A few months ago, Kelly Osbourne screeched about Prince Harry on her podcast and she got the attention she needed. According to Kelly – a reality star who begs for attention on her podcast – Harry is a bad person because he “whines” and “talks about himself” and he’s trying to be the Pope. Well, Kelly and her family once again decided to talk about Harry on their podcast. I just-

Kelly Osbourne called out Prince Harry on her family podcast The Osbournes, slamming him for taking “the victim road” with his wife Meghan Markle. As her mother Sharon defended the monarchy, Kelly’s brother Jack sided with her as she doubled down on the anti-Sussex comments she made three months ago on the I’ve Had It podcast.

Kelly defended herself, saying: “I said he was a t**t. I just think he’s such a whinger and the thing is, maybe it’s because I feel a certain level of disappointment in the sense where I feel like they had an opportunity to become the most liked, loved people in the entire world that could actually bring some positive change. But then went down this, like, victim road instead. I get wanting to leave [the Royal Family]. I get that, but then just leave. Don’t leave and then just give ‘woe is me’ stories about how difficult it was.”

She added, “Because again, I said this on the podcast I was on, life is hard for everybody. I was just on a podcast and they asked me what I thought of Harry and I just said I think he’s a ‘t**t’. And that’s it.”

Jack chimed in, agreeing with Kelly: “But the funny thing was, I don’t know if you looked at any of the comments from any of the articles, but it was amazing how many of these wokey American people were vehemently defending them. And you’re like, “Hang on a f***ing second!”’

Their mother Sharon strongly disagreed, adding that she loved and respected the monarchy especially after having met Queen Elizabeth II four times. However, as much as she cares for the institution, Sharon said that the monarchy needs to be “modernized.”

“That’s because I’m old,” Sharon continued. “I love it! Everybody’s human, we’re all human. They do a lot of good, but they’re human beings and they f*** up. We all f*** up. So the thing is, they do a lot of good also.” Sharon added that the monarchy “needs to be scaled down” and that there should be less “pomp.” Although she added that she doesn’t think the monarchy should be “stopped,” she noted that it desperately needs to be updated for the 21st century.

[From The Independent]

I’ve said this before, but years ago, as the royals’ “Heads Together” campaign was happening in real time, I found it so simplistic, with the message being: talk about your feelings, get help, go into therapy. I was like “this message is so obvious.” But looking at it now, I understand that the message was something the British audience needed to hear and, frankly, still needs to hear. There’s a ridiculous amount of anger and flat-out rage at Harry for… talking about his mental health journey, talking about his feelings, talking about how therapy helped him. They call him a whinger and a tw-t, they call him emasculated, they call him woke. Anyway, Kelly Osbourne is still f–king racist trash and her mother is horrible. I did find it funny that Sharon has basically sent death-threats to the Sussexes but even she is like “the monarchy needs to be slimmed down and modernized.”

That one time Kelly Osbourne thought she was Cooking #kellyosbourne #bellashmurda pic.twitter.com/TRlIsxQSjb

— dailyhappenigzz After Hours (@dailyhappenigzz) September 19, 2023

Photos courtesy of Cover Images.

The Princess of Wales stepped out today in Kent, her second event in as many days. Today she visited the Orchards Centre, a children’s center which provides support for children with special needs. Her purpose here seems to be connecting the very real need for additional support for special-needs kids with her busywork Shaping Us “campaign.” For the event, Kate wore black pants, a really awful beige-y shell, an orange-red blazer from Zara (retails for £59.99) and flats from Boden. The blazer is a repeat, as are the shoes. The pants probably are as well. She looks like she got dressed in the dark – she has a real problem putting colors together. The beige top ruins this – it should have been white or black (preferably black). Of course, the blazer just looks really cheap though.

The Princess of Wales has arrived at a children’s centre where she will join a sensory session for youngsters with disabilities and special needs. The Princess, 41, is at the Orchards Centre in Sittingbourne, Kent, to highlight the importance of supporting such children and their families. It is the first in a series of engagements she will carry out in the run-up to Christmas in support of her long term Shaping Us campaign that aims to highlight the importance of childhood experiences for the under fives.

