Culture

Celebrities React to Earthquake Caused by Old Gods They'd Displeased

Today in celebrity gossip:  Celebrities tweeted about an earthquake, former Two and a Half Men star Angus T. Jones grew a huge beard, and Courtney Love found the missing Malaysia Airlines plane.

By Price Peterson
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This article is from the archive of our partner .

Today in celebrity gossip:  Celebrities tweeted about an earthquake, former Two and a Half Men star Angus T. Jones grew a huge beard, and Courtney Love found the missing Malaysia Airlines plane.

Every few weeks the Old Gods who dwell in the glowing caverns beneath Los Angeles grow angry at a lack of virgin sacrifices and make their discontent known by rattling the very earth beneath our feet. Those of us who live in Los Angeles may have accepted this reality but that doesn't make a violently wobbling flatscreen TV any less alarming! Fortunately, as in all other ways, we are able to process our thoughts and feelings through celebrity proxies. Like us, they did not enjoy the Old Gods' wrath either! Us Weekly compiled a ton of celebrity Tweets about yesterday's 4.4-magnitude earthquake in Westwood, CA. Most of them are boring, don't worry (Kaley Cuoco: "That was way too scary..."). But on the upside it WAS a good exercise in celebrities laying bare some of their darkest thoughts and fears. For example, the earthquake caused Nicki Minaj to "re-evaluate" her entire life. Kim Kardashian expressed the fear that she had imagined the earthquake entirely: "Anyone else feel it?" Evan Rachel Wood used the occasion to spoil the twist ending of a very good movie: "My house shook like when the jet engine falls on donnie darko." But for my money the best celebrity reaction was Paris Hilton's:

Yep, just a casual reference to an "already scary nightmare" that Paris had been having.  I guess I'd just imagined that when she closes her eyes at night she experiences a blurry white static for eight hours only to then wake up and experience a blurry white static for sixteen more hours. Guess not! What do you think a Paris Hilton nightmare entails? Having to raise four obese children and trying to work a vacuum cleaner? Being chased through a hedge maze by Mary-Kate Olsen? Or maybe it's hours and hours of flaming skulls screaming, just screaming right in Paris Hilton's face? The imagination truly soars. [Us Weekly]

Hey, remember when Mia Farrow's daughter Dylan Farrow wrote an open letter to the NY Times detailing the ways in which Woody Allen had sexually abused her as a child, and in the process called out a baker's dozen actresses who have worked closely with him? It only happened about six weeks ago, but in Internet time that was like a whole other geological era. Anyway, one of the actresses Farrow guilt-shamed was frequent Allen collaborator Scarlett Johansson, and as luck would have it, Scarlett Johansson has movies to promote and thus interviews to grant and thus ill-considered soundbytes to bestow! In an interview with Guardian U.K., the actress made it clear that she hadn't given much thought to the controversy but the little thought she had given left her with something approaching resentment toward Farrow and others who would criticize Woody Allen.

I think it's irresponsible to take a bunch of actors that will have a Google alert on and to suddenly throw their name into a situation that none of us could possibly knowingly comment on. That just feels irresponsible to me.

Johansson raises a good point. Celebrities' Google alerts should NOT be gummed up with frivolous news stories involving other peoples' molestation charges. You know? Some things are sacred. But her weirdly under-considered opinions on the subject didn't end there! What about the backlash against Allen himself? Was Scarlett Johansson aware of it?

I'm unaware that there's been a backlash. I think he'll continue to know what he knows about the situation, and I'm sure the other people involved have their own experience with it. It's not like this is somebody that's been prosecuted and found guilty of something, and you can then go, 'I don't support this lifestyle or whatever.' I mean, it's all guesswork.

See, this is a lot like the time O.J. Simpson was acquitted for murder and everybody in society just sort of accepted it and welcomed him back with open arms. Who were WE to judge? All that evidence was very circumstantial. Just too much guesswork for any of us to draw conclusions. Anyway, the interview's a good one in general because the dialogue then moves onto Scarlett Johansson's OTHER big controversy involving her sponsorship deal with SodaStream for which she had to step down from her OxFam ambassadorship on the grounds that SodaStream is currently violating THE GENEVA CONVENTION by maintaining a production facility in the West Bank. But again, Johansson holds firm-ish to her beliefs while also sort of complaining about having to be bothered with defending herself: "I was literally plunged into a conversation that's way grander and larger than this one particular issue." Leave Scarlett Johansson's Google alert alone! [Us Weekly]

It's nothing new for disgruntled Scientologists to put their former church on blast with allegations of corruption, abuse, and general insanity, but lately there's been a newer trend of actual celebrities (i.e. people we CARE about) doing that. Arguably director Paul Haggis was one of the first big Hollywood defectors, and of course there was Leah Remini's big turn last year. Now we can add to that list Jason Lee's ex-wife Carmen Llywelyn, who while not particularly famous herself, certainly experienced that next-level treatment while married to Lee in the late-90s: "Since I was in the ‘celebrity’ circle of the hierarchy, I can tell you with certainty, the big abuses were hidden from me." Llywelyn's apparently fed up with harassment she's faced from the Church lately and has taken to both Twitter and Instagram to attack Scientology and even Jason Lee himself:

I don’t hate you #JasonLee. Truth be known, I actually wish we could be friends. But this abuse isn’t comedy. Not art. And I know you know… Jason Lee I’ll never mention your name again if you acknowledge the [Scientology Office of Special Affairs and the #scientology handlers use my PC folder to harass me.

That last part entails a common complaint against Scientology about how Church operatives goad members into confessing their darkest secrets only to then use those secrets against members who threaten to leave. As usual, the Church of Scientology responded to these allegations with personal attacks: "It goes without saying that, based on her own comments, this source is unreliable, highly biased and appears to be a bit 'off.'" And while it's true that Llywelyn's social media accounts are, uh, passionate, it's also pretty riveting reading. Your move, Nicole Kidman. [Radar]

While we're on the subject of fringe celebrity spiritualism, let's check in on Angus T. Jones, the titular Half Man from Two and a Half Men! You may recall he was once the highest-paid child actor in history who went on to leave his hit show in 2012 after revealing himself to be a born-again Christian who felt the sitcom was "filth." So what's he up to now? He's still very devout, but more importantly he is VERY bearded. Us Weekly has a video of Jones discussing his experiences since leaving the show, which includes becoming a student, living in Colorado, and "working with the World Harvest Outreach Church in Houston." But seriously, look at that beard. [Us Weekly]

The world may finally be able to breathe a sigh of relief, as the ongoing IRL nightmare mystery of the disappeared Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 has been solved by none other than Courtney Love! Please sit down and be wowed by the former Hole frontwoman's incontrovertible evidence as to the whereabouts of that ill-fated plane:

It's not clear if the U.S. Government will hire Courtney Love as a full-time international mystery solver, but she deserves it and more importantly WE deserve it.

This article is from the archive of our partner The Wire.