Something interesting is happening right now. Over the weekend, Page Six got the ball rolling with multiple exclusives about Ben Affleck and Kick Kennedy, the 36-year-old actress/socialite and daughter of Robert Kennedy Jr. Page Six’s sources had Ben and Kick hanging out at the Polo Lounge and elsewhere. DeuxMoi had some gossip too, that Ben and Kick were spending time together “since June” and they’ve been spending the night together too. Then People Magazine jumped on the bandwagon and they have their own sources who confirmed the rumors. The pile-on happened very quickly and Ben was getting branded with the “degenerate cheater” tag. So his rep finally went on the record:

Ben Affleck and Kathleen “Kick” Kennedy are not dating, the actor’s rep says.

“There is no truth to any of it. I don’t know if they even know each other,” says Jen Allen, Affleck’s spokesperson, in a statement obtained by PEOPLE on Tuesday, Aug. 27.

Multiple sources recently told PEOPLE that Affleck, 52, and Kick, 36, have been “spending time together,” with one source saying they’d been linked since late spring.

[From People]

What’s funny is that People Mag already ran Jen Allen’s quote as something from an unnamed source, so Jen Allen must have called them back and said “I guess I have to deny it on the record.” Well, even an on-the-record denial isn’t stopping the gossip. No one buys it, not after independent verification from People Mag. Meanwhile, Page Six claims that Ben and Kick were seeing each other back in 2019-2020, before he met Ana de Armas.

Kick Kennedy and Ben Affleck started hanging out even before the Oscar winner began dating “Blonde” star Ana de Armas in March 2020, sources tell Page Six. Affleck and Kennedy have been spotted together at the Polo Lounge at the Beverly Hills Hotel over the past few months, as Page Six revealed. However, it appears they have been pals for longer than initially thought.

“Their friendship has been going on for a while, even before Ana,” one Hollywood insider told Page Six. “When Ben started seeing Ana in 2020 and chose to quarantine with her during Covid, Kick was less than thrilled.”

After things got rocky with wife Jennifer Lopez earlier this year, Affleck got back in touch with Kick, we’re told, and they struck up their friendship again.

Despite multiple sources confirming to People magazine that Affleck, 52, and Kennedy, 36, the daughter of Robert F. Kennedy Jr. have been “spending time together,” a spokesperson for Affleck denied they were dating, telling the outlet Tuesday, “There’s no truth to any of it. I don’t know if they even know each other.”

A Hollywood source who has worked with Affleck, told us, “Affleck would love nothing more than to be part of the Kennedy clan. It’s a dream for any Boston guy … I think he would rather have that than a billion-dollar, red-carpet glam life with J. Lo.”

[From Page Six]

I understand the chokehold the Kennedys have on people in Massachusetts (the Kennedys are a tragic-yet-glam dynasty) but why choose a Kennedy from one of the most rotten branches of the Kennedy tree? Robert Kennedy Jr is trash and you would think people would be wary of even being associated with his children. Anyway, I find it interesting… Ben didn’t want this to come out right now, in the way it did. Ben doesn’t want people to know that he’s been dealing with Kick Kennedy for years.

Photos courtesy of Kick’s IG, Avalon Red, Cover Images and Backgrid.

For years, one of my favorite sub-genres of royal gossip is “royal thunder-stealing.” Thunder-stealing is standard operating procedure in the Windsor clan, as the left-behind Windsors wrongly believed that they would get more attention if they pushed out the most charismatic royals. In recent years, King Charles and Queen Camilla have felt like Prince William and Kate are constantly stealing their thunder, and the whole family is in a constant state of thunder-security because, at any moment, Prince Harry and Meghan could steal their thunder by simply walking outside or making an announcement of future plans. On Monday, Penguin Random House announced the release date for the paperback edition of Prince Harry’s Spare. This, too, stole the left-behinds’ thunder. From a hilariously disturbed column in the Daily Express: “Prince Harry’s Spare update was a calculated move to disrupt the Royal Family’s plans.” LMAO.

