAN: My favorite is 8 1/2.
GWYNETH PALTROW: I'm terrible. I have never seen any movies. Literally. I've seen like The Bodyguard. My intentions are always to go to the video store and get these wonderful movies that I've never seen -- then I spot Threesome, you know, and I get that. For the third time. It's really sad.
STEPHEN SABAN: What's the last movie you saw in a theater?
GWYNETH PALTROW: Oh my God. I made my boyfriend go. He was so mortified, but he went with me anyway: Mad Love. I was so excited to go see it.
STEPHEN SABAN: Tell me about Jon Bon Jovi, your costar in Moonlight and Valentino.
GWYNETH PALTROW: He's like this big rock star -- whatever. I was so into him. Totally. Well, I wasn't into him in a, like, sexual way -- but every other woman on the set was beyond into him in a sexual way. He has such a sweet manner, and he's so charming that it's hard not to think -- at minimum -- that he's a babe. Even though he's from New Jersey and has that winged hair.
STEPHEN SABAN: What would you most likely be arrested for?
GWYNETH PALTROW: Probably for disorderly conduct or disturbing the peace. Or for lewd conduct in a white BMW.
STEPHEN SABAN: In what order would you give up sex, fame, and money?
GWYNETH PALTROW: I would give up fame easily, no contest. Then I'd give up money, then sex.
STEPHEN SABAN: Have you ever poured pancake batter on Brad Pitt's stomach, laid him out in the sun, and made waffles?
GWYNETH PALTROW: Constantly. We do that all the time.
SEEMS WE'RE NOT THE ONLY ONES WHO DON'T THINK TOO HIGHLY OF GWYNETH
NY POST...PAGE
SIX...01/13/99
THE agents and publicists and lawyers who represent Hollywood's hottest new
hunk, Viggo Mortenson, are struggling to quash the rumor that he caused the
break-up of Gwyneth Paltrow and Ben Affleck. L.A. is buzzing how Affleck
was crushed when he found out his lover of the past year had been sneaking
off for some horizontal mambo with her co-star from "A Perfect Murder."
Mortenson, who has split from his steady girlfriend Exene, doesn't want to
play the heavy in this script. His handlers are worried there will be a backlash
if he severed one of Tinseltown's handsomest couples. But friends of Ben
believe the whispers, and are quietly saying that Gwyneth, who previously
lost Brad Pitt under similar circumstances, "has a problem with monogamy."
(Hello - she wasn't married to any of these guys.) Brad maintained a gentlemanly
silence for months, but finally told Vanity Fair last fall, "You figure it
out." Now others are piling on. People still remember and share the tale
of how Paltrow supposedly got the lead in "Shakespeare in Love." According
to the buzz, the screenplay had been sent to Winona Wyder when broken-hearted
Gwyneth was staying with her after the Brad breakup at Winona's Gramercy
Park apartment. Gwyneth found it on the coffee table, quickly called her
agent, and landed the role. Winona was so angry, she wouldn't talk to her
former friend. But Gwyneth made it up to her by setting her up with Affleck's
good buddy Matt Damon. The two are still together - unlike Gwyneth and Ben.
A spokesman for Paltrow said he never comments on her personal life. A flack
for Mortenson denied the affair.
LONDON TIMES January 21 1999
DIARY:
Acting up OUR grandest theatrical Dame, Judi Dench, has forgiven Gwyneth
Paltrow. On the set of Shakespeare in Love, Judi moaned to the director about
the starlet's "diva-like antics" (Gwyneth enjoyed being driven the 50ft from
her trailer to the set, and Dame Judi said she "would be happier if the leading
lady would speak to me once in a while"). At the film's post-première
party, Gwyneth was glacially polite: "Goodbye all. Goodbye photographers,
goodbye Judi, see you soon." "Oh, surely," said Dench, with impressive
enthusiasm. -- JASPER GERARD
AND WE CAN'T FORGET THOSE WHO HAVE MADE "US" FAMOUS
NY DAILY NEWS....By ERICA KENNEDY
03/11/99
There are two camps of women: those who hate Gwyneth Paltrow and those
who love her. On Oscar night, both will be watching. And waiting.
