The last time we checked in on Tom Holland, he said he was taking a year off from acting. The reason he gave for his hiatus was that filming the Apple TV+ show The Crowded Room “broke him.” I predicted then, before there were many reviews, that the show sounded like a dud and that Tom was miscast based on the trailer. Now that more reviews are in, my suspicions were correct. It has a 48% on Metacritic and the consensus is that it tries to withhold a “twist” that you can see coming if you just do a rudimentary Google about the project, or just read the context that every news outlet publishes alongside descriptions of the show. It’s also apparently quite slow. Anyway, Tom is still promoting The Crowded Room and appeared in a video on the Unilad YouTube channel. I think Unilad is kind of similar to Buzzfeed? I don’t know it that well. He talked about the negative reviews and how he’s used to disappointment because of his football (soccer) allegiances. He also mentioned what he hopes people get out of watching the show and advocated for mental health awareness.

Tom Holland is hopeful his TV miniseries “The Crowded Room” will touch fans despite negative reviews.

The 27-year-old actor appeared on Unilad’s “Get a Job” series Friday where he addressed the Apple TV+ psychological thriller, which he starred in and executive produced.

“It’s no secret that my show has been so horribly reviewed,” he said.

Holland’s character Danny Sullivan in the series, based on the 1981 novel “The Minds of Billy Milligan,” is arrested after a shooting at Rockefeller Center in 1979.

Indie Wire graded the show a C-, Variety called it “empty” and CNN said the series yielded “pretty mediocre-to-bad results.” The Rotten Tomatoes score at publish is 31%.

Holland said on Unilad that he learned how to be “very resilient” as a result of being a Tottenham Hotspur fan. The soccer team has never won the Premiere League.

The actor explained that because he learned resilience, he’s far more concerned with what viewers learn from watching “The Crowded Room” over how it stacks up in reviews.

“I think that the message of the show, which can speak to so many different issues is that asking for help should be something that we as a society celebrate. It’s an act of bravery,” he said.

[From USA Today]

The joke about Tottenham Hotspur was cute, but he also completely brings up how horribly reviewed his show is, when the interviewer is just asking him about football. Perhaps they planned that segue ahead of time but if they didn’t, Tom is out here just telling people “my new show was reviewed horribly!” That…probably doesn’t make people want to watch it. Not sure how effective that is as promo. Nevertheless I hope Tom doesn’t let the bad reviews get to him. It’s not all on him that the show wasn’t a hit. I think he really was just miscast and that the script had some problems. I do hope, however, that he chooses his next project wisely, and picks something that plays to his strengths. I’m not saying he has to always be a loveable goofball in the mold of Peter Parker but his character has to have a certain level of lightness and charm. He’d be so great in a romcom if we still had those.

Also in that video, Tom reveals (with a distinctively proud look) that he fixed Zendaya’s door once, early in their relationship. He says she was impressed, which is quite sweet. Tom is a trained carpenter, which is very useful. I’m wondering what exactly he fixed. Did he tighten up the hinges? Did he have to change out the door sweep? Swap out a strike plate? Anyway it’s just a cute little story. I see why people are obsessed with them as a couple, they’re very adorable.

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David & Victoria Beckham have been married for 24 years! [LaineyGossip]
Rob Schnieder is backing Robert Kennedy Jr. Gross. [Dlisted]
My nemesis Laura Dern looked terrible in Italy, hahaha. [Tom & Lorenzo]
The Idol created the worst scene on television. [Pajiba]
Some non-alcoholic drinks if you’re having a Hot Sober Girl Summmer. [Jezebel]
Kendall Jenner & Gigi Hadid had dinner in Paris. [JustJared]
More of Ascot’s dramatic hats! [GFY]
A civil war within the Duggar Family. [Starcasm]
You can buy a Barbie-branded Xbox console. [Buzzfeed]
SCOTUS will not hear a case about a charter school’s dress code. [Towleroad]
Sienna Miller’s Glastonbury look. [RCFA]

