Subscribetkchrist: A little gallows humor, given the public nature of the person, is no more inhuman here than making a joke about the deaths of Abe Lincoln or Julius Caesar. Though there is no need to be cruel.I think the point being made by the chiders is that people give more respect and . symbols in response to the deaths of world leaders with war crimes and countless gallons of blood on their hands, than they do someone who was unremarkable but not mean, cruel, or destructive. There are no deformed or maimed children hobbling around Southeast Asia because of Anna Nicole Smith, for example.
As Vladimir Nabokov once said, "There is nothing more exhilarating than philistine vulgarity." If this is true, then "The Anna Nicole Show" is pretty damn exhilarating. ... Lacking in many significant personal relationships, Anna spends her days hanging out with her lawyer, Howard K. Stern; her personal assistant, Kim Walther; her 16-year-old son, Daniel; and her mood-stabilized poodle, Sugar Pie. So far, we have seen Anna stumbling around in a stupor, babbling incoherently, climbing in and out of bathtubs and getting her sizable ass stuck between a pair of narrow table legs. ...
Cheap, crass, deeply committed to unapologetic gawking, "The Anna Nicole Show" is to "The Osbournes'" what US Weekly is to People magazine. If "The Osbournes" humanized fame and made it seem familiar, "The Anna Nicole Show" deconstructs it and makes it seem monstrous. Tawdriness notwithstanding, this may be the more honest, and more valuable, view. At 34, her professional prime squarely behind her, Anna Nicole still clings to the same trailer park dream -- the one in which everything is pink and everybody loves her -- to her overall detriment and alienation.
Explain to me how, exactly, the state of simply "being a human" has some kind of intrinsic, respect-demanding property.No.
"I am very saddened to learn about Anna Nicole's passing. She was a dear friend who meant a great deal to the Playboy family and to me personally. My thoughts and prayers are with her friends and loved ones during this difficult time."And a blog post by the Playboy photo editor she worked with:
The turbulent life of Anna Nicole Smith ended today in a hotel room in Hollywood, Florida. Born in the tiny Texas town of Mexia, Vickie Smith (her first and real name) was a teen-age mother, waitress, short order cook, stripper, Playboy Playmate, Playboy’s Playmate of the Year, Guess Jeans model, actress, wife of an 89-year old oil tycoon, participant in an on-going battle over the tycoon’s estate after he died, overweight reality TV show star, svelte spokesperson for a weight loss program…all in a few short years.
Appropriately, her idol was Marilyn Monroe. Her face, even without makeup, was stunning. As she said herself, “I love the camera.” And it loved her. She appeared on four Playboy covers, in numerous Playboy pictorials, specials, calendars, etc. When George Marciano of Guess Jeans saw her photos in Playboy, he quickly made her his next Guess girl.
I met Anna Nicole on her Playmate set in our Santa Monica studio. At 5’11”, she looked every bit the movie star. She had that look—not just another great blonde but someone extraordinary. She was candid, funny, unpretentious. And she was so happy to be in LA. “I’m eager,” she said, “to be anywhere that isn’t Texas.”
Playboy readers loved Anna. We couldn’t give them enough of her. She was Playmate of the Year, the pictorial for which was photographed by fashion photographer Daniela Federici. We featured her several more times in pictorials…on the beach, in bed, in the bathtub. Her sexuality and her spontaneity always revealed themselves to the camera. Her exploits since Playboy have been well publicized.
And now she is suddenly gone, like with Marilyn and Jayne Mansfield, taken too quickly. Perhaps Billy Joel should write a sequel to his song “Only the Good Die Young” simply changing the last word to “Beautiful.” We’ll miss you, Vickie.
Born Vickie Lynn Hogan in 1967, Smith grew up in the small town of Mexia, Texas, where she eventually found employ as waitstaff at the town's befamed palace of poultry perfection, Jim's Krispy Fried Chicken. Whilst tendering her services, she came into contact with young Billy Wayne Smith (at sixteen, he was actually a year her junior)...Et bla bla cetera. Say what you will about the NY Times obit's snark quotient, it's Joyce, Hemingway, and Faulkner rolled into one by comparison: "The product of a hardscrabble Texas girlhood, Ms. Smith, at least in her mature years, was obtrusively voluptuous and almost preternaturally blonde." Now, that's a sentence.
Young Anna Nicole fulfilled a need to serve her country by working at a Wal-Mart. From that perch, she deigned to accept a spread in Hugh Hefner's publication Playgirlboy in 1992. She was Playmate of the Year in 1993. She only then officially adopted the name Anna Nicole Smith, a moniker composed of an opaque series of extremely personal allusions.
She consented to allow Guess? Jeans to use her as a model.
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posted by thirteenkiller at 12:54 PM on February 8, 2007