Newsletter Monday, May 15, 2017

[LaineyGossip.com - Calling all smuthounds!] Monday, May 15, 2017 [Intro for May 15, 2017]( [Nicole Kidman arrives for the screening of the film 'Dogville' at the 56th International Film Festival on May 19, 2003 in Cannes]( Dear Gossips, The Cannes Film Festival begins on Wednesday. It’s the 70th anniversary. And while we still have 48 hours to go before the opening gala, Peter Bradshaw, the film critic for The Guardian, predicted today, in a hilariously frothy article, that the [Queen of Cannes 2017]( will be Nicole Kidman, with four projects screening on the Croisette: Top Of The Lake, How To Talk To Girls At Parties, The Killing Of A Sacred Deer, and The Beguiled, all works of auteur directors Jane Campion, John Cameron Mitchell, Yorgos Lanthimos, and Sofia Coppola. The last time Nicole was in Cannes it was for Grace Of Monaco, in 2014, which, as you know, went nowhere. And that might explain why, though Peter Bradshaw doesn’t use the word “comeback”, it’s implied that this is what it is. I don’t know that it’s a comeback, exactly. It’s not like Nicole hasn’t worked. If you look at her work production over the last few years, every year, really, she almost always has multiple releases. Lately though, it’s true, it does feel like there’s been a resurgence, starting with Lion last fall and then, of course, blowing wide open with Big Little Lies. Back in April, Anne Helen Petersen asked [How Many Times Does Nicole Kidman Have To Prove Herself?]( in a piece for Buzzfeed just before the BLL series (or season one, if they really do decide to extend the story) finale. Instead of “resurgence” though, AHP describes it as a “revelation”, positing that for some reason, Oscar-winning Nicole Kidman is repeatedly a “revelation”, because she has to keep reminding us that she is that good when, arguably, we don’t ask the same of, say, someone like Johnny Depp. Or at least we didn’t, until recently. When Nicole is grooving though, when she’s enjoying a career upswing (and an artist who’s been around as long as she has will have several cycles of high and low), she has a tell. In his article for The Guardian today, Peter Bradshaw remembers Nicole in Cannes in 2003, with Lars Von Trier, promoting Dogville. It was two years after she and Tom Cruise ended. She’d just won the Oscar for The Hours. During the press conference, “(w)hen the director went off on a rant about how much he despised America, and wanted a Free America campaign to compare to the Free Iraq one, Kidman lit up a cigarette (contravening the no-smoking rule) and pantomimed her boredom, completely upstaging him”. Have you ever seen video of this? The moment happens around the 3 minute mark but, if you can, watch the whole thing because her body language is hilarious. She’s a teenager here, she’s Malia and Sasha Obama at the turkey pardon, she doesn’t bother trying to conceal the fact that this is boring: The tell is the impertinence. The tell also showed up last week on The Ellen DeGeneres Show, during that [awkward cooking segment]( with Ellen and Giada De Laurentiis which made headlines late last week. Some people thought it was Giada who was being an asshole, several times insulting Nicole’s inexperience in the kitchen. I was most annoyed by Ellen who seemed intent on sabotaging the whole segment from the beginning. And others blamed Nicole for being rude and spitting out bread. No matter the side you take though, the point here is that this is the same irreverent Nicole Kidman who interrupted her director’s monologue and lit up a cigarette in Cannes in 2003. She is feeling herself right now. And we get to see what that looks like in excess, in Euro excess, when she walks that outrageous red carpet, at the glamour-tackiest party of the year. Attached – Nicole’s given us a lot of memorable Cannes looks over the years. But one of my personal standouts has to be the halter drop-waist, bloused Pucci she wore that same year. Yours in gossip, Lainey [Click here for the rest of the photos.]