“Earthquake 8.9,” to adopt the banner headline atop Newsweek’s title square, pretty much renders everything else in the magazine world insignificant. The cover shows a big photo of floating devastation with no need for words, though it does flash the inside story “The Scary Tsunamis Yet to Come”—though we could have done without the “Shocking Photos of a Disaster” come-on.
Interesting that it also promotes “Charlie Sheen is Winning" by Bret Easton Ellis along with other inside stories on the bottom (“Gun Rage: 2,405 Shot Dead Since Tucson” shows someone there was on top in coming up with a good story concept). Interesting in that especially in light of Japan, Charlie Sheen at this point is really a mindless waste of time. Yes, he’s winning, but winning at what? Think if all that energy he’s focusing on himself was channeled into helping someone else—let alone his own kids. And the fact that Newsweek put his picture alongside the story title—it didn't for any of the others—shows that the new Newsweek/Daily Beast connection is at least as concerned with sensationalistic fluff as life-and-death weekly news.
But Newsweek did beat out Time, which completely missed out on the earthquake and has a wordy art cover picturing its “Your Data For Sale: Everything about you is being tracked—get over it” cover feature. My esteemed private investigator pal Steve Rambam (the technical consultant for Kinky Friedman’s acclaimed mystery novels) has used the variation “Privacy—get over it” as the title for his lectures.
Just in time for the annual South By Southwest music trade conference in Austin, Billboard has a “Special SXSW Preview” to go with its cover feature on L.A.’s Odd Future Wolf Gang Kill Them All collective of young rappers, producers, skateboarders, filmmakers, designers and “general miscreants.” And I’m happy to see my talented buddy Ray Chew get featured inside for his new gig as musical director of American Idol.
Rachel Zoe graces the cover of The Hollywood Reporter’s style issue, with the inside story devoted to “the town’s most powerful stylist’s” so-called “Fashion Empire.” The trade has its Sheen feature, too--which is understandable—and talks to the lawyers for the star, Two And A Half Men’s co-creator Chuck Lorre (the main target of Sheen’s wrath) and Warner Bros.
On the strictly celeb front, Entertainment Weekly’s “Life After Lost” cover (the story’s about where the stars and creators of the show are at a year after it ended) seems itself lost in light of the real losses being suffered in Japan. More appealing is its feature on Daniel Radcliffe, who is easily maturing into a top grown-up star with his new Broadway role in the revival of How To Succeed In Business Without Really Trying.
Jet finds Nia Long “Fearless & Fine at 40” and poses the philosophical question, “Should college athletes be paid?” The answer should be yes if they want to be in Forbes’ cover story “The Billionaires Issue,” which tallies 1,210 billionaires in 54 countries. The ish also identifies “The Richest People on the Planet”: I checked. I wasn’t one of them.
And for you Vogue-aholics, Italian Vogue is in, and L’uomo Vogue has two covers, one with Stefano Accorsi, the other with Riccardo Scamarcio.
--jim bessman
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