Base:
She: Daily Beast
He: Esquire

Duration:
She: 3 Weeks
He: 2 Weeks

Stated Reason for Stunt: ("Poor Writer Does Oblvious Movie Star Stuff as Easy Formula" is implicit)
She: Seeks"an effort to understand this complex star."
He: Seeks to "break down the sanity of the Goop life, from common sense to madness."

Make:
She: 3 kinds of chocolate chip cookies, sugar-free banana nut muffins, turkey ragu, a grand, multi-Holiday feast.
He: Smoothies, soups, "Chicken with Onions, Lemon and Saffron",

Go:
She: A Mario Batali restaurant Gwynnie likes
He: Acupuncture

Get:
She: Leggings
He: Tinted under-eye moisturizer

Do:
She: ReadsCrime and Punishment, gives herself a sugar-and-coffee scrub, drinks 2 tablespoons of EVOO nightly, does a Seven-Day Detox, gives up "white foods (bread, pasta), preserved foods (chips, cookies), toxic foods (candy, ice cream), and foods containing heavy metals", negativity.

He: Reads The Sheltering Sky , gives to charity, does same Detox, acupuncture, dance cardio workouts, attempts organic-only eating, gives up "dairy, gluten, meat, shellfish, condiments, sugar, alcohol, caffeine, and an entire class of food (tomatoes, eggplant, potatoes, and peppers) called nightshades."

Be:
She: Practices the African philosophy of ubuntu
He: Listens to Deepak Chopra

Breakthrough:
She: "And then, like magic, at some point in the middle of week two, I stopped noticing what an unbelievable hassle it was to follow this ridiculous plan. My ear adjusted to Gwyneth's affect, and rather than guffawing at some of her more outlandish suggestions, I found myself intrigued by the $249 Voltaic Solar Backpack and her recommendation to "take your drinking water to the next level" with a $900 alkaline filtration system. What vegan shoe designer does Cameron Diaz recommend? I suddenly wanted to know."

He: "Yet... after four or five days, I noticed a change. I stopped craving coffee. I felt a steady stream of energy all day long. There was, in fact, a spring in my step. My mind wasn't quite as sharp as it used to be, and I had trouble concentrating during meetings, but physically speaking, I felt recharged."

Amusing Failures:
She: gives up the detox after a couple of days; doesn't have time for all the recipes, and can't afford anything.
He: Embarrasses himself dancing and is seen and mocked by neighborhood children; takes an unmanly interest in various effete things.

Conclusions:
She:

There's a lot to scoff at here, but the three weeks I spent following GOOP were pure joy. Expensive, inconvenient and totally unsustainable-yes, but also full of unexpected pleasures...She may be tone-deaf and full of wacky ideas about food and religion, but she really just wants everyone to feel as good as she does. On a few occasions, I think I got close. My GOOP plan began with cynicism and failure, and by the end, I was cooking a giant pan-holiday dinner party with recipes from Thanksgiving, Christmas, Hanukkah and Valentine's Day for my boyfriend, three girlfriends, and Rue McClanahan of The Golden Girls.

He:

At the end of this two-week experiment, I can report, without qualification or caveat, that I felt very, very good. I was sleeping better. I had more energy. I'd lost nine pounds. Revolutionary or not, Gwyneth's way worked, and if it worked for this sinner, it could work for anybody. Case closed..And yet. I wasn't having much fun. (I like to eat red meat and drink too much at parties. It makes me happy.) I wasn't doing well at work - maybe it's because I was drinking less caffeine, but I was more reserved in meetings and a little slower on the uptake. I was also quite a bit poorer than when I started out.

Conclusions: It was interesting to see the contrast in the approaches. Although both tried to be open-minded, the dude was clearly more skeptical about the whole endeavor, and found the lifestyle more of a departure. Perhaps most important, he found the whole thing kind of embarrassing. She, on the other hand, even as she bemoaned the unachievable nature of many of Gwyneth's recommendations, got into the spirit of it. In a way this makes sense: Gwynnie's a woman, and Goop's base is, presumably, female. (And if we're more prone to suggestions, tips, advice, self-help, this also implies an open-mindedness, and an ability to take the good.) What they both took away from the stunt was common sense: eat better, drink water, think positive. Do you need self-congratulatory trappings and oblivious stars to tell you this? No. But, hey, if people are taking something good away from it, fine. Both these pieces kind of read like a fable: they have to make a long, absurd journey only to find what was always there in front of them. And while that makes me think that Goop is a waste of time, Gwyneth would probably have a quote about paths and roads and moisturizer that some people would rather hear - and that the rest of us can mock. What did these pieces teach us? Nothing. Or, as Goop would have it, everything.

