For years now, there have been mutterings about an alleged Kurt Cobain biopic floating around. Courtney Love really wants it to happen – but so far, no producer or director has really picked up the idea and pushed for the project to happen. The biopic idea got new life over the awards season because first-time Oscar nominee Jeremy Renner repeatedly told interviewers that he was very interested in playing Cobain. Unfortunately, Courtney Love wants to go in a new, SPARKLY direction. Yes, Courtney’s idea for Kurt is none other than Sparkles/Vesty McSparklepants himself, Robert Pattinson. And that’s not all – Courtney also wants to cast Scarlett Johansson in the “Courtney” role. Here’s more:

ROBERT PATTINSON has landed his dream film role – playing KURT COBAIN in a Hollywood biopic. The Twilight star has always thought of himself as a musician rather than an actor, he even reckons his guitar is his best friend. So securing a part playing the tragic NIRVANA genius, who shot himself in 1994, is ideal for the pin-up.

R-Patz has been in regular contact with Kurt’s widow COURTNEY LOVE, who has been handed a key role in the production by bosses at Universal Pictures. The HOLE singer wanted R-Patz as Kurt and SCARLETT JOHANSSON to portray her. My graphics team have mocked up Rob and Scarlett as the hellraising pair.

A source said: “This is a big money deal for Courtney. She has agreed to the film on condition that she gets to decide the main aspects of the project including director, casting, screenplay and music. Robert has been calling and emailing her non-stop. She has been a bit wound up by his manners, but he is her number one choice to play Kurt. She is adamant Scarlett will play her. Scarlett is friendly with FRANCES BEAN, her daughter with Kurt.”

Courtney has been in touch with director DAVID FINCHER about the project, which has the working title All Apologies. He was behind Fight Club, Se7en and The Curious Case Of Benjamin Button.

It’s not the first time a studio have tried to make a film about Nirvana, who had hits with Come As You Are and Smells Like Teen Spirit.

A few years ago Sony Pictures were told to sling their hook by Courtney when they floated the idea of ZAC EFRON as Kurt, while Frances Bean would play her mum.

[From The Sun]

Honestly, I’m not ripping my hair out with ScarJo or Sparkles. Would they suck? Sure. But I get the feeling this film would suck no matter who you put in it. I do think that it’s funny that these are Courtney’s alleged choices for the casting of herself and her late husband – arrogant much? The only think ScarJo and Courtney have in common is the occasional styling. And Sparkles as Cobain? Eh. Cobain was a little guy, with very delicate features. Sparkles has similar delicate features, but he’s still a tall, lanky Englishman. And I don’t really want to see Sparkles do “Polly”.

This little story comes via the UK paper The Telegraph, and it’s about an event I had no idea ever took place. Apparently, someone hilarious at the Oxford Union debating chamber decided to invite Courtney Love to speak. And she showed up. And she talked about everything from her daughter Frances (“The Bean”) to Kurt Cobain’s suicide (“It just wasn’t cool”) to her love of Greek myths (”I’m having my Demeter and Persephone moment with my daughter”). I have to admit something: even though Courtney says a few dumb and/or ridiculous things, she actually sounds relatively sober, thoughtful and moderately intelligent here. I’m shocked.

Courtney Love has said her daughter is the most important thing in her life – the day after an order restricting her access to the teenager was extended.

The Hole frontwoman, speaking at the Oxford Union debating chamber, said 17-year-old Frances Bean kept her going after the suicide of husband Kurt Cobain. Addressing 300 students at the world-famous forum, the singer said: ”What gave me strength was my daughter’s life force. My daughter’s the most important thing to me, in my life.”

The 17-year-old, her only child, is in the care of Cobain’s mother and sister after temporary custody was granted to them in December. Wearing a sparkly black top, black trousers, long black boots and glasses, Love surprised the students by telling them of her passion for quantum physics and Greek myths.

She admitted to them, referring to the saga of a mother and her child: ”I’m having my Demeter and Persephone moment with my daughter.”

Describing herself as a feminist, she said she did not like to be referred to simply as the widow of Nirvana frontman Cobain. But in one of the most moving parts of the hour-long question and answer session, she spoke of the devastating impact his death had on her.

Referring to her band’s 22-year-old guitarist, Love said: ”He goes: ‘God, Kurt was cool’. No, he wasn’t. Not in the sense of that action. That action had a horrible effect on our family. It’s not cool. It just wasn’t cool. And that action was regretted the second it happened. I was expected by the zeitgeist to go with him or something. But I worked. I had to work to get money to feed my kid.”

