Fan Fare

Hey Mel (Gibbons), we got your picture right here!

Celebrity news website Radaronline.com on Friday dropped its latest bomb on Mel Gibson when it published a picture of a chip-toothed Oksana Grigorieva, who claims Gibson is responsible for her damaged front teeth. The two are locked in a bitter legal battle revolving around the custody of their daughter, and in the past week Radar has been publishing audio tapes of Gibson ranting at Grigorieva.

While the tapes sound like Gibson, there has been no formal confirmation it is him, and we can’t vouch for the authenticity of the photo, either. But they are all up on the Radar site, if you want to see. And whether authentic or not, they’ve helped turn up the heat on Mel.

But we received picture of a different Mel, and he has been getting a lot of attention in recent days, too. It seems this other Mel is a monkey — or rather a gibbon, which is a member of the family of apes — but his name is close to the famous “Braveheart” actor.  They call him Mel Gibbons at the Turtle Back Zoo in West Orange, New Jersey, where he is kept — for now (we’ll get back to that in a minute). Zoo director Dr. Jeremy Goodman said Mel (that’s him in the photos)  gets a lot of attention at the zoo for his nearly famous name and for his personality. “He’s been one of the most popular animals at the zoo. He definitely shows off and is definitely an entertainer. But he’s never gone on a rant or rave, fortunately. He’s a good boy,” Goodman said.

Alas, Turtle Back will soon be losing Mel Gibbons. Goodman said he will soon be relocated to a new zoo, in Texas, at the recommendation of the American Association of Zoos. It seems it’s time for Mel to find a mate, and so, the staff at Turtle Back is preparing to ship him off to live with a female gibbon.

Goodman is quick to point out that there are no behavioral issues with Mel Gibbons and, we think, that is a good thing for his new mate.

Mel Gibson: We heard the tapes, too.

We heard the tapes, too. And they are not good. Mel Gibson (if, in fact, the voice on the tapes is his, and it sounds a lot like him) comes across angry, irrational, foul-mouthed and exhausted from ranting at his former girlfriend and the mother of his infant daughter.

If you don’t know what we’re talking about, in the past few months, the “Braveheart” Oscar winner has been caught up in a pitched legal battle over the failed relationship with his ex-girlfriend Oksana Grigorieva, and has filed a restraining order against the other. But in the past two weeks, the publishing of audiotapes by celebrity website Radaronline.com has raised the stakes in the legal skirmishing and threatened to hurt Gibson’s career — maybe even ruin it. On the tapes, a voice said to be Gibson hurls expletives and racial slurs at a woman who is purportedly Grigorieva. You can read about the first tape with the racial slur here. A second tape was posted by Radaronline.com on Monday.

The tapes, Gibson’s anger, and his use of a racial slur in the initial tape have become news because of Gibson’s use of anti-semitic slurs when he was arrested for drunken driving in 2006. Gibson, of course, apologized for that outburst and paid his price in the court system. Where the latest tapes are concerned, representatives for Gibson, so far, have declined to comment, citing pending litigation. But Hollywood is talking, mostly about whether his career can survive another round of bad publicity. One of our colleagues at The Hollywood Reporter wrote about the subject here.

Mel did bounce back from the negative press in 2006, making a movie “Edge of Darkness” that hit screens in January (read our story about his return here), but it earned only $80 million at global box offices. There’s no doubt he has not reclaimed major star status. His agent dumped him last week (read that here). Still, he has another film, “The Beaver,” that is now in post-production and will soon be in theaters. So, the question is, will anyone go see it? Or, put another way, is it time for Mel Gibson to hang up his Hollywood star?

Mel Gibson finds comeback going tough

(Note strong language in quote, paragraph 4)

The art of the come-back should never be underestimated — especially if you’re Mel Gibson.

Gibson, back on the big screen after an eight-year  absence, is having a tough time fielding the inevitable questions about his infamous drunken anti-Semitic outburst in 2006.

After keeping a mostly low, public profile since that arrest, the “Mad Max” star has been on the media circuit promoting his new kidnap thriller “Edge of Darkness” — and trying to keep a smile on his face.

But the facade cracked in an interview with Chicago TV station  WGN when Gibson ended an uncomfortable chat with reporter Dean Richards by calling him an “asshole” as he signed off, apparently not realizing his microphone was still on.

Richards had asked Gibson, whose split last year from his wife, his new girlfriend and baby have also put him on the cover of gossip magazines,  whether he thought public perception had changed after “all that’s been in the news about you.”

“That’s almost four years ago, dude. I’ve moved on. I guess you haven’t,” snapped Gibson.  “It is a while back and I’ve done the necessary mea culpas. Let’s move on, dude. Come on.”

Mel Gibson shoots music video for girlfriend

Mel Gibson just released his latest movie. Well, actually, it’s a music video he directed for his pregnant 39-year-old girlfriend, Russian singer/pianist Oksana Grigorieva. 

“Say My Name” is the first video from her upcoming debut album, “Beautiful Heartache,” which will be released through Gibson’s Icon Records label. The clip can be downloaded from her Web site, along with a new track “Flying Upside Down.”

Gibson shot the video in Mexico, opting for black-and-white “to reflect the mourning of something irreplaceable that was lost,” according to Grigorieva. “Its spare nature emphasizes the voice, the piano and its heart.”

“Flying Upside Down,” on the other hand, is an upbeat pop tune, although the lyrical content is also heavy. The song “is about difficult choices we have to make, the path we take and the brave faces we adopt in order to go on,” she said. 

Grigorieva and Gibson started working together in 2008, after Gibson had split from his wife, Robyn. (They are currently in divorce proceedings.) ”She can play,” Gibson, 53, admiringly told Jay Leno last month. “She was trained in Russia. Rachmaninoff, there’s very few people who are man enough for Rachmaninoff.”

Obama’s top aide comes with Hollywood connection

Barack Obama’s first appointment as U.S. president-elect comes with an inside-Hollywood connection.  His newly chosen White House chief-of-staff-to-be, Illinois congressman Rahm Emanuel, is the older brother of Ari Emanuel, a founding partner of the A-list, Beverly Hills-based talent-management firm Endeavor.

So colorful and well-known a showbiz figure has he become that he inspired the character of the sly Hollywood agent Ari Gold, played by Jeremy Piven, on the HBO series “Entourage.” The role has earned Piven two Emmy Awards.

The younger Emanuel broke away from the talent agency ICM in 1995 to help start Endeavor, which has since grown into one of the leading deal-brokers in the entertainment industry with a client roster that includes Matt Damon, Ben Affleck, Jude Law, Hugh Jackman, Christian Bale, Adam Sandler and Steve Carell. Among the stars he personally represents are Larry David, Michael Moore, Sacha Baron Cohen and Mark Wahlberg.      

Having grown up in suburban Chicago, Ariel “Ari” Z. Emanuel is the youngest of three brothers — Ezekiel , an oncologist and bioethicist, and Rahm, a former aid to President Bill Clinton who later was elected to the House of Representatives from Illinois and became a confident of Obama. Ari Emanuel, too, has been active in Hollywood political circles, hosting fundraisers for Democratic candidates that included a $2,300-per-plate event for Obama during his presidential campaign.

Their father is a Jerusalem-born pediatrician who was active in the pre-independence Israeli underground, and their mother was a social activist and onetime Chicago-area nightclub proprietor.

In 2006 Ari Emanuel made headlines when he publicly condemned actor-director Mel Gibson for making anti-Semitic remarks at the time of his arrest for drunken driving. Emanuel called then on others in Hollywood to show their outrage by ”professionally shunning” Gibson.