It seems no accident that the dates surrounding Prince Harry’s paperback edition of Spare coincide with key moments for the Royal Family. While some might interpret the Duke of Sussex deciding not to add new chapters as an olive branch to smooth over tensions, I find the timing of the announcements highly suspect.

Take, for instance, the decision to announce the release of the paperback on Monday, right as the Royal Family are holidaying at Balmoral. This is time for the Firm to rest and reflect after a rather turbulent year, a brief pause from the public eye. Yet, the announcement feels less like a coincidence and more like a calculated move to disrupt the Royal Family’s plans.

The absence of Prince Harry, Meghan, and their children from this year’s Balmoral gathering, dubbed the “Balmoral summit,” speaks volumes. Insiders suggest the Sussexes are a central topic of discussion, adding an extra layer of tension to their already fraught relationship. So the announcement at this time strikes me as something of a warning shot to say that although they are not physically there with the family at Balmoral, the Spare is still there and always will be!

More pointedly, the paperback’s October release clashes with King Charles’s high-profile appearance at the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting in Samoa – the first he will attend as King. Set to be published in the US on October 22, and the UK just two days later, Spare’s release will undoubtedly cast a shadow over an event of significant importance to the monarch. This is no small matter, especially considering the 75-year-old monarch’s ongoing cancer battle and the effort he’s putting into this trip. To overshadow such a moment suggests more than just poor timing – it hints at an agenda.

The re-release of Spare will inevitably dredge up the book’s bombshell claims, from Prince William’s alleged physical altercation with Harry to the rift between Meghan and Kate. By keeping the contents unchanged, Harry ensures these revelations remain fresh in the public mind, reigniting the drama that has strained his relationship with the family.

[From The Daily Express]

Don’t you understand, the announcement of a paperback edition stole the Windsors’ thunder WHILE THEY’RE ON VACATION. They were just innocently sitting around Balmoral, holding summits about what to do about Prince Harry and Meghan, when BAM, there was news of a paperback from America! Fetch the smelling salts and a royal rota reporter, this simply cannot stand! What’s also funny is that they couldn’t claim that the Sussexes’ Colombian tour stole anyone’s thunder, because the left-behind Windsors were just farting around, doing nothing and trying to avoid the white nationalist riots in England. Good times. As for the paperback coming out during Charles’ big overseas trip… lol. Oh well!

Once again, I have to remind these idiots: if you wanted to control Harry and Meghan’s schedule and have a say in how and when they announce things, you probably should have taken them up on their offer to be half-in the cult.

Photos courtesy of WellChild, CBS screenshots, Avalon Red, Cover Images.

Here are some photos of Angelina Jolie arriving in Italy ahead of the Venice Film Festival premiere of Maria. She stars as Maria Callas in Pablo Larrain’s latest biographical film. Angelina wore a “short-sleeve trench coat” as she arrived in Venice, and Vogue is obsessed with the summer trench and her Mulberry boots. Fingers crossed that Angelina doesn’t promote this film in a variety of sack dresses. Meanwhile, it’s looking pretty certain that Angelina will also go to Canada for the Toronto Film Festival. Not for Maria, but for the film she directed, Without Blood. Not only will she premiere Without Blood at TIFF, she’s also receiving the TIFF Tribute Award. Good!

Angelina Jolie is set to receive the TIFF Tribute Award in Impact Media at the upcoming Toronto Film Festival.

The Oscar-winning actress will be honored on Sept. 8 at the TIFF fundraiser, while also bringing her latest film, Without Blood, to Toronto for a world premiere. Written, directed and produced by Jolie, Without Blood is a war drama based on the Alessandro Baricco novel of the same name and tells the story of a girl’s quest for revenge and healing during a time of conflict. Salma Hayek Pinault and Demián Bichir have lead roles.

Jolie will be feted alongside fellow trophy winners Amy Adams, Jharrel Jerome, Cate Blanchett, Mike Leigh, Durga Chew-Bose, David Cronenberg, Clément Ducol, and Camille and Zhao Tao. TIFF Tribute Award honorees tend to have films in Toronto’s official lineup.

