View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Ähtäri Zoo (@ahtarizoo)

In January 2018, Lumi and Pyry uprooted their lives by moving from their native China to embark on a new life in Finland. At first it seemed like things were going to work out for the pair: they’d secured a $9 million home for 15 years, along with an annual income of about $1.675 million. And all they had to do was lie around all day and be doted on! Did I mention Lumi and Pyry are giant pandas? They are indeed Ailuropoda melanoleuca, and they were loaned by the Chinese government to Ahtaria, a private Finnish zoo. This kind of exchange — bears for good foreign relations — is part of China’s infamous “panda diplomacy.” But sadly, in this case, the cost of caretaking for the giant pandas proved to be too large for Ahtaria Zoo. Lumi and Pyry will begin a month of quarantine before they begin the long voyage home.

Finland will return two giant pandas to China in November, more than eight years ahead of time, as the zoo where they live can no longer afford their upkeep, the chair of the zoo’s board told Reuters on Tuesday.

The pandas, named Lumi and Pyry, were brought to Finland in January 2018, months after Chinese leader Xi Jinping visited the Nordic country and signed a joint agreement on protecting the animals.

Since its founding in 1949, the People’s Republic of China has sent pandas to foreign zoos to strengthen trading ties, cement foreign relations and boost its international image.

The Finnish agreement was for a stay of 15 years, but instead the pandas will soon go into a month-long quarantine before they are shipped back to China, according to Ahtaria Zoo, the pandas’ current home.

The zoo, a private company, had invested over 8 million euros (about $9 million) in the facility where the animals live and faced annual costs of 1.5 million euros for their upkeep, including a preservation fee paid to China, Ahtaria Chair Risto Sivonen said.

The zoo had hoped the pandas would attract visitors to the central Finland
location but last year said it had instead accumulated mounting debts as the pandemic curbed travel, and that it was discussing a return.

Rising inflation had added to the costs, the zoo said, and Finland’s government in 2023 rejected pleas for state funding.

In all, negotiations to return the animals had lasted three years, Sivonen said.

“Now we reached a point where the Chinese said it could be done,” Sivonen said.

The return of the pandas was a business decision made by the zoo which did not involve Finland’s government and should not impact relations between the two countries, a spokesperson for Finland’s foreign ministry said.

Despite efforts by China to aid the zoo, the two countries in the end jointly concluded after friendly consultations to return the pandas, the Chinese embassy in Helsinki said in a statement to Reuters.

[From CNN]

Inflation affects everything — even pandas! I just want to make something very clear to Lumi and Pyry: it’s not your fault. No, listen to me! It’s. Not. Your. Fault! You have each served your country and your species to the greatest of your ability in your impactful, if brief, tenure as national ambassadors. And you absolutely shouldn’t in any way feel you bear responsibility for whatever geopolitical relations fall to pieces or trade war calamities ensue following the early and abrupt end of your mission. Both countries knew the risks involved when negotiating this transaction; if they can’t handle the fallout, then that’s on them. So to whoever will be receiving Lumi and Pyry upon their return, can we please get some regular, photographic updates on the floofs? To make sure they’re reacclimating and happy not hanging on to any shame?

And a quick update from our last coverage on panda diplomacy: Yun Chuan and Xin Bao made it safely to from China to San Diego, California and are living their best lives at the Zoo’s Panda Ridge. Of course in light of this Finnish news, the real test will be to check on them in about seven years from now…

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Ähtäri Zoo (@ahtarizoo)

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Ähtäri Zoo (@ahtarizoo)

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Ähtäri Zoo (@ahtarizoo)

Boris Johnson’s memoir will be out on October 10th, and his publisher is trying to hype the book by releasing choice excerpts and previews. One of the big excerpts – the one which has gotten the most attention in the UK – is Boris Johnson writing that in January 2020, he was tasked with prevailing upon Prince Harry to stay in the UK. The timeline: BoJo became prime minister in the summer of 2019, and Harry and Meghan left the UK for a “Christmas holiday” in Canada in December 2019. By early January, they announced their intention to step away from the royal family, and by January 13th, Harry was meeting with his family and the courtiers alone at Sandringham and working out the terms of Sussexit. Then, just days later, Harry and Boris both attended the UK-Africa investment summit. Boris pulled Harry aside and they spoke alone for twenty minutes as Boris tried to convince him to stay in the UK. Boris apparently writes that the meeting was not his idea – that Buckingham Palace and Downing Street asked him to speak to Harry and make the last-ditch appeal. Now Buckingham Palace claims that they didn’t ask BoJo to do anything.

