The move creates a fabulous new ladder of ascent for aspiring young dreamers looking to scale the heights of the LA swanky cocktail party-centric web journalism.

The Grazer Cultural Attaché slot is one of Hollywood's most-fabled sinecures. The job as it, has been described, focuses around bringing in the great thinkers of the land to meet with the greatest producer of our times for a free-wheeling meeting of the minds. Past great minds wrangled over the years are said to include Jonas Salk, Edward Teller and author Malcolm Gladwell as well as less renowned professors and thinktank dwellers who've been wheedled into showing off their knowledge wares beneath Grazer's Beverly Hills throne.

While the responsibility of genius-wrangling has been traditionally assigned to a one (or in recent months, a couple) Imagine employees, former workers describe the process as consuming the entire office, with all employees brainstorming and submitting a list of names for Grazer himself to whittle down.

In May of last year, when Brad Grossman, Grazer's former CA stepped down, an email seeking his successor was widely circulated and reported on. The email contained the following job description:

This person would be responsible for keeping Brian abreast of everything that's going on in the world; politically, culturally, musically... They're also responsible for finding an interesting person for Brian to meet with every week... an astronaut, a journalist, a philosopher, a buddhist monk... There is LOTS of reading for this position! Grazer may ask you to read any book he's interested in. You'll probably get to read about 4 or 5 books a week and you may be required to travel with him on his private plane to Hawaii, New York, Europe-teaching him anything he asks you about along the way... You will also be provided with an assistant... Salary is around $150,000 a year... You will be to Grazer what Karl Rove was to Bush.

The task of finding his own "architect" however, finding a mind worthy of the being his personal Karl Rove, may have been too much for the The Klumps producer. Grazer gave an interview to, ironically, to the Huffington Post last December in which he claimed himself attaché-free. He said:

That was sort of a joke title. I've been out meeting different people, I have a record, for 24 years, of meeting someone every two weeks. It helps inform your filter and hopefully informs your taste. I don't have anyone that's doing that for me right now. I use a couple of my assistants and I just say 'hey, can I meet so-and-so' and then we work on it or I'll call them myself, but I don't have a person that does that any longer.

Considering to whom he was speaking, Grazer may just have been wanting to hide his attaché from Arianna's potentially poaching claws. Whether the title was formally bestowed upon him or not, sources tell us that Silverman, who had been Grazer's assistant, was in fact acting in the Karl Rovean role. For a cultural attaché to leap out of that heady role after little more than a year at most, seems a bit abrupt, but perhaps once you have tasted the air at those heights, it is hard not to climb ever higher, right into the eagle's nest of all showbiz self-congratulation, The Huffington Post.

Gigi originally wanted one million dollars a month in child support, a number now winnowed down to $40,000. She'll also get a lump sum of $4.75 million, plus around $9 million additional so she buy a place of her own, that's in her name. So she can get a fresh start! And he has to pay 500k for Gigi's lawyers.

So all told, that's definitely better than coughing up $12 million every year for his two sons' out of control basketball sneaker addictions.

[TMZ]

Publisher's Weekly has a review of her latest, Queen Takes King, and they liked it well enough, though its characters are "celluloid" and totally unbelievable. It tells the tale of an aging ballet dancer who divorces a real estate mogul and oh gosh how are they going to figure out how to still be rich without each other.

After 25 years of marriage-most of it squandered on unspoken disappointment, stifled grief and wasted affection-ex-ballerina Cynthia Power and real estate tycoon hubby Jackson are headed for divorce. At the same time, Jackson's latest condo project is teetering and Carolyn's ballet board is in turmoil. Though lesbian daughter Vivienne counsels Cynthia to "think three moves ahead," Jackson, torn between his ambitious and reckless lover and imperious father, is staying in the game by sheer grit.

So let's see if we can unpack this dense allegory. The ballet dancer—free, creative, supported by chic lesbo daughter—is the saintly Levangie, right? And the gritty one with the reckless relationship is the insane-haired Grazer? Phew. Maybe the ballet dancer demands seven thousand dollars a month for "fine art," too. Or, maybe, because of creative license and stuff, it's like six thousand instead.

