The long, distinguished line of British nobility, dating all the way back to the days of William the Conquerer, must be rolling over in their various graves this Halloween. Recent news from London indicates that soccer star David Beckham may soon be named a knight of the realm — Sir David Beckham, to you. All of which is fine and dandy, except when you realize one thing — this knighthood would inevitably result in the creation of Lady Victoria Beckham!

I know, you are probably screaming right this minute, just like I was when the realization dawned on me. Posh Spice as Lady Victoria Beckham? I don’t think the world is ready for this. This is more of an affront to civilized society than anything that Paris Hilton and Lindsay Lohan have done. Far more. Victoria Beckham is completely and utterly lacking in any kind of class at all. She is totally devoid of taste, decorum, bearing — all of those qualities which are required in at least microscopic amounts for membership in Britain’s upper-crust realm. Even Charles and Camilla, in the depths of their tampon scandal, had a bit more class than Victoria Beckham. This cannot be allowed to go forward.

I hope that the British Prime Minister’s office, or whoever comes up with the list of nominees for a knighthood, comes to their senses and withdraws Beckham’s name. Once he is knighted, it cannot be undone. We’ll be stuck with Lady Victoria Beckham for ever. It will turn into a media event that will eclipse Brad and Angelina’s invasion of Namibia. Victoria Beckham will become, in a word, insufferable.

And don’t forget — if this Halloween nightmare comes to pass, Lady Beckham’s good friend Katie Holmes will experience a jealousy that knows no bounds. And God only knows what Tom Cruise will do to make it up to Katie. He’ll probably buy a small Central European country and install Katie as queen. Lady Victoria and Queen Katie. Is this what 2007 may have in store for us all?

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Posted on October 31st 2006 and posted to Tom Cruise, Katie Holmes, Spice Girls, Victoria Beckham, David Beckham, CELEBRITY BABY NAMES | Comments(1)

Somtimes, there is despairingly little to say about some celebrity births. And so it is with newborn Francesca Nora Bateman. Little Francesa (the name is simply the Italian, feminine version of the Latin name Franciscus, which means, roughly, “from France,”) arrived with minimal fanfare on October 28. Mom and Dad, as the headline indicates, are the actors Jason Bateman and Amanda Anka. You probably know Bateman from Fox’s Arrested Development, and perhaps you know Amanda Anka from occasional appearances on Buffy The Vampire Slayer. Or not.

In its annoucement of the birth, People had so little to say that they stuffed the story with sentences like “the couple live in Los Angeles, close to Bateman’s sister, Justine, who starred in the 80’s sitcom Family Ties.”

The only other thing of note in this fodder for a slow celebrity news day is the fact that Amanda Anka is the daughter of celebrated (by some) lounge crooner Paul Anka.

Where is Lindsay Lohan when you need her?

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Posted on October 30th 2006 and posted to CELEBRITY BABIES, CELEBRITY BABY NAMES | Comments(0)

After what seemed, at least to Holly Marie Combs fans, to be the longest pregnancy on record, she finally gave birth yesterday to a baby boy. Combs, who starred in Charmed on The WB for 8 seasons, and husband David Donoho, finally welcomed their son Riley Edward, according to People.

It was initially thought that Combs was expecting a baby in September. When the little one failed to appear, fan sites and celebrity watchers moved the date to October. But when young Riley arrived on Thursday, Donoho told People that “he has hair like Elvis - a full head of black hair. The doctor said he came out looking like a two-year old.”

Well, that explains everything. It looks to me like he was actually due in September, 2005, but stayed in utero for an extra 13 months or so. Technically, that would put him at exactly two years old, just like the doctor said, counting from conception. Maybe 8 seasons of messing around with all that witchcraft stuff on Charmed has had more of an effect on Combs than has been previously thought. We could be witnessing the world’s first 24 month pregnancy. I imagine Riley will be taking his first steps by this weekend, and ready to go Trick-or-Treating by Halloween.

But I digress. This blog is supposed to be about celebrity baby names, not their gestational issues. Riley, according to Baby Names Garden, is of Old English origin, meaning “rye-clearing.” So we can be pretty sure that the name wasn’t chosen because of its original meaning. I guess Combs and Donoho just liked it. Myself, I think there’s more going on with the initials: R.E.D. Isn’t that some kind of wizard thing?

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Posted on October 27th 2006 and posted to CELEBRITY BABIES, CELEBRITY BABY NAMES | Comments(9)

It’s Friday. It’s the end of the week. It’s a slow day for those of us whose blogs focus on esoteric niche topics like celebrity baby names. Even the celebrities seem to have stopped having babies for a day or so.