Jolie also brought her earlier films First They Killed My Father and The Breadwinner, which she executive produced, to Toronto for launches.

[From THR]

Jolie fans, I really hope that we have an amazing fall and an amazing awards season. I don’t have a sense of how Without Blood will be received, but the early buzz on Maria is that it will be an awards contender. I think Angelina will probably promote both films concurrently, and it will help if Without Blood gets some critical buzz too. So many red carpets! So many capes and sack dresses! I’m so excited. As for this TIFF award… yeah, they pass these out like candy, but still, it’s nice. I’m glad she’s being honored.

Photos courtesy of Backgrid.

Jenna Ortega covers the September issue of Vanity Fair, all to promote Beetlejuice Beetlejuice, the long-awaited sequel to Tim Burton’s classic comedy. Michael Keaton, Winona Ryder and Catherine O’Hara have returned to their roles, and Jenna was cast perfectly as Winona’s goth daughter. While that’s the film she’s promoting, the bulk of the interview is about Wednesday, the hit Netflix show starring Ortega as Wednesday Addams. She’s filming the second season now in Ireland and it should be out next year… meaning a two-and-half year wait in between seasons? Insane. I enjoyed this interview because I root for Ortega, even if she sometimes says some weird things. She comes across as very sensitive and private. Some highlights:

Her life after ‘Wednesday’ became a monster success: “A majority of the last year and a half has felt very far from me.” She describes the experience almost like a sci-fi thriller: “very dissociative and alien and out-of-body. When people mention my name, it’s almost like my name has been taken from me. Now I just feel like I’m floating and…I’m up for interpretation.”

Her feelings on being a “celebrity”: Celebrity is “absolutely ridiculous. I remember feeling really wrong for resisting it… I think if anybody were in my shoes and reacted to it in a welcoming manner, there’s something severely wrong with you.”

Growing up in La Quinta, California: “I find myself constantly reaching back to what once was… I never had my own room growing up. And now I get to travel the world.”

Stepping foot on the ‘Beetlejuice’ set: “Every time I walked onto that set, I wanted to remember it for the rest of my life. You have Willem Dafoe in a trench coat, sliding down in a back pew, just watching everyone,” she says, while Ryder stood by with her pointy bangs of yore. Then Keaton materialized. “I remember feeling my soul leave my body for a second… And then in between takes, he’s sitting down and drinking his tea.”

At 18 years old, she wanted to be a producer on ‘Wednesday’: “I think it’s natural to be fearful of signing your life away and wanting some sort of agency or wanting confirmation that your voice would be heard. I’m aware of my position as an actor. I know that I’m not in charge…. But I think with someone like Wednesday, who is in every scene, it only makes sense for that person to be that involved in what’s going on behind the scenes because she’s onscreen every second of the project.” She says she was told that it wasn’t common for actors to produce in the first season of a series but that they could revisit the issue in season two. “And then I think a lot of the work that I ended up doing and a lot of the conversations that I was having were more of a producer’s conversations half the time.”

On the major backlash to her claims, last year, that she rewrote ‘Wednesday’ scripts and punched up her dialogue: “To be fair… I think I probably could have been….” Then she hesitates, dangling the longest silence of our interview. “I probably could have used my words better in describing all of that. I think, oftentimes, I’m such a rambler. I think it was hard because I felt like had I represented the situation better, it probably would’ve been received better. Everything that I said felt so magnified…. It felt almost dystopian to me. I felt like a caricature of myself.”

You can’t please everybody: “You’re never going to please everybody, and as someone who naturally was a people pleaser, that was really hard for me to understand. Some people just may not like you…and that’s entirely fine.” In fact, “I got sick of myself last year. My face was everywhere…so it’s like, fair enough, if I were opening my phone and I saw the same girl with some stupid quote or something, I would be over it too.”

The backlash to a young woman standing up for herself: “Women have to be princesses. They have to be elegant and classy and so kind and…then when they’re outspoken, they can’t be tamed and they’re a mess.”

