The Washington Post's Jason Horowitz offers a who-put-this-chocolate-in-my-foul-rancid-tub-of-weeping-peanut-butter profile of leftie PR operative Hiltzik, pegged to the fact that he works for Beck. It's crazy, because Hiltzik is a liberal Democrat who worked on Hillary Clinton's 2000 Senate campaign, Eliot Spitzer's 1998 attorney general campaign, and Harvey Weinstein's lifelong megalomania campaign. So how can such a mensch, with all these Hollywood liberal friends, work to advance the career of an increasingly popular nativist demagogue?

The close friendship and lucrative business relationship that has developed between the 45-year-old conservative firebrand and the 37-year-old former Democratic operative shows how partisan media personalities get discovered, promoted and catapulted into the political stratosphere, even when the talent and the talent broker have opposing ideologies. But for Hiltzik's former Democratic allies, the alliance is still mostly shocking.

It is truly a puzzle. It's almost as though Hiltzik is more interested in making money, or accumulating power, than in devoting his life to advancing the political ideals he has claimed in the past to endorse. What sort of self-respecting flack would work for a client whose ideas he doesn't personally advocate and live by?

And how can someone who has flacked for souls as pure as Hillary Clinton, Eliot Spitzer, and Harvey Weinstein turn around and offer his services to a monster like Beck? It's a crazy, crazy world.

The most fascinating thing about Ali Wise's craziness is its very pedestrian nature—pedestrian on crystal meth, maybe, but still. She didn't snap and murder her ex's lover in a jealous rage; that's been done. Instead, she hacked into their voicemails, deleting messages as she went. It's a nightmare, because who would believe you when you told them you didn't return their call or make that appointment because your messages were surreptitiously deleted by a jealous, tech-savvy fashion publicist? The crime's unlikely nature is what makes it deadly (socially).

Anyhow, cops say that Ali didn't just go all Hackers on one lady interested in her ex, Downtown Records boss Josh Deutsch; she was all up in everybody's voicemail. The NYP reports:

As if to prove the axiom that publicists are forever on the phone, the 337 "hacked" calls Wise allegedly made into Freudenberger's cell and landline voice-mail systems were just the beginning.

She made at least 137 additional calls into the voice mails of Victim No. 2, at least 119 calls into the voice mails of Victim No. 3, and at least 102 calls into the voice mails of Victim No. 4, the criminal complaint says.

She's facing charges of trespassing, tampering, eavesdropping, and stalking. Girl, you know he's not worth it!
[Pic: Getty]

1. Be a Book Publicist—It worked for Melissa Broder, Sloane Crosley's publicist. Extend this chain ad infinitum. Crosley's book was called "I Was Told There'd Be Cake," and Broder's book will be called "When You Say One Thing But Mean Your Mother." The titles grow more impenetrably twee with each generation. Broder's publicist's future book will be called "Banana Karenina Sings the Blueberries, Or: The Indubitably Odd Presidency of Cherry True-Man."


2. Tumblr—Hey hey, Tumblr-of-the-minute Shit My Dad Says is the latest hot literary property! The hottest since This is Why You're Fat. Or Look at This Fucking Hipster. Even that Twitter book, which is almost like Tumblr or whatever, (internet buzzwords here). The point is: If you want a book off your internet crap, get it before the meme collapses.


3. Be a Celebrity—No matter how bad the economy gets, America will never tire of reading about celebrities and who they fuck. Which reminds us...


4. Fuck a Celebrity—Writing about Bernie Madoff's penis size will get you lots of press, but it might obviate the public's need to actually buy the book. Beware.


5. Latch Onto a Huge News Story and Ride It Straight to Book Hell—It must seem like common sense to hand out all those fat six-figure book contracts for books about The Historic Financial Crisis of 2008 or The Historic Election of 2008 while those things are happening. Then the book comes out a year later and nobody cares any more, plus **everything** has already been said. Be sure to get a good advance on a book deal like this. It's all you're gonna get.


6. Puppies—Quiz: You're a high-ranking editor at one of America's most prestigious news outlets. How will you get yourself a book deal. Answer: Write a column about your puppy! "Write a column about your puppy" is always a good answer to most of the aspiring author's daunting questions about the publishing industry. Motherfuckers just love puppies.

