Several days ago, Alan Dershowitz decided to stand up for Prince Andrew. Dershowitz claimed that Andrew made a mistake by settling out of court with Virginia Giuffre in 2022, and that Andrew basically only decided to settle because his mother made him. Keep in mind, Andrew and his lawyers believed that they could get Virginia’s civil suit thrown out of court, and when the judge said it could go ahead to trial – and Andrew was looking at taking the stand and having to face cross-examination in an American court – suddenly, Andrew couldn’t settle fast enough. That was supposed to be the end of Andrew – he was supposed to be shuffled off and never heard from again. Instead, he’s been trotted out over and over in the past two years at public events. It’s clear that all of the current royal sturm and drang is nothing but performative BS for the cheap seats. Now a source tells the Times the same thing: King Charles isn’t going to do jacksh-t to Andrew.
The King will not force Prince Andrew to move out of his home on the Windsor estate, an associate of the duke has said, because “blood is thicker than water”.
Reports last week suggested that the King was preparing to put pressure on his brother to move out of his home at Royal Lodge by making him fund his own security needs. However, the associate, who is in regular contact with the duke, said that although some palace officials favoured such an aggressive approach, the King would never authorise it. The source said the duke was uncomfortable with the renewed coverage of his friendship with the paedophile financier Jeffrey Epstein, but that the latest disclosures would have no bearing on the duke continuing to live at Royal Lodge.
“The duke has rights like any leaseholder in relation to that property so it’s not like anybody can say, ‘I’ve decided you’re going to move out’, ” the source said. “It’s a very unattractive proposition to withdraw security to kick out your brother and I’m sure the King would never allow that, even if it was suggested to him.”
“The King is somebody with a high level of integrity. There are people in the royal household who would take a more aggressive stance, but in that family, blood is thicker than water.”
The source said that the duke did not expect to return to public life “unless there is a significant turnaround in the public perception of him…If [people believed] he was wrongly accused, I’m not sure that would be enough because of the association with Epstein,” the source said. “The stigma of Epstein would have to wear off.”
Okay, this is actually Andrew lavishing praise on his brother and publicly reminding Charles that “blood is thicker” and “a man of integrity would never evict his brother!” Please, Charles has no integrity, and he evicted his own “blood” relation, his son. All that being said, the end result will be the same – Charles does nothing but make a lot of noise about “punishing” Andrew and then nothing ever comes of it.
Most years, the Golden Globe nominations are a free-for-all which ultimately have little bearing on the Oscar races. Most years, the guild awards are much better indicators – the Producers Guild nominations usually match the Best Picture Oscar noms, SAG is a good predictor of the Oscar acting noms, DGA noms are a predictor for Directing Oscar noms and on and on. But this year’s SAG Award nominations are flat-out crazy and the Globes actually had better noms. I was overcome with schadenfreude at the fact that Leo DiCaprio got “snubbed” for a nom for Killers of the Flower Moon, I missed the fact that soooooo many amazing performances were also snubbed. Here’s a list which is by no means comprehensive:
*No Sandra Huller for Anatomy of a Fall. Arguably, Huller gave one of THE acting performances of the year, and before this SAG snub, I would have considered her a low-key threat to Lily Gladstone’s Best Actress chances. You can argue that Anatomy is a “foreign film” and less likely to be seen by a mostly-American guild, but half of the film is in English! I also believe the child actor Milo Machado Graner should have been in the awards mix but apparently no one from Neon thought that.
*No Mark Ruffalo for Poor Things, but Willem Dafoe and Emma Stone did get nominated. I haven’t seen Poor Things yet but I believe the critics who said that Ruffalo’s role is the showier part and that he kills it.
*No Greta Lee or Teo Yoo from Past Lives. I kind of felt like Greta Lee was more of a critics darling and Teo Yoo was definitely not going to get nominated, but still – Greta’s performance was great and blanking Past Lives feels anti-Asian!
*No Charles Melton or anyone from May December. Real talk, I’m sort of fine with Natalie Portman and Julianne Moore being ignored for nominations – while I thought they were both great in May December, they’ve been there and done that and it’s fine. Charles Melton really deserved a lot of love for his role though, he was great and he was already picking up big critics’ awards for the movie. I also sort of think May December should have been considered for ensemble, because it really was a great ensemble performance??
