I don’t mind people disagreeing with me. I just think that Meghan has ambitions outside the royal sphere, so I don’t think Kate is what she’s measuring herself against. She’s not using the royal yardstick anymore. She was still using it during Wimbledon, but she knows that thanks to her family she can’t meet the royal standards, so now she’s pivoting hard towards celebrity. Her competition is Chrissy Tiger, Posh, Amal, Angeline, and Gwyneth now.
Yeah, but Megs can’t sustain a competition with those celebrities long term.
Re: Brad getting sued. I genuinely think that Brad actually really cared about the cause in New Orleans, but again, as someone who was a nonprofit professional for years before going corporate is that nonprofit work is WORK. It’s so hard to get right. People don’t expect that they can step in as an investment banker or doctor for a day, but somehow ladling soup for 4 hours automatically makes you a poverty expert. (Which is why I side eye 98% of celeb charity work!) People get get Masters and PhD degrees to go into jobs that will likely never pay them more like 70k. The celebrities that do the best are ppl who just donate and advocate with their own passionate stories to bring public awareness, not make it about THEM or their “ideas” but gracefully let the experts do their thing. I am sure Brad thought his idea to combine his passion for fancy sustainable green architecture built by star architects in Nola was great, but in his excitement and hubris forgot that the point of the aid he was giving the community is not about him or his architecture boner. His project should have never involved piloting concepts for sustainable housing when the goal was to provide those who had lost property with functional, cost efficient, solidly constructed houses quickly. Now we have this mess with all that money wasted. Contrast that with Mariska Haritgay’s incredible work for sexual assault victims through Joyful Heart Foundation. As the public face of it, she tells a compelling story of how deeply she connects to the issue and routinely advocates for it. But look at who she leaves the nonprofit’s operations to – serious hardcore educated professionals who have deep experience in sexual assault trauma: http://www.joyfulheartfoundation.org/about-us/staff
Another great example of this is Christy Turlington, who almost died in childbirth then went and got a master’s degree at Columbia to devote her efforts to reducing maternal mortality internationally.
Anyway, to bring this back to this whole mess… what I’m saying is that even with the best intentions and true passion like Brad, usually celebs who don’t know their role as a public figurehead and try to get into programming without knowledge run into trouble. It’s incredibly difficult to do charity right. While it remains to be seen how impactful Kate is, what I do appreciate about her is how involved she is in the things that have always defined her life – art, children. She doesn’t overstate her importance and while that might be seen as lazy or not splashy, I appreciate that she defers to others and her personal involvement and level of activity seems to come from a genuine place. MM’s challenge is to come up with a cause she’s truly devoted to and can speak well to, but with so many facades who knows who she really is?
Thank you so much for sending this in!
Yes, exactly. I really think that the fact that Kate brings in experts and defers to them is fantastic. So many people come in with the best of intentions and end up with something completely unworkable and sometimes even downright harmful.
I think it’s technically his non-profit, Make It Right, that is getting sued. I’m not sure how much liability Brad actually has with that since it’s a separate organization. The public relations, however, regarding it definitely aren’t great.
I only remember the Madonna-flag picture from an MTV “Rock the Vote” campaign.
I think if she did anything with the Union Jack, she’d look like a Spice Girl.
Megs just doesn’t excel at looking royal. I think she’s always going to look trashy because she just doesn’t have good taste. And all she really wants is $$$.
Can I just say. While everyone freaks out over #Prick’s photo at RL show, I’m over here smiling because it seems like Anne and Jessica are trolling the Duke and duchess of Buttsex.
She called him a liar and a thief too, and claimed her coach wasn’t coaching from the sideline, which was untrue because he admitted to coaching right afterwards.
The WTA is claiming sexism, but the stats don’t back them up. Men are punished at more than twice as often as women. Interestingly, men get more “time delay” violation and women get more “on court coaching” violations.
Yep, the reason the rules exist and are enforced is so you don’t have a brattish player ruining the game for everyone, which is exactly what happened here. I’m seriously side-eyeing Serena’s “women’s rights” comments because the person who had her big victory ruined and her record possibly tarnished was another POC woman, Naomi Osaka.
I find it (sadly) ironic that this whole debacle went down at Arthur Ashe Stadium. Arthur was the epitome of class on the court. You never saw Arthur engaging in McEnroe-like antics on the court such as breaking a racquet during a match because he was mad.
Not only that. Serena is now the female John McEnroe because women should have the right to be epic brats, just like men. I think this is worse than just a loss.
Yep, the reason the rules exist and are enforced is so you don’t have a brattish player ruining the game for everyone, which is exactly what happened here. I’m seriously side-eyeing Serena’s “women’s rights” comments because the person who had her big victory ruined and her record possibly tarnished was another POC woman, Naomi Osaka.
