I’m expecting some knee-jerk defensiveness over this, but it’s my hope you guys actually read this story and consider what’s actually being said and what isn’t being said. People Magazine’s cover story this week is about the Duke and Duchess of Sussex, their business and what’s next for them, especially since the British media is very focused on making Harry and Meghan sound like failures. I still say that they should have done or said more to combat the bullsh-t that went down over their Spotify contract getting canceled, but I’ve had issues with their communications strategy for a while. I actually think that’s their biggest problem – what could have been a larger story about the industry’s fluctuations became a story about Harry and Meghan “failing” because they weren’t pushing back on anything. Some highlights from People Mag:

Not so solid footing? Meghan Markle and Prince Harry are coming off a record-breaking Netflix series, a hit podcast and a bestselling book — yet finding solid footing in Hollywood remains an ongoing challenge. In June, the Duke and Duchess of Sussex “mutually agreed to part ways” with Spotify after delivering one podcast, Archetypes, under their reported $20 million deal, with executive Bill Simmons publicly criticizing the couple shortly after the announcement. Later that month, the Wall Street Journal took a critical look at their production company’s Netflix output. (That deal is worth $100 million.) In July, the entertainment industry itself was rocked by a historic writers and actors strike.

The Archewell brand: Joe Quenqua, a senior media strategist, tells PEOPLE in this week’s cover story that the latest headlines reflect “serious growing pains” for the couple’s nascent Archewell brand.

A five-year plan: But for Harry, 38, and Meghan, who turns 42 on Friday, “there wasn’t necessarily a five-year plan” — as one royal insider puts it — when they left the U.K. Royal life “wasn’t a world they wanted for their family,” says the royal insider, noting that their choices reflect that. “Everything else flows from that, for whatever time period it takes.”

Their deals with Netflix & Spotify: “The royal element and, in some ways, the drama around them inflated the price, deals and expectations,” says a top Hollywood insider.

Their other projects: While Prince Harry’s book and their Netflix show offered a glimpse behind palace walls like never before, so far it seems that Harry and Meghan’s projects without a royal component have struggled to capture the public’s attention. Their Netflix docuseries Live to Lead debuted to indifference, and an animated project they were developing called Pearl, about a girl inspired by female leaders, was quietly dropped last year. Some experts say Harry and Meghan are being held to a higher standard than others. “Very few other production companies are measured by what’s actually hit the airwaves,” says a source close to the couple, noting there are “plenty of things that are in different phases” under their shingle.

Spotify tea: Meanwhile, an Archetypes production source says the couple was not set up for success on Spotify: “They were given no formal lay of the land to kick things off, so they were already on unsteady footing even before the ink was dry.” Though Archewell Audio produced just 12 episodes of Archetypes for Spotfiy, the source noted, they “have a lot of ideas and did pitch them,” but said there was too much red tape between Spotify and the Sussexes. “Things moved very slowly on both ends.”

The future: “Has their final chapter been written? Absolutely not,” an industry executive tells PEOPLE. “Hollywood loves a comeback.”

[From People]

I’ve previously made a list of everything they’ve done in three years (now three and a half years), but it’s worth highlighting again: a bestselling memoir; a hit podcast; a successful children’s book; a massive hit docu-series; a post-pandemic Invictus Games; setting up a charity and production company simultaneously; investing in a latte company; joining BetterUp as a CIO; producing a successful AppleTV series; welcoming their daughter, and on and on. But even with all they’ve accomplished, I also think there’s room to say that they’ve flopped a few times and they were too slow out of the gate. Which is basically the point of this People Mag cover story – yes, they’ve had some major successes, but everything hasn’t been rosy, etc.

Photos courtesy of Backgrid, cover courtesy of People.

Lizzo is facing a big lawsuit and some very serious accusations. The lawsuit? Hostile work environment and what amounts to sexual harassment and discrimination. Lizzo is being sued by three dancers from her most recent tour and they describe an extremely toxic work environment. This is soooo bad.