We're sure that divorces send both gentlemen and ladies, both rich and poor, reeling—it's the end of an error, after all—but if Levangie continues to insist to solely mine the shallow depths of rich divorcée ennui, we might start thinking she's some sort of opportunist.

Either way, we encourage you to pick up the tome, which drops in June, lest the poor Levangie be forced to scrape by on her $1 million-a-month divorce settlement. The poor dear.

Bradley Jane Pitt and Natalie Portman will be starring in a romantic comedy together, based on the book Important Artifacts and Personal Property From the Collection of Lenore Doolan and Harold Morris, Including Books, Street Fashion and Jewelry. Then a sunset and a sunrise will do a movie with a forty word title and we'll be forced to argue forever about which one starred the more beautiful things and had the most annoying name. [Variety] Kevin Costner is still working. So that's something. [Variety]

Are you ready for a boy version of Splash? Too bad. Brian Grazer is producing a new movie called Merman that is about just such an abomination. Keep a close eye out for Darryl Hannah in one scene. She's that extra, all blurry in the background, weeping. [Variety] Speaking of weeping, poor sad former SAG exec Doug Allen, who was fired two months ago, popped back up on the picket lines yesterday. After he wandered around for awhile, distractedly eating a hot dog and faintly humming a song no one could identify, someone finally asked what he was doing there. "I heard that some of my friends were here," he told them (foreal). Everyone felt bad for him and let him hold a sign but afterwards when everyone went to go get beers together, they told him they were all just going home. [Variety]

Disney/Pixar's fancy new computer movie Up is set to open the Festival de Cannes, that humble little film festival that happens every May, going mostly unnoticed, down in the south of France. [THR] In the realm of actually small, actually important news, the husband of Adrienne Shelly, the New York-based Waitress filmmaker who was murdered two years ago, is producing a finished screenplay she left behind, a decades-spanning family drama called The Morgan Stories. [THR]

VH1 is kicking aside the pile of bottles, cans, and dead groupies to pick up one of their old standbys. The network is reviving its former flagship series Behind the Music, with Lil' Wayne and Lil' Scott Weiland already set to appear. Oh goody. Don't you want to know more about what happens behind the music of, say, ... (The sad/funny thing about this is that I was trying to come up with a joke about some current music star. But then I couldn't think of any because I have no idea what the kids are listening to anymore. So, I'll just leave it hear. A sad, sorry blank.) [THR]

In fact, it's only the pedigree elsewhere on the credit roll — Brian Grazer is producing, Robert Donwey Jr. is a front-runner to star — that seems to reassure Hefner in the face of a B-Rat incursion on his life story:

"It's going to be a very curious change of pace for him . . . but I believe in Brian," Hefner said. "The one thing I would want the film to be is something other than a light comedy, to have something to say and express something about the change in social sexual values. You know, Brian made a comment that I was the only man who had made love to over a thousand women and they all still liked him. And I do take some pride, in fact, that I remain friends with the majority of former wives and girlfriends. I am a romantic."

This can't be reassuring to Ratner, who would hate to have wasted his last year and a half of attempts to convince Hefner that he, too, is a romantic with male-slut sensitivity befitting his legendary subject. The law of averages suggests that the whole girl-ashamed-to-be-seen-with-the-Rat thing is bound to happen on occasion, just as eventually Ratner would have it in him to make a watchable, rewarding non-sequel. You're in good hands, Hef. Just keep an eye on them around the mansion.

• Playboy founder Hugh Hefner's first true love was movies [LAT]

HuffPo sought answers.

How do you do your hair?
It's not much of an ordeal. It happened by accident by my daughter who was 12 years old at the time. She just popped it up and was like, 'I like your hair that way,' and I kept the accident alive and it became my hairdo.