*No Fantasia Barrino or Taraji P. Henson from The Color Purple. I haven’t seen it so I can’t speak on the quality of their performances, but it’s more than possible that The Color Purple simply came out too late for most people to appreciate the performances (Danielle Brooks was nominated, as was the ensemble).
*No Zac Efron for The White Claw. Haven’t seen it, don’t want to, but people say he’s great. Did anyone really expect a nomination though?
* No Leo DiCaprio, which I’m fine with because he was f–king exhausting in KOTFM. That being said, it’s a joke that Leo was snubbed and yet Bradley Cooper got a nomination for Maestro.
*Speaking of KOTFM bulls–t, the film did get a SAG nomination for ensemble, but apparently by some SAG rule/technicality, it’s almost exclusively white actors being recognized for the ensemble and very few of the Native American actors. The Wrap says more than a dozen Native American actors were excluded from the ensemble nomination.
*No Andrew Scott for All Of Us Strangers. Eh. I kind of felt like that might happen.
*No one from Saltburn, which seemingly everyone watched over Christmas. Maybe people thought it was stupid??
*The Gilded Age’s second season got an ensemble nomination but no individual noms. Which I’m sort of fine with? Y’all can rave about Carrie Coon – and she is great in the show – but it’s just a fancy soap opera. Same with Christine Baranski – she’s wonderful on the show, but I’m fine with her not being nominated.
*The eldest boy got snubbed!! It’s insane that Jeremy Strong missed out on a Lead Actor nomination for Succession and yet they nominated Brian Cox (who wasn’t even in the show past the third episode of the last season). While the fourth season really did belong to Kieran Culkin and Sarah Snook, Strong turned in another fantastic performance, as he did every season.
Anyway, we’re currently in the middle of the Oscar-nomination voting period, and the Oscar noms come out on January 23rd. Let’s hope the Oscars correct some of these mistakes.
Photos courtesy of Netflix, AppleTV+, Avalon Red and HBO/Max.
Something I’ve thought about a lot in the past two years is how the British royal family is so singularly hateful about every single thing connected to Prince Harry that they’ve gone out of their way to snub wounded warriors, veterans and Invictus Games competitors. The Windsors, en masse, blanked on the British Invictus team during the Hague Invictus games in 2022. The Windsors’ grudge against veterans grew even more noticeable during the Dusseldorf games last September, with the Telegraph and Mail even publishing some quotes which explicitly criticized the Windsors for looking “mean-spirited and petty.” The British Invictus team was aghast that the Windsors seemed hellbent on ignoring them. Not only that, there was a concerted effort by Prince William, Kate and Charles to “torpedo” the positive coverage of Invictus domestically and internationally. The Windsors looked incredibly foolish, short-sighted, anti-military and anti-veteran.
Well, funny story! Prince William and Kate have decided that their new 2024 cause will be a renewed focus on the British military. They’re even planning to make some kind of special trip to visit servicemen abroad.
The Prince and Princess of Wales will kick off their year with a “renewed focus” on the military. William and Kate are set to make their first tour of 2024 to a foreign country where British armed service personnel are stationed. Royal sources confirmed the couple are in advanced discussions to travel outside of the UK to thank British troops on behalf of the nation.
The Mirror is not revealing the location for security reasons but the trip is set to take place next month. William last year visited British troops in Poland on operations concerning the war in Ukraine.
The first trip of the year will not focus on Ukraine, but sources say this will continue to be a pillar of their work for the next 12 months. A royal source said: “It’s no secret about the Prince and Princess’ affection for the military but 2024 is about celebrating the efforts of those personnel abroad, often away from their family and friends, fighting in conflicts that are a long way from home. This is about a renewed focus to recognise their dedication and the royals feel very strongly about their role in representing the armed forces.”
A “renewed focus” on the military after Peg and Buttons were too stupid to simply send out a warm tweet wishing the British Invictus team well. A celebration of the British military after ignoring the veteran community for years out of spite for Harry. Sounds like Will and Kate were really triggered by NATO Joint Force Commander General Guglielmo Miglietta bringing a 1100-person NATO delegation to the Invictus Games in Dusseldorf. We knew that already – William was incandescent with rage about Harry and Meghan’s wonderful NATO photo-op with the delegation. Ten bucks says that Will and Kate’s very special international trip is to Germany and maybe even to a NATO base. If so, that means it took William four solid months of shrieking hissy fits to get NATO to agree to a photo-op. Pathetic.
