When I saw the “Drew Barrymore wishes her mom was dead” headlines, I didn’t bother clicking because this is clear and obvious rage and click bait. Drew recently covered New York Magazine (which is not the outlet pushing these headlines) and in the interview she talked about the complex relationship with her mother. But where is our reading comprehension? As if any celebrity, especially Drew!, would utter those words in an interview.
That’s not to say people sometimes don’t feel that way about the people who gave birth to them but this isn’t about what she said, it's about what she said being twisted into a headline. Her frustration here is justified. Anger is justified. It’s hurtful for Drew and it’s also bad for pop culture because celebrity profiles are on life support. Let’s consider this: why would any famous person go into an interview when this could be the potential outcome? They could go and do “celebrity x interviews celebrity y” pieces which are not illuminating for the most part or “personal essays” which are highly controlled myth-building narration. The most common complaint I hear about celebrities is they are too controlled, it’s all fake, all relationships are PR etc. – but how can we hang onto the real ones if the audience buys into these kinds of stories? The person writing the headline is doing her dirty but so is anyone who buys into it. We should know better by now!
A friend of mine who works in retail noted that Goop has been having a lot of sales lately and wondered about the robustness of the business model. This kind of upscale clothing – designer and pricey but not as expensive as a Gucci or a Tom Ford – cannot be an easy sell right now. On top of that, Goop has expanded pretty quickly and grown its product range so it feels much less exclusive than it once did. Definite growing pains.
Lady Gaga’s Haus Labs went through a significant rebranding last summer, moving towards mixing skincare and holistic elements with makeup. After a big splash, her social media engagement has been less consistent than other celebrities (like JLo, Hailey Bieber, Selena Gomez, Rihanna, Ariana Grande), likely because she is working on a film. When Gaga goes into that, she goes deep. That said, there’s business to be taken care of as Haus Labs is launching in the UK. Will she make the trip over for a personal appearance?
I’ve tried a lot of skin stuff but never dermaplaning and I always wondered about what it does and Eva Mendes describes it as shaving. Now I have even more questions – like once you start what happens if you stop?
Marky Mark wants to turn his Las Vegas compound into Desert Hollywood and while I can see why that appeals to some in the industry (like cheaper land), there is no replacing Los Angeles. It’s not just about the actors but the hundreds of people it takes to get a show made, from catering to grips to drivers. Actors fly in for a shoot but transporting crews is expensive and time consuming. This isn’t to say Los Angeles is the only place to film – Vancouver, Toronto, Atlanta, New York City are all busy spots. But all of those places have multiple levels of tax incentives, years and years of building up skilled crews and powerhouse production sites (like Tyler Perry Studios). Can Las Vegas get there?