Taylor Swift’s fan base is one of the most passionate fan communities out there. Taylor plays into this with all her Easter eggs, encouraging her fans to pay attention to every tiny detail. Having a fan base so devoted comes with a dark side, as we have seen in recent years. Fans have called in death threats to Taylor’s enemies at Big Machine and The Kid Mero, and as far as I know she doesn’t usually intervene or ask them to stop doing this stuff. So this might be something of a first. Ahead of the re-release of her third album, Speak Now, Taylor’s asking fans not to harass one of that album’s main muses: John Mayer. Kind of. She didn’t address him directly, but if you’re in the know, it’s not hard to figure out who she’s talking about.

She never said his name, but Taylor Swift asked fans not to attack ex-boyfriend John Mayer when she releases her version of the album Speak Now—which contains the song “Dear John”—next month.

“I’m 33 years old. I don’t care about anything that happened to me when I was 19,” she said during a concert in Minneapolis on Saturday night.

“I’m not putting this album out so that you can go and should feel the need to defend me on the internet against someone you think I might have written a song about 14 billion years ago.”

Swift was 19 when she briefly dated Mayer, who was 12 years older than her—and fans have long been convinced the scorching track is about him and their breakup.

[From The Daily Beast]

There is no doubt the song is about John Mayer. Everything about it points to him, down to the fact that the guitar lick in it sounds just like him. I also think that whatever she says to the contrary, she has some residual bitterness toward him. On the extended edition of her latest record, Midnights, she released a song called Would’ve Could’ve Should’ve that is also believed to be about John, since it references her “dancing with the devil” at nineteen. (If you aren’t well-versed in her lyrics just trust me on this.) I have to be honest and admit that Would’ve Could’ve Should’ve is my favorite song Taylor has ever done. For one thing, Aaron Dessner produced it and it is so much better than her work with Jack Antonoff. For another, I experienced a traumatic event at nineteen that triggered a religious crisis just like she sings about, so the song maps onto my own life in a way that’s downright spooky. Anyway in it she sings, “I can’t let this go/I fight with you in my sleep/The wound won’t close/I keep on waiting for a sign.” Those don’t sound like the words of someone who has resolved their anger, just saying. Maybe she wrote the song years ago, but she also knew her fans would make the connections to Dear John. They’re right there. I noticed them on my first listen. I think John is a sleazebag but I also think Taylor’s fans frequently take things too far. Here’s what I wonder: if the Swifties go after him after all, is she going to say anything then? Or is she going to let it happen? My gut tells me it’s too little, too late for Taylor to speak up about this now.

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What kills me about the Rehabilitation of Susan Hussey is that no one cares about that racist old bag anyway. Like, all of this effort, all of this hand-wringing and careful PR to rehabilitate an 84 year old woman who is still dreadfully racist, rude and well-connected, and for what? Everyone knows that she’s still terrible. Everyone knows that she’s still deeply unpleasant. But people just go along with it and for what? So an 84-year-old can rub elbows with King Charles and Queen Camilla and no one will say sh-t? Well, after Hussey was racist to Ngozi Fulani last November, she was let go from her emeritus position as some kind of lady-in-waiting to Camilla. Except that only lasted a month or so before Buckingham Palace organized a careful rehabilitation campaign to protect Hussey and bring her back into the royal fold. Hussey began appearing at royal events, she continued to get palace invitations, she contacted her friends in the media who dutifully proclaimed that she attends church with Black people, therefore she’s not racist. She attended the coronation, and last week, she was laughing it up with the king and queen at the royal box at Ascot.

Lady Susan Hussey appears to have been reinstated as a permanent fixture at big royal events, as she attended Ascot in the monarch’s box for the second day in a row. The former lady-in-waiting to Queen Elizabeth II, who was known as the Queen’s Number One Head Girl, was pictured smiling with Queen Camilla on day four of the famous race meet in Berkshire.