I don’t know much about Pat McAfee other than “he’s some kind of successful sports commentator/analyst.” McAfee currently runs the successful The Pat McAfee Show, which airs on ESPN and their streaming service. Aaron Rodgers basically signed a contract to come on the show every Tuesday and provide analysis of football and sports culture. Aaron’s Tuesday appearances have been a descent into madness, with Aaron becoming radicalized before our eyes over the course of about four years. Rodgers was once seen as an intelligent, attractive football “hunk.” He’s now an anti-vaxxer, a QAnon dumbass and someone who gleefully spreads rumors about how his enemies are pedophiles.
Two Tuesdays ago, Rodgers did just that on McAfee’s show, insinuating that Jimmy Kimmel’s name would appear in the Epstein files. Kimmel clapped back HARD and threatened to sue. McAfee was so flummoxed that he had to put on a long-sleeve shirt and walk back Rodgers comments. Then Rodgers appeared on McAfee’s show two days ago and Rodgers refused to apologize to Kimmel and instead went on another anti-vaccine tirade. Pat McAfee has had enough. He said Rodgers is done (on his show, at least).
Aaron Rodgers will not be returning to The Pat McAfee Show in the near future following comments he made insinuating that Jimmy Kimmel could be linked to Jeffrey Epstein.
On Wednesday, sports analyst McAfee, 36, announced that the weekly segment “Aaron Rodgers Tuesday” would no longer be featured for the remainder of this football season.
“I’m pumped that that is no longer gonna be every single Wednesday of my life,” McAfee said as he and two others on his show applauded.
“So ‘Aaron Rodgers Tuesday,’ season four, is done. There’s gonna be a lot of people that are happy with that, myself included. To be honest, the way it ended, it got real loud… I’m happy that he’s not gonna be [in] my mentions going forward, which is great news.”
A source also told CNN that McAfee ended Rodgers’ segment “due to his recent behavior, not the conclusion of the regular NFL season.” They want to underline that for ESPN/Disney – Rodgers is out specifically because he’s a nutjob, not because of any football reasons. While McAfee could probably find success somewhere other than ESPN, you could actually tell that he was uncomfortable with Rodgers using the show as a platform for an increasingly bonkers worldview. I suspect ESPN/Disney went to McAfee and they were like “Rodgers should go” and McAfee was like “I totally agree, I’ll do it ASAP.”
Here’s a supercut of Aaron Rodgers obsessing over COVID-19, Fauci and vaccines during today’s Pat McAfee appearance. pic.twitter.com/0guNeUDA2m
— Justin Baragona (@justinbaragona) January 9, 2024
From CB: I was so convinced by Rosie’s post about E.L.F. dupes that I bought a bunch of E.L.F. products. I really like the Poreless Putty Primer and my favorite purchase is the E.L.F. Lash n Roll mascara. It gives great coverage and long-looking lashes and it doesn’t clump at all! Plus it’s vegan and doesn’t irritate my eyes. And the Halo Glow makes my skin look amazing, but I’ve been using that for a while. Here are some more things that Rosie and I are looking at on Amazon.
Looks like we might see the Duke and Duchess of Sussex leave their Montecito home in January after all. Everyone was carrying on and arguing about whether Meghan should leave the house to attend the Golden Globes – she was invited, but was apparently too busy to attend – and I wasn’t looking forward to another round of “will the Sussexes go to the Oscars.” We were looking at another bleak Sussex Undercover Season. But no more – Prince Harry will be honored at the 21st Annual Living Legends of Aviation Awards on January 19th. Check this out:
Prince Harry is flying into a special group. The Duke of Sussex, 39, is among the four people who will be inducted at the 21st Annual Living Legends of Aviation Awards in Beverly Hills on Jan. 19, it was announced on Wednesday. The event, hosted by John Travolta, will honor “those who have made significant contributions to aviation/aerospace.”