Boris Johnson was not asked by Buckingham Palace to try and persuade Prince Harry to stay in the UK, The Telegraph understands. The former prime minister claims in a new book that he was asked to give the Duke of Sussex a “manly pep talk” to convince him not to step back from his royal duties. He says that officials from Buckingham Palace and Downing Street made the request in the belief that a last-minute intervention, in January 2020, might encourage the Duke to change his mind.

In Unleashed, his memoir which will be published on Oct 10, Mr Johnson describes “a ridiculous business… when they made me try to persuade Harry to stay. Kind of manly pep talk. Totally hopeless”. The pair enjoyed an “informal” 20-minute meeting, which took place behind closed doors on the margins of a UK-Africa investment summit in London’s Docklands, on January 20, 2020.

Sources close to the Duke confirmed that the then prime minister did suggest that both he and Meghan remain in the UK.

However, sources with knowledge of such meetings at the time insisted that the Palace did not ask Mr Johnson to intervene. While it cannot be ruled out that a member of the Downing Street team suggested that it might be worth mentioning to the Duke, there was no specific formal request. By that point, all involved had realised that any attempt to persuade the Sussexes to stay would be futile. The following day, Prince Harry flew to Canada to be reunited with Meghan and their son, Archie.

The previous evening, the Duke had delivered a speech at an event for Sentebale, his charity based in Lesotho, in which he said he had “no other option” but to step back from royal life and spoke of his sadness that it had “come to this”. A week earlier, on Jan 13, the Duke had joined his grandmother, Elizabeth II, father and elder brother for the so-called Sandringham Summit, to thrash out the terms of his exit.

[From The Telegraph]

The current “Buckingham Palace” saying this is not the same as the “Buckingham Palace” in January 2020. Different courtiers, different CEO. It’s possible that QEII and her courtiers did request it, but then-Prince Charles and Clarence House did not. We know for sure that Kensington Palace didn’t request jacksh-t – they were doing the most to push Harry out and leak everything that was said during the summit. This is a beef between Charles and his dead mother about what to do about Harry – QEII clearly wanted Harry’s exit to be handled with more sensitivity, more delicacy and more warmth. But the whole point of the “hard Sussexit” was, in Charles’s mind, to force the Sussexes to capitulate and come back, broke and broken. The fact that it now looks like the monarchy asked the whole-ass prime minister to beg Harry to stay is not the image the current monarchy wants to project.

Photos courtesy of Avalon Red.

In April 2022, Politico and TMZ reported that Angelina Jolie had filed (as a Jane Doe) for the FBI’s records on their investigation into the 2016 plane incident. The 2016 incident was the game-changer for Angelina. That was where a likely blackout-drunk Brad Pitt terrorized and assaulted Angelina and their children for hours on and off the plane. In 2022, Angelina was technically getting a Freedom of Information Act request, but really, she was trying to piece together what exactly happened with the FBI investigation and why the FBI didn’t file any charges against Pitt. Angelina did manage to get her hands on some of the partially-redacted records, including the FBI’s records of Jolie’s own statements to them about what Brad did to her and the children. Many of those records were then FOIA-requested by media outlets who then published their own coverage, much to Team Pitt’s chagrin. Well, long story short, after two years of trying to figure out why the FBI didn’t charge Pitt with any crime, Jolie is now dropping it.

Angelina Jolie is ending her legal battle against the Department of Justice and FBI over documents connected to the alleged 2016 plane incident involving her then-husband Brad Pitt.

Under the anonymous “Jane Doe,” Jolie, 49, had requested in a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) in 2021 that FBI documents about the incident be released to her. Court documents obtained by PEOPLE indicate the Maria star dropped the case on Wednesday, Sept. 25.

The highly redacted documents Jolie had been pursuing detailed an allegedly drunken altercation on Sept. 14, 2016, between Pitt, 60, and his then-wife — which came days before Jolie filed for divorce, ending a relationship that began in 2005.

Their children were reportedly present for the alleged conflict on a private plane that had caused the Los Angeles Department of Child and Family Services and FBI to investigate Pitt. A source said at the time that Pitt became “verbally abusive” and “physical” with one of their kids, which he denied. Later in 2016, the FBI closed its investigation with no charges against Pitt and DCFS also concluded its investigation, concluding no findings of abuse.

