Hilary Duff is pregnant with her fourth, and she’s already got a lil’ bump. [Just Jared]
Does Taylor Swift read LaineyGossip? [LaineyGossip]
Review of Netflix’s A Nearly Normal Family. [Pajiba]
Jessica Chastain goes “mildly Mrs. Roper.” [Go Fug Yourself]
Sydney Sweeney wore Balmain on the Tonight Show. [RCFA]
David Tennant returned to Doctor Who & he was hot. [Jezebel]
Baby Josh Groban looked like Channing Tatum. [Seriously OMG]
Erdem’s pre-fall collection is gorgeous. [Tom & Lorenzo]
Travis Kelce’s friends could see Trav marrying Taylor Swift. [Hollywood Life]
Pop culture moments which absolutely happened in 2023. [Buzzfeed]
Andy Cohen said that Anderson Cooper is open to threesomes. [Socialite Life]

A lot of publications are already running their “best and worst of the year” listicles, which I think is too early. The year-end listicles should go up around Christmas, and no, I will not explain. The Hollywood Reporter released their “Biggest Hollywood Winners and Losers of 2023” list several days ago, but it’s only getting picked up now by the British media. Guess why? The listicle reporter, James Hibberd, included the Duke and Duchess of Sussex as one of his “losers” of the year. You can see the piece here – the winners are Taylor Swift, Greta Gerwig, the Vegas Sphere, Fran Drescher, Margot Robbie, horror films, Jenna Ortega and silver foxes. Losers included: Bob Iger/Disney, AI, Yellowstone, the Scream franchise, Marvel, Twitter and the Sussexes. Here’s THR’s blurb about the Sussexes:

Lost — Harry and Meghan
In 2020, the royal duo fled a life of ceremonial public service to cash in their celebrity status in the States. But after a whiny Netflix documentary, a whiny biography (Spare — even the title is a pouty gripe) and an inert podcast, the Harry and Meghan brand swelled into a sanctimonious bubble just begging to be popped — and South Park was the pin. The show’s 20-minute “World-Wide Privacy Tour” takedown in March was savage, and was followed by Spotify dropping Archetypes, with a top executive labeling the duo “grifters.” Still, all the scorn and mockery beats otherwise having to attend 200-plus official royal family engagements a year, which sounds hellish.

[From THR]

… The Netflix docuseries came out in 2022, as did Archetypes, and both were very successful (last year). The one big thing on the Sussexes’ plate this year was Harry’s memoir, which was a bestseller and one of the biggest publishing success stories of the year. I actually agree that the Spotify/Bill Simmons thing was awful – and the Sussexes completely mishandled it from a PR/communications perspective, and this is further evidence of that, that it’s being included in the “worst of the year” lists. What should have been a larger story about Spotify’s business model changing became solely about the Sussexes. The fact that the Sussexes didn’t push back and let Bill Simmons’ “grifter” remark sit out there, unchallenged, is the biggest mistake they made this year. As for South Park… my god, how much are Trey Parker and Matt Stone paying these people?

Photos courtesy of Avalon Red, Backgrid.

The way Omid Scobie has now explained the “royal racist” names being included in the Dutch translation of Endgame, the names DID appear in a very early draft, a draft which was likely sent to translators and never updated by the publisher. Which means that at some point – early in the process, before the lawyers got involved – Scobie did say that the Princess of Wales and King Charles were the two people named in Charles and Meghan’s 2021 correspondence. Which is a big f–king deal, as is the fact that apparently those names were widely known on Fleet Street and never reported, because they’ve all been waiting for Meghan, Harry or Omid to say it outright. When Endgame first came out, the Windsors furiously briefed everyone that all options were on the table and that they were thinking of suing. Then there were crisis talks last week, and suddenly the “we’re suing” narrative changed dramatically. Here’s how the Windsors feel now:

Friends of senior royals say the family is expected to “quietly forget” veiled threats to take legal action after a book by reporter Omid Scobie named King Charles and Kate Middleton as the so-called “royal racists” whom Meghan Markle—in a bombshell interview with Oprah Winfrey in 2021—alleged raised “concerns” over the skin color of her son Archie before he was born.

