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The painful, pathetic Chris Brown and Rihanna collaboration

Tue, 21 Feb 2012 16:45:00 +0000

Few things in life live up to expectations. But when rumors started flying after the Grammys that Chris Brown and Rihanna were collaborating, the collective shudder of revulsion seemed to indicate that the result would be a truly unholy mingling. On Monday, the two debuted guest spots on the remixes of their new singles: Brown's "Turn Up the Music" and Rihanna's "Birthday Cake." And by God, nightmare it is.

Brown and Rihanna are no strangers, of course. Brown is still serving his five-year probation stemming from a 2009 felony plea after an altercation with Rihanna. Back then, the haunting image of Rihanna's bruised and swollen face was splashed all over the Internet; Brown laid low until the inevitable, damage-controlling Larry King interview several months later.

The Senate and Grammys condone domestic abuse

Wed, 15 Feb 2012 12:50:00 +0000

It's a great time to be a domestic abuser. Just last week, not a single Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee voted to reauthorize the Violence Against Women Act -- a law that in 2000 and 2005 swept easily through the renewal process. While saying he "supports this law, always has," Sen. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, did helpfully offer some changes – including, according the New York Times, "a huge reduction in authorized financing, and elimination of the Justice Department office devoted to administering the law and coordinating the nation’s response to domestic violence and sexual assaults." Surely those contentious new provisions that would offer protection to gay, lesbian and transgender victims as well as undocumented aliens wouldn't have anything to do with the holdup. Writing for GOPUSA last Tuesday, the perennially terrible Phyllis Schlafly crowed that the move was "a refreshing indication that Republicans are no longer intimidated by feminist demands" over a law that was "promoting divorce, breakup of marriage and hatred of men." Well, thank God we dodged that bullet. Now just fend for yourself dodging the real bullets, ladies.

The Grammys’ most memorable moments

Mon, 13 Feb 2012 12:30:00 +0000

The Grammys have always trod the line between dull veneration of industry success and outrageous celebration of rock 'n' roll excess. But this year, with the losses of Etta James, Clarence Clemons, Gil Scott-Heron and Amy Winehouse, the show had an even tougher time finding the right pitch than Coldplay's Chris Martin did.

The specter of death would have hung heavily over the proceedings even if Whitney Houston hadn't died suddenly the day before. But the singer's untimely demise Saturday gave an unavoidable air of sorrow to the proceedings, a grim dose of reality that couldn't help crashing into the fantasy realm of Lady Gaga scepters and Nicki Minaj eyelashes. That's why the most memorable aspects of the broadcast weren't just the loudest or the tackiest. They were sad, they were weird, they were sometimes awful; sometimes, they were even fantastic. And they were dominated by two big-throated ladies – the troubled diva from Newark and Adele, the whiskey-voiced British blonde. And though we loved The Civil Wars' one minute of perfection and were baffled by Rihanna's "When Harry Met Sally" hair and got weepy over Paul McCartney and company's poignant and timely "Golden Slumbers/Carry That Weight," these are Salon's top-10 biggest moments of the night.

Chris Brown’s romantic comedy debut

Wed, 20 Jul 2011 12:21:00 +0000

There's no doubt R&B star Chris Brown has made some questionable choices since his violent breakup from Rihanna in 2009, yet no matter what the man does, his legions of fans are there to support him.

When he stalked off the set of "Good Morning America" this spring -- punching his hand through some glass on the way out -- people blamed Robin Roberts for catching him off-guard with her line of questioning. His tearful tribute to Michael Jackson at the 2010 BET awards may have had critics questioning his sincerity, but his devotees believed his heart was in the right place. Even the artist's Twitter feud last December with rapper Raz-B, which devolved into homophobic slurs and violent words, was seen by Brown and his fans as just another case of "haters hating." It seems that in Chris' mind -- and those of his followers who helped his recent album "F.A.M.E." to the top of the charts -- he can do no wrong.

Chris Brown’s latest anti-gay P.R. disaster

Wed, 13 Jul 2011 18:14:00 +0000

[UPDATED BELOW]

It's been only four months since Chris Brown stormed off the set of "Good Morning America" (breaking a glass window on his way out) after Robin Roberts pressed him on being arrested for assaulting his then girlfriend, Rihanna. That hot temper of his certainly didn’t win him any new fans, and even his supporters were criticized for coming to his defense. Despite all the awards the man is able to win for his music, he is P.R. poison.

