With Mackenzie Phillips, When Is It Too Much Information?

By Jo Piazza Posted Oct 4th 2009 07:00PM

Mackenzie Phillips just keeps going and going and going ...

It's been almost two weeks since Mackenzie Phillips dropped the bombshell that she carried on a ten-year incestuous affair with her father John Phillips. In the past ten days, there have been plenty of emotions from the public, starting with shock and horror followed by a voracious need for more details. We also watched as members of the Phillips clan -- Chynna, Bijou and Michelle -- tried to piece together their own admittedly-hazy memories of their family history.

Now we're just exhausted. We've watched Mackenzie on Oprah, on Extra, on Larry King and on the Today Show...twice. We even bought the book she has been touting, 'High On Arrival,' just in case we had missed anything. Does anyone else feel exhausted watching her retell such painful stories at such a high frequency? Expert Opinion After the Jump >>>

Scenes From the Mackenzie Phillips Book Tour

'Larry King Live'

'Oprah'

'Today'
"It is amazing that she keeps going. If she were my client, I would have advised her do no more than two key interviews with tremendous reach such as the one she did on Today Show," advised Rebecca Brooks, president of The Brooks Group PR.

"When she started (her tour) viewers/readers were stunned and felt for her, but by continuing, she looks like she has alternative motives and the over-saturation will lead to irritation and ultimately people will tune her out and not care."

And yet Phillips shows no signs of slowing down. She chatted with Mario Lopez on Extra Thursday night and even said she was still shocked and confused that people had such strong reactions to her story. "I didn't expect this firestorm," Mackenzie said with a straight face. She said the same thing to USA Today.

AOL StyleList contributing editor and longtime gossip columnist Ben Widdicombe says, '"Come off it Mackenzie."

"She was naive to think she could drop a bombshell like this and not set off shockwaves. She had to know what she was doing," Widdicombe tells PopEater.

Whether or not she knew was a maelstrom this would cause is irrelevant now because, Mackenzie is selling mad copies of her book. This week, 'High on Arrival,' was number 14 on the USA Today bestselling books list. Will she do more publicity in hopes of nitting No. 1?

"These things have cycles. And Mackenzie did a publicity blitz when her book came out. And we reeled from that," explains Rachel Sklar, editor-at-large for Mediaite.com to PopEater. "And then we heard from her sisters, and we reeled from that. And then the talking heads and bloggers chewed it over, and we all reeled together and that's how a story makes its way through the public consciousness. At some point, you have to just shut up and read. In the meantime - there's David Letterman!"

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Shocking Celebrity Tell-Alls

Mackenzie Phillips reveals details of a sexual relationship with her late father, Mamas and Papas singer John Phillips, in her 'High on Arrival.' See More Scandalous Reveals From Stars >>>

Tags: high on arrival, HighOnArrival, mackenzie phillips, MackenziePhillips

Comments

(35)

Sunday 04 October

By NM

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I wonder what her real mom was like. Could she have been any worse than the guy who did raised or? Or should we say not raised her and slept with her. I hope she can stay clean. I wish her the best.

Wednesday 14 October

By Marcus

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Her real mom is never mentioned so I looked up Mackenzie's biography in Wikpedia. Her mother's name is Susan Adams. I wonder why she has not come forward and defended her daughter.

By myke hawke

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Its obvious she made it up to sell her book as she has been washed up for awhile.

By Scooter

Mackenzie Phillips looks better than she has in years. I think she needs to tell her story to get the pain out and release the past. I don't think she is making this story up to gain celebrity status or to sell her book. Incest is a dirty secret that is rampant in a lot of dysfunctional families. Good for her that she can come out with it for her sake. I hope other people find inspiration and stregnth to realize it is not their fault.

By janilee

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I agree...thank you for posting something nice and sensitive. I think and hope that Mackenzie will help other people by telling her story. Mackenzie has always seemed genuine and has a good spirit. I hope this helps her. She deserves some happiness in her life.

