“Is that…is that Paris Hilton falling down?”
“You’re definitely right about it being Paris Hilton. I wouldn’t say she’s falling so much as…listing terribly to one side.”
“Paris being Paris, would you say she’s A-listing to one side?”
“I wouldn’t, no, although I would say that it’s no surprise that she’s listing terribly – it’s not like Paris does anything all that well.”
“Except being Paris.”
“And, sometimes, she’s not even convincing at that.”
“Oh, ha ha.”
“Ho.”
“Yes, the excitement is palpable here in the Doohan Memorial Ballroom in downtown Los Angeles. The young, the beautiful, the mindless are all here doing what they do best.”
“Which is?”
“Being young, beautiful and mindless. Surely, you couldn’t possibly ask anything more of them.”
“Oh, of course not. In past generations, being young and beautiful was enough to get you into high society. Intelligence, not especially valued since the end of the Cold War, has become positively passé in the America of George W. Bush.”
“They say the last book the President read was Brad the Sock Puppet Learns About Linguini.”
“Well, those types of rumours are hard to prove because, of course, the President’s reading list has been classified since he took office. Unlike the rest of us, whose histories of taking out library books are available to any intelligence agency that wants to –”
“No matter. Everybody who is anybody wants to be a member of the illiterati. Over here, Nicole Ritchie is in a corner of the vast ballroom –”
“Interesting how she has managed to position herself as far away from Paris Hilton as is geometrically possible in this space.”
“Hmm…are you suggesting some knowledge of higher mathematics on Nicole’s part?”
“Well, no. It’s probably just a coincidence, faux intelligence born of embarrassment.”
“There is a lot of that among the illiterati. That’s why it can sometimes be so darn difficult to tell them apart from people with average intelligence.”
“Nicole appears to be struggling to keep her cleavage in her dress. Oh, and, over there, the entire cast of the second season of American Idol have made three tables their own.”
“I understand that they have threatened to cut off the genitals of anybody who asks them to sing.”
“They’re probably just cranky that nobody has asked them for an autograph.”
“To be one of the beautifully ignorant people, you just have to be poorly read, you don’t have to have manners.”
“As if to prove your point, there’s Russell Crowe, looking for a telephone to throw at somebody.”
“Funny that they would let Crowe in, but keep Tom Cruise out.”
“Word has it that that decision has nothing to do with Cruise building a library in his home to house all of L. Ron Hubbard’s books and papers on Scientology. Not only is there no evidence that Cruise has actually read any of them, but, even if he had, their intellectual value is actually in negative numbers. No, apparently Cruise is rumoured to have been caught reading Nietzsche for Beginners when he was a teenager, and, although he swears it isn’t true, that’s enough to brand him an intellectual in Hollywood.”
“Can’t let just any old riff raff into the illiterati.”
“Damn straight. If anybody could join the illiterati, who would want to?”
“Who’s that guy in the wheelchair?”
“He looks awfully familiar. Do you thi – hey, wait a minute! That’s Stephen Hawking!”
“Who?”
“The world renowned physicist! The author of A Brief History of Time!”
“A book?”
“Well, ah –”
“You read that?”
“I..uhh…I saw the movie.”
“Oh. What would he be doing among the illiterati?”
“Maybe he’s trying to pass.”
“That’s pathetic. Somebody should – okay. Security has come to talk to him and…yes, yes, they’ve picked up his wheelchair and thrown him out of the building. Just as well – nobody likes a wannabe.”
“Indeed. We should all count ourselves very lucky that we live in an anti-intellectual society. Judging people based on their wit or other signs of intelligence, well, that’s just elitist. After all, not everybody can be born brilliant.”
“True. Judging people based on their wealth and beauty seems much fairer.”
“Really?”
“What?”
“I…I’m not sure I understand that logic.”
“WELCOME TO THE CLUB!”
“Oh. Ha ha. Right.”
“Hey! Is that Keanu Reeves talking to Anna Nicole Smith?”
“Oh, to be a fly on the wall for that conversation!”
“Not that there’s likely to be anything to the conversation worth remembering.”
“No. But buzzing around the heads of two famous, beautiful people – who could ask for anything more out of life?”