THERE WAS a celebrity drama in both presidential campaigns this week, although the casts and outcomes couldn't have been more different.
Sen. Barack Obama's campaign announced that uberstar George Clooney will host an exclusive -- that means expensive -- fundraiser for the Democratic candidate in, get this, Geneva, Switzerland, on Sept. 2.
For $1,000, guests will get to attend a reception and hear Clooney give a speech, presumably praising Obama (who will be otherwise engaged back in the States). Ten thousand dollars gets you dinner with Clooney at the grand manse of Charles Adams, an international American attorney who has represented such clients as Euro Disney. The event is expected to sell out, as are all the five-star suites in Geneva hotels that week.
There's a back story to this event with at least as much drama as one of Clooney's movies, involving the Obama campaign's favorite accessory -- the BlackBerry.
Like all Obamaites, Clooney is tethered to the device and frequently text messages the Illinois senator with whom he's been friends for many years. The problem is that Clooney, who spends his summers at his vacation home on the shores of Italy's Lake Como and other Mediterranean locales, has a BlackBerry old enough to have belonged to Steve Jobs' father. The last time this columnist got a glimpse of it, it was about the size of a brick.
The actor also has been known to mistreat it slightly (for example, it went on the blink after Clooney dropped it into a sink). Lately, the battered device's SIM card has been malfunctioning, so talks between the candidate and the star -- and everyone else in Clooney's far-flung entourage -- have been spotty.
Obama, not the kind of guy to be put off by a balky BlackBerry, reached Clooney last week the old-fashioned way: by phone. The two men, according to one associate, quickly finalized the plans for the Geneva fundraiser.
The event is the first Clooney has held since Obama entered the presidential race. The actor has intentionally stayed off the campaign trail because he feared the senator's Republican opponent would make an issue of Obama's celebrity support. (Who would ever do that?)
In any event, the fundraiser will cap a busy summer for Clooney, who has been spending time recently with his good friend Rande Gerber and Gerber's wife, Cindy Crawford, in St. Tropez.