Despite the palace initially saying they would keep “all options open” in regard to the book, Endgame, an early Dutch version of which named Kate and Charles in error, almost three weeks after publication, there is no evidence of legal action against either Scobie, his agents, the Dutch publishers or news outlets which repeated the claims.

“The king has bigger fish to fry,” a friend told The Daily Beast. “It’s only a book. It’s a classic case of ‘Don’t explain or complain’ and let it blow over. They will just quietly forget it now. I don’t think there are going to be any lawsuits being filed.”

Asked if the claims in the book about Charles and Kate were accurate, the friend said: “I think anyone who knows Charles knows he is not a racist.”

When it was pointed out that Meghan and Prince Harry have been careful not use the word ‘racist,’ with Harry saying in a TV interview, for example, that the alleged remarks were instead an example of “unconscious bias,” the friend said: “Good, because he is not. But if there are these nuances, then you just wonder whether the appropriate place to raise the issue was with Oprah.”

A former courtier told The Daily Beast they would be “astonished” if Charles pursued legal action, adding, “This is over. The book has been pulped. Nobody cares.”

A friend of William and Kate similarly said they understood there will be no formal legal action against the claims made in the book. “Every day of the week people write acres of nonsense about them, and the reaction is always the same; don’t dignify it with a response, just keep on doing the job and let actions speak louder than words.”

[From The Daily Beast]

Notice that not even Tom Sykes’ unnamed royalist sources can rise to Kate’s defense and declare that she’s also not a racist. Please, the lack of institutional support for Kate’s racist ass is turning into one of the biggest follow-up stories. As for the Windsors suddenly pulling the “never complain, never explain” card… they literally spent weeks screaming, crying and throwing up about the book. They threatened lawsuits, they organized unhinged “Meghan HATES Kate” stories, they complained and explained all over the place. Part of me also believes that Charles backed away from all of this lawsuit talk because his lawyers asked him “who would you sue and why?” Piers Morgan? Omid? Meghan? If Meghan really did name those people in her letter to Charles, then Omid surely can’t be sued for factual reporting (in a mistranslated Dutch edition).

Photos courtesy of Avalon Red, Cover Images.

Embed from Getty Images

I’m sorry but Claire Foy’s outfit at the All of Us Strangers premiere is completely unhinged. The fringe shirt, the skirt, all of it. Bonkers. CB pointed out that Wayfair has a lamp with a very similar vibe. [GFY]
After being purchased by Paste, Jezebel is back!! [Jezebel]
Wait, how are the Golden Globes nominations decided?? [LaineyGossip]
The Frasier reboot actually sounds like it has a good premise. [Pajiba]
Who are Donald Trump & Joe Biden’s celebrity contemporaries? [Buzzfeed]
Bridgerton season three premiere date and casting news [Just Jared]
I hope Amanda Bynes is okay. [Hollywood Life]
This guy looks like a Duggar except for his giant neck tattoo. [Starcasm]
Terrifying vintage Santas. [OMG Blog]
Oprah went on Drew Barrymore’s talk show. [Seriously OMG]
Andrew Scott looks beautiful and ‘70s. [RCFA]

Embed from Getty Images

Embed from Getty Images

Sydney Sweeney and Glen Powell have been in New York this week to promote their rom-com Anyone But You. There are too many movies with similar-sounding names out right now, or is it just me? Anyway, this film seems utterly forgettable but Sydney’s still trying her best to sell it, bless her heart. Her fiance didn’t come to the premiere, from what I saw. Glen hasn’t been in a relationship since Gigi Paris dumped him for how close he seemed to Sydney. At this point, I’m not sure that Glen and Sydney are happening, but I would absolutely believe that they slept together at some point.