On Wednesday’s Latin heritage: Ortega likes that Wednesday’s Latinness is “not being shoved down your throat. There’s nothing worse than when they have the side Mexican character who’s carrying the flag on their shoulder. We’re so much more than that.”

Her father is Mexican-American & her mother is Puerto Rican: “But then, oftentimes, you’re just not good enough. Because I wasn’t born in a Spanish-speaking country, I know people have a hard time connecting with me.” Ortega doesn’t speak Spanish fluently, nor does her father, but it was her mother’s first language. “I think there’s a part of me that carries a bit of shame. For a second I was almost nervous to speak about my family’s background because…I feel like I was made to feel like it wasn’t…” She stops short before saying “valid” or some variation thereof. “But also, something that I’m learning is…it’s not my job to carry the weight of everybody who’s ever had that experience.”

[From Vanity Fair]

The thing about asking to be a producer on Wednesday in the first season, when she was only 18 years old, is so bold. It reminds me of an interview I read with Minnie Driver, where she was talking about her awe for the younger actresses standing up for themselves and stepping into a producer’s role really early in their careers. Minnie was like – my generation never did that and we should have, and it’s badass that the girls are doing it now. Anyway, Jenna is now a producer on Wednesday, as of Season 2. As for the Latin heritage stuff… I didn’t know that she doesn’t speak Spanish. If it wasn’t spoken at home, then yeah, she wouldn’t have picked it up. And I like that she represents the diversity of Latina experiences. Not every Latin actress has to play a trope or stereotype. There are goth Latinas. There are nerd Latinas. There are Latinas who don’t speak Spanish.

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Vanity Fair (@vanityfair)

Cover & IG courtesy of Vanity Fair.

It’s really crazy to watch Francis Ford Coppola destroy any and all goodwill. Coppola is currently hyping his long-gestating passion project, Megalopolis. He’s been talking about this fakakta film for years, trying to get financing for it and trying to get actors to sign on to it. He finally made it and the film premiered at Cannes to lukewarm reviews and a flurry of bad press. There were credible and widespread reports that Coppola mistreated women during the production. The mistreatment was… Coppola being way too “friendly” and “handsy,” trying to kiss female extras and being generally sleazy. In a new Rolling Stone interview, Coppola didn’t do much to dispute the stories:

In a May report by The Guardian, multiple anonymous crew members said that Coppola incorporated “old school” tactics to “try to get [female extras] in the mood” for a nightclub scene. That included allegedly hugging and kissing actresses during takes.

“You’re talking about the Guardian piece, which is totally untrue. If you read that piece, you’ll realize that whoever the sources were — and I honestly don’t know who the sources were — it’s the same people who provided quotes for that Hollywood Reporter piece that said all these people were fired or resigned, and that there was a mass exodus, all of that,” Coppola said, citing the below-the-line team leaving in 2022. “And the truth of the matter is, they were looking for some sort of dirt. The young women I kissed on the cheek, in regards to the New Year’s scene, they were young women I knew.”

Coppola continued, “It’s all so ridiculous. Look at the timing of that article. It’s right before we’re about to premiere the film at Cannes. They’re just trying to damage the picture.”

Previous sources told Variety that writer/director Coppola was unprofessional during the scene in question and ruined takes to touch the actresses in frame. One of the sources claimed that Coppola announced on a microphone, “Sorry, if I come up to you and kiss you. Just know it’s solely for my pleasure.”

[From IndieWire]

Again, I believe the industry reporting about Coppola’s lecherous behavior on set. “I knew those women” is not a defense when women are coming out and saying that he made them uncomfortable. “They’re trying to ruin the film” is also not a valid defense when his behavior is the problem. Speaking of Coppola’s problematic behavior, it turns out that he’s become one of those crusaders against all things “woke.”