( Posted at 12:37 PM [Show Your Work: Miley, Gaga, and Kelly – Shapeshifters, Name-changers, and Bad Bosses]( [Miley Cyrus performs on stage at 102.7 KIIS FM's 2017 Wango Tango at StubHub Center on May 13, 2017 in Carson, California]( [Miley Cyrus](’s new song Malibu – it’s boring right? Come on, admit it. Even if you’re the most hardcore Miley fangirl, you can’t tell me that song is lighting you on fire. Still… Is Miley’s Malibu as boring as her new “image”? On this week’s episode of Show Your Work, Duana and I offer our observations on Miley Cyrus, the shapeshifter. Shapeshifting can be useful, if you’re a mutant. But as a popstar in these times, is shapeshifting really a career asset? Speaking of shapeshifters, or maybe not – [Lady Gaga]( will be credited as Stefani Germanotta in A Star Is Born. Duana is [The Name Therapist]( so she has some thoughts on the name-change and we both have thoughts on singer-actors or actor-singers, like who can…and who CAN’T. So it’s been maybe five minutes since [Ryan Seacrest]( was confirmed as [Kelly Ripa](’s co-host on Live! And now he’s probably going to resume his role as the host of the soon-to-be-rebooted American Idol. According to [Page Six](, Kelly is pissed. It’s been over a year since the Michael Strahan debacle. They chose someone safe and reliable to replace him. The work, then, was supposed to be developing a rhythm, establishing Kelly & Ryan as morning regulars. And now the work might be having to work around HIS schedule. If you’re Kelly, how do you take this and do you have any concerns? We obviously do. I’ve been wondering whether or not Kelly has a work mentor. Who in the industry can she relate to? [Chris Rock]( is Aziz Ansari’s mentor. And the other day Vulture posted the companion piece to their [excellent feature]( on Aziz - an interview with [Chris about Aziz](, which in my opinion should now be industry standard. Like the next time Jennifer Lawrence agrees to talk to Vanity Fair about Emma Stone, a week later, Vanity Fair should just post the entire interview to go along with the profile. As Duana points out though, maybe not everyone would be as generous and as willing as Chris Rock – and that’s why this move is so effective: because it highlights BOTH of their work; it ends up being a press opportunity for both of their projects in the most authentic way possible. And finally… did you know that Emilia Clarke was not the original Khaleesi? Do you remember the name of the person who played Daenerys Targaryan in the pilot? Probably not. In this week’s installment of Do We Need To Care About… Kathleen Rose Perkins and the replaced pilot actresses. Thanks for all your shouty emails and tweets! Keep shouting at us about work. Work shouts are the best! (Insert the regular SYW blurb about twitter etc) Catch us weekly on [iTunes]( and [Google Play]( and hit us up on Twitter at [@laineygossip]( and [@duanaelise]( [Click here for the rest of the photos.]( Posted at 7:58 PM [Katy Perry’s Witness and American Idol]( [Katy Perry attends the 102.7 KIIS FM's 2017 Wango Tango on May 13, 2017 in Carson, California]( As you know, they’re rebooting American Idol on ABC. Last week, it was [reported that Kelly Clarkson]( was supposed to be one of the judges but she’s going to The Voice instead. Now it’s [Katy Perry](. According to [TMZ]( the deal is almost done and they’ll announce it at the ABC Upfronts later this week. Katy has also just today confirmed the title of her new album: Witness. She’ll go on tour in September. Katy is one of the top artists in the game. And American Idol isn’t exactly a top show anymore. It was cancelled for a reason. Simon Cowell has openly declared that [he’s not interested](. I don’t know anyone who was missing American Idol. If you do, please let me know. But here’s the [Show Your Work]( question: American Idol needs Katy Perry but does Katy Perry need American Idol? Does she need to be locked into all those auditions and the live shows? Maybe? As Jezebel [pointed out]( earlier today, Katy knows her way around a hit song but her last two singles, Chained To The Rhythm and Bon Appetit, aren’t exactly bangers, especially not in comparison to her previous hits. Apparently she’s bundling the album with the tour tickets so that they’ll count as sales so as to preserve her #1 streak. (Can’t wait to hear from all those [Taylor Swift]( fans chiming in about whether or not Taylor has to do that… and if she doesn’t… if that means TAYLOR IS BETTER, THE BEST!) Are Katy and her management, sensing that she might be at a plateau, or maybe even a decline, looking at American Idol for a boost? Would American Idol deliver that boost though? Seriously? Attached – Katy at Wango Tango this weekend. [Click here for the rest of the photos.]