The visit is considered an opportunity to acknowledge the difficulties faced by many parents and carers who struggle to access the time and resources needed to look after children with special needs. The Princess has made the early years a cornerstone of her work, launching Shaping Us in January through The Royal Foundation for Early Childhood.

The mother of three, wearing black trousers and a red jacket, will join a sensory development class with a group of children with a range of needs and conditions, including social communications difficulties, autism, complex needs and Down Syndrome. She will meet parents and their children, as well as some of the front-line practitioners running the service to understand more about portage and how it supports families on a day-to-day basis. The class will be run by the Kent Portage Team.

The National Portage Association is a home-visiting educational service for children with special needs from birth until pre-school age. Celebrating its 40th anniversary this year, it works with more than 100 portage services, providing a quality framework and training for practitioners and parents.

[From The Telegraph]

I’m not going to complain specifically about this – kids with special needs fall through the cracks of many educational systems and there is a real lack of support in many Western countries. Kate SHOULD make these kinds of visits and highlight the work being done at local levels and lavish praise on what sounds like a really great program. My larger issue is that Kate is trying to connect it to Shaping Us, which is a PR campaign that exists to waste time, money and resources. Shaping Us’s sole message is “the Early Years are important!” Kate has no plan about how to get tangible support, resources and funds to children and families. I was just thinking about this the other day – when is the last time Kate even ATTENDED a fundraiser, much less hosted one?

Photos courtesy of Cover Images.

There was a huge Dior runway show/event in Paris yesterday, and all of the Dior-associated people came out for it. I’m including photos of Jennier Lawrence, Robert Pattinson, a severe-looking Charlize Theron and my pick for prettiest princess, Beatrice Borromeo (married to Pierre Casiraghi).

So… um, thoughts about Jennifer Lawrence? J-Law has been a Dior brand ambassador for many, many years, as have Rob Pattinson and Charlize. Jen usually only comes to fashion week for the Dior show and nothing else. We haven’t seen much of her since June, when she promoted No Hard Feelings. At a few of those June premieres, we did talk about her changing/tweaked face. It seems to have gotten worse. I’m still sort of curious about what she’s done and why – she was always such a natural beauty, but she seems to love that “Real Housewife/Kardashian” look so much that she’s trying to emulate it. It’s like she’s surgically eliminated the uniqueness and character from her face.

Rob’s pants are ridiculous and I can’t believe Dior gave Charlize THAT outfit.

Photos courtesy of Backgrid, Cover Images.

Nadine Dorries is some kind of former Tory MP turned Daily Mail social/political commentator. I have no real frame of reference for the American equivalent – maybe someone like Claire McCaskill, a former senator turned MSNBC political pundit? Something like that (update, I was trying to figure out an equivalent of a government official-turned-pundit, I was not comparing Dorries’ politics to McCaskill’s). Well, Dorries wrote a column about how she’s on Team Sophie Turner, a column which I mostly ignored. As it turned out, Dorries actually buried some royal commentary at the end of her Mail piece. This is very curious:

After their triumphant State visit to France last week, I hope King Charles and Queen Camilla are enjoying a G+T or two. All those people who said Charles would struggle to step into his mother’s shoes have been forced to eat their words. The royal visit did more for international relations than any politician ever could.

But I can only imagine the pang Charles must have felt knowing that his success abroad is tempered by the ongoing family rift with Harry and Meghan. As a parent, you are only ever as happy as your least-happy child, whether that child is four or 40 (as Harry will be next year).

Charles will know that two issues go to the heart of whether he can heal this rift. The first is the issue of protection. When the Sussexes are in Britain, the threat to their security is serious and genuine. This problem falls on the shoulders of the Home Office: as I know all too well, a basket-case of a department. To say Harry can’t have full police protection, even if he pays for it himself, is a nonsense. Suella Braverman needs to get this sorted.

The second thorn is accommodation on the Royal Estate. There are enough rooms in Kensington Palace: let Harry and Meghan have a few so they have a safe and familiar place to stay. The children can get to know it – and it will give them a strong sense of their heritage. Prince Harry will always be of royal blood, and though family rifts are always painful, time is a great healer.

