The great Simpson-Wentz-Trachtenberg love triangle comes to blows.
Once upon a Warped Tour, Michelle Trachtenberg nestled Pete Wentz in a trailer atop the sweltering pavement of a Ventura County lot, two becoming one to the thrash and song of The Academy Is… just beyond.
‘Twas the summer of '06, a time of relative serenity, when La Lohan, still employable, wreaked havoc on the set of Georgia Rule, Stars Are Blind inspired similar terror on the charts, and somewhere in Malibu, Mel Gibson chalked up his vehicular woes to “the Jews.”
In the lush land of Hollywood’s young, Trachtenberg, freshly broken from her X-Men beau of two years, Shawn Ashmore, was looking, and Wentz, of newfound eminency due to the web’s early wonders - when dick pics were still disseminated through LiveJournal and not yet Twitter - was open for business.
Their first sighting came at a Nylon bash in June, to the tune of Good Charlotte, to a room of Cory Kennedy and mere Travie McCoy arm-candy Katy Perry. Trachtenberg had arrived with Ashmore, yet posed individually for a photo with Wentz. Weeks later, in early July, a paparazzi shot emerged of just the two: Trachtenberg, recently having wrapped production on Black Christmas, shielding her eyes from the lone camera as a giddy Wentz escorted her to a Brazilian eatery in Santa Monica.
The next morning, amidst the scorching hipster detritus of the Vans-sponsored bazaar, a coupled Trachtenberg and Wentz cooly nodded in unison as a skinny-jeaned virtuoso fondled the mic. The natural crescendo of a romance between Fueled By Ramen’s tsar and his chosen inamorata.
But then emerges a Simpson, Ashlee, rhinoplastied and dangerous, tending wounds of her own from a recent split with the guitarist for her backing band, Braxton Olita, supposedly due to the public criticisms he’d levied of his girlfriend’s surgical sprucing. “Braxton likes Ashlee the way she used to look,” a pal of Olita’s dished to one Aussie rag. (Other whispers, far more sinister, placed the breakup onus on Simpson’s almighty dad-ager Joe, supposedly unimpressed by Olita’s non-celebrity and hungry for a more famous consort for his daughter, preferably one on the “A-List”; rumored efforts to fix Ashlee up with Matthew McConaughey fell flat.)
Wentz, by contrast, heaped praise. On the MTV Movie Awards blue carpet in June, the Fall Out Boy bassist, who’d once told Rolling Stone that Simpson was his celebrity crush, doused attempts at gossip arson by Perez Hilton, who’d naturally invoked the very buzzy subject of Ashlee’s disappearing schnoz. “I’ve always thought Ashlee was very pretty,” Wentz gushed, planting the seed, perhaps unwittingly, of a romance just weeks away.
And while the approximate point of cross-pollination remains unknown, it’s best estimated to have occurred sometime in the summer sizzle, consummated, as Wentz would later relate to Howard Stern, before a mirrored room at the SoHo Grand, and publicly heralded with Simpson straddling Wentz’s lap at a MisShapes party in early September.
Per Us Weekly, Wentz hurriedly dumped Buffy’s little sis to romance Jessica’s - although he’d later insist he was in fact the dumpee - and MySpace’s soon-to-be king and queen were formed.
So paths diverge; Simpson and Wentz eventually wed under the ministerial eye of Papa Joe, and shortly thereafter a Bronx Mowgli is born.
Wentz’s former flame, however is rumored red.
On the eve of her ex’s aisle-trot in 2008, it’s said Trachtenberg, resurrected for TV as a Gossip Girl, was caught barking into a phone some harsh words for the Simpson-Wentz wedding, a sighting made by none other than a friend of Wentz’s who’d incidentally occupied a seat next to Trachtenberg at an airport terminal. The pal promptly dished on the chance encounter in a LiveJournal entry, quoting Harriet The Spy as remarking at one point, to a surely terrified receiver, “WHAT?! ….. You’re going to my ex-boyfriend’s wedding tomorrow?!”
Naturally, Trachtenberg rushed to Ryan Seacrest’s radio show to rebuke the tale altogether.
But again, tempus fugit, and another summer arrives. It’s now 2009, seemingly a lifetime since the season of that pseudo-punk schism. Now, with her stages few and far between, Lilo unleashes her most dramatic of acts on the front porch of a sapphic deejay; Paris, once mighty, is but a memory; and under the roof of Los Angeles’ Wiltern Theater, the parties involved in that almost-ancient love triangle reconvene for a cause achingly à la mode: the launch of the DJ Hero video game.
