Backstage kiss????from an #unapologeticbitch ??#rebelheart

A photo posted by Madonna (@madonna) on Mar 17, 2015 at 9:23pm PDT

I don’t understand why so many of Madonna’s Instagrams are such poor quality. Huh. Anyway, Madonna and Ellen DeGeneres have been making news all week, I guess. I’ve been ignoring it, but I guess I can’t anymore. Madonna appeared on The Ellen Show to shill her album, and wouldn’t you know? Justin Bieber also stopped by. Just so Madonna could flirt with him. In this clip, Ellen, Justin and Madge played “Never Have I Ever.”

It was cute. Madonna and Justin sort of treated each other gently, right? And Madonna’s voice seems especially soft these days. Not that she’s ever been shrill or a screamer or anything, but she definitely seems… softer, right?

Meanwhile, Madge did Us Weekly’s 25 Things You Don’t Know About… feature this week. Us Weekly has only revealed a preview, but it’s already making headlines. Madge says she’s never met Pres. Obama, she’s sick of “Material Girl,” she hates mushrooms, and she loves Drake. She told Us Weekly: “The lifelong ambition I still want to fulfill is to go on a dream date with Drake – and only kiss him.”

Last thing: Madonna finally commented on the ongoing Dolce & Gabbana controversy. She used to be the face of Dolce & Gabbana and she’s been close to the designers for years. She posted one of her old D&G campaign photos with this message:

All babies contain a soul however they come to this earth and their families. There is nothing synthetic about a soul!! So how can we dismiss IVF and surrogacy? Every soul comes to us to teach us a lesson. God has his hand in everything even technology! We are arrogant to think Man does anything on his own. As above so below! Think before you speak.,,,,,,,,,,,??#livingforlove

[From Instagram]

So there you go.

Photos courtesy of Madonna’s Instagram.

Jon Cryer has a new memoir coming out next month. I suppose he wanted to get his side of the story out now that “Two and a Half Men” has finally, mercifully wrapped. The book is called So That Happened and The Hollywood Reporter has an exclusive preview. It’s long and we’ll only be including a few parts here, but it’s a fun, easy read so go there if you’d like to see more.

THR has an excerpt in which Cryer explains his side of Charlie Sheen’s 2009-2011ish breakdown. Cryer tried to walk a delicate line between being a supportive friend and recognizing Sheen’s behavior for the drug-addled, abusive meltdown that is was. He shares/paraphrases some texts that Sheen sent him right after Sheen was arrested for abusing his then-wife, Brooke Mueller, over the holidays in Aspen in 2009. In his messages to Cryer, Sheen always acts like everything is fine. Cryer’s inner monologue is the best. Maybe he had a great ghostwriter, but his dry, self-effacing humor comes across well. Here are some of the best parts, including one in which he admits hiring a hooker, at Sheen’s insistence, to help him get through a rough divorce.

Charlie asked him to hide a bunch of vanilla porn for him
One day during the first season of Two and a Half Men, I got a knock on my trailer door. It was Charlie — my trailer was next to his — and he seemed panicked.

“Dude! Dude! I need your help.” “Sure thing,” I said and ended the cellphone call I was on. “What’s going on?”

He handed me a heavy shopping bag. “Denise is coming over,” he said, “and I need you to hide something for me.” Oh, boy, I thought. If this is drug paraphernalia …

“Is it legal?” I asked. “What? Yeah, oh, yeah. It’s legal. Hey, thanks.” He left, and I had to look.

By legal, he meant barely legal. The bag was filled to the brim with porn.

Curiosity getting the best of me, I had to find out what kind of porn captivates Charlie Sheen, what decadence frightens him into having me squirrel it away for him. Clowns? Golden-shower pictorials? German scat porn starring Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke? I was prepared for the weirdest, but it really was all pretty tame, some of it just topless mags. Really, if this was the worst I’d have to deal with regarding Charlie’s vices, bring on the bags of porn for me to hide

He hired a prostitute from a site Charlie recommended
I was in a bad state right after my divorce, and I certainly didn’t feel dateable. I was an emotional basket case. What good was I to any woman I might have interest in? I decided I might as well pay someone for company and certain intimate pleasures so that I could at least get my equilibrium back with the opposite sex.

Charlie suggested a few online purveyors he occasionally used, as this was when prostitution was gaining a foothold on the Internet. He and I had different tastes, so I didn’t go with his exact recommendations, but my forays into prostitution were about as awkward as you might imagine.

