Paris Hilton in 'Gatsby' Remake (Signs of the Apocalypse)

Fox News ^ | Thursday, September 09, 2004 | Roger Friedman

[presidio9]

Maybe F. Scott Fitzgerald is rolling in his grave. Then again, maybe not.

All I know is, entrepreneurial 'N Sync singer Lance Bass is getting ready to produce a big-screen take on "The Great Gatsby" with Paris Hilton as an updated Daisy Buchanan.

Maybe someone will ask Paris tonight at her, uh, book party if she's even read "The Great Gatsby." Perhaps Merle Ginsberg, the ghostwriter of "Confessions of an Heiress: A Tongue-in-Chic Peek Behind the Pose," will read it to her tonight at Lot 61.

Anyway, if Bass and his partners get their way, the Jay Gatsby character will be played by Chris Carmack, the third lead young man on Fox's TV series "The O.C."

Jamie-Lynn DiScala, of "The Sopranos," will play Tom Buchanan's love interest — made famous in the 1974 film version by Karen Black and in 1949 by Shelley Winters.

So to review: That's Paris doing Mia Farrow, who in turn did Betty Field, and a guy from "The O.C." as Robert Redford, previously incarnated by Alan Ladd.

No word on who will play the story's conscience, Nick Carraway, who was brought to the screen in 1974 by Sam Waterston. I'm thinking Freddie Prinze, Jr., but no one asked me.

All kidding aside, Lance continues to be a tireless presence who will not rest on the 'N Sync laurels. He's just produced another film, "Lovewrecked," directed by Randal Kleiser and also starring Jamie-Lynn and Carmack alongside Amanda Bynes.

By the way, here's a title for the Gatsby update: "Jay G." I'm not kidding.

[Xenalyte]

The only reason I've ever finished a Fitzgerald book is to see if the awful characters get their comeuppances. I root for major casualties.

[GOP_Raider]

Ok, so naturally my question after reading that was if the film would be shot entirely in night vision?

[akorahil]

He was boring, uninspired, and had a prediliction for writing about girls with issues (for obvious reasons). I say "Bleah".

And I am FROM St. Paul, so I should be totally bought into the FSF lovefest, well, I always have been a little different....

[dangus]

Ahhh, that was the upside of bouncing around the tracking system: Twice the Shakespeare, none of the early-20th-century proto-beatnik sh!t.

Heck, I don't even know those books... although Babbitt sounds familiar... Was that plagiarized or something?
(/obscure political humor)

[utahagen]

I'm with you on that. The Apocalyptic Age has begun.

[cyborg]

Okay *lol*

[oyez]

Reading James Joyce is a running reminder that my attention span isn't what it used to be. Hmmm. Maybe it was to great in the first place.

[akorahil]

Oooh...tough call.

Well, coming from the Land of 10,000 F. Scott Fitzgerald freaks, I will vote for him, with the understanding that I am biased...

[elbucko]

That book sucked.

I agree! I must say that I am relieved that I am not the only one to think so. The "Left" believes it to be the "Great American Novel". It's only a soap opera about excess wealth put to print, and a poor one at that.

[Xenalyte]

Check out this thread - and while you're over there, wish it a happy second birthday!

[Trillian]

That would be more fitting for her..

[Argh]

I read recently that Joyce's Ulysses is so abstruse because Joyce got the preliminary print back from the publisher and scribbled a bunch of notes to himself all through it: these were later incorporated into the first printing as well as the editor could guess because for some reason, Joyce never got another crack at re-editing. I dunno, I wasn't there. I had to read Portrait in college and the only thing I remember now is that the protagonist refused to scratch himself when he got itchy...

[presidio9]

White men who even THINK the "N-word," no matter what the context, are evil evil EVIL!

[ozzymandus]

Is this from The Onion? Wasn't Daisy a spoiled, clueless heiress? That's certainly accurate typecasting, but I can't picture a movie Daisy whose only dialog is "Like, oh wow!", and "Ew, gross!".
Seriously, I liked the book, and the 74 movie version was the only good role I've ever seen Redford in. He was perfectly cast as a complete phony who ended up dead in his own swimming pool. Wasn't Bruce Dern the mechanic who plugged him?

[Xenalyte]

Hell, at an English class at Houston Baptist University in 1989, I was told by a classmate that "Huck Finn" promoted homosexuality because of one line: Jim saying to Huck, "Come back to the raft, Huck honey."

He objected to our having to read the book on those grounds. Fortunately, since it was a private school, the professor laughed at him.

[presidio9]

Sounds like the nitwit on a thread about the David a few days ago who claimed that the fact that Michelangelo created the most beautiful male nude in history and wrote sonnets to male friends PROVED that he was a practicing homasesshule.

[Flashman_at_the_charge]

I must confess to feeling a little smug myself when I read about some insufferable ass getting his just rewards in life.

[Xenalyte]

Schadenfreude is a decent motivator for reading Fitzgerald, Hemingway, and Faulkner.

[Flashman_at_the_charge]

Well you're a braver soul than me. Why waste your time on mediocre literature when you could be up the pub having a pint?

[Dr. Eckleburg]

Nick, what madness is this?

Wasn't Mia Farrow enough of an insult?

"So we beat on, boats against the current, born back ceaselessly into the past."