[From The Daily Mail]

“As a parent, you are only ever as happy as your least-happy child.” Whenever we see Prince Harry, he looks happy, rich, well-laid, well-endowed and handsome. These people are desperate to convince themselves that “their prince” is somehow deeply depressed more than three years after he left his toxic and abusive birth family and set himself up in a California mansion with his beautiful wife and two children. As for her solutions… what’s shocking is that so few people within the British media, government and royal institution admit that Harry’s security concerns are real and that it’s a completely bonkers position to say that Harry can’t pay the Met police back for his security when he does visit the UK. As for this new talking point (being floated by Buckingham Palace) that the Sussexes should be given a few rooms in Kensington Palace… they literally never should have been evicted from Frogmore Cottage. That decision will haunt Charles forever – he evicted his grandchildren from their safe and secure British home out of spite.

Photos courtesy of Avalon Red.

Royal reporters desperately want to talk about the Princess of Wales’s absence from Prince William’s NYC trip, and her upcoming absence from his Singapore trip. There are two concurrent lines of gossip. One is that William doesn’t want to be anywhere near his wife these days and he ordered her to stay away so she wouldn’t make an ass out of herself overseas. The second line of gossip is that Kate is Forever Lazy, too lazy to actually do an odd event here or these outside of a 30-mile zone around Adelaide Cottage. Both versions have some truth to them, imo. Well, Kate and her mother heard about all of this Singapore gossip and they want us to know that Kate is absolutely NOT lazy. No mention of what William wants though…

Friends of Kate Middleton have hit back at anonymous suggestions that she should be doing more foreign trips as part of her remit as Princess of Wales, saying the fact that she is widely considered one of the most popular members of the family shows that the public support her focus on raising her young family. A friend of Kate’s told The Daily Beast that the accusations were “absurd.”

Accusations of shirking official duties have long dogged both William and Kate, and surfaced again over the summer when William failed to attend the final of the women’s soccer World Cup in Australia. Now the suggestion has been aired again, but specifically in relation to Kate, in an item in the Daily Mail’s usually well-briefed Ephraim Hardcastle column (Hardcastle is a fictional byline and the column is usually written by an editor based on newsroom gossip and in-house tips).

A source close to Kate told The Daily Beast: “If the accusation is that Kate isn’t puling her weight, that is absurd and everyone who knows them knows it. It is not exactly a state secret that she has three children aged 10, 8 and 5 on whom the future of the monarchy depends. She works incredibly hard. They have had this type of criticism from the press before and I’m sure they will have it again. It’s water off a duck’s back. Real people understand that you have to prioritize your children at that age, and you can’t both just go flying off to New York at the drop of a hat. The fact that they both consistently receive very high approval ratings shows that the public get it, even if the Daily Mail wants to find fault.”

[From The Daily Beast]

Oh, Carole was BIG MAD. Carole – or someone a lot like her – was screaming down the phone at Tom Sykes. Nothing says “it’s water off a duck’s back” like furiously briefing the Daily Beast’s Royalist columnist at the merest hint of behind-the-scenes drama. As for the Hardcastle column in the Mail… they didn’t exactly say that Kate was too lazy to go to Singapore (although it was implied), but the main thrust was that the Foreign Office and the government wanted Kate to travel more, especially with the kids, but she was refusing or William was refusing. At some point, we’re going to need an answer about who decided that Kate wasn’t going to Singapore. Also: “It is not exactly a state secret that she has three children aged 10, 8 and 5 on whom the future of the monarchy depends.” Oh, honey. It reminds me of that shady Tatler story calling her “the kingmaker.”

Photos courtesy of Cover Images.

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Taylor Swift (@taylorswift)

What a summer it’s been for Taylor Swift. Just think of how it started off: her dalliance with noted scumbag Matty Healy made even her devoted fans super mad. But for someone as famous as powerful as Taylor, it’s hard for a scandal to really stick. Now she’s hooking up with an NFL player, Travis Kelce, who my dad assures me is the best tight end in the league (I don’t follow football). So far he appears unproblematic, and between the billion dollar success of her Eras tour and her new boy toy, she has recovered from the bad PR. Taylor Swift kicks off the international leg of her Eras tour in November, so it only makes sense that the Eras concert film is getting an international release, too. It will be released in over 100 countries worldwide on October 13 and it’s expected to do huge numbers at the box office.

Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour, the concert film of Taylor Swift’s phenomenally successful world tour, is going global. In addition to North America, it was revealed Tuesday that the film will also hit cinemas in more than 100 countries overseas timed to its Oct. 13 domestic launch.

“The tour isn’t the only thing we’re taking worldwide,” Swift wrote on Instagram. “Been so excited to tell you all that The Eras Tour concert film is now officially coming to theaters WORLDWIDE on Oct 13!”

AMC Theatres, which is releasing Eras Tour in the U.S. via Variance Releasing, is handling the international distribution of the film. AMC and its partners are working to reach agreements with movie theater operators representing more than 7,500 cinemas globally.

Eras Tour is already scheduled to play in more than 4,000 movie theaters in the U.S., Canada and Mexico. AMC has confirmed that in Europe, the film will play at every Odeon Cinemas location. More details on locations will be released in due course.

Early North American box office tracking data for Eras Tour suggests the movie will open to a massive $75 million, with some more bullish analysts believing the opening weekend numbers could cross $100 million with an upper ceiling of $125 million.

[From THR]

I wonder if Taylor will have the same elevated ticket price gambit for the overseas release. I remain irrationally annoyed by the $19.89 ticket price for a standard definition movie with a standard run time, when that’s about what you pay for an IMAX ticket. I don’t think it will work so well in other countries. (Also, exchange rates ruin the 1989 album reference. $19.89 is 140 Danish krone, for example, which is a meaningless number in Taylor lore.) That being said, I also think it will be huge, and the inflated ticket price is part of that expected $75 million opening. For the many people who can’t afford concert tickets, the movie is the next best thing, so there will be a lot of demand from Swifties. By directly distributing through AMC, Taylor has neatly side-stepped working with the Hollywood studios and the ongoing strikes, which is smart from an optics standpoint. I’m most excited for the re-release of 1989 this fall, which apparently features a vault track called “Slut!”

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Taylor Swift (@taylorswift)

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Taylor Swift (@taylorswift)

Last year, Shakira gave a rather legendary Elle interview. She spoke at length about just how much she did to make her relationship with Gerard Pique work, and she also spoke at length about how the Spanish tax authorities are trying to jam her up. For years, Spanish authorities have claimed that Shakira didn’t pay enough taxes given her part-time residence in Barcelona. Shakira has long employed PricewaterhouseCoopers, the internationally renowned tax specialists and accountants. She has all of her literal receipts, she knows exactly how many days she spent in Spain, she knows how much she’s paid and what she owes. She also no longer lives in Spain – she moved to Miami shortly after Pique cheated on her in their home. Well, the Spanish authorities are still desperate to punish Shakira and get as much money from her as possible. I said before that the Spanish tax agencies are coming across like scammers, and I still feel that way.

Prosecutors in Spain have once again charged Shakira with tax fraud — this time linked to taxes filed on her 2018 income. In a statement obtained by the Associated Press, Barcelona prosecutors accused the Columbian singer, 46, of failing to pay about $7.1 million (6.7 million euros) in taxes in 2018. They alleged that she avoided paying the taxes by using an offshore company located in a tax haven.

They also noted that Shakira was informed of the charges in her current home city of Miami, according to the AP, who first reported the news. Shakira did not immediately respond to PEOPLE’s request for comment.

The new charges come after a Spanish court said in July that it started an investigation linked to alleged fraud on the singer’s personal income tax and wealth tax in 2018. The court said it had no information on how much money was in question at the time, according to the AP.

The court, located in Esplugues de Llobregat near Barcelona, opened a second case as a result of a complaint made by the Barcelona Economic Crimes Prosecutor regarding Shakira allegedly defrauding the tax agency, per a translation from Spanish media outlet El Pais. Another local outlet, El Periodico, reported that the prosecutor’s office filed a complaint for two alleged tax crimes.

A representative for Shakira told PEOPLE in a statement at the time that she “defends having always acted in accordance with the law and under the advice of the best tax experts. She is now focused on her life as an artist in Miami and is confident that there will be a favorable resolution of her tax issues.”

