An 'insider' told Popeater that:

Nowhere near enough people paid the $19.95 [online fee] to cover the reported $150,000 the fading brand paid the Alaskan hunk to go rogue.

That figure is a lot higher than anything we've reported. Our best guess is Playgirl paid Levi around $25,000 plus a cut of the revenues. So this could, of course, be part of Richard Johnson's vendetta against Johnston for snubbing him at the Fleshbot awards. A spokesperson for Playgirl told P6 that:

Between the hours of 1 a.m. and 3 a.m. the morning the shoot went live on Playgirl.com, we had already surpassed all daily sign-up records. For the amount we paid, not $150,000, we were astounded at how well it has gone for us. In terms of sheer publicity, it has been worth millions.

In terms of sheer publicity? That may be an accounting term for 'who's going to pay almost $20 to see those pictures'?

The real news of today's Page Six item was not that Mercer got wasted, crashed the stage at the Plaza Hotel, and tried to sing "New York, New York" before being forcibly removed. No, it was that Martha Stewart, Betsey Johnson, Isaac Mizrahi, Courtney Love, and Woody Allen were all in the same room at the same time for the same purpose. Apparently their love of music unites the domestic diva, two fashion designers, the professional mess, and the director who has been making the same film since the '70s.

This is how a conversation between them would probably go:

Martha: Betsey, would you like to be on my show and do some cooking? Do you have your own cupcake recipe?

Betsey: No, I don't bake cupcakes, but once Andy put LSD in cupcakes and passed them around the Factory. It was delish!

Isaac: Oh, lady, I could never eat a cupcake! Carbs haven't been fashionable since before I started selling clothes at Target.

Courtney (ignoring everyone, but updates her Facebook status to say): martha stewart is talkking about cupcakes. i fucking hate fucking cupcakes!!!! how retarded is that bitch?!?!?!?! she must have been molested...

Woody: Hi, everybody. I don't really feel comfortable with any of you. I mean, Martha's been in jail, Betsey is doing drugs, Isaac might make a pass at me, and well, it's Courtney Love. I think I need to leave.

Martha: Wait, Woody. Do you love lite jazz?

Woody: Why, yes, Martha, I...I...I...kinda do.

Betsey: Me too, it reminds me of the Velvet Underground and my underwear.

Isaac: Jazz is my favorite too, can we all be besties?

Courtney (she looks up from her Blackberry for a minute, looks everyone square in the eye, lights a cigarette, and starts typing again, but then stops to say): No.

Mortimer's reality show wraps taping this week, but it wouldn't be right for the show not to have a climatic battle and the chosen antagonist is Devorah Rose, editor of alleged magazine Social Life. Apparently Rose was going around telling people Tinsley's man is a poor! The Tinz couldn't stand for that and went over to defend poor Prince Casimir Wittgenstein-Sayn's honor as the richiest rich who wipes his ass with Fabergé eggs. Her on-camera entourage (including Paul Johnson Calderone) all went over to scream at Rose. If the photos are this good we can't wait to see the CW promos!

By all accounts (except the inevitable Page Six item about the brou-ha-hoax, where CW honcho Justin Rosenblatt says of the program, "It's entirely unexpected and in the moment. The storylines all arose organically."), the whole thing looked staged, with many at the party ignoring the action completely. Before, it used to be enough to fuel these social fueds by floating a few items in the gossip columns and reaping the benefits. These days the hottest accessory in town is a camera crew—just look what it did for the Real Housewives of New York—and this altercation is really the most brilliant form of manipulating one.

It starts at a party full of media types, most of whom stood by acting blasé as supposed fight took place in front of the camera. Nevertheless, they are expected to blog and tweet and write about the action, even though no one believes that it happened. This not only gets publicity for the personalities involved, but also their respective reality projects. The fight will continue to play out over months, while being massaged and edited by television executives. By the time we see the finished product (in Tinsley's case, the show comes out in January), it has been chewed, swallowed, digested, and pooped back out so what we end up with is a beautiful sparkly diamond turd of a reality television moment. We'll be so blinded by the dramatic luster that we won't even care that it was effectively staged, we'll all just be covering our gaping mouths at that bitchy thing The Tinz said about The Dev's outfit.

This isn't Rose's only fake drama buffet as of late. Last week at the launch for bikini line diNeila she got into it with socialite Jules Kirby, when the latter showed up to the party unannounced. Guess what there was a camera crew there too! Welcome to step one of the brand new process.