[Crosley/ Broder pic: Ron Hogan]

Sent: Thu Jul 30 17:14:53 2009
Subject: To whom it may concern

To whom it may concern:

On June 4, 2009, Sydney Masters, an employee of R. Couri Hay
Creative Public Relations, Inc., sent an email promoting her client Paul
Morgan, CEO of Phoenix Rising Laser that contained factually erroneous and
misleading statements about the TRIA Laser Hair Removal System. This email
was sent in error and we regret that we made these statements about TRIA.
On behalf of R. Couri Hay Creative Public Relations, Inc., Ms. Masters, Mr.
Morgan and Phoenix Rising Laser, we apologize for any confusion about the
safety, efficacy or features of the TRIA Laser Hair Removal System that we
may have caused.

The TRIA Laser Hair Removal System is the only FDA approved
laser hair removal system for at-home use. It received FDA clearance in
2008 and has never required a prescription for use. The TRIA Laser Hair
Removal System uses the same semiconductor diode laser technology used by
the professional systems and was developed by the same scientists who
invented the technology nearly two decades ago. Clinical studies
demonstrate that the TRIA Laser Hair Removal System delivers long-lasting
hair reduction and prevents the hair from growing back.

Questions about the TRIA Laser Hair Removal System should be
directed to TRIA Beauty, Inc. at triabeauty.com or 5880 W. Las Positas
Blvd., Suite 52, Pleasanton, CA 94588. For questions related to R. Couri Hay
Creative Public Relations, Inc. or to Paul Morgan, please contact Mark W.
Smith of Smith Valliere PLLC, 509 Madison Avenue, New York, New York 10022
(212) 755-5200.

Sincerely,

R. Couri Hay
President & CEO
R. Couri Hay Creative Public Relations, Inc.

[RCH pic via Guest of a Guest]

This is really just bizarre, so we're gonna stick to the facts here: Victor Munoz is SPEAKING OUT about the month he spent guiding Octomom's, uh, media relations campaign, or something. He hooked her up with Dr. Phil and Radaroline and other bloodsucking media outlets, in return for undisclosed fees. But he had to take a step back from the Octomadness eventually; she simply wouldn't listen to this publicistrealtor's advice.

As for their split, Muñoz said Nadya, "Wasn't listening to me anymore and her and her attorney (Czech) thought they could do what I did. She second-guessed lots of opportunities I put in front of her.

"Nadya is her worst enemy. I'm not going to call her stupid but her father (Ed Doud) said she was a 33-year-old woman, book smart, with a 13-year-old mind," he said.

But hey the OctoMom thing actually landed him his current job as sales manager over at All American Real Estate Mortgage Co., so, silver lining. We swear this is all true. [Whittier Daily News]

Riverhead, which published the book last year, has been displaying three of the dioramas in their offices. But now they'd like to have that space back. "As you can see from the picture, I can't exactly house them in Riverhead's offices forever," she says. "I also can't fit more than two in my apartment. Nor, honestly, would I want to. It's creepy enough that I even have the crafts supplies to make dioramas in my house.

So, she's selling the one — "the most intricate," she promises — that goes with the essay "Sign Language for Infidels" in an auction to benefit Housing Works.

Crosley's description:

Diorama For Sale, Never Used*

*Okay, slightly used. This is one of three dioramas constructed to coincide with the publication of I Was Told There'd Be Cake. Each diorama was meant to represent one of the essays and here we have the butterfly-abusive ASPCA violation that is "Sign Language for Infidels." The diorama was created with neurotic love over a series of late nights in my apartment, the scent of bourbon and Aleene's Tacky Glue (is there any other kind?) in the air. It was then filmed during equally late intervals at Penguin's offices, where similar emotions and scents were present but mingled with salsa and chips.

The diorama itself, sketched out here, now looks a whole lot better. For one thing, it's three dimensional. For another, it's Plexiglas. For another, it has clothing hangers made of paperclips and, come to think of it, is the last time I used a paperclip. In EBay language, I would keep it myself, but my apartment only has so much room. Joseph Cornell it ain't, but it does come with a cotton ball and felt rendering of a homeless guy. Finally, the auctioning off of this diorama for Housingworks (http://www.housingworks.org/ ) is a fitting end for a story that started years ago, with me attempting to be charitable and volunteer and failing miserably….

