Oh, Toby Young Again

Toby Young's naked ambition is refreshing. I appreciate the fact that he isn't ashamed to say that he wants to be a big Hollywood bitch, engorged with money and fame, bedding every starlet he can get his sweaty claws on. So many aspiring assholes in L.A. seethe quietly about the fact that they don't have the juice, that this personal trainer and that son of a mutual funds manager have somehow leapfrogged over them into the great movie Empyrean. Young doesn't mutter these things under his breath; he writes a book about it.

In The Sound of No Hands Clapping (great title, that!), Young flat out admits that, yes, he is enamored of celebrities, that he would love nothing more than to be just like them. Certainly his temperment is right on line for this kind of career goal; Young has turned his self-regard into a vocation. Recently on his blog, Young admitted that he "LexisNexis"-ed himself every day. That means he actually pays money to read articles about himself. You gotta love this guy - he understands well that print writers have to make complete jerks of themselves if they want the media to pay attention to them. His chutzpah would be galling if he wasn't such a funny writer. But I'm giving it up for him, because the man is funny and audaciously ballsy.