Well, we wonder if the editor Social Life and face of diNeila bikinis is signing her real name to all those reality show release forms. Which is Deborah Denise Trachtenberg. Yesterday when the crew was following her to the airport, they wouldn't let her on board because she was trying to get past security using pseudonym Devorah Rose and they weren't having it. What, you expect a fake editor who engages in fake fights to not have a fake name?

[Image via Guest of a Guest]

He did a remarkable job of not saying much. At 8:15 the party had barely begun at the downtown hotspot, known for its strict velvet rope and the racy performances on its main stage, the gregarious Tank Jones and his brother Marvin (in the role as Levi's trainer) were some of the first people to arrive. They installed the one-time human campaign prop at a table in the corner of the balcony so that several PR people could start the parade of press. The rest of the venue was practically empty, but everyone was clustered around Levi.

As the Observer's John Koblin interviewed Playgirl's spokesman Daniel Nardicio about the future of the magazine, the Levi interviews started. Everyone made way for a camera crew from Entertainment Tonight, which has exclusive access to Levi for all the behind-the-scenes action for the photo shoot that is taking place right now (if everything goes according to schedule). We didn't get close enough to hear what they asked during their ten minutes with Levi.

As they clear out, there were more print interviews to do. Michael Musto came by to say hi, but he interviewed Levi at his hotel earlier. I asked Musto if he was a good interview. He said yes, but agrees that it's hard to get him to say much. Jo Piazza from CNN came in and taped a few second with the Johnston crew. Before she started her interveiew, Tank said he's not answering questions about Sarah Palin or about suing for custody of Tripp, Levi's son with Palin's daughter Bristol. Then he flirted with her a little bit as she squeezed in next to Levi to ask her questions. Most of the questions were the same all night: How is this different from Alaska? What is he going to show? Is he ready for the shoot? Does he know that he's a gay icon? Will he do more porn? What does the future hold?

Levi always answers with the fewest words possible. This may make him appear a bit dim, but it seems a smart move for a guy who's standing around a bunch of people paid to turn any utterance he makes into "news." With the reporters gone, he quietly joked with Tank and Marvin.

When Piazza was done, he joked a bit with Nardicio, teaching him how to tuck a dollop of chew under his lip. "Don't you throw up on this table!" Tank chided. A PR person came by and said there were more interviews to be done. "I know. This isn't my first rodeo," Levi said. Another reporter sat down, this one from People. They knew to send a pretty girl.

When she left, the PR man told Tank that Page Six boss Richard Johnson wanted an introduction. Tank responded, "We're not talking to them. No pictures, nothing." The PR man conveyed the message to Johnson. "He just wants to say hi," Mr. PR pleaded with Tank. But Tank had made up his mind: No Levi for Johnson. "That's fine," said the Page Six editor before heading back downstairs. After he left, Tank complained about a Page Six item accusing Levi having a small dick and thus afraid to do any full-frontal shots: "That's not true!"

There was a break in the action and a PR girl brought by the trophy Levi will receive later in the evening: an 11-inch dildo made of silver. Everyone at the table laughed nervously and made jokes about how Levi isn't going to accept a dildo. Levi returned his trophy to the nice lady and said, "I can't believe I just won a giant silver dildo." He and Tank conferred and decide there can't be any pictures taken of him holding it, so they plan to have Nardicio take the stage with him and hold the award.

Then the photographers arrived. In groups of two, they came by the corner, their flashbulbs blinding in the dark club. Levi knew to look directly into the camera and then occasionally look away to blink. He didn't look like he was having any fun. When all that was over, he passed some time ogling the scantily-clad go-go dancers down below. Tank said, "Those are all real women right? I don't want to look if they're not real women." Another laugh. Nardicio tells them that they're all real women. I pointed out that there were definitely some drag queens in the mix. "That's OK, I didn't want those ones anyway," Levi responded. He told me that he hadn't had any time to go out and party while in New York City. "It's been all work. I'm all about business," he says. "But I like New York more each time I come here." What does he think about this event? "It's different," is all he'll say.

As the show starts, Gawker alum Joshua David Stein showed up asking questions for New York magazine. It was getting loud, the house was full. Tank informed him they'd do an interview later. Levi leaned over the balcony to watching the award ceremony on stage and performances by the likes of boy/boy/girl aerialist trio Mantryx. When the intermission came, the crew decided to go outside for some air.

