I have a confession to make. I read (okay, fine, I subscribe) to Star magazine. I don’t know why, but I can’t resist. Bizarre tales and zoomed photos of uber beautiful, obscenely rich, questionably talented stars, who can’t seem to stop screwing up their lives. Between multiple stints in rehab, public mental breakdowns, entitled attitudes and arrogance, weird plastic surgery, and inexplicable clothing choices, they’re like a train wreck you can’t not watch. One of the most fascinating consequences of fame and fortune seems to be an inability to stay married.
These people seem to think that making it to two years means the marriage was a success, and now it’s time to split the $175 million estate and move on to something a little fresher, a little newer. But before they part company, somebody has to pay off the nanny to keep her from making a booty-load of money selling secrets to the tabloids about their scary parenting techniques and the fact that she’s been sleeping with Daddy for the past four years. Meanwhile, Mommy’s co-star has ditched his new wife for her, but too bad for him because Mommy has decided to take up with the 26-year-old UPS driver because he brings her expensive packages every day and he’s got six-pack abs.
It’s clear to me that Hollywood is desperately in need of a common-sense therapist to the stars. Someone has to tell these people that they’re doing it wrong. While they’re obviously well versed in weddings, they’re woefully short on any practical knowledge of marriage. I’m not sure where everyone is getting their marriage advice, but it’s bad. Bad.
Here’s what I imagine Mommy and Daddy Superstar are telling their young, future Hollywood Walk-of-Famer about marriage:
- Fight about everything. Nothing is too small or off-limits. After all, you’re the star in this relationship. If you give in, ever, you’ll be perceived as weak, which won’t serve you well in the divorce.
- The marriage should be just like the honeymoon. If, in a year, he isn’t treating you the same way he treated you on your honeymoon in Bora Bora, he’s lost interest and is probably sleeping with your sister. This won’t reflect well on you. Dump his ass.
- Don’t be afraid to threaten him with divorce if he doesn’t get back in line. Tape the Pre-Nup to the refrigerator door. Highlight the part that says he walks away with the clothes on his back if you are unhappy for any reason.
- If you don’t get at least half his crap during the divorce, sell your sex videos to the tabloids. You can always blame the slutty nanny.
- Never go to bed angry. Stay up and duke it out, no matter how ugly it gets. Lots of alcohol will make it easier to express your hostility. Remember to insult his dead grandmother’s alcoholic sister and her unemployed loser husband as often as possible. This will remind him not to mess with you.
- You should be having torrid, adventurous sex at least three times a week. Every night is better. He needs to be sexually exhausted at all times. You don’t want him all frisky and out on a film shoot with a leggy 20-year-old camera tech. He’ll get caught with her, naked in his trailer, and that just makes everything all messy.
- When in public, be “in love.” Celebrity power couples need to be seen as a couple. If you’re fighting, fake it. Remember, the paparazzi loves a public smackdown, but the public loves a love story. You’re an actress, dammit. Act.
- If your relationship is in trouble, have a baby. Preferably from your current hubs or a third-world country, and not the pool boy, but whatever gets the job done. Adorable baby girls swathed in Vera Wang are great for “Just chillin’ at home with the kids” photo ops, and the public eats that shit up. For all that day-to-day parenting crap that you won’t have time for, that’s why God invented nannies. But get an ugly one. It’s well documented that men are biologically incapable of resisting the nanny (see #4).
- Do not, under any circumstances, refer to each other as “Mom” and “Dad,” to your kids or to Winston, that ridiculous pot-bellied pig you two bought because it was trendy. At the end of the day, no man wants to sleep with Mom.
- He needs to understand that you have an extended family and he’s got obligations. Bring him over and make sure he knows he’s expected to befriend and help support anyone at the dinner table who needs it. Yes, that includes your trampy sister, your rehab-proof stepbrother, and of course, your mother, who slept with your last four boyfriends. (Can’t you just let that go? It wasn’t her fault. She’s got a condition.)
- It’s better to marry for money or career visibility than for love. Love fades. Money lasts forever, if you’re smart. And for God’s sake, always get married in a community-property state. I shouldn’t even have to tell you that.
- Learn to keep secrets from each other. The marriage could hit a rough patch too soon if he ever discovers you signed the Pre-Nup with your sister’s name, and that those three months you claimed to be overseas helping starving children in Rwanda, you were actually in rehab. Again. And does he really need to know that you have three plastic surgeons on speed dial because when you were in high school, you had thick glasses, a large mole on your chin, and a schnoz that could snort up a small puppy?