Three of Lizzo’s former dancers have accused the singer of sexual harassment and creating a hostile work environment in a lawsuit filed Tuesday. They also allege that she pressured one of them to touch a nude performer at an Amsterdam club and subjected the group to an “excruciating” audition after leveling false accusations that they were drinking on the job.

The dancers accused Lizzo — a performer known for embracing body positivity and celebrating her physique — of calling attention to one dancer’s weight gain and later berating, then firing, that dancer after she recorded a meeting because of a health condition.

The suit, filed in Los Angeles Superior Court and provided to NBC News by the plaintiffs’ law firm, also accuses the captain of Lizzo’s dance team of proselytizing to other performers and deriding those who had premarital sex while sharing lewd sexual fantasies, simulating oral sex and publicly discussing the virginity of one of the plaintiffs.

The suit does not say if Lizzo knew about the allegations linked to the dance captain, Shirlene Quigley, but the plaintiffs believed the singer was aware of their complaints about her, according to their lawyer, Ron Zambrano.

The suit names Lizzo, whose real name is Melissa Viviane Jefferson, her production company and Quigley as defendants. In addition to accusations of a hostile work environment and sexual harassment, the suit brings claims for religious and racial harassment, false imprisonment, interference with prospective economic advantage and other allegations. Not every claim was brought against each defendant.

“The stunning nature of how Lizzo and her management team treated their performers seems to go against everything Lizzo stands for publicly, while privately she weight-shames her dancers and demeans them in ways that are not only illegal but absolutely demoralizing,” Zambrano said in a statement.

[From NBC News]

You can read more at NBC News – the stuff from Amsterdam is pretty bad, but what strikes me more than anything is that Lizzo had really selective boundaries with her employees/subordinates – in certain circumstances, she would treat dancers like they were all BFFs, but in other situations, she would lord her employer status over those same people and threaten them constantly. Anyway, this sounds like a pretty open-and-shut case of a hostile work environment.

That dance captain, Shirlene Quigley, responded to the suit by… prosthelytizing on her social media. Imagine that sh-t at work. I would have been out of there so fast, good lord. Additionally, filmmaker Sophia Nahli Allison shared her damning story about trying to do a tour-documentary with Lizzo and leaving after a few weeks because Lizzo was “arrogant, self-centered and unkind” and how the environment was toxic AF.

Lizzo’s dance captain, Shirlene Quigley, takes to Instagram following lawsuit that alleges she attempted to convert dancers to Christianity and inappropriately simulated oral sex in front of them:

“I just wanted to get on here really quick and say God is so, so good!” pic.twitter.com/c8CuFf0LdF

— Pop Crave (@PopCrave) August 2, 2023

Sharing this because validating other Black women’s experiences is deeply important to me. pic.twitter.com/gd2xEK6szq

— Sophia Nahli Allison (@SophiaNAllison) August 1, 2023

Photos courtesy of Avalon Red.

As we’ve discussed, the Duchess of Sussex’s old TV show is back in the headlines and a massive hit on streaming. Suits, the nine-season drama which originally aired on cable network USA, has accumulated billions of views on Peacock and Netflix. Every single day, there’s someone on Twitter talking about how Suits is a great show and Meghan Markle is fantastic on it. There’s simply been a huge revival this year in the show and in Meghan’s acting career. Instead of framing the story as a huge positive for Meghan and this popular show, you should see the pissy, angry way the British media is writing about it. Take, for example, this Telegraph headline: “Americans are bored of Meghan Markle – so why are they binge-watching Suits? The Duchess of Sussex finally has a huge Netflix hit, thanks to the vacuous legal drama she left behind. What’s the appeal?” These freaks think that if they scream “Americans hate Meghan” into a mirror 20 times, their wish becomes real. Literally tens of millions of people are discovering or rediscovering a pleasant legal drama and supporting Meghan. Some highlights from this BITTER Telegraph piece:

Meghan Markle is riding high in the ratings – and for once, it has nothing to do with Prince Harry, Oprah Winfrey or her stormy relationship with the Windsors. The Duchess of Sussex occupies four of the top 10 places on Netflix USA’s “most watched” charts thanks to her old legal drama Suits, in which she plays spiky paralegal Rachel Zane.