Out on the sidewalk, it is a whole different scene. Dressed in identical tuxedos like they all went shopping at the same men's store earlier that evening, they moved as a unit. Flanked by two enormous black men, Levi wasn't easy to approach. That didn't stop the reporters. Kelefa Sanneh from the New Yorker came up received a stern lecture from Tank about not asking about Palin or custody. Sanneh started his round of questioning but was cut off by the arrival of two 20-something guys who made up TMZ's camera crew. They'd been tailing Levi and his crew ever since they arrived in New York and seemed almost like old friends. Sanneh backed off, to avoid getting captured by their camera. TMZ doesn't care about restrictions and they began asking about custody and Palin. Tank demurred. "Come on, you know better than that."

While Tank was distracted by dealing with the TMZ mess, Jacob Bernstein from The Daily Beast snuck up and peppered Levi with questions and scribbled furiously in his notebook. A male-female duo from Hollywood Life sidled up and began asking their own questions and with a Flip camera. After the questions, the Hollywood Life crew each took their picture with Levi. With Levi alone again, Sanneh came back for a second attempt at an interview. This time, though, he talked more to Tank that Levi. It's easy to go that direction, since Tank is a gregarious quote machine while Levi answers everything with about three words.

Levi was scheduled to accept his award as soon as the ceremony restarted after the intermission. The PR girl shadowing him told him and Nardicio to go hang out at Nick Denton's table so they'd be right next to the stage. but there isn't any room at the Gawker Media overlord's table. Levi headed instead for socialite Tinsley Mortimer's table where photographers eagerly snapped the unlikely pairing. Joshua David Stein returned for his promised interview, but Levi said he needs clear it with Tank. Stein rebutted that Tank had already cleared it, but Levi — who either didn't remember, didn't care, or simply wanted to protect himself — turned him down again, this time a little more firmly. Marvin stepped in and said they'd talk to Tank and do the interview later.

Levi asked who he needs to thank in his speech which he obviously hasn't thought about until then. Nardicio told him to thank Fleshbot and The Box. Levi added that he should also say something about the upcoming issue of Playgirl and to tell people to buy it. He is all business.

When his award was announced he and Nardicio went on stage where Levi successfully avoided being photographed with a big silver dildo. His speech was exactly what he planned: He thanked Fleshbot and The Box and then told everyone to buy his issue of Playgirl.

After leaving the stage, he meets up with Tank and Marvin and they head out the door. He has to get up early to work out before his big shoot. Our colleague Irin over at Jezebel got her questions answered about the type of ladies Levi likes and JDS eventually got his interview, making poor Richard Johnson the only person denied the chance to exchange banalities with the man of the hour. Levi, like he said, was all about business, and last night his business was spectacle.

Top three photos by Hee Jin Kang, bottom by GuestofaGuest

Not much is known about the baby-faced Malaysian, but tales of his largess are swirling about and frequently as he has been dropping tens of thousands of dollars at hot spots around the city. Here's what we know:

Name: Take Jho Low
Age: 28
Occupation: Officially he is an adviser to some international corporations, but no one knows what that means or seems to believe that is the truth. People say he's involved in oil, gas, and construction. He and was appointed to the board of Malaysian bank UBG Berhad last year. It's rumored that he's an arms dealer.
Residence: Rents several apartments in the Park Imperial on West 57th St in midtown that house him and his staff—including several body guards. Famous neighbors include Daniel Craig and Sean Combs.
Motorcade: Travels about town with his entourage in a fleet of Escalades.
Nightclub Spending:

• Spent $160,000 in one night at Avenue this September during Fashion Week.
• Routinely spends between $50,000 and $60,000 at Pink Elephant.
• Bought Lindsay Lohan 23 bottles of Cristal at 1OAK when she was celebrating her 23rd birthday.

• Just celebrated his 28th year starting last Wednesday with a four-day bash at Ceasar's Palace in Las Vegas.
• Megan Fox was flown out to Vegas to hang out with the birthday boy, who routinely surrounds himself with models.
• The hotel pool was surrounded by caged lions and tigers and filled with girls in bikinis. Later, at a nightclub, Low bought 120 bottles of Cristal for the revelers.
• Jamie Foxx gave him a red sports car for a present.
• Paris Hilton and Usher also attended the party.

[Image via Getty]

The funniest thing so far today is the fact that Page Six reported this item with the "Won't Somebody Please Think of the Noble Press?" angle instead of the "Look at these whining, babied reporters" angle.