You can also watch a video documenting its creation or take a Flickr tour.

Always at the ready to swat away a junket reporter when the questioning strays off movie-pimping topic, or phone in a craftily worded, 4 a.m. denial ("Not only was my client not acquainted with the dead hooker in question, he wasn't even in Las Vegas this weekend. He was shooting his upcoming guest appearance on Entourage!"), it's time Hollywood's hard-working plate-spinners get the recognition they deserve.

Without further ado, then, we proudly present The 2008 Defamer Flack Honors. Winners, please come forward to collect your trophy (a clipboard-wielding thirtysomething woman hurling herself upon a grenade, cast in the finest bronze), and say a few carefully chosen words of appreciation.

Most Loyal
Elliot Mintz
Taking on Paris Hilton as a client is not a task for the fainthearted; but doing it with the gusto and blind obedience demonstrated time and again by Elliot Mintz elevates him from the rank-and-flacky-file to the level of some kind of publicist archangel. Not only did Mintz return to his post after his client's failed attempt at tossing him under a bus during her suspended license trial, he slathered himself, for reasons still not completely understood, in orange face paint for her birthday festivities. We're choking back tears right now.

Best Liar
Liz Rosenberg
Madonna's rep Liz Rosenberg had the publicity equivalent of SoCal wildfires to contend with this year, as if dropped by parachute with nothing but a watering can and her own slippery wits to fend off the singer's raging divorce inferno. It was enough to make a flack long for the relative innocuousness of new-new-face scrutiny, tales of corset-crappings, and other assorted moustache rides.

Still, even the most gifted of professional liars are bound by human constraints. As we tried in vain to place all the appropriate pushpins in our increasingly convoluted MadgeRod CynthRavitz Clusterfuck case map, Liz & Co. themselves could barely keep track of which fibs were meant for us, and which were never meant to leave the walls of Spin Control HQ.

The Worst Publicist in the World
Jonathan Jaxson
True, we crowned Jonathan Jaxson The Worst Publicist in the World back in November, with two months and one Jeremy Piven handroll-related P.R. nightmare to go before 2008 closed out. Didn't matter. The second we met Cheetah Girl Adrienne Bailon's spokesperson, and listened to him tell an Atlanta CBS affiliate's morning show audience of his plan to fake a nude photo scandal that (surprise!) backfired, eventually leading to his client and her fellow Cheetahettes being disinvited from the Macy's parade, we knew we had met a bold new breed of publicist, far deadlier than any that came before. This is the P-2000: Incompetent Robot P.R. Killing Machine. Fight the future.

PRs - that mysterious and dark breed of fixers, stuntsters and arch media manipulators - have, for more than a century now, been as fundamental to the Tinseltown fantasy as the Hollywood sign itself. They are, according to Borkowski, in his new book The Fame Formula, the hidden gatekeepers of the Hollywood dream machine “who guard its formula, often to the death”

Even today, Borkowski, whose clients have included Michael Jackson, claims that movie publicists are part of a powerful cabal who mostly go unnoticed, who ruthlessly hold the media in their grasp and who “truly understand the dark Conradian soul of man” (ie, our baser instincts).

And the most incredible line of all:

Here, increasingly, the job of the publicist is to tread the fine line between matching a “suitable” journalist with the talent and choosing a craven sycophantic hack who will play the promotional game.

That would be you, Times reporter Kevin Maher! Flack-turned-author Mark Borkowski thanks you for being enough of a sycophantic hack to make his book sound interesting!

Remember, a "Hollywood publicist" is often a guy like this.

[Times UK]

[Big Think]

Who is Rob Shuter? Once upon a time, he was one of the most powerful celebrity flacks in America, repping clients like Paris Hilton and Jessica Simpson. Eventually he got fired from his agency, Dan Klores Communications, lost his big clients, and ended up at OK!, which is really where he belongs. What went wrong?