Lady Hussey was also seen engaged in conversation with the King in the royal box on Thursday, and last month attended his Coronation less than six months after resigning from royal duties in the wake of a race row. The 84-year-old was forced to step down from an honorary role supporting the King after being accused of “interrogating” a Buckingham Palace guest about where she was “really” from.

However, she was welcomed back into the royal fold for a church service in Sandringham at the end of January. While no longer employed by the palace, her appearances in the royal box at Ascot this week suggest she has been welcomed back into the inner circle.

[From The Telegraph]

Again, all of this effort and for what? Are Charles and Camilla so desperate for racist company that Susan Hussey was the only one who could provide what they needed? It was clear from the start of this whole debacle that Camilla and Charles didn’t even care – they shared Susan Hussey’s opinions and mindset, and judging from these photos, their sense of humor. I can only imagine what racist sh-t Hussey said to make Camilla laugh like that.

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Photos courtesy of Cover Images, Backgrid, Getty.

Phoebe Waller Bridge and Harrison Ford have been traveling around North America and Europe to promote Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny, which comes out this week. I feel a little bit sorry for Harrison – he’s old to do these kinds of international promotional tours, although he’s always loved playing Indiana Jones, so I get that he wants to “say goodbye.” Plus, he just refuses to retire. Phoebe has enjoyed every minute of her time with Harrison, and she’s been doing a little fashion tour during the promotion. Phoebe plays Indiana Jones’s goddaughter, and she drags him into some adventure with the Dial of Destiny. There are Nazis! And weird de-aging technology!

Last night, for the big London premiere, Phoebe wore an Ashi Studio Couture look. While this photographs as a “cape,” it’s not. It’s some kind of backless cape-hybrid with the look of a cape but only on the shoulders. Anyway, I think she looks stunning here. Probably her best look of the promotional tour.

Phoebe also wore Roland Mouret at the Berlin premiere a few days ago – this also looks great on her, and I continue to have a lot of jealousy about how clothes look on small-chested women.

Photos courtesy of Avalon Red, Cover Images.

Some people wondered if the past few weeks of coordinated attacks on the Duke and Duchess of Sussex’s American business were some kind of move by Prince William, ahead of his “big announcement.” Not so much – William can’t walk and chew gum at the same time, and I just have trouble believing that he could arrange any or all of this. I believe the coordination against the Sussexes is something else entirely. Another reason why I don’t think William is behind it is because he couldn’t even manage the rollout of his new program, Homewards, a £3 million scheme to… put some Royal Foundation money into halfway houses for homeless peeps. That’s it – he’s putting a relatively paltry sum of money into a relatively small solution. People probably would have praised the program if William and his team hadn’t gone completely overboard by lavishing praise on Peg for his “authenticity” and envious “ability to relate” to peasants. William’s staff have blanketed the media with talking points about how Peg will “end homelessness,” and then when people ask how or they criticize his little project, those same staffers get very huffy:

Prince William will also face challenges about how someone with such wealth and extensive property holdings can make such calls over homelessness.

“The last thing we need is for William to get involved in this issue, a man who has three huge homes and a vast estate gifted to him by the state,” says Graham Smith, of the anti-monarchy group, Republic. He says homelessness is about government policy and investment and will not be “resolved by charity or royal patronage”, accusing Prince William of being “hypocritical”.

But a Kensington Palace spokesman said it was about the prince using his public platform to make a positive difference.

“This isn’t about a PR stunt. This is about trying to change the way that we as a society think about homelessness,” said the spokesman.

[From BBC]

On the very first day of the rollout, within hours of the big launch, KP staffers had to huffily declare to the BBC and a dozen royal reporters “This isn’t about a PR stunt!” I beg to differ. Speaking of, the BBC also ran another critical about William’s Homewards: “Can Prince William navigate politics and privilege to cut homelessness?” Ouch.