Amid the ongoing legal battle over their French vineyard Château Miraval and wine company, Jolie responded to a 2022 lawsuit from her ex with details of the alleged incident, including that Pitt had “choked one of the children and struck another in the face.” A source close to Pitt told PEOPLE at the time, “It’s incredibly sad that she continues to rehash, revise and reimagine her description of an event that happened 6 years ago, adding in completely untrue information.”

[From People]

I don’t know why she dropped this, other than she was tired of being stonewalled by the FBI and she likely achieved some of her goals anyway. It’s also worth noting that back in 2022, Jolie/Jane Doe’s lawyer told Politico that Jolie had been trying to get the FBI records for years without having to file a FOIA action, and the FBI stonewalled her that entire time too. It feels like Angelina has her suspicions that something went down between the FBI and Pitt and both parties are doing the most to cover it up.

Photos courtesy of Cover Images, Backgrid.

Here are more photos of Cardi B in Paris in recent days. She attended multiple Paris Fashion Week shows, and on Friday, she attended the Paris Saint-Germain match. Some of the shows she’s attended in recent days: Vivenne Westwood, Messika, Rick Owens, Mugler, Rabbane and more. Plus, she’s been going to parties. Cardi is definitely giving “happy to be single, at long last” energy. The more Offset rages online, the more Cardi posts fashion stuff on her socials.

When we last checked in on Cardi, she was confirming something – Offset accused her of sleeping with someone else while she was pregnant with their third child, and Cardi responded by tweeting “AND DID.” She also went on IG Live and basically ripped Offset to shreds for his years of cheating and disrespect to their marriage. Offset’s response to all of that was “U will be calling me after couple months u my bm I won.” As in, “you’re my baby-mama, I won.” Cardi was his WIFE. She loved him and had three children with him and he’s throwing that in her face like a f–king clown. Cardi also told that man she regrets marrying him but she doesn’t regret their children:

During her livestreams, Cardi seemingly avoided naming the Migos rapper but spoke directly to him. Cardi, who’s in France for Paris Fashion Week, said “I don’t care” about any other women with whom Offset might be having relations: “I’m too much woman for you. … And I’ve always been too good for you.”

“Nothing surprises me anymore. You’ve done it all, so I don’t care,” she said at a different point in the livestream. “Thank you for my kids, though. All three of them, I don’t regret none of them. But I regret you. I don’t regret my kids; you’re a good daddy. You’re all right.”

“I don’t want you dead because … my kids love you down,” Cardi also said. “So I would never do that. And I really follow street codes.”

Cardi claimed she didn’t want to bring their issues to social media and possibly “turn off” any possible future partners but felt compelled to hop on Instagram because Offset was being “messy” and “petty” “because you’re hurt.”

“Let’s go lick for lick. Let’s go round for round. Let’s go hit for hit,” she said. “I told you: Leave me … alone.”

Cardi also claimed Offset has tried to “threaten” to take what “I worked my ass off for,” seemingly in their divorce proceedings, “because I’m moving on.”

“Now we’re going to court war, right?” she said.

[From USA Today]

Cardi is one of those people I would not want to f–k with in court. She’s got great lawyers and she will fight forever just to make a point. Offset will not come out ahead, but he’s absolutely the type of man who will try to squeeze as much money out of Cardi as he can. Meanwhile, the Toxic Male Podcast Complex has a lot to say about Cardi possibly banging someone else while she was pregnant. Notice that very few women have sh-t to say – it’s because women overwhelmingly feel like “good for you, get yours.” The one thing that’s driving me a little bit crazy is that Cardi is only weeks postpartum and she’s doing all of these couture-changes and parties. I’m sure the baby is with her, but it’s a lot! I hope she’s resting in between shows.

I see dead people…… @rickowensonline pic.twitter.com/jKi8EDJfwR

— Cardi B (@iamcardib) September 28, 2024

Photos courtesy of Cover Images, Backgrid.