I was charmed to tears by the clever writing and superb cast in "Shakespeare in Love" (we're rooting for you, Judi). I knew Gwynnie was a lock for a nomination, so I called my fierce competitors in our annual, $20-a-head Oscar pool (last year's winner walked off with $440) and threw down the gauntlet: Vote for Cate or Meryl or go out on a limb and cast your ballot for Emily Watson. But put your money on Hollywood's golden girl and risk banishment from next year's festivities.
"All right, count me in," Aisha Steiner, 30, the Oscar party hostess, said. Then she encouraged me to get the word out.
Dominique Anglade, 28, a design assistant at Coach, was happy to oblige. "Fabulous! The thing that drives me crazy about Gwyneth is that magazines are always touting her 'educational background.' I don't care if she went to Spence. Since when does a high-school diploma make you highly educated?" she sniffed.
Meredith Lieberman, a 27-year-old publicist, was the only holdout.
"What? I LOVE Gwyneth!" she shrieked.
Oh, hell no! We have to stick together on this one, I told her. It's all or nothing. After much cajoling, the fix was in.
Now just in case you think it's just me, check out the alt.gossip.celebrities newsgroup — a cybershrine of Gwyneth Paltrow- loathing.
When Entertainment Weekly recently asked the actress if she had heard of such anti-Gwyneth sites, the Golden One feigned blissful ignorance.
"No. I haven't," she said. "If I looked too closely at [the criticism] it might hurt my feelings. Sometimes, ignoring it is better."
Yes, that probably is best. After viewing the vitriolic spew aimed in her direction, I doubt Gwynnie's frail shoulders could shrug it off.
The group is unofficially moderated by a witty, catty thing who calls herself — what else? — PUSSSYCATT. In the ongoing is-she-or-isn't-she-a-bitch saga, Steven Hill (who runs his own GP fan site) infiltrated the newsgroup and asked, "Why is there this rampant, intense hatred of this particular actress? How can people take Gwyneth's success so personally?"
An AGC newsgroupie called Dane responded to Gwynnie's No. 1 fan with a lengthy diatribe spelling out the "spot a phony bitch phenomenon."
"Women seem to have no trouble picking up on it, nor do most gay men, but straight guys are usually oblivious," she wrote.
According to Dane, it all harks backs to high school when the teen queen sauntered through the halls with an attitude that said, "I'm better than you, more feminine than you, I'm dressed better than you, and all the boys like me better," thereby setting up "a false pecking order."
She believes Gwyneth is such a "lady," one who "behaves generally like a princess, thinks she's perfect, expects to be waited on hand and foot and minces through life making others miserable or trying to. The biggest giveaway is that they try to act in public as though they are sweet, innocent, precious, darling little things, when they clearly are not," Dane pointed out.
"If someone really 'nice' had everything Gwynnie has, got it as 'effortlessly,' to use your word, we'd probably like her and be happy for her."
Gwyneth, she concluded, is the starlet who most acts like "a rapacious phony," so she "gets all the hate."
This posting compelled me to enter the fray with my first-ever reply: You go, girl!
But that was before the Golden Globes. Gwynnie in her Rapunzel hair extensions shows up with her "best friend" kid brother, accepts her statue in an emotional state so shaky it invokes Linda Tripp, and sends her love to her ailing grandfather. Cut to a tearful Tom Hanks in the audience.
Yes, I thought, hang in there, Grandpa.
I liked her in "Emma," "Sliding Doors" and, of course, "Shakespeare in Love," but this was the performance that got me. (Sorry, Dane.)
As soon as Hanks' mug faded from the screen, the phone rang.
"Gotta give it up to her," Aisha said. "How's that boycott looking now?"
