Kate Moss: Too Little, Too Late

Media Orchard sometimes wonders if any behavior is outrageous enough to create a PR scandal that actually hurts a celebrity’s career.

After all, we live at a time when a homemade porn tape launches the career of Paris Hilton … when Tara Reid lands a reality show on E! based on her curriculum vitae of late-night drunkenness … when publicist Lizzie Grubman gets a reality show on MTV based on her notoriety for calling people white trash and running them over with her car … and when both rap stars and Martha Stewart can enhance their cred through jail stints.

All of this makes it very difficult for celebrities to know, as they hurdle from indiscretion to indiscretion: “Am I just having harmless fun — or am I walking into a PR nightmare?”

Poor Kate Moss. You can’t blame her for being confused.

Here’s the back story.

London’s Daily Mirror last made headlines on this side of the pond in 2004, when it published fake pictures of British soldiers abusing Iraqi prisoners of war. The paper said it was very, very sorry for publishing fake pictures, fired its editor, and vowed to do better in the future.

Media Orchard doesn’t know if this story qualifies as better — but at least the pictures are real. Too real for Kate Moss. The Daily Mirror published a front-page pic, with more inside, of the erstwhile “teen waif” apparently using cocaine.

As the always-understated Mirror put it:

THE Daily Mirror today reveals shocking pictures of supermodel Kate Moss snorting a fat line of cocaine during a debauched drugs and drink session with junkie lover Pete Doherty. As the white powder induces a sudden rush to her brain, she rocks back in her seat and laughs hysterically. The coke is kicking in.

Within seconds she leans forward and again sniffs into a tightly rolled-up five-pound note, hoovering up every last grain of the Class A drug.

It is clear from the extraordinary images, captured during a Mirror undercover investigation, that the 31-year-old catwalk queen is a practised user.

After the story broke, Kate came clean and admitted the drug use in private meetings with her employers. It couldn’t have been much of a shock; Kate’s been in rehab in the past. And so employers of Kate, including Swedish clothing giant H&M, initially came out in her support.

Initially.

Then the angry calls from customers started pouring in, and Kate’s employers wilted in the backlash. H&M, Chanel and Burberry all have dropped their contracts with the woman the London tabloids now brand the “cocaine shame model.”

An H&M spokeswoman told the New York Times : “After the feedback from customers and other papers, we decided we should distance ourselves. If someone is going to be the face of H&M, it is important they be healthy, wholesome and sound.”

At least it’s important now.

Kate’s mistake — besides the obvious one — is that she focused her damage-control efforts on her most immediate constituency, her employers, but not on the general public. She should have spoken to the media the day the story broke and followed with a major television interview two or three days later.

The old saw is that the fans build you up just to tear you down. While this may be true, fans can also be very forgiving when given the chance.

The Daily Mirror reported Sunday that Kate has finally agreed to a TV interview, with U.K. personality Michael Parkinson. This comes after Kate issued an apology through the media late last week. Let’s hope for Kate’s sake that it’s not too little, too late.

Of course, if nothing else, there’ll always be a role ready for her on MTV’s “Surreal Life.”

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