A Most Delightful Idiocy

The quite frequently hilarious blog Immoderation has inspired me. They've run a column on six celebrities who should have absolutely no place being famous. It's a star-studded affair, including Star Jones, Ashlee and Jessica Simpson and, coming in at number one, Mr. Demi Moore himself...Ashton Kutcher.

The list itself is very funny. This is the entire entry for #5, Leelee Sobieski:

Lee Lee has quite an established film career, starring in such blockbusters as Joy Ride and Here On Earth. In her spare time she enjoys talking like a man, going to events that celebrities seem to go to, and singing her own name. Leelee Sobieski ladies and gentlemen.

But while I agree with the spirit of the endeavor, I think Lindsey of Immoderation and I have very different views on what makes a celebrity worthwhile. I like my famous people, particulary if they are involved in reality television, to be as outrageously clueless and/or stupid as possible. That makes them more entertaining.

Oh, sure, there are smart celebrities whose work I genuinely value and enjoy. Guys like Dave Chappelle and Chris Rock, David Cross and Patton Oswalt, Jack Nicholson and Steven Spielberg, Martin Scorsese and Crispin Glover, and many many many many more. (Yeah, I threw Crispin Glover in there...what of it?)

But you need to have half-insane dimwits in there too, just to keep things interesting. Celebrities are fun because we elevate them to this level of immense importance and unthinkably high status, and then we expect them to behave just like everyone else.

So, with that in mind, I'm proud to present my list of the Top 6 Most Delightfully Insipid Celebrity Morons. Oh, man, this is going to be fun.

Now, remember, this is not "Biggest Celebrity Asshole." We all know who would win that contest on this blog, right? I don't even need to go there...Okay, his first name starts with a Z, and his last name rhymes with the sound my digestive tract makes whenever I even think about his hit sitcom or popular 2004 indie film.

This is Most Delightfully Insipid Celebrity Morons. It's, like, totally different.

6. Sir Charles Barkley



You've got to love this guy because he's on TV all the time, constantly, and he's unable to put together a coherent sentence. The guy's a paid television commentator and he communicates on the level of a 6 year old. And not even a clever 6 year old who reads ahead of the rest of his class. The kind of slightly-below-average 6 year old who walks around constantly with popsicle stains on his overalls.

My roommate Chris related a story about Sir Charles that I will share with you. He was at a celebrity golf tournament where Barkley was playing. Charles flirtatiously taunted a female competitor with the following remark:

"You better bring me some bunion, because my feet are tired from kicking your butt."

So, we learn two things from this quote. First, Charles Barkley does not know the meaning of the term "bunion." Two, even though he probably realizes on some level that he doesn't know the meaning of the term "bunion," he goes ahead and uses it in an insult anyway because, after all, he is Charles Barkley.

5. Jonathan Antin



This guy is a real treasure. I first saw him on a hilarious episode of "Da Ali G Show," in which Sasha Cohen's fashionista character Bruno bonded with Beverly Hills hairstylist Antin over the observation that evil guys tend to have moustaches. Seriously, cause like, Saddam Hussein and Hitler...think about it...

Then they gave him his own reality show on Bravo where he gets to torment his attentive hairdressing staff about inane, petty bullshit. Whatever producer made that call...you, sir, are a genius. Jonathan Antin with a camera crew around him and an inflated sense of authority makes those aforementioned dictators look like Jeff Lebowski.

4. Bono



Bono's done a few good things. He's always telling people that Africans are starving, which people apparently need to hear, even though I've known there are starving Africans since I was a child and nothing ever seems to actually happen to get them some food. Maybe, instead of constantly alerting heads of state to the deplorable conditions in Africa, Bono should just make a pizza run or something. I mean, it won't solve the whole problem, but you've got to start somewhere, right? (I am aware, as well, that he works a lot to raise money to help AIDS victims in Africa, but it's a lot harder to make light of Africans dying of AIDS than dying of starvation for some reason, in my desensitized, sick Western mind).