As for Sydney’s premiere look, she wore a Miu Miu dress with a million crystals, plus earrings from Fred Leighton. Sydney is a brand ambassador for Miu Miu and she’s talked about how grateful she is for the extra money and attachment to a major label. All in all, it’s a pretty good fit between actress and brand. While this dress isn’t my favorite thing ever, it suits her and it suits the film promotion. As a fellow big-chested girl, I will say that I admire the fact that Sydney manages to walk that fine line between “being too covered up” versus “being too boobs-forward.”

The thing is, when you actually see Glen and Sydney together, their attractiveness sort of cancels out and they just come across as bland, right? Also: I’m adding a bonus photo of Sydney wearing a bonkers ensemble of wide-leg jeans and a matching vest-and-coat look. That was right before the premiere!

Photos courtesy of Backgrid.

Two weeks ago, Piers Morgan “revealed” the names of the royal racists which were named in a “mistranslation” of Omid Scobie’s Endgame (which were originally named by the Duchess of Sussex in a letter to King Charles). The names are: King Charles and the Princess of Wales. After a lot of performative pearl-clutching and “demands” that Prince Harry and Meghan speak up in defense of the Windsors (lmao), nothing much happened. There was a crisis meeting between Charles, William and Kate, and they apparently decided to say nothing and just keep doing photo-ops with diversity props. It’s also clear that Kate was in a panic and she reached out to dumbasses like Camilla Tominey to defend her honor (Tominey made Kate sound even more unhinged though). So, what is Kate’s larger plan? Just keep style-stalking Meghan and lean into her “simpering white supremacist Karen” vibe? Pretty much.

Kate Middleton is yet to publicly comment on allegations in Omid Scobie’s new book that she was one of two royals who questioned Prince Archie’s skin colour. But according to one expert, that doesn’t mean she is going to take the “absurd accusations” lying down – and will “punish” Prince Harry and Meghan Markle “in her own classy way”.

Brand expert Denise Palmer-Davies exclusively told Fabulous: “The accusations made in the book are utterly absurd, but they will still ultimately have hurt Kate. She won’t let that show though – she is a strong, powerful woman and she will keep calm and carry on. Responding to the claims only gives them attention, so Kate is carrying on with her life as normal. She is much like the Queen in that respect, stoic, she won’t show how upset she really is. She put on a brave face at the Royal Variety show and at her Together at Christmas carol concert.

“I don’t doubt that those close to Harry and Meghan would want all this to take off her shine – but far from it. In fact, Kate remains popular, she has the public’s support and while she is on the front pages of all the newspapers, it is all positive press, like her Strictly visit. It’s like she is unintentionally punishing them in her own classy way.”

Kate’s name being dragged into the racism row will only further deepen the rift between her, Harry and Meghan.

“I didn’t think there would be a way back for Kate and William and Harry and Meghan, but there absolutely won’t be now,” Denise said. “I can imagine William is furious. It is attack after attack – it’s just relentless. I can’t see Kate – or William – ever forgiving them for this. Even though Meghan and Harry haven’t directly named her themselves, someone associated with them apparently has, and the fact they haven’t come out and defended her speaks volumes. It’s a huge betrayal and totally unforgivable.”

[From The Sun]

“The fact they haven’t come out and defended her speaks volumes” – so you agree that it speaks volumes when royals don’t step up and defend someone who is being unfairly maligned and denigrated? You agree that it’s an unforgivable betrayal when a royal briefs racist lies to a royal reporter? Gee, I wonder why Meghan was suicidal in the first place? Could it be that Kate, William and their people were openly targeting her maliciously and that’s the whole reason why the Sussexes left? Besides, it’s now clear that Kate *was* one of the many royals openly discussing her “concerns” about how dark Meghan’s children would be. Why the f–k would Meghan and Harry defend her? As for Kate’s “classy” punishment… I mean, creepily style-stalking the Black woman she hates is certainly a lot of things, but “classy” isn’t one of them.

Photos courtesy of Avalon Red, Cover Images.