[From People]

Shakira refused to “settle” one of the previous charges because, as she has said, she has confidence in her own records and her PwC accountants. I’ve seen comments on here and other places about how Shakira has tax shelters and residences in tax havens… and? It’s not illegal to have a residence in a tax haven. It’s not illegal to set up tax shelters. Tax loopholes exist all around the world. Of course Shakira has protected herself and protected her assets. I think a lot of people have big problems when it’s a successful Colombian woman protecting her assets and refusing to roll over for a government agency in the middle of a smear campaign.

Photos courtesy of Cover Images.

Embed from Getty Images
Over the past couple of weeks, we’ve talked about how I’m fascinated by dreams and other “Universe-y” things like intuition, synchronicities, psychic abilities, etc. Well, Halloween season is officially upon us, so naturally, we’re moving right along into another topic that I find fascinating: ghost stories!

On a recent episode of Rob Lowe’s podcast, “Literally! With Rob Lowe,” Kevin Bacon shared a story about his Connecticut farmland being haunted. Kevin, who grew up as a city boy in Philadelphia, decided to buy a farmhouse in 1983. He ended up loving country life so much that he started buying up the land surrounding it in order to maintain his privacy. And this is where Bacon’s ghost story begins… <Muahahaha! Cue spooky organ music.>

“I’ll tell you a funny story,” Bacon began. “The guy that sold me the house, he lived across the road.”

“One of the pieces [of land] that we bought had an old house in it and he didn’t want me to own the house. It was an abandoned house that he had grown up in,” he continued. “And we kind of went back and forth on it for a while and then eventually I said, ‘Listen, you can’t sell me a piece of land but not sell me the house that’s on it.’ ”

“He said, ‘I can’t sell it to you because it’s haunted and I’m afraid that you’ll get possessed and, you know, do some serious damage,’” Bacon said. The Mystic River star said that he and the owner “went back and forth on this haunted house thing” for a while before finally working things out.

“We finally came to an agreement in the contract that I had to destroy it within, I don’t know, a month or something like that,” he told Lowe, who then asked the actor if he ever spent a night in the ghost-infested house.

Bacon said he did not.

“Not only did I not do that, but I went up there and there were some beautiful old pine boards and a banister and I said to [wife Kyra Sedgwick], ‘We gotta take those out,’ And she’s like, ‘No, you’re not. You’re not putting those f—ing things in our house.’ ”

Lowe — whose fascination with the supernatural is no secret — also asked about the origin of the ghouls.

“It was a long story that had to do with a Native American who in the 1700s had been murdered, I think, by a colonial soldier,” Bacon shared. Before selling the house, the owner even “had ghostbusters there,” according to the actor. “It was a whole long thing,” he said.

The movie star, who has been in several horror movies throughout his career — most recently Peacock’s “They/Them” — also shared his personal stance on the paranormal.

“I always find that when you’re in a scary movie, everybody wants to know, ‘Well, have you ever seen a ghost?’ or ‘Do you, you know, believe in ghosts?’” Bacon said. “And the thing I always say is ‘I would really love to but as of yet, it just hasn’t happened. But I hope someday that it will.’ ”

The podcast host, who does believe in the paranormal, recalled his “intense” experience filming his ghost-hunting series The Lowe Files with his two sons — including a conversation he had with a ghost.

“I wish that I had kept that house up. That would’ve been a great episode,” Bacon joked. “Celebrity haunted house.”

“I would’ve been there in a minute,” Lowe responded.

[From People]

I love these kinds of stories and can listen to them all day (or at least until approximately two hours before bedtime). I’m so excited that Snap Judgement and Glynn Washington have made the Spooked podcast free again. Seriously, feel free to share any supernatural stories if you got ‘em. I am *here* for them. Anyway, I really want a follow-up interview with the man who sold Kevin that house. I’d love to know what his personal experiences were (if there really were any) and what happened with their ghostbusters ordeal. The story he told sounds a bit lot cliché, but as they say, I want to believe. I also had no idea that Rob Lowe and his kids had their own ghost-hunting series, hahaha.

