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The 10 Best Parts Of Lady Gaga's "Queen Of The Universe" Lawsuit
By
Ben Yakas
Published Feb 2, 2013
Modified Feb 2, 2013
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By
Ben Yakas
Published Feb 2, 2013
Modified Feb 2, 2013
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Would it shock you to learn that Lady Gaga is a bit of a diva? No, of course it wouldn't, because then she wouldn't be Lady Gaga. But that is the basis of a lawsuit filed against her by former personal assistant Jennifer O'Neill. O'Neill wants hundreds of thousands of dollars in overtime pay which she believes she is owed, while Gaga called her a “f--king hood rat who is suing me for money that she didn’t earn.” Gaga and O'Neill have both been deposed now, and the NY Post has all the ego-stroking details from their testimonies. Because you don't actually want to read the whole thing, we've picked out our ten favorite quotes.
- Lady Gaga has a healthy sense of self-esteem: “She’s just — she thinks she’s just like the queen of the universe,” Gaga said during the deposition about O'Neill. “And, you know what, she didn’t want to be a slave to one, because in my work and what I do, I’m the queen of the universe every day.”
- Lady Gaga doesn't sleep alone: “I was by her side virtually 24 hours a day, seven days a week,” O’Neill testified. “That includes sleeping in the same bed with her. Because she did not sleep alone.” She added that she felt it was a required part of her job. “Unlike anybody else on that tour, I did not have my own hotel room. I was not asked if I wanted my own hotel room,” she said.
- Lady Gaga lets her assistants hang out with Terry Richardson, so why aren't they more appreciative? “I’m quite wonderful to everybody that works for me, and I am completely aghast to what a disgusting human being that you have become to sue me like this,” she said. “Because [O'Neill] slept in Egyptian cotton sheets every night, in five-star hotels, on private planes, eating caviar, partying with [photographer] Terry Richardson all night, wearing my clothes, asking YSL [Yves Saint Laurent] to send her free shoes without my permission, using my YSL discount without my permission.”
- Lady Gaga doesn't know how to work the DVD player, and/or is really lazy: “Another thing she would do in the middle of the night, would be wake me up to have me change the DVD in the DVD player because she didn’t want to watch that DVD any more and she couldn’t get up to walk across the room to change the DVD herself,” O’Neill said.
- Lady Gaga doesn't want her assistants getting laid: “I had no privacy, no chance to talk to any family, no chance to talk to any friends, no chance to have sex if I wanted to have sex," O'Neill said. "There was no chance to do anything.”
- Lady Gaga doesn't fetch her own tampons: “She might have said I need some tea, I need — can you get my computer for me, can you get my phone, my battery is dead, I need a tampon, the toilet doesn’t flush,” O’Neill said.
- Lady Gaga is realistic about work hours...except when she's not: Gaga said in her deposition that all her employees work only an eight-hour day, noting, “This job is a 9-to-5 job that is spaced out throughout the day.” So on the one hand, “You don’t get a schedule that is like you punch in and you can play f--king Tetris at your desk for four hours and then you punch out at the end of the day." On the other other hand, “I’m not in any way discounting how hard an eight-hour work day can be, or discounting the role of an assistant.” Because, “an eight-hour workday could still be a very difficult workday, you know, if you’re digging ditches or, you know, you’re, you know, putting sealing on a roof, you know.” So we're a bit confused: working for Lady Gaga is or is not harder than digging ditches?
- Lady Gaga will not encourage your interest in tube tops: “Not that people who do that don’t deserve their hourly pay, but I’m just pointing out that I deserve everything I’ve worked for," Gaga said. "I deserve every dollar of it. And she deserves every dollar of her $75,000 that we agreed to. But she does not deserve a penny more.” Instead of paying O'Neill, Gaga said she wants "to give all the money that she wants to my employees that work hard for me now that deserve it. I’m not going to give it to her so she can go to Intermix and buy herself a new tube top."
- Lady Gaga doesn't like it when you embarrass her in front of Terry Richardson: Gaga noted that after she walked the runway at Thierry Mugler’s fall 2011 fashion show, she and O'Neill partied all night with Richardson and other socialites. The next day, when they had to fly back to America, O’Neill insisted on sleeping in the second bed and “completely, like, flipped out at me, beyond belief” when “I told her no.” Gaga said: “‘Jennifer, this is really inappropriate in front of Terry Richardson,’ and she was like, ‘Don’t I get some sort of seniority because I’ve been here longer and I’m your friend?’ ” That was probably the wrong thing to say: "The first thing I thought was ‘You’re not my f--king friend,’ ” Gaga said.
- Do Not Stare At Lady Gaga:“Are you going to stare at me like a witch this whole time — honestly?” Gaga asked at the start of the deposition. “Because this is going to be a long f--k ng day that you brought me here.”
Tagged
divas
Jennifer O'Neill
lady gaga
lawsuit
queen of the universe
Ben Yakas
Ben Yakas is a former Gothamist reporter.
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Gothamist is funded by sponsors and member donations
Gothamist is funded by sponsors and member donations
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