It was business as usual — all messed up — for six journalists from such upscale magazines as Forbes Life, Manhattan, and Prestige who were invited to experience the new luxury seats designed exclusively for first-class travel on Swissair. The junketeering journos found themselves booked into less luxurious business class both to and from Switzerland last week. Maybe the airline felt so many people are flying first-class these days, it didn't really need the press

I guess it's up to us, then? Hey everyone, look at these whining, babied reporters.


The Week is guaranteeing advertisers that their ads will test highly in consumer recall, or the magazine will keep running the ads for free until they do test well enough. This means, I think, The Week has plenty of extra ad space just lying around.


If you were waiting impatiently for the arrival of Esquire's latest bleepy technology doo-dad thingy, in the magazine, good news: It's here. Go look at it if you want, or not.


Conde Nast is planning to launch more of its titles in China, where the print magazine business is not such a god damn train wreck. We cannot mock them for this sound strategic move.

First of all, Levi doesn't seem like the kind of guy who isn't in on his own joke. We're surprised that he didn't go on The Tonight Show himself to do the bit—and if Conan didn't ask him to, well, then he's stupider than NBC for putting Leno on every night at 10. Anyway, TMZ reports that Levi's lawyer, Rex Jones, has asked for a retraction because of the skit (full video below) where William Shatner, in patented hip cat poetry reading persona, reads supposedly real dispatches from Levi Johnston's dubious Twitter account.

We've believed for some time that the account is fake, and now Butler is claiming that we were right all along and is demanding NBC apologize for claiming there were the real tweets of Sarah Palin's nemesis. To NBC we say, first of all the account wasn't verified, so it was going out on a limb to say it was real. Second of all, duh! Levi may be a little daft, but he's not the asshole who sent those tweets.

As far as his infamous Playgirl shoot goes, we learned from the online publication that they finally got a signed contract delivered today. Now they only have a week to plan all the details of the shoot, which is supposedly going down on the 13th. Playgirl spokesperson Daniel Nardicio says that they're in talks with longtime staff photographer Greg Weiner—the latest to join the porn-named squad of Levi Johnston, Tank Jones, and Rex Butler—to be the lensman. They'll most likely be shooting at a well-known gym as well as a famous hotel and in a studio. Levi gets into town this Friday, so keep your eyes open for him around town. As for what Page Six had to say about the size of Levi's hockey stick, Nardicio isn't too worried. "We've never spoken to Levi about the size of his penis and trust me, we have no concerns as to whether it's big enough and if we did, we wouldn't be telling Page Six about it."

When talking to Page Six, Levi's svengali Tank Jones might have gone back on his previous statement that Levi would definitely be naked for the shoot, but we're ignoring that. Now that there has been so much chatter about the size of the rifle he's hunting with, he has to show to save face. If he doesn't everyone will say that the claims about it being small were right. We can't wait to judge for ourselves.

[Illustration by Steven Dressler]

What if it's too small?
Grower not a shower, baby. This was the same strategy that got your kid's grandma halfway to the vice presidency. Sure, her resume was distressingly short, and her intellectual prowess a bit thin, but everyone said she was a quick study. It's all about potential.

But, like, really small?
Blame it on the weather. Page Six is already doing this for you, noting that "one location for the shoot is a chilly ice rink."

What if this hurts my chance at getting custody of Tripp?
Sure, work in the adult entertainment industry may at times seem like a reason for revoking custody—Sarah Palin thinks so, and so does Sandra Bullock. But you're a teenage high school dropout with no wage-earning skills to speak of and, if we had to hazard a guess, not much by way of savings. Any level of legally-acquired financial security is going to be a boon here. Also, though Tripp's very existence proves that physical maturity does not always pair itself with mental or emotional maturity, our Pavlovian response to "Levi's manhood" might turn into some sort of subconscious message-making conceit at some point.

What if my mom sees me?
Oh, honey. They don't have Playgirl where your mother is. Just tell her you finally got that job on the oil rig.

What if it gets gay?
Well, we already know you're OK with a little bicuriosity, but a good old fashioned "no homo"—plus a dash of anatomical ambiguity—always helps:

Levi's manager, Tank Johnson [sic, it's Jones], tells Page Six, "We haven't had any discussions of that nature at all," and refused to confirm whether Johnson would go full-frontal during the shoot.

See? Already troubleshooting like a champ. Now drop those pants and start posing!