( Posted at 7:15 PM [“RENT” Live on Fox]( [RENT ]( Alert, Oregon Trail Generation*, this is not a drill. Fox has announced that [RENT will be its next live musical]( (along with A Christmas Story, which I like, but… never thought of as a musical?). Take a second with that. Call back every angst-filled lyric you memorized and practiced and tearfully belted out in your room, and defiantly four-part–harmonized in the hallways at school when you were surrounded by your friends and the sniffs that ‘drama kids are so annoying’ couldn’t touch you. ‘Light My Candle’ ‘Five Hundred Twenty-Five Thousand Six Hundred Minutes’ …. ‘No Day But Today’ I felt excited about this, and then I felt a bit silly. After all, RENT has not been untouched by time. First of all there’s the movie. I remember being SO excited to see it, bouncing and giggling in my seat with my friend, and before the opening number was finished we were… subdued, and then just straight up disappointed. The magic didn’t make it to the screen, even though all the details were just right. Then there’s the fact that a lot of the show’s subject matter just isn’t as present as it was then. After all, the Gen Xers who were protesting Benny’s rent hikes are now mild, obedient middle managers. Winona Ryder famously (and convincingly!) played a mom last year. 90s angst and apathy seems so outdated it might not even make it into history (who is going to admit that we used to sing things like ‘Novocain for the soul’ and think people would take our ‘pain’ seriously?). Plus, there’s the fact that the show focuses largely—depending on your interpretation, entirely—around the immediacy of life in the face of “The Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome”. I don’t think I will ever ‘get used to’ the fact that what HIV/AIDS means now, in 2017, is so completely different from what we were brought up to think it meant 20 years ago. There’s no blame to lay there—that’s just how much we knew then. But it means that RENT, which seemed for sure like it was always going to be modern and topical, has become a tiny bit more of a historical piece… which takes nothing away from its actual messages of valuing life and the people you love all of the time, not just when you’re called to do so on the calendar. The music holds up—as sing-able in or out of context as it ever was. The diversity of cast and the stories are as relatable as they ever were, with a couple of exceptions: 1. Forgive me, but did Santa Fe ever become a thing? 2. Voicemails. Even moms don’t leave them anymore… mostly. So can the show survive a transition to one-night-only TV? In so many ways, it encouraged people not to be cynical, and given that I’m writing this roughly 20 years after I first fell in love with the show, I need to hear the message as much as anyone. On the one hand, it’s a little of-its-time and not quite old enough to be ‘vintage’, but then again, it’s kind of a spiritual godparent to pop culture phenomena like Dear Evan Hansen and 13 Reasons Why, so it’s more relevant than maybe I give it credit for. In fact, I realize it’s tame enough by today’s standards, give or take a little euphemistic/sanitized heroin, that the show is perfect for parents, who might have been fans of it, to share with their kids, for whom it will be vintage at best. God, what a terrifying thought. *(or Gen X/Millenial hybrids, if you prefer) [Click here for the rest of the photos.]( Posted at 6:30 PM [Smutty Tingles]( [The neighbourhood supervisor]( – don’t f-ck around on his watch! (Dlisted) [Taylor Swift praises Gigi Hadid]( (Just Jared) Pippa Middleton’s [wedding assistant]( (Cele|bitchy) What Ivanka Trump [can’t live without](2.89158045.765078450.1494865987-1210396767.1493826732) (Jezebel) [Harry Styles covers Kanye West]( (TooFab) First look: [Penelope Cruz as Donatella Versace]( (TMZ) [Melissa McCarthy delivers on SNL]( (Pajiba) [The Crown at the BAFTAs]( (Go Fug Yourself) There are [already rumours]( about where Prince Harry and Meghan Markle will get married (Celeb Dirty Laundry) [Click here for the rest of the photos.]