It’s quite the turnaround, given the recent narrative around America going off the Sussexes. Their Hollywood friendship group is reportedly dwindling; not too long ago Meghan and Harry were mocked by South Park, in which they were shown holding signs demanding “stop looking at us”. They were also on the receiving end of several cruel jokes in Chris Rock’s recent Netflix comedy special, in which he suggested that Meghan’s strife with Harry’s family was nothing more or less than a retelling of the timeless story of in-laws not getting on.

But nobody is joking about the remarkable performance of Suits. It has broken records since arriving on US Netflix on June 23 (in the UK, it’s come and gone from the streamer and has always had a loyal following) and, according to Nielsen, was watched for 3.14 billion minutes in the week of June 26-July 2. No matter how much the reruns cost Netflix, Suits is inarguably better value than the $100 million the streamer reportedly threw at the Sussexes for a couple of documentaries.

There is even talk of Suits returning following its cancellation in 2019, although the producers acknowledge that Markle is unlikely to be part of any potential reunion.

It’s the Friends phenomenon all over again….Suits is different in that, unlike the peerless Friends, it is definitely no classic. But that’s possibly part of the charm. The show is slick and silly, while the acting is stiffer than the upper lip which Harry flexed in that interview with Oprah.

The appeal of Suits is partly down to Meghan – an unknown when initially cast in Suits and now one of the world’s most recognisable celebrities. She has a key part as Rachel, a deadpan striver making her way in the hyper-macho world of Manhattan law. True, nobody could mistake Markle as the second coming of Meryl Streep. But she brings a spiky energy to the likeable Rachel. Hard-working uncompromising, you can see why she was a fan favourite even before the Sussex factor. Still, the true magic of Suits lies in the bromantic energy between its lead characters, Mike Ross and Harvey Dent. They are the Mick and Keith of silly New York legal dramas, and their crackling chemistry has Suits fans bingeing until their eyeballs pop.

[From The Telegraph]

“Vacuous legal drama” in the headline, and then this person spends most of the piece praising the male performances. Typical. Like, I’ve never thought that Suits was some ground-breaking drama, but there’s absolutely an enormous appetite for a flashy and fun escapism. This person was just trying to act like Meghan isn’t the reason why Suits is the surprise hit of the summer. They have to denigrate every single thing she does or ever did, like they weren’t blessed to have someone beautiful, talented, hard-working and accomplished join that fakakta family. They fumbled the bag and instead of acknowledging it, their cope is to seethingly obsess about her.

Photos courtesy of Avalon Red, ‘Suits’/Instagram.

WE DID IT! Two and half years after Donald Trump openly incited the January 6th insurrection, Trump has been indicted by a grand jury following a lengthy and methodical DOJ investigation. There are four counts in the indictment against Trump, and there are also (as yet unnamed) co-conspirators cited in the indictment. Meaning, more charges to come and more arrests to be made, especially for fart-soaked Rudy Giuliani and Trump’s whole cracked-out team of ratf-cking helper-monkeys.

Former President Donald J. Trump was indicted on Tuesday in connection with his widespread efforts to overturn the 2020 election following a sprawling federal investigation into his attempts to cling to power after losing the presidency to Joseph R. Biden Jr. The indictment was filed by the special counsel Jack Smith in Federal District Court in Washington.

It accuses Mr. Trump of three conspiracies: one to defraud the United States, a second to obstruct an official government proceeding and a third to deprive people of civil rights provided by federal law or the Constitution.

“Each of these conspiracies — which built on the widespread mistrust the defendant was creating through pervasive and destabilizing lies about election fraud — targeted a bedrock function of the United States federal government: the nation’s process of collecting, counting and certifying the results of the presidential election,” the indictment said.

The indictment said Mr. Trump had six co-conspirators, but it did not name them.

Mr. Trump now faces two separate federal indictments. In June, Mr. Smith brought charges in Florida accusing Mr. Trump — the current front-runner for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination — of illegally holding on to a highly sensitive trove of national defense documents and then obstructing the government’s attempts to get them back. He is scheduled to go on trial in that case in May. In addition to federal charges in the election and documents cases, Mr. Trump also faces legal troubles in state courts.