• Shuter planted a fabricated item in Page Six about his client Paris Hilton being attacked at a club by a supposedly "jealous" Zeta Graff. Graff subsequently sued for $10 million, which compelled Shuter to give legal depositions demonstrating his sleazy method of doing business (plant fake shit on Page Six, specifically). It was all very entertaining. Paris Hilton ended up paying $2 million for this transgression.
• He treated his work on behalf of vapid singer Jessica Simpson like he was a Cold War CIA operative behind enemy lines. He planted nasty items about Simpson ex Nick Lachey. Then he decided to help Simpson get some press by fabricating a big romance between her and singer John Mayer. He convinced People and Us Weekly to put the story on their covers, and then made them all look like fools when the celebs themselves admitted there was no big romance at all. In one masterstroke, Shuter had shattered his own credibility (ha), made his own client look like a desperate liar, pissed off fellow celebrity flacks, and, perhaps worst of all, made enemies of some powerful celebrity magazines. He was then fired by Joe Simpson, for all of the above reasons.
• Having established himself as an untouchable dirtbag that no legitimate PR agency would hire and no smart news outlet would trust, Shuter was scooped up by OK!, first in a consulting role and then as entertainment editor. And now as the top guy. Just perfect.

In unrelated rumormongering, there was gossip earlier this year that Shuter may have been somehow involved in a purported FBI investigation of In Touch magazine for "payments to at least one editor in exchange for prominent placement of certain B-list celebrities." Supposedly some shady British cabal of celebrity flacks and gossip reporters was under scrutiny. We hoped Shuter was wrapped up in it! Alas, no evidence ever confirmed the rumors. And to be fair, he even has some admirers among the gossip press, who say he's friendly and witty.

So what will Shuter be doing for OK!? A good guess: helping them continue to spend big with no apparent monetary return. We hear that OK! is the leading bidder in the war for Angelina Jolie's upcoming baby pictures, with a sum rumored to be around $15 million for worldwide rights. That's in line with the magazine's history of profligacy; we also hear that they've yet to turn a profit, despite an investment in the nine-figure range.

And Shuter, the fabricating flack, will fit right in. One of the best quotes I ever heard while working at PRWeek was from an editor at OK! who gushed on and on about how nice the mag was to its friends in PR, summing it all up by explaining, "We work directly with publicists and celebrities themselves to get the real story." Sure. All together now in the race to the bottom.

Publicity is really complicity. This is a simple concept that for whatever reason took me way too long to understand, but it first hit me on the set of Monster's Ball when, after I asked Halle Berry to approve some stills, she looked over a stack of contact sheets and said something like "You know, they're all fine to use however you want, but don't show them to my publicist because she'll just kill everything."

We are talking about photos that depicted Berry looking like hell, but that also showed her inhabiting a wholly unexpected character. At that moment I got the sense that Berry would be utterly complicit in the campaign, which she was, for which she was rewarded with an Oscar. You'd be surprised at how many actors (or, perhaps more accurately, their representatives) I've dealt with over the years who have not been able to grasp this.

Amen. Walker goes on to add that — gasp! — "[p]ublicity should not try to obfuscate" and that "lifestyle" publicists are probably best left to club promotion as opposed to shepherding films through competitive festival and theatrical marketplaces. We'd expect no less honesty from Jeremy Walker, which is all the more reason we'll so miss him — and sure, maybe even envy him from time to time — should he stay gone for good. Maybe he'll try consulting? Every studio in town could learn from a guy like this.

• Jeremy Walker on Independent Film PR [Indiewire]

Anyone with a phone and a computer can hang out a public relations shingle these days. In fact, with today's bloggers and party planners fancying themselves as high-powered PR gurus, just about anyone has. That's why Media Image Consultant MICHAEL SANDS stands out, and away, from this self-absorbed, self-important crowd...

MICHAEL SANDS has been instrumental in helping the Public Relations industry of the '80s transform into Media Consulting in the '90s and evolve into the wide range of competencies that constitute today's Media Image Consulting profession. In fact, he coined the phrase...

For many years, Michael said "Cheese" to the clicks of Nikons...

Michael was photographed for: GQ, ESQUIRE, BRIDE'S, L'UOMO VOGUE, PARADE, TIME, the NEW YORK MAGAZINE, NY TIMES SUNDAY MAGAZINE, and even a few JC Penney catalogues...

Michael knew when it was time to stop saying "Cheese" and start saying "Cheesecake," as in C'est Cheesecake, his successful LA-based gourmet cheesecake business...