Francis Ford Coppola told Rolling Stone that his intention with “Megalopolis” was to make a movie that could not be deemed “some woke Hollywood production.” The cast includes controversial actors such as Jon Voight, who has turned heads in Hollywood for his conservative views and outspoken support for Donald Trump, and Shia LaBeouf, who was accused of sexual assault in 2021.

“What I didn’t want to happen is that we’re deemed some woke Hollywood production that’s simply lecturing viewers,” Coppola said. “The cast features people who were canceled at one point or another. There were people who are archconservatives and others who are extremely politically progressive. But we were all working on one film together. That was interesting, I thought.”

As far as working with LaBeouf, who has barely starred in any movies since accusations surfaced against him, Coppola praised the actor while admitting things were tense with him.
Popular on Variety

“Shia [LaBeouf] really took to it,” Coppola said. “I had no experience working with him prior to this, but he deliberately sets up a tension between himself and the director to an extreme degree. He reminds me of Dennis Hopper, who would do something similar, and then you’d say, ‘Just go do anything,’ and then they go off and do something brilliant.

[From Variety]

This will be used as an example, for years to come, of how a generational talent ruined all of his industry goodwill by making a sh-tty movie and going all-in on the losing side of several culture wars all at once. “Me Too was stupid, I should be able to do what I want with women” and “I’m going to hire a credibly accused domestic abuser, that will show everyone!” And then when everything he touches flops hard, he’ll blame “woke culture.” What a disappointment.

Photos courtesy of Avalon Red.

Embed from Getty Images

I remember, right after the Russian invasion of Ukraine, when Russian citizens claimed that their access to most social media platforms and messaging apps was cut off or strongly discouraged by the Kremlin. The Kremlin basically told everyone that they could only use Telegram, a messaging app developed by shadowy Russian tech billionaire Pavel Durov. I’ve never used Telegram, although I’ve heard stories about how it’s grown in popularity with Europeans and Russians. Well, over the weekend, Pavel Durov was arrested in France for all of the criminal sh-t being done by Telegram’s users. This is a huge story in Europe and Russia and it’s a huge story for any tech billionaire who believes he should not be held liable for what happens on his platform (cough cough Elon Musk cough). So I was reading this CNN story about Durov and did you know this guy claims to have 100 children??

Pavel Durov is a lot of things to a lot of people. Programming prodigy. Billionaire entrepreneur. Kremlin stooge. Free-speech fighter. Biological father to at least 100 kids.

Durov, the elusive founder of Telegram who was detained in France over the weekend, cuts the figure of a mysterious, globe-trotting tech bro with Mark Zuckerberg’s prodigiousness, Jack Dorsey’s bizarre lifestyle habits and Elon Musk’s libertarian streak – plus a similar obsession with pronatalism and fathering children. Durov said in July that he had fathered more than 100 children thanks to sperm donations he had made over the past 15 years.

Worth an estimated $9.15 billion according to Bloomberg and armed with an array of passports and residences, Durov has for a decade lived a life without borders, a man on an often-shirtless journey to secure the freedom of communication from the prying eyes of governments, democratically elected or otherwise.

Now, Durov’s legal trouble is drudging up an old debate, pitting Telegram’s end-to-end encryption, which keeps communications between users secure even from the company’s employees, against the security concerns of various governments and the European Union’s campaign to rein in big tech.

[From CNN]

Durev built Telegram back when Mark Zuckerberg bought WhatsApp, because Durev didn’t think anything on the market was good enough. Telegram’s double-blind encryption system means that it’s the messaging app of choice for terrorists, despots, coup plotters and, as always, pedophiles. And of course this guy is a “pronatalist.” That’s in the grand tradition of creepy, shadowy, authoritarian-supporting tech billionaires being obsessed with repopulating the earth with their “seed.” I can’t believe sperm banks let this guy donate that much. Ew. I really hope he doesn’t have that many children out there. It’s some Boys From Brazil bullsh-t.

Embed from Getty Images

Photos courtesy of Getty.