I thought I’d idle away a few minutes with a quick tour of the Celebrity Gossip Jungle:

First stop, Glitterati Gossip. I love this site. Main reason — whoever is writing it actually writes. Today’s top story is about Katie Holmes tapping fashion arbiter Victoria “Posh” Beckham for help with her wedding wardrobe. The post fairly drips with irony. Way more interesting than gossip sites that regurgitate stale stories about this star’s new dress or that star out walking their dog, yada, yada, yada.

Next stop, a site where I have to be careful of what I say, so as to adhere to my stated policy of non-vitriolic writing: Baby Razzi. Notice I didn’t even give them a link? That’s because of their philosophy of how they harvest images from around the web (and I’m quoting from their site):

babyrazzi.com finds photos and images that are taken from the web and therefore believed to be in the public domain.

Huh? Interesting definition of “public domain” there. It’s on the web, so it’s free for the taking. Some of us pay for our images, or at least use something from Creative Commons. No matter what the image is, somebody created it, therefore it is their work. I know I get pretty mad when I see people stealing my work without as much as a nod, never mind an outright request. Don’t know why photographers would feel any different.

Maybe it’s time for bloggers who work in the celebrity journalism space to form some kind of association, like the National Press Association. It could be called CBGB’s — the Clandestine Band of Gossip Bloggers. Now that the New York rock mecca is closed, maybe the acronym is up for grabs. It could  establish standards for its members, like ‘no taking other people’s images without permission,” and a commitment to at least “one original post out of five per week”. And then the group could start negotiating as a block with some of those advertisers out there, so bloggers could be getting a bit more in advertising revenue…

Wow, major digression there. That’s Fridays for you.

On to Defamer, a gossip blog whose very tag line:

LA is the world’s cultural capital. This is the gossip rag it deserves.

tells you immediately that you may have arrived at the gossip blog to end all gossip blogs — let the irony begin, let the sarcasm drip. Gotta love it. Where else can you consistently find such great headlines as:

Great Moments in Contextual Advertising: If it Burns, They Can Sell it

Cate Blanchett Graciously Feigns Hysterics at Brad Pitt ‘Babel’ Set Antics

The writing inside the posts is every bit as good as the headlines. Defamer is a masterwork of the true gossip genre.

Over to Teddy & Moo’s Place: they’re not real big on the writing here, like a lot of blogs (maybe they should be renamed phogs) it’s the images that take center stage. But at Teddy & Moo’s, it works — the images are big, bold, and in your face. If it’s pics you want, it’s the place.

Celebrity Smack. Funny, very sarcastic. Tag line: “The Celebrity Gossip Blog That Refuses To Kiss Ass.” My kind of site!

Celebrity Buzz. A softer touch, more mellow, but with a sharp bite. (A recent post: “To email (Rush) Limbaugh and tell him what a dick he is, click here”).

The Blog You Love To Hate. Witty, caustic, and unapologetic. On Monday, called Katie Holmes “a greedy fashionista.” Cool.

Celluloid and Vinyl. Celebs who get on the wrong side of this blog end up on the cutting room floor. Sharp, funny writing, very irreverent, (as opposed to just “irreverent”) and great, original graphics. (Don’t tell Baby Razzi).

I’m Not Obsessed. Another funny and caustic blog, and not afraid to post really large photos of stars’ faces, really close up. (Like this one of Jennifer Aniston).

Golly, where has the time gone? My “few minutes” have turned into an hour, and my quick tour of the celebrity gossip jungle must come to a screeching stop. It’s been a lot more fun than I anticpated. Maybe I should make this a regular Friday thing — a quick tour of the Celebrity Gossip Jungle. It gives me something to do when there are no new celebrity babies to blog about. And as Juvenal said, “who will watch the watchers?”

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Posted on October 27th 2006 and posted to Katie Holmes, Spice Girls, CELEBRITY BABIES, Victoria Beckham, Jennifer Aniston, CELEBRITY GOSSIP, CELEBRITY BABY NAMES | Comments(1)

Heisman Trophy winner and Arizona Cardinals quarterback Matt Leinart, and USC women’s basketball star Brynn Cameron, scored big on October 24, when Cameron gave birth to their baby boy, Cole Cameron Leinart.

Rumor has it that college football and basketball scouts have already pencilled-in the address of the sporting couple’s California home, getting an early start on the chance to sign up the kid with the hottest sports genes in America.

Leinart used to knock around with Paris Hilton, according to People, but these days he is busy with less incendiary activities, such as the Matt Leinart Foundation, through which the former USC football icon helps raise money for underprivileged and disabled children. Now that’s a worthy cause, so I’m not going to make any more funny jokes about Leinart and Cameron. But would some kind web designer please go to the Matt Leinart Foundation website and create at least a webpage for him? Note to Matt: that’s pretty lame for a foundation webpage. You could do better than that with a freeby from Yahoo! or something.