Lana del Rey apparently got married to Jeremy Dufrene, an alligator tour guide she has likely only been dating for two months, tops. [Just Jared]
Analysis of the Sussexes’ media strategy in recent weeks. [LaineyGossip]
Jeremy Allen White is now dating Molly Gordon? [Hollywood Life]
Spotlight on male model Franky Cammarata. [Socialite Life]
Malcolm Gladwell enjoys Joe Rogan’s podcast. Huh. [Pajiba]
Katy Perry is in Australia, for reasons. [Go Fug Yourself]
Don’t do this to your brows. [OMG Blog]
OMG, Oprah’s tie situation is bonkers! [RCFA]
Christina Aguilera & JC Chasez reunited (and both look great). [Seriously OMG]
A feud among Southern Charm stars. [Starcasm]
What is a “shut up ring” and how can we avoid it? [Buzzfeed]

Lana Del Rey got married to alligator tour guide Jeremy Dufrene today. pic.twitter.com/BGEfqenUea

— Pop Crave (@PopCrave) September 27, 2024

Even before the Princess of Wales went missing for six months this year, she always had Keen Incognito seasons, where she would seemingly disappear without a trace for weeks, sometimes months, at a time. Traditionally, the Keen Incognito Season features a few “private meetings,” some reported emails or phone calls, the odd tweet. Another feature is that we get “sightings” provided by royal reporters, who were briefed by the palace that Kate was absolutely out in Norfolk or Bucklebury or wherever. I think that’s what’s happening now, especially since we’ve established that Kate is well enough to watch tennis for hours and well enough to travel to Balmoral for a kids-free weekend getaway. We won’t ever see Kate, but we’ll hear about what she’s up to – a private meeting in Windsor! – and we’ll get a tweet. Speaking of:

Congratulations and thank you to @ENBallet and @Sadlers_Wells for the wonderfully powerful, moving and inspiring performance of Akram Khan’s Giselle. Creativity at its best! C pic.twitter.com/YbnMd7j9Pi

— The Prince and Princess of Wales (@KensingtonRoyal) September 26, 2024

What’s a little bit funny about this is… The English National Ballet is not even Kate’s patronage. It used to be Diana’s patronage, then it reverted back to the Crown, and I think QEII was technically patron for years. Then in June of this year, Queen Camilla became patron. Camilla just did her first ballet event earlier this month! Kate is stealing Camilla’s ballet thunder!

Anyway, I’m glad Kate enjoyed a day out to watch some ballet. I find it interesting that she publicized it and put it in a tweet. Curious timing, eh? The whole thing is odd, honestly. I really do wonder if there’s ever going to be any energy towards the idea of “if Kate can watch tennis or ballet or put together a commercial for her marriage, she can do some Zooms with her charities?”

PS… I don’t have the patience to look through months of KensingtonRoyal tweets, but purely going from memory, is this Kate’s first “-C” tweet since William tossed her under the bus for that manipulated Mother’s Day photo?

Photos courtesy of Avalon Red, Cover Images.

Before Prince Harry arrived in London back in May, he contacted his father’s office about a possible meeting while they were both in town. King Charles and/or his courtiers rejected this meeting privately, and Harry issued a public statement saying that he would not see his father due to the king’s “full program this week.” Charles then pranced around a garden party and handed a military appointment to William. Not only that, but Charles went on the attack for weeks, screaming about how Harry should have begged him for a meeting and even then, Charles still would have rejected him because Charles hates Harry and so does Camilla! It was all very childish and chaotic from Buckingham Palace and a reminder that Charles and Camilla do not have the temperament to be in charge of anything. Well, Harry is due in London on Monday for the WellChild Awards. So obviously, Charles and Camilla are making Harry’s visit all about their immature psychodrama.

Camilla wants Charles to skip meeting Harry: King Charles III would like to meet with his son, Prince Harry, when he visits the U.K. next week, but is weighing counsel from advisers, including his wife, that it would be unwise to do so. Queen Camilla wants Charles to skip a meeting with Harry to avoid stress as he fights cancer, one of her friends told The Daily Beast.

Charles plans to be in Scotland during Harry’s visit: However, Charles will be in Scotland next week, The Daily Beast has confirmed, and has no intention of traveling, while Harry is expected to be based in London. It is not impossible, of course, that Harry could travel to Scotland if invited. He is certainly capable of traveling around the U.K.; last time Harry was in the country he spent a night at his mother’s ancestral home, Althorp, and, as The Daily Beast exclusively revealed, visited her grave, which is located on an island on the sprawling country estate.