There you have it: The Grazerdo is simply the result of a playful and affectionate child stumbling, with the help of a small amount of epoxy resin still coating her palms from a science fair model-building project, upon a signature look that just works.

Next week: How a Skinny Black Tie Can Save a Life.

• Brian Grazer On His Role With "Frost/Nixon," Bush, His Hair And More [HuffPo]

[Photo credit: FilmMagic]

• VH1 Classic Rock Autism [VH1]

• Previously: Defamer Halloween Costume Ideas, Vol. IV: The Rebel
• Defamer Halloween Costume Ideas, Vol. III: The Dreamer
• Defamer Halloween Costume Ideas, Vol. II: The Aberration
• Defamer Halloween Costume Ideas, Vol. I: The Visionaries [Defamer]

"I'm telling you, he's got a scene where he's swimming in Speedos, and he looks fantastic," Grazer says. "He's going to add 10 years to his career with that scene alone, just watch."

Though we've gone on the record as staunch Tom Hanks apologists, the notion of this scene has us worried; after all, not every fiftysomething has the defined pecs of a Grazer. It's been nearly a decade since Hanks whittled his body down to Cast Away shape — and that butt shot from last year's Charlie Wilson's War? All we're sayin' is that we wish it was as forgettable as the movie it was in.

• First look: 'Angels & Demons' will fly faster than 'Da Vinci' [USA Today]

They dont have an NYC house—they both stay at the Mercer Hotel when in town. Also: She's not getting ANY of the houses. They were all in his name. He's buying her home, but he keeps Hawaii and all of the LA homes. And she signed a pretty airtight prenup (which is why they split right before the ten-year mark). She is getting more, but not $12 mil a year.

We're still waiting to see the legal documents TMZ refers to in their story. In the meantime, we'll turn back to the only science we can rely on in these contradictory times—the stars—for guidance. We're a Grazer with a Bruckheimer rising. What are you?

• Previously: Who Gets What In The Brian And Gigi Grazer Divorce [Defamer]

After all, it's hard enough facing a happy Brian Grazer, whose Imagine Entertainment is also headquartered on the Uni lot, where it cranks its own fistful of prestige titles every year. Imagine evil Grazer, suspiciously adapting a Jokeresque grin and pitting his own interns versus DreamWorks assistants in a climactic time-bomb face-off after Snider usurps yet another plum release date for Untitled Shia LaBeouf Sequel. It could happen, reports The New York Times:

[Uni president Ron] Meyer would not discuss anything related to a DreamWorks deal, except to say: “We would be very pleased to be back in business together. We don’t anticipate a real impact on our current or future slate from distributing their films.” [...]

Officials at NBC Universal have said that they realize a deal with DreamWorks could upset Universal’s equilibrium and that they will take that into consideration before entering into any kind of formal partnership. But ultimately, the company wants the deal to happen; the money that the company can make by distributing DreamWorks movies — which are hits more often than not — far outweighs any ruffled feathers.

We certainly hope so for Grazer's sake. It's hard times, after all, and you'd be surprised: All that Hawaiian appliance-and-furniture replacement adds up before you know it.

• DreamWorks, Universal ink deal [Variety]

• A DreamWorks Deal Could Rock Universal’s Boat [NYT]

Grazer's cash haul per year is $28 million, 13 mil of which came from just his production co. salary. The rest comes from "corporate distributions ... perquisites ... as well as interest and dividend income."

Gigi is asking for nearly a million per month in child and spousal support ($988,184), including a grand per month for "furniture and appliance replacement" at their Hawaii house. She spends $7K for "fine art" every month ... just for their NYC pad. But here's the good news for Brian — she's only asking for $42 a month to clean the New York pad.

It's really up to the individual to decide when the moment is right to pull open the bedroom drapes and let the sun shine onto a new chapter in one's life. Perhaps it takes a grueling, 28-day laptop Wack-A-Grazer marathon—with breaks only to address basic bodily functions and scrape some sustenance out from the bottom of a frosting container—to emerge from the other side fully intact, confident that $1 million plus cable series residuals will offer enough of a mental cushion to hit the Hollywood husband circuit again.