She said no-one offered her counselling or psychological support in the wake of the death, adding that, as a Buddhist, chanting helped her. After being asked what her legacy would be, Love replied: ”I never expected I would be connected to the Alpha male as some kind of ancillary object and to this day it mystifies me. I’m a feminist and it’s deeply ingrained so I just don’t get it, and it shocks me.”

Love, whose band plays a sold-out gig at the Shepherds Bush Empire, London, next week, admitted she was ”not a very good celebrity”.

She said: ”I’m a very good rock musician. But when it comes to celebrity I don’t have it quite right. I couldn’t have a perfume. What would it be called?”

She said the benefits of celebrity were ”free shoes and bags” however. Despite her ”high jinks and shenanigans” in the past, she said her drug addiction was firmly behind her.

”When you’re under 30, okay,” she said. ”But after 40 it’s just ugly.”

Love described herself as ”Amglish”, describing the time she spent at Summerhill boarding school in Suffolk and later living in Liverpool. She also said she had moved to Ireland as a U2 fan and that Bono was her mentor as a teenager.

She said: ”This is where I want to live, either Oxfordshire or Buckinghamshire. The first time I came to Oxford I was with Echo and the Bunnymen and I walked around, and the bricks were so black and it was so magical.”

She said she encouraged Frances Bean to apply to the university, but her daughter had not wanted to. Displaying her own cultural knowledge, she said Robert Graves was her favourite author and that she would take classical music by Mozart to a desert island.

Love also said she admired the poet Rilke and that his work, along with watching quantum physics videos on YouTube, had affected her music.

”Quantum physics has done my band a world of good,” she added.

[From The Telegraph]

I get what Courtney is saying about Kurt’s suicide, and I’m getting an after-school-special vibe from it. But I get it, and I can’t even imagine how difficult it would be for a Courtney and The Bean to get through it. That being said, Courtney negates the after-school special anti-suicide vibe by lying about what came after: “I was expected by the zeitgeist to go with him or something. But I worked. I had to work to get money to feed my kid.” Um… no. Courtney maintained control over a significant part of Kurt’s estate for years, so no, she didn’t have to “work to get money to feed my kid.” Oh, and the whole thing about the Buddhist chanting helping her through Kurt’s suicide also made me roll my eyes, but whatever.

Here’s the thing – I don’t hate Courtney. I think she’s was probably a horrible mother to The Bean, and I think Courtney is still battling her drug/alcohol/mental illness demons big-time. But I can’t hate her. Nor do I think she’s some misunderstood feminist, or some Rilke-quoting genius. She’s smarter than most of the women in her industry, but that doesn’t give her a pass for acting crazy.

Fans of Activision’s Guitar Hero game can master enough songs to unlock the likeness of Kurt Cobain to help them shred on songs that are way beneath Nirvana. Granted, Nirvana tunes weren’t exactly complex symphonies but do you think Cobain really wanted to be seen jamming on Bon Jovi’s “You Give Love A Bad Name?” Kurt’s sense of irony notwithstanding, me neither. And Krist Novaselic and Dave Grohl (Kurt’s bandmates in the seminal band) agree.

“This is a statement regarding Nirvana, Guitar Hero and the likeness of the late Kurt Cobain.

We want people to know that we are dismayed and very disappointed in the way a facsimile of Kurt is used in the Guitar Hero game. The name and likeness of Kurt Cobain are the sole property of his estate – we have no control whatsoever in that area.While we were aware of Kurt’s image being used with two Nirvana songs, we didn’t know players have the ability to unlock the character. This feature allows the character to be used with any kind of song the player wants. We urge Activision to do the right thing in “re-locking” Kurt’s character so that this won’t continue in the future.

It’s hard to watch an image of Kurt pantomiming other artists’ music alongside cartoon characters. Kurt Cobain wrote songs that hold a lot of meaning to people all over the world. We feel he deserves better.

Krist Novoselic and Dave Grohl

[The Boston Herald]

I mentioned Bon Jovi specifically for a reason. The Widow Love’s lawyer has also released a statement declaring that the New Jersey rockers’ songs are way beneath even Kurt’s videogame likeness to have to play.

Love’s lawyer told us, “Activision is exploiting Kurt’s image in a manner anathema to the very essence of his music, spirit and essence.

I along with Ms. Cobain hope those who love Kurt’s music strongly voice their sentiments to Activision and demand his image not be debased by singing the songs of Bon Jovi.