What little we know of Prince William and then-Kate Middleton’s courtship is that Kate was desperate to throw herself into his path for much of her teens, and then she made sure to hang around William’s group of friends while they were at St. Andrews. The story was that William and Kate were generally in the same circle of friends, then things changed when a scantily-clad Kate walked a runway at a student fashion show. By their third year, they were living together with some other friends. Reportedly, they had some breakups even during those university years too, and William openly cheated on her. No one expects Netflix’s The Crown to tell that version of the story, but according to the actor playing William, their romance will not be some big fairytale.

The Crown will portray the Prince and Princess of Wales’s early relationship as “stagnated and weird”, the actor playing William has revealed. Ed McVey, 24, said he wanted to avoid depicting the beginning stages of the Royal couple’s romance on the hit Netflix show as “smooth sailing”.

He said: “We didn’t want to make it a smooth journey, meeting and falling in love and then getting together. We wanted it to be stagnated and weird, as relationships are, because there’s never smooth sailing, nothing is ever one thing.”

“We know that they get together in the end and we know that they’re perfect for each other, and we know how much they love each other … but we wanted to put as much in the way of that as possible,” he explained. “Put so many bollards and so many emotional brick walls, essentially, in terms of them getting together. And really what we wanted is for the audience to be like, how are they going to get together? We want the audience to be like, ‘oh just say the right thing or just stop being so awkward with each other and just get together’ and then luckily you see that in the end,” he added.

Meanwhile, Meg Bellamy said she faced challenges depicting a young Kate as there was “no footage” of her talking or walking in the university years era that she portrays her. The actress said that she tried to pitch her voice higher, for example, to “remove the royal protocol side of it”, adding: “I tried to make that more youthful, more like myself.”

[From The Telegraph]

“Put so many bollards and so many emotional brick walls” – they’ve turned it into a romantic comedy? Interesting. I mean, there’s part of me that’s happy that The Crown isn’t rewriting the narrative to make it sound like it was love at first sight. Kate really had to work hard to get his attention, she and her mother put so much time, energy, money and effort into baiting the honey trap, only for William to not take the bait for a while. Once Kate got him, she wasn’t letting him go, no matter how he treated her.

Photos courtesy of Netflix.

I watched the trailer for The Boys in the Boat a few months ago and I thought it looked good, but I completely forgot that George Clooney produced and directed it? George loves a WWII-era film, my goodness. This one is even pre-WWII but just barely. It’s based on the true story (and adapted from the nonfiction bestseller of the same name) of the University of Washington crew team who represented America at the Olympic games in Berlin in 1936. It’s a feel-good film about college kids who survived the Depression then represented their country on a global stage at the Olympics in Nazi Germany. Intense.

Anyway, these are photos of George and his wife Amal at last night’s LA premiere. The Clooneys were in Europe last week and there were some premieres and screenings, but they didn’t get a ton of attention. I guess this marks the beginning of the American promotion. Amal looked gorgeous in a striking yellow gown which appeared to be corseted. This is a great cut for her figure and I don’t even hate the yellow on her. Like, there’s too much yellow on red carpets and it’s such a tricky color. But with Amal’s coloring, she looks amazing. George looks nice too.

George told Access Hollywood that Amal doesn’t have a stylist!

Photos courtesy of Avalon Red, Backgrid.

I love British names – I hear the name “Luther Ford” and, here in America, that would be the name of a handsome and large Black man. But in the UK, Luther Ford is a pale ginger actor and film student. Luther Ford was cast as a teenage/early 20s Prince Harry in the final season of The Crown. While Meg Bellamy and Ed McVey are stuck talking about William & Kate’s college love story, Luther spoke to the NY Times about how he got into character and whether he actually gives a sh-t about the Windsors.

How he felt when he was first cast as Harry: “At first I was like, “This is amazing — brilliant, brilliant, brilliant. I’m going to tell everyone.” But the first rehearsal was when I realized, “Oh, this is actually serious, and this is not going to be something I’m just going to walk through.” I was so naïve, and then when I actually got there, I was looking at the script like, “God, I don’t know how to act. I don’t know what I’m doing.”