Now there is news of Chris using anti-gay slurs during a pickup basketball game. According to a Radar source:

“He got really ticked off when things didn’t go his way during the game, saying, ‘That’s gay!’ and ‘You’re a f*gg*t a**!’ to the other players,” an eyewitness tells Star exclusively.

When another player didn’t pass him the ball, the 22-year-old Forever singer, perhaps best known for beating up Rihanna, fired off more slurs, calling him a “f*gg*t” and saying it was a “gay” move.

Mel Gibson says he was “betrayed”

Fri, 22 Apr 2011 15:23:00 +0000

He's back. With his new movie, "The Beaver," just weeks away from release, Oscar-winning hothead and domestic abuser Mel Gibson is at last on the full career rehab track, granting Deadline his first interview since a series of explosively vitriolic, threatening conversations with his ex Oksana Grigorieva emerged a year ago. Though he's a long way from the sputtering loon of the tapes and says "of course" he regrets what he said on them, the real revelation of the interview is how easy it appears for Gibson to believe he's a victim too.

It would have been a challenge to promote a movie in which he stars without his doing any publicity for it, and Gibson appears to have chosen very carefully for his first foray back into the spotlight. Finally owning up to the veracity of the tapes he long refused to acknowledge, Gibson bravely dealt with journalist Allison Hope Weiner's hard-hitting questions like "Aren’t you going to be hurt if people judge you based on what they believe occurred here?" and her reassurances that director Todd Phillips' decision to ax his cameo in "The Hangover 2" "a very Hollywood hypocritical moment." It's the interview that reads like a colonoscopy!

Chris Brown finds an unlikely defender

Tue, 05 Apr 2011 15:06:00 +0000

Is Chris Brown -- convicted felon, smasher of windows, ripper of shirts -- a "victim"? That's the verdict from no-stranger-to-controversy-herself comic and radio host Rosie O'Donnell, who took to Twitter Monday to follow up on last week's broadcast in which she opined, "I just don’t know why this kid seems to be held to a different standard than anyone else." "i have compassion for both he and rhianna - its is not a simple discussion - layers n layers… he is a victim too," she wrote. Compassion in an undeniably noble commodity, and it takes great strength and character to forgive those who've truly atoned for their actions. O'Donnell went on to say, "I do not condone it - I understand it," referring to Brown's own troubled history, one in which the deck of appropriate role modeling seems to have been stacked significantly against him.

The media’s treatment of Charlie Sheen vs. Chris Brown

Tue, 22 Mar 2011 17:23:00 +0000

Chris Brown should be on top of the world. His new album F.A.M.E. dropped today, with already three No. 1 songs. It's also currently the most downloaded album on iTunes. So when Brown went on "Good Morning America" to talk to Robin Roberts, he was probably in a pretty good mood, and put on a game face to discuss his current status with Rihanna, his ex-girlfriend and pop star whom Brown assaulted before the Grammys in 2009.

But Robin didn't let the topic drop, and kept maneuvering their discussion back to the felony charges that Chris pleaded guilty to, along with the restraining order that the R&B star is trying to get downgraded. Chris struggled through the segment and then allegedly started getting violent: breaking the glass of his dressing room window, screaming, and ripping off his shirt.

Chris Brown blows his redemption

Thu, 30 Dec 2010 16:07:00 +0000

Everyone deserves a second chance. On Wednesday, Chris Brown used up his.

Just last week, the convicted abuser who assaulted then-girlfriend Rihanna nearly two years ago in a beating heard round the world, was showing off his certificate for completing a 52 week domestic violence course. But the man who announced last year he wanted to be "a role model" -- who said, "I want to definitely be a man and learn who I am and learn how to control emotions" -- behaved like neither a role model nor a real man when singer Raz-B offhandedly tweeted, "Im just sittin here Thinking how can niggas like @ebenet & @ChrisBrown disrespect women as Intelligent as @HalleBerry11 @Rihanna." That seems to have been sufficient provocation to undo all that anger management Brown's been striving toward. He swiftly – and crudely -- shot back, "nigga you want attention! Grow up nigga!!! Dick in da booty ass lil boy."

Chris Brown: Crying comeback kid?