My forays into prostitution were about as awkward as you might imagine. I went with an out-call for my first try, which means they come over to your house. My chosen vendor drove a white BMW and sported a sexy Finnish accent. It was really a very friendly experience, maybe because the act of having sex is quite the conversational icebreaker. The next time, I went to her place, which probably wasn’t really her place. We sat down, tried to make small talk and halfheartedly stumbled into a conversation about recent fluctuations in the stock market. Somehow I ended up spending 25 minutes of my hour helping her with financial planning.

How Charlie responded to him after Charlie’s arrestfor spousal battery
[I] read that… “Carlos Irwin Estevez” has been arrested in Aspen, Colo., for spousal battery [of third wife Brooke Mueller]. Alarmed and freaked out, I texted him: Dude, my thoughts are with you. If you need to talk, give a call; if you’ve got bigger problems, call me when you get back.

Charlie texted back: Thanks bro. Yikes — f— me, wut a bad day … I’m flying home tonite. I’ll try to call over the weekend. Shower rape was bad but the food was okay. Hair and makeup for mug shot got there too late.

He followed that with: And I had same bail bondsman as Kobe. … No joke …

Charlie’s manager, Mark Burg, called me to say that any statement of support I could offer up would be great. I told him I would be happy to but that it sounded like Charlie wasn’t sober anymore, and I hoped he’d get on track again. Situations like this are rough on your sense of friendship and loyalty, because the allegations are serious, yet you know Charlie and Brooke are a drug-troubled pair, and Charlie’s your longtime friend who was proud of his sobriety, but that doesn’t mean he didn’t do something to her, and you should give a woman the benefit of the doubt when she’s been abused, and oh, boy…

How Charlie parlayed his arrest into a massive raise
In February I got a knock on my trailer door one day, and it was Chuck Lorre. I invited him in, and he said, “Jon, can you talk to Charlie? I hear he’s going off the rails.” Chuck himself is a recovering alcoholic and open and honest about it. This was such a sincere plea that I knew I had to consider it. “I can try,” I told him.

The next day, though, Charlie went into rehab, so we never got to have that conversation. Charlie did, however, have a different kind of productive conversation — with Warner Bros. Despite falling off the wagon, a rocky marriage, looming felony charges and possible time behind bars, he managed to secure a massive raise [to $1.8 million an episode], fully three times what I was being paid. I immediately began contemplating a series of well-publicized drunken brawls in retirement homes or possibly leading cops on a destructive car chase just prior to my next contract negotiation.

[From The Hollywood Reporter]

There’s more in the Hollywood Reporter, including the fact that Charlie used to show Cryer vag pics of the girls he was dating. Cryer also accidentally ended up dating a woman who used to date Charlie. After Charlie told him this (with some trepidation) he dumped her. I’m sure there were more reasons why Cryer broke up with the woman, but it sounds like he was more pissed off that she never told him she used to date Charlie. Charlie said it didn’t work out with that particular lady because she wasn’t down for a threesome with him and another woman.

Cryer has even more funny anecdotes, and he comes across as a decent guy despite the hooker story. I like what he said about how “you should give a woman the benefit of the doubt when she’s been abused.” To me that was the takeaway from this story, and that explained a lot about why he kept largely quiet during Charlie’s meltdown. Incidentally, Cryer did sort-of say something about Charlie when everything was going down. Back in February, 2011, he tweeted “It’s too sad! Sorry guys, that you must hear so bad news! I’m also shocked!” In response, Charlie went on one of those UStream video rants he was doing at the time. He called Cryer a “turncoat” and a “troll” and faulted him for not reaching out. Cryer then went on Conan and joked that he was a troll. He said “Those words were really painful to me, for many reasons. Not the least of which is…um…I’m sorry, this is really hard for me. I can’t even believe I’m saying this. The fact is, I AM a troll.” It was funny and he handled all that crazy business very well.

Jon Cryer is shown with his new wife in 2014 and with his daughter and wife in 2013. Header photo is from 2009. Credit: WENN, FameFlynet and CBS

Remember when Katie Holmes was a ninja? How she left Tom Cruise without Tom Cruise knowing? Secret cell phones and lawyers undercover and a new security team, all in place well before she blindsided him: I’m leaving you.