The Goop Matrix [Esquire]

My Life As Gwyneth [Daily Beast]

The profile details Ellis' move to L.A. and comes in the middle of his writing the "sequel" to his first book, Less Than Zero (which made him a literary superstar at the age of 20), which is tentatively titled Imperial Bedrooms. The article - which isn't avalible online - paints Ellis as kind of sad and living a very existential, somewhat disconnected life. Also, he thinks The Hills is genius. The full quote, transcribed from print:

He is, however-and on this subject, he is highly animated-a huge fan of MTV's scripted reality series of the young and the monied in L.A., THE HILLS. "I think THE HILLS is the greatest show I have ever seen in my life," he says, sincerely. "It is a modern masterpiece. I think that ADAM DeVILLO is a mad genius. He creates it and controls it perfectly." Mr. ELLIS is very specific about the way he watches THE HILLS. "I'm holding off on Season 4 right now. I started watching a bit of it, but I'm waiting until the DVD comes out because I want to see it all so beautifully mastered. Even if you download the show there is that irritating MTV logo in the corner. It doesn't work for me that way. It has to be on a big screen with the sound right up. It blows me away...I'm sorry, but whoever invented HEIDI MONTAG and SPENCER PRATT are just...nothing matches it. I've never see L.A. look more beautiful in a work of art. There are no movies that are as beautiful as that."

This is why I'm never moving to L.A. Just like The City is why you should never move to New York.

He was also, interestingly enough, called out on a social networking site on a date going out ("BRET ELLIS is not a fan of social-networking sites. He has been "caught out" by someone on a dating site, though understandable doesn't care to flesh out that story. He won't try it again.").

Thing is, this makes an interesting point that I've never really considered before. The Hills is the tame, boring drug-less version of Less Than Zero (note to Hills producers: show them doing blow, and I'll watch). A bunch of severely disaffected brats, fucking around with their parents' money, creating an awe-inspiring charade of lives inextricably tied to the celebrity culture of Hollywood. This raises the question: was Less Than Zero the predecessor to The Hills? Do we blame Ellis for Speidi? Is Paul Telegdy off the hook today?

Meanwhile, Fantastic Man, which could be a test-tube baby between Esquire and McSweeny's, is kind of a fascinating product. It's a giant, pretty magazine with nice pages and a strange sense of humor. It costs $11. And it has Bret Easton Ellis on the cover, drinking a Diet Coke. This should tell you what kind of magazine it is: at once both kind of genius and a complete waste of one's time. I love it.

For example, in one issue, there is:

- A 1,000 word essay from the Editor-In-Chief of Interview on waking up with a hangover in Paris.

- A 1,000 word treatise on the greatness that is toast.

- A designation of the word "Super" as their word of the season. This is written on their masthead.

- A selection of single meals art-world people have had recently (one of them: pervy photog Terry Richardson's meal of a vegetarian burrito from Pinche Taqueria in New York. "For dessert, he had a pack of sour Skittles, also very 'yum yum.'").

- And a cover story featuring Bret Easton Ellis with nothing to promote. Did we mention he was drinking a Diet Coke?

The thing is, Chris Jones is not alone in his bromantic feelings towards Vince's golden acreage. To most "dudes," Vince Vaughn is the kind of guy they want to befriend, or even better, the kind of guy they want to be. He was even given the "The Golden Mantlers" and inducted into the Guy's Hall of Fame by Spike TV. But why has the dude demographic, a demographic which is generally not comfortable with expressing same sex affection, professed its undying love for this gargantuan funnyman? We parsed the Esquire article and figured it out.

1. He's good looking, but not too good looking, and certainly not girly looking. He's a big hunka virile man.

His hair rises like a wave above the low-tide beach that is his forehead. (He calls it his fivehead.) His face is full, puffy enough to make him sometimes look as though he's fighting to keep his eyes open—not as though he's just woken up but as though he's never bothered to go to bed in the first place. it.

2. Vaughn dresses like a slob and is still able to pull down famous, quality ladies, like Jennifer Aniston, Joey Lauren Adams, and by some accounts Cameron Diaz.

He wears a pair of old-school Nike sneakers that could be used as war canoes. About…Even from across this crowded restaurant, it's possible to see a jumbo slice of Vaughn's naked belly. It's too much to ignore, this great golden acreage, because he leads with it and because it's probably been kissed by Jennifer Aniston, standing on her tippy-toes. The man doesn't just occupy airspace; he fills it.