( Posted at 5:17 PM [Katie & Jamie in Paris]( [Katie Holmes/Jamie Foxx]( [E! News]( was the first to report on Friday that [Katie Holmes]( and [Jamie Foxx]( were together in Paris last week. A few hours later, [PEOPLE]( followed with their own story about how Katie flew into Paris to join Jamie for a few days as he wrapped shooting the new Robin Hood movie (he plays Little John). I had no idea they were doing another Robin Hood movie. Supposedly this version will be “dark” and “gritty”. And it’s apparently not the only version that Hollywood [is working on](. Did you know you needed this much Robin Hood in your life? Also, Joby Harold wrote the screenplay (the one with Jamie Foxx). Joby Harold also co-wrote King Arthur: Legend Of The Sword, which Sarah didn’t think much of –read her review [here](. Anyway, this post isn’t actually about the surge of Robin Hoods. This post is about how Hollywood’s most undercover lovers (for now, anyway – watch this space) tried to go undercover in Paris and while we now know that they were together there, they still managed to evade photographers, even though Paris paps have been on high alert for weeks on [Tom Cruise]( who’s been shooting the new Mission: Impossible. And that’s the intrigue here, because we already know that Katie and Jamie are a thing, have been a thing for years, so it’s not surprising that they spent time together in Paris, it’s only a story that they spent time together in Paris while Tom is also in Paris… because Paris is suddenly a small town. (Paris is not a small town.) At the beginning, it was thought that Katie and Jamie were hiding their situation for fear of Tom’s retribution. It’s been four years now though. And they’re still hiding their situation. Um, how long does someone have to be afraid of Tom Cruise for? [Click here for the rest of the photos.]( Posted at 5:01 PM [Johnny Depp, king of the jungle]( [Johnny Depp and the cast of Pirates Of The Caribbean 5 surprise fans at Disneyland Paris, May 14, 2017]( No joke, I was distracted when I first read the headline this weekend, so my initial reaction was: is Tim Burton doing a Tarzan movie with [Johnny Depp?]( He’s not and they’re not. But that’s also not out of the realm of possibility for those two. Last week Johnny Depp was making headlines after The Hollywood Reporter published an extensive article about his “[missing millions]( and his on-set unprofessionalism. The title of the piece was “A Star In Crisis”. WHAT CRISIS? It was announced this weekend, pre-Cannes, that Johnny is attached to a new film, King Of The Jungle, based on a Wired article about John McAfee. “The article, John McAfee’s Last Stand, followed McAfee, who cashed in his fortune, left civilization and moved to the jungle in Belize. There, he set-up a Colonel Kurtz-like compound of guns, sex and madness. In the film, a Wired magazine investigator accepts what he thinks is a run-of-the-mill assignment to interview McAfee, but once he arrives in Belize, he finds himself pulled into McAfee’s escalating paranoia, slippery reality and murder.” So, basically, a movie about an unhinged megalomaniac, the kind of role Johnny Depp’s been playing for 20 years. I mean it’s not like he’s going to be the journalist, which actually would be interesting. Imagine: Johnny Depp is the writer from Wired. And Michael Shannon is John McAfee. You want crazy, Depp? Sit your ass down because Michael Shannon will show you crazy. Regrettably, this is not the film they want to make. But what we have learned here is something we already knew: Johnny Depp is going to be fine. Even though he cost Disney all kinds of money with his drama and his delays, even though he might be “in crisis”, Johnny Depp isn’t lacking for opportunity. There probably isn’t even any added insurance on his films either despite the fact that his behaviour, according to The Hollywood Reporter, set back the production budget on Pirates 5. Here’s Johnny at Disney Paris with the rest of the cast of Pirates 5 with as big of a smile as we’ve seen from him in years. That’s all it takes then when you’re Johnny Depp. That’s how easy it is when you’re Johnny Depp. [Click here for the rest of the photos.]( Posted at 3:31 PM [The Riverdale finale and my new obsession]( [Cole Sprouse arrives at the 2017 PaleyLive LA Spring Season 'Riverdale' Screening And Conversation at The Paley Center for Media on April 27, 2017 in Beverly Hills, California]( Late Friday night, approximately 15 minutes after I finished watching the Riverdale finale, I was so deep into creeping [Cole Sprouse](’s Instagram account, I accidentally liked a photo from December 2015. I was saving photos like this one to my phone, on purpose, for no good reason. [+5 perception. I got to do a shoot for @luomovogue with the love of my short life, @rushkabergman Grooming by @claudiobelizario and 📸 by @matthewbrookesphoto I'll be posting some more shots throughout the day, but make sure to check the full story in this February issue.]