“The double agent for the patriarchy is basically just a woman who perhaps unknowingly is still putting the patriarchal narrative out into the world. Is still benefitting off, profiting off and selling a patriarchal narrative to other women. But it’s a wolf in sheep’s clothing. You know, just because you look like a woman, we trust you and we think you’re on our side, but you are selling us something that really doesn’t make us feel good. You’re selling us an ideal, a body shape, a problem with our wrinkles, a problem with ageing, a problem with gravity, a problem with any kind of body fat. You’re selling us self-consciousness. The same poison that made you clearly develop some sort of body dysmorphia or facial dysmorphia, you are now pouring back into the world. You’re like recycling hatred. I find that really dangerous and I think it’s unacceptable and I don’t care if you’re a woman. I think constructive criticism is needed for anyone to ever evolve. For our gender to evolve we need some sort of constructive criticism. As long as we do it in a somewhat careful way. (…) So many of the worst things in the world have happened motivated by greed. And I just don’t think that’s an acceptable excuse anymore. How much money do you need? Really how much money do you need? How much money do any of these huge influencers who are worth millions or billions sometimes… why are they still promoting appetite-suppressant lollipops to young girls? And it’s not a fight against obesity. They have young, already slim girls, in their adverts for Flat Tummy company, this company that are absolutely everywhere, and they’re even being advertised in some of the most mainstream magazines, women’s magazines, and they have a billboard in Times Square. The money is built on the blood and tears of young women who believe in them, who follow them, who look up to them like the big sister they never had. It’s so upsetting and it feels like such a betrayal against women.”
“When the [Wonder Woman] TV show came out, I was twelve years old, and I just never seen anything like it in my life. I mean, soon as the going got tough, you saw this woman who was seemingly demure and sweet and beautiful and all of that. [Diana] could transform into this superhero and just get the job done. It wasn’t about her trading in her femininity or her intelligence. She wasn’t vindictive towards other women. She was just her. And the lasso, and the bulletproof bracelets
― I mean, that sort of superhuman power associated with being a girl… I’ve never seen anything like it. I’m still a twelve-year-old girl. I try to talk her off the ledge every once in a while, but I’m still a twelve-year-old girl.” ― Viola Davis on her obsession with Wonder Woman
It’s what everyone does in a divorce. The wealthier, non-custodial parent uses money to gain more access to the children and the less wealthy custodial parent uses the children to get more money.
The weird part, imo, is that Angelina is acting like someone who is really short on money. I’d heard rumors about her out-of-control spending, but I was skeptical. I guess the rumors were right.
And I have no doubt this is one of the reasons why Laura Wasser quit being AJ’s lawyer.
I always had a larger view. I’m interested in real life – my family, my friends. I have tried never to define myself by my success, whatever that is. My happiness is way beyond roles and awards.
I had confidence because of James. And I was glad to see a lot of your humor in it. Jason: I was too. It’s tough because you’re going from one filmmaker, Zack Synder, who gave birth to it, to another. The new director has to be able to build a whole new world and set the tone. And James let me do silly stuff. He’d encourage me to be a bit more goofy and then I’d watch [scenes during post-production] and I was like, “Holy s—, he kept that in!” I did a lot of stuff that I didn’t think he was going to keep.
James told me about how when you were growing up in Iowa, that your experiences there helped you relate to what he wanted to do with half-human and half-Atlantian Aquaman.
Jason:
One hundred percent. I grew up in the Bridges of Madison County area, like one county over. I graduated with maybe 100 kids, all very much the same. I stood out. I didn’t kind of do the same stuff. I was a bit of a skateboarder, and I started rock climbing. I love Iowa, but I just didn’t fit in. If you’re a Hawaiian kid in Iowa, you’re kind of a fish out of water. Then I went back to Hawaii and I got ostracized there too. I loved both, but just made my own path. So I think it’s easy to relate with Arthur Curry, not really being accepted here and not really being accepted there. I definitely got bullied, but it was—
What other superhero parts have you tried out for over the years?
Jason:
I met the Russo brothers [who directed Marvel’s Captain America: Civil War and Infinity War], who are amazing. It was one of the best meetings I’ve ever had. I was going to do something with them, which unfortunately didn’t work out.
Can you say what character it was?
Jason:
I don’t know. It was going to be a villain, I think. People always want to hire me to play a villain, you know? I did an audition for Guardians of the Galaxy, which was super cool. I got to audition with [Chris Pratt], who’s just a legend and a gentleman. That didn’t work out. And then really the other one after that was my audition for Batman with Zack. And I almost didn’t go because I was like, “This is bulls–t. I’m not a white guy. I ain’t playing Batman. Even if I do, I don’t even want to. It’s like an American playing James Bond, you know? I almost didn’t do it. I thought for sure I was going to be playing [DC Comics villain] Lobo or something. The only people I knew they were casting for were Batman, Superman, and Wonder Woman — who the hell am I going to play? So in the meeting, I just played it as if Batman had died in an alley and some thug picked up his suit and put it on. I just played him as a smart ass, jaded and sarcastic. And that’s when Zack was like, “I have an idea…”
What was it like working with your costars?
