For anyone keeping track on the still un-named James L. Brooks’ film’s boy club celeb eat-out-a-thon, Owen Wilson has somehow moved up to the front of the pack. And at Parc no less, the Stephen Starr hot spot at Rittenhouse Square. Oh sure, Jack Nicholson ate there and smoked there (outside) and strolled along the Square to the pleasant astonishment of those around him. And most certainly Paul Rudd hit the less-than-Parc-y Oh Shea’s! around the corner for a brew with the workingman barroom habitués. But Wilson, in Philly previously for Marley and Me, has made Parc his nearby hotel-home-away-from-home, as he’s supped there once by himself, stopped in to have a tall frosty beer while wearing his slippers and hit the Francophile noshery with Rudd in tow just last night. Keep up the good work, Owen.

He’s so elusive…

I wasn’t especially confident about my quest, because I have never met a person who successfully caught a gnome. But still I set out on Thursday, whizzing around the city on my bicycle, looking for signs of an 18-inch bearded man.

The Travelocity statue has been visiting Philadelphia the past few days after residents used social media sites Facebook and Twitter to beckon the him to the City of Brotherly Love. Since his arrival, he has been posting tweets about his whereabouts. It was all the encouragement I needed to go on a wild goose (er, gnome) chase.

Armed with a camera, I biked down a rain-slicked Walnut St towards City Hall, where the Roaming Gnome had said he was chilling with William Penn. I was disappointed to find that my arrival was too late. I sat on the steps of City Hall, instead, staring off down Market Street. But I was determined not to give up too soon. When another tweet was posted, I was again hot on his trail.

The gnome’s post had a GPS location attached that placed him on Latimer and 17th. Even with an exact location, though, I couldn’t find him anywhere. Forlorn and defeated, I sat down on a bench in Rittenhouse. A homeless man was nice enough to keep me company for a short time, and we silently people-watched together.

I spent the better part of my day trying to find that tiny man who came to our enormous city. I’m still unsure where my search whent awry — Matt, a fellow intern here at City Paper, managed to find him. Maybe I’m just not gnome-hunting material.

Meredith Edlow, GPTMC

Although he’s quiet, reserved, and stands just under 2 feet tall, the audacious creature-person brought to Philadelphia by Travelocity is tackling our city one lawn at a time, and he’s doing it like a star. Roaming Gnome landed in Philly yesterday as part of Travelocity’s Summer of Possibilities national six-week tour.

The travel agent company has the nation vote among three cities every week for the Gnome to visit.  The contest drew in roughly 50,000 votes among Washington D.C., Boston and Philly, with our city nailing a whopping 21,000 votes — just a grand more than runner-up Boston.

“If you truly look at history, Boston is important. But Philadelphia is quintessential,” says Cara Schneider, media relations director of the Greater Philadelphia Tourism Marketing Corp. (GPTMC). “If you look at Philly’s neighborhood fabric, life in the city, food and culture and history, you couldn’t have America without Philadelphia.”

Meredith Edlow, GPTMC

Schneider met with the iconic traveling lawn piece yesterday to schedule events for his stay in Philadelphia. Although the Gnome’s crew is not aware of their next destination until the day before take-off, Schneider says that since his arrival in Philly, the Gnome has been making a lot of friends. “He was kissed, hugged, bitten and cooed about by the whole staff,” she says. “And let’s remember, he’s the spirit of travel. He, and his handlers, are on the road to inspire wanderlust.”

Some stops: the steps of the Art Museum, Saturday’s Phillies game (at which the Gnome is rumored to meet the Phanatic) and other destinations around the city. Today at 10:30 a.m., you can catch Gnomey at the Comcast Building. Afterward, he’s heading for Boat House Row and then Reading Terminal.  For happy hour this evening, he’ll be drinking at McGillin’s.

If you see the Roaming Gnome, take a snapshot and send it our way (e-mail carolyn.huckabay@citypaper.net); and remember, even if you don’t want a picture with him, according to his Twitter, Roaming Gnome is giving away ”Free hugs for everyone! Come here so I can plant a smackeroo on your cheek.”

Make out with a gnome? I’m game!