[TMZ]

Players on all gaming platforms for Guitar Hero 5 can unlock Kurt’s avatar when they reach the Nirvana songs. The other dismaying aspect of this for all Nirvana defenders against cheesiness is that once Cobain is unlocked, you can have him jumping around like an idiot while performing other people’s songs. Picture Kurt Cobain grrrl-powering around acting like Gwen Stefani singing “Just A Girl”.

Novoseloc and Grohl have been pretty strict on how Nirvana’s tunes are marketed and such, much to Cobain’s widow Courtney Love’s dismay. They have one thing in common, though. Disdain for Activision. Courtney’s official statement comes after she’s made plenty of batsh*t crazy tweets about the matter, including comparing playing the game with Kurt’s avatar to necrophilia and rape of her family. Love most recently tweeted that she met with the nerds over at Activision and was fairly blunt about how she felt about her dead husband’s likeness.

@sheruinsyou i think g hero is vile due to this “partner” he demanded i consider it i met with them i told them their avatar was a joke

im really grossed out that the people who forced me to do a “deal Memo:” withthese assholes at activision would lie well wait for my esq.

@sway5150 oh thank you and the rest of you, thois has really hurt and embarassed my teenager, he looks goofy and gross and he wasnt.

[CourtneyLover79]

If you get a chance, subscribe to Courtney’s Tweets for a pretty interesting look at a woman on the edge. She types everything that is on her mind. Love apparently signed off on this, so the blame lies at her door. I feel for Frances Bean, though. Bad enough that her dad died in that manner and now he’s lame fodder for video games.

Courtney Love, the insane too-skinny pill addict who once posed for a photo in which she cradled a dead look-alike of her deceased husband, Kurt Cobain, has compared users playing with the new Guitar Hero avatar of Kurt to committing “necrophilai” [sic] and to “raping me and my family mother in law child” whatever that means exactly. You can read some of her tweets on the matter if you have a high enough tolerance for crazy. Love is apparently in a dispute with her dead husband’s ex Nirvana bandmates over their decision to license Kurt’s image for use in the popular home video game. Idolator breaks down the controversy and explains Love’s confused outrage:

Were you kind of cheesed off when you found out that the Kurt Cobain avatar in the forthcoming installment of Guitar Hero would be able to sing songs by the likes of Bon Jovi and Bush? Well, it turns out that Kurt’s widow Courtney Love is none too pleased about the development either, as evidenced by a string of Tweets she sent earlier today that complained about this appropriation of her husband’s license.

It all started when rock journo Everett True got cranky about the Kurt-Guitar Hero synergy on his blog a few hours ago, calling Love and Dave Grohl—who he blamed for this fully—”F*cking corporate c*ck-sucking memory-destroying fret-wanking MTV-supporting fame-chasing money-grabbing grave-turning publicity-loving vacuous spoiled jaded cunting rock wh*res.”. He mentioned Love by tweet-ID while linking to this blog post on Twitter, and she fired back over a series of 140-character missives:

“when did @everetttrue get bitter, i own my rage but im not yet bitter, and if you think for one second from the lunchbox and now this..NO”

“the goddammed Lunchbox was it for me i get crucified over Converse shoes i didnt approve and stood it, then spy a lunchbox and nowGHERO?NO!!”

“btw @everetttrue Jack f’ing White your personal god is doing Ghero, do you think they told me that this mf*cking avatar’s(badenuff)”featur”

“yeah Jack WHite,Dylan,Petty,Kings of Leon, i dragged my ass and never signed of on the avatar, let alone this f*cking”feature”i have NO say”

“correction i do have say, theres been 4 breaches of a very strict contract, eg i was forced by lying bankerlawyers to sell some publishing,”

“wich forces me to lose some power, the loser bully who put money in the bank commissioned illegally a child and then stole every pennydid it”

“and @everetttrue he did it in breach of contract if you had listened to my ranting raving “bizarre”etc youd see that i speak only the truth”

There were also a few gratuitous Dave Grohl insults, just ’cause. I guess what she’s trying to say is that she didn’t sign off on this, and her being crucified in the blogosphere is off the mark? Let’s see what the folks at CLTranslated think:
“i may have been forced by some lying lawyers to sell some publishing, but i never signed off on this guitar hero thing. breach of contract!”

[From Idolator]

Oooh I’m so glad that Idolator included that link to CLTranslated! I’ve never heard of it before, but it’s a Twitter account with the tagline “Basically, I translate Courtney Love’s tweets into plain English for the rest of the world.” Even with a human filter, Love’s tweets still don’t follow any kind of order or make much sense.

