That Extra Half Inch

Want to go back to the pre-media age? Or you're just looking for an excuse to escape the world and hide in a cave? Then read on because I've got two very good reasons for you to unplug your modem and start packing for that cave. Twiglet Beckham is getting her own TV show and she's just about to launch her book about style. As a talent and style vacuum, you might wonder what she's got to tell us about either but clearly TV mogul Simon Fuller and one publishing house think otherwise. Neither is letting her overwhelming chav mediocrity stop them from cashing in on a global brand like Victoria.

Both the TV show and the book, That Extra Half Inch which I'm sure refers to David's trouser deficit, are about fashion. To give you an idea of what gems might be in that book, here are a few reminders of Victoria's style. Enjoy. Or, alternatively, get packing for that cave now.

Curve appeal

You've got to love Monica Bellucci. She's not only beautiful but she talks sense. None of this size 00 nonsense for her. In this month's French Elle, she dismisses the Hollywood fashion for skinny women, saying that she eats pasta and chocolate and doesn't go to the gym. While every supermodel claims to live on MacDonalds but secretly just smokes and vomits, you know that Monica is not just talking the talk. She has, as she says, curves and not the standard issue jutting bones as modelled here by Eva Herzigova. Eva might claim to knock back cheesy fries with the best of them, but we all know she's lying. I've never seen a junk food fanatic with arms that small.

PR love

Jessica Simpson. One word: yuck. The ratty plastic hair extensions, the oversized sunglasses chosen by her stylist, the porn star nails, the fake nose, smile and breasts. What's left to like? Not much. I'd need to clean any chair she'd been sitting with an antiseptic wipe on before I'd park myself on it.

And now she's compounded her immense dislikeability by revealing that she's dating John Mayer. She's plugging her new album, he's on tour with Sheryl Crow. It's got the dirty fingerprints of a PR stunt all over it.

Cruise out of control

Finally the world comes to its senses. In the space of a week, the time it took me to get a tan on holiday, the tide has started to officially turn on crazy Tom Cruise. Dropped by film company Paramount, he's now at least $12m poorer a year and doesn't have a lucrative first look deal with the Hollywood giant any more. Cruise is worth about $750m so $12m is only going to seem losing some spare change down the back of the sofa but the act of being dropped should start to puncture his bubble of amazing self-delusion.

And who do we have to thank for Cruise finally getting his comeuppance? None other than a Hollywood trophy wife. Paula Fortunato (lucky by name, lucky by husband's platinum Amex), the wife of 83 year-old Paramount big cheese Sumner Redstone, told hubbie that Cruise's comments about Brooke Shields would turn away swathes of female film goers. Last year, Cruise famously badmouthed Brooke for taking anti-depressants for the baby blues. According to the man with the heel raises, the tablets are rubbish, psychiatry is even worse and only Scientology, vitamins and exercise can make you a happy person.

Fortunato, who clearly loves her husband for his personality and definitely not for his power or huge personal wealth, was right: Mission Impossible III didn't make the same money at the box office as its predecessor. People might want to see short crazed one act but they don't want his advice on gurning and spouting nonsense. The only question is: why did it take Hollywood so long to see that?

Old Bag

As she shrinks, her bags get bigger. It's strange but true. Victoria Beckham's latest fashion accessory is ridiculously huge. It's not as if she's lugging around the odd loaf of bread, wheel of cheese or copy of War and Peace, so why does she need the space? I'm guessing it's so that David can carry her when her legs finally give way. Now that she's supposedly expecting baby number four, he might have to put the bag into action sooner than anticipated. Not only is she not supposed to have any more kids (three caesereans and you're done) but she doesn't eat. He'll soon be carrying her around in a bag like one of Paris Hilton's skinny chihuahuas.

You, Me and Shagging Dupree

So, the plot thickens. It seems that Kate Hudson may be getting divorced for one very tall, blonde, quirky reason with one very strange shaped nose. Yep, you guessed it - Kate is a lot closer to You, Me and Dupree co-star Owen Wilson than her husband would like. Kate seems to like it well enough, in fact so well that she's allegedly ditched hubbie for Mr Wilson. According to a suspect source quoted in a US celeb mag, Kate and Owen are not, repeat not, having a fling; it's love. I think we have another potential Tori Spelling marriage on our hands.

You, Me and No Dupree

And so another one bites the dust. Kate Hudson and Chris Robinson are getting divorced after almost six years of marriage. Anyone, even atom thin Nicole Richie with her oxygen starved brain, could have seen that one coming. How many shots do you need to see of a forlorn Kate on the beach with her son and no husband for the old alimony penny to drop?

It's nicely timed though, you have to hand it to her. Kate's new film You, Me and Dupree opens this month and the news of her divorce has got her global coverage. Could she be sharing PR with Tom Cruise, I wonder?

