Jessica Simpson:Dumb blonde or savvy businesswoman

[EdwardKnoxII 0]

http://www.rollingstone.com/features/cover...en.asp?pid=2041

 

Portrait of a Living Doll

 

Dumb blonde or savvy businesswoman? You make the call

 

By Vanessa Grigoriadis

 

When there are five or six people crammed into your relatively small hotel room, it's common to pick up your underpants off the floor. But in the bathroom of this burgundy junior suite in midtown Manhattan, a pair of blue lace panties are crumpled almost under the heel of Jessica Simpson. Simpson, who is being tended to by fawning stylists, publicists and hair-extension experts, flicks a French-manicured nail over a fleck of mascara on her temple, the only blemish on a disturbingly perfect face. Then, in her drowsy, cat-in-the-sun-like way, she turns and looks for -- well, who she always looks for.

"Nick," she coos, training her coffee-colored eyes on her husband, Nick Lachey, who is intent on a ballgame and exhibits no sign that he has heard his name. "Nick, baby?" says Simpson. "Will you iron mah new shirt?"

 

"No," answers Lachey, in a typical knee-jerk bit of sarcasm, but just a minute later -- whipped mofo that he is -- he rises from the couch to retrieve the iron from a closet. As he walks to the bedroom, the cord slithers behind him and retracts with a sudden shump.

 

"That's a nifty little iron," says Simpson, smiling.

 

"All irons do that," declares Lachey. "It's not a new feature, my dear." He takes Simpson's new Gucci shirt, a black button-down, off its hanger. A price tag dangles from the collar.

 

"Two hundred and thirty-eight dollars!" exclaims Lachey.

 

"Just steam it," says Simpson.

 

"It's a fucking shirt!" he yells.

 

"I didn't buy it with your credit card!" cries Simpson. "I had budget, so why not? Record company gives you money for clothes, why not take it?"

 

"Mmm," grumbles Lachey. "They don't give me money."

 

With a relationship that is uncannily similar in real life to what you see on Newlyweds, their hit reality show on MTV, Simpson, 23, and Lachey, 29, seem alternately like a girl and her dad, a young couple working out the kinks and two people who should never have gotten married -- and probably wouldn't have, except that Simpson wouldn't have sex with Lachey until they did. Part of the reason that the show is a hit -- despite the fact that MTV did not have high expectations for it initially -- is because it's so hard to figure out whether Simpson is the most annoying person in the world and Lachey a saint for putting up with her or if Simpson is too much of a sweetheart for her own good and Lachey a hostile bastard who likes making fun of his wife. Then there's the schadenfreude of Simpson's nearly constant gaffes. Like, most famously, when she thought that Chicken of the Sea tuna is not tuna but, rather, chicken.

 

"My confusion there was that I hate fish," says Simpson. "But I love tuna, and there was a half of a second there where I thought maybe it could be chicken. 'Cause I liked it, and I don't like fish. Unless it's from Long John Silver's and deep-fried."

 

Tonight Simpson and Lachey are going on Larry King Live, the event for which the Gucci shirt was purchased. But now, though, they are late, and Simpson is no longer sure about the shirt. "Should I wear different clothes?" she asks anxiously.

 

"You look beautiful, baby," says Lachey.

 

"But should I wear different shoes?" asks Simpson, stamping a rhinestone Jimmy Choo. "I don't like my outfit!"

 

"C'mon, you're gorgeous," says Lachey. The publicists and stylists let loose with a flurry of accolades: "You're too beautiful for words," "What an outfit," "Who's prettier than you, Jessica?"

 

"I might smell bad," says Simpson.

 

"And this is different from other days how?" says Lachey, laughing.

 

"Nick!" exclaims Simpson. Then she throws her arms around his neck. "You know you think I smell scrumptious," she whispers, drawing him close. He puts a hand on her cheek, softly, and gives her a light kiss.

 

Before the premiere of "Newlyweds," in mid-August, Jessica Simpson was primarily known as the teen-pop star who was a virgin and wasn't Britney Spears, though she kind of looked like her. Four years ago, she sold almost a million units of her first single, "I Wanna Love You Forever," but it has been a downward slide since then. Though her first album, Sweet Kisses (1999), sold close to 2 million copies, her next efforts, Irresistible (2001) and In This Skin (2003) -- all a similar-sounding mix of passionate love ballads and junior-prom dance rock -- haven't done nearly as well.

 

In some ways, Simpson is as daft as she seems on the show, but she's also far savvier about her career and the nature of the record industry than one would think. "Everyone was always like, 'Who's Jessica Simpson?' 'Oh, she's like Britney and Christina,' " says Simpson. "It was so hard on me. Plus, I never had my own thing happening, so I felt like I had to do what they did, like, I had to show my stomach and dance. But that's not me. My dream is to be like Jewel, to sit on a chair in my bluejeans and sing my heart out."