Sure, the Phillies’ Cole Hamels and wife Heidi got a Philly Style welcome into their Residences at Two Liberty Place condo on Monday. But you’d think that for $2.2 million-plus for three bedrooms and an ex-mayoral candidate (Tom Knox) as your neighbor, you’d have your air conditioners working properly (or perhaps just switched on) — I’m hearing the joint was super hot, with sweat beading off some swells like whores in a church pew. ESPN’s Sal Paolantonio, Chuck Peruto Jr., ex-Sixers GM Billy King, weather stud Doug Kammerer and 610 WIP’s Howard Eskin were eating chef Daniel Stern’s fare (he’s opening a restaurant on the high-rise condo’s 37th floor), as were Paul Rosen, Alycia Lane, John Bolaris, John Colabelli and Dan Gross. Lane being there with Gross? I can’t imagine she loved that.

Maybe she was over-taken still by another brand of troubling media. We did hear that Lane told guests that she was pretty shaken up a few weeks back when Law & Order ran a Lane-like tale of woe (co-anchor cyber-stalking) where her character was murdered — apparently it really dredged up some horror for her. I saw the show. I was pretty scared, too.

More of this stuff in Icepack’s continuing online adventures this Thursday.

Former WYSP personality Kidd Chris, who was fired in May 2008 in connection with a racist song he played on the air, returned to Philly this past Friday to perform with his band The Beatoffs.

The show, which went down at Bootleggers in Woodlyn, was opened by porn star Mary Carey, who also contributed to a brutal duet of Katy Perry’s “I Kissed a Girl.” Friend of the show Constantine also joined the band on stage, delighting the approximately 700 fans who showed up (according to security).

And here is a clip of Kidd Chris addressing his loyalists, then using his artistic vision to show the world precisely what Christopher Cross was trying to say with his legendary song “Ride like the Wind.”

Video courtesy of Ron Fin.

Kidd Chris, former morning radio host for the formerly “mighty” 94.1 WYSP, is returning to Philly tonight with his band The Beatoffs. Hosted by Bootleggers at 1936 MacDade Blvd. in Woodlyn, the show is being touted as a reunion of sorts.

Chris was fired in May 2008 by YSP, which chalked up the canning to pressure over a racially offensive song entitled “Schwoogies.” The song was sung by show regular Lady Gash two months prior to the termination. Rumors swirled after the abrupt firing on the day Chris was scheduled to host his birthday event. Some claimed it was simply an excuse for CBS (the parent company of YSP) to reformat its morning slot in what has become a bizarre three-year stretch of disorganized attempts to recover from the departure of Howard Stern to Satellite Radio.

The Beatoffs consists of Chris on guitar, co-host Tomas Katijima on lead vocals, writer DJ EggNog on bass and show regular Blake From Sales on drums.

Rumored to be in attendance are friends of the show like comedian Geno Bisconte, porn star Mary Carey, slow adult Cheeseburger and others.

Before laughing like a maniac and rudely hanging up on this reporter, Chris gave one thought on why people should come to the show tonight: “We’re making legendary songs … better.”

The show starts at 10 p.m., but a weekly happy hour promotion is available: If you call ahead (610-490-9970) or register online at BootleggersUSA.com, admission is free between 8 and 10 p.m.

Photo | Patrick Rapa

I just had an encounter at Second and Chestnut with Brian, aka Philly Boy Brian, from A&E’s Parking Wars. Turns out Brian, who says he’ll be working in the neighborhood, is the officer who gave me a ticket just last week! A celebrity ticket! (I got said ticket for not being completely up on the new press parking regulations.) While I’m doing my best to heed Molly Eichel’s warning to not let it go to my head, I’m having a hard time. That’s me and Philly Boy Brian above, and that’s me pretending to be furious about a ticket (after the jump).

(more…)

Via CBS3:

[Jon] Bon Jovi and 12 others—including NBA star Shaquille O’Neal and civil rights activist Paul Robeson—were named to the New Jersey Hall of Fame on Monday. The honor is meant to highlight positive contributions made to a state often stereotyped as a land of corrupt politicians, belching refineries and gangsters.

[...]

Other inductees to the hall’s second class include funnymen Bud Abbott and Lou Costello; astronomer Carl Sagan; Yankee shortstop Phil Rizzuto; novelist F. Scott Fitzgerald; poet Walt Whitman; comedian Jerry Lewis; tennis star Althea Gibson; inventor Guglielmo Marconi; and writer William Carlos Williams.

How was Walt Whitman not a first-ballot Jersey HOFer?

Click to enlarge.

Marc Steel

Mayor Nutter will welcome Academy Award Winner Jamie Foxx, Gerard Butler, and Director F. Gary Gray to Philadelphia to shoot Law Abiding Citizen.  Mayor Nutter will present the cast and crew with a Liberty Bell, the official gift from the City of Philadelphia.

Law Abiding Citizen is a psychological crime thriller focused on a criminal mastermind who runs a dangerous operation from his prison cell and the ambitious assistant D.A. who stands in his way.