For a couple of years now, the bottom has dropped out of the podcast industry. Circa 2019-20, everybody was getting a lucrative podcasting deal, tens of millions of dollars were being thrown around for exclusive podcasts. Then the industry retracted, big-time, and only a handful of podcasts are getting those kinds of seven-figure and eight-figure deals these days. So this is sort of a throwback, but I understand why it’s happening. Since 2022, Travis and Jason Kelce have hosted the New Heights podcast. They talk about everything, from football to their relationships to pop culture and everything else. New Heights was a huge success before Travis began dating Taylor Swift last year, but the pod has definitely gone next-level ever since the Swifties became religious listeners (alongside the gossip & entertainment media). Now that Jason is retired from the NFL, people wondered if New Heights would continue or what would happen. Well, the Kelce brothers have struck a NINE-FIGURE deal with Amazon.

Wondery has snapped up the rights to the podcast New Heights with Jason and Travis Kelce. The podcast studio, owned by Amazon, has signed a distribution and an exclusive, ad-sales representation deal with the podcast from the two brothers turned NFL stars. The deal size was described as being in the nine figures and “very competitive,” according to a person familiar with the matter.

As part of the multi-year deal, Wondery will have global distribution rights to all audio and video episodes of the podcast, the podcast’s back catalog and the right to create international audio adaptations of the podcast.

The brothers launched the podcast in 2022, with Wave Sports + Entertainment, with behind-the-scenes looks at their football careers and their own lives, as well as insights on the season and pop culture. While Jason, then a center for the Philadelphia Eagles of the National Football League, and Travis, a tight end for the Kansas City Chiefs, were already a draw, the podcast entered a new level of the cultural zeitgeist when Travis started dating Taylor Swift and began talking about life with the pop star on the podcast.

New Heights typically ranks as the top sports podcast on Apple and Spotify during football season, and has recently won Ambies, Webbys, and Shorty awards, in addition to podcast of the year at iHeartMedia’s 2024 iHeartPodcast Awards.

[From THR]

This is what I mean when I describe Travis as in it to win it. While his career will be just fine if he and Taylor break up, he understands the enormous heat score that comes with being Taylor’s boyfriend. Again, New Heights was already a success pre-Traylor, but I do not believe that Amazon would be shelling out nine-figures on the Kelce Bros’ pod without the Taylor connection. This is all happening in addition to Travis entering the acting world AND hosting a game show AND all of his other lucrative side-gigs and sponsorships.

Photos courtesy of YouTube and Backgrid.

I only became aware of Jools Lebron, the “very demure, very mindful” TikToker last week, thanks to RuPaul featuring her on Jimmy Kimmel Live when Ru was guest-hosting. (Millennial here, with the social media savvy of a Boomer.) Like I said at the time, I thought Jools nailed her TV moment; she was funny, quick, and on brand. And Ru isn’t the only celeb who’s taking notice of Ms. Lebron, as J.Lo and none other than Snoopy have nodded to her in their socials. While Jools is not new to TikTok, the “demure” posts only began in early August. It’s crazy how much she’s taken off in just a month! But now there’s a hitch: someone else has filed to trademark “very demure, very mindful,” seemingly out of Jools’ hands. Jools was so distraught about it, she even posted a video where she described feeling like she messed up and “didn’t try hard enough.” You know what’s not very demure? Stealing someone else’s catchphrase…

Trans content creator Jools Lebron, who popularised the “very demure, very mindful” TikTok trend, was left in tears after someone else reportedly filed to trademark her viral phrase.

TMZ reported on 23 August that a person under the name of Jefferson Bates, from Washington, filed to trademark Lebron’s phrase, “very demure, very mindful”.

According to court documents obtained by the outlet, the trademark is intended for use in marketing, advertising, and promotion.

In a since-deleted TikTok video which saw the star crying, Lebron said that the situation was “really f***ing me up”, adding that she “invested so much money and time into this”.

The makeup mogul said in the 24 August clip: “I feel like I did it wrong, I feel like I didn’t try hard enough, and I just feel like I dropped the ball.

“I feel like I f***ed up, and someone else has it now,” she said of the trademark. “And I don’t even know what I could have done better because I didn’t have the resources.”

