Mariah: singing a tune of self destruct?
It was only three short years ago that Mariah Carey's career was in the toilet. But she seems to have forgotten that. Last week, Carey fired her longtime publicist, Cindi Berger, of powerhouse firm PMK HBH, because - I am told - she held her responsible for a stupid, unchecked gossip item that ran in a local newspaper.
On top of that, Mariah is all but severed from the record company exec who brought her back from the abyss of the infamous "Glitter" movie and soundtrack. Jerry Blair, who worked on Carey's records for more than a decade at Sony/Epic, started her new Monarc Records at Island/DefJam and helped make her "Charmbracelet" album a success following the "Glitter" debacle. Now Blair is out too.
In their place: Jennifer Lopez's former manager, Benny Medina, who has systematically taken over Carey's career, sources say. Carey obviously doesn't realize that following her "nervous breakdown" in the summer of 2001, and the "Glitter" disaster, it was Blair and Berger who reconstructed her press image. This pair worked tirelessly to smooth over Carey's bad publicity and do something to make her seem sympathetic. Prior to the Blair/Berger resuscitation, Carey had the baggage of being a defendant in plagiarism lawsuits and a night-crawling trollop.
It always startles me when celebrities forget the work that professionals do to make them stars. A couple of years ago I heard one movie star tell Charlie Rose that she actually picked her own material for films, when everyone in the business knew it was her savvy business partner. But this is what happens when millions of dollars make stars feel insulated from reality. In Mariah's case, it's the $50 million which EMI Records paid her to leave their label after "Glitter" almost killed them.
Ironically, Carey seems blissfully clueless that Medina was Lopez's manager when J-Lo stole - or was given - advance music from "Glitter" for her "I'm Real" single remix with Ja Rule. The result was that Carey freaked out, as ex-husband Tommy Mottola made the handoff. But who does she think Mottola gave the "Glitter" samples to? Lopez herself? Carey was never the brightest bulb on the Christmas tree, but you have to wonder now if someone's forgotten to plug the lights in at all. (Fox 411)
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