Looks like Seliger and GQ are in a little hot water over the Rielle Hunter (John Edwards affair) pictures where she’s got no pants on (MSNBC Story Here). The only reason I’m commenting on this at all is because I’ve been on the receiving end of phone calls by publicists and subjects who’ve done things on set with a camera pointed at them they later regret. To be fair the same thing happens to writers all the time. Fact checkers are routinely berated over the phone as people try to reshape what they said.
There is a known phenomena where people seem to rip their clothes off when you point a camera at them. Seems to have happened to Rielle. I don’t think the photographer is to blame.
Author Lisa DePaulo (wrote the piece in GQ) on hardball with Chris Matthews: When Matthews questioned the spread, DePaulo cracked, “This is GQ, not Newsweek.” (source)
And now the standard BTS video:
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How could she possibly blame the photographer? It takes some serious consideration to take off your pants! And then let someone photograph you and think that’s a good idea if you’re trying to convey a certain image. Hello!?
There’s even video of Seliger showing Hunter the photos on his laptop while he’s shooting…
http://abcnews.go.com/GMA/John_Edwards_Scandal/john-edwards-mistress-rielle-hunter-knew-pics-gq/story?id=10109896
Seems Hunter’s comments don’t have a (pants) leg to stand on.
This is a tempest in a teapot me thinks. What I am really interested to see is how the David Burdeny/Sze Tsung Leong flap plays out.
dean buscher
Oh my lord, somebody’s naked…who gives a rat’s ass…living in this country I am often reminded of how incredibly emotionally stunted most of the populace is….
Even if she hadn’t been looking at the photos on the laptop during the shoot, as evidenced in the BTS video, she’s posing on a BED without any pants on — is she really going to try to suggest she didn’t think those shots would be ‘suggestive’….? Oh please. Give us a break.
There is also an inherent contradiction of ‘morality,’ if you will, in the following sentence from the beginning of the MSNBC piece (and I quote):
“Rielle Hunter is said to be upset with several somewhat racy photographs of her that accompany the long interview in the new issue of GQ in which she details her affair with John Edwards.”
Um, she gave a LONG interview [for a prominent national magazine] in which she DETAILS her AFFAIR with [married man and prominent national politician] John Edwards. (All caps for emphasis only.) And yet she’s upset about some slightly suggestive photographs that accompany the long interview detailing her affair with a married man and prominent public figure…? Hmmm let us ponder that…: yeah right.
Smells to me like someone is trying to backpedal and milk the PR as much as possible in the process.
I mean what the hell? “WHOOPS! My pants fell off!” I don’t think so.
She’s an adult, and a media professional to boot, and was perfectly aware of what she was doing at the time. I mean sitting in your underwear on a bed filled with stuffed animals and “Gee, they’re really ONLY shooting me from the shoulders up”. Come on.
My money is on this scenario:
– She does the shoot.
– The pictures get published, and she and any publicist she’s contracted are psyched. Controversy sells. (Why else would she be doing interviews if she didn’t want publicity?)
– Team Edwards, currently looking to repair his public image, catches wind and threatens a shitstorm of repercussions. (They can outspend her in court after all and could make her life very difficult through his connections if they wanted to)
– She pulls some story about how she thought it was headshots out of her now clothed bottom. She goes on TV with waterworks, straight to Barbara Walters, the queen of judgmental quasi journalism.
I’m with GQ and Mark on this one. She and Miley Cyrus can go stuff it.
Don’t really see what the big deal. OMG girl with out pants?! Media blows things up for reasons that are apparently beyond me. This shouldn’t even be something that has to be discussed. Her publicist probably said to make it out like the photographer told her to do that so she would not look bad after the fact.
Lookin like a fool with her pants on the ground.. Sorry couldnt resist..
Since Hunter was filming John Edwards when they met, I doubt this was the first time the clothes flew off around a camera…
being from europe and all.. “nothing to see, please move along”. pun intended.. but mr seliger sure shows off some serious amount of camera p*rn for the bts-video.. good marketing on his side, too.. and beautiful images, wouldnt expect anything less..
Being from England, pants has a slightly different connotation in english, cue some disappointed staring at photos!!!
I think Seliger is telling the story he wanted to tell. I have nothing but admiration for beautiful shots that – in the end – became a big part of the story.
It’s obvious that political media needs to push back regardless of the point of view. The only way to avoid controversy in the case of Rielle Hunter would have been to produce forgettable images. If that’s what they wanted, they hired the wrong guy.
Nice touch with stuffed animals. No wonder she’s upset, this picture makes a strong point, hahaha. Oops!
@Chris Schultz, Glad someone else noticed that. Way more creepy than showing your legs.
Chalk one up for Seliger. He was just showing what Rielle Hunter really fantasized about having after all.. to be a “celebrity” scantily clad in a magazine, connected to fame, fortune, and power. Or whatever she wants.. which probably has a lot to do with fantasy.
I mean the whole thing was sooooo glamorous (heavy sarcasm implied).. the wrecked marriage, the harsh media glare, the failed presidential bid, the moving from house to house, the sex tape, and God knows what else I’ve left out.
Sadly (no sarcasm implied) there is an innocent child involved and Edward’s own family that is emotionally damaged by the whole affair.
There are some serious deeper issues involved with Rielle Hunter. She is an untreated addict – sex, cocaine, relationships. That is my opinion and I’m sticking to it.
She calls him, “Johnny”.
Don’t you know the former Mrs Edwards thinks that’s just precious…
If the trademark owners of Dora the Explorer, Sesame Street, and Barney don’t mind, I’m surprised anyone else does.
@Matthew Hakola, very funny!!!
Another villain photographer to blame. Case closed
That poor child in the photo has noo idea what is coming in her life with a mother like Rielle Hunter and a likely to be absent (emotionally and/or physically) father like “Johnny” Edwards. Lets just pray for that child to have a good life growing up.
@ Sista Motella
I was thinking about their daughter, too. Although her mother must have signed a release for her photo to be published, and of course the editors have a right to use it, I just wish they would have left it out. It’s hard to imagine a toddler wanting this kind of “fame”.
I wonder what kinda gun Seliger used as the subject signed the release? Hmm…? GO MARK!
This women is just an opportunist, trying to milk her 15 minutes of over exposure.
Having worked with Seliger I know for a fact that he would never force a subject into any position or location that they did not agree to first.
I also find it hard to believe that her PR people didn’t “OK” the sittings before or during the shoot.
Personally I’d much rather see the nudes of Jennifer Aniston that Mark shot in the late 90’s that have never been published long before the infamous men’s tie shots last year.
I have worked with Seliger in the past and he is so top shelf. He will not speak ill of any celebrity he has photographed even when asked about Courtney Love.
About Hunter: He showed her everything they were doing during the whole shoot so she has, as someone brilliantly wrote above, no (pants) leg to stand on!! And what you all forget- this is a woman who has a sex tape of she and John Edwards! So how can she be upset by this situation when she should be upset for breaking up a marriage with a woman who is facing death from cancer!!
Mark- don’t let this Andy Warhol 15 minute of fame tramp get you down!!
This story has the plot line of a ’70s porn movie: Professional woman, trying to make her way in the world, who has one tiny problem — for some unexplained reason her pants keep falling off. And every time it happens “situations” ensue. The sex tape with the presidential candidate, the photo shoot etc.
She is a videographer by trade, no? Maybe she could record her own story.
What a crock! She knows exactly what hse is doing, just liek she know Edwards was married. Cheesy PR is what I think, and it doesn’t deserve any attention
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