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Going to Elle in a Handbasket

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THE CHRONICLES OF GNAR-NINA Garcia (Photo: Getty Images)
Based on the latest round of innuendo surrounding fashion glossy Elle, it's kind of a surprise the staff is able to put out a magazine at all. The main disturbance, of course, is the ongoing saga surrounding ousted fashion director and current (at least for now) Project Runway judge Nina Garcia. The latest, per WWD, is that Garcia has been offered a six-month editor-at-large contract that would keep her at Elle through the fifth season of PR, which ends in October. It's unclear whether she's accepted the offer, though a source tells WWD that she's in talks with producers to stay on as judge even if she isn't with the magazine. It's also unclear what would happen if Garcia leaves Elle but the magazine decides to renew its contract with PR, though at this point, Garcia's brand probably carries more weight with the show than does Elle's.

How WWD is actually getting their information is yet another source of tension.

A tipster writes to Gawker to suggest that creative director Joe Zee, a longtime enemy of Garcia's, may be the one feeding intel to WWD reporter Stephanie Smith. Not exactly shocking—media reporters and editors are a chummy bunch—but nonetheless embarrassing for Zee if he is in fact using WWD as a mouthpiece, especially given the fact that neither Garcia nor Elle have issued a comment to the press about the whole ordeal.

Zee is making things awkward around the office for other reasons as well: the tipster also claims that elle.com editor Keith Pollack is actually Zee's "boyfriend/lover" (we can't find proof that they're dating, though Pollack was described as a "close friend" of Zee's before he took the job), and that Zee has given jobs to a bunch of under-qualified former boyfriends. And then there's the fact that the filming of Fashionista, the upcoming Tyra Banks-produced show in which of bunch of aspiring magazine "professionals" compete for a job as Zee's assistant, has so disrupted the day-to-day operations of the magazine that staffers can't actually do their real jobs.

At least there will be video footage of when shit really hits the fan.

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