My line beeped. It was Jane, another college pal.
I told her sheepishly that Gwynnie had scored some points with Aisha and me. I was thinking of lifting the Oscar ban.
Jane was incensed. "What? Are you falling for that? She's an actress, for chrissakes. It was her best performance yet." Well, maybe.
But, then again, maybe not.
Celebrities are such easy targets. It's easy to dislike them "just because." Because they're rich, wildly successful, beautiful, sexy — and you're not. In hip-hop parlance, that's called playa-hatin'. It's just as easy to adore them for the same capricious reasons. The love can turn to hate — or vice versa — at any moment.
Who they really are will never be anything other than a figment of our fertile imaginations. Or to paraphrase that oft-quoted philosopher Leonardo DiCaprio, "People are always trying to sum you up in a few words when YOU don't even know who you are."
So, I'll admit it. As we creep up to Oscar night, I've had a radical change of heart. I think Cate deserves to go home with the gold, but my money's on the sentimental favorite. I will have my fingers crossed when I hear those four familiar words. And the winner is …C'mon, win it for Grandpa. And win for me so I can walk away with the honeypot. Cheers.
Kennedy is a freelance writer.
SALON 04/02/99:
Paltry Paltrow
SALON...BY MICHELLE GOLDBERG
When Gwyneth Paltrow won her best actress Oscar, it was a reminder, as if I needed one, that the traumatizing hierarchies of high school never really go away. I was curled in a chair at a friend's Oscars party, a fresh peach juice bellini in one hand, chocolate covered strawberry in the other, smiling and feeling fine, sure in some way that when the envelope opened, it would be Cate Blanchett. I even had a dim hope that the academy's internationalist sentiment would stretch beyond goofy Roberto Benigni, and the Oscar would go to the remarkable Fernanda Montenegro. Either way, I didn't really care; I'd only bet $5.
But when I heard the name Gwyneth Paltrow, I felt like I'd been kicked in the chest. My reaction quite surprised me, because I hadn't realized I had anything invested in a ceremony I always thought of as just another excuse to dress up and drink champagne with friends. The party's guests, mostly women and gay men, hissed and booed. Then they burst out laughing when Gwynnie, looking like a spun-sugar figurine on top of Tori Spelling's wedding cake, started bawling and reeling off the names of every dead person she could think of, trying to convince us, perhaps, that she had ever had a hard day in her life. When "Sliding Doors" came out, I had asked my friend Cassi, the party's hostess, to see it with me, but she demurred, saying she hated Gwyneth. At the time, I was surprised, because I'd never given much thought to her one way or the other. But her sob, her bubble gum-colored Ralph Lauren dress falling low on her bony shoulders, her hair in a chaste ballerina bun, wearing a necklace called the princess, for godsakes, I understood that loathing perfectly.
The way the fluff media, and now the academy, have anointed this pampered it-girl tells the rest of us one thing -- that being skinny, blond, well-bred and well-connected trumps everything in this culture, even talent. Paltrow is as perfect as the bitch queens in "Jawbreaker" or "Heathers," but since real life lacks the raw justice of teensploitation films, she seems devoid of dark secrets, and thus she never has to lose out to the geeky, quirky girl -- the girl like me. In "Jawbreaker," Rose McGowan's nefarious Courtney ends up standing onstage with tears of humiliation and despair streaming down her perfectly made-up face. Likewise for Sarah Michelle Gellar's evil Katherine in "Cruel Intentions." But in life, Gwyneth Paltrow's tears are of joy and victory. It was the Oscars audience that was left to cringe in misery.
