2 Dollar Productions

A few days ago, my brother and I were having pints at the Draught Horse Pub and discussing such weighty topics as the proliferation of weapons in North Korea, a revolutionary mass transit system for the public, the relative merits of pomade and eventually Brad Pitt.

By this juncture everyone in America has watched Pitt's marriage to Jennifer Anniston crumble, and his subsequent romantic entanglement with Angela Jolie to blossom.

The fact that Pitt would leave his wife for Angela Jolie was not surprising because all red-blooded American men and virtually all women would also drop their significant other like a greased pig for the opportunity at a single five minute tryst with Jolie in run-down Spanish bodega.

So while I wasn't surprised by Pitt's actions, I did find the public's relative lack of outrage a little strange.

My brother had no such reservations, however, and he calmly leaned back on his barstool and said "Of course he got away with it - he traded up."

I knew right away that my brother was right.

The truth was simple: When public figures cheat on their spouses with someone who is better-looking they can weather the storm, but when they get caught cheating with a dog-faced substitute they are mercilessly berated.

Hugh Grant learned this lesson several years ago when he cheated on Liz Hurley with a hooker who looked like she'd been beaten with an ugly stick and who was far from Divine.

Grant caught a load of grief not because he cheated and not simply because he got caught with a prostitute. Instead he found himself embroiled in such public shame because he cheated on an exquisite-looking woman with a third-rate hooker who was far from a looker and should have been paying Grant instead of the other way around.

More recently Jude Law experienced this phenomenon when he cheated on the lithe vixen Sienna Miller with his nanny; a woman who doubly shamed Law by keeping a detailed diary describing his prediliction for premature ejaculation.

Like Grant, Law found himself on the wrong end of public opinion after the story broke. And I had to agree because only a dangerous lunatic or a serial pervert would trade in Miller for a poke at an extremely average-looking nanny.

After recapping these shameful episodes, my brother and I both agreed that Pitt realized the error that some of his fellow thespians had made when he considered whether to cheat with Jolie.

He realized the impressive pedigree that goes with cheating up (see Michael Douglas, Harrison Ford, Jennifer Garner) and also that the public will accept a bit of philandering as long as it's not with someone less attractive.

Big-time celebrities would do well to remember this rule because when executed properly it can not only give your career a boost, but it can also get you laid by Angela Jolie.

And it doesn't have to be in some filthy Spanish bodega unless that's the way you like it.

-BDS