Cameron Diaz has been awarded damages today after winning her High Court libel suit against The Sun in the UK. In an article published on 12th May, the newspaper had falsely claimed that Diaz had been seen kissing an MTV producer.
The article said: "JUSTIN Timberlake's bride-to-be Cameron Diaz has been caught snogging a married man. The Hollywood babe, 32, was spotted in a clinch with the TV producer while her pop star fiancée prepared to go into hospital for a throat operation. Witness Oscar Duran said: 'Cameron wrapped her arms around the guy and started kissing him on the mouth. They stood kissing for a good three minutes.' Cameron and producer Shane Nickerson, 33, who works on her MTV travel show Trippin have enjoyed more than just a professional relationship, according to a US magazine. Mr Duran told how he saw the pair emerging from the Oracle Post studio in Santa Monica where Trippin is dubbed and stop behind bushes in broad daylight. He said: 'They seemed to glance around to see if anyone was watching.' Mr Duran confessed: 'I was surprised they would stand there in public on the sidewalk kissing.' Nickerson's wife Elisa is a high school teacher. They have a one-year-old daughter Lucy."
29 July 2005
28 July 2005
Size Counts:
A Celebration of the Erection
Size Counts: A Celebration of the Erection is the first photobook devoted to the phallus. Published in a limited edition of 1,000 copies, it also features erection-themed poetry and a brief history of phallic mythology.
22 July 2005
Vanity Fair
Roman Polanski, director of Rosemary’s Baby and Chinatown, has been awarded £50,000 in damages in a libel case against Vanity Fair. Polanski had sued the magazine after it published Queen of the Night, a feature by A.E. Hotchner on the New York restaurant Elaine’s in its July 2002 issue.
The defamatory passage was a quote from Lewis Lapham (p. 154): “The only time I ever saw people gasp in Elaine’s was when Roman Polanski walked in just after his wife Sharon Tate had been viciously murdered by the Manson clan. I was sitting at a table with a friend of mine who had brought the most gorgeous Swedish girl you ever laid eyes on. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a more beautiful woman. Polanski came over and asked to join us. It turned out that Polanski had been in London when the atrocity took place, and he was on his way back to Hollywood for the burial. The Swedish beauty was sitting next to me. Polanski pulled up a chair and inserted himself between us, immediately focusing his attention on the beauty, inundating her with his Polish charm. Fascinated by his performance, I watched as he slid his hand inside her thigh and began a long, honeyed spiel which ended with the promise ‘And I will make another Sharon Tate out of you.’”
The article was commissioned for the magazine’s US edition, though it was also reprinted in the UK edition, and Polanski sued in the UK as British libel law — unlike the US — does not require proof of ‘actual malice’. Polanski became the first person to give evidence via video link at a British libel trial, as he lives in France to avoid extradition to the US over a 1977 conviction for sex with a minor. After the damages were awarded, Vanity Fair editor Graydon Carter questioned how “a man who lives in France can sue a magazine published in America in a British court”.
The defamatory passage was a quote from Lewis Lapham (p. 154): “The only time I ever saw people gasp in Elaine’s was when Roman Polanski walked in just after his wife Sharon Tate had been viciously murdered by the Manson clan. I was sitting at a table with a friend of mine who had brought the most gorgeous Swedish girl you ever laid eyes on. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a more beautiful woman. Polanski came over and asked to join us. It turned out that Polanski had been in London when the atrocity took place, and he was on his way back to Hollywood for the burial. The Swedish beauty was sitting next to me. Polanski pulled up a chair and inserted himself between us, immediately focusing his attention on the beauty, inundating her with his Polish charm. Fascinated by his performance, I watched as he slid his hand inside her thigh and began a long, honeyed spiel which ended with the promise ‘And I will make another Sharon Tate out of you.’”
The article was commissioned for the magazine’s US edition, though it was also reprinted in the UK edition, and Polanski sued in the UK as British libel law — unlike the US — does not require proof of ‘actual malice’. Polanski became the first person to give evidence via video link at a British libel trial, as he lives in France to avoid extradition to the US over a 1977 conviction for sex with a minor. After the damages were awarded, Vanity Fair editor Graydon Carter questioned how “a man who lives in France can sue a magazine published in America in a British court”.
10 July 2005
The Stanley Kubrick Archives
An exhibition of artefacts from Stanley Kubrick’s personal archives was held in Germany last year, and will begin an international tour later this year. The exhibition was curated by Bernd Eichhorn, who was one of a select few researchers permitted to examine Kubrick’s archives in situ at Childwickbury Manor (his home in St Albans, near London) after his death. Alison Castle also delved into Kubrick’s storage boxes at Childwickbury, and her new book The Stanley Kubrick Archives, published by Taschen, is arguably the definitive work on Kubrick.
If a book’s weight is any indication of its quality (and it often is), then The Stanley Kubrick Archives is very good indeed, weighing 5kg. This lavish, folio-sized book begins with frame-enlargements from each of Kubrick’s films from Killer's Kiss (under its working title Kiss Me, Kill Me) to Eyes Wide Shut. Unfortunately, this section is problematic for a couple of reasons: it omits Fear and Desire (the feature debut that Kubrick later disowned), and it lists incorrect aspect ratios for three films. (Paths of Glory’s correct ratio is 1.66:1, Lolita’s alternates between 1.33:1 and 1.66:1, and Barry Lyndon’s is 1.66:1).
The second half of the book presents “the nuts and bolts of Kubrick’s creative history.” This is a treasure trove for Kubrick fans, illustrated with more than 800 photographs, script pages, and props. There are also reprints of selected Kubrick interviews, and new essays by Gene D. Phillips, Rodney Hill, and Michel Ciment. Each copy of this (admittedly expensive) book also comes with a CD recording of an interview Kubrick gave to Jeremy Bernstein on 27th November 1966, and a strip of twelve frames from Kubrick’s personal 70mm print of 2001: A Space Odyssey.
If a book’s weight is any indication of its quality (and it often is), then The Stanley Kubrick Archives is very good indeed, weighing 5kg. This lavish, folio-sized book begins with frame-enlargements from each of Kubrick’s films from Killer's Kiss (under its working title Kiss Me, Kill Me) to Eyes Wide Shut. Unfortunately, this section is problematic for a couple of reasons: it omits Fear and Desire (the feature debut that Kubrick later disowned), and it lists incorrect aspect ratios for three films. (Paths of Glory’s correct ratio is 1.66:1, Lolita’s alternates between 1.33:1 and 1.66:1, and Barry Lyndon’s is 1.66:1).
The second half of the book presents “the nuts and bolts of Kubrick’s creative history.” This is a treasure trove for Kubrick fans, illustrated with more than 800 photographs, script pages, and props. There are also reprints of selected Kubrick interviews, and new essays by Gene D. Phillips, Rodney Hill, and Michel Ciment. Each copy of this (admittedly expensive) book also comes with a CD recording of an interview Kubrick gave to Jeremy Bernstein on 27th November 1966, and a strip of twelve frames from Kubrick’s personal 70mm print of 2001: A Space Odyssey.