3. And speaking of ladies! Vaughn makes sorta lame frattish jokes a lot but he's good natured enough to get away with it. Like this conversation between Vince and bff Jon Favreau. Didja know? Wives are naggy and annoying!

"Are you done having kids?" Vaughn asks.
"Yeah, I'm done."
"You're not going to pull the goalie ever again?"
"No. Joy says, 'It's wife number two if you want more kids.' "
"Then you would have to move to, like, some Islamic country where you could have another wife," Vaughn says.
"Or nowhere. I could do the Hollywood thing, just hit reset."
"Or you could move into Warren Jeffs territory."
"I could set up a compound?"
"Yeah," Vaughn says, "a compound. That was so disturbing. You see all these little girls who look like extras from Little House on the Prairie. It's like Half Pint's been putting out for everybody. . . . "
"Polygamy seems appealing," Favreau says, "but then I've been watching that show Big Love, and you realize it's the same headaches."
"It's triple the headaches. Triple the nagging. Triple the question, What are you thinking?"
"Yeah, one marriage is enough," Favreau says.

4. But finally, the reason so many dudes love Vince Vaughn is because underneath all that golden-hued bluster, he's really just a sad clown. Dudes can wholeheartedly get behind Vaughn because he's not confident 100% of the time. Even the most hardened bro needs to shed a tear every now and again.

Just then, Vince Vaughn looks the way a big man looks when someone stands up to him for the first time in his life. He looks like a man who knows that he can cover only so much ground, that even giants have their limits. He looks like a man who knows he will have to pick a side. He looks suddenly smaller. He still looks a lot like Vince Vaughn, only built to scale.

Vince Vaughn: The Biggest Man In The Room [Esquire]

VINCE VAUGHN LOOKS A LOT LIKE VINCE VAUGHN, ONLY BIGGER...His face is full, puffy enough to make him sometimes look as though he's fighting to keep his eyes open—not as though he's just woken up but as though he's never bothered to go to bed in the first place. His shirt is open at the collar, probably because it has to be. It's also open at the waist. Even from across this crowded restaurant, it's possible to see a jumbo slice of Vaughn's naked belly. It's too much to ignore, this great golden acreage, because he leads with it and because it's probably been kissed by Jennifer Aniston, standing on her tippy-toes.

Yes, well, that's surely a mental image that won't go away! However, the writer is not yet done pounding home Vaughn's bloat. Gorge on these excerpts:

· He's the biggest man in the room. And because of his size, and because he inherited from his salesman father a competitive streak as well as a knack for volume business, he is voracious in his appetites (steak and lobster and creamed spinach) and his desires (to be loved).

· He sinks deeper into the couch, exhausted by his lies.

· There is only one question that Vaughn will answer without reservation. He answered it the night before, at the steakhouse, underscoring every elaborately constructed sentence, paragraph, and punctuation mark with a forkful of lobster meat...

· He swells up and starts shouting again.

· Favreau shows up and Vaughn makes room for him on the couch. He's just wearing a T-shirt and jeans, sucking on a mint for lunch, ready to go to work. It's funny seeing them like this, the two guys from Swingers at their ten-year reunion, a little older, a little fatter, a little tired-seeming and wrung out.

· And just then, Vince Vaughn looks the way a big man looks when someone stands up to him for the first time in his life.

"...Like a fat dude caught stuffing cake in his mouth," right? We're just guessing!

• Vince graces the cover of Esquire magazine [Vince-Vaughn.com]

Come on. I mean, you couldn't go with the Bond-girl year? You didn't like the orange bikini? I liked the orange bikini. That would have been a pretty good year. Or what about the Monster's Ball year? That was a sexy moment. Couldn't you have packaged that up with some list of the best movie sex scenes ever? That would have been very easy, very magaziney...There are billions of women on the planet, but let's just say for shits and giggles that I am the sexiest woman alive. [...]

Berry's favorite male body part, and more styling-challenged photos of her in old Esquire covers after the jump!

A little later on, Berry opens up about what turns her on in a man, besides the obvious requirement of being a ravishing French Canadian model:

When it comes to what I think is sexy about men, I like forearms. That's my body part. They're generally exposed, available, a little bit vulnerable. A forearm is different with every man, and when it comes to forearms, size matters. I don't like them slight. [...]

What else? Ah, yes: the big O. You know that stuff they say about a woman being responsible for her own orgasms? That's all true. And in my case, that makes me responsible for pretty damned good orgasms these days. Much better orgasms than when I was twenty-two. And I wouldn't let a man control that. Not anymore. Now I'd invite him to participate. I'll tell you this: I've learned my tricks. I know what I like. I do not wait around. I initiate. And I'm not all about frequency. I favor intensity.