He has been charged by the Manhattan district attorney’s office in a case that centers on hush money payments made to the porn star Stormy Daniels in the run-up to the 2016 election. The efforts by Mr. Trump and his allies to reverse his election loss are also the focus of a separate investigation by the district attorney in Fulton County, Ga. That inquiry appears likely to generate charges this month.

[From The NY Times]

If you subscribe to the NYT, you can read the indictment here. It spells out in concise terms what Trump actually did, and how the criminal conspiracies came together. This feels cathartic – this is the one a lot of us were waiting for. Trump getting charged under the Espionage Act was amazing too, don’t get me wrong. But I still say Trump and every single one of his co-conspirators, including the January 6th terrorists, should be charged with high treason, murder and attempted murder. These should be death penalty charges. Those f–kers smeared feces on the walls of the Capitol. They made a noose to hang Mike Pence. Speaker Pelosi was in that secure underground bunker for hours. They planted pipe bombs. Trump assaulted his Secret Service detail because he wanted to go to the Capitol to join his people.

Jack Smith is hot, right? I would.

Photos courtesy of Avalon Red, Backgrid.

I went to see Barbie with my lovely wife; she said pink is my color. #imkenough pic.twitter.com/4E0LJMQpmC

— George RR Martin (@GRRMspeaking) July 31, 2023

George RR Martin dressed up in pink to see Barbie. This Barbie is never going to finish Winds of Winter! This Barbie is a procrastinator. [Buzzfeed]
Shawn Mendes got sunburnt in Ibiza. [OMG Blog]
Balmain’s Resort collections are so fussy. [GFY]
Offset addresses the rumor (which he started) that Cardi B cheated. [JustJared]
Barbie is such a huge success by every metric. [LaineyGossip]
Review of Talk to Me, a horror film I will not see. [Pajiba]
Natasha Lyonne’s bangs, you guys. [Tom & Lorenzo]
Elon Musk took down that stupid strobe-light X sign. [Jezebel]
The Da Vinci Code & the MAGA cult. [Towleroad]
Kylie Minogue wore Mugler to promote her Las Vegas residency. [RCFA]

As we discussed yesterday, Prince William (barely) did a thing to highlight some Earthshot Prize winners’ innovations. The thing in question was a video with food-vloggers Ben Ebbrell and Kush Bhasin of the YouTube channel Sorted Food – William turned up at the beginning to explain the innovations, then William left Kush and Ben to work out the applications and develop the veggie burger. Then William showed up at the end of the video to do a little skit with a food truck – William “served” the burgers to “unsuspecting” people and gave them a lecture about Earthshot. I’ve cued the video to that part:

As you can see, this isn’t really a city street available to passerbys. They set up the foodtruck in an alley or some kind of closed-off area, and then they brought people up to the foodtruck. Well, there’s a rumor going around that Sorted Food and/or Kensington Palace basically set up every part of the foodtruck skit, meaning those people were hand-selected and told how to give “surprised” reactions to William’s presence. It looks like the palace’s screenwriters are not on strike. Did they film this on some studio backlot?? Were those people paid for their acting performances?

The royals produce a staged video and @ITV and @SkyNews report it as if it were a genuine moment of surprise from ‘diners in london’. https://t.co/Zn2tLwycKz

— Republic (@RepublicStaff) July 31, 2023

They certainly missed the corruption and hypocrisy of the royals. Talk about that. https://t.co/omnpTuv6WM

— Republic (@RepublicStaff) July 31, 2023

Photos courtesy of Avalon Red.

I was never into Arrow, so my first real vibe-check on Stephen Amell was two years ago, when he was thrown off a Delta flight for screaming at his wife. The vibe was decidedly “off.” This new story does nothing to dissuade me from feeling like Amell is a giant knob either. Amell is obviously a SAG-AFTRA union member, but he’s not “on strike” apparently. In comments this week, Amell called the strike “myopic.” Yikes.