In the wee hours of June 2, a phalanx of famouses and not-quites converged at the Wilshire Boulevard haunt to honor the Guitar Hero spin-off; Eminem roused the crowd with a few Relapse tracks and Jay-Z jockeyed the mic for a timely tribute to the new administration, launching into a rendition of My President Is Black set to a strobing backdrop of Obama and the stray Biden.
Amongst the starry hordes in attendance: sentient strains of disease Leonardo DiCaprio and Lukas Haas, Chuck’s Zachary Levi, Pauly Shore and Clueless’ Breckin Meyer, Kelly Osbourne, Tony Hawk, Taraji P. Henson, Vanessa Minnillo, Kate Mara, Travis Barker, Simon Rex and Andy Milonakis, naturally; Ashley Olsen - sans Mary-Kate, Nicky Hilton - sans Our Lady of Lazy Eye, and Ali Larter, hot off her tragically snubbed work in Obsessed. (Proud to say I saw it in theaters!)
In VIP, Ryan Phillippe crossed arms with Abbie Cornish, and Kim Kardashian mingled with Brittny Gastineau; the cast of Entourage made their usual nightlife presence, as did DJ AM, months shy of an untimely SoHo demise.
Trachtenberg had reportedly arrived to the soiree with a new man, only to find herself awkwardly seated beside Simpson and the boy from the band, both flashing matching bands to honor their treachery. (Condolences to the party planner who was likely canned afterwards.)
Though, by most accounts of the evening, things began rather civilly, they quickly devolved into the bloody - or at least devastatingly boozy.
Pleasantries were traded; Simpson and Trachtenberg exchanged kind words and cute pictures of little Bronx, but suddenly there was a turn.
As the night progressed, Simpson’s bathroom jaunts became frequent. “Ashlee got very, very drunk,” tattled one blogger. And given her notorious inability to hold her liquor - McDonald’s, anyone? - it seemed a recipe for disaster.
Wentz, ensconced beside Blink-182’s Mark Hoppus, paid little mind to the unfolding chaos - that was until his wife treated him to an impromptu lapdance. A witness told Perez Hilton, “She was grinding up on Pete like a stripper. It was actually pretty disgusting!”
The entire time, Simpson kept her eyes locked on Michelle.
Then she sprung into wanton attack. It started with drunken, slobbering, in-your-face taunts, before the Boyfriend chanteuse surmounted the fatal and since-immortal, “I hope you know, the whole time you were dating Pete, I was fucking him!“
Debris. Gasps. Dropped jaws. In the distance, the faint sound of flacks furiously crafting statements of appeasement.
A stunned Trachtenberg opted for peace, replying to Simpson’s vitriolic confession with an olive branch, ”I’ve never said bad things about you. I’m happy for you guys.“ However, her foe was just getting started.
Simpson proceeded to get louder, closer; verging on physical attack, Ashlee had to be restrained by Hoppus’ wife. All the while, Wentz watched in horror.
The couple made a hasty exit from the party, but the damage had been done. Within hours, the night’s events spilled into the blogosphere, first on Perez before a prompt appearance in Page Six; Simpson’s rep shockingly confirmed the details of her client’s rampage, proffering only the addendum the feuding ladies had since made amends, ”It was just a misunderstanding. Ashlee has since apologized to Michelle and they remain on good terms.“
But online commenters quickly took sides, and few strayed to Camp Ashlee.
As the rumor mill churned beyond control, even pal Nicole Richie tried to play publicist; days later, at a joint runway show for Richie’s House of Harlow line and Wentz’s Clandestine Industries, a shock question aimed at Pete regarding his wife’s tussle with Trachtenberg prompted The Simple Life alum to jump on the offense.
”That’s not appropriate!“ Richie barked. (Trachtenberg was later questioned about the DJ Hero dust-up herself on Kathy Griffin’s talk show. As the episode’s no longer available online, I’m running off memory, but I recall Michelle declining to discuss the situation as there’s a ’child involved,’ or something to that effect.)
Simpson, for her part, avoided the fashion event’s red carpet altogether, opting to sneak in the back alongside Wentz’s then-protégé Tyga, but it seemed nothing could quell the rock wife’s PR woes.
With her doomed gig on Melrose Place still months away, Ashlee was left to rebound from her recent bout of bad press the only way possible in 2009…
… a NOH8 campaign, naturally.
Happy Pride!