Hilarious criticism of the Esquire article. And well-deserved - the name of the article is "Angelina Jolie Dies for Our Sins"???? Seriously? Seriously?? Celebrity worship has reached an all new level of psychosis. Or maybe the Esquire author was suffering from a high fever - those quotes don't make a lick of sense. The editor must be hallucinating, too -how could they allow that silliness?

What's stupid is that there's enough going on in Jolie's life to provide actual, interesting information in a nice, simple article, instead of panting, fawning, obsession. I would actually be interested to find out: what is the exact nature of her relief work? How're those adopted kids doing/adjusting to their new life? What was hardest about making her latest movie? If she met Pearl's widow, how nerve-wracking was that? What projects is she working on now? One page, tops, and I'd have all the info I care about.

This so reminds me of those pretentious articles Vogue and Seventeen always ran about actresses - they always, always, ALWAYS started out with a long description of what the actress was eating during the interview (to let us know the actress TOTALLY wasn't anorexic or anything, y'all, and could eat whatever she wanted, and just loved to eat), and how gorgeous and down-to-earth and natural she really was.

These people are just people. Not tabloid villians or ethereal beings. When will the press understand that we are smart enough to get that?

Other obligatory descriptions seen in most every celebrity profile: 1) Manner of dress (usually understated and down-to-earth, yet worn in a manner that makes them look 100 times better than any normal person who wore the same outfit) 2) Hair and makeup (again, usually casual, but they still look fabulous despite their best efforts to look sloppy) 3) The prop they toy with that somehow has great significance (the pack of cigarettes they place so carefully on the table, the fork they expressively gesture with, a necklace or earing they softly stroke as they speak). It'd be just a nervous twitch or sign of boredom if it were you or me, but with them it carries deep MEANING and shows how much more relaxed/driven/thoughtful they really are than the normal people out there.

Another classic is 'driving with the star', in which the writer describes with detail being in the same auto with the star, which turns they make onto which streets...

And don't forget the assurances that the "whole fame thing" means nothing to the celebrity being interviewed, and a description of them laughing and rolling their eyes at the very idea of them caring about it.

That "whole fame thing" angle is usually the funniest of all, as if they simply stumbled into their .00000003 of the population careers. These are generally driven and competitive people -- who, if they start as kids, have driven and competitive parents.

An "understandable" adjunct is the quote from movie stars who are themselves the children of movie stars, usually along the lines of "they got me in the door, but I had to prove myself once I got there."

For most of the good-looking, can-act population, "getting through the door" never happens.

I usually read at least one celebrity profile per celebrity, just to get a fix on their beginnings and their current life. But with favorites, I read 'em all, just to "check in" as their careers continue.

It's funny though, with the old-timers like Nicholson and Pacino, when THEIR annual profiles come around, there are simply no more new stories to tell about them, except the one about being an aging movie star at 50, 60, 70...

Another great staple of celebrity profiles is the amusing anecdote that makes the star seem down-to-earth and accessible, yet still manages to remind you they're better than everybody else. Two great examples come to mind:

When Tom Cruise was still married to Nicole, I remember a profile that told about how they lost the grill overboard while out at sea with the kids and he had to scuba dive to retrieve it. He's just a goofy, clutzy dad like everybody else...except he has a million dollar boat stocked with diving equipment.

Also, there was the time Sarah Michelle Gellar was so exhausted from doing Buffy and movies (I believe it would have been around the time of the first Scooby Doo film) that she drove all the way to the studio, wearing nothing except a slip. She only realized what was going on when she noticed other drivers staring at her. (I think she was driving a convertible at the time.) This is a fabulous story because it's funny, shows she's self-effacing, and throws a little bit of sex into the mix, as you wish you could have been one of the lucky commuters who caught the show.

Then there are the occasional profiles where, despite the writer's best efforts, the celeb still comes across as a jerk. I recall a piece on Gillian Anderson, dating back to near the end of the X-Files, where she came across as the most ungrateful, delusional person imaginable. She griped incessantly about how overworked she was and how the series was holding her back from bigger roles. (Keep in mind she had no career prior to the X-Files and hasn't done much since.)

I love Esquire to death. To me it's to the bathroom to what popcorn is to a movie theater, but the Angelina thing had me walking out halfway out though the movie. It was "The Mexican" of bathroom literature.