Then it was every day paps with Suri in New York, part protection …      

Eva Mendes spoke to Extra yesterday, because for some reason, Eva is back to talking to the press in a big way. For much of 2014, Eva went radio silent. We found out later that she went underground as soon as she started showing with her pregnancy, although we didn’t learn about the pregnancy until she was like seven months along. Before her pregnancy, Eva was more pap-friendly, and she played the game of “not talking about Ryan Gosling while still making references to him constantly.” Well, that’s what she’s reverted back to. And during her Extra interview, she talked about her style – she prefers dresses to pants – and her theory on how to keep her man happy.

Motherhood is putting a lot of things into perspective for Eva Mendes, including just how appreciative she is for her own mother. The actress revealed that her sleepless nights and long days with her baby girl Esmeralda can be grueling, but she also confesses that it’s made her praise her mom that much more.

“Now I understand so much, my mother’s never gotten more ‘I love you so much mommy’ texts, I mean, randomly… ya, I get it now,” she told Extra during an interview, and adds that although the 6-month-old sleeps through the night now (yay!), there are still a few nights when baby Esme throws mama for a loop.

“But you never know, right, something random can happen and she’s just suddenly not sleeping through the night and you’re like, wait, I thought we were sleeping through the night, what’s up?!” She laughed, “Why does it always happen at three or four in the morning?!”

Mendes also revealed her secret rule to keeping one of Hollywood’s hottest leading men happy at home—and unfortunately, it may be a tough pill to swallow for some of us. Most of us. “You can’t do sweatpants… ladies, number one cause of divorce in America, sweatpants, no!”

[From E News]

Are you kidding me? “You can’t do sweatpants… ladies, number one cause of divorce in America!” If sweatpants are causing divorces, maybe we should rethink MARRIAGE entirely. While she said it in a joking manner, I get the sense that she really does feel that she “can’t” wear sweatpants. Because she’s all about “pleasing her man” or whatever. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying any woman is a horrible person for putting in some effort with their style or trying to look nice for their husband/SO. But there are times when sweatpants are awesome. There are times when a woman wants to hit the “off” switch and not feel the need to “look cute” for her significant other and she should be able to do that without it being a divorceable offense.

Oh, and all of this comes from a woman who thinks turbans are the height of sophistication.

View image | gettyimages.com

View image | gettyimages.com

Photos courtesy of Getty, Fame/Flynet.

Alison! Happy 40th Birthday from Dominique! Wishing you continued youth at heart this decade. By request, here are shots I’ve yet to post of Idris Elba and Sam Heughan.

And for Emily who has taken matters into her own hands – Happy Birthday! Stephen Amell and Robbie Amell are atta…      

Here are some more photos of Kate out and about yesterday in England. Polka dots! I still don’t care for them, but I still have to give her props for making public appearances, especially since we were being told a month ago that Kate would be winding down her public schedule. There’s a rumor (?) that she’s going to be making some kind of public appearance tomorrow, and she’s also confirmed – with Prince William – for three events on March 27th. This second pregnancy has been so different from her first one, hasn’t it? When she was pregnant with George, she couldn’t wait to wind down her meager schedule. People Mag also had a glowing story about Kate’s “magic dust” charisma during this visit to Woolwich – go here to read.

As for when Kate is actually due, before yesterday, I had only heard “whispers” from various royal sources. Some claimed end of April, some claimed it could even be beginning of May. But while Kate was out yesterday, she confirmed her due date (sort of) to a commoner:

Prince George will be a big brother sooner than later! Kate Middleton revealed that she is expecting her second child to arrive by the “mid-to-end” of April.

The Duchess of Cambridge broke the news to volunteers at Brookhill Children’s Centre in Woolwich, where she attended a coffee breakfast before watching a training session and visiting an on-site nursery. “I told her she is beautiful and that she’s got a tiny little bump,” volunteer Christie Osborne, 49, told reporters following Middleton’s visit. “I asked when her baby is due and she said mid-to-end of April.”

While Middleton revealed her due date, she did not reveal the sex of her second child.

[From E! News]

Crap, mid-to-late April means that The Great Kate Wait 2.0 is probably going to start on April 10 and she’ll give birth on April 29th and it will be a total clusterwhoops for gossip coverage AGAIN. I mean, I understand that she doesn’t want to give out the exact due date and she’s probably just repeating what her doctors told her anyway. I’m not blaming her – I’m blaming the crazy media overload that will accompany this news.