Nicole Richie Watch

Another day, another yet scarier picture of Nicole Richie. Just how thin can she get? Right now there's more meat on Victoria Beckham and Keira Knightley and that's saying something.

Should we stop validating her thinness by giving it space? The more interested we are in her shrinking and now shrunken chest, the more interested she is in staying thin. All this attention can't be doing her any good. Before she was Paris Hilton's chubby sidekick but now her skin-and-bone chic has made her a celebrity in her own right. Why would she give that up?

Death woes

Poor little Tori Spelling. Not only does her father die but he only leaves her $1 million in his will. And then she falls out with her mother, meaning the $1 million in unlikely to be bumped up. What's a girl to do in this kind of situation? Get new breasts, of course. There's nothing quite like a bra heaving with fresh silicon to boost the spirits. Or at least, that's what Tori seems to think. So she'd better start shopping for bigger bras again because that marriage isn't going to last that long. Now that her vast inheritance will only keep her in peroxide and Botox for a year, Tori can't help but lose her shine for new hubbie Dean. Suddenly leaving your wife and child for an extensively remodelled and now impoverished 'actress' doesn't seem so clever now, does it Dean?

PR offensive: round 462

Tom Cruise has been taking it easy of late. While Katie has been spotted out shopping, naturally sans baby, Tom has kept out of the public eye. We say 'Thank Christ' but he says 'Time for another staged heterosexual moment'. So, here we have Tom and Katie locked in another 'passionate' embrace. The tight black t-shirt, bulging bicep and firmly pursed lips, never mind the man operating what looks like a giant light behind them, couldn't possibly mean that this is just yet another PR job, designed to keep the straight flag flying especially now that baby Suri is about to make her first public appearance. The mysterious Suri, who is more elusive than the Scarlet Pimpernel, James Bond and Osama bin Laden rolled into one, is about to be unveiled in Vanity Fair. Nothing too high profile then, Tom. So the baby might actually exist but is it actually his? Or Katie's? My money's on the black-haired baby belonging to Cruise's Hispanic maid. That way Katie is spared sleeping with Tom, or at least a visit from the turkey baster, and stretch marks. And Tom gets a baby without having to see, never mind fiddle with, a lady's undercarriage.

Middle age rebel

When is Madonna going to get over her angry teenage rebellion? We've had the angry sex pictures, the angry pointy bras, the angry here's-my-48-year-old-
crotch-in-a-highcut-leotard-thrust-too-close-
to-the-camera moment. I for one have had enough. But Madonna, alas, has not. The anger and need to shock are still raging and, despite being only two years from 50, Madonna feels the need to strap herself to a crucifix to piss off the Pope. Why does the Pope's disapproval matter so much? Surely it would have been more shocking for her just to go on stage and sing after a long career of whipping up 'controversy' for the sake of it. You can wrap your skinny ankles round your neck, change your outfits 25 times and compare the Pope to Mussolini all you like but you still can't sing. And you're still 48 not 15. Get over it.

Mother love

Your mother should teach you certain things about life. That you will always be the one to wipe down the kitchen surfaces after dinner, no matter how much of a New Man your partner is. That high heels look good but will cripple you. Not Melanie Griffiths though. Instead of passing on practical advice to her 17 year-old daughter, Melanie has opted to hand on the Griffiths tradition of addiction. It's cigarettes now but it's sure to be Vicodin later.

Bob Spice

It's truly a sad day when a haircut is more newsworthy than Israel bombing the fuck out of Lebanon, but then the British tabloids are nothing if not grossly insensitive and celeb-obsessed. Today the big news is that Victoria Beckham has got rid of her hair extensions. It's bad news for the Russian economy - Victoria was buying real human hair from Russian women and keeping whole villages of long-locked ladies from the bread line - but good news for anyone who can't bear to see another VB clone sporting the nylon equivalents.

Old Victoria has gone back to the style that she sported before she fell in thrall to the Barbie aesthetic. It's short, it's choppy, it's a weird bob. What do you think?

White Trash Wedding

Pamela Anderson is a living testament to two things: the earning power of silicon implants and the fact that money can't buy you class. Take for example her latest nuptials. When you think St Tropez and yachts, you certainly think money but you might also think style. Okay, so P Diddy, the Beckhams and that peddler of expensive tat Roberto Cavalli all hang out there. They all have a certain style, if one that falls outside the usual bounds of taste. Then you see Pamela Anderson marrying Kid Rock on a yacht in St Tropez and you see her singlehandedly give the French Riviera a white trash makeover. The veil, the bikini, the baseball cap. The way she can't keep her eyes open and her mouth shut. She brings a touch of cheap porn to anywhere she goes.