And cringe they did -- I'm pretty sure my party was no exception. As Erika Kennedy had written in the New York Daily News, "There are two camps of women: those who hate Gwyneth Paltrow and those who love her. On Oscar night, both will be watching. And waiting ... I knew Gwynnie was a lock for a nomination, so I called my fierce competitors in our annual, $20-a-head Oscar pool and threw down the gauntlet: Vote for Cate or Meryl or go out on a limb and cast your ballot for Emily Watson. But put your money on Hollywood's golden girl and risk banishment from next year's festivities." Kennedy went on to point out the vicious Paltrow-bashing on alt.gossip.celebrities, a newsgroup where one woman's e-mail signature says, "Who's the phoniest bore around? Gwynnie!" Some posts treat her name like a dirty word, calling her G***** P*****.
There are several reasons why Gwyneth's success feels like a personal affront. For one thing, she represents a retreat from the spunky heroines of the past few years, girls like Kate Winslet, Christina Ricci and Lili Taylor. Sticklike and demure, she's the very opposite of carnality, a poster child for those who want women to return to modesty after a few measly years of girl power.
Still, displeasure with cultural forces doesn't begin to explain the reactions Gwyneth evokes. Instead, she seems to touch insecurities that are far more primal. If we were lucky, our parents comforted us when we were maladjusted adolescents by telling us that the head cheerleader with a waist the size of a Virginia Slim would end up pregnant and working at Sears. Once we graduated, smarts and creativity and stuff like that would finally start to matter more than being as skinny as an X-ray and as unthreateningly insubstantial as Gwynnie's pink gauzy wrap. The revenge of the ignored is one of our most cherished cultural myths -- just look at the multiplexes, filled with movies like the aforementioned "Jawbreaker" and "Cruel Intentions," as well as "She's All That," "The Rage," "Never Been Kissed" and so many others.
Gwyneth Paltrow's success cuts against all that. The daughter of rich, famous, still-married parents, Paltrow attended the tony Manhattan girls' school Spence, where, Vogue informs us, "she was a popular student." As for her struggle to the top, US magazine tells us that she started out doing theater with mom. "Later," David Hochman writes, "after bumping into family friend Steven Spielberg (whom she adoringly refers to as 'Uncle Morty') in line at a movie, Paltrow got the role of Wendy in 'Hook' without so much as a screen test or a reading." There's something profoundly disillusioning about this story, something that says only suckers have to start from the bottom. It's not that she's not talented, it's just that she's not that talented, surely not talented enough to deserve the accolades raining down upon her. In fact, she would be easier to take if she couldn't act at all -- then, at least, there would be some rational excuse for the visceral hatred she brings out in so many.
Hating Gwyneth is about more than hating nepotism, or hating the beautiful. The entertainment industry is full of kids with famous parents, some of whom are utterly endearing even if it's obvious that their families' fame gave them a leg up. Take Drew Barrymore, for instance, another Hollywood child who got her first break from Spielberg. Drew is no great thespian, but I, for one, am thrilled every time she succeeds. The difference between the two, of course, is that Drew's life, like a tawdry take on the Diana story, shreds the myths of princesshood, while Gwynnie's embodies them. Uma Thurman is another gorgeous, privileged blond, but her fame doesn't feel like an insult either. With Uma, there's this light and mischief in her eyes, an ironic playfulness in her best performances. It's easy to see Uma Thurman as a latter-day Lauren Bacall, and her glamour feels aspirational and inspirational in a way that Paltrow's just doesn't. Gwyneth is gorgeous, no doubt, but there's no spark to her, just wan good breeding, a WASPy kind of surface graciousness.
Whenever women complain about how sickly skinny fashion models are, magazine editors and designers snipe that models function as clothes hangers, that curves and flesh would distract from the purity of the designs. Are we to accept that same formulation for actresses? In a way, Gwyneth is beloved for being a mannequin. Look at her biggest roles -- in "Shakespeare in Love" and "Great Expectations," she was the unattainable object of desire, cherished above all for her beauty. In "Sliding Doors," her character's most dramatic transformation comes via a haircut and bleach job. She was quite good, actually, as a hooker in Paul Thomas Anderson's "Hard Eight," but that was before she had become a movie star, and she seems to be leaving such parts behind. Her next projects, after all, include "The Talented Mr. Ripley" with fellow upper-cruster Matt Damon; "Duets," directed by daddy; and -- the ultimate credibility enhancer -- a summer stock production of Shakespeare's "As You Like It," where she's parlaying some of her Hollywood buzz into the role of -- what else? -- the cross-dressing Rosalind. It makes sense, after all. For a while, with Winslet, Jennifer Lopez and Reese Witherspoon, it seemed like we were starting to get beyond the Joan Rivers definition of female beauty. But what the culture kings really adore, it seems, is women as pure as little girls, with the manners of matrons and the bodies of boys.
