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Movie Review
"Stigmata"
A damp, shallow thriller gives that old-time religion the MTV treatment.
By Mary Elizabeth Williams
[09/10/99]

Music Review
Sharps & flats
Unable to translate critical success into mainstream sales, Me'Shell Ndegeocello ends up "Bitter."
By Alex Pappademas
[09/10/99]

Column
Kevin Spacey knows our secrets
The enigmatic actor's roles embody manipulation and cunning.
By Michael Sragow
[09/10/99]

Movie Interview
Arabian knights
"West Beirut" director Ziad Douieri talks about growing up in the crossfire of a raging civil war and raging hormones.
By Cynthia Joyce
[09/09/99]

Music Review
Sharps & flats
The Bottle Rockets trade trad country for classic rock, leaving them with one tire in a ditch, the other on the right track.
By Kandia Crazy Horse
[09/09/99]

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"I was deeply touched by that ... especially because it was a man talking about keeping women safe," Kim said. "Women have to look out for each other." Next question: Just how did you get that pasty thingy to stay stuck over your nipple? "We use an adhesive bonding ... like, for hair and stuff," she said, segueing seamlessly from the political to the personal without batting a single false eyelash. "We didn't use Krazy Glue ..."

So it went at the 16th Video Music Awards on Thursday night in Manhattan, where fashion and politics and irony and rap and rock and Buddy Hackett came together in one big pre-millennial wet kiss. The awards themselves, of course, mean nothing. The annals tend to read like a "Where are they now?" casting call (paging Jenny McCarthy). Take home an Oscar, and you spend the rest of your life as "Academy Award-winning-(your name here)." Win a Moon Man, and you're A-Ha.

But if the Oscars are all about honor, then the Video Music Awards are all about spectacle. The Oscars are hushed and reverential, freighted with gravitas. The VMAs are backstage fistfights, bleeped blue language, Howard Stern's pimply bare bottom descending from the heavens and disgraced kiddie TV star Pee Wee Herman mincing onstage to ask if we've heard any good jokes lately. The 1999 show didn't -- couldn't -- offer us any of those memorable moments. The world has changed too much. Courtney Love's cleaned up. Axl Rose has calmed down. Sinéad O'Connor's been ordained. Madonna's presumably arranging play dates instead of S&M photo shoots; the feel-my-pain of grunge has been supplanted by the sugary pop of the Backstreet Boys. And given that the Clinton presidency has survived the whole nation knowing what he did with that cigar and That Woman, a guy masturbating just doesn't seem that perverted anymore.

The biggest shock of the night wasn't Chris Rock's barbs or Lil' Kim's boobs or Renee Zellweger's evident lack of underwear; it was a newly brunet David Bowie taking the stage to introduce Lauryn Hill, who was looking exactly like Courteney Cox. Other than that, it was all about the love. Everything was "in the house," everything was "off the hook" and many things were both at the same time, according to the stars. MTV balloters loved Lauryn Hill and Ricky Martin, awarding them five and four Moon Man trophies, respectively. (Among their other triumphs, Hill's "Doo Wop (That Thing)" won for best video, best female video, best R&B video and best art direction; Martin's omnipresent "Livin' La Vida Loca" won for best pop video and best dance video.) Will Smith and Jada Pinkett Smith loved their nephew Kyle so much they felt compelled to deliver nonstop shout-outs to the 9-year-old birthday boy, thus turning the red carpet into a real-time version of your local radio station's all-request and dedication hour. Martin loved him some Armani. This we learned after he won the first award of the night, for best dance video, and dispatched his choreographer to the pressroom. "What are you wearing, Tina?" bellowed a reporter up front. "I'm wearing Armani," she said, "because Ricky wears Armani, and I'm with Ricky." Makes sense.

Pamela Anderson Lee loved formerly estranged husband Tommy Lee, and wasn't shy about sharing. "Is it good to be back together again?" asked MTV News' Chris Connelly during the pre-pre-show interviews. "It's so good," gushed Pammy, clad in sequined pants, a corset and a fuzzy pink Cat-in-the-Hat chapeau. "It's all good." The press corps got excited when the Lees made their way backstage. Finally, here was a chance to ask that old chestnut -- "Have you stopped beating your wife?" -- and have it actually apply. Trouble was, we never got to ask anything. As soon as Pammy took the podium, moving in the tiny stutter-steps that were all her skintight pants and hooker heels would permit her and starting to talk about who'd designed her get-up, Tommy dashed into the room, flung open his trench coat and bared his naked body to the Pamster's approving eyes. "I'm too distracted!" she announced, chasing her spouse offstage. Puh-leeze ... like nobody's seen that before.

Next page | Chris Rock takes the piss out of everybody; Eminem takes a shit