- If you’re feeling bored or restless, or Hubs isn’t paying enough attention to you, get out there and have a little fling. It’ll make you feel all girly and sexy again, and you can take all that forbidden energy back home to the hubs. Win-win.
Now let’s go buy you a wedding dress. Money is no object. We’ll use the orphan fund. They won’t mind, because, after all, you’re a star.
Life could have been much easier if my mother had followed this advice with her multiple husbands, but noooo, she walked with nothing every single time! duh.
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That sounds like she married for love, Barbara! Hollywood would have steering her differently, but the heart has a mind of its own! :)
I’m not sure it was all for love, but definitely lust.
OK. I’m sharing this but I had to first tell you I already adored you. If it’s possible I love you all the more now that you have revealed your subscription to Star.
Star is trashy. Star is fluff. I love love love my Star.
Thank God, Carla! I need some backup here! :)
Such a truth. I like my calm simple loving life.
I agree, Peggy! I need to be reminded from time to time that the “glamorous life” might not be all it’s reported to be! :)
While I don’t subscribe to any of the Hollywood magazines, I get my celebrity gossip fix every four weeks when I have my hair cut and colored. So I can’t ever stop coloring my hair. Thanks for my Monday morning chuckle, Vikki!
I know, Roxanne! I started subscribing to Star when I began to cut my own hair. Damn, I miss those free magazines! :)
oh man….so many of these are right on the knocker (or is it knockers in this case?) I am soooo over all the flash and grab sexy superstar marriages that implode 5 minutes after they start. It kind of makes me happy to be old, boring and married to the same guy for all these years!
Thank-you for this. Of course these are the lessons being taught! I really don’t understand how an attractive Nanny is still being hired in Hollywood? I mean we all got the memo.
Haralee, ya think? Geez, what Hollywood wife would hire a gorgeous Swedish nanny?? I mean, seriously? :)
Thanks, again, for the morning laugh. I try not to read about celebrities, but they’re wickedly attractive like a car wreck or a teenage horror movie or a pool boy in a thong. We shouldn’t notice, but we do.
You’re welcome, Elaine! I agree, they have some sort of freaky attraction, and I can’t resist articles titled “He’s sleeping with his tennis instructor, and she ran over his golf clubs. 13 times.” But then, I never claimed to read War & Peace. :)
Marriage Hollywood Style. You can always tell when someone is having marital trouble. There are stories all over the place about how great their marriage is. A couple weeks later, they file for divorce. Sad life. LOL!
Sheila, that’s SO true! Every time I hear Kim or Kanye praise their marriage, the next edition says he’s sleeping with his tennis instructor and she’s taking all of his gold chains and moving the babies to her mom’s. Again. :)
Hahahaha…when you become therapist to the stars, can I be your receptionist? I don’t really want to work or anything..I just want to eavesdrop.
I’m with you, Michelle! I’m not sure therapy would undo an entire childhood of obviously terrible advice, but it would be fun, wouldn’t it? :)
Hilarious and unfortunately so true! Somethings never change.
I know, Rena! I can always count on my Star magazine to remind me of that. Half the time anymore, I don’t even know the kids I’m reading about, but they’re just as crazy as their parents! :)
I’ve never known anyone who admits to subscribing to the Star! Fabulous. This was hilarious and just what I needed this morning! Sharing.
Thank you, Jennifer! As you can tell by reading my blog, there are very few things I’m afraid to admit. Hubs is, understandably, less excited about that than you are! :)
Ugh. Ugh. Ugh. Not the best messages. Except the sex part. I do espouse lots of sex. But it can’t always be adventurous and excellent. A low bar for lots of sex has helped my relationship.
“A low bar for sex.” You are HILARIOUS, Anna. I might have to borrow that one, but I promise to give you credit! :)
ha — well, i dont read Star, but I have had a subscription to People Magazine for about 20 years, so I can relate!
There were two types of literature my grandma kept at her side: the King James Bible and Star magazine. I see nothing wrong with this :)
Yes, the tabloid world can be riveting. And pictures deceive. The couples you think are happiest end up having the nastiest divorces. Still fascinating, though. Thanks for the reminder.