Embed from Getty Images

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Kevin Bacon (@kevinbacon)

Photos credit: Jeffrey Mayer / Avalon and Getty

Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson routinely tops yearly lists of highest paid actors, with some even naming him the highest paid actor ever in Hollywood. Do I think Johnson merits being the highest paid actor? (And please note I’m pronouncing it in my head with a Laurence Olivier flair as acTOR!) If we’re talking about acting as a craft/art form, then no, I do not. But I totally understand how he’s amassed the hefty paydays, and I enjoy the comedy and physical agility he brings on screen. What I enjoy about him most, though, is how consistently and genuinely he pays it forward. From donating seven figures to keep striking actors afloat, to surprising fans on a celeb tour bus in his LA neighborhood, to setting up UFC fighter Themba Gorimbo with a new, furnished house in Miami, Johnson is like a huge, jacked fairy godmother. Over the weekend Johnson took to Instagram to answer a fan’s question on the drawbacks to fame… he had none:

A lucky son of a b: “I have been a lucky son of a bitch to have been famous for a long time, and I realize that there are no drawbacks to fame because I remember how s— once was,” he added. “Back in the day, the alternative to fame [was] not being famous, and I couldn’t pay rent, I was struggling to figure out who I was, I was broke as f—. I try my best to keep all of that in the forefront of my mind.”

He lives like he’s ‘a day away’ from losing it all: “I never let that go,” he continued. “I always say, ‘I’m a day away from being evicted again’ so it keeps me hungry. So for me, there are no drawbacks to fame. I got a lot of celebrity friends who completely disagree with me, and that’s okay. We have had healthy discussions about fame. And that’s okay, having a difference of opinion. It invites dialogue. It invites discussion. But for me, there are no drawbacks.”

LOL, he misses the mall: “I miss going to the mall. I miss going to the stores. Just hopping in my car and going [to the] grocery store, drug store, the mall, wherever,” Johnson said. “All that has gone away years and years ago, so anytime I go, it’s a thing. Gotta call ahead, logistics, security.” Johnson also admitted that every now and then he does get the urge to go shopping by himself, but things eventually turn into a “zoo.”

Don’t chase fame: “I always tell people this. There’s young digital influencers out there, social media, entertainment, singers, athletes, all these young bloods who think, ‘Hey, I gotta chase fame, greatness equals fame, fame equals greatness.’ And I always share this with everybody I talk to,” Johnson added.

Chase greatness: “I learned over the years to not chase fame, and I share that with people today who are on the come up,” he continued. “Don’t chase fame. Chase being great at something. Chase greatness. Fame will come, or it won’t, but if you’re great at something, that’s enduring.” Johnson then shared a quote from legendary running back Walter Payton: “If you’re good at something, you will tell everyone. If you’re great, they’ll tell you.”

[From People]

Ok, so at the beginning I felt like he was equating “fame” with “success.” To me, they’re very different animals. Success helps you pay the rent, success contributes to your sense of self. Fame is what’s making it hard for him to go grocery shopping (allegedly, though I love the image of him calling Ralphs for a security briefing, “I need bananas — cover aisle 10!”) I wholeheartedly agree with his comment on greatness, lofty as it sounds. Someone once said to me that pure concentration is the key to happiness. If you’re working towards greatness, you have to be fully concentrated on mastering each facet, each level. And I bet Johnson would concur that happiness is even greater than fame. Now someone treat that man to a normal, low-key visit to a mall, pronto!

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Dwayne Johnson (@therock)

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Dwayne Johnson (@therock)

Photos credit: SI/Avalon, Acero/Alter Photos/Avalon and via Instagram

Bad Bunny & Kendall Jenner sat together at the Gucci in Milan. This is their “fashion debut” although they’ve gone to basketball games together.[LaineyGossip]
Cate Blanchett will always show up for Armani. [Tom & Lorenzo]
All about Chris Pratt’s dumb water lie. [Pajiba]
What films do you consider “pretentious”? [Buzzfeed]
Mindy Kaling looks like she’s going to prom in this pic. [RCFA]
ACAB, this is just one reason to never date a cop. [Jezebel]
Chris Evans & Alba Baptista were seen flying out of Portugal. [JustJared]
Jessica Chastain at the Sustainable Fashion Awards in Milan. [GFY]
Shakira goes cowgirl. [Egotastic]
Brian Austin Green & Sharna Burgess are engaged. [SeriouslyOMG]

Embed from Getty Images