Intro for January 30, 2025

Dear Gossips,  

Yesterday I mentioned media training and a perceived bias against it, probably because people assume it makes a celebrity “less authentic” when really all it does is make them “more prepared”. (Prepared does not mean inauthentic, ask any type A overachiever.) Well, we have another instance in which a little media training might have helped—Best Actress nominees Karla Sofía Gascón and Fernanda Torres have ended up in a headline battle.

In an interview with Brazil’s Folha de São Paulo, Gascón said, “I don’t like that there’s a social media team that work around these people that are attempting to discredit my work and my film because that doesn’t take us anywhere. To highlight someone else’s work, you don’t need to destroy others. You will never see me talking negatively about Fernanda Torres or her film, but on the contrary, I do see many people working around Fernanda Torres who talk badly about me, and Emilia Pérez.”

Gascón then clarified that she is not talking about Fernanda Torres herself, calling her fellow nominee a “wonderful ally” and saying she is an “enormous fan” of Torres. Rather, she was talking about social media hate being aimed at Gascón herself and Emilia Pérez. As a trans actor, I have no doubt there is a LOT of sh-t being slung Gascón’s way, nor am I surprised social media is being less than kind to Emilia Pérez which is 1) bad and 2) about a trans woman. Social media users are not known for their restraint, and that’s a double whammy of things people will attack with fervor. 

To that end, some people on social media claimed that Gascón violated Academy rules that speaking negatively about eligible films/performers is prohibited, but Gascón didn’t talk sh-t about Fernanda Torres or I’m Still Here. She said there are people AROUND “all these people” who “talk badly about me”. It does sound like she’s implying these are official social media managers spreading vitriol online, but her original remarks were in Spanish and I’m not confident the translations available are 100% accurate (so many people are using AI to translate now, and I just do not trust that. I don’t even trust Google translate). Still, Gascón didn’t say anything directly disparaging about Fernanda Torres, so she’s not in violation of the rules.

But this is another example where a little preparedness goes a long way. I assume Netflix and team Emilia Pérez wants to focus on the positive and not acknowledge the backlash the film is garnering, not least because a not insignificant portion of that backlash is just down to hate and intolerance. But it wouldn’t be the worst thing in the world to have someone onside who is taking the temperature in the room and preparing responses to something like the backlash Emilia Pérez is seeing regarding legitimate criticisms about the film’s depictions of Mexico and the trans experience. There IS legitimate criticism out there, and having a canned response to it might help avoid a war of words like we’re seeing right now.

Meanwhile, four days before Gascón’s interview was first published, Torres took to Instagram to sing the praises of her fellow nominees, including Gascón.

I don’t doubt Fernanda Torres and Karla Sofía Gascón get along just fine when they meet in person on the trophy trail. I don’t for one second assume there’s any personal enmity between them. But it’s a competitive awards season, and Best Actress is far from an assured win for anyone. Every interview, every soundbite counts. Unfortunately for Karla Sofía Gascón, she had a soundbite go sideways on her this week.

Live long and gossip,

Sarah