Previously: Getting Foxxy on the set of Law Abiding Citizen

CAN I PLEASE HAVE A MILLER LITE YES BUD LIGHT IS FINE THANK YOU!!!!!!!!!!

Photo | ChrissMari

Blogger ChrissMari spotted Billy Mays, the screaming informercial pitch man with the surprisingly interesting Wikipedia page, at the Four Points by Sheraton at 12th and Race last night.

“He’s doing some sort of show in town,” says ChrissMari of what she overheard from the gloriously bearded dynamo. “He was trying to get a cheap room from the hotel, too.  I was too busy making fun of him to talk.”

Foxx post Parc.

HughE Dillon | PhillyChitChat

You will not stop Jamie Foxx from running rampant through your town or eating all of your tony designer food. No.

After our spies last Saturday spotted the Foxx in pre-Law Abiding Citizen mode, they began to work into overtime, catching him eating mussels at Stephen Starr’s Parc for lunch. Anyone who thinks that’s a hefty snack that would’ve weighed him down will marvel at Foxx’s calorie-cutting prowess (you must YOU MUST) as he played basketball Monday night at the Bellevue’s Sporting Club. There’s also word he hung out at Plush with Charlie Mack Sunday morning after he was at G-Lounge. But that was Saturday… we need fresh Foxx people. Fresh Foxx. We sorta half expect him to show up at the National Constitution Center’s evening reception for the America I AM: The African American Imprint exhibition bash Jan. 14 at 6 p.m. with Tavis Smiley, Cornel West and Harry Belafonte. Stay tuned. Stay Foxxy.

Around 3 p.m., there was an Eddie Van Halen sighting at 15th and Spruce, in between the Rita’s Water Ice and the … wait for it … Spruce St. Laundromat. He’s wearing a jean jacket and red sneakers. It’s hard to imagine him so hot for teacher right at this very moment … doing laundry. But whadadadayagonna do. Go ahead, jump. And say hi.

Then there’s last week’s moment, with Rob Halford and a bunch of Judas Priest-ers at Hot Topic at the Plaza at the King of Prussia Mall. This is what my pal, photog Scott Weiner, did on his birthday — went to see Judas Priest. I only told him to go to there to buy himself something nice, something leather and hellbent. Oh, well. Might as well jump.

Picture this in a bath towel …

ew.com

While scads of faceless button-down Banana Republic young professionals whose lives stopped when Friends waited around for Jennifer Aniston today shoot scenes from Marley & Me in front of the Bellevue (this after Owen Wilson and Eric Dane just filmed at Broad and Walnut), I have this from a reliable spa-going source at Adolf Biecker in The Rittenhouse.

Parker Posey — she filming Happy Tears with Demi Moore and now Ellen Barkin — walked into the spa area the other day in a smock and flip flops, only to come out next … in a bath towel. A bath towel. Every post-pubescent indie dude who watched those Christopher Guest and Hal Hartley films repeatedly just got their life’s thrill. I’m told that though she was wearing no makeup, Parker looked as lovely ‘n’ lithe as she does on screen, and that when she was in the salon getting nail services earlier that week, she rolled around on the floor with her poodle. You can breathe, boys.

Rawr.

Photo | © Scott Weiner 2008

It’s hard to say what sort of love was in the air last Saturday. If you stayed in Philly, you found that Theater Exile’s brand of l’amour offered the quirkily politicized, the twitchily Kafka-esque and the bloodily, fully nude when it came to author Tracy Letts and director Matt Pfeiffer’s paranoid Bug at Christ Church Neighborhood House. Give it up for tragic lovers/Bug stars Grace Gonglewski and Matt Saunders for their diabolic naked performance, inside and out, literally and figuratively. They’ll be there through May 18.

Far away, in another galaxy — Harrah’s in Atlantic City — there was Tila Tequila. We’re still barely certain what it is she does. But she seemed to do it with glossy bisexual sass during MTV’s A Shot at Love with Tila Tequila, as well as during her Harrah’s pool party. And even though a boy won last season’s A Shot at Love (Bobby Banhart), the reality TV monster must be fed. Tila never called Bobby, apparently, and the MySpace heroine will film season 2 ASAP. So if she couldn’t find love in California, why doesn’t she look eastwardly? "The funny thing is that a lot of the contestants [are] from the East Coast this season," she was heard to say in that steely coy/cutesy mode of hers. We can only hope someone from Philly gets in.

Thanks to Scott Weiner for the photo and the fun stuff.