Ladies, This '50 Shades Of Grey' Stuff Is Getting Out Of Hand

I don’t even know where to start with this, but here we go. Erika Leonard, AKA E.L. James AKA Snowqueen Icedragon, is one of the smartest people on the planet. With what writing and storytelling experience that she had, she created an empire by piggybacking on Stephanie Meyer’s success by writing erotic fan fiction for lonely women on Twilight message boards, using the names Edward Cullen and Bella Swan in her story, Master of the Universe.

Then a funny thing happened – she realized that Twilight fans will buy anything and she turned her ripped off stories into the original book, 50 Shades of Grey. Now a best-selling excuse for guys to go play golf, Grey is, of course, being adapted into a film, because women already paid $20 for a book so why wouldn’t they spend $12 to see Christian Grey beat Anastasia Steele with a whip? Let’s start the rumor mill, shall we?

A fun rumor went around Hollywood this past weekend: Angelina Jolie, people were saying, had been approached to direct the movie version of the steamy romance novel Fifty Shades of Grey.

… sources said there may have been an informal conversation but that nothing was real, and reps for the actress-turned-filmmaker say there haven’t been any talks with studio Focus Features (Focus also denied the rumor). (Via THR)

Tell you what – if Angelina Jolie agrees to direct 50 Shades of Grey, I will not only read the entire 3-book series, but I will also start my own erotic fan fiction website called “Fitty Shades of C-Tates”. And as excited as that may make some of you – *stares at Jacktion!* – ain’t gonna happen.

But Focus could hire a sock puppet to direct this thing and it won’t matter because 50 Shades is the hottest thing on the planet. How hot? It has made the sex toy and hardware industries blow the f*ck up.

“Oh, we’ve been selling rope to women,” says Clifton Kahn, owner of Lexington Hardware on the Upper East Side. “I’d say tenfold more rope than usual in the last six months. The women are definitely buying, and it’s still continuing.”

The store’s most popular item is the soft-cotton “clothes line” rope, which retails at a bargain $5 for 50 feet.

Tarzian Hardware in Park Slope, Brooklyn, has also seen a rash of rope sales. “It’s usually men buying rope, but the women, they’ve been coming in the last few months,” cashier Christina Davila told The Post. “I’ve actually read the book. So when the women buy rope, it was kind of like, ‘Hmmm, that does seem a little unusual.’ ” (Via the NY Post)

Sex toy stores are also selling 50 Shades gift packs, but that’s boring. I’m happier thinking about women running into Home Depot with their fingers flicking the beans while they demand to know where the softest rope and Purell are located.

And for the biggest 50 Shades fans, you can even download your own sex contracts just like the one that Christian made Anastasia sign, and then you can slap this signature on it to seal the deal.

Finally, to close out this recap of erotica news, here’s Gilbert Gottfried reading an excerpt of 50 Shades of Grey.

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