Jason:
[Amber Heard, who plays Mera] and I are mostly alike. We’re kind of the deviants. She likes to have her wine, I like to have my beer, and we’re both kickbacks. Patrick is definitely the thespian but he’s also a joker. And Yahya is just the mission man. We would always work out together. I didn’t pull too many pranks like I normally do.
What’s the secret to acting like you’re underwater when you’re not actually filming underwater? Jason: Pretend like you’re underwater. That’s the secret. Pretend like you’re underwater. Act, motherf—er, act.
I don’t want to blame anything on the Kardashians, but the pressure to emulate that lifestyle is infectious, and some of my clients don’t realize that other celebrities are getting a lot of stuff for free. There are celebrities who get paid to be courtside at basketball games, $25,000 or $50,000 just to sit there for two hours. And not only that, they’ll get an entire box of designer clothes shipped to their house so they can pick out what to wear, for free. It’s impossible to keep up with that, but it’s natural to want to. My clients experience the same social pressures that we all feel, in normal life, except for them it’s amplified and more public.
The songs that made her famous—“The Greatest Love of All,” “I Wanna Dance With Somebody (Who Loves Me),” “One Moment in Time”—tell you almost nothing about Whitney Houston, who, as Kevin Macdonald’s new documentary vividly catalogues, had more than her share of secrets. “Whitney” is not the first posthumous documentary about the singer, but it goes startlingly deep, both in the damage it dredges up and in the context it gives to her achievements.
2_SUGARS. They’re not having fun. They are probably pumping each other up in private while expressing anxiety in pms. They are a fandom – we all know how those work. They wanted to see Harry Meghan do the Cambridge stuff, make appearances, interact, be playful together, laugh together. The Cambridges didn’t cling but were clearly a unit.
3_The Sugars are not having fun because the pda with Harry and Meghan is “off” and they know it. There is no eye contact, no he says something and she laughs, she says something back and he laughs, people around them enjoying it. It’s weird. Sugars are looking for their romantic “fix” and it’s not there. Every time they have an appearance Sugars hope they’ll get more but it’s always the same.
4_so I know they are disappointed. The politics of fandom mean they can’t admit it to the whole fandom, but you know little clusters of them worry among themselves. Added to which her fashion fails, and the rest of the RF giving them the Big Chill, this is not playing as they expected.
5_Sugars may play the race card, but that would only work if Meghan truly looked great, but her looks were being picked apart anyway. Or if she were clearly doing a stellar job but getting unfairly dinged for not being robotically perfect. However, Meghan is a hot mess and they can see it for themselves, both fashion and job performance. So they are left with spinning themselves.
I can’t speak as to the politics of fandom, but I do think Meghan set some expectations that she cannot hope to meet now. That’s part of the problem.
Another part of the problem is that Meghan is “getting” stuff based on absolutely nothing. The fun part of watching the seating arrangements, events, loaned jewels, family orders, etc… is that they were supposedly based on work done, personal relationships, discretion, lack of scandals and stuff like that. Meghan is “getting” stuff based on absolutely nothing–heck, she’s likely getting them because she’s a complete fuck-up and needs the extra help–and that makes the “gets” absolutely meaningless. It’s hard to fan-girl that.
Can we talk about Leslie Jones in the front row at Christian Siriano’s show for New York Fashion Week?
For anyone who may have forgotten, Leslie Jones met Siriano when he volunteered over twitter to dress her for the Ghostbusters 2016 premiere when she was struggling to find a dress as no designer had offered to work with her. This was also amid Leslie’s twitter harassment issues.
Siriano’s show included women of all sizes & skin tones as well as Avie Acosta, who is trans woman and the first trans person in any of Siriano’s NY fashion week shows. As well as being inclusive of gender identity, Siriano included two gender non conforming androgynous male models in the show.
Leslie has said of Siriano that “he’s so normal, he’s so down to earth, and he does love all women. That’s what I love about him. He loves all women.”
So in the words of Siriano himself, “people are people,” & “we all grow in the same garden.”
I would bet real money that Doria will do (or has already done) that interview.
Can we remember that Megs wouldn’t allow KP to take Thomas “under their wing” before the wedding? That when Megs had KP release a statement it mentioned that Megs “cared for” her father not “cares for.” Past tense vs. present tense.
We should start considering whether these two press idiots–aka Harry & Megs–are already dumb enough to run to Oprah to whine publicly about her family in addition to any interview Doria has already done with Oprah.
I can see these two famewhores doing this after Ascot. It wouldn’t surprise me if they did. They wouldn’t want to wait a year or two for an interview with someone so well known. They’d want to do it as soon as possible so that they can maintain their hype and press interest. The thing is, once they do something like this, then it’s game on for the rest of the UK press to do what they do best.
House of Brat 