Stephen Amell, whose Starz drama series Heels returned for its second season over the weekend, is not going to the mat for the actors strike that is rattling in Hollywood. Amell, best known for playing the lead role in The CW’s Arrow, has called the SAG-AFTRA strike “myopic,” “incredibly frustrating” and a “reductive negotiating tactic.”

When SAG-AFTRA members voted on authorizing a strike, an overwhelming 98% majority of returns gave guild leadership the green light to walk out of negotiations if needed, with roughly half of eligible members submitting ballots. Speaking over the weekend, actor Stephen Amell doesn’t count himself among the members in favor of one.

During an appearance for a Q&A with fans at Galaxycon in Raleigh, N.C., Amell voiced his disagreements with the ongoing actors strike, which began on July 14.

“I support my union, I do. And I stand with them. I do not support striking. I don’t. I think that it is a reductive negotiating tactic,” Amell began, sighing. The footage of Amell’s appearance at the convention was widely distributed on social media. “I find the entire thing incredibly frustrating. I think the thinking as it pertains to shows — like the show that I’m on that premiered last night — I think it’s myopic.”

Amell’s professional wrestling series “Heels” debuted its second season on Starz on Friday. The actor’s Galaxycon appearance was not explicitly billed as a promotional event for “Heels,” per the organization’s website.

[From Variety]

Yeah, my first question was: why the hell is he doing promotion for his TV show? Promotional events, press junkets and fan events are strictly prohibited by SAG-AFTRA during the strike. So there’s that alongside all of his comments. Amell sounds like such a douche here (big surprise, I’m pretty sure that’s who he is). SAG-AFTRA didn’t want to strike and they continued with the pre-strike negotiations for as long as they could in good faith. They even gave the AMPTP an extension in July, only the AMPTP only asked for the extension so the Barbenheimer casts could do their promotions and premieres. AMPTP was the organization operating in bad faith, while SAG-AFTRA has always wanted to sit down and really hash out these issues.

Photos courtesy of Avalon Red.

Get the tea on who will return for Bridgerton Season 3. [Just Jared]
Kanye West’s Twitter account was reinstated. [Socialite Life]
I really wonder if people are paying attention to Brad Pitt’s scabbing. [LaineyGossip]
You’re telling me there are ten Saw movies?? [Pajiba]
Emily Ratajkowski’s outfit here is so 2001. [Go Fug Yourself]
Stevie Wonder sings happy birthday to Quincy Jones. [Seriously OMG]
Madison Pettis wore a “pearl skirt.” [Egotastic]
Australian men don’t ask questions?? [Buzzfeed]
Meatball Ron DeSantis is deeply unpopular.[Towleroad]
A 90 Day Fiance couple are enjoying life in America. [Starcasm]
Valentino’s “Pink Panther” collection. [T&L]

One of the biggest mysteries about the Windsors is why they’re incapable of “being the bigger person” publicly. The courtiers fuss around endlessly to praise the Windsors’ brilliance, work ethic and their relatability, and yet magnanimity and good manners seem to elude them consistently. The Frogmore Cottage issue was the perfect example of this: the Sussexes were given a dilapidated shack, they were harangued until they “paid back” the cost of the renovation for a home they never owned, then they were were evicted from a home on which they had a valid and fully paid lease. So much for King Charles being a “caring father” or “loving grandfather,” you know? The Windsors rarely, if ever, err on the side of looking warm or loving. Well, someone convinced King Charles that it would be good for a quick PR hit to tell people that he “invited” the Sussexes to visit him over the summer in Balmoral. In fact, the Mail’s whole dumb story about Charles’s “first Balmoral summer without his mother” is about the Sussexes, basically.

This year, however, the Balmoral break will be different. For a start, King Charles and Queen Camilla will not be staying at Balmoral Castle itself, as the Queen always did. I can reveal they will be basing themselves at Birkhall, their private home on the Balmoral estate. Sources tell me the King and Queen will happily ‘decamp’ to the main castle for official visits, such as that of the Prime Minister Rishi Sunak and the Scottish First Minister (although it has yet to be confirmed whether avowed republican Humza Yousaf will accept).

But Birkhall will serve as their main base until the early autumn, leaving Balmoral without a monarch physically in residence for the first time since the 19th century. The castle will not remain empty, of course. All family members, I am told, are expected to stay at some point over the next few weeks.

