Monthly Archives

June 2018

Johnny Depp Profile Goes Viral – For All The Wrong Reasons

–Johnny Depp‘s shady lawyer arranged for a profile in Rolling Stone, and whatever sympathy they were trying to garner with this article — it totally backfired. (Variety just called it a “PR liability.”) Written by Stephen Rodrick and titled ‘The Trouble With Johnny Depp’, it does not paint a favourable picture of the fading star. You really should read the whole thing because it’s batcrap crazy, but the most eyebrow-raising parts are when he argues that his financial troubles were actually *under* reported (“It’s insulting to say that I spent $30,000 on wine. Because it was far more…By the way, it was not $3 million to shoot Hunter [S. Thompson] into the f***ing sky. It was $5 million”), Rodrick’s view of how the actor considers his legal woes (“Depp seems oblivious to any personal complicity in his current predicament. [Lawyer] Waldman seems to have convinced Depp that they are freedom fighters taking on the Hollywood machine rather than scavengers squabbling over the scraps of a fortune squandered”) and the article’s closing salvo (“‘Thanks for coming,’ says Depp. ‘This could be your Pulitzer.’ For the next 15 minutes, Depp tries to figure out how to open the gates to his mansion fortress. He clicks buttons and pushes the fence, but nothing budges. He is a lost boy who won’t find his way home before dark. I finally tell him I can shimmy over the fence. I clamber over and jump down. Through the bars we say good night.”)

–Michael Schur says his favorite joke from this season of The Good Place is a Pirates Of The Caribbean diss. It is pretty perfect.

–Pete Davidson officially confirmed his engagement to Ariana Grande on Jimmy Fallon’s show last night:  “Some people come up to me and say, Yo man, you give me hope. I didn’t know I was that ugly…I’m a lucky motherf***er.”

-I love that a bunch of TV writers rooms across all types of different networks have banded together to support an initiative to help families separated at the US border.

–Demi Lovato dropped a surprise new single called Sober, in which she reveals that after six years of sobriety, she apparently relapsed.

-While Brad Pitt‘s camp is planting stories about how he’s being cheated out of custody rights, Angelina Jolie  is visiting Mosul a year after its liberation from ISIS, and talking about the world’s lack of action.

-This GQ first person essay by Brooklyn Nine-Nine star Stephanie Beatriz is really worth your time.  She talks about how she’s getting married to a man, but how that shouldn’t make her seem any less bi.

-Bless Zoey Deutch for not holding back her criticism when asked  on Watch What Happens Live what it was like to kiss James Franco.

-It’s good to see that Rian Johnson has a sense of humor about this kind of fandom bs.

–Justin Theroux posed for the cover of Men’s Health and kept his shirt on so what was even the point?

-Speaking of covers, Janet Jackson looks amazing on the new issue of Essence. In the interview, she talks about going through an “intense” bout of depression in her 30s.

–Seth Rogen is justifiably excited about the possibility of sharing a song credit with Beyonce on the upcoming Lion King soundtrack.

-MTV is rebooting Daria, Made, Aeon Flux and The Real World — and hopes to sell them to other networks/streaming services — as it launches MTV Studios. The studio push is an effort across all Viacom brands, which is why Nickelodeon just sold an animated kids show to Netflix.

-Wait, Ozark is actually getting a season 2?  That surprises me.

-This is an excellent look at Queer Eye’s latest iteration.

–Jim Carrey sings a sad song for Michel Gondry in the Kidding teaser.

-Netflix is really out here bringing back the romcom, huh? They just released the trailer for To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before. It looks super cute and I devoured the book it was based on so I’m here for it.

Ariana Grande and Pete Davidson Get Matching Tattoos

–Ariana Grande and Pete Davidson moved into a $16 million NYC apartment.  They also got more matching tats. What is this life?

-In her Rolling Stone cover story, Cardi B says she plans to take her baby on the road on her upcoming tour with Bruno Mars: “I don’t want to miss one second. I don’t want to miss no smiles, I don’t want to miss no new movement, I don’t want the baby to confuse me and the babysitter.” She also sounds off on Trump: “He has proven himself to be a madman so many times, and proven himself to be disrespectful to women, and that still hasn’t gotten him impeached.”

-On Watch What Happens Live, Andy Cohen asked Cher for a list of her best lovers over the years and she put Tom Cruise “in the top 5.” Well.

-Jeebus. Whatever you think Chris Hardwick did or did not do to Chloe Dykstra, his subsequent behaviour following her essay has been repugnant. First there was his gaslighting, victimized denial.  And now “somebody” has leaked private texts between the two to TMZ, which show that he broke up with her and she tried to reconcile.  What in the world did he expect this to prove? She was already clear in her essay that she kissed another man when they were together, which caused their split. And anyone who thinks that women who’ve been manipulated and abused don’t have complicated relationships with their manipulator and/or don’t often get sucked back in, needs to talk to more women IRL.

-Meanwhile, it’s very telling that so few people who know or worked for Hardwick have jumped to his defense. I’ve seen lots of verifieds back up Dykstra, but not one tweet from a blue checkmark that says anything along the lines of “wow, this really doesn’t line up with what I know of him.” And last night The Wrap posted an article which quoted a bunch of his colleagues and former employees, and the general consensus seems to be “nobody’s surprised.”

