Marriage, divorces and babies are surefire sources of publicity for celebrities looking for a little brand enhancement. But such real-life events, with all the real-life consequences and commitments that go along with them, can become so, you know, real. What’s more, they require so much time and work – weddings to plan, lawyers to pay, nannies to hire.
As the ongoing Donald Trump-Rosie O’Donnell imbroglio reminds us, a feud is much easier (and cheaper) to start and maintain.
And once ignited, nothing attracts the media swarm more reliably than an old-fashioned, mud-slinging celebrity feud. Feuds are a publicity jackpot that can keep paying off. In this age of manufactured buzz and choreographed chaos, if Hollywood doesn’t already have feud-coordination departments, it might soon.
Here’s a field guide to celebrity feuds as you wander the pop culture landscape.
Merry-go-round feuds: In which two or more members of a recurring cast of characters keep the feud wheel spinning.
Iconic example: Paris Hilton and Lindsay Lohan feuding over a boyfriend (Stavros Niarchos). Before that it was Lindsay feuding with Hilary Duff over a boyfriend (Aaron Carter) or it’s Hilary feuding with Alicia Silverstone or Lindsay feuding with Jessica Simpson. The life cycle is complete when everybody involved has been in a feud with everyone else in the circle.
Good-love-gone-bad feuds: In which two people who got famous as a couple or were famous and got more famous when they paired up feud.
Iconic example: Justin Timberlake and Britney Spears. Showbiz is like any other office; plenty of workplace romances don’t work out. To achieve feud status, the aggrieved parties must go public with their problems, as Justin and Britney did when they broke up and he wrote a song about her.
I-honestly-hate-you feuds: In which the feuding parties aren’t in it for the publicity; they are committed to a long-term relationship based on mutual mistrust and disdain.
Iconic example: Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis set the standard for this category, a decades-long record broken only when Frank Sinatra brought the two together during one of Jerry’s Muscular Dystrophy telethons. On the pop music side, John Lennon and Paul McCartney maintained a level of animosity unlikely ever to be matched, trading swipes in interviews and songs for years.
Hip-hop feuds: In which a rapper trying to establish himself as a hip-hop star adds the necessary feuds to his résumé.
Iconic example: Notorious B.I.G. and Tupac Shakur, whose blazing-guns battle lionized their status as legends but spurred countless stories about the East Coast-
West Coast divide in hip-hop. Since then, it’s been one feud after another – Jay Z vs. Nas, 50 Cent vs. The Game, Eminem vs. Triumph the Insult Comic Dog.
