Just when you thought the Gods of Tabloidism, after breakfasting on Tiger Woods and lunching on Charlie Sheen, had hived off to the ashram to drink their own excretions and contemplate a life of true emptiness, the news wires are trembling once more.
Peter Biskind, the author of a biography on Hollywood actor, producer, and (here's the debatable part) alleged 24/7 stickman Warren Beatty has calculated that Beatty slept with around 12,775 women , give or take.
That's almost 13,000 conquests.
Biskind's means of calculation? Because we live in a post-objective-fact, non-reality-based culture, he didn't ask Beatty himself. He made the assumption that Beatty had slept with one girl a day during a putative sex-a-thon that lasted from the time he lost his virginity at age 19 to when he lost his promiscuity in 1991, stumbling on Annette Benning, marriage, monogamy and kids.
Biskind, who once was a respected figure (having penned the enthusiastically-received Raging Bulls and Easy Riders about the auteur directors of the 70s, Coppola and Scorcese and the like) has tried to bolster his credibility by saying this ludicrous figure excludes "daytimes quickies, drive bys, casual gropings, stolen kisses, and so on."
Oh, that clarifies things. The 13,000 was just Beatty's night work. His part time job.
There are a few juicy quotations to spice this dubious smorgasbord, including Beatty supposedly proclaiming of Jane Fonda, "Oh, my God. We kissed until we had practically eaten each other's heads off."
Joan Collins, whom older readers may remember as a sexual icon of the late 70s and middle-aged crumpet/vamp in early 80s, allegedly sighed, after many rounds with Beatty, "I don't think I can last much longer. He never stops - it must be all those vitamins he takes."
Or something.
Forgive me, Father, for I'm about sermonise. This brouhaha of bonks is predicated on the assumption that relentless promiscuity is interesting.
It's as interesting as pathological nose-picking. It's a sign of uncertainty about masculinity. I've seen serial rooters in action in New York. They're often dreary. They're invariably on the make. The world is a Rorschach Blot Test that always has the same result: More chicks!
The latest report on this matter involves Tiger Woods. The poke-mad putter-wielder reported swum ashore from his yacht Privacy, and held a news conference in his dripping jocks.
"I got more women by accident than Beatty got by design," he mumbled, "That's a quote by the way."
It is too, it's President Lyndon Johnson on John F Kennedy.
Don Giovanni, the amour-crazed lead of Mozart's eponymous opera, was not available for comment, but his representative did contact us with the following statement. "Mr. Giovanni congratulates Mr Beatty on almost breasting the 13,000 mark. But he would like to underline that there is quantity, and quality. Mr Giovanni is confident that the 2,065 women he slept with were better serviced than Beatty's somewhat gluttonous total."
Numerous notches on the bed post is not an indicator that the notcher was interested in women, but a suggestion that he was interested in how other men viewed him. Which sounds a bit like, well, you know, the beckoning of the other team, the love that once didn't dare speak its own name.
The closet may not be the only beneficiary here. Peter Biskind
is surely hoping his tome, Star. How Warren Beatty Seduced America
will rise higher than the 424 rank it currently has on Amazon's
bestseller list.
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Tim Wilson's blogs here
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