Designed and implemented Los Angeles Police Chief Daryl Gates' campaign and slogan "Gates Must Stay", increasing public awareness during the Rodney King incident.

"He's in a meeting."

"That's a great question."

"So good to see you."

"I really don't know."

Anything preceded by the word "candidly."

That the fiercely loyal flack had finally succeeded in doing what publicist-watchers had long feared he would, managing to squeeze not just his nose, but his entire head and neck up his demanding client's hindquarters.

[Photo: WENN]

• Frock horror! Paris celebrates her birthday as a punk princess [Daily Mail]

"It's an honor to be up here and to be honored as publicity whore of the year," Apatow deadpanned. "And you're all my pimps."

There were surprisingly few references to the writers strike other than a guffaw-inducing jibe by Apatow.

"I have 27 pages of jokes here; I've been on strike for three months and haven't been allowed to write," he said. "I was up all night laughing and looked outside my window, and Paul Haggis was outside picketing."

Despite such welcome moments of levity—publicists can laugh at themselves, but they'll fucking cut you if you try that with one of their clients—the awards were not without their disappointments: sadly, our prediction that New Line would be honored for its groundbreaking work in frozen-dead-baby-related viral marketing on behalf of The Number 23 did not come to pass. Instead, the Warner Bros. publicity team was recognized for helping to sell the year's most homoerotically charged entertainment, 300, to mainstream America as a CGI-enhanced action-adventure, then immediately repackaging the film for its incredibly successful run of campy midnight screenings in which audience members joined in "It's Raining Men" singalongs while tossing plastic spears at a chorus line of dancing, scantily clad Spartans reinterpreting the blockbuster's action at the front of the theater.

[Photo: Getty Images]

And from Kevin Mercuri, a senior VP at 5W, comes this email:

"Regarding the Joe Francis entry, don't believe everything you read. Sitrick didn't garner this Sunday's Style piece, the 5W Public Relations team did. We've been placing him on Nightline, Greta Van Susteren and roughly thirty national and regional radio shows every week, and we've been pitching Mareya Navarro and just about every other applicable journalist. I could even connect you with Joe Francis (yes, from Jail) to back up the story that 5W is getting him coverage, not Sitrick."

Wow, thanks! That won't be necessary.

Mathis (who is good at her job) "will continue to be responsible for investor relations, media relations, public relations, community relations, crisis communications, corporate speechwriting, employee communications and the Company's Internet and Intranet sites." She's also won some big-time awards! If you'd like to know more, you can ring up the contact listed on the release—Catherine Mathis!

The New York Times Company Names Catherine J. Mathis Senior Vice President, Corporate Communications and Kenneth A. Richieri Senior Vice President and General Counsel

NEW YORK—(BUSINESS WIRE)—Dec. 13, 2007—The New York Times Company announced today that Catherine J. Mathis, vice president, corporate communications has been promoted to senior vice president, corporate communications and Kenneth A. Richieri, vice president and general counsel, has been promoted to senior vice president and general counsel. Both promotions are effective immediately. Ms. Mathis will continue to report to James Follo, senior vice president and chief financial officer, and Mr. Richieri will continue to report to Janet L. Robinson, president and CEO, of the Times Company.

In making the announcement, Ms. Robinson said, "These appointments reflect the depth of experience and numerous contributions Catherine and Ken have made to our business during their respective tenures."

"Catherine is the consummate communications professional. She has a deep understanding of our business and, under her leadership, we have taken a smart, strategic approach to media and investor relations.

"Ken's breadth of knowledge has served us well for the past 24 years, and his expertise is invaluable to us as the Company continues to execute complex business strategies."

Ms. Mathis will continue to be responsible for investor relations, media relations, public relations, community relations, crisis communications, corporate speechwriting, employee communications and the Company's Internet and Intranet sites. She joined the Company in 1997 as director of investor relations. In 2006 Ms. Mathis was named Communicator of the Year by the New York chapter of International Association of Business Communicators. The award is the chapter's highest award, recognizing integrity and excellence in everyday communications or in response to specific crises or challenges.

