The humble Nokia — lauded by millions for its indestructible construction and never-ending battery life — may be the downfall of Australian actor Russell Crowe.
His old 5110 was found in the glovebox compartment of the Mercedes he sold at his Single & Fabulous Divorce Auction last weekend.
What a nightmare.
The lucky buyers are the gang on Triple M's The Grill Team. They're nice guys but they're also the kind of jerks who'd read Russell's text messages out on air — and I say that with respect and gratitude.
The team snapped up the 2001 Mercedes-Benz S500 Saloon for $34,160 and, as they sat in the cabin soaking up that gorgeous used car smell, they opened up the glovebox to pull out the log book and check if Russell had been keeping up to date with his dealership services.
That's when they found the Nokia. After all these years, it still had more battery life than my iPhone does 30 minutes after waking up. With it's cutting edge green-lit backscreen and stylishly chunky rubber buttons, it's a true piece of history.
So, what's the first thing you do when you find someone's unattended phone? You go through their text messages and look for embarrassing information about literally anything.
This morning, Russell called into the show — I assume on a landline — and tried to laugh it off, telling the guys the phone "is so old it probably can't text".
But it most certainly can. And co-host Emma Freedman found the ancient messages.
Emma Freedman finds the receipts. Photo / Facebook
Of course, content like this to too good not to story-arc over days and weeks so the texts have just been teased in a video on the show's Facebook page.
"I've read a few of (the text messages) — I'm a bit confused," Freedman said, before reading one out.
"'I'm going to s ..." she recited, with the rest of her sentence bleeped out.
Stay tuned.
At first I was surprised Russell Crowe had a Nokia. But as I pondered it more while eating spoonfuls of peanut butter at my desk, it all made sense. The Motorola Razr would've been far too femme. And a BlackBerry would've been far too corporate for Russell, who ignores the millions of dollars in his bank account and pretends to be working class in his black Kmart tracksuits. He never would've lived it down if the boys down at the Rabbitohs game saw him whip out a BlackBerry.
So a Nokia is definitely on brand for Russell Crowe. It's so on brand I wouldn't be surprised if he still uses one.
It's just a total shame Nokias didn't come equipped with cameras back then. We could've been treated to a whole bunch of racy bathroom selfies showing Russell posing with one leg swung over the bathtub ledge while wearing his leather Gladiator skirt.