Michelle Goldberg is arts editor of Metropolitan magazine in San Francisco.
VILLAGE VOICE 10/14/98:
Gwyneth Paltrow's Anti-Fan Club
By Peter Braunstein
We're all familiar with the DiCaprio mania fueled by teenyboppers who would eagerly take a bullet for Leo. Gwyneth Paltrow, by contrast, seems to produce the more perplexing phenomenon of the anti-fan: people who follow her career as rabidly, but with the ultimate purpose of invalidating it. Everywhere you turn from video stores to cafés to online chat rooms Paltrow hating is in venomous vogue. On the Net, the celeb watchers of the newsgroup alt.gossip.celebrities have drawn up a 30-count indictment of Gwyneth, charging her with such high crimes as stealing scripts from best friend Winona Ryder and being blasé about the Brad Pitt breakup. Camille Paglia cited her career as an example of Affirmative Action for show-biz brats.'' Other movie buffs have dubbed her a glorified Meg Ryan,'' a rich man's Melanie Griffith,'' and, most intriguingly, a Sandra Dee without the innocence.'' Even songs about Gwyneth seem hostile, as in "6ix" the Lemonheads 1996 ode to her character's decapitation in Seven (Here comes Gwyneth's head in a box'') an apt reference, considering that Gwyneth is fast becoming the Marie Antoinette of Young Hollywood.
Paltrow bashing,'' according to one online anti-fan, is about the 3 p's: privilege, princesshood, and Paltrow self-love.'' Paltrow demonology is centered on the belief that her career has been one long coattail ride: daughter of actress Blythe Danner and producer Bruce Paltrow, cast in her first film role by family friend Steven Spielberg (whom she calls Uncle Morty''), then girlfriend of "The World's Sexiest Man.'' Add to this the glaring divergence between the media gushing over Gwyneth (New York magazine called her a funky angel come to earth to do some good deeds and maybe get in some shopping at Agnes b.'') and the widespread public perception that she has been foisted on them by the media or, as one woman put it, anointed a star without being one.''
Then there's Gwyneth's uncanny ability to transport many young women back to that low-self-esteem vortex known as high school, making them feel jealous, angry, and flawed vis-à-vis Gwyneth, the Homecoming Queen of their collective subconscious. But there's a new twist: if Young Hollywood is simply high school's cool kids'' with publicists, the rest of the class has become the American film audiences who pay their salaries which sort of alters the power dynamic.
Now American audiences generally want to believe that multimillionaire celebrities can be just like you and me,'' providing stars (particularly women) convey a certain humility. But it seems that Gwyneth can't walk that self-effacing-celebrity tightrope without falling off. Her expressed desire to learn better manners'' was nullified by her wayward assertion that no regular people'' live in New York City. Her ambiguous remarks about turning down Kate Winslet's role in Titanic because it just wasn't my cup of tea,'' perhaps meant to flaunt her indie credentials, were interpreted instead by anti-fans as face-saving haughtiness.
What can Gwyneth do to redeem herself? One Paltrow hater suggests a strict diet of self-deprecating supporting film roles'': not Emma, but perhaps Harriet, her awkward sidekick. Then again, avoiding English accents altogether might be a better idea. In all likelihood, though, Gwyneth has nothing to worry about, considering that even her detractors will avidly follow her career in search of further indictments, as "She's no Audrey Hepburn'' becomes the cry of a generation.
