Porn! Pole dancing! Public relations!

Memo to everyone writing about and/or interviewing Diablo Cody:

You, with the leer in your eye, do not have to mention in every other paragraph that the screenwriter of "Juno" is a former stripper.

Haven't you heard? She was a stripper. A STRIPPER!! Catholic-school upbringing in a suburban Minnesota town, then a U-turn into sex work. And she wrote a book about it. STRIPPER!!!

Though Ms. Cody (not her real name) is on a brand-building tear and understands the value of shocking "the establishment" (make hers a double!) do not fall for it, "journalistic" brethren. Don't think that having the word "stripper" twice (in the main headline and the jump) will really help you sell papers anyway (we're talking to you, L.A. Times).

The Envelope, the Times' online awards-centric site, has even given us a tatt-watch, with side-by-side photos of the pinup-girl tattoo on her arm, one with her husband's name visible and the other with roses where that name used to be. Has she broken it off with her not-famous significant other, the story asks. Oh, keep your pants on.

Cody, nee Brook Busey (whose new name -- for reals -- is a mashup of a city in Wyoming and a Duran Duran song) recently landed on Entertainment Weekly's "50 Smartest People in Hollywood" list, just behind Kathleen Kennedy but ahead of Cate Blanchett. For. One. Screenplay. And yes, the now-permanent ID "former stripper" takes up valuable space in a 75-word featurette.

No doubt Cody has become a masterful marketer, if she wasn't one already, and her so-clever-it's-nauseating, yeah, like morning sickness, high-school-preggers dramedy is benefiting greatly from it.

But we just have two words for those goons and dorks luridly obsessed with her former day job:

Enough already.

Comments

[john muscarnero]

Finally someone says, or writes rather, what I've been thinking since I first heard her brand name over a year ago. I feel like I've been brainwashed in the last few weeks by the bombardment of her quirky rockstar hipster rebel contrived persona. Talent and wise decisions made over a longer period make you worthy of the 50 smartest list, not a clever PR spin and one cute screenplay. I will be the first to eat my words if in ten years she's a creative force to be reckoned with, although I doubt then she'll still carry that former-stripper moniker if she is.

[Noah Vail]

Reminiscent of the LA Times' ga-ga treatment of ex-go-go dancer Hilary Henkin when she penned "Romeo Lies Bleeding" all those years ago. Despite the Times' vigorous grunting and thrusting, Ms. Henkin has apparently done little else since then aside from the dreadful "V for Vendetta" and a disputed credit on "Wag the Dog." Hmm, still wonder why the Times is so desperately seeking subscribers?

[Langdon]

perfectly said, she is being crammed down our throats more than "weapons of mass destruction" were thrust into our faces in the days leading up to Iraq war by the Bush administration. I can't read any more praise of her without screaming in my head
"GIVE ME A BREAK!"
Juno is the most overrated piece of garbage in years, the only thing about Cody that isn't overrated is her publicists ability to work her story, although, she is a publicists wet dream with her back story so I don't even give that person much credit, her journey into the convenient one year stunt as a stripper is as contrived as her phony break up with her husband. MY GOD! she is like every girl I knew in high school who desperately wanted to be different because they realized the suburbs were bland and generic and thus put themselves on a higher plateau because they assumed no one else knew about Iggy Pop and MC5!. They get the obligatory tats and Bettie Page haircut, you know, the uniform. Suburbs bland?! c'mon, what an observation Tycho Brahe. Sadly, we are about to see many more of these suicide poseurs in coming days, that is fine with me, but keep the pen and paper out of their hands for the love of God.

[kashmir]

Well obviously she is very talented, and the movie Juno is a very nice one, all about human values, real, valuable relationships, trust, life of an unborn infant, friendship. And all with great humour. So what is so sour, guys? That she is a free spirit?

And about Iraq: for sure everybody told to the americans that there is no prove for the veapons of mass distructions, but you already planned the war on oil. But I dont get it, how this is conected to Juno.