January Jones’ accident and her history with alcohol
Another one of those crazy stories that could only come from Hollywood! Mad Men actress January Jones was driving home around 9 PM last night after watching the Los Angeles Lakers game at The London West Hollywood Hotel when she lost control of her Range Rover and smashed into three parked cars. The owner of one of the smashed vehicles tells TMZ, “she heard the crash, looked over her balcony and saw Jones. She says around 10 minutes after the crash, Food Network star Bobby Flay showed up in a separate car, began talking with her and telling her to leave the scene, which she did.”
Wait. What? Bobby Flay?
As it turns out, Flay was reportedly at the same Lakers viewing party at The London West and had exchanged numbers with January Jones because she was looking for someone to redo her kitchen. (Los Angeles is a small town if you’re a celebrity.) TMZ spoke with Flay about the incident:
Flay says he saw her drink a beer but wasn’t really watching her alcohol intake. Flay says he had only met Jones once before, and last night she asked for his number because she wanted to redo her kitchen and give his number to her designer. Flay obliged, and says he doesn’t know why Jones chose to call him after the crash, but nonetheless he drove over to help her. He says he did not argue but just wanted to make sure she was ok.
Jones gave her ID to one of the residents nearby, left the scene and went to her home where she called the police. She returned after 45 minutes in a change of clothes and chewing gum, which is important because a witness tells TMZ that she could smell alcohol on Jones’ breath before she left the scene. Police did not administer a field sobriety test because there would be no way to prove that she did not take a drink during her 45-minute absence. Jones is claiming that she crashed because she was being followed by paparazzi, but none of the witnesses on the scene reported seeing photographers and there have not been any photos from immediately after the accident to surface or offered to TMZ.
January Jones has been very open in the past about her affinity for alcohol – especially beer. She gave a long interview with GQ senior editor Mark Kirby that appeared in their November issue during which she consumed at least 8 beers. The two start off at a Chilli’s restaurant located at O’Hare airport in Chicago and continues as the two board a plane for a flight to Los Angeles:
By the time she’s telling me this, we’ve finished our beers and queso and are sitting in our seats for Los Angeles … Because by now, January has already finished her first in-flight drink and is giving me a hard time for being slow on mine. It’s clear that she’s taking the notion of having fun on her “vacation” very seriously; it’s up to me to keep pace. Shouldn’t be a problem, I think. She’s so small—give her another beer or two and she’ll be asleep.
Here’s January Jones at the 66th Golden Globe Awards writing her name on the bottles she brought to the party: (Photo by Michael Buckner/Getty Images)
During the flight January gets more and more inebriated and starts telling more and more drinking stories:
“Lifehouse makes me cry—is that a weakness? So does Maxwell! I need another beer.”
She pushes the little yellow flight-attendant button.
“Love pressing that,” she says. “Makes me feel powerful.”
…
The flight attendant—older, highlights, annoyed—arrives.“Can I get another Bud Light?”
“I think there’s only one left,” says the attendant.
“You know what? She’s trying to cut us off,” January says when she’s gone.
“Apparently we’re badly behaved.”
“No, we’re not! I remember being on a British Airways flight with a friend where we got cut off big-time. You know in first class, where they have tables in between the seats? Well, we were chewing tobacco and playing quarters. And they were like, You are cut off! Go to bed!”
“You definitely didn’t need college if you can play quarters.”
“Yeah, I don’t feel like I missed anything. I’m a beer-pong champion! Among my friends, anyway.”
January does seem to prefer beer. Here are a couple photos of her in some rather elegant mixed company drinking brews:
(Above Photo: Kevin Winter/Getty Images for AFI. R-L: Tommy Lee Jones, Josh Groban, January Jones and her mother at the screening of ‘Three Burials Of Melquiades Estrada’ during AFI Fest presented by Audi at the Egyptian Theatre on November 7, 2005)
(Above Photo: Michael Buckner/Getty Images for GQ. L-R: Actor Chris O’Donnell, actresses Jennifer Carpenter, and January Jones attend the GQ ‘Men Of The Year’ party held at Chateau Marmont on November 18, 2009 in Hollywood, California.)
There’s not much Kirby can do as his interview basically turns into a series of January Jones drinking stories and comments about how different she is than her character Betty Draper from Mad Men. (Oh, and a bunch of unbelievably sexy photos of January in lingerie!)
We are drunk. Or at least I am. January swears that she’s not really drunk at all, that she’s been known to have a twelve-pack from time to time (liquor doesn’t agree with her), and that once, in high school, she downed twenty-six beers in a single night. (“I threw up a lot. But it was a contest…. I hope this story isn’t only about drinking.”)
Sorry January, but the story was basically just about drinking. (And sexy photos)
We have a breakfast date set for the next morning, at a little place in Los Feliz, to make sure we can cover the sorts of topics (“So, are you single?”) that might be awkward to talk about over beers on a four-hour flight. January walks in—jeans, sunglasses, loose-fitting top—and promptly announces that she had two more beers after returning home from the airport, pushing her grand total up toward eight.
“You remember last night?” I ask. “You said that in high school you once drank twenty-six!”
“I did drink twenty-six,” she replies coolly.
I guess it’s possible this drinking braggadocio went to a party to watch a sporting event and drank one beer, then got chased by a hooligan band of Brigadoon paparazzi not interested in photos of a celebrity automobile accident, then was advised by Bobby Flay ten minutes after the accident to go home, then called 911 (does her cell phone only have Bobby Flay’s number?), then grabbed a stick of chewing gum and then returned to the accident. It’s possible. Right?
(Top Photo: GQ)