• Brian Grazer's Got a Lot of Gs to Deal With [TMZ]

A. Joan Rivers

B. Andy Dick

C. Grazerhead

In today's installment: Neil Patrick Harris, Woody Allen, Matthew McConaughey, Brian Grazer, Blake Lively, Pierce Brosnan, Christian Slater, Chris Noth, Jason Lee, Jenny Lewis, John Rzeznik, Dave Navarro, Mark McGrath, Dyan Cannon, Camryn Manheim, Bruce Vilanch and more!

WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 6
· I was at the Arsenal in Los Angeles last night and saw (HOT)MIKE BORTONE (Survivor), PAMELA ALDON ( I remember her from Grease 2, but now on Californication and King of the Hill) and LIZA SNYDER (Yes, Please). They looked like they were having a great time, drinking & laughing & hanging out with a bunch of fun people. At one point I thought Liza & Pamela were going to get up & dance with the DJ's, but no luck. Good Times.

THURSDAY, AUGUST 7
· Saw BLAKE LIVELY at Urth Cafe in Beverly Hills. Amazingly, she mistook ME for one of her friends and stopped me as I walked by and said, "Hello." She realized her error and was very sweet in apologizing. She's as pretty in person as she is on TV.

· DYAN CANNON — all 90lbs of her — managed to waft/ tremble/ stumble into my abs class today at Equinox. I thought to myself, "Oh my god, that woman looks like the gorgeous Dyan Cannon, star of my all-time favorite and underrated Al Pacino movie Author! Author! But it can't be her because her surgically enhanced lips are bigger than my ass."

While the instructor yelled at us during the "reverse crunch" series ("this targets LBF, people! Lower Back Fat! Nothing attractive about that!"), I determined that it was indeed her. Her body is 15, most of her face is 35, but her lips are just...wow. A very bad decision. Sort of criminal, really, that some surgeon would go through with that. Someone should hire her for something—but first demand she gets rid of the trout pout.

· I saw WOODY ALLEN & SOON YI today at MOCA. He does not at all try to hide the fact that he's looking at you. Definitely a people watcher.

SATURDAY, AUGUST 8
· While at the Eddie Izzard show at the Kodak, I spotted a very cheery CAMRYN MANHEIM. I always expect her to be in a foul mood but she seemed open and, dare I say, bubbly. As I was waiting for the show to start I felt the cold wave of hack comedy wash over the crowd. As I turn around, I see a T-shirt with a hacky comment and the unmistakable bleached bowl-cut of BRUCE VILANCH entering the room. Watching Izzard perform, Vilanch must have felt like a midget trying to guard Shaq. Hopefully it made him realize he should quit the business and leave the hackiness to butchers, golfers, and Dane Cook.

SUNDAY, AUGUST 10
· I saw JOHN RZEZNIK of the Goo Goo Dolls getting his Polish on at Warszawa in Santa Monica. He was with some appropriately punk looking pals, pretty cool, having his pierogi.

MONDAY, AUGUST 11
· It was the day of hot rocker boys of the 90’s at Equinox on Sunset. Saw DAVE NAVARRO and MARK MCGRATH. Dave’s always there, so that might not be much of a sighting. Mark got approached by some overeager fangirls and looked a bit confused, then scurried away.

TUESDAY, AUGUST 12
· It was a celebrity smorgasbord at Nobu (Malibu) around 8:30pm: BRIAN GRAZER, PIERCE BROSNAN (looking fantastic!), CHRISTIAN SLATER (not so much) and MATTHEW MCCONAUGHEY (the usual). They were not all together as that would be just plain weird.

WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 13
· Driving home from work last night (13 Aug) I passed MIA MICHAELS (So You Think You Can Dance) heading in the opposite direction (west - natch!) on the Santa Monica Blvd. at the Van Ness intersection. She drives something big and Jeep-like and black. Naughty lady was at the wheel and using her cellphone. Brazenly! But then, as we all know, celebs are above the law.