–George and Amal Clooney have donated $100K to help reunite migrant children who’ve been separated from their parents.

–Judd Apatow is calling for a total boycott of Fox and urging entertainers who work for Fox movies and TV to speak out — and many have, including New Girl showrunner Liz Meriwether, Marti Noxon, You’re The Worst showrunner Stephen Falk, and actor Adam Scott. But some of the celebs who are staying silent are surprising.

-I am very glad that this New York Times interview with Josh Brolin on his blockbuster moment doesn’t shy away from his history of domestic violence with Diane Lane. The fact that the “summer of Brolin” coincides with #MeToo is deeply odd. Not surprisingly, he skirts the issue. “God, I’ve never been so careful with my words. Ever. Maybe in all 50 years. And there’s no reason for me to be other than there’s no explaining it. Do you know what I mean? The only person who can explain that would be Diane, and she’s chosen not to, so I’m O.K. with that.”

-Oh, he also just signed on to do a show on Hulu. Ok.

-I can’t believe this is what Justin Bieber is looking like these days. How? When? How?

-Amy Adams talked about being mistaken for her stand-in on her new HBO show, and being shocked by how differently she was treated when they thought she was someone else.  “At one point somebody grabbed me really hard and pulled me. I went, ‘What’s going on?’ And they’re like ‘(Gasp) You’re not Reb!'”

-Grey’s Anatomy star Jesse Williams has been ordered to pay $100k/month in child and spousal support.

–Busy Phillips has a book coming out! Yes, please.

-Plans for future A Star Wars Story films — including the Obi-Wan movie — have been put on hold. This seems like a good idea. Not that I doubt we won’t be getting a ton more standalone SW films soon, but after Solo a pause and regroup makes sense.

-The saga of John Travolta‘s latest box office flop Gotti keeps getting stranger. Its weird anti-critic campaign may include tampering with Rotten Tomatoes’ audience rating.

-This Felicity cast interview is delightfully bonkers. (I now want a Scott Speedman/Scott Foley sitcom based on these interactions.)

–James Van Der Beek‘s wife had a home birth for their fifth (fifth!) kid and he documented it on IG.

–Linda Hamilton and Mackenzie Davis look appropriately buff while filming Terminator 6.

-Hmmm…the latest episode of The Handmaid’s Tale comes with a warning “This episode has content that may be extra sensitive for some viewers” — but the show has become so brutal that TV critics couldn’t figure out which scene they were referring to. (Well, female critics, anyway.)

-In the trailer for the Robert Zemeckis–directed Welcome to Marwen, Steve Carell plays a man whose life is shattered after being beaten within an inch of his life by a group of Nazis. He copes with his trauma by making art out of an elaborate WWII doll village called Marwen.

–Michael B Jordan is a dad (and a daddy!) in the new Creed 2 trailer.

Cardi B Bares Her Belly Bump on Rolling Stone

Rolling Cardi B Cover

-The cover of Rolling Stone’s July issue leaked and it features Cardi B, her fiancé Offset, and her very expectant belly.

-Whoa. Michael B Jordan is looking buff in the Creed 2 poster. I want this tattooed onto my inner eyelids so I see it every time I close my eyes…

–Meghan Markle’s hat game is lit, y’all.

–Chris Pratt had a romantic picnic with Katherine Schwarzenegger (daughter of Maria Shriver and Arnold Schwarzenegger) and TMZ was there to document the whole thing.

-I’m not exactly in the age range to fangirl over Zayn, but GQ’s cover story on how the 25-year-old British singer “is deeply, maddeningly, almost trolling-ly enigmatic” is a good read.

-As someone who considers Amanda Woodward a personal hero, I really hope Heather Locklear is ok.

–David and Victoria Beckham are still officially together, in case you were wondering.

-The top reason Bachelorette hopefuls are eliminated from consideration are STDs, which are immediate disqualification. Huh. Honestly did not see that coming.

-Say what you will about Seth MacFarlane, but dude is putting his money where his mouth is. Days after criticizing Fox News coverage on Twitter, the Family Guy creator donated $2 million to NPR and $500,000 to California public radio station KPCC.

-Don’t call it a comeback: just months after sexual misconduct allegations surfaced, Kevin Spacey will appear in a movie that hits theatres in August. So all is forgiven, I guess?

-I didn’t know enough about XXXTentacion to comment on his death, but there has been some very good writing on how hip hop fans are grappling with it today, specifically here, here and here.

-What CAN’T Carrie Coon do? Here’s a clip of her singing with Mackenzie Davis in her new film, Izzy Gets The F**k Across Town.

–James Corden staged an Andrew Lloyd Webber-themed “Crosswalk the Musical” in London.

-Alright, so whatever Apple’s streaming service ends up being I’m clearly going to have to subscribe. Their latest big get is The Big Sick’s Kumail Nanjiani and Emily V. Gordon, who just landed an anthology series on immigrant stories.

-I don’t know how I missed this, but Netflix saved Lucifer from cancellation a few days ago. This TV season is *wild*.

-I’m so glad that Amy Adams‘ HBO series is getting raves.

–Tiffany Haddish gets out of prison and upends her sister’s life in Tyler Perry‘s new movie, Nobody’s Fool.