Of course Harry’s team would not confirm any of this?? Harry’s team would not confirm to The Daily Beast when he is arriving into the U.K., where he is staying, or how long he is planning to be on British soil. The awards ceremony, which honors seriously ill children and is one of Harry’s most important causes, is scheduled for Monday evening.

Charles wants to heal the relationship he destroyed: Meanwhile Charles, reminded of his mortality following his diagnosis with cancer for which he is undergoing grueling treatment, would like to heal the relationship with Harry both for personal reasons and to ease pressure on the monarchy itself, a friend says. The friend said: “The king has an instinctive impulse towards Christian reconciliation, and his cancer diagnosis has only sharpened that. He wants this settled, not just because he loves both his sons, but because it has been so destabilizing for the monarchy.”

The security issue: However the king is understood to feel his hands are tied by the constitutional awkwardness that might arise if Harry were to directly lobby him over his security provision. His son and heir Prince William’s very clear views on the matter of his brother are also part of the king’s calculations about how and when any reconciliation might be effected. Although William sent birthday greetings to Harry recently, the two brothers are completely estranged and no longer speak as a result of William’s fury of what he sees as Harry’s betrayal of him and wife Kate Middleton in his memoir.

Camilla hates Harry: Camilla is said by friends to be one of those who has not encouraged a meeting with Harry, as she does not want her husband to be subjected to unnecessary stress before his trip to Australia in mid-October, ahead of which he is gathering his strength at Birkhall, his retreat in the Scottish Highlands. The friend of Camilla said: “She has been the principal voice urging Charles to slow down and take things easy. The last thing she wants him to do is to get stressed out over a meeting with Harry.”

Camilla is now telling people that she saw Harry in February too: The Daily Beast understands that Camilla was also present at the meeting, marking the first time they had spoken face to face since he cast toxic aspersions on her in his memoir and in interviews promoting it, saying she was prepared to leave “bodies in the street” in her quest to be made queen. Harry did not apologize to her at that encounter for his remarks, The Daily Beast has been told by a friend of Camilla’s.

[From The Daily Beast]

Camilla has been telling lies and briefing the press about Harry’s February visit since the very day it happened. I still believe that it was one of the rare moments that Charles told Camilla to get out, that he wanted to have a private conversation with Harry. Camilla’s behavior indicates as much – she’s still pissed that she was thrown out of the meeting, and she’s been demanding that Charles refuse to see Harry ever since. And now Camilla is huffing about how Harry didn’t apologize to her. WHY WOULD HE? If anything, Harry went a lot easier on her than he could have. Anyway, all of this is about Camilla and what she wants. Charles is too weak to stand up to Camilla AND the courtiers who want to see him isolated and estranged from his son.

Photos courtesy of Cover Images.

Prince Harry was in New York this week for so many high-level meetings and events, some of which were in and around the United Nations. It was a business trip for him, and his business involved The Parents Network, Sentebale, African Parks, The HALO Trust, Travalyst and more. But he apparently also had time for some fun. He stopped by 30 Rock and prerecorded a bit with Jimmy Fallon for the Tonight Show. Spooky season is coming up – or is it already here? – and Fallon is hosting “Tonightmares,” a mini-haunted-house adventure within 30 Rock. Fallon and Prince Harry went through the haunted “maze.” This reminds me so much of Ellen DeGeneres always sending her most-easily spooked celebrity guests through a haunted house too, but I like that Fallon organized this at 30 Rock. The video is very funny and cute:

I love the part where the two young women are like “who was that? Prince Harry, OMG!!” Harry cursed a few times but midway through the haunted maze, he was the one holding Jimmy’s hand and leading him through it. Adorable. I’m sure Harry stole everyone’s thunder over in Salt Island. How dare he have fun while his father has cancer!!

TONIGHT: Prince Harry & Jimmy experience Jimmy Fallon’s Tonightmares! #FallonTonight #Tonightmares pic.twitter.com/lTBgmltlt3

— The Tonight Show (@FallonTonight) September 27, 2024

Photos courtesy of the Tonight Show’s social media.

