Samantha Selinger-Morris June 10, 2012
Going off the rails? ... Amanda Bynes. Photo: AP
Sometimes I read the goings-on among celebrities and think: what are they on? And where can I get some?
While the rest of us may cower like wet chihuahuas during confrontations with authority, this week various child stars displayed a self-confidence usually reserved for military leaders who've just pulled off a coup.
On Tuesday, for instance, after She's the Man star Amanda Bynes was charged with driving under the influence after side-swiping a police car with her BMW in West Hollywood in April, she pleaded her case to the highest office.
''Hey @BarackObama … I don't drink,'' Bynes tweeted the American president. ''Please fire the cop who arrested me. I also don't hit and run. The end.''
The same day, Bruce Willis's middle daughter, Scout, was charged with under-age drinking and offering police officers a fake ID after downing a ''Pakistani beer'' in New York's Union Square. Although she was guilty of both activities, Willis refused to cop the two charges.
Where do these pint-size stars get their outsized confidence from? (Besides from their parents, who treat reality as though it were a dog's chew toy.)
Willis clearly borrowed some from her Bronx-born attorney, Stacey Richman, who had no qualms with swapping legal grounds for arguing her client's case in favour of a 12-year-old's idea of justice, telling People magazine about her approach: ''Seriously, you were under-age once … who wasn't looking to get into a bar?''
Steve Carell, however, thinks twentysomethings have extraordinary gumption these days for an entirely different reason. He told the graduates of Princeton's 2012 class on Tuesday that thanks to text messaging and Twitter, they no longer have to experience being dumped by someone face-to-face, as he had, an unfortunate experience that leads to ''self-loathing''.
''My point is,'' Carell told them, ''I suffered and you should have to suffer too.''
The glitch in his theory? They do suffer, thanks to Twitter.
Just ask Amanda Bynes, who copped a serve from Vanity Fair over her deluded tweet to Barack Obama.
The magazine's idea of where her request probably sits on the President's priority list? ''Before getting around to fixing the privacy settings on his Facebook account but after fixing the US unemployment rate.''