Here's the New York Post's gossip column item about Cooper going to the "best hotel in the world" in India:

Anderson Cooper has been consoling himself over falling ratings by living it up in Jaipur, India, at one of the world's most opulent hotels. The CNN star was spotted Tuesday with his muscular friend, Benjamin Maisani, an owner of East Village bar Eastern Bloc, at the Rambagh Palace, named the best hotel in the world by Conde Nast Traveler. Cooper's $3,200-a-night room features a four-poster mahogany bed and views of the gardens of the former Maharaja palace. Our source said, "Anderson's room has a large round bathtub. On the first night it was filled with bubbles and sprinkled with red rose petals." CNN declined to comment.

Saying Cooper is gay is no longer a scoop. It's not a scandal. Even the humor involved in all the clever winking and nodding is past its expiration date. With today's item Page Six may have exhausted all the ways to say "He's GAY GAY GAY!": the room only has one bed, Maisani's "muscular," and perhaps most blatantly, he owns Eastern Bloc. Every 'mo in New York knows Eastern Bloc is a gritty, dirty gay bar ("a true man meat bar") that often has boy-on-boy porn playing on its TVs. (The stencil over the DJ booth offers "Free Moustache Rides" and one outside once read "One Gay at a Time, Sweet Jesus.") All the patrons know Maisani, because he's big, and know he's dating Cooper. Word on the street is that Madonna's recent appearance there had less to do with her getting back to her East Village gay roots and more to do with the fact that she was with Cooper, who wanted to play "whose boy toy is hotter" with Madge.

Cooper's see-through closet is such a joke that it doesn't make sense to call him in the closet anymore. If he won't say it, we will: Anderson Cooper is officially out. There's no difference between him and Neil Patrick Harris. They both play it straight at their day jobs and then openly go about town with their boyfriends and do TV interviews about how much they love Kathy Griffin and The Real Housewives of Atlanta.

It's not like Cooper's in a club all of his own, either. He is part of an increasingly large crowd of notables who won't come out but have given up trying to hide that they are gay. Queen Latifah denied that she was going to marry her girlfriend, a girlfriend who she tries to pass off as her "trainer." Kevin Spacey got busted lying about being mugged in a London cruising park. Ricky Martin has stopped even trying to fight the gay rumors. Jodie Foster has never said she's a lesbian out loud, but she basically came out when she thanked her partner in an acceptance speech.

These gay-not-gay celebrities are different from the Hugh Jackmans, John Travoltas, Tom Cruises, and Kenny Chesneys, who are all constantly plagued with gay rumors that they strenuously try to deny or deflect. If they're gay, they're doing it in secret. Cooper and his set of cohorts live openly gay lives — and that's a good thing — but they refuse to acknowledge what the public already knows.

In Anderson Cooper's specific case, we sort of understand why he won't open his mouth and let the rainbows fly. All the guy has ever wanted to do was be an old-fashioned newsman and unfortunately him coming out would make him a part of the story. Every time he tried to cover something having to do with gay civil rights (or Madonna or Fire Island) plenty of people would claim that his reporting was biased because of his sexual orientation. It's not fair: Katie Couric doesn't have to worry when she covers pay inequality for women, and neither does Harry Smith when discussing new medicine that will eradicate baldness.

Coming out would open Cooper up to irrational accusations from those waiting to pounce on the "liberal media" just as quickly as A.C. pounces on his muscle man in an Indian hotel room. That sucks, but it's the way it currently is. How does it get changed? Well, by having some major national news figures come out and show that they can still get blown over in a hurricane or report live from a war zone without breaking into a anti-Prop 8 rant.

That's right, Anderson, it's going to take you to change it. Rachel Maddow has paved the way, but all the baby gays out there need you to man up and be our Jackie Robinson. The first step is the easiest, you just have to say what everyone already knows.

Top pic of Cooper and Maisani snapped in June by Pacific Coast News; pic of Eastern Bloc via Alice Bartlett's Flickr

This has to be Serena Torrey:

"We think of it as a reenactment of what's been reported, and not original reporting," a spokeswoman for the magazine told us. "We draw from a variety of sources, but Page Six is the preeminent gossip column, and the place where most of these celebrities play, so it's no surprise that many of these items are drawn from Page Six. We love Page Six."

Note that the item doesn't mention the NYM flack by name. The Post has never had a problem doing it before, but maybe Page Six just doesn't have the space for it. Or they don't want to give her the attention. But! Allow us to "reenact" this underminey, multi-layered quote for you, translated for the general public. The best part is: no thought went into that email or phone conversation! These people work like machines:

We think of it as a reenactment of what's been reported,

You guys, it's a fucking drawing.

and not original reporting.

