It’s London fashion week, and coiffured editors, expensively clad stylists and
a sprinkling of celebrities are taking their front-row seats. A clutch of
paparazzi besieges the LA starlet Kimberly Stewart. She poses and preens —
careful to show just the right amount of measured indifference — then turns
to an odd-looking, plump man with pink hair sitting next to her and whispers
something wicked in his ear. The pair giggle conspiratorially, before Miss
Stewart smiles for the cameras once more. Nobody notices that the man with
the pink hair has whipped out his BlackBerry and is furiously typing
something on it.
Later that night, in the VIP room at the ultra-hip East End hang-out BoomBox,
the man with the pink hair turns up again. This time, Kelly Osbourne, queen
of the London after-hours scene, is hanging off his arm and his every word.
Party organisers buzz around him, making sure he has a drink in his hand,
and every minute or so, raucous laughter emanates from his corner of the
room. A few days later, he is hooking up with Sienna Miller, and, by the
time the Brit awards roll round, he is posing for pictures with Amy
Winehouse and Lily Allen.
The pink-haired man who appears to be at the centre of things isn’t a pop star
or a celebrity. He’s Perez Hilton (real name: Mario Armando Lavandeira Jr),
gossip blogger extraordinaire and self-styled “queen of all media”.
The camp, 32-year-old internet star is based in LA, but is visiting London
to soak up the scene and any salacious tittle-tattle. It all ends up on the
website that he runs singlehandedly, www.perezhilton.com. One of the
internet’s most talked-about destinations, the site draws 4.5m hits a day.
One of Perez’s trademarks is the jokes, opinions and doodles scrawled in white
marker over pictures of celebrities. Britney Spears is simply described as
“Trash”, Avril Lavigne is labelled “Loser” and Madonna branded “Drunk”. But
the site has become notorious for breaking celebrity news, as well as for
its vicious but hilarious commentary. It had minute-by-minute updates on
Anna Nicole Smith’s collapse and death, even showing footage of her being
given CPR. From Britney dancing half-naked with strippers to what Nicole
Richie is wearing on her latest LA shopping spree, Perez has the gossip as
it happens.
The speed with which he can disseminate a story leaves the redtops and
celebrity weeklies for dust. He was first with pictures of the hard-partying
Lindsay Lohan checking into the Wonderland Center rehab clinic. “A source
from the rehab facility called to tell me,” Perez says, over dinner. “But,
you know, I was really glad when Lindsay checked into rehab. She is really
crazy, and part of that was to do with all the insane stuff she was doing.”
Between mouthfuls of pasta, he drops little acid bombs of gossip. “I love
Nicole Richie. She’s obviously got issues, though. You know, she got in that
car and was caught driving backwards down the wrong side of the road. It’s
sad”; “The Olsens are both very badly behaved, but they do it very quietly”;
“Justin Timberlake — he’s really into himself”; “Britney? Who? Who? I don’t
even know who she is any more. I really hope she is only three steps from
rehab. She’s got issues”; “I love British celebs. I love Jordan. Keira
Knightley’s a bit of a sourpuss, but Amy Winehouse makes up for that. I’m
just annoyed Amy wasn’t as shit-faced as usual when I met her”; “I love
Victoria Beckham. Do I think she has a natural sense of style? No. Jennifer
Lopez has a natural sense of style — she never repeats a look. Victoria
repeats looks.” During the meal, Perez checks his constantly vibrating
BlackBerry nearly 40 times.
“I started the website to entertain myself,” he says. “It was fun. It still is
fun. But I work super-hard for it. My phone is going nonstop. Everyone is
ringing me all day. Photo agencies, PRs, publicists. I’m at the top of my
game. Yesterday, 4.52m people looked at my website. I don’t want to let down
my readers, who’ve come to expect certain things from my site. You see stuff
on my site first.” Luckily, Perez needs only four hours’ sleep a night.
The urge to gossip is in his blood. “I grew up in a Cuban household in Miami,
where gossip didn’t have a negative connotation. My mum was in the know
about everything and everyone,” Perez explains. After training as an actor
in New York, he moved to LA; when his acting career failed to take off, he
moonlighted as a magazine journalist and as a publicist, picking up contacts
along the way. “That’s how it works for me. I know a lot of people.” He
started the site two and a half years ago, after being sacked from his job
for spending too much time blogging. The pastime has grown into a lucrative
career: his huge audience has attracted advertisers to his site, and he has
a nice sideline in Perez merchandise. His “F*** rehab” T-shirt is a
bestseller. “It was well over a year before I was making a profit,” he says.
He won’t say how much he’s worth, but during his London visit, he stays at
the five-star minimalist hideaway the Hempel. Still, he insists: “I’m not
motivated by money. That’s not why I started the website.”
