Catherine Zeta-Jones looks supernifty, supertrim. Hair seems a hair darker. Teeth white and pearly. Stunning black sheath a perfect length, elegant. Husband’s had health problems. Stepson’s had drug situations. She’s had medical issues. So what did we talk about?
Her homeland. Wales.
“I go back all the time. Constantly. Every year. My heart’s there. I love the water. Love to walk on the beach. I stay involved with all things there. I go even with my children when my husband can’t make it. My family’s there and they spoil my kids who I’m trying to teach a little Welsh language.
“I’m only having them learn small words. Like I taught them to say ‘botwm bol.’ ”
Which means what?
“Belly button.”
Catherine’s botwm bol you mightn’t catch but you’ll see the rest of her in the new movie “Red 2.”
Jets & rock
Jets owner Robert Wood Johnson IV of the Johnson & Johnson Johnsons, does Aug. 28th’s Jets kickoff lunch, Cipriani Wall Street. His lupus fund-raising letter suggests “purchasing a $25,000 table.” . . . INTO six-time Grammy nominee’s filth, debauchery, vulgarity, viciousness, methadone, heroin, alcohol, decadence, nihilism, aggression, heavy metal, high octane? Read “The Lost Gospels According to Al Jourgensen.” A Mel Tormé saga it isn’t.
Horsy snaps
Fotog Drew Doggett, whose pish-posh clientele includes supermodel Helena Christensen, did remote Sable Island off Nova Scotia’s coast and shot 400 tough, enduring, entirely unmanaged wild horses that freely roam the isolated isle. The original herd, per legend, swam ashore from 18th-century shipwrecks. Aug. 1 these photos show at Sylvester & Co. in Amagansett.
Ali’s court K.O.
We soon get “Muhammad Ali’s Greatest Fights.” HBO will go behind closed doors of the nine Supremes deciding Ali’s landmark 1971 case. Frank Langella plays Chief Justice Warren Burger, Fritz Weaver’s Associate Justice Hugo Black, Danny Glover is Thurgood Marshall, Ed Begley Jr. has the role of Harry Blackmun. Justice John Harlan, respected jurist with 15 years on the Court, argues the decision’s status quo. Harlan, in the person of Christopher Plummer, challenges the ideals of his new clerk.
Such will come upon us later this year.
Slim fandom for film
James Cromwell was in the Oscar winner, silent film “The Artist,” was Oscar-nominated for the pig film “Babe,” and his newie is “Still Mine.”
“I live out of a suitcase,” he said. “Location to location, set to set. Mostly wherever my lady is. Maybe soon Costa Rica where our friend has a farm.
“Once artists finish a movie it’s out in the ethos. Gone. Over. If one of mine’s on TV I don’t watch. Maybe just a minute. To see was I good or to say, ‘Oh, Jimmy, you could’ve done this better.’ And awards are just gewgaws. Mine’s on the fridge. Behind bananas.
“Today’s movies are dreadful. Unwieldy. They lack ideas. No longer story, story, story. It’s throw in money, not intelligence or inspiration. More and more expensive films, studios can’t afford. It’s just sell the product like oatmeal, don’t change it.”
“Still Mine” with Geneviève Bujold opens tomorrow.
Put a ring on it?
Viewers watch TV veryveryclosely. Good-looking well-dressed Kristine Johnson — proper mien, perfect work, mother of two — has co-anchored local CBS news with Chris Wragge since 2007. A fan writes me asking: “She isn’t wearing her wedding ring anymore. Anything happen in her personal life? Just wondering.”
DOWNTOWN’s Moya Chicken & Beer Restaurant. Window sign reads “Grilled Man Wanted.” Does that mean dead or alive?
Only in New York, kids, only in New York.