Whether he was interested in the Windsors before he was cast: “Not particularly. They are embedded in British culture whether you like it or not. I didn’t love them or hate them, I was semi-impartial. The fact that I didn’t know a huge amount about the royal family and the fact that I had been cast, that kind of made me feel like, OK, well, there must be something I’m doing that just works for the character.

Whether he consumed the Sussexes’ docuseries or Harry’s memoir: “I listened to the audiobook of “Spare” all the time while filming because he’s reading it. It was good for the voice. But I would only use it in the sense of what Peter’s scripts were exploring, because otherwise, there was too much to worry about. It’s not about doing an impression, but capturing a kind of essence or a flavor. So we were encouraged to focus on the timeline of the show because the rest is somewhat irrelevant.

The Black Sheep: “One of the things Peter was interested in exploring in terms of brotherhood, and the institution was the idea of Harry being the black sheep of the family. In a funny way, I related to that because, as a non-actor who was new to that world, going onto “The Crown” set, it didn’t take a huge stretch of imagination to feel like an outsider. When you’re surrounded by some of the best British actors I didn’t immediately feel like I fit in with them. I leaned into the fact that it was uncomfortable for the role. It was useful to feel out of place.

How he feels about Harry now: “Yeah, I’ve thought about him every day. By thinking about someone and researching a lot about them, you build up a lot of empathy for them. It’s your job to like them in some way.”

Whether he wants to know what Harry thought of his performance: “It would be a lie to say no — but I’m definitely not holding my breath for a statement.”

[From The NY Times]

Yeah, my guess is that Harry would never make a public statement about watching the last season of The Crown, but he might privately send Luther a note or something. Luther seems like a nice guy, honestly – what’s surprises me the most about so many of the younger actors who have been cast in The Crown is how many of them are completely ambivalent towards the royals. They view them as characters to unlock as actors, but the actors generally don’t care one way or the other about “the royal family.” Josh O’Connor was republican-adjacent, Emma Corrin basically only liked Diana, and Luther sounds like he only really gives a sh-t about Harry.

Photos courtesy of Avalon Red, Netflix/The Crown.

It’s an open secret within the British media and longtime royal watchers that Prince William and Kate barely live together at this point. Adelaide Cottage is supposedly “their” home in Windsor, but it’s far more likely that Adelaide is Kate’s separation cottage, where she does the school runs and doesn’t have enough space for “live in staff.” I bring that up because we really don’t know where William is most of the time – perhaps he’s based out of Kensington Palace, perhaps he just keeps a suite of rooms at Windsor Castle, perhaps he’s living in Frogmore Cottage, who even knows. Meanwhile, Will and Kate barely work, and they barely work together. So the Ephraim Hardcastle column in the Daily Mail pointed out something interesting: Will and Kate made a point of traveling together to Kate’s fruity Christmas carol event. The Mail thinks they should stop doing that, traveling together.

Dropping the late Queen’s convention that those first in the line of succession travel separately, William, Kate and the children motored together to Kate’s Westminster Abbey carol service.

In the event of an unlikely disaster, we could have ended up with Harry as the heir apparent and Meghan as Princess of Wales. The King has not altered Harry and Andrew’s positions in the line of succession. For the sake of everyone, William might consider his travel arrangements in future – or ask his dad to change the succession rules.

[From The Daily Mail]

Mail columnist Richard Eden was ringing this bell too, that it’s imperative that the Sussexes be removed from the line of succession because what if something happens to the Wales family? Are these people just being macabre or is something being left unsaid? Or is this still all about the Sussexes, like always? Like… maybe William and George should fly separately, but they’re raising this kind of stink about William and George using the same car? Besides, it’s pretty clear that William and the kids do most things separately, especially given that William barely stays at Adelaide.

Note by CB: Get the Top 8 stories about Will and Kate’s crumbling marriage when you sign up for our mailing list! I only send one email a day on weekdays.

Photos courtesy of Cover Images, Avalon Red.