Courtney also got all up in arms a couple of years ago about some Doc Martens ads that featured Kurt and other rock stars of late as angels. At that time Courtney actually had a publicist who was able to issue a very coherent statement about how his client wasn’t informed about the use of her late husband’s image. Celebrity Tweet tells us that Love is the most second most prolific celebrity tweeter of the day and has penned a whopping 91 tweets and counting so far today. She’s behind Tila Tequila in her lame attempt to make #Chargers Suck a trending topic, though. Tequila has posted 141 tweets so far. So who’s crazier? As JayBird has said many times before, someone should unplug Courtney Love’s Internet. I would include Tila Tequila in that statement, but I kind of like how she’s incriminating herself in whatever case she would have had against Shawne Merriman.

Courtney Love is shown out in NY on 8/31/09. Credit: ANDERSON/VILA/bauergriffinonline.com. Screenshot from Guitar Hero thanks to Idolator.

Courtney Love has had gastric bypass surgery to lose weight, and is rather amused that we all bought her story that the loss came from half starving herself and detoxing.

The former Hole singer, 44, once wrote on her blog that she was inspired to lose weight by Oprah Winfrey who got thin by drinking slimming drinks.

But a source told the the News of the World: ‘Courtney keeps laughing to her friends and saying, ‘Everyone thinks I’ve had hypnosis but why bother with all that effort? All I did was check myself in and have a fat band fitted’.

‘Courtney has always had problems with her appearance and is convinced she is ugly and fat. Two years ago she had a gastric band fitted at a surgery in Beverly Hills.

‘Lots of doctors refused to do it as she was nowhere near obese, just a little overweight, but eventually she found one.

‘And as soon as she had the operation the excess weight started to drop off her. Now she is just skin and bones and looks terrible.’

Daily Mail

Courtney might think it’s funny that we all fell for her ruse, but we weren’t the ones who got cut open, fitted with a surgical device then sewn up again at great expense. Although, no one was really going to follow Courtney’s advice as – apart from the fact she’s a raving maniac – she claims to have lost weight using meal substitute shakes and detoxing. I’m trying to decide whether the surgery or the diets would be more torture.

Courtney recently claimed that someone has stolen Kurt Cobain’s ashes from her, and an Australian artist says she’s going to smoke them to set him free. So much for the more traditional practice of scattering them gently on a hillside. Courtney has made no statement about this, but hopefully she’ll get them back. Regardless of the ‘artistic merit’ of smoking Kurt (why do I suspect that he won’t be going alone, but rather indulged in a large joint?) I think his widow probably deserves to decide exactly how to set him free.

Here’s Courtney Love in Hawaii on 3/29/07. Credit: EDO/COB/Fame Pictures

I vividly remember the day the news came out that Kurt Cobain was dead in an apparent suicide, April 5, 1994. I was in college at the time and ended up glued to the radio most of the day, waiting for more news about it. At first they didn’t confirm that it was Cobain’s body which was found, and we were hoping it was just a mistake and was someone else. It was indeed Cobain and the troubled lead singer of the band that popularized grunge music was dead at 27 like other music greats before him. I remember the party I went to that night, in which Nirvana was blasting, and the friends I talked to, drunkenly discussing what it all meant in our young lives.

14 years later and Cobain’s only child, Frances Bean, made the questionable decision to celebrate her 16th birthday with a “suicide” themed party at the House of Blues in LA in which a contest was held for guests that looked the most “dead.” The party featured the band “Mindless Self Indulgence” and cost her supposedly broke mother $323,000.

Courtney Love spent over $323,000 on her daughter’s birthday party.

The Hole singer – who is the widow of the late Nirvana frontman Kurt Cobain – spared no expense in ushering Frances Bean into adulthood at her ‘RIP childhood’ themed 16th birthday.

The event was held at Los Angeles’ House of Blues restaurant. Courtney arrived in a dress worn by actress Angelica Huston in creepy comedy movie ‘The Addams Family’.

Frances’ announcement of the party:

Date: Tuesday, September 2, 2008
Time: 9:30pm – 11:30pm
City/Town: Los Angeles, CA

MY one and only sweet 16…..eerrrr actually it’s my “suicidal 16″.
At the house of blues, on September 2nd from 8:30 (TIME HAS CHANGED FORM 9:30 TO 8:30 KEEP THAT IN MIND) to 11:30 pm.

MINDLESS SELF INDULGENCE IS PLAYING
i suggest all who intend on coming go to itunes of youtube and look them. If you don’t like them, then please don’t come. all will be forced to jump around and dance. ALL.

YOU MUST BE WEARING BLACK OR RED OR YOU WILL NOT BE ALLOWED IN! this does not mean you have to wear something “nice” or “fancy” but there is a color code so do it!

