Sleepless Clooney suffers like us? In his dreams...
I feel for George Clooney. Not only does he want an Oscar, but he can’t sleep. And he gets lonely.
In fact, his life is ‘disturbingly like yours’ according to an interview.
Yes, George’s life is a lot like mine except for a few minor details: The mansion by Lake Como and international stardom.
But then again, he gets back pain – so do I! He hasn’t seen Brad Pitt for a year. Nor have I! He watches a lot of rubbish TV. Me too!
So where do you go to my lovely, when you’re alone in your bed? George fills us in.
Tough life: Brad Pitt, left, and George Clooney may not have the perfect celebrity life we all think they enjoy
He tries an early night, turns off the TV at 10pm – but that causes him to think and ‘once I start that vision roaring’ he can’t drop off and then wakes five times a night.
And there is more: he has been dumped, been in bad relationships and drinks too much. Being George Clooney is a lonely business.
I could help him with his insomnia as my doctor is sending me to do Mindfulness for mine. Its like Buddhism with no mention of Buddha and I hope a few sessions will Zen me to sleep.
The alternative is drugs. But Clooney doesn’t like drugs. He has even had that special cocaine that famous people take that gives them no pleasure whatsoever.
Perhaps he could talk to his mate, that other pitiful specimen, Brad Pitt.
Brad now says he spent much of the Nineties depressed and stoned.
‘I was smoking way too much dope,’ he says. ‘I was just sitting on the couch and turning into a doughnut.’
When these objects of fantasy talk about the reality of celebrity, it is always an attempt to make themselves more real.
Mental-health charities cheer them on, for it is important to know that being rich and famous does not necessarily make people happy.
There is even something called Paradise Syndrome when everything is just too perfect.
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Clooney’s confessional, though, reveals his real insecurity: his desire to be taken seriously. His latest role in The Descendants is a deliberate play against type.
These men want to be known for more than their looks. Clooney and Pitt have become campaigners for a variety of causes to remind us that they are not just pretty faces.
Brad has Angelina, George has a succession of women with walk-on parts and a deceased pot-bellied pig.
That other humanitarian hunk Sean Penn once had Madonna – but this was before he was so politically enlightened that he hung out with the likes of Hugo Chavez.
Penn’s intervention over the Falklands, rather like Clooney’s loneliness, has caused in its own way a great deal of ridicule.
Penn may now be the pin-up boy for anti-colonialism – but some of us have not got over the fact he once tied Madonna to a chair, threatened to cut her hair off and beat her up in a nine-hour ordeal until she escaped bleeding and weeping.
Also, he has now made friends with Guy Ritchie. Unforgivable.
Anyway, the Penn/Madonna marriage was over long ago and also produced the dreadful Shanghai Surprise, but ever since then he has taken himself more and more seriously.
Clearly acting, as Ewan McGregor once happily said, is not ‘a man’s job’.
Is this at the root of all this turmoil?
For, while Clooney lies awake, Penn does his bit for the anti-colonial struggle while living in a part of America that was once Mexico. But never mind.
The message these guys want us to hear is that they are not just surface, they are deep and complicated and just like us. But do we really want to know?
If living the dream means sleeplessness and loneliness, what are we mere mortals to do but toss and turn all night?
Adele's no Whitney - she is in control of her destiny
Of the many ridiculous reactions to the sad death of Whitney Houston, one was the insane question: ‘Will Adele become the new Whitney?’
Er, no. I am no expert on Whitney but anyone can see that from the very start she was put in some kind of straitjacket.
Rebel: Adele refused to conform, isn't a super-skinny manufactured music product and so is in control
First by her church and then by her record company. With or without her abusive husband, she would have rebelled.
Adele has already rebelled – simply by not being super-skinny and by writing her own material, which gives her control.
Adele’s music is not for me, but I love the fact she is doing so well. When I saw her live years ago she came in with her hair tied up and kept her coat on.
She had the confidence to know that her voice was enough. And it is.
She was clearly a star as the world now sees. It is great to watch the love flowing towards this lush, creamy-skinned Tottenham girl.
Workfare won't work and isn't fair
It didn’t take long. There are already protest posters everywhere, using Tesco’s red, white and blue logo: ‘Fiasco. Enslaving little helpers.’ Exploitation. Every little helps.
The Government’s workfare programmes appall many, forcing the unemployed to work for nothing or lose benefits.
And alongside Tesco, other huge companies have signed up to profit from the misery of the unemployed.
Protest: Compassion for those who cannot work is in short supply
Government policy now depends on demonising all on benefit as lazy sub-human scroungers.
Nothing is more harsh than the much-contested ‘reforms’ of disability living allowance.
How are the mentally and physically, even terminally, ill now supposed to work? Apparently if you have less than six months to live, they may let you off, which is very Big Society of them.
Who is going to employ these ill, weak people anyway? This is the age of the self-scan checkout and alongside this vicious slashing of benefits, unemployment is rising.
Money may be short (though not for the Olympics or Trident) but so is compassion.
While there is no work, this policy is not only morally obscene but literally unworkable.
Clever Cameron on Scottish independence
The photograph of Cameron’s cheerful but desperate porridge-munching in Scotland was funny, but his speech was clever.
While Salmond presents independence as an inevitable and amicable separation, Cameron is also now trying out emotional territory.
He is saying we can work at it, you know we love each other really and I will give you the space you need – honestly. And I’ll change.
I promise. I won’t be so domineering. And in his speech he was happy to name many Scots and their achievements.
It’s a shame, though, that his speech-writers did not mention a single woman. This Union, I would say, still needs sexing up somewhat. but literally unworkable.
![Mandatory Credit: Photo by ITV/REX Shutterstock (3529676ab)
Coronation Street - Ep 8161 Wednesday 3 July 2013 Emily Bishop [EILEEN DERBYSHIRE] has a shock proposition for Norris Cole [MALCOLM HEBDEN]. Picture contact: david.crookatitv.com on 0161 952 6214
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