But, as the site has grown, so have his power and influence. As well as
relaying celebrity gossip, he reviews films, television shows and music. For
instance, his backing of Mika, the music sensation of this year, has brought
the British pop star to a wider audience in America. Perhaps that’s why,
despite the vitriol and bile he throws in their direction, many celebrities
are keen to cosy up to Perez Hilton. “There are a lot of celebrities who
like me. Sienna Miller does — she wants to make out with me,” Perez jokes.
Miller, by the way, is the one he calls Sluttyienna. He often likes to
doodle a trail of pee coming out of her groin.
Miller can obviously see the funny side of Perez, but his popularity is based
on his willingness to say things that the mainstream media won’t. The
celebrity stylist Rachel Zoe is a favourite target. She may be hailed in the
glossies as a fashion superstar, but she often appears on the site with
“Leatherface” scrawled across her forehead. “I respect Rachel Zoe for having
been able to get to the point where she is. I may make fun of her. I may
call her an asshole with haemorrhoids, but she’s the one laughing all the
way to the bank.” He has christened Jennifer Aniston “Maniston”. How does he
get away with it? “Thankfully, I’ve been sued less than a handful of times
over the past two and a half years. One lawsuit a year isn’t bad. But the
more successful you are, the more people want to sue you, it seems.”
Perez has come a long way in a short time — from a fat, gay, failed actor to a
regular in the VIP suite (though he’s still fat and gay). But he’s in no
danger of becoming one of the people he writes about, even though he often
posts pictures of himself with his new famous friends. “No matter how many
people try to kiss my butt,” he says, “I have the same amount, if not more,
who hate me.” He wouldn’t want it any other way. “What I do, the way I see
it, it’s like surfing. One day is never like another. It’s about going out
and hitting the waves every day. It’s my religion. It’s who I am.”
With that, his BlackBerry buzzes. Girls Aloud, Naomi Campbell and Louise
Redknapp have been spotted at the Julien Macdonald after-show party. He’s
got work to do.
MORE BLOG STARS
D-LISTED (www.dlisted.com)
Who? Inveterate New York gossip bitch Michael K — the East Coast Perez.
Sample soundbite “Is Kelly Osbourne mixing baby powder with some water
and using it as foundation? ... She looks like something Pete Doherty would
cut up, put a flame to and smoke.”
Obsessions Majors on Britney. (“Britney Spears is like a terrible train
wreck, where people’s heads are on the floor and everything is covered in
blood. I mean, it disgusts me, but I can’t tear myself away.”) Also hates
Victoria Beckham’s breasts (“Separated by a couple of seas”), and is
peerless when it comes to Pete Doherty (“I would like to know Pete’s
definition of ‘going clean’. I’m thinking that means getting high with
cleaning supplies instead of street drugs.”)
JUST JARED (www.justjared.com)
Who? A rarity in the Hollywood bloggers’ community. He is (drum roll,
cymbal thwack!) straight. Tends to overlay his pages with celebrity
irrelevances. Be warned: Iraq may feature. As may football.
Sample soundbite “Bony-back Kate Bosworth dined at trendy Hollywood
restaurant Magnolia on Saturday with four girlfriends. For appetisers, the
not-so-big-boned beauty had cigarettes and bottled water, followed by a
heaping ball of bread. Bosworth finished off the course with a wedge of
iceberg lettuce.”
Obsessions Everyone — although Jared recently went big on the swimsuit
issue of the American magazine Sports Illustrated (not just cover star
Beyoncé, but Kanye West, Tyra Banks and Israeli model Bar Rafael),
accompanied by insightful comments such as “Wowowow”. Yeah, okay, we get it:
you’re not gay.
GAWKER (www.gawker.com)
Who? Jessica Coen and Alex Balk. It’s more highbrow than the low-rent
gossipers, but involves no less mischief.
Sample soundbite (on Anna Nicole Smith) “Give the girl credit: she
didn’t care what she put in her mouth while she was in this world and she
went out of it the same way.”
Obsessions Gawker is your one-stop shop for everything
celebrity-related, delivered with a sentient, user-friendly precision. If
you’re famous, you are a Gawker mainstay.
PINK IS THE NEW BLOG (www.pinkisthenewblog.com)
Who? As his online persona suggests, Pink is the campest of all the LA
bloggers. This is not a man to invite to tea with a maiden aunt.
Sample soundbite “I think Oasis’s outstanding contribution to music is
that they’ve not been making music for the past few years.” On Matthew
McConaughey: “Hot damn! He sure does have a badonkadonk on him, don’t he?”
Obsessions The Beckhams are one of the few English celeb pairings he
takes seriously (well, as seriously as a man who uses the euphemism
“badonkadonk” for the male member can).