Prince Harry served as a helicopter pilot during his military service in the British Army, flying training missions in the U.S., U.K. and Australia as well as combat missions in Afghanistan.
He was awarded his Flying Wings in 2010 following completion of the eight-month Army Pilot Course with the Army Aviation Centre, learning to fly the Firefly fixed-wing aircraft and the Squirrel helicopter and accumulating approximately 220 flying hours. Harry spent 3½ years in training and operational service with the Apache Force during his time with the Army Air Corps, winning the prize for best co-pilot gunner during training and becoming a fully operational Apache pilot in February 2012.
The Living Legends of Aviation also praised Prince Harry as the creator of the Invictus Games, the Paralympics-style sporting competition for wounded service personnel and veterans.
I can already hear the incandescent rage-shrieking from England! While Sanhurst is playing a losing game of royal politics, Harry will be feted alongside Navy pilot Fred George, CAE CEO Marc Parent and world speed aviation record-holder Steve Hinton. While Harry’s pilot credentials are great, I would assume that Harry’s work on Invictus was what really got him this honor. God, I hope Harry’s hostage gets to leave the house on the 19th!!
PS… Some people already brought this up, but go here to read that story about how Prince William wore special airplane-embroidered slippers to the Top Gun: Maverick premiere, and William repeatedly pointed out his airplane slippers to all of the Top Gun actors. So, on one side, we have a violent, petty idiot who is obsessed with planes that go VROOM, and on the other side we have a prince who served two tours in combat, who then founded an Olympic-style event for wounded warriors. Pick your fighter.
January is a natural time for considering our own behavior and what we want to change for the new year. Like Brooke Shields, I shy away from setting firm resolutions. Really it just comes down to a tedious mental game for me, where if I declare a change another part of me will rebel and say “you’re not gonna tell me what to do!” It’s noisy in my head. Instead I try to make gentle suggestions to myself, and convince myself it’s hugely different from making resolutions. (I know I’m ridiculous, I know.) A similar popular new year’s practice is Dry January, wherein you abstain from drinking alcoholic beverages for the duration of the month. People Mag spoke to Dr. Rocco Iannucci, MD — director of the Fernside Residential Treatment Program at McLean Hospital and Psychiatry Instructor at Harvard Medical School — about the benefits of Dry January, both mental and physical.
Your liver will thank you: First and foremost, Dr. Iannucci points out that abstaining from alcohol throughout January is “helpful for your liver.” He adds that abstaining for “relatively short periods of time” can have a positive impact. “People with significant liver inflammation related to alcohol will oftentimes see their markers of inflammation go back to normal within the course of a month, and that’s people who have a significant level of alcohol intake,” he explains. “Alcohol is a toxin to the liver,” Dr. Iannucci continues. “The good news is the liver up to a point has a lot of capacity to heal and so giving it that chance to heal can be really helpful.”
Alcohol disturbs our sleep rhythms: “The thing that I think many don’t realize is that even small amounts of drinking do disturb your sleep… Most people will notice the immediate effects of alcohol,” Dr. Iannucci says, citing the ability to fall asleep earlier as an example. But while this is true for many people, he says alcohol consumption can also cause “morning awakening and fitful sleep… That can happen with half a drink,” he explains. “It doesn’t take much for alcohol to start to disturb our sleep rhythm so that our sleep isn’t as restorative as it would be otherwise.”
The potential for weight loss: “I think we can underestimate the degree to which alcohol adds calories — and they’re ‘empty’ calories, meaning they really don’t have any nutritional value,” he explains of the oftentimes “quickly consumed” beverages. “Especially in the forms of sugary drinks, you don’t really notice how much you’re taking in.” While the amount of weight lost during Dry January differs per person… Dr. Iannucci says that “many people find that they lose weight during the course of a Dry January.” Drinking aside, new activities during Dry January can aid in weight loss, especially if your weekends or weeknights usually revolved around alcohol.
Strength in numbers: And while “stopping alcohol” may cause “younger people or people who are dating” to fear “isolation” during Dry January, Dr. Iannucci says joining forces for the month of abstinence can make things easier. He suggests convincing some friends to participate or finding support online. “People will do that through social media and or through apps to help support Dry January and can give you that sense of being connected a little bit more.”