And here we thought we were the only ones who associated intense orgasms with thick, hairy forearms! We raise a fist in solidarity, sister!

• Halle Berry Is the Sexiest Woman Alive, 2008 [Esquire]

Our first instinct was to disbelieve the story; after all, virtually every profile we've ever read of Hathaway mentions how carefully and professionally she answers questions, concerned that her quotes will be taken out of context. Had Hathaway been emboldened after her split with boyfriend Raffaello Follieri, or was someone putting naughty words in her mouth?

Turns out, it's the latter. We contacted Esquire for comment, and spokesperson Rhett Usry was shocked by the rumor. "Absolutely not true," he told us. "There is no interview with Anne Hathaway at all in the upcoming issue of Esquire."

So where did the story originate? All signs point to this September 12 posting on Celeb.Dump, a photo-laden blog promising "Sexy Celebrity Pictures With Little To No Bullshit" (and headlines like "Stacy Keibler is so very hot" and "Jessica Simpson touching herself"). "Thanks to Miss M. from Esquire for letting me know" about the rumor, said the poster (who declined our repeated requests to comment on his tip).

As for how this obscure bit of gossip hit the big time, we're betting it's due to a potent mix of wishful thinking, Hathaway's Rachel Getting Married press tour, and lingering conflation of the actress with Brokeback Mountain. Either that, or Follieri's got an axe to grind. Memo to Celeb.Dump: if your "source" claims to be Esquire's liaison to the Vatican, it may be time to place some calls.

[Photo Credit: AP]

• Anne Hathaway Loves Anal Sex [Celeb.Dump]

At a recent magazine conference, art director and legendary ad man George Lois explained the rationale behind his legendary Esquire photo shoot: "I spoofed the upcoming woman's movement by slapping shaving cream on the beautiful blonde Italian actress Virna Lisi [because] no American beauty had the [bleeps] to pose for it." We respect that, certainly, but we're not exactly sure that the context holds the same meaning for Jessica Simpson in 2008 that it did for Lisi back in 1965. It's one thing to show your tits freely after getting out of rehab, but it's another to slather shaving cream on your face and call it an homage. One takes balls; the other? A sock in the pants.

• JESSICA SIMPSON'S EDGY NEW LOOK [NYDN]

Thing You Don't Know About Women #1: "PMS is not a lame excuse to be able to yell at you. It's a great excuse."
Who It's About: John Mayer. Wouldn't you want an excuse to yell at him, too?

Thing You Don't Know About Women #2: "We really can pump our own gas. It's just that we've got this fantasy of you as a '30s-era full-service station attendant. You'd look so cute in the hat."
Who It's About: Patrick Wilson. He would look cute in any hat. Or without any hat. Or without any clothes...

Thing You Don't Know About Women #3: "We're not complimented when you call your ex a slut. She dated you, too. So what are we?"
Who It's About: Carson Daly. He was engaged to Tara Reid. Nuff said!

Thing You Don't Know About Women #4: "We're smart enough to know that smell is always the dog."
Who It's About: Craig Ferguson. He looks gassy.

Thing You Don't Know About Women #5: "Yes, we can dish it out."
Who It's About: Wilmer Valderrama. He was probably skeezing on other starlets all the time (see Lohan, Lindsay; Moore, Mandy) and deserved a stern talking to.

Thing You Don't Know About Women #6: "No, we can't take it."
Who It's About: Wilmer again. Bet he has a sass mouth.

Thing You Don't Know About Women #7: "We want to raise children. We just don't want you to be one of them."
Who It's About: LFO's Rich Cronin, solely because he was behind the lyrics: "New Kids On The Block, had a bunch of hits/ Chinese food makes me sick." Those had to be written by someone with the mentality of a seven year old.

Thing You Don't Know About Women #8: Women are meant to talk and men to listen. We don't want to be fixed; we want to be heard.
Who It's About: Kip Pardue. The insouciant smirk always plastered to his face makes us think he wouldn't be the best listener.

Thing You Don't Know About Women #9: "When we ask if you've had any work done, it's because we want to know what our kids will really look like."
Who It's About: Carson Daly. Have you seen his face recently? He looks like an entirely different person.

Thing You Don't Know About Women #10: "When we ask you how we look, it's okay to lie; when we ask you how she looks, you better lie."
Who It's About: Ross McCall. This is advice he should keep with him for the future.

Jennifer Love Hewitt: 10 Things You Don't Know About Women [Esquire]
Jennifer Love Hewitt [Who's Dated Who]

Earlier: The Esquire Map To...Minnie Driver's Dating Life
Women We Love