Being accused of meddling in politics is an occupational hazard for any Prince of Wales. And any involvement in addressing a shortage of affordable housing is inescapably political, not least when there is so much anxiety about rising rents and mortgage costs.

But being accused of being a bit too political might not actually be a bad thing, according to royal author Prof Pauline Maclaran, particularly for a younger generation.

“The real risk is being irrelevant,” says Prof Maclaran. “Prince William needs to resonate with young people. He has to do more than cut ribbons and smile and wave. He needs to give back to the public,” she says.

In that respect, being seen as pushing the boundaries and fighting a cause will be seen as a positive benefit, says Prof Maclaran of Royal Holloway, University of London. Prince Harry has his own public cause in taking on the tabloid press, so now Prince William will be out there fighting homelessness.

But Prof Maclaran says a key to its credibility will be showing that he has made a personal contribution. The Royal Foundation of the Prince and Princess of Wales is initially providing £3m – with £500,000 seed funding for initiatives in six locations.

[From BBC]

Yikes. Oddly, it feels like people were really prepared to criticize William’s latest big keen project. It sort of felt that way several months ago when Kate re-launched her stupid f–king Early Years thing with the “Shaping Us” rebrand. People have known that there’s no there there for years, but now that William and Kate have the Wales titles, suddenly there’s more criticism, more cynicism, an attempt to really point out how desperate William and Kate are. Desperate to be relevant, desperate to “compete” with the Montecito royals, desperate to be seen doing something.

PS… He invited Ginger Spice to one of the launch events. He’s just doing this to hang out with celebrities, yet again.

Photos courtesy of Cover Images.

Prince William is out and about today, doing the second day of “events” related to the flop launch of Homewards, his homelessness project. Given that William’s office has blanketed the British media with out-of-touch quotes about how William is the savior of homeless people, I thought that Kensington Palace would have demanded that Kate stay home, to give William all the headlines. Turns out, not so much. Kate stepped out today to open a new charity office. Hilariously, King Charles and Queen Camilla are also out and about today – looks like no one got the memo that this week belongs to Pegwards!

To be fair, Kate’s event today seemed pretty low-key. She even repeated a dress from her closet – she previously wore this £1,335 Alessandra Rich dress to the Wimbledon men’s singles final last year. The dress is very Kate – polka dots (or fabric buttons!) and ruffles, something which was designed with a sense of whimsy but Kate wears with earnestness. Everything’s so matchy-matchy with Kate too – the navy-and-white heels with the white purse… I think the shoes should have been different, but that’s just me.

The event was opening One Small Thing’s new Hope Street center. One Small Thing provides housing and support to recently incarcerated women as they re-enter society. This new center will provide housing for five women (you read that correctly) who are re-entering society. So this is sort of like a half-way house too, which is sort of what William is trying to do.

Photos courtesy of Cover Images.

The thing about Donald Trump is that he’s always done crime out in the open, for everyone to see. It’s not a matter of “oh, how will we ever catch this elusive and wily criminal?” The issue has always been the desire to prosecute, and that’s only shifted in recent years, sadly. Now the DOJ has a rock-solid, 38-count indictment against Trump for stealing classified documents and lying about stealing classified documents repeatedly. The federal government’s case against Trump looks and sounds open-and-shut, especially since, oh right, Trump incriminated himself repeatedly. Speaking of, CNN got their hands on one of the audio recordings of Trump incriminating himself in 2021 about all of the classified documents he stole:

CNN has exclusively obtained the audio recording of the 2021 meeting in Bedminster, New Jersey, where President Donald Trump discusses holding secret documents he did not declassify. The recording, which first aired on CNN’s “Anderson Cooper 360,” includes new details from the conversation that is a critical piece of evidence in special counsel Jack Smith’s indictment of Trump over the mishandling of classified information, including a moment when Trump seems to indicate he was holding a secret Pentagon document with plans to attack Iran.