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Posted on October 26th 2006 and posted to CELEBRITY BABIES, CELEBRITY BABY NAMES | Comments(0)

Nick Valensi, the guitarist for the New York City-based rock band The Strokes, is the daddy of a brand new set of twins (one of each) with his wife Amanda De Cadenet.

I haven’t yet heard officially what the babies are named — but after the cockup with Jayden James Sutton Pierce Whatever Spears Federline, I’m not even going to print the rumors that are flying around. Can’t afford to be made a fool of twice in one week — I’ll leave that to the other guys.

I do think Nick is a bit young to be taking on a couple of kids at once — he’s only about 25 himself. Amanda, by contrast, is 34, and has a 14 year-old daughter from her earlier marriage to Duran Duran bassist John Taylor. Hey, at least they have a built-in babysitter.

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Posted on October 25th 2006 and posted to CELEBRITY BABIES, CELEBRITY BABY NAMES | Comments(0)

In an exclusive, the website TMZ is reporting that it has snagged a copy of Britney Spear’s and Kevin Federline’s birth certificate for their baby born on September 12, and it turns out that everyone — People, US Weekly, me — got it half wrong! Britney and Kevin did have a boy, but his name is Jayden James, not Sutton Pierce, as was widely-reported at the time.

But, having been burned once, one has to be cautious. Is that it? Is that the lot? Last week, there was a rumor floating around that Britney had given birth to a girl. Where did that come from? More to the point, where did it go? Seems to me that the only journalistically-responsible thing to do now is to assume that — well, to assume that we can’t assume anything, I guess.

Who thinks Britney actually had twins?

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Posted on October 24th 2006 and posted to Britney Spears, CELEBRITY BABIES, CELEBRITY BABY NAMES | Comments(0)

The Sun newspaper in England is reporting this morning that Madonna plans to ask her British pal, actor Rupert Everett, to be godfather to her sort-of adopted son David. Setting aside the international furor over David’s bungled adoption, which has caused Madonna to schedule an Oprah appearance to explain everything, the choice of Everett is misguided.

I wrote last month about Everett’s idea for a celebrity sperm bank, which I felt was a terrible idea, as did one other person who commented on my post. With Everett being at the center of a such a firestorm of controversy over celebrity sperm banks, can he be trusted as the godfather of a boy who is now one of the biggest celebrity babies of all time? I don’t think so.

As I mentioned in my post about Everett’s idea, it showed a complete lack of understanding about what it means to be a celebrity baby. A celebrity baby is not just sperm and eggs. A celebrity baby is an event. A celebrity baby is a wacky name. A celebrity baby is a registry at Petit Tresor, (even if it didn’t work too well for Britney Spears).

Madonna needs to rethink this one. I’m sure her buddy Everett is a nice person deep down, but when it comes to celebrity babies, he is seriously misguided. And the role of godfather to little David Banda is just too important, and too high-profile, to be left to an amateur. It’s really a job for Brad Pitt or Tom Cruise.

 

 

 

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Posted on October 24th 2006 and posted to Tom Cruise, Brad Pitt, Britney Spears, Rupert Everett, Madonna, CELEBRITY BABIES, CELEBRITY BABY NAMES | Comments(0)

 

I don’t have a lot of information on this one yet, but Starpulse is reporting that Metallica lead guitarist and heavy metal rocker Kirk Hammett and his wife Lani welcomed a baby boy into the world earlier this month. His name: Angel Ray Keala. Rock on dude.

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Posted on October 21st 2006 and posted to CELEBRITY BABIES, CELEBRITY BABY NAMES | Comments(20)

Molly Parker, the Canadian actress and star of HBO’s series Deadwood, has given birth to a baby boy. Parker, and her husband director Matt Bissonnette, have named the little bloke William Strummer. It appears that Strummer is his middle name, but I’m waiting for confirmation.

I can’t find the name Strummer in any of the baby names websites that I like. It was of course the name of Joe Strummer, late co-founder and lead singer of the legendary British rock band The Clash. Maybe that’s who little Mr. Parker-Bissonnette is named for.

Now that Deadwood is over, it seems the female leads from that show are starting a Deadwood mom’s club. Actress Anna Gunn, who plays the wife of Sheriff Bullock in the show, had a baby girl last month. I wonder if we’ll be hearing from Trixie next.

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Posted on October 20th 2006 and posted to CELEBRITY BABIES, Molly Parker, CELEBRITY BABY NAMES | Comments(0)