Just as it’s hard to imagine what life was like before the Internet, it’s hard to imagine what the Internet was like before it was full of celebrity sex tapes. In 1997, IEG Entertainment offered the world downloadable copies of Baywatch bombshell Pamela Anderson and Mötley Crüe drummer Tommy Lee celebrating their whirlwind 1995 marriage [...]
100 Greatest Celebrity Scandals Of All Time
#8: Janet Jackson And Justin Timberlake’s Nipplegate
You can bump ‘n grind while simulating orgasm on MTV, and you can cram prime-time TV with cleavage galore, but you can’t bust out the right half of an R&B diva’s very substantial rack during the world’s most-watched sporting event. Justin Timberlake probably had no idea what kind of maelstrom he’d set off when, during [...]
#7: Britney Spears Meltdown
Britney, light of our lives, fire of our loins! How do we love thee? Let us count the ways: 1. Your “One More Time” schoolgirl outfit. (Hands up, who rubbed one out to that?) 2. “Oops, I Did It Again.” The song that launched a thousand lazy Life & Style headlines. 3. Your 55-hour marriage [...]
#6: Charles Manson Murders
The hippie dream received a rude awakening in 1969 when Charles Manson, a failed musician, used psychedelics and “free love” (orgies, rape, that kind of thing) to transform a group of troubled, vulnerable young adults into a violent, psychotic “family.” His efforts eventually led to a series of grotesque murders in August 1969 (slogans like [...]
#5: Michael Jackson Molestation Charges
Once upon a time, the biggest pop star in the world was accused of molesting a frequent visitor of his Neverland Ranch and settled out of court before a criminal suit could be brought against him. He ignited global fury and another court case 10 years later by claiming in a documentary that he shared [...]
#4: O.J. Simpson Murder Trial
The circus never ends when O.J. Simpson is around. After a much-televised “trial of the century” full of racist cops, bloody gloves and a leech called Kato Kaelin, the football star/actor/Hertz spokesperson was found “not guilty” of the murder of estranged wife Nicole Brown Simpson and her friend Ron Goldman, infuriating well over half of [...]
#3: Princess Diana Dies In Car Crash
Princess Diana, the “people’s princess,” was often described as the World’s Most Photographed Woman. So it shouldn’t have been too shocking when the paparazzi chased her driver head-on into a concrete pillar in a Paris underpass on August 31, 1997. In the decade since, a media ecosystem has grown fat off of books and movies [...]
#2: The Monica Lewinsky Affair
If only Monica Lewinsky hadn’t blown Bill Clinton! We know that Mr. I-Did-Not-Have Sexual-Relations-With-That-Woman wouldn’t have been impeached in 1998 for lying under oath. But there is so much we don’t know … Would a zippered Clinton have gone on to prove MVP in Al Gore‘s presidential campaign and subsequent victory in the 2000 election? [...]
#1: The Murders Of Notorious B.I.G. And Tupac
Sex, murder, conspiracy, police corruption, bi-coastal gang warfare, Diddy – this scandal has it all. The rivalry between the east and west coast rap scenes may have begun with minor east coast rapper Tim Dog‘s amusing 1991 hit “Fuck Compton,” but thanks to big money and short fuses, the battle soon grew as epic and [...]