Late Wednesday, New York City’s Mayor Eric Adams was indicted on federal criminal charges. At the time, the indictment was sealed, but it has since been unsealed. More on that in a moment. On Thursday, federal agents executed a search warrant on Gracie Mansion!! That’s the official home of the NYC mayor. The search warrant was for all of Mayor Adams’ tablets and phones and anything pertaining to Turkey. The country. Because apparently, Mayor Adams was taking bribes from Turkish officials. He faces five federal charges of bribery, fraud and soliciting illegal foreign campaign donations. Here’s the thing: I totally believe he did it and I totally believe the feds have enough evidence on him, but OMG, Donald Trump and Clarence Thomas are RIGHT THERE. Some highlights from the NY Times:

Mayor Eric Adams was defiant on Thursday in the face of five federal charges of bribery, fraud and soliciting illegal foreign campaign donations, insisting he would stay in office and imploring New Yorkers to hear his defense. The indictment, which was unsealed on Thursday morning after a search of the mayor’s official residence, Gracie Mansion, followed an investigation that started in 2021. Prosecutors said the scheme began when he was a top elected official in Brooklyn and continued after he became mayor.

The investigation focused on whether Mr. Adams, 64, had conspired with the Turkish government to receive illegal foreign campaign contributions in exchange for acting on its behalf. Damian Williams, the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York, said that Mr. Adams had been “showered” with gifts that he knew were illegal.

“This was a multiyear scheme to buy favor with a single New York City politician on the rise: Eric Adams,” Mr. Williams said at a news conference. “Year after year, he kept the public in the dark.”

If convicted of all five counts in the indictment, the maximum penalty under law would be 45 years in prison. But under the federal sentencing guidelines, he would likely receive far less.

According to the indictment, Mr. Adams had “sought and accepted improper valuable benefits” since at least 2014, when he was Brooklyn borough president. The benefits included luxury travel — free and discounted Turkish Airlines tickets and free meals and hotel rooms — from wealthy foreigners and at least one Turkish government official, prosecutors said. He traveled on the airline even when it was inconvenient, they said, including a 2017 flight to France from New York that first stopped in Istanbul. Mr. Adams tried to hide the gifts or make it appear as if he had paid for them, according to the indictment. Their value exceeded $100,000, prosecutors said.

In exchange, prosecutors said, Mr. Adams pressured officials at the New York Fire Department to permit a new Turkish consulate building in Manhattan despite safety problems. A Fire Department official overseeing the safety assessment said he was told he would lose his job if he did not follow the order.

[From The NY Times]

You can read the indictment here, the NYT put the full document online and annotated it. I’m not a lawyer, obviously, but from I read, they really do have an abundance of evidence, not just from Adams, but his staffers who acted as go-betweens with Turkish officials. There are extensive electronic receipts. It shows the equal-parts horrifying and hilarious banality of fraud, the bargaining, the sleaze, the fact that they were so stupid to leave all of this documentation of their crimes.

The ultimate Eric Adams thing is that the feds have this message pic.twitter.com/kFumQJF54t

— David Dayen (@ddayen) September 26, 2024

“You are a disgrace for all Black people in this city!”– Eric Adams’s news conference is not going well pic.twitter.com/Gq0Ui8Yeyh

— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) September 26, 2024

Photos courtesy of Avalon Red.

Pablo Larrain’s Maria was just days away from its world premiere in Venice when Netflix purchased the movie and quickly began to promote the hell out of it. During the film festival season, I kept waiting for a teaser trailer to be released, but they only gave us a small clip, a scene where Maria Callas is talking to her butler about doctors and medication. The film shows Maria Callas at different stages of her adult journey – her early fame, her love affair with Aristotle Onassis, her declining later years. Well, Netflix has just released the teaser trailer and I’m completely sold.

Just the shot of Angelina Jolie-as-Maria walking out into the street in Paris in the 1970s was enough for me. In case you’re wondering why this looks so pretty/beautiful, it’s because Pablo Larrain is an amazing director, but he’s also working with cinematographer Edward Lachman. They know how to f–king light a scene properly. This will “complete” Larrain’s triptych of famous-woman bio-pics – he started with Jackie Kennedy, then went to Princess Diana and now he’s ending it with Maria Callas. I hope that Angelina, like Natalie Portman and Kristen Stewart, gets an Oscar nomination under Larrain’s direction.

I also hope that Netflix supports the hell out of this movie. They just announced the timeline too – Maria will have a limited theatrical release starting November 27, then it will be available for streaming on Netflix on December 11. The right time for an Oscar campaign, although they easily could have moved it up a few weeks. I wonder if Angelina will do some major magazine profiles, or maybe even a 60 Minutes interview.

Photos courtesy of Pablo Larrain/Netflix, Backgrid, Avalon Red, Cover Images.