Top Ten Celebrity Winners and Losers of 2010
Dec. 20, 2010 — -- For some, 2010 brought Oscar statues, revived careers, and pages of praise.
For others, the year rained rehab stints, scorned mistresses and pages of, well, the opposite of praise.
From the celebrity kingdom, there were winners and there were losers. Below, five who fall firmly in each category:
Sandra Bullock: She beat out a crop of highly qualified contenders to score a best actress Oscar for her turn as an adoptive mom in "The Blind Side." Her husband stole her thunder by revealing his extramarital affairs mere weeks after her big win, but no matter. Bullock weathered the storm that followed with grace, got the hell out of her marriage, and adopted a little boy from New Orleans who currently rivals Suri Cruise in the cute celebrity kids department.
Winona Ryder: For a long time, the thing for which many people remembered Ryder was her 2001 shoplifting arrest. Finally, she's rubbing out that black mark on her career with a small but scintillating role in the much buzzed-about "Black Swan," which features her as a fading ballet star who, ironically, freaks out after her own personal belongings are stolen.
Conan O'Brien: NBC gave him his dream job, then ripped it out of his hands, but it's all good. O'Brien became the subject of maybe the biggest Internet rally ever (How many of your friends changed their Facebook and Twitter photos to the Team Coco logo?), sold out arenas across the country during his I-can't-be-on-TV-so-I'll-come-to-you live tour, and landed at TBS, where he's revived his tried-and-true brand of late-night comedy.
Jeff Zucker, the NBC exec who fired him from the "Tonight Show?" He's now out of a job. Revenge, it's sweet.
Justin Timberlake: We knew he could dance. We knew he could sing. We knew he could bring sexy back. But until his scene-stealing turn as Napster co-founder Sean Parker in "The Social Network," we didn't really know he could act. Now we do. J-Tims, modern day Renaissance man.
Kanye West: First, he said sorry to Taylor Swift. Then, he went on to drop the most critically acclaimed album of the year, sure to sweep the Grammys come 2012. (Swift's latest album will also be a contender then. Sparks, they may fly.)
Jesse James: His greatest claim to fame was being the husband of the Oscar-winning Bullock. Now he's the guy who cheated on her with a tattoo model/former stripper, soured his better half's big moment, got slapped with a divorce, and, if some tabloid reports are to be believed, is chasing his ex-wife around the country in hopes of reconciling with her. He also owns a motorcycle shop and used to have a reality TV show. Bravo.
Tiger Woods: Yes, he was last year's biggest loser, but this year, he showed that in addition to not having a handle on his personal life, he doesn't really have a handle on his job either. Strutting back onto the golf course after his high-profile hiatus/sex-rehab stay, Woods proceeded to win exactly … zero times.
Mel Gibson: Gibson's reputation sank to the gutter after several recordings, purportedly of him berating Oksana Grigorieva, his ex-girlfriend and the mother of his infant daughter, leaked online. Jews, African-Americans, women, homosexuals, anyone appalled by the sound of a grown man growling into a phone -- there aren't a lot of people those recordings didn't offend.
Jay Leno: Sure, he got to keep "The Tonight Show." But at what cost? When Leno cheerfully took back his old gig and refused to stick up for O'Brien though the NBC brouhaha, he went from being America's loveable, sometimes-funny uncle to the guy who refuses to leave at the party even after the lights are turned off. Move it along, man, move it along.
Speidi: Like the eczema of the earth, they're the rash that just won't go away. Heidi Montag and Spencer Pratt started the year off with a bang when she revealed her brand new body, the product of ten plastic surgeries. The "Hills" reality stars went on to announce that they were separating, only to get back together to try and "make things work." (Or is it that no one else can put up with them?) Now Montag wants her old body back, and the rest of us want back every minute we might have paid attention to her and her husband.
