January 31, 2009 --
JULIA Roberts ended up a "Pretty Woman," but the star was labeled "too trailer park" when she was first starting out. That's one of many revelations in the new book "The Cult of Celebrity," in which author Cooper Lawrence dishes dirt on the early days of some of the world's most glamorous boldfaces.
Celebrity agent Robert Attermann told Lawrence his Abrams Artists Agency made the mistake of not signing Roberts: "Julia Roberts came in years ago, and the commercial agent who met with her at the time said, 'Nah, she's too trailer park.' As a matter of fact, when we moved offices, we were going through old rejection files, and in there was Annette Bening, Robin Givens, Julia Roberts and a couple of others."
Lawrence also dishes on the diva behavior of music icons like David Bowie, Janet Jackson and Sean "Diddy" Combs.Publicist Susan Blond told the author that Diddy once wanted a seat at a Versace fashion show. Blond related: "He said if we didn't get him in, we would be fired. We called, but it was the middle of this East Coast-West Coast rap war when everyone was being shot. They didn't want [any rappers there] and we were fired the next day."
Janet Jackson put pressure on Blond as well. "When I met with Janet, she'd say, 'I just want to be in the columns,' and she wanted 60 [mentions] in the columns," Blond recalled. "She just wanted to keep hot, and that's what she wanted - to just keep that name on Page Six."
