Stars Who Don't Sell Magazines

Gwyneth Snubbed By Entertainment Weekly, Plus Other Stars Who Don’t Move Magazines

Posted by: Kate Torgovnick Filed in: celebs
12:50PM, Tuesday July 21st 2009

The new Entertainment Weekly is on newsstands today, and it features the stars of “Iron Man 2.” There’s Robert Downey Jr., of course, along with Scarlett Johansson and Mickey Rourke. But wait a second, isn’t Gwyneth Paltrow in that flick, too? According to this morning’s New York Post, Gwyneth was intentionally snubbed for the cover because “rightly or wrongly, the editors feel any cover with Paltrow is newsstand suicide.” Cold diss! [New York Post]

Admittedly, Gwynnie is not my favorite celebrity in Hollywood. There’s her whole detoxorexic obsession that has me wishing that, just once in a while, this chick would eat a slice of cake. And there’s her faux British accent and overblown formality (remember when she referred to Billy Joel as William?) which makes me cringe. Oh, and who could forget her shiny legs on “The Tonight Show with Conan O’Brien”? But, still, every now and then Gwyneth does something cool. See: “The Royal Tenenbaums.” And she is gorgeous in that Grace Kelly kind of way. So is it true that people just won’t pick up a magazine if she’s on the cover?

This got me thinking, who are the other celebrities in Tinseltown who sell the fewest magazines? Here are the worst-selling covers of last year, according to Women’s Wear Daily, along with how many copies were sold on the newsstand. [WWD]

Vogue
Best-Selling Cover: Keira Knightley (559,000 copies)
Worst-Selling Cover: Rachel Weisz (276,000 copies). But Gwyneth was a close second with 310,000 copies.

Vanity Fair
Best-Selling Cover: Angelina Jolie (504,000 copies)
Worst-Selling Cover: Katherine Heigl (314,000 copies)

Elle
Best-Selling Cover: Victoria Beckham (413,000 copies)
Worst-Selling Covers: Carrie Underwood (253,000 copies)

Glamour
Best-Selling Cover: Jessica Simpson (775,000 copies)
Worst-Selling Cover: Nicole Kidman (460,000 copies)

Cosmopolitan
Best-Selling Cover: Scarlett Johansson (2 million copies)
Worst-Selling Cover: Jessica Simpson (1.5 million copies)

W
Best-Selling Cover: Angelina Jolie (78,000 copies)
Worst-Selling Cover: Hilary Swank (27,000 copies)

InStyle
Best-Selling Cover: Eva Longoria-Parker (889,000 copies)
Worst-Selling Cover: Anne Hathaway (585,000 copies)

Marie Claire
Best-Selling Cover: Women of “Sex and the City” (440,948 copies)
Worst-Selling Cover: Jennifer Connelly (191,000 copies)

Harper’s Bazaar
Best-Selling Cover: Lindsay Lohan (213,000 copies)
Worst-Selling Cover: Drew Barrymore (120,000 copies)

While all the numbers aren’t in for 2009 yet, it’s worth noting that Giselle Bundchen’s covers of Vanity Fair and Harper’s Bazaar have both been their worst-performing of the year, so far. Interesting.

So do any of these best/worst sellers surprise you? And do you think Entertainment Weekly was right to keep Gwyneth out of the shot?

comments

_jsw_
wrote on July 21 2009 @ 12:59 pm: [report]

Interesting. In at least half of those cases, I would have preferred the lessor-selling version, based purely on the celebrities listed.

bogart4017
wrote on July 21 2009 @ 01:01 pm: [report]

This is hate on Gwenyth month. She bought it on herself with her comments about how Spain is so much better than the US and all the history it has. I feel like everybody else—if you like it so much then stay there. With all its faults this is still the greatest country in the world. And this is coming from someone who isnt all that patriotic.

Parker
wrote on July 21 2009 @ 01:20 pm: [report]

I agree, I think she is unlikeable in general. Though to me her role in the first film seemed relatively minor, maybe that is a reason why she wasn’t included now that there are more interesting characters involved.

GreenAura
wrote on July 21 2009 @ 01:24 pm: [report]

Several of these baffle me. Jessica over Nicole Kidman? Eva over Anne? Lindsay over Drew? This just proves that much of our society isn’t interested in substance.