The Data Lounge
Shallow Gal by -- C. Barillas, Editor
Monday, 13 August 2001
A hilariously revealing interview in W magazine with the titanic ego housed
in the wee frame of Gwyneth Paltrow has exposed her bubbly personality to
be the roiling caldron of flesh eating acid we've been telling you all so
much about lo these many years.
Pity.
Back in 1999, you may recall stories percolating from the set of "Shakespeare in Love." Co-star Dame Judi Dench was reportedly "quite astounded" by the behavior of the lame Gwynny P. during the making of Miramax's massively over-hyped Elizabethan drama -- a sentiment, I thought, best expressed when she deftly ground a heel into the aisle-spilling train of Gwyn's pink dress on her way to accept the award for Best Supporting.
Now that's what you call classy British understatement -- and all perfectly deniable. (You don't get to be a Dame by being obvious.)
The conceit firing the overly blonde Miss Full of Herself just spills from W's pages as tells how she sought out therapy to deal with the crushing weight of her celebrity. "If you think about the whole world focusing on one person that much — if you pointed that much energy at an atom, it would explode. You think about one poor, tiny girl just trying to make her way through. I thought I wasn't going to make it. … I was like, 'I need help!'"
Oh barf. Just ask Winona Ryder how helpless she is. Not only did she steal the "Shakespeare" script from under the nose of her once dear friend, she rode like a souped up steamroller over anyone who dared to question her. Which brings us to another sore point, alas --- her relationships.
"As my reputation will attest," she says crisply, "I have problems with commitment."
Which we guess is just another way of saying there's only so much arrogant self absorption grown adults in her company can stand. She claims there's no bitterness over losing Brad to Jennifer, though I do recall the phrase "pathetic" leaking from her lips in oblique reference to the engagement. "I'm sure we wish other well."
Ha! And that's with someone she knows. Her compassion for the rest of us -- the great imperfect masses -- also drips steadily from W's pages as she reminisces about the time she spent in a fat-suit shooting "Shallow Hal."
It "was so sad … so disturbing. No one would make eye contact with me because I was obese. I was wearing this black shirt with big snowmen on it. … It was heartbreaking, and I kept thinking, 'But it's still me underneath.'"
Yes, dear. Precisely.
HARPER'S BAZAAR 11/01
Gwyneth Paltrow tells Harpers Bazaar she blames the misperception that
she's an "ice princess" partly on her fine breeding. "In this day and age,
if you sit up straight, chew with your mouth closed, and have good manners,
you're a snob," she says. She reckons that her frosty persona stems from
her half-Protestant, half-Jewish heritage. "The world knows the WASP, but
my friends know the Jew half, which is very open," she insists.
The star, whose upcoming films include the comedy Shallow Hal and the quirky indie The Royal Tenenbaums, has lately been spotted with Luke Wilson, her co-star in Tenenbaums. She tells Harper's about her ideal man, "He's tall and thin, but muscular, to start with the superficial. A gentleman. Someone who's well educated, funny, witty, artistic, and has a lot of integrity. He doesn't have to grab all the attention in the room. A good kisser."
Says the star, who's been linked to a series of non-celebs between Affleck and Wilson, "I love men, even though they're lyin', cheatin' scumbags. I'm a very sexual person. I'm lucky if I get past six weeks. The make-or-break is six weeks."
NY POST/PAGE
SIX...07/22
GWYNETH Paltrow has figured out what to do when there are no parking spaces
outside her West Village building. She parks on the sidewalk, a practice
that annoys her neighbors. "When she can't find a parking spot, she consistently
parks her silver Mercedes SUV - literally - on the sidewalk in front of the
deli across the street from her house, forcing everyone to walk around it
into the street," our spy sighs. But Paltrow's rep, Stephen Huvane, insists
it happened just once: "Gwyneth is not the kind of girl who would do that
all the time."