As for the sex of the baby… so many people think she’s having a girl this time. It was well known that William sort of hoped they would have a girl for the first pregnancy, but Kate “did her duty” and provided a male heir. So she has pretty good luck. I think she probably is having a girl. As for the name… I’d put $5 on something like Alexandra Elizabeth Diana. Or Victoria Diana Elizabeth. Something like that.

Photos courtesy of WENN, Fame/Flynet.

Dear Gossips,

There was a LOT of Katie Holmes in Gossip yesterday. Like on top of what seemed like confirmation that she and Jamie Foxx are together, she posted a dance video to Instagram (which Maria covered in Smutty Social Media) and TMZ was all over her too…

Did that seem accid…      

Terry Crews is like a giant fountain of energy wrapped in a blanket of charisma. Terry’s enjoyed plenty of success, but he’s currently killing it as a sensitive tough guy on Brooklyn Nine-Nine. It’s also difficult to forget those Old Spice ads from days past.

Terry is an unabashed feminist. Last year, he published a memoir called Manhood, which detailed his awakening to the need for gender equality. Along the way, he also stomped all over the traditional clichés of masculinity. Terry has a new interview with Dame magazine where he covers so much stuff — his feminine side, the misogyny of sports culture, and how male pride is a terrible thing. Oh, and he believes 50 Shades is truly dangerous:

Embracing his feminine side: “One thing I love, and that I’m starting to understand more, is that we really are both. Every man and every woman has both sexes in them. As manly as I am, with a one chromosome difference, I’m a woman. We have to embrace the duality that we are. When you’re in touch with that feminine side, you can empathize, along with having the strength. You become protective of people who are being wronged. When you’re too manly, there’s no grace, there’s no empathy. It’s all judgment. When you embrace either side of who you are, if you’re a woman and you embrace that manly part of you, or if you’re a man and you embrace that female part of you, it makes you a really whole, wonderful person.”

Misogyny, sports culture & 50 Shades: “Coming up in the sports culture, I saw it was nothing for guys to say things like, ‘Oh, you know she wanted it.’ I knew guys who had the attitude of, ‘You know you shouldn’t have walked out the door looking like that, girl,’ thinking they had the right to feel on her or to rape her, because of what she was wearing. Once I realized that I was part of that culture, I knew that I had to change it. This is the truth — thinking is the hardest thing you can ever do. For example, 50 Shades — can you just think about what it’s saying? Every art form has a message, and the message I’m getting from 50 Shades is that it’s OK to dominate and control women. And not only is it OK, it’s sexy. And even worse, deep inside, she wants it. That’s the most dangerous mind-set you can have, and our mind-set will determine where we end up. We can do something about this. I’m very optimistic because right now, we have more ways to go than we did before. Before, as a man, it was that Mad Men type of misogyny or nothing.”

On male pride: “My message to all men is that you have to kill pride. You’ve been taught that pride is a manly thing, that pride is a good thing. But the problem with pride is that it stops you from growth. When you’re so proud that you won’t change, you’ve got problems. Male pride causes wars; millions of people have died because of male pride, because one man would not back down. Male pride will say, ‘I’d rather blow up my whole family than have everyone look at me as though I’ve lost.’ That is so dangerous. I go back to the biblical story of Solomon. I look at male pride in that respect: a man who is proud would rather cut the baby in half and destroy it all, rather than save his own life and his own future. When you kill that pride, instantly, you become a better person, because now you’re listening. Now you don’t know it all. Now you’re humble. Now you can grow and get smarter.”

[From Dame magazine]

The whole interview is an engrossing read. Terry discusses the “pimp culture” he grew up with and how came to reject it. He also details his role with the Polaris Project, which aims to eliminate human trafficking.

What’s interesting about Terry’s views is that he’s changed over the years. During an interview with The Agenda (last year), Terry said, “I have been that guy where I felt I was more valuable than my wife and kids.” He grew ashamed of that attitude and learned from his mistakes. Terry vowed, “I’m not going to be silent” on issues of gender equality. Did you know he’s been married for 25 years to Rebecca King? Dude is doing something right at home, which isn’t hard to believe.

