Posted on April 16, 2007
Anna Nicole Smith, I owe you an apology. I don’t know if The Breeze circulates in pop-culture icon heaven, but if it does and you read my article about Britney Spears shaving her head and blowing the story of your death out of the water, I am sincerely sorry. Clearly you will always be able to one-up Spears — even beyond the grave. I am your humble Star magazine-reading servant, here to clear your good name and show the rest of America (that undoubtedly reads The Breeze) that you are the reigning queen of fresh gossip — with or without a pulse.
She’s done it again. Yes, Anna Nicole Smith has spun the heads of all media members, news reporters and gossip junkies like me without even lifting a finger. On April 10, a DNA test revealed that Larry Birkhead, photojournalist and former lover of Smith, is the true biological father of Dannielynn Hope Marshall Stern — try saying that five times fast. This unique name that Smith gave to her daughter, who will be undoubtedly grateful in years to come, is a combination of Smith’s late son’s first name and the name that Britney Spears had supposedly wanted to name her child if it were a girl: Lynn. With this genius fusion of blond ideas, Smith added Hope as the first middle name; Marshall was subsequently tagged on in respect to her late second husband (the creepy old wrinkly guy she married for true love); and finally Stern, Smith’s attorney and alleged father of Dannielynn. Whether she knew it or not, Smith left us all a great going-away present: a bit of scandalous hearsay as to whom the true baby’s daddy is.
Some sort of bright shiny medal should be awarded to Birkhead; after all, he had a lengthy list of competition even while excluding Stern from the list of candidates. The men in question included Mark Hatten, Smith’s former boyfriend of two years, presently serving a seven-year, eight-month sentence in Pleasant Valley State Prison for making threats to Smith (and is apparently up for parole in December, ladies — sounds like quite a catch). Alexander Denk, Smith’s confidant, personal trainer, bodyguard and most importantly chef, submitted a DNA sample of his own stating, “She always told me she wanted to have kids with me.” Then there was J. Howard Marshall — yup, the dead husband — who although was unable to come forward himself, was rumored to have had some of his sperm frozen before his untimely death, which Smith would have used to um, well you know.
But my personal favorite, and man I was rooting for, was Prinz von Anhalt, the husband of crazy Zsa Zsa Gabor. At the risk of ending his 20-year marriage to Gabor, Anhalt claimed that he would do whatever it took to get paternal rights for the child he supposedly had with his mistress of 10 years. He went through numerous lie-detector tests and submitted his DNA to the court but unfortunately for him (and most likely for his marriage), Anhalt isn’t the father. Anhalt’s thought of the day: the foot that is now kicking him should have been placed in his mouth to avoid all this.
Oh, Anna Nicole, we thank you for instilling our faith of your power to bring gossip and scandal into our lives even after your death. The answer to the great mystery of who is Dannielynn’s father is just the kind of closure that Americans need to know in order to sleep well at night. But say, Anna, I was reading about those paternity tests and they’re only 99.9999 percent accurate — what else are you hiding from us? All I know is that Britney Spears has got to have an alien child with two heads, five noses and tie-dyed skin to show you up.
Sarah Delia is a sophomore English and art history major.
