White House Correspondents’ Dinner Less Hollywood This Year: Report
Scandal’s Kerry Washington will be there and so will Steven Spielberg and House of Cards’ Kevin Spacey but this year’s White House Correspondents’ dinner will not be attracting the Hollywood players of previous years says The Hill. President Obama is attending the Conan O’Brien-hosted dinner but George Clooney isn’t coming this year. The daily Congressional newspaper cites the big Tinseltown turnout for the recent second Inauguration, the lack of a good juicy scandal and the more frequent presence of Hollywood types in the nation’s capitol nowadays as the primary reasons for “more subdued” event this year. Charlize Theron spoke at a congressional breakfast on AIDS awareness today in D.C. today and was a guest at last year’s White House Correspondents dinner but she won’t be attending the April 27 event this year. WME boss Ari Emanuel won’t be attending this year either. Neither will Fox News’ Greta Van Susteran who has become infamous over the past few years for bringing guests like Lindsay Lohan and Kim Kardashian to the dinner.
Related: CNN Adds Guests For White House Correspondents Dinner
After last year’s WHCD, Tom Brokaw was highly critical of the love-in between Hollywood and the beltway. “It is time to rethink it. I think George Clooney is a great guy. I would like to meet Charlize Theron. I don’t think the big press event in Washington should be that kind of glittering event where the whole talk is about Cristol champagne, taking over the Italian embassy, who had the best party, who got to meet the most people,” the former NBC Nightly News anchor told meet the press. He might partially get his wish this year. Unlike the heavily hyped party it co-hosted in 2012 with Google to time with the D.C dinner, the Hollywood Reporter isn’t doing anything this year (This may be a cost saving move since the publication is thought to be up for sale). Funny or Die are also not having their big First Amendment Party shindig this year instead opting for a smaller 150 secret party with guests from Portlandia, SNL and House of Cards the night before the WHCD. ABC News is still putting on a pre-dinner cocktail party with Yahoo! News and Univision on the 27th and Politico publisher Robert Allbritton is still hosting post-WHCD brunch on April 28 at his Georgetown home.
Get more from Deadline.com: Follow us on Twitter, Facebook, Newsletter