Mon, 28 Jun 2010 14:50:00 +0000

Unless you missed last night's BET Awards and the frantic chatter that ensued on Twitter, you know that Chris Brown had a meltdown during his Michael Jackson tribute. He flawlessly performed a medley of his idol's songs, until he got to "Man in the Mirror." The singer, whose image hasn't recovered since he assaulted pop star Rihanna nearly a year and a half ago, broke down onstage -- his voice cracked and he appeared to weep, unable to continue singing. He let the background vocals play as he dropped to a knee, pounded the air and gasped for breath. The audience looked on in shock.

Given the potent, and seemingly relevant, lyrics -- looking in the mirror, making a change, yada yada -- it's hard not to see it as an act of contrition for brutally beating up his girlfriend. The question on folks' minds, though, seems to be whether it was a genuine display of emotion. A poll on the Los Angeles Times' website asks: "Was Chris Brown faking it at the BET Awards?" Most viewers have responded that he was genuinely choked up thinking about the King of Pop's death, but the second most popular answer is "Chris was 100% faking a breakdown to get sympathy." Somehow, I doubt he's that good of an actor. The real question, in my mind, is whether the display of emotion was rooted in remorse for what he did or because he was reminded of how far he has fallen in his quest to become the next Michael Jackson.

Chris Brown denied visa over abuse

Tue, 08 Jun 2010 16:54:00 +0000

It turns out domestic abuse wasn't the best career move for Chris Brown. Sure, many of his die-hard fans welcomed him with open arms after he assaulted then-girlfriend Rihanna, but the same cannot be said for the United Kingdom. The day before the start of his European tour, Brown has been denied a visa on account of his rap sheet, and the tour has been postponed.

"We reserve the right to refuse entry to the UK to anyone guilty of a serious criminal offense," a UK Border Agency spokesperson told AFP. "Public safety is one of our primary concerns. Each application to enter the UK is considered on its individual merits." That raises the question of whether Brown was actually considered a credible threat to public safety, and whether all abusers are treated equally by the Border Agency, but officials declined to comment further. It certainly sends a powerful message, though: Britain isn't playing around when it comes to domestic violence.

Chris Brown still doesn’t get it

Thu, 03 Sep 2009 15:03:00 +0000

CNN

Chris Brown on "Larry King Live."

Chris Brown does not do penance well. On “Larry King Live” last night, the superstar singer, better known lately as the guy who beat up Rihanna, appeared eminently uncomfortable in his new self-appointed job of “role model.” Clad in that baby blue V-neck sweater and matching bow tie and flanked by his mother and his attorney, celebrity ambulance chaser Mark Geragos, he looked more like a Care Bear than a convicted domestic abuser.

Throughout the entire hour -- a 30-second teaser of which leaked on Monday -- Brown remained soft-spoken and polite, mumbling terse replies and staunchly refusing all inquiries into the specifics of what happened that night last February with Rihanna. That gambit -- like his cuddly ensemble -- was a clever way of assuring that America never got a glimpse of the young man who used his girlfriend’s face as a punching bag. What, after all, would be the payoff for him in saying what led up to the violence? What could he possibly say that wouldn’t sound like a “she was asking for it” rationalization?

The battle over Rihanna

Mon, 23 Feb 2009 17:14:00 +0000

Critics everywhere have weighed in on last week's leak of police photos showing Rihanna's badly injured face, taken after she was reportedly beaten by her boyfriend Chris Brown. Broadsheet's Tracy Clark-Flory wrote on Friday, "I can't bring myself to even link to it, because it seems like such a sickening violation of Rihanna's privacy." Over at Feministing, Jessica Valenti clearly agreed, dedicating her "Friday Feminist Fuck You" to TMZ (the outlet that released the photo) and a "double fuck you" to any blog that reposted the image, since "exploiting a physical assault for traffic is beyond disgusting." At Jezebel, Anna Holmes wrote a post announcing that "we won't ignore [the photo], but we also won't post or link to it" and posed the question, "Is posting such a photo exploitative or educational? (Is it both?)," while Jezebel contributor Tracie Egan did include the photo in an entry on her own blog, "One D at a Time," because, she wrote, it elicited in her a visceral reaction and she "immediately recognized the value in that." Even Rihanna's father, Ronald Fenty, has expressed the degree to which the release of the photos has left him torn; he has criticized the leak, calling the LAPD "sloppy" for allowing it to happen, but told Us Weekly, "It's good and it's bad to see the picture, because there's other people who were thinking differently, that [her injuries] may not be that bad."