“These are the papers,” Trump says in the audio recording, while he’s discussing the Pentagon attack plans, a quote that was not included in the indictment.

In the two-minute audio recording, Trump and his aides also joke about Hillary Clinton’s emails after the former president says that the document was “secret information.”

“Hillary would print that out all the time, you know. Her private emails,” Trump’s staffer said.

“No, she’d send it to Anthony Weiner,” Trump responded, referring to the former Democratic congressman, prompting laughter in the room.

Trump’s statements on the audio recording, saying “these are the papers” and referring to something he calls “highly confidential” and seems to be showing others in the room, could undercut the former president’s claims in an interview last week with Fox News’ Bret Baier that he did not have any documents with him. “There was no document. That was a massive amount of papers and everything else talking about Iran and other things,” Trump said on Fox. “And it may have been held up or may not, but that was not a document. I didn’t have a document, per se. There was nothing to declassify. These were newspaper stories, magazine stories and articles.”

The audio recording comes from a July 2021 interview Trump gave at his Bedminster resort for people working on the memoir of Mark Meadows, Trump’s former chief of staff. The special counsel’s indictment alleges that those in attendance – a writer, publisher and two of Trump’s staff members – were shown classified information about the plan of attack on Iran.

[From CNN]

LMAO: “The special counsel’s indictment alleges that those in attendance – a writer, publisher and two of Trump’s staff members – were shown classified information about the plan of attack on Iran.” I mean, it’s not funny. But holy sh-t, everything about Trump is such a f–king clownshow. Trump was truly just waddling around his various golf clubs, showing highly sensitive classified material to random people. But Her Emails got a special mention too, which just makes this *chef’s kiss*…

Wow CNN got the tape of Trump’s conversation about classified documents pic.twitter.com/0NVQYAEkor

— Acyn (@Acyn) June 27, 2023

Photos courtesy of Backgrid, DOJ.

Prince Christian of Denmark is the heir to the heir – the eldest son of Crown Prince Frederik and Crown Princess Mary, and grandson of Queen Margrethe. Prince Christian will turn 18 years old in October, and I kind of forgot that he’s so old. After Christian, Mary and Frederick welcomed Princess Isabella, who just turned 16 in April. Their youngest children are 12-year-old twins Vincent and Josephine. So, Christian is getting ready for his big coming-of-age birthday in October, and he has some thoughts. Thoughts about money, and how he’s not going to take the allowance the government will offer him on his birthday:

Prince Christian of Denmark won’t be accepting a royal allowance just yet. On Monday, the Danish Royal House announced that the future king will not be taking the government funding he is entitled to by law when he turns 18 in October. Instead, the eldest son of Crown Prince Frederik and Crown Princess Mary will continue to focus on his studies, and the issue will be revisited when he turns 21 or if there is a change of throne. Christian’s grandmother Queen Margrethe is currently Denmark’s reigning sovereign.

“His Royal Highness Prince Christian turns 18 on 15 October 2023,” courtiers said in a statement on Instagram Monday, posting the prince’s cypher. “Prince Christian’s main priority in the coming year will be the completion of the Prince’s upper secondary education. In continuation of this, the Royal Palace will provide information on Prince Christian’s further youth and education courses when the time is right.”

“It has thus been agreed with the Prime Minister’s Office that support will only be sought in the Folketing [Danish Parliament] for a law on annuities when the Prince turns 21 or upon a possible change of throne, if it takes place before that,” the update from the Danish Royal House continued. “Only after this is the expectation that His Royal Highness will participate to a greater extent in official contexts. However, it depends on where the Prince is at this point in his education. Until then, just like today, Prince Christian will only participate in official contexts to a limited extent.”

