In its infinite wisdom, CNN has hired Camille Donatacci–whom you know better as Kelsey Grammer's most recent ex-wife, Camille Grammer–to co-host its Oscar red-carpet coverage Sunday.
(And you thought Piers Morgan was stunt casting!)
In honor of Newport Beach-born Donatacci-Grammer's gig, we present five of her most memorable moments.
Amazingly, they mirror those of Katie Couric!
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Camille spun a dancing career that landed her in several music videos and Club MTV in the 1980s into a modeling career in the '90s that included appearing nude in several Playboy publications. That led to a brief soft-porn career in flicks such as Marilyn Chambers'
Bedtime Stories, New York Nights.
She met Kelsey Grammer on a blind date in 1996. Despite his having already been engaged thrice before and married twice before–Kelsey says his second wife, a stripper, was abusive, shot a gun at him
and, after talk of divorce a year into their marriage, attempted
suicide, causing a miscarriage–Camille married him in
Malibu in 1997. Via a surrogate mother, they had two children to go along with the Frazier star's other three.
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Another life-defining event happened to Camille in 1996: She was
diagnosed with Irritable Bowel Syndrome, something the couple announced
on The Howard Stern Show. From that moment forward, whenever Camille's
voice has been heard live in studio, over the phone or on tape, Stern's
gremlins have interrupted her with fart sounds.
On the Jan. 12 Howard Stern Show, Camille told the host not-so-coyly that Kelsey
wasn't gay, but then strongly suggested he appeared in the
cross-dressing La Cage aux Folles on Broadway because he liked wearing women's clothes. On the next night's episode of Bravo's reality show The Real Housewives of Beverly
Hills, Camille
revealed Kelsey wanted out of their marriage. After the couple's split was known, Camille repeated the Kelsey-wears-lady-clothes story to several of her fellow Housewives. But seven days after the disclosure on Stern, she appeared on Lopez Tonight and claimed the cross-dressing crack was a joke. As for the divorce, it was finalized on Feb. 10, with 42-year-old Camille getting primary custody of the two kids and child and spousal support in the tens of millions. Kelsey married his fourth wife, 29-year-old British flight attendant Kayte Walsh, on a Broadway stage today. Cheers!
On Jan. 16, it was revealed Camille hired famous attorney Larry Stein to get her off Real Housewives, which she claimed Bravo edited to make her appear hateable. Under her deal, the network could have picked up her
option for a second season. Stein managed to get an out for his client, but she did not exercise it as of the reunion show later that month. TMZ surmised she was trying to control how she was edited in case Bravo had any hope of keeping her.
Showbiz Tonight Road to the Gold, CNN, Sun., 4 p.m.
OC Weekly Editor-in-Chief Matt Coker has been engaging, enraging and entertaining readers of newspapers, magazines and websites for decades. He spent the first 13 years of his career in journalism at daily newspapers before “graduating” to OC Weekly in 1995 as the alternative newsweekly’s first calendar editor.