Your bags will be searched at the door
not my rules, but it is the house of blues’ rules
so don’t be stupid and try to bring shit it
do it b4 you get into the party if you have to
and try to be stealth!

DON’T SEND ME (frances) YOUR ADDRESSES ANYMORE
SEND THEM TO GIANA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Pinkberry and The IN N’ Out truck will be catering. Of course there will be vegetarian food there to.

WE ARE ALSO HAVING A CONTEST
its the “who can look most dead contest”
if you dress up dead and are picked as the top 3 you will receive a: IPOD TOUCH and a $200 gift certificate to amoeba.
so get that face paint on, and try to make it as realistic as you can. there will only be 3 WINNERS.

i guess that’s it!
hope to see you guys there!

xx franny

[From ONTD via Gossip Rocks]

Frances is 16 and we all did stupid things at that age. She might not fully realize or care that some might consider it tasteless to have a suicide-themed “death of childhood” party, even without a dad who supposedly died by his own volition. It would have been up to her prescription drug-addled mom, Courtney Love, to tell her that it was inappropriate. We all know that never would have happened and Frances got her suicide-themed party. Maybe in a way she was triumphing over a troubled past – or just being a teenager who doesn’t give a sh*t and thinks death is a style to embrace and a long way off.

Frances looks very pretty with black hair and red lips. She should smile more.

Photos from Frances Cobain’s MySpace

Just three months ago Courtney Love revealed that her late husband, Kurt Cobain, had his estate plundered by identity theft. She claims $72 million was somehow stolen as the thieves took out multiple credit cards, lines of credit, and even bought a house using his name and social security number. She said that she knew the fraud was happening back in 2003 but that “nobody believed me until now.”

Now Courtney’s LA home has been robbed, either recently or some time in the past – it’s hard to tell with her, and she found that not only were thousands in jewelry and clothing missing but that someone had taken Kurt’s ashes. She claims she’s suicidal after finding the ashes missing, and that she “used to take them everywhere with me”

She had kept the singer’s ashes in a pink teddy-bear-shaped bag along with a lock of his hair.

But a couple of weeks ago, she was horrified to discover them gone, along with thousands of pounds worth of clothes and jewellery.

Courtney said: “I can’t believe anyone would take Kurt’s ashes from me.

“I find it disgusting and right now I’m suicidal.

“If I don’t get them back I don’t know what I’ll do… They were all I had left of my husband. I used to take them everywhere with me just so I could feel Kurt was still with me.
“Now it feels like I have lost him all over again.”

[From News of the World]

It may be true that the ashes were all Courtney had left of Kurt. She sold most of his clothing at auction last year, saying “We’ll make a lot of money and give a bunch of it to charity.” She claimed her daughter, Frances Bean, 15, didn’t “need to inherit a giant hefty bag full of flannel f***ing shirts … A sweater, a guitar and the lyrics to ‘Teen Spirit’ — that’s what my daughter gets.” And she got the ashes and a lock of hair I guess. I would rather hang on to some clothing and personal items, but that’s just me.

Courtney Love is shown leaving the Groucho club with Noel Fielding on 4/17/08, thanks to WENN.

Kurt Cobain is alive and well, according to the United States social security system.

It seems that someone has stolen the long dead musician’s social security number five years ago, and taken out 188 credit cards, purchased a house and several cars using his identity. And not just a little bit of money was taken, it was around $72 million, according to Courtney Love. Why didn’t Courtney realize that the money had been taken?

This week Courtney, 43, met cops in Van Nuys, LA, to give them details of a probe by forensic accountants Kroll which discovered £36 million missing. Cheques had been stolen and cars bought by villains.

She told The Sun: “I knew it had been going on since when I went cuckoo — bananas — in 2003.

“It was fraud after fraud. But nobody believed me until now. I did a check on my deceased husband’s social security number and he has a house in New Brunswick, New Jersey. He bought it last year.”

The Sun

Courtney has now gone to the police to try and get some of the money back, most of which was going into trust for the couple’s daughter Frances Bean. The Nirvana estate makes around £21 million a year, according to The Sun. I’m absolutely horrified that his social security number could be used like this, considering the high profile nature of his death and widow. I’m unfamiliar with the legal system in the United States, but I’m guessing Courtney will at least be able to claim the property from the ‘owners’.

And what if Kurt Cobain did indeed fake his death and has purchased a new home as some Nirvana fans would love to believe? Courtney says “He should probably get his ass back home.”

Pictures via D-Listed.