I agree with you and she should be commended for being so forthright and sincere. She looks better now than when she was doing the television series.

By Allie

We are waaay past the point of too much info! The only remedy now, is for Phillips to stop giving out any information.

This may have been info that should only have been shared with a professional therapist; no purpose has been served to float this out nation-wide. She and her father were both so drug-addled and sick, that there is always the possibility that this is a leftover remnant of some pharmaceutical trip.

Some things the public does not need to know, even to sell books!

By jebby1

Hmmm ...

Were the Phillips good friends with the Lettermans?

By Kay

now all she is trying to do is make money on the book. And who can believe her she fried her brain years ago with all of those drugs. I don't believe even half of what she says!

By tiffany

I think she is very courageous for coming forward. If you are tired of it than stop reading about it or watching it. Can you imagine if you were going thru this or have gone thru this and you watched her story and realized you weren't the only one going thru it? No matter how sick we think this is, it is going on all across the world. She is making it easier for other women to come forward and put a stop to this in their incestuous relationships.
She might be advertising her book, but there is no amount of money that will ever make this right for her.

By abbyvlle

The only thing she was any good at was doing drugs. She's running out of money now so she trashes her dad who can't tell his side of the story. She will never get it togeather.

By Sandy

This is so sad. Instead of embracing her and trying to help, we continue to judge her. Who does she have to confide in except the outside world. She's probably thinking they'll listen. But who does really listen to anyone anymore? Most just want to talk at someone.

By scott

Who give a S*&T??? Let her FADE AWAY QUICK!!!

By Cher

She ruined the Mamas & the Papas for me! I can't listen to them anymore since I heard this news. I can only think of what John Phillips might have been instead of what I thought I remember about him. How pitiful that she ruined his image without John here to be to defend himself.

By salome

tv's been a trash land, a total waste land ,so mckenZEES tell all is simply a drop in the bucket until the NEXT celebUtard either confesses or confabulates .

Monday 05 October

By tori

I think Mack is telling the absoulute truth about everything and she should be able to tell her story a thousand times if she needs to get through all she's been through. Being a survivor of sexual,verbal,mental,physical abuse is a life long struggle and now that she's been able to come clean about it she feels free and the more she tells the healthier a person she will be. She's never looked better and I for won stand behind her!!!!

By lovingtiffanym

She was silent for nearly twenty years. If sh wants to talk let her talk. It's either her or JON & KATE. Which would you prefer?

By John Delery

Technically, she's an incest survivor, but mostly she's an incest enabler. She was 18 when the horror began, old enough to object, old enough to at least threaten to call the police the first time, old enough and credible enough after 10 years to file a charge. Consensual incest: the ultimate oxymoron. She chose to reveal to America's Confessor, Oprah, the most shocking aspect of her life, not to help or to heal but to get free pub and a plug for her book. It's no more cathartic to disclose this iniquity publicly on TV than it is to expose it privately to a psychiatrist--the only difference: free attention! Really, can't anyone shut up in this incredibly shameless country shut up anymore?

By Raejean

She was an ADULT when the incest occurred, drugged out of her mind or not, and she consented to it or helped to enable it for ten years.

Now that her father is dead and voiceless and she is attempting to sell this book to pay the bills because she destroyed her career, she conveniently steps forward and drops this cheesy personal bombshell on what little remained of his musical legacy.

I have no respect for this thing. She is a sick-minded, diseased loser and probably seduced the old man and blackmailed HIM.

At minimum, a self-respecting individual would have kept this a private issue. She is playing the public service card because the disclosure is to her potential monetary advantage. If she really cared in such a humanitarian context, she would do volunteer or hotline work anonymously.

By lor

What most of you out there is that she has probably suffered from what is known as Stockholm Syndrome. That's when a person who is a victim develops a loyalty to their abusers. If any of you out there remember the case of Patty Hearst, that's what happened to her when she was kidnapped. People, stop victimizing the victim.

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