You did all the work! Truly. We couldn't do what Page Six does. You know: celebrity gossip, right?

We draw from a variety of sources

Even though we heard about Page Six "exclusives" around town long before they were in print, obvi. We just didn't get around to them. Also, we won't attribute plenty of other people, so you're not alone.

But Page Six is the preeminent gossip column,

You guys are famous, and old! Mostly old.

and the place where most of these celebrities play,

And your rapport with 42 West, PMK/HBH, and every other publicist in town is formidable. You really know how to get those flacks dialing/handing you "tips"!.

so it's no surprise that many of these items are drawn from Page Six.

so it's no surprise that many of these items are drawn from Page Six.

We love Page Six.

We still won't attribute you. Thanks for the good material, scumsuckers. Eat shit and die. But no, really: we love Page Six.

Credit where credit's due: publicists are wordsmiths in their own right.

Oh, Azrouël is very attractive, we're not disputing that, but we just aren't so sure that he's straight. Sure, it's reinforcing negative stereotypes that all male fashion designers are gay, but if he's so hot to trot, then where are all the ladies who are sleeping with him? Neither the write-up on The Daily Beast nor the profile in Page Six Magazine reveal a single lady who'll cop to dating him.

Azrouël is most famously linked to Katie Lee Joel, the former pianowoman of Billy Joel. However, she only says "Yigal Azrouël is a great friend of mine." There is a name for that, and it's called a beard. Of all the socialites Page Six says he's bagged, only one — Zani Gugelmann — would go on record and says, "Yigal is a dear friend, however I have not dated him." The Beast has several ladies saying he's straight, but none who ever claimed to have gotten undressed for him other than to try on one of his creations.

After all, being straight seems to be doing wonders for business. What does the world need with another queer dress draper? Here is his gimmick and the press has come calling. In his store he flirts with the ladies and gets them to buy his dresses in the hopes that he will take them to bed. Well, good luck with that. You have about as much chance of going for a piggyback ride on the Loch Ness monster.

So, when was the last time that "Fashion's Hottest Playboy" actually scored a piece? So, short of a sex tape or a nice woman who will attest to his prowess on the record, we're not going to believe it. Pictures or it never happened.

According to Page Six, the former Miss Teen USA and possible Hollywood madam, walked right up to Chambers (who plays Dr. Alex Karev) at a party in L.A. Problem is, even after all the kerfuffle, he had no clue who she was. Harsh. And this was on Tuesday, the day after the hot tub adventure went public.

Damn, we give it a month before she's somewhere in Hollywood knocking over tables and screaming, "Don't you know who I am? I was the other girl in the McSteamy tape!"

Speaking of McSteamy, he was snapped by the paparazzi yesterday, reportedly leaving the doctor's office. What could he be doing there? Probably research for his role. Yeah, that's it. No checkup needed.

He was never the prototypical P6 staffer; he was primarily a rewrite man before joining the gossip page in the wake of the Jared Paul Stern scandal. Last year, Hoffman found himself embroiled in a lawsuit over an item P6 ran regarding a sex tape showing the fiancee of radio shock jock Opie; that issue still has not been fully sorted out. One insider tells us that Hoffman, who's in his 50s, may have just outgrown caring about the celebrity detritus that made up his beat on P6.

Dylan Stableford also got word that Hoffman was dropped from the gossip page. We're waiting for comment from the Post. Update: And it is, "No comment."

Page Six is younger now: Corynne Steindler, Neel Shah, and Emily Smith, reporting to overlord Richard Johnson.

The Post declined to comment to us. But an insider tells us that P6 boss Richard Johnson has already made the offer to Smith, who served as TV editor, and then US editor of The Sun until leaving to become "East Coast news director" at Life & Style early this summer. All that's left, we hear, is "crossing the I's and dotting the T's" on her paperwork to make it all official.

Update Emily confirms the move in a statement passed on by Life & Style: "Going to Page Six is my dream job. I'm sad to leave Life & Style, but I'm proud to have been part of the transformation of the magazine." Her now ex-boss Dan Wakeford says: "Emily is an amazing journalist and I understand why she is such a hot commodity."

Email us and say hey, Emily.
[Pic via]

The New York Post's gossip column didn't have much to base its conclusion that Ritchie had given the sleuthing tale a homoerotic backstory except for Downey's quote in the News of the World earlier this year that his Holmes and Law's Watson are "two men who happen to be roommates, wrestle a lot and share a bed. It's bad-ass."