While Christian has stepped out with his parents and siblings Princess Isabella, 15, Prince Vincent and Princess Josephine, both 12, for royal events like the Royal Run in Copenhagen and Queen Margrethe’s birthday celebrations, he is not yet a full-time working royal. The prince follows his father Frederik, 54, as second in the line of succession and currently attends the Ordrup Gymnasium school.

[From People]

The Netherlands’ Princess Catharina-Amalia did the same thing two years ago, ahead of her 18th birthday – she turned down the $2 million royal allowance she was entitled to as heir. I suspected, at the time, that she turned down the money because she wanted to have a few more years of just being a young adult, traveling and going to university. I suspect that’s part of the reason why Christian has turned down the allowance too – he’s not ready to participate in the quid-pro-quo of what the allowance means in the larger sense, that the Danish people might feel like he should do more or be seen more. It’s also interesting to me that there’s so much transparency with “royal allowances” outside of the UK.

Photos courtesy of Avalon Red, Cover Images.

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Selena Gomez is, as always, having a busy year. She was dating a Chainsmoker for a little bit, then said she was single. She was spotted with Zayn Malik at least once, then said she was single. There was some social media drama with Kyle Jenner and Hailey Bieber. She wrapped the third season of Only Murders in the Building, got two new cooking show gigs on the Food Network, and filmed a movie with Zoe Saldana in Paris. So I guess Selena was due for a little more drama? Fans noticed that over the weekend she unfollowed a few fellow celebs on IG, including Zayn Malik, the Hadid sisters, and Zendaya. But sources insist there’s nothing to see here.

There’s no feud in the building!

Over the weekend, eagle-eyed fans noticed Selena Gomez seemingly unfollowed a handful of celebrities on Instagram — including Bella and Gigi Hadid, Zayn Malik and Zendaya — but a source close to the Only Murders in the Building actress says rumors of any drama are unfounded.

“There are absolutely no hard feelings with anyone she unfollowed,” the source tells PEOPLE exclusively. (While fans claimed Gomez had unfollowed Dua Lipa, the “Levitating” singer still appears on the Rare Beauty founder’s follow list.)

Earlier this year, Gomez and Malik sparked romance rumors after they were spotted on a date in N.Y.C. However, the “Back to You” singer confirmed her relationship status in a hilarious June 8 TikTok that showed her hollering “I’m single!” at the athletes during a soccer game.

“I’m just a little high-maintenance,” she joked in the clip. “But I’ll love you soooo much.” In the comments section, Gomez wrote, “The struggle man lol.”

Over the years the star, 30, has been open about her complicated relationship with social media, saying it was healthier for her to limit her time online.

Gomez recently returned to the States after spending two months in Paris to film the upcoming movie Emilia Perez alongside Zoe Saldaña.

“Thank you Paris for being a home to me for two months!” Gomez — who’s been garnering Emmy buzz for her work on Only Murders’ second season — captioned the post. “I loved every moment. Working on this film has completely changed my life. I can’t wait to share more soon! Love you all.”

While she was in the City of Light for work, Gomez also fit in some exploring with family and friends, including sharing an oversized croissant with younger sister Gracie and a rooftop hang with her girlfriends with the Eiffel Tower as a backdrop.

[From People]

I really like Selena, but I also can recognize that girl likes a little drama, and that’s okay! But she also likes to pretend she doesn’t because it doesn’t go with her whole be kind, Rare Beauty, mental health thing. And I don’t totally buy the source’s claims that “there are no hard feelings with anyone she unfollowed” because of precisely who Selena unfollowed — two women whose long term exes she dated and one of the exes in question. (The only one that truly seems random is Zendaya.) Like, maybe there’s no new/current beef, but she just got sick of seeing them in her feed. Sometimes you just get tired of people and need a break, but that’s what the mute button is for. Apparently, Zayn also unfollowed Selena. Anyway, it’s a little bit dramatic. Even if there was no special reason, at the very least she knew that people would notice and talk about it because fans notice stuff like this and it becomes a story. Like I said, she likes a little drama.

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