From 1992 until 1997, Ms. Mathis was vice president of corporate relations at the Overseas Shipholding Group, Inc. Previously she held various management positions at International Paper Company. Ms. Mathis graduated with a B.S. degree in business administration and an M.B.A. degree in marketing and management information systems from the University of Minnesota.

Ms. Mathis serves on the Board of the National Investor Relations Institute and is president of the Investor Relations Association.

Mr. Richieri became general counsel of The New York Times Company in January 2006. He served as deputy general counsel from 2001 until 2005, and was promoted to vice president in 2002. He served as assistant general counsel for The New York Times Company since January 1993, handling electronic publishing, intellectual property and business issues. Previously, he was senior counsel since 1989. Mr. Richieri joined The New York Times Company in 1983 as legal counsel.

Before joining the Times Company, Mr. Richieri was an associate at Cahill Gordon & Reindel from 1976 through 1982. Mr. Richieri received an A.B. degree in political science from Brown University in 1973 and a J.D. degree from Harvard Law School, graduating cum laude.

Photos of Ms. Mathis and Mr. Richieri are available at: http://www.nytco.com/press/press_photos.html.

CONTACT: For The New York Times Company
Catherine Mathis, 212-556-1981
mathis@nytimes.com
or
Abbe Serphos, 212-556-4425
serphos@nytimes.com

"Later, while sitting in a coffee shop in the West Village—inexplicably one of the only areas in Manhattan Ms. Crosley can comfortably navigate in spite of the spatial dysphasia disorder from which she has suffered since childhood—she politely said she did not find the question of her universal appeal very interesting." Okay; let's talk about your bizarre disease, then.

Indeed, given that "Ms. Crosley appears actually to enjoy the clusterfuck" of media parties, we have a right to know: What is this spatial dysphasia and, more importantly, is it contagious? Following in the grand tradition of Pasteur and Salk and House, let's proceed first to an exact-match Google search, which reveals that one thing "spatial dysphasia" is not is an accepted medical term. Or any other kind of term for that matter. Leon seems to have sort of made it up, actually!

One might fear that the trail ends here. Happily, though, we find that, in addition to personal essays on her butt and her goldfish, Crosley also recently wrote one, for Salon, about her "severe spatial disability." The scene after a seven-year-old Sloane scored in the tart-cart tranche on her first standardized test:

My mother went on to explain my brush with brilliance, my aptitude for geniusness, my general awesomeness, but the school was having none of it. They made me take an IQ test, after which the test administrator announced he had never seen such a right-left brain discrepancy. I was diagnosed with a severe temporal spatial deficit, a learning disability that means I have zero spatial relations skills.

It was official: I was a genius trapped in an idiot's body.

It makes some sense now: "spatial dysphasia" as a phrase of solidarity with "someone else who hid her problems in plain sight...working double-time just to keep up with everyone else's standard of 'normal.'" Now is also when our investigation becomes irretrievably weird, because "recognition dysphasia" is just as non-term a term as the spatial variety. As it turns out, "face blindness" is actually a form of agnosia, which Wikipedia tells us is the "loss of ability to recognize objects, persons, sounds, shapes, or smells while the specific sense is not defective." This might be Crosley's problem with subways and the street grid, but it's definitely not dysphasia.

Truth is, dysphasia is just another word for aphasia, the familiar catch-all term for post–brain damage problems in producing and comprehending language. That's langauge, as in speaking and writing. It is therefore impossible to be a "spatial dysphasic," or a "facial" one. But perhaps Sloane Crosley is in fact an aphasic/dysphasic whose condition prevents her from accurately describing her condition. (Certainly, she appears to have some kind of difficulty communicating normally: "Ms. Crosley...cuts to the chase with editors and writers, and conscientiously tailors her pitches to suit their tastes.") Then again, there's the distinct and unpalatable possibility that Crosley, like so many before her, confused dysphasia with the identical-sounding dysphagia ("difficulty swallowing").

But, let's not work too hard at his; she probably won't be the best person you know in publishing anymore if she ever actually became knowable:

Earlier, an ex-boyfriend had walked by carrying something like four drinks; asked to describe Ms. Crosley, he gave a wistful smile before turning away. "Inscrutable!" he said to no one in particular as he disappeared into the crowd.

The Most Popular Publicist In New York [NYO]