Paula – I take it all back.

Remember how everybody used to accuse the former “American Idol” judge (but forever your girl) of getting a little overly familiar with the male auditioners and contestants? That she flirted a little too much, and in some cases picked her tiny self up and flung herself over her product placement Coke cup right into their very young arms?

Well, as wacky as Sister used to get, I don’t ever remember her asking a hopeful to take his shirt off. But that’s what Kara did in last night’s Denver episode, raising her inappropriateness with the Bikini Girl rivalry right into hideousness. It was supposed to be funny, when she and Posh Spice asked this kid with a blusey voice and a ponytail to take his hair down. But saying “Take your shirt off?” Sleazy. If Simon and Randy had said to some girl “Take your jacket off and let’s see the goods”….well, even if they wanted to they wouldn’t do that. Harrassment knows no gender, y’all. I…well…it was sorta gross.

Read the full story

Middle-aged spread. It happens – but not in Hollywood.

Or, at least, not to Hollywood actresses who want to remain sought-after stars.

Sex and The City‘s Kristin Davis, for instance, favors hiking and the elliptical machine to keep her 44-year-old bod camera-worthy, she tells Self magazine.

And it shows during the strip-to-your-undies moment on the beach in her new film, Couples Retreat.

Davis – sporting tiny, lacy unmentionables – more than holds her own against co-stars Malin Akerman, 31, Kristin Bell, 29, and Kali Hawk in that scene.

What about her male counterparts in the film?

Well, let’s just say Vince Vaughn and Jon Favreau – at 39 and soon-to-be 43 – look like a lot of other middle-aged guys we know … guys who’ve been no strangers to a good brewski and burger. They’ve let themselves go a tad since their Swingers days in 1996 – especially Vaughn.

That’s cool and their choice. Maybe they prefer relaxing and indulging instead of hitting the gym and scarfing salads. And it’s not like they’re hideous now – they’re still cute.

But it’s funny how it’s no problem for them to continue to be movie stars, flaunting their burly, naked torsos across America’s cineplexes. Can you image a female celeb being accepted in the same physical condition? She’d be ripped to shreds.

Makes me wonder: When will we be seeing extreme close-ups of men’s dimpled thighs in our supermarket checkout line? Think Star magazine will be coming out with the male version of its “55 Best and Worst Beach Bodies” issue anytime soon?

 Loading ...

I was in the mood for a silent movie last night – a mood that probably strikes more than is entirely healthy – so I popped in “Exit Smiling,” a lovely little MGM picture from 1926 that Warnerarchive.com has put out. It’s one of the exceedingly rare screen appearances of Beatrice Lillie, who completely justifies her reputation in this comedy about a third rate theatrical troupe.

How crummy are they? The leading lady is a drunk, and the leading man is Franklin Pangborn, every bit as swishy at the beginning of his career as he was later on. There’s lots of endearing behavioral detail, well-directed by Sam Taylor, but it’s Lillie’s performance that drives the movie.

She was only two years past a New York debut that earned her lasting fame, and what struck me on seeing the picture was how very Chaplinesque her performance is – the fact that she has a long and very funny comedy sequence opposite Harry Myers, later the drunk millionaire of Chaplin’s “City Lights,” didn’t hurt.

Her movements are graceful and rhythmic, even when she’s breaking things, she does a couple of those quizzical moues that Chaplin used to do, and the keynote of the performance is her character’s refusal to be humiliated or downcast. This indefatigibility is funnier in a woman than it is in a man, especially when it’s done by a woman who’s not classically attractive. Lillie’s soigne manner makes her a Norma Shearer with a sense of humor, rather than the more clownish Carol Burnett.

Despite the title, the film ends on a down note, as Lillie’s character is dumped by the man she loves. It’s the only strange, sour note in a movie that is otherwise 77 minutes of pure pleasure.