The attempt is beneficial, whatever the results: Whether people fully committed to Dry January or opted for a Damp January (cutting back on alcohol over the month), Dr. Iannucci says “both” attempts “offer benefits because you make a change in your behavior… People can sometimes see themselves as having failed it,” a mindset he doesn’t view as helpful because the attempt is beneficial alone. “I think it’s really kind of a win-win,” he says. “Whether you are able to not drink the entire month or whether you do sometimes drink in that month, you’re still likely to see some benefits in terms of psychological health and physical health,” Dr. Iannucci explains. “So it’s worth doing… What we don’t want to do is beat ourselves up over trying to do something good.”
Full disclosure: I barely drink, so I actually have done a Dry January, completely unwittingly. For me personally, I just substituted Coca Cola (which I’ve been imbibing way too much lately) for all of the merits Dr. Iannucci lists above. The benefits still hold up for soda! And I’ve already failed for a soda-less January! Sorry Dr. Iannucci, I know you said not to use that word. Most of what Dr. Iannucci says here makes sense. It’s stuff we probably know already, but it’s still a helpful boost to see it presented together in a compelling argument. Elsewhere in the interview Dr. Iannucci stresses that it’s important to acknowledge that everyone is different and will therefore have a different Dry January experience. Your relationship to alcohol before trying a Dry January is a big factor, as is, well, pretty much everything else. Which is why Dr. Iannucci also notes that consulting with your doctor first is the safest way to start a Dry January.
Whatever your goals are for January and beyond (I’m intrigued by CB’s article on thinking about doing less), be kind to yourself along the way. Cheers Bitches, I raise my glass of seltzer in toast to you all!
Photos credit: Cottonbro studios on Pexels
Willem Dafoe might get nominated for an Oscar this year for Poor Things. Poor Things is looking like a critical darling/word-of-mouth success of the season, and Emma Stone isn’t the only actor getting Oscar vibes from the film. If Dafoe does get nominated, it will be his fifth nomination with zero wins. I would argue that Dafoe absolutely should have won for The Florida Project, but that year, the Best Supporting Actor Oscar went to Sam Rockwell for his performance in the god-awful Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri. I like Sam and everything but for the love of god, Dafoe’s performance was a million times better. Anyway, Dafoe is back on the awards-season grind and he recently made some interesting comments about art in the age of streaming:
Willem Dafoe recently told The Guardian that “more difficult movies, more challenging movies” usually fail to perform well on streaming platforms because most subscribers just want to go home and “watch something stupid.” That’s a problem for someone like Dafoe, whose movies are often dense and challenging such as “The Northman,” “Inside” and “Poor Things,” just to same a few of his recent offerings.
“The kind of attention that people give at home isn’t the same,” Dafoe said. “More difficult movies, more challenging movies can not do as well when you don’t have an audience that’s really paying attention. That’s a big thing. I miss the social thing of where movies fit in the world. You go see a movie, you go out to dinner, you talk about it later, and that spreads out. People now go home, they say, ‘Hey, honey, let’s watch something stupid tonight,’ and they flip through and they watch five minutes of 10 movies, and they say, ‘Forget it, let’s go to bed.’ Where’s that discourse found?”
“They aren’t making movies the same way they used to,” he continued. “They’re being financed by toy companies and other entities, and they become the vehicle to make the movies, because they know how to do that. Streaming, they’re becoming like a monopoly, they have the means of production and distribution. And so it’s very complicated.”
The four-time Oscar nominee couched his comments by noting he’s a “crummy” and “lousy” source to be dissecting the film business or “to have a really good overview on what has changed,” but he’s correct when he says that streamers like Netflix have their own production arms and thus have the power to make and distribute movies straight to an audience designed to like “something stupid” over a challenging movie. Dafoe did not call out Mattel by name, but that toy company now also has a film division (and it’s off to a blockbuster start with “Barbie”).
