By Tim Dahlberg
Associated Press
The rich and famous, it seems, split up differently than the rest of us.
Christie Brinkley loaded up the kids in the family private jet and flew off to Colorado in search of comfort after discovering her husband was having an affair with an 18-year-old and spending some of the family fortune on Internet porn.
Cynthia Rodriguez chose Paris in the summer for her getaway, booking a room at the mansion of rocker Lenny Kravitz while trying to get over the very public tale of her husband’s friendship with Madonna and his alleged dalliances elsewhere.
News of Brinkley’s trip surfaced this week as part of a divorce trial in New York that was a tabloid dream. Amid the tales of lust, money and motherhood was a retort by her soon-to-be-ex that she should have been an actress instead of a model after her performance in court.
About the only thing missing was an appearance by Madonna, but apparently this was one divorce she didn’t have to deny any involvement with.
That’s not the case when it comes to the Rodriguez family, whose relationship had always provided headline material for the New York tabloids. Even they couldn’t believe their good fortune over the past few days when Cynthia Rodriguez’s dissatisfaction with her husband culminated with a filing seeking an end to their five-year marriage.
Teenage girls, sex and aging supermodels are always good fodder. Put a pop star and a Yankee superstar together, and you can keep printing papers until you run out of newsprint.
Our fascination with everything celebrity apparently knows no bounds, though that shouldn’t come as any surprise to anyone who pays attention to the daily mating dance between the paparazzi and Britney Spears or watches the has-beens that masquerade as celebrities on shows such as “Dancing With The Stars.”
We can’t get enough of Paris Hilton, can’t believe David Archuleta sings like he does, and can’t stop talking about xow Nicole Kidman actually named her new baby Sunday Rose.
We’re so celebrity obsessed that more Americans can probably better tell you how much Ed McMahon is in arrears on his Beverly Hills estate than they can discuss the monthly trade deficit with China.
And now there’s a national debate over whether A-Rod’s relationship with Madonna is spiritual or sexual.
My uneducated guess is that it’s neither, and not just because I’ve never met a ballplayer who had many deep thoughts. I’m leaning toward the theory that Madonna ó who shares a manager with A-Rod ó either wanted good seats at Yankee Stadium or was desperate for a publicity jump-start for her Sticky & Sweet world tour that begins in August.
She’s certainly not inviting Rodriguez over for some late-night batting tips. He’s doing just fine at the plate, though he’s not hitting home runs at nearly the same pace he did last season.
Yankee manager Joe Girardi said the other day he didn’t think the problems in A-Rod’s personal life would spill over to the field, and he’s probably right. Remember, this is the same player who hit 54 home runs last year despite tabloid photos showing him with a woman reported to be a stripper at a Toronto hotel.
Besides, people get divorced every day. It’s not even all that intriguing unless, of course, you add Madonna, Lenny Kravitz, a new baby, and pictures that show C-Rod is very serious about physical fitness to the mix.
OK, so maybe it is an all-star cast worthy of an all-star player. And I suppose it beats worrying about gas at $4.40 a gallon or the fact the Yankees are stuck in third place, 81/2 games out with the season more than half over.
As far as baseball players with domestic issues go, though, former pitcher Chuck Finley being assaulted by his actress wife, Tawny Kitaen, was more interesting. So was Kris Benson’s wife showing up at the Mets’ annual holiday party in a low-cut Santa costume and discussing intimate details of the couple’s sex life on her Web site.
And don’t forget the two Yankee pitchers, Fritz Peterson and Mike Kekich, who traded both wives and families in the middle of the 1972 season.
The Rods, both A and C, would have to go a long way to top that.
Personally, the whole thing bores me, though I will acknowledge some interest in finding out what kind of prenuptial Cynthia Rodriguez has and how much of the $275 million contract A-Rod signed after last season she might get. Yankee fans should be interested in that, too, because it’s their ticket money that will fund both Rods for many years.
For now, though, I’ve got other things to worry about. I’m sure you’ve heard the latest about Tom Brady and his main squeeze, Gisele Bundchen….