PinkNews has contacted a representative of Jools Lebron for a comment on the matter.

The TikTok star’s success began when she posted a selfie video on the platform earlier this month, satirically telling her followers how to act “mindful” and “cutesy” when going to work.

“You see how I do my makeup for work? Very demure. Very mindful. I don’t come to work with a green-cut crease. I don’t look like a clown when I go to work. I don’t do too much. I’m very mindful while I’m at work. You see how I look very presentable? The way I came to the interview is the way I go to the job,” she said.

The TikToker popularised the phrase on the social media site, even catching the attention of Penn Badgley to Snoopy. After experiencing viral fame, Lebron previously announced that she now has the money to pay for her gender-affirming care.

“Hey, maybe you should make the videos. Because one day I was playing cashier and making videos on my break and now I’m flying across countries to host events and I’m gonna be able to finance the rest of my transition,” she said in a TikTok video. “I finally said it without crying.”

[From PinkNews]

Oh honey, don’t beat yourself up so much! And I say that as someone who’s spent a lot of her life beating herself up. (But it’s always so much easier to tell someone else not to do it, funny that.) Jools has since resumed creating very demure, very mindful TikToks, so I’m hoping that means her mood has lifted. And she does have reason to be optimistic: from my one-hour online degree in US trademarking, I’ve learned that the first person to file is not necessarily the first person to be granted the trademark. Get this, kids, in America you can use a trademark before tending to the legal bits (the filing), and generally be granted first dibs. So, like squatter’s rights? In any event, I’d say Jools has a very strong case to make of having used the trademark in a demonstrably public way, ahead of anyone else. But just to be certain, I’d love to see one of her celebrity admirers hook Jools up with the resources to get proper representation. Please people, I’m invested now! Anyone who gives us the perfection of a video titled “How I come out of a weekend depression in a demure manner” needs to be protected AT ALL COSTS.

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Jimmy Kimmel Live (@jimmykimmellive)

Jools LeBron, the creator who popularized “demure,” shares she’s unable to launch merch because her viral phrase was already trademarked:

“I wanted this to do so much for my family and provide for my transition and I just feel like I dropped the ball.” pic.twitter.com/FxTVHfb6Lo

— Pop Crave (@PopCrave) August 24, 2024

For the past month, there’s been a lot of talk about what will happen in Balmoral as the left-behind royals gather at the Scottish castle for their annual summer holiday. Prince William and Kate apparently arrived at Balmoral late last week, and they were seen driving to church on Sunday. King Charles, Queen Camilla and Prince Andrew are also in Balmoral right now, and other royals are probably there this week too. So, it’s the perfect moment for a “summit.” A summit about the future of the monarchy, a summit which will reportedly be about “what do we do about the Sussexes?” Five-plus years later, they still believe that Prince Harry will come crawling back to them and/or that Harry’s titles should be removed. So what else is on the agenda of this family summit? Apparently, they’re going to decide that Zara and Mike Tindall need to step in and help out Prince William and Kate.

Zara and Mike Tindall are facing urgent calls to help “relieve Prince William and Princess Kate”, according to inside sources. King Charles, 75, and Queen Camilla, 77, held a summit at Balmoral Castle earlier this week to discuss the future of the Royal Family.

In 2020, Meghan Markle and Prince Harry both stepped back as senior royals which severely disrupted the set-in-stone plans for King Charles’s future vision of the monarchy. Coupled with Prince Andrew’s departure and this year’s health crises that have rocked three senior members of the Royal Family, the King and Queen are likely holding crunch talks to secure the stability of the monarchy.

Sources have revealed that one of the main focuses of the summit was the next generation of royals, signalling a strategic shift in focus away from the Duke and Duchess of Sussex. An insider told The Express: “The strategy now is to move away from focusing on what the Sussexes are doing and place an emphasis on the next generation of royals.”