 

What mostly differentiated Simpson from the teen-pop pack was her pledge of abstinence, made at a time when Britney Spears was saying the same thing but no one quite believed her. Simpson sold it, though. After all, she was a minister's daughter, a poor kid who moved seven times before she was eight as her father, Joe, sought work as a youth minister and therapist for abused kids in Baptist parishes around Dallas.

 

The Simpson home was open to any needy child in the neighborhood, so that in addition to Simpson and her younger sister Ashlee (who now plays Cecilia on the WB's 7th Heaven and recently began recording a rock album for Geffen Records), there were often other kids at the table -- an at-risk adolescent, a pregnant teen. Jessica herself, raised in this gospel of giving, says she loved nothing more than performing selfless acts of devotion -- as a child, she kept twenty-odd photos of missing children under her pillow, praying for them each night. When she was sixteen she tried to adopt a Mexican baby found in a Dumpster. (It's unclear, however, when she stopped picking up her towels from the floor.) Even today, Simpson remains involved in charity as international ambassador for Operation Smile, a reconstructive-surgery nonprofit. "With all the heartache in life, it changes a life to smile," she says. "And they don't even know it, because they don't know what we have."

 

At any rate, holding off from sex until marriage was just how Simpson was raised. On her twelfth birthday, her father gave her a purity ring, a silver band with a cross, to be replaced on her wedding day. "I told her that I would try my best to be the man in her life," says Joe Simpson, in a cadence eerily similar to a marriage vow. "That I would be her support and her security, that I would encourage her and worship her and fill her up until she found the man of her dreams."

 

What Simpson's father didn't specify was what role he would play once she found that man, namely Lachey, whom Simpson started dating when she was eighteen and married last fall. ("Nick was the first person to touch my body," says Simpson, gesturing from her neck downward, then making a swirling motion around her pelvic region. "Swear.") He was twenty-five, and she was, obviously, a very innocent eighteen, but they bonded over their third-class status in the music business: His group 98 Degrees found itself playing catch-up to the Backstreet Boys and 'NSync (the band is currently on hiatus; Lachey will release his first solo album, SoulO, in November). "So Nick and I really are a match made in heaven, because we understand each other," says Simpson.

 

But even after marriage, Simpson's life, which has been almost inhumanely sheltered, remains tightly interwoven with her parents'. Her father is her manager (he also has final cut on every episode of Newlyweds), and her mother, Tina, is her "best friend" and stylist. In their midforties, neither is the conventional church type -- Simpson's mom even talked her dad into getting an earring a couple of years back, and his hair is lightened to the same vibrant blond as Jessica's. One of them travels with her often, since she is afraid to get on a plane alone. When Lachey is not at home, she bunks at her parents', in Los Angeles' Studio City, forty minutes away. "We're Southern, and we're spiritual, and we're really close," says Joe, who didn't even have a problem commenting on Simpson and Lachey's sex life on Newlyweds.

 

"I think it's weird," says Lachey.

[Lil' Bitch 0]

I second dumb blonde.

[Slayer 0]

I'm not even gonna bother reading that whole thing

 

<puts big red 'X' in "Dumb blonde' box>

 

If she is a savvy businesswoman, then Anna Nicole is a fat female Einstein

[Guest hhheld_down]

dumbass blonde all the way

[1234-5678 0]

I'll go with "Savvy" just to be the oddball.

[kkktookmybabyaway 0]

Doesn't matter -- she has more money than everyone in this thread combined.

 

She's smart enough...

[1234-5678 0]

Doesn't matter -- she has more money than everyone in this thread combined.

 

She's smart enough...

Great point. Just the fact that we are talking about her proves that.

[Vern Gagne 0]

Both

[Guest FrigidSoul]

Doesn't matter -- she has more money than everyone in this thread combined.

 

She's smart enough...

Having money doesn't equal intelligence. Look at the Hilton sisters

 

 

Record companies saw a young hot piece of ass that could sing. If anything they're the intelligent ones.

 

No denying she's dumb...but I'd still hit it

[haVoc 0]

Doesn't matter -- she has more money than everyone in this thread combined.

 

She's smart enough...

I saw something on her this week that said she's 3 million in dept because her last/recent album has bombed. So, if this is true, then how the hell do they live the way they do? How does she still manage to have stylist, hair and make up people hanging all over her?

 

Also, if she has "only" sold about 2 million records, how did she get as rich as she did? I've heard bands say they didn't even start making money off albums until they sold about 2 million records.

[Slayer 0]

I saw something on her this week that said she's 3 million in dept because her last/recent album has bombed. So, if this is true, then how the hell do they live the way they do? How does she still manage to have stylist, hair and make up people hanging all over her?

If that's the case, they're gonna go the way of MC Hammer real soon

[DerangedHermit 0]

She's smart enough that she's milking it for what she's got.

[Nighthawk 0]

Doesn't matter -- she has more money than everyone in this thread combined.

 

She's smart enough...

I'm too lazy to do my whole spiel about money, but here's the end...

