Off Screen

Charles Manson has been complaining. “A long time ago, being crazy meant something. Nowadays everybody’s crazy,” he said in a recent prison interview. I don’t know if he was waxing philosophical or just moaning about his loss of status, but when you start to think a wacked out, full scale, messianic, psychopathic murderer is talking sense, then you might as well face it, either the world’s gone mad or you have. I like to think it’s the world.
Manson, of course, was one of the first genuine celebrity sickos, his slaughter of actress Sharon Tate and others being related and rehashed in books, films and documentaries almost as quickly as it unfolded. If he had been operating today, he would probably be a maniac millionaire, a regular on Oprah Winfrey (live from Fulsom Prison), with his own line in self-help videos: Do It Yourself Psychosis, The Manson Guide to the Lyrics of the Beatles and Step Aerobics for Solitary Confinement. All he’d need is a good agent.
John Wayne Bobbit obviously has one (if you’ll excuse the rather poor double entendre). The man whose name has become quite possibly the most cringe-inducing word in the English language (well, for men anyway. Clitorectomy probably has a similar effect on women), has milked his re-attached dick (sorry) for all it is worth. Despite accusations that he was a no-good, low-down philanderer and convicted wife-beater who basically got what he deserved, Bobbit has made a fortune from selling his story, endorsing products (I hate to even speculate what products: Unusual sexual accessories? Kitchen knives? Superglue?) and is now set to star as himself in a film of the entire sorry affair. It has not yet been revealed who will play the part of his penis, although my vote would go to Dudley Moore: he’s small, wrinkly and behaves like a dick, so it would almost be typecasting. Robin Williams is said to be interested, but only if the part is made bigger.
Divorced from Mrs Bobbit, whose last words to him before she went for the scissors were “I want a separation,” (you’re making this up, aren’t you? – Ed), JW received a short prison sentence last week for beating his new (now ex) fiancee, with further charges of assault still pending. This is probably considered quite an astute career move, giving him something else to discuss when he hits the talk show circuit again. It won’t be long before stars are committing crimes just to give their career that extra boost. Perhaps the O.J. Simpson, Michael Jackson and Craig Charles scandals will turn out to be just particularly inspired publicity campaigns. Of course, facing charges of murder, child molesting and rape may be taking things a little too far. More timid celebrities would be well advised to start with something like shoplifting and work their way up. At least sports stars can do a variety of drugs, and have fun while gaining notoriety.
Tonya Harding is one sporting celebrity who has discovered the wages of sin can run into six figures. Banned from competitive figure skating for her role in the attack on Nancy Kerrigan, Harding has embarked on a new career in the movies. Disney bought up the screen rights to the Harding-Kerrigan Olympic confrontation, in which Harding’s character will be cast as the villain of the piece, but she gets to play heroine in the starring role of crime thriller, Breakaway. In an attempt to launch herself as a new screen tough girl (Mess with Tonya and she’ll break your knee-caps!), Harding plays a waitress who finds a stash of mob money and kicks the shit out of any mafia man foolish enough to try and take it away from her (why do the words ‘straight to video’ spring to mind?).
But for real movie madness, we have to turn away from the worlds of crime and sport, to the world of politics, with the news that Ronald Reagan is planning a film comeback. The 83-year-old ex-president has been meeting with agents and producers and reading scripts in search of an old-timer role like Henry Fonda’s On Golden Pond. What I want to know is, will there be a part for Maggie? Perhaps they could be cast in a kind of septuagenarian Love Story, in which Ron develops an unusual bowel cancer and Maggie, in a desperate attempt to relive their glory days, takes him on a last holiday to the Falklands where they rent a boat and mount their own invasion of Argentina.
Diego Maradona could guest star as a Argentinian hit man who has found God (in his hand). The film would have a happy ending. Lorena Bobbit would show up in the last reel and cut Maggie’s dick off.