This indicates a renewed effort to ensure the monarchy’s legacy is secured by the younger members of the Royal Family. While much attention has been on Prince William, Princess Kate, and their children, the discussions at Balmoral also explored roles for other royal family members, including Zara and Mike Tindall’s children. The royal couple share three children, Mia, 10, Lena, 6, and Lucas, 3. Although not in direct line to the throne, their involvement could be significant for the monarchy’s image and presence, according to the insider.

They added: “The future of the Royal Family doesn’t just hinge on the Wales family, but also on other members of the Royal Family that hold a visible profile in this country and around the world. It’s all about building a brand and the family recognises that.”

[From GB News]

“It’s all about building a brand and the family recognises that.” In just a few short years, we’ve gone from courtiers insisting that the Windsors are the “gold-standard brand” to courtiers publicly begging the Tindalls to step up and help out the lazy heir and his wife. The truth is, the Windsors ARE a brand and during QEII’s reign, the brand was good and solid for decades. The Sussexit damaged the brand in ways which are still being felt today for the Windsors. It’s a fundamental thing: the way Harry and Meghan were mistreated, disregarded and punished did more to hurt Brand Windsor on a global scale than any republican movement. What we’ve also seen for years is that the Windsors are incapable of reverse-engineering the Sussexit or throwing fresh meat at the problem. That’s why there’s this constant talk of “the York princesses should step up” or “Louise needs to be a working royal” or, now, “the Tindalls should help out.”

Photos courtesy of Backgrid, Avalon Red, Cover Images.

Since Lady Louise Windsor turned 18 years old, conversations have been happening every three months or so about whether Louise would “join the Firm” and become a working royal. The royalist press has been itching for Louise to “provide some youth and glamour” to the dying institution. Hilariously, Louise’s parents do not seem to want that at all, and neither does King Charles or Queen Camilla. Please, Charles and Camilla are so self-absorbed that they never want anyone younger to get any attention. Louise is currently a sophomore at St. Andrew’s in Scotland, and she’s apparently thinking about what will be next for her after graduation. Apparently, she’s considering enlisting in the military??

Lady Louise Windsor is one of the most crucial royals in the future of the British monarchy – though you may not have noticed it. The studious niece of King Charles, 20, is seldom seen at royal events with her family as she prioritises her studies and keeps a lower profile – but as she’s set to be considering a career in the military, her nickname as The Firm’s ‘secret weapon’ may soon materialise.

Lady Louise, whose parents are Prince Edward and Duchess Sophie, is said to have ‘fallen in love’ with army cadets alongside her university degree at St Andrews – much like her father did a generation earlier.

A source told The Sun: ‘She talks about being very keen on a career in the military, serving the King and country. She is all about the Army Cadets and has fallen in love with it.’

If the 20-year-old royal, who has maintained a low profile during her university days, goes down the military path, she will be the first female royal since her late grandmother, Queen Elizabeth II, to do so.

Eighth in line to the throne, she is currently in her second year at the University of St Andrews studying English and has reportedly said on her LinkedIn page that she is interested in pursuing a career in ‘the military, diplomacy or law’.

Thus far, Lady Louise has ensured her studies come first as she completes her degree – missing out on two Easter Sunday services in a row as she stays in Edinburgh.

Nonetheless, the 20-year-old royal delights fans with every appearance – whether it’s her obvious enthusiasm for horse riding and all things equestrian, or her uncanny resemblance to her mother. As far back as 2021, she was dubbed the royal family’s ‘secret weapon’ thanks to her popularity with royal fans.

[From The Daily Mail]

I didn’t catch the fact that Louise has skipped the past two Easter services in Windsor, preferring to stay in Scotland. I thought Louise simply wasn’t invited to church during King Charles’s reign. That’s interesting and maybe it speaks to Louise’s reticence to play the same games as her parents. Same with enlisting in the army – it could be her way of getting the hell away from the whole royal system. We’ll see if she really follows through. But it’s interesting… for years, the royalists have demanded that Louise become a working royal ASAP and she’s like “nope, not doing it.” Louise did go to Trooping this year though.

Photos courtesy of Avalon Red, Cover Images.