WASHINGTON — In Hollywood, the website TMZ.com has already transformed celebrity culture, putting stars on notice that cellphone-toting tattlers and aggressive paparazzi are ready to splash their indiscretions all over cyberspace.
Now, the site that first disclosed Mel Gibson's anti-Semitic rant and the medications stored in Anna Nicole Smith's refrigerator is coming to the nation's capital. And local denizens are wondering why.
Sometimes called "Hollywood for ugly people," Washington usually rewards policy wonks. Think earmarks, fine print, protocols.
"Washington is where the term 'celebrity' includes former surgeons general, defense lawyers and Pat Buchanan," said Rep. Linda T. Sanchez (D-Lakewood), whose status as a prominent bachelorette and stand-up comedian might make her a target for TMZ's gossip hounds. "TMZ is going to be bored out of its mind. The only thing keeping TMZ in D.C. for more than a week would be its lease."
Arianna Huffington, who hosted A-list parties in Washington as the wife of a prominent congressman, disagrees with inferences that D.C. will bore the gossip-hungry public. "Let's see, Mark Foley, 'Duke' Cunningham, Ted Haggard, Claude Allen at Target, William Jefferson's frozen 90 Gs, the Bush twins, 'Scooter' Libby, Ann Coulter, Deborah Jeane Palfrey and her 10,000-name trick book. Too boring? I don't think so," she said.
Asked if she thought TMZ would trivialize electoral politics, Huffington demurred. "Give the public some credit. It can tell the difference between the main course and dessert."
Still, founders of TMZ, named for the "thirty-mile zone" around Los Angeles that includes much of Hollywood's glitterati, are betting there is enough celebrity juice in Washington to warrant a new outlet in D.C. Within a month, an advance party is expected to land along the shores of the Potomac River.
"Celebrities aren't just in Hollywood," supervising producer Gillian S. Sheldon said.
Some think the market for gossip in Washington is already saturated, with the Politico, Wonkette and Smoking Gun websites already scouring the city, and a corps of card-carrying gossip writers working for magazines and newspapers.
"It's like a toy store the day after Christmas -- the good stuff is already picked over," said Jack Pitney, a political scientist at Claremont McKenna College.