· While waiting outside of my chiropractors office...I see CHRIS NOTH (aka, BIG) come out of "Miss Barry's Bootcamp". He was shirtless and glistening all over (having just finished being tortured by "Miss"). Anyway, he was very nice and did not seem to mind people checking him out (nice bod for an over 50 man). Needless to say my tiny little life got a lot bigger for a second.

· It was a celebrity paradox at Poquito Mas on Cahuenga. First, we see a scruffy yet sexy JASON LEE eating with his son PILOT. He seemed like a typical father with him, very sweet, taking him to the bathroom, making sure he had enough nachos, etc. He had a FULL beard (Jason Lee, not the kid), but it kind of worked on him. Then, just minutes later, an absolutely adorable JENNY LEWIS walked in with a pal. They looked like two sweet high school girls. She and Jason Lee made the awkward "I'm famous and you're famous and we are kind of Silver Lakey-Eastsider cool" nod to each other and I couldn't help but think that they would be an adorable couple. A little too cool for school though, perhaps...

THURSDAY, AUGUST 14
· NEIL PATRICK HARRIS and DAVID WALTON (from Quarterlife) are working up a sweat (separately) at Equinox on Sunset.

We see the similarity as well, and applaud Christopher Nolan and co. for taking the toned-down direction they did. After all, you never know when you're going to need a spiky-haired icon in your corner. Follow the jump for the separated-at-birth shocker.

• 'The Dark Knight': Early Joker Concept Art [/FILM]

Keep in mind this is the same script Universal bought more than a year ago for seven figures, piling on none-too-cheap rewrites by Brian Helgeland and now, according to Patrick Goldstein, British playwright Paul Webb. But that's the least of his problems, said Uni chair Marc Shmuger:

The original script had enormous appeal because it had what Hollywood craves—a great part for a big movie star. But it wasn't exactly the kind of character Scott imagined for his vision of Sherwood Forest. "The script had the sheriff of Nottingham as a CSI-style forensics investigator, set in medieval times," Shmuger explains. "It was really well written, but Ridley's interest took him in a different direction." ...

The delay could help on one front. Crowe, who has looked, shall we say, like he's been feasting on the king's venison in recent films, needs to lose some weight before he's ready to play such an athletic part. (After all, he's not playing Friar Tuck in this movie.) As encouragement, the production team plans to send Joe Abunassar, a top Las Vegas-based trainer who works with NBA stars, to Australia to get Crowe into fighting shape.

So old-fashioned! Everyone knows the Seth Rogen Stretch-and-Retch is the wave of the future. In any event, Shmuger confirms the studio still wants Nottingham, but all signs point to a mid- to late-2009 shoot for a 2010 release, which we take to mean that the U and Nottingham producer Brian Grazer should default to Ron Howard by the time you finish reading this. Alas, Ridley, you were close.

• 'Nottingham': Will Russell Crowe ever romp in Sherwood Forest? [LAT]

"I just found out," Miller, 26, tells the BBC. "It's the most exciting news in the world."

This isn't any old Robin romp: This time in Sherwood Forrest, the usually villainous sheriff is due to be portrayed as heroic, while Robin - traditionally known for nobly stealing from the rich to give to the poor - is not. ...

Casting for the Hood has yet to be announced.

We were under the impression that "revisionist" simply meant Grazer and Scott may splurge on a dialect coach for this version, thus avoiding the dodgy English accents that torpedoed Kevin Costner's mullet-hero stab at Robin Hood in 1992. Instead, look for the crafty filmmaker circumvent both the old myth and a near-certain SAG-strike hangover by simply hiring Denzel Washington, tweaking a few lines from the American Gangster script, jamming everyone in the forest for eight weeks and letting the testosterone do the rest. He's not Ridley Scott for nothing.

[Photo Credit: Getty Images]

• Sienna Miller to Star in New Twist on Robin Hood [People]