 

You know who's better than Van Gogh? Almost everybody, he made nothing!

[Guest Dave O'Neill, Journalist]

I add my name to the dumb blonde list

[Ravenbomb 0]

I add my name to the dumb blonde list

Ok. Hey, guys, Dave is a dumb blonde, too

[EdwardKnoxII 0]

Tuna Canner Sets Jessica Simpson Straight

(Tuesday, October 21 11:00 AM)

 

 

LOS ANGELES (Zap2it.com) - The quality of information usually improves the closer you get to its original source. It's a lesson pop star Jessica Simpson now understands.

Simpson finally received the full answer to the chicken-or-tuna question she famously posed in the premiere episode of MTV's "Newlyweds" when she visited executives of Chicken of the Sea Monday (Oct. 20). Executives at the San Diego-based company gave her the scoop.

 

"We wanted to bring her down and make sure she understood the difference, and told her the story of how the brand name originated," Don George, senior vice president of marketing for Chicken of the Sea, tells the AP. George also says he' be interested in having Simpson be a spokeswoman for the product.

 

 

The company was the first to can "light" tuna, in 1914, and wanted consumers to know that the fish had a less fishy taste (might this be the origin of "tastes like chicken" as well?). So it started marketing the brand as Chicken of the Sea.

Simpson understands the ridicule she's endured from her chicken/tuna gaffe and others on "Newlyweds," such as saying "I don't eat buffalo" when offered a buffalo wing. She tries not to let it affect her.

 

"I think it's fun," she says. "I've made a mess up on national television, and everyone has been giving me a hard time about it, but it's better just to sit back and laugh at yourself."

 

"I do have my ditzy moments."

[EdwardKnoxII 0]

This mini-movie is to funny. Are You As Dumb As Jessica Simpson? http://www.liquidgeneration.com/poptoons/n...ick_jessica.asp

[EdwardKnoxII 0]

http://channels.netscape.com/ns/tv/story.j...d=20030917NY114

 

Jessica Simpson, ABC Reach Sitcom Deal

 

 

LOS ANGELES (AP) - Jessica Simpson, the singer famous for dippy-blonde moments on her MTV reality show, has reached a deal with ABC to develop a comedy.

 

``Jessica has infectious energy and unmistakable star quality,'' ABC Entertainment President Susan Lyne said Friday. ``She also has a built-in fan base in both music and television, which is a great jumping off point for us.''

 

Simpson, 23, and her husband, Nick Lachey, also agreed to a second season of their reality show, ``Newlyweds: Nick & Jessica.''

 

The series made Simpson infamous for unintentional humor, including the time she confused the tuna she was eating for chicken.

 

``Is this chicken, what I have, or is this fish?'' she asked Lachey, 29, in the show's first episode. ``I know it's tuna, but it says 'Chicken by the Sea.'''

[Lightning Flik 0]

If she just got ABC to give her her own comedy, well, she must be quite savvy. Or the luckiest dumb blonde in the world.

 

I'd stick with the first one, because I'm scared of what would happen if she was the second one.

[EdwardKnoxII 0]

Or Jessica gives great head.

[EdwardKnoxII 0]

http://channels.netscape.com/ns/celebrity/...cel20031106.htm

 

MUSIC INSIDER: Nick & Jessica Rock Opera

 

It looks like Nick Lachey and Jessica Simpson are getting in on the joke by mocking their own marriage as seen on their MTV reality series, “Newlyweds."

At this year’s Billboard Awards, airing on Fox Dec. 3, America’s sweethearts are “doing a rock opera performance based on the issues in their married life as told on their show,” reveals Billboard Music Awards Show producer Bob Bain. “They’re going to be the opening performance,” he says.

 

Can you imagine -- we might be getting a song about whether Chicken of the Sea is actually fish or chicken. Or Jessica's refusal of a buffalo wing because "I don't eat buffalo" -- could that be turned into a production number? This could be some pretty funny stuff.

 

Bain just says "We're nearly finished" with preparation of the piece and leaves the details for viewers to find out for themselves.

 

The man behind Nickelodeon's Kids' Choice Awards and Fox's Teen Choice Awards, Bain says, "Awards shows are by nature boring. In my opinion, they should be looked at as the variety shows of the new millennium."

 

A Nick & Jessica rock opera certainly will be, um, different.

 

Regardless of how much people like making fun of Nick and Jessica, one can’t deny their sudden A-List status. At least MTV isn’t denying it, as the Lacheys have already signed on for season two of “Newlyweds,” set to premiere next year.

 

Marilyn Beck and Stacy Jenel Smith are featured on E!Online under the daily "Ask Marilyn" column and in monthly celebrity profiles and industry features.

[Guest Coffey]

No denying she's dumb...but I'd still hit it

This is the only correct answer.

 

Lock thread please.

[Slayer 0]

No denying she's dumb...but I'd still hit it

This is the only correct answer.

 

Lock thread please.

She's probably too dumb to even have sex, dur hur