ERIC GARCETTI STILL WANTS TO BE AMBASSADOR TO INDIA

FOR A MINUTE, IT LOOKED LIKE THE EX-MAYOR MIGHT HAVE GIVEN UP. BUT NEW DELHI DREAMS DIE HARD

BY PETER KIEFER

EX-MAYOR

Eric Garcetti’s on-again-offagain trip to India appears to be on again. Maybe.

L.A.’s 52-year-old former mayor, who handed City Hall’s keys to Karen Bass in December, has been packing his bags for New Delhi ever since President Joe Biden nominated him for the ambassador post back in July 2021. But sexual harassment allegations leveled against Garcetti’s former municipal aide Rick Jacobs—and charges that Garcetti turned a blind eye toward those allegations—have kept Garcetti’s Senate confirmation dangling for nearly a year and a half, and by the end of 2022, it looked like both Biden and Garcetti were ready to throw in the towel. Talk around town was that Biden was instead going to appoint Garcetti U.S. envoy on climate, a job that doesn’t require confirmation and may soon be vacant if rumors are true that current occupant John Kerry is ready to retire.

But now, it looks like Garcetti may have a shot at India after all. In January, Biden announced that he was resubmitting

Garcetti’s name to the Senate, which now has one more Democrat in it since the midterm elections. Will that extra seat make all the difference? Capitol Hill sources are skeptical, since it’s not just Republicans objecting to the appointment but also a couple of Dems, like Mark Kelly, who have expressed concerns. Still, in December, before the newly expanded Democratic majority took office, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer managed to squeeze together enough votes to confirm Biden’s pick for ambassador to Brazil, Elizabeth Frawley Bagley, who’d been ensnared in a scandal of her own regarding old comments that some deemed anti-Semitic. If Schumer could pull Bagley over the finish line with only 50 Democrats, shouldn’t he be able to do the same for Garcetti now that he’s got 51?

Obviously, Biden thinks so; otherwise, he wouldn’t keep nominating the guy.

OH, BOTHER! WINNIE

THE POOH SLAYS

HE’S NOT SO CUTE anymore. Not all that cuddly. And ever since Christopher Robin moved out of the forest, he’s grown murderously bitter. That’s right, folks: Winnie the Pooh, the beloved children’s book character, has been given a Texas Chain Saw Massacre-style makeover in a new live-action horror flick, Winnie-the-Pooh: Blood and Honey, due in theaters February 15.

“We’ve gone the anamorphic route—half bear, half human,” explains producer-director-writer Rhys Frake-Waterfield. “You want your villain to be [big enough to] hold something sinister and slashing away.”

The demented adaptation of the A. A. Milne story—its copyright conveniently expired in 2022—is just the latest from London-based production house Jagged Edge, which for the last couple of years has been turning publicdomain bedtime stories into Michael Myersstyle nightmares with films like Easter Bunny Massacre and Jack & Jill: The Hills of Hell. Says

Frake-Waterfield,

who is currently hard at work on Peter Pan: Neverland Nightmare, “I’ve got a long-term goal to ruin 7 billion childhood memories.”—ANDY LEWIS

IS DAVID GEFFEN DATING A PORN STAR?

DAVID GEFFEN’S Instagram page has long been filled with the rich and famous, with everyone from Julia Roberts to Jerry Seinfeld popping up in selfies snapped on the 79-year-old mogul’s yacht. But none of those star-studded photos attracted nearly as much attention as the pic Geffen posted Christmas Day showing off his latest way-younger boyfriend, Donovan Michaels. “Merry Christmas indeed!” Geffen captioned the picture.

As it turned out, a number of social media users claimed to have recognized Michaels under a different name, identifying Geffen’s new boy toy as Brandon Foster, an exotic dancer and onetime porn star.

“He used to work at the same bar as me,” posted Morgan Le Shade, intimating that the club in question was Liquid Tampa in Florida. Another former dancer, Hunter Vance, also claimed he knew Michaels. “Brandon is his real name,” Vance told Los Angeles when we reached out. “We all danced together before he [got into] porn.”

L.A.’S RANKING, OUT OF 182 CITIES, IN A NEW WALLETHUB STUDY OF THE BEST TOWNS FOR SINGLES, BASED ON DATING OPPORTUNITIES, FUN AND RECREATION, AND ECONOMICS.

Geffen, of course, has been known to date younger men—and is famous for treating them well. Remember how he took 26-year-old surfer Jeremy Lingvall to President Barack Obama’s 2009 state dinner?

Alas, Michaels/Foster may want to hold off on picking out a tuxedo for any future state functions; Geffen quickly deleted the photo from his Insta account after his boyfriend’s alleged porn star past was revealed.

—SHEILA MCCLEAR

IS THAT AN ARNOLDI YOU’RE WEARING?

VENICE ABSTRACT artist Chuck Arnoldi is famous for incorporating medium: schmattes. The 76-year-old Guggenheim Fellow was recently approached by British luxe label Alexander McQueen for a collaboration on its spring/summer 2023 line.

“They’d seen a painting of mine and wanted to use it to create dresses for women and suits and T-shirts for men,” Arnoldi says. “I had no idea who or what Alexander McQueen was. Didn’t have a clue.”

But Arnoldi’s wife, novelist Katie Arnoldi, explained who the late designer was and how his company is still producing high-end fashion, and then Arnoldi received a packet of sketches from McQueen’s design team. “I said to Katie, ‘This stuff looks pretty good.’ I told them, sure, they can use it,” he says. “They offered me 50 grand, and I said, ‘OK.’ I don’t care about

Stanford’s Lame List of Bad Words

The university released a catalog of newly forbidden words and phrases as part of its Elimination of Harmful Language Initiative. The list, which triggered a furious outburst, has since been withdrawn.

nontraditional materials— like parts of trees—into his paintings. But now, he’s branching out into a new

Alexander

American “Insinuat[es] that the U.S. is the most important country in the Americas.”

Guru

“In the Buddhist and Hindu traditions, the word is a sign of respect. Using it casually negates its original value.”

Karen “Used to ridicule or demean a certain group of people based on their behaviors.”

Killing Two Birds with One Stone

“This expression normalizes violence against animals.”

Man Hours

“This term reinforces male-dominated language.”

Walk-in “Ableist language that trivializes the experience of people living with disabilities.”

You Guys

“Lumps a group of people using masculine language and/or into gender binary groups.” the money. My lawyer told me I could have asked for four times as much!”