Photos courtesy of WENN

I have no plans to see Fifty Shades of Grey. I read the book and that was enough for me. For what it’s worth, I’ve heard that film is better than the book, that they strengthened the Anastasia character and made her likeable and charming. Which is nice, because Ana was awful in the book. She was flavorless, a dishrag, a whining, perpetually tear-stained mess. There were many treatises and “think pieces” written about Anastasia and Christian Grey’s relationship, whether it was truly consensual and loving, or whether it was an abusive relationship dressed up like BDSM. Since I can only speak to the book characters, I’ll just say that their relationship made me uncomfortable and yes, I think Christian crossed the line several times into fitting the description of an abuser.

I wasn’t alone – many people do believe the book and the film represent a glorification of abuse, and there were some protests against the film. When Dakota Johnson sat down for an interview with TV2, she was asked about the protests and the assessment that Ana was Christian’s victim rather than his romantic partner. Dakota disagrees.

Speaking in a video interview with Kjersti Flaa for TV2 about criticism that Christian’s treatment of her character is abusive, Dakota Johnson, who plays Anastasia Steele, said: ‘I think that is an uneducated opinion. Maybe because I know more about the BDSM world, so it makes sense to me, but everything that these characters do, they make the decision to do it.’

Domestic violence campaigners in America and the UK called for a boycott of the film when it was released last month because they believed it ‘glorified’ and ‘romanticised’ abuse against women. The National Center on Sexual Exploitation launched a campaign titled Fifty Shades Is Abuse, which urged people to donate to local women’s shelters instead of buying movie tickets. In London, feminist campaigners, Fifty Shades Is Domestic Abuse, said the novel dangerously romanticises the idea that women can fix broken men.

Defending the film, Dakota added: ‘Christian doesn’t abuse Ana. She’s not a victim. She’s not a sad, weak-minded, passive person. She’s strong and confident and is exploring her body and her sexuality in a private environment with somebody that she loves. And, you know, it’s a movie.’

[From The Daily Mail]

Ana is “not a sad, weak-minded, passive person”??? YES SHE IS. At least she was in the book. She was always crying! She started guzzling endless amounts of alcohol to numb herself to Christian’s sexual and emotional demands. He literally orders her around, tells her what to eat, what to wear and he even tells her what birth control she should use. There were like a million examples of the Fifty Shades of Sketchiness in the book.

Now, all that being said… Dakota didn’t write it. The way I see it, she’s just defending her portrayal of a screwed up character in a screwed up situation. I don’t think Dakota should be slammed for this. Go yell at E.L. James.

Photos courtesy of WENN.

In December and January, the internet exploded with Kaley Cuoco stories. She said she wasn’t a feminist, then described all the ways she was a feminist as a way to explain why she’s not a feminist. At the end of the day, I said we should just stop arguing with her because there were only so many rounds we could go on that particular merry-go-round. I bring that situation up because something similar is happening with the ongoing Dolce & Gabbana controversy. At this point, I’m kind of like “ugh, stop arguing, these jagoffs are never going to ‘get it’.”

As we’ve been covering all week, the controversy began when Stefano Gabbana and Domenico Dolce made some comments about gay marriage, gay families and children born via IVF. Their comments went viral and Elton John was one of the first to call for a boycott of D&G. Stefano Gabbana responded by calling Elton a “fascist” for daring to disagree, and for thinking that children born via IVF are just normal kids instead of “synthetic children” who will obviously be screwed up in life because their parents are gay. Well, here’s the next part – Stefano and Domenico sat down with CNN to defend themselves and they literally DO NOT GET IT. They do not understand why their comments offended so many people.

You can see the video here. They don’t understand that they are allowed their opinion, same as everyone else. They don’t understand that if they make bigoted statements about LGTBQ families and their children, people have every right to react. That is what happens in a free society. At one point, Gabbana says: “Boycott Dolce & Gabbana for what? They don’t think like you? This is correct? This is not correct. We are in 2015. This is like medieval. It’s not correct.” Yes, we are not in medieval times. It is 2015. Why are YOU still happy to treat gay parents like second class citizens? Dolce also says some words about how he, personally, “believes in the traditional family” but that he doesn’t “judge” people who go through IVF. How generous.

Either they still don’t understand why people are upset, or this whole thing is just some stupid stunt. Either way, I hope we can stop arguing with them about it. In their original interview, they didn’t say “Oh, I don’t want to be a father, that’s not for me, I personally have traditional views on that kind of stuff.” They made sweeping and offensive generalizations about all gay parents and kids born of IVF, and it’s not “medieval” or “fascist” for people to react to their comments.

Photos courtesy of WENN.