Sounds Like Chastity Is Trying To Go Both Ways
Is Chastity Bono a closet “Ellen” critic?
The late Sonny Bono’s daughter, who’s entertainment media director of the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation, was quoted in Daily Variety this week as saying the struggling Ellen DeGeneres sitcom “is so gay it’s excluding a large part of our society.”
“A lot of the stuff on it is somewhat of an inside joke,” she said. “It’s one thing to have a gay lead character, but it’s another when every episode deals with pretty specific gay issues.”
GLAAD immediately released a statement claiming Bono’s remarks were taken out of context, saying she was just repeating other people’s theories and that they weren’t her own feelings.
“We don’t want to upset a show that we love and worked so hard to keep on the air,” a GLAAD spokesman said.
Loose talk
Former “Seinfeld” writer Carol Leifer, on Jerry Seinfeld’s decision to end the show: “I’ve followed him a lot in comedy clubs and he does know when to get off. When he’s onstage he knows when to leave.”
For some of her fans, it’s a real drag
Liza Minnelli turns 52 today.
At least that’s what his wife keeps telling him
Director Ivan Reitman was none too pleased when DeGeneres gal pal Anne Heche came out of the closet shortly after he cast her opposite Harrison Ford in his romantic comedy “6 Days, 7 Nights.” But it turned out fine, Reitman says now: “There’s a heat between them - I see it and they feel it. You can’t fake that kind of chemistry.”
He could quickly reach titanic proportions
Leonardo DiCaprio may be the latest Hollywood hearthrob, but his grandmother thinks he’s too skinny. DiCaprio “needs to get something on his ribs,” says 83-year-old Helene in den Birken, who’ll soon fly from Germany for a visit. “He’d pass up any hamburger for my apple streusel cake. And for my homemade sauerkraut.”
But she is starting to feel Fonda herself
Jane Fonda told teenage girls at a Montana conference that she began suffering from bulimia and anorexia at age 15 and didn’t break out of her shell until she met husband Ted Turner. Said the 60-year-old Fonda: “I still have a ways to go before I can feel happy with myself.”
She’s become quite the roly-poly model
Kathy Bates, whose plump proportions resulted in a string of “Ugly Duckling Turned Star” stories, is more comfortable with herself these days. “I do think my personal attributes have been a help in my career,” she tells the New York Daily News. “When I’m traveling around the country, I run into women who work in factories or restaurants, women who are glad to see themselves on screen through me.”
And all we can really say is, ‘Fat chance’
“All My Children” star Susan Lucci, who has received 17 previous Daytime Emmy Award nominations - and never won - has again made the list of finalists for this year’s ceremony, scheduled May 15.
, DataTimes ILLUSTRATION: 2 Photos
The following fields overflowed: CREDIT = Compiled by staff writer Rick Bonino