That is, except the Duke and Duchess of Sussex whose ‘open invitation’ to join family gatherings hasn’t exactly been rescinded, but is certainly not expected to be accepted. Relations between father and son, I understand, are still not good, although the family feel encouraged by claims that Harry and Meghan are now determined to focus on the future rather than family recriminations.

‘If true, that can only be a good thing and may offer a sliver of hope that at some point in the future personal relationships can be rebuilt,’ one source close to the family tells me. ‘It’s been a very visibly challenging year when it comes to the Sussexes.’

King Charles, I understand, is not thought to have read his son’s vitriolic memoir Spare yet, but is aware of its contents. ‘Why would he read something that he knows is going to be so hurtful?’ another friend asks.

Contact between Prince William and his brother is non-existent and there doesn’t seem to be a reconciliation in the offing any time soon. ‘You can read the room on that as to where things are [between them],’ says a source, making clear that as far as William is concerned the subject is very much off-limits.

‘It’s sad, but it is what is. This is a family as well as an institution,’ they added.

[From The Daily Mail]

“That is, except the Duke and Duchess of Sussex whose ‘open invitation’ to join family gatherings hasn’t exactly been rescinded, but is certainly not expected to be accepted.” These people. How about: the king would love nothing more to see his redheaded grandchildren, he called Harry personally to invite the whole Sussex family to Scotland! That puts the onus on the Sussexes to accept or decline and Charles comes out of it smelling like a rose. “King Charles, I understand, is not thought to have read his son’s vitriolic memoir Spare” – if Charles, famously a book-lover, ever got around to reading his son’s bestselling memoir, he would discover that Harry actually adores and loves his father.

Meanwhile, Becky English also revealed that Prince Andrew will absolutely go to Balmoral this summer, probably with Fergie and their daughters. Andrew got an invitation too.

Photos courtesy of Avalon Red, Cover Images.

Most people haven’t been following the British media’s reporting on Brad Pitt, or at least that’s what I thought. The British media hasn’t been shy about saying it outright, that Pitt was still filming that Formula 1 movie even after SAG-AFTRA called the strike. Initially, there were sources insisting that the film, loosely called Apex, was going on hiatus immediately during the strike because Pitt is such a “good union member.” But then Apex kept filming in the UK and Hungary. You could argue, hey, maybe Pitt isn’t in those scenes, maybe they’re just doing stunt scenes, etc. Except that there’s a growing body of evidence that Pitt absolutely was filming scenes during the strike. This story from the Sun got picked up by some of the trade papers in LA:

Brad Pitt is pulling the plug on filming for his new blockbuster Apex to show support for the current strikes by Hollywood actors and writers. The screen star is supporting the walk-out by actors’ union the Screen Actors Guild (SAG), and has cancelled the production for now.

A source said: “Brad is arguably one of the nicest guys in Hollywood and this move seals that reputation. He has been filming Apex, his new Formula 1 film, for the past few weeks but has now pulled the plug. Brad agreed that they would finish shoots booked in but has postponed planned production over the next two months.”

“The cast and crew of Apex have been filming in Budapest but Brad has called for the future dates to be put back, in solidarity with everyone striking. Everyone has been informed that there will be a two-month hiatus now. Conversations about when to start up again are ongoing but it’s likely it will be in November when they will be going to Las Vegas to shoot some scenes.

“Postponing the production was a massive call, especially financially, but Brad has listened to the concerns of the people he works with and wants to show his support.”

[From The Sun]

Imagine making a big deal about how you’re putting a film on hiatus in solidarity with your union… weeks after your union went on strike. A few days ago, I was describing Pitt’s activities to someone I would not consider to be well-versed in unionization and the first thing out of her mouth was “he’s a scab.” Like, the SAG and WGA strikes really have gotten through to people and workers of every variety are watching what’s happening. Even more than that, they’re paying attention to who worked through the strikes. The fact that Deadline, Entertainment Tonight and several American outlets picked this up too – that’s notable.

Photos courtesy of Avalon Red.