Main event: Call Me Mrs. vs. Can We Talk
![Rivers
(The Spokesman-Review)](https://thumb.spokesman.com/4XCfEcknom-YIhg0rEbH2zxbvBk=/400x0/media.spokesman.com/photos/2005/01/16/fea_ent166_01-16-2005_F93HIUM.jpg)
At tonight’s Golden Globe Awards, I guarantee that the best entertainment of the night won’t come from inside the Beverly Hilton, where the prizes are doled out.
It’ll come from the red carpet.
That’s where “The View” co-host Star Jones Reynolds (the bridezilla of daytime talk television) will take on Joan Rivers (the collagen queen of snark) in a fashion-commentary smackdown, no holds barred.
In case you haven’t heard, it’s a de la Renta rumble that’s being hyped in the Hollywood tabloids like a Don King fight. The two gossip mavens will go at it, Manolo-a-Manolo, across the crimson shag.
Blonde vs. brunette!
Pulled-up vs. pre-nupped!
The thrilla in chinchilla!
In this corner: “Call Me Mrs.” Star, representing the cable heavyweight E! network.
In that corner: “Can We Talk?” Joan and her daughter, “Find Me a Job” Melissa, representing the bantam-class TV Guide Channel.
Yes, you read that right. The TV Guide Channel, famous for … well, nothing except its hypnotic, slow-rolling TV-schedule grid. (“Wow, six hours of ‘Seinfeld’ reruns again?”)
But this bout is so big, so bling, so botoxed, that for the first time in its history, the TV Guide Channel will shed the schedule for two hours tonight, beginning at 6, the same time Star takes to the carpet.
The awards show will run on NBC from 8 to 11 p.m., and the network will have Nancy O’Dell from “Access Hollywood” doing its celebrity stalking from 7 to 8. But let’s face it, in this game, she’s strictly third-string.
Here’s how the Joan-Star showdown came about:
For eight years, Joan was the undisputed chief of the celebrity fashion police. In fact, she practically invented the sharp-tongued trash talk that put E! on the map during the awards-show season.
But last year the Rivers team jumped ship after TV Guide waved a cool $8 million contract in front of their surgically reconstructed noses.
So E! hired Star, and played hardball at September’s Emmy Awards, barring Joan from the celebrity stroll because of an exclusive contract between the network and the television academy.
Now they’ll face off at the Globes, with a difference in styles as wide as the carpets they cover.
“We’re a little sharper, we’re a little more critical,” said the 71-year-old Joan of her and Melissa, 36. “At my age, who gives a damn? You’re not going to like me? Get to the back of the line. You want to sue me? Get back to the end of the line.”
Star, 42, says several celebrities have told her she was a refreshing change on the carpet.
“I would rather be thought of as the friendly face than the mean face,” she said. “Why can’t I gush a little? Why can’t I make them feel tremendously special? Who says you have to go in there and be critical and acerbic?
“I will not be that jaded journalist, I will not add to any of that nastiness.”
Don’t let the trash talk fool you. Joan and Star are both board members of God’s Love We Deliver, which provides free meals for people living with HIV-AIDS, cancer and other serious illnesses.
So, yeah, they actually like each other.
“I like her very much,” Joan said, “as long as she’s not wearing my same dress.”