Basically, I just hate this guy because he's so into being an international celebrity. Starting with the "Achtung Baby" album (which is, I'll admit, a pretty great rock album), he just started buying into all of his own lame bullshit, and ever since he's this obnoxious rock god caricature, loping around in tight leather pants trying to get Boutros Boutros Ghali to take him seriously. What the hell? Just go back to writing songs. Actually, you know what, I've heard that "Vertigo" crap. Don't even bother with the songs. Just get out of my face, and get some of those starving kids some Lunchables, for fuck's sake.

I mean, look at that photo...what an ass. He'd do well to heed this advice from the helpful blogger over at Random Acts of Violence.

3. Tara Reid
If Tara Reid didn't exist, we'd surely have to invent her. At first, she was famous for being the hot girl in the American Pie movie. Then it was for dating noted automaton Carson Daly, who moved up from being a drive-time Los Angeles DJ to the leading personality on MTV, despite having all the charisma of...well, of a drive-time Los Angeles DJ. Now, she's famous for getting plastered and having her surgically decimated boobs fall out of her top.

I mean, those Immoderation girls can say whatever they want...That's an excellent reason to be famous. I mean, Meryl Streep, so what, you've made a few movies? You ever get shitfaced at Puff Daddy's New Year's Eve Party and wind up exposing yourself to the paparazzi? Actually, the best part about that whole incident was that, after her publicist came over and alerted her that her deformed breast was visible, she got angry at the photographers. As if they had revealed her bosom through a force of sheer will.

2. Donald Trump



Trump is such a ridiculous, preening bloward caricature, you almost think it can't be real. That it must be some sort of character, an act he puts on in public to get attention. If he hadn't been famous before "The Apprentice," and that show was America's first introduction to the man, no one would beleive he really existed. They'd think Trump was really brilliant character actor Gary Oldman in one of his patented chameleon-like disguises.

But no, this is really his personality. He genuinely thinks a penthouse constructed entirely of pink marble and gold fixtures is classy, as opposed to gauche enough to make Kevin Federline dismiss him as nouveau riche. He's keenly interested in the future of the beauty pageant industry. He's constantly depicted on his TV show tooling around in a private helicopter despite the fact that the entire series takes place on an island you can walk across in half an afternoon. And come on, people, he had Craig in the Final Four! What's wrong with this guy?

1. Ashlee Simpson



I want to have a million of Ashlee Simpson's babies. She is the most clueless and therefore adorable person alive. Friends of mine will know that I'm not embellishing my adoration for Ashlee in any way, shape or form for the entertainment or reading pleasure of my blog audience. This shit is for real.

Ashlee's MTV show was like a revelation. She is so shallow, her shallowness actually kind of transforms before your eyes into a great depth. She's so dumb, it's almost Zen.

What I love most about Ashlee is how she assumes that wealth and fame are owed to her, and gets genuinely agitated whenever anything threatens to take her fantastical success away. When the recording of her debut album didn't go well, she was heard to complain that she had given up a successful film career just to do this stupid major-label rock album, so why shouldn't they do it exactly the way she wanted? When her "Saturday Night Live" lip synching incident shocked and appalled the nation, she responded by getting snippy whenever reporters brought it up (after initially blaming her band). When European reporters insist on asking actual questions rather than just setting up her canned answers, she quickly turns hostile. Don't these guys realize that she really wants to be famous and popular? Can't they be good enough to respect that?

Again, I come here not to bag on Ashlee but to praise her. You might think she has it made, that her life is remarkably pleasant and easy, but it's got to be really grueling to be this vapid. There's always the danger that a stray thought might accidentally enter her head, maybe questioning the ultimate purpose of spewing nonsensical rhyming couplets to a delighted throng of 9 year old girls, and what would she do then, huh? Keep right on shopping for handbags with her equally inane girlfriends? Well, yeah, probably...