He’s right and he’s wrong. I absolutely believe that people are more likely to stream something stupid or uncomplicated just because it’s easier and more accessible. The pandemic showed people that watching the latest movie doesn’t have to be a grind – they can sit at home and watch new(ish) releases in comfort, and that comfort will often extend to, let’s say, “unchallenging” pieces of art. That being said, I rented like ten movies on Vudu over the holidays and I watched them all from the comfort of my home and I watched each one from start to finish because I could engineer my own bathroom breaks and snack breaks. That’s something else which Dafoe is partly referencing too – there are a lot of people who will finish a movie if they “paid” for it. I can watch 20 minutes of some stupid Netflix movie or Prime movie and stop because I don’t feel like I’ve paid specifically for that one bad movie. And yet I finished Killers of the Flower Moon even though 120 minutes into it, I was exhausted by the torture p0rn of Native Americans. I still finished it because I paid for it.
One of the funnier bits during CNN’s 2023 New Year’s Eve special was John Mayer appearing in a cat café in Tokyo. It could have been lame. I mean, the premise was funny and the scene was set, but that kind of bit takes some charisma and humor to pull off. For example, Martin Short and Steve Martin riffing about New Years in a cat café would automatically be funny. Kevin Costner, not so much. Luckily for Mayer, hosts Anderson Cooper and Andy Cohen, and all of us watching at home, all it took was Anderson’s uncontrollable giggling at the entire scenario to make it entertaining and go viral. According to Cohen, Mayer was originally supposed to do his guest spot in his hotel room, but came up with the idea to do it in a cat café instead.
Andy Cohen is giving credit where it’s due when it comes to that viral cat café moment with pal John Mayer on New Year’s Eve.
“He was going to be joining us from Tokyo and I said, ‘Look, we will set you up in your hotel.’ And he said, ‘I’d love to go somewhere more fun, like a cat café.’ And I was like, ‘Okay, well lemme see if we can find one,’” Cohen, 55, exclusively tells Us Weekly on Tuesday, January 9, while promoting Walmart’s “Save Your Resolutions” campaign.
Once CNN found a café for Mayer to phone in from, Cohen says he gave Anderson Cooper a heads up about the hilarious location ahead of their CNN New Year’s Eve Live special.
“I told Anderson a few times, ‘Hey, John’s going to be at a cat cafe,’ but I think he tunes me out sometimes, so I think that’s why it was immediately so funny to him,” Cohen recalls. “And also the cats’ butts were in John’s face the whole time. I think just that visual was so funny.”
The internet went into a frenzy when Cooper, 56, erupted into a fit of giggles as Mayer, 46, joined the special from inside a cat café and was surrounded by felines — some of which had their butts in Mayer’s face.
“This doesn’t look sanitary, John,” Cohen said during the broadcast, while Cooper exclaimed, “John, there’s cats everywhere.”
Mayer appeared not to be fazed by their alarming reactions, replying, “I believe it passes all health codes. I think it’s just fine.”
He continued, “There are cats. Yeah. This is a place you can come, enjoy a drink or two and talk to cats. It’s a cat bar. I don’t know how much more clear I can be about this objective of this place.”
I had to rewatch the segment to even remember what they were talking about because all I could think about was Anderson losing his everloving mind over the cats. His reaction was the thing that made the segment work, and Mayer did well playing it off as the comedic straight man unbothered by a cat’s butt in his face. It *was* a funny visual. Do you think that Anderson even knew that cat cafés are a thing? They don’t seem like his jam but you never know. I can totally believe that Andy tried telling him a few times, but was ignored or tuned out. I’m pretty sure that’s a natural reaction to hearing Cohen talk in general. Anyway, +1 to John Mayer for the idea. If he’s back on the show next year, he should keep the theme going and give an interview from a dog park or zoo or something.
Photos via Instagram and YouTube screenshots
50 Cent is practicing abstinence in 2024. [Hollywood Life]
Nicole Kidman is filming a movie called Babygirl? [LaineyGossip]
Which characters steal a movie with one line? [Pajiba]
John Mulaney’s Girlfriend went to the Governors Awards. [Just Jared]
Photos from the Globes Weekend parties. [Go Fug Yourself]
Megan Thee Stallion & Renee Rapp did a song for Mean Girls. [OMG Blog]
Ask Republicans about the Comstock Law. [Jezebel]
Who showed up to the Astra Film Awards? [RCFA]
AJ McLean & Joey Fatone are touring together? [Seriously OMG]
One of these Sister Wives has a $2 million home?? [Starcasm]
Fox News & TikTok is a bad combination. [Buzzfeed]