That was apparently enough to put conservative radio host and family-friendly movie critic Michael Medved into a full-blown gay panic. "There's not a seething, bubbling hunger to see straight stars impersonating homosexuals. ... Who is going to want to see Downey Jr. and Law make out? I don't think it would be appealing to women. Straight men don't want to see it."

Well, we got a hold of a copy of a script to see just how gay it is, and to Medved's relief (or secret disappointment?) there're no scenes of Holmes and Watson going Brokeback. Our version is dated March 18, 2008, so it may not be the final, final revision. But the only explicit sex mentioned is a half-naked post-coital shot of Downey and Rachel McAdams in bed. That doesn't mean, of course, that Ritchie didn't direct his actors to give the Holmes-Watson dynamic some sexual tension. Here's the script's gayest moment — a scene that comes early in the movie when Watson tells Holmes that he's getting married. I could see how it could be played gay, but be your own judge.

Click images for a larger, more legible version

• Tom Cruise tells the Beckhams how to raise their kids, supposedly. One of the sincerely funny parts of the just-released Funny People is a dick joke involving Tom Cruise, Will Smith, and David Beckham, and this makes that joke exponentially funnier! I'm sure someone will ruin it in the comments - probably me - but honestly, this justifies $7 of the $12 you'll have to pay to see Funny People (or whatever the proportional fraction is for being not being eye-gouged with ridiculous movies prices who live in places more reasonable than Gomorrah New York. [Showbiz Spy]
  
  
• Jude Law's Babeh Mama Of The Month has a name for their new lovemunchkin, and it's going to be "Sophia" as in "I'mma Sophia Ass In Court, Moneybags!" [People]
  
  
• Tyra Banks is going to be on Gossip Girl because she loves to ruin things you love. [US]
  
  
• Emma Watson is related to a real witch, swears People! I want to know what editor at People was like, go through centuries of lineage of obscure witches and Harry Potter cast members and see if you can dig some shit up. Gold star for both of you, srsly. [People]
  
  
• Beyonce wants you to stop taking pictures of her ass, which America is crazy in love with. But who's stupid enough to take a picture of Jay-Z's wife's ass? Also, I heard a great story this week that apparently, Beyonce fucking loves to go to bars in New York incognito with Jay-Z to play Buck Hunter. I hope this is true because if so that's just great, and not because it's oh, Beyonce loves Buck Hunter, that's cute. No, it's awesome because you know they could just buy a Buck Hunter machine but instead they insist on going to bars and secretly getting a thrill out of it. How this item hasn't been reported before is beyond me? [Showbiz Spy and Me]
  
  
• Katy Perry and Rihanna are friends, now, and they've been hanging out in places like Barbados! And...the Meatpacking District! Meanwhile, some internet dork quietly prepares the inevitable "I Kissed An Umbrella" mashup. [Page Six]
  
  
• Leighton Meester's boyfriend, Sebastian Stan - who seems like a legitimately awesome guy, and believe this, is a great actor! Ask anyone who saw him on Broadway in the revival of Eric Bogosian's Talk Radio! Seriously. - talks about what it's like to watch her make out with Ed Westwick on the set of Gossip Girl, which is relatively kinky for People. [People]
  
  
• Heroes star Zach Qunito was questioned by cops twice while filming a skit for Funny or Die. The cops were lucky he didn't slice their brains open and take what little powers they have. [E!]
  
  
• Did you know E! has someone cooking up celebrity conspiracy theories? That's kind of sincerely great and something I wish I'd thought of first, but then again, it's only great if someone at E! is doing it. This week: what if Jon and Kate were all a lie? [E!]
  
  
• American Idol winner Kris Allen is subletting the fully-furnished Arkansas apartment he shared with his wife for $600 a month because they're going to be in Hollywood for a little bit. (1) They're subleasing, that's cute and (2) the fact that it's $600 a month, is like, okay, after you live in New York for so long you forget what rent in other parts of the world cost and then, for whatever reason, you see them, and think about what a ridiculous ass you are for paying $900 a month to live in what more or less amounts to a recycling bin (but one that's off of Avenue A!) and that you could do this job from Asheville, North Carolina so why not just do it from there? And then you remember that Asheville, charming as it is, doesn't have Shake Shack. And then you remember that you're willing to stand in line for an hour for a fucking cheeseburger and you should probably just order an Arsenic Shake the next time you're there. [TMZ]
  
