The World According to Paris...Einstein it ain't

Paris Hilton is Barbie incarnate. From her Repunzle-esque butter-blonde hair to her bottomless blue eyes to the general pristine, fresh out of the box perfection and cleanliness she radiates, there’s no doubt about it – she is Hollywood’s Z-list blonde. She’s pampered, preened and perfect. Notorious heiress and scandalised socialite, she rocketed to fame off the back of a homemade porn tape released by an ill-fated ex boyfriend. Plus she's got that Disney star grin.

She became a household name and poster child of spoilt, shallow and stupid (and sexy) whilst being silly and skedaddling about and getting up to various sensationalised scandals and shenanigans with former friend Nicole Richie. Paris was the clown-footed beanpole and Nicole was the cheeky cherubic one. The two cavorted around caravans and harassed their new households for money in the send-up of their selfishness ‘The Simple Life’ and since then, I don’t really know what Paris has been up to, aside from collecting a menagerie of exotic animals and brushing her hair in front of the mirror whilst attempting and pretty much succeeding (for a time) at breaking into the world of film (she took a pole through the head in ‘House of Wax’ and hooked up with a black actor to quash those racism rumours).



It seemed that the reality TV star crown had passed from Paris to the Kardashian sisters (one of which, Kim, also leapfrogged her way to fame thanks to a porn tape). It was now the turn of the doe-eyed, deep-tanned brunettes to saunter about acting moronic and moany, ‘entertaining’ us with their day-to-day stints in ‘Keeping up with the Kardashians’. But Paris seems to have awakened from her dead-pan, fish-eyed slumber in latest reality offering ‘The World According to Paris’. It’s not exactly Stephen Hawking’s answer to how the universe was formed, but there you have it.

So what do we learn about Paris? In her syrupy, sugary, sickening voice over’s, Paris informs us that she’s having to crash at sister Nicky’s pad after her residence is broken into. We also learn that Paris is somewhat intolerant of new assistant Lexie’s side job as a writer of porn scenarios forcing her to choose between penning naughty sex scenes and working for Queen Parie. But there must be more right? Yes...there is. Paris can’t stomach her 8 am community service stint, nor can she stand close friend Brooke's, (ex of Charlie ‘Winning’ Sheen) new assistant, whom she refers to with ironic short-sightedness as a ‘hungry tiger’. Paris has also bagged herself a boyfriend, Las Vegas club owner Cy, but the fabric of their wafer thin relationship is stretched to breaking point when a married with children ex begins to bombard her with texts.



For me, reality TV is a guilty pleasure. You don’t admit to watching it in the cold, harsh light of day. You watch it by candlelight, half hidden behind the sofa, with the curtains drawn and the subtitles on with cheetos in your hair. Then you go to work and talk about that awesome documentary you watched about the dangers of climate change. The truth is there is something inherently watchable about trash TV, and that includes the slew of ‘em from Jersey Shore to Teen Mom, and there is something fascinating (yes I said it) about trying to decipher whether Paris is a carefully constructed image, a sort of blur between Marilyn Monroe and a Cindy doll, or just a genuinely vacuous little girl lost in Hollyweird. In the world of silver screen blondes, she’s the curdled cream that rises to the top of the milk jar – the antithesis, the send-up, the satire of the beautiful, breathy blonde.

For the most part, Paris shows herself to be cold, narcissistic, judgemental, hypocritical, delusional and insufferable and her ‘world’ is equally so. Paris doesn’t realise that she herself is a ‘hungry tiger’ – desperate for a crumb of fame and to bask in the limelight of reflected success. If I can admire Paris for one thing, it’s her inability to bow down to the boob job brigade, but as Paris confides that the baby girl voice has gotten her everything she’s wanted and jostles her way through adult relationships like an emotionally immature, attention-whoring 13 year old, you realise that Nicole Richie might have settled down and levelled out, but Paris is still projecting...well, Paris, a facade with all the depth of a Disneyland ride. She hasn’t really changed and she’s not quite ready to show us the ‘real’ her.