  
• The Game - he's a rapper, heh - got into a fight at a funeral. I wonder if he's ever seen Shotgun Stories by Jeff Nichols. It's a great movie about two families from rural Arkansas (speaking of Arkansas!) and the wide divisions between them made more evident by an incident at a funeral of the two family's shared patriarch. It was directed by David Gordon Greene's film school colleague and made David Edelstein's Top 10 films last year and is quite fantastic and incredibly subtle, maybe the most subtle, poetic film I've seen in the last two years. Also, Michael Shannon is genius in it. Anyway. He probably hasn't. Anyway: TMZ helpfully points out that The Game is referred to in the lawsuit of his alleged funeral beatdown as someone who "fashions himself as some kind of rapper, gangster and/or celebrity," haha. [TMZ]
  
  
• Michael Jackson's shady doctor - who, when I wrote the item about him being a sketchball, a bunch of you shithead commenters were like, oh, he's not shady, how can you say he's shady only because he went bankrupt and has a bunch of liens on him in, like, six different states, we know nothing about him, and I was like, listen, people: game recognize game, and this dude is shady - was in dire financial straits and was being paid $150,000 a month by Jackson. The Daily News gets deep into Conrad Murray's financial issues, and yes, they are shady, which leads me to believe that you people that were trying to convince other people that this guy wasn't shady are all tax criminals and I've now recorded your IPs and sent them to the IRS, LOLZ JK. Oh, also, he invested in a Trinidadian energy drink called Pitbull, which is hysterical. [NY Daily News]
  
  
• Paris Hilton is back with Doug Reinhardt. [NY Daily News]
  
  
• I almost didn't read a Page Six item today entitled ASHTON KUTCHER WAS A BIG FAKE either because I figured, fuckit, I could write that one without even looking or secretly some part of me actually didn't care to know which element of Ashton Koosher's existence was fraudulent. But I read it because it's one of those strangely compelling "rainy day" Page Six items that bring philosophical elements of identity into question, like, okay, if Ashton Koosher Was A Big Fake, then what am I? What are you? What is in my cat's cat food bowl? I think Richard Johnson maybe secretly sometimes sits around his desk and thinks of subversive ways to fuck with the gossip-hunting people of the world who think way too far into it, like me. Anyway: it turns out he used to buy fake watches and fake Versace pants and fake Calvin Klein T-shirts to show his family how not broke phi broke he was when he first started out acting, even though he didn't have a place to live. Okay, well, the fake Versace pants thing is just funny, because, like, Versace is an indicator of success? Certainly not in taste, from what little I understand about fashion. And then you get to the bit about fake Calvin Klein T-shirts, and it's like, (A) really? How much is a real one? And (B) where do you go in L.A. to actually purchase fake Calvin Klien T-shirts? Can't you just get the real deal at T.J. Maxx or something? Don't they come 3 to a $50 pack? The guy who sells fake Calvin Klien T-shirts must be the shadiest dude in West Hollywood. Also, when did Ashton Kutcher start acting, the age of enlightenment? Jesus. [Page Six]
  
  
• J-Lo went to Rome and a bunch of people were like AHHHHHHHHH JAYYYYYY-LOOOOO YOUWEREAWESOMEINGIGLI!!!!!!!! And I guess it's like - I know, I know, obvious joke, but - When In Rome, act like people might've acted in 2001? Furthermore, the way Europeans freak out about American celebrities must mean the European celebrities absolutely suck. One thing America will always do right: produce a good movie star. Or at least assimilate one. Related: I once got conned by a smelly chain-smoking photo-opping mime outside of the Pantheon for four Euro. Fucking Rome. [TMZ]
  
  
• Things Chase Crawford apparently isn't afraid of: rain. Things that now make Page Six on a Saturday: celebrities who aren't afraid of rain. Now: I want the list of the ones who are. [Page Six]
  
  
• I'm not entirely sure what this D-Listed post entitled "NeNe Will Choke A Bitch" is about, but it sure sounds entertaining. [D-Listed]
  
  
• Finally, if you watch United States of Tara you know that "Buck" is the best character on the show. Well: Chasing Amy star Joey Lauren Adams ends up in a love affair with Buck in the next season. Fantastic! [EW]

Post managing editor Jesse Angelo, who hosted the East Village shindig with publicist Steven Rubenstein, sang Paula's praises and apologized for Post editor Col Allan's absence. Page Six editor Richard Johnson gave Froelich his own toast. And then Paula read aloud her Post mock up about how she's really leaving her gig to go find a man. It was a very enjoyable time.