( A post shared by Cole Sprouse (@colesprouse) on Feb 8, 2017 at 3:04pm PST I was texting my friends, who were out living their lives, heart emojis and all caps declarations of love for [a f-cking Sprouse twin](. It’s wrong. I know it’s wrong. It’s so so wrong but I don’t want to be right. After 13 episodes, Riverdale has officially turned me into an obsessive teenager and I’m not mad at it. I’m mad at Riverdale for other reasons we’ll get to, but my newfound crush on Cole Sprouse (he’s 24; I’m not THAT gross OK) is not one of them. Jughead Jones has earned my adoration. When I wrote about Riverdale [around mid-season](, I mentioned that Sprouse was slowly coming into his own as Jughead but the object of my teenage dreams at the time was [KJ Apa]( – well, KJ Apa’s abs. As Riverdale’s first season progressed, KJ Apa’s Archie went from intriguing leading man to a cardboard cut-out of an intriguing leading man. He still looks great but he’s got the depth of a Katy Perry song. Can we all agree that heading into the finale, Archie was the f-cking WORST? In the season’s second last episode, Jason Blossom’s murderer was finally revealed. To recap, the show’s major murder mystery was Who Killed Jason Blossom? The reveal was a big moment. The whole gang is sitting in front of a laptop, watching Jason get brutally murdered. Cole Sprouse is silently weeping into his hands and every muscle in his face is devastating. Meanwhile, KJ Apa looks like he’s sneaking glances at his cast mates to see if he too should be emoting. KJ Apa’s limitations as an actor have been exposed while Cole Sprouse’s potential seems limitless. There were, however, two scenes in the finale that gave me hope for Archie Andrews in Season 2. If you’ve seen the episode, you know which two scenes I’m referring to. I didn’t know watching someone pound a block of ice with their bare fists could turn me on but now I do. Archie is at his best when he’s doing something physical – making out with Miss Grundy/Valerie/Veronica, walking shirtless, pounding ice— and when he’s exploring his complex relationship with his parents, which brings me to the second scene that might make Archie interesting in Season 2. In the episode’s stunning final sequence, Archie’s father Fred, played by Luke Perry, is *SPOILER* gunned down in the middle of Pop’s diner. I’m a big fan of Fred Andrews and not just because he’s Dylan McKay but IF Fred doesn’t make it out of Pop’s alive, maybe this tragedy will unearth a darkness in Archie that will finally bring out KJ Apa’s range – if he has any, that is. We’ve seen how well the daddy issues plot has worked with Jughead and FP Jones. Season 2 is when KJ Apa needs to prove he’s more than just a pretty face. The last time I wrote about Riverdale, I wished for more of the classic Archie/Betty/Veronica love triangle we’re all familiar with. In the season’s final few episodes, I got my wish – sort of. The triangle is more of a love square. Jughead and Betty seem to be the couple we’re supposed to root for. In the finale, when Jughead says, “I love you Betty Cooper,” it was the first time I believed them as a legit OTP (that’s One True Pairing for those of you not well-versed in the vernacular of teen TV fandom) and I don’t think that’s just my Cole crush talking. The way he delivered that line though? Swoon. Betty and Jughead are star crossed lovers from opposite ends of town, divided by social standing and class, drawn together by shared feelings of isolation and loneliness. It’s all super sweet until Jughead switches schools and interrupts a HOT makeout scene to casually join the same gang that sent his father to jail. That’s not going to end well. So, if Betty and Jughead don’t make it through Season 2, where does that leave Archie and Veronica? Archie clearly has a thing for Betty now that she’s moved on because he’s the ultimate f-ckboi while Veronica is over here talking about soulmates 30 seconds after she and Archie make their relationship official. Let’s talk about how Riverdale is doing Veronica Lodge a major disservice. After starting as a witty, independent, caring ex-mean girl, Veronica has turned into a whiny, clingy shell of her former self. This tweet sums up most of her dialogue in the final episodes. anyone on Riverdale: help me, i'm dying. Veronica Lodge: this is because of my dad isn't it? My dad, Hiram Lodge, paid you to say that. [pic.twitter.com/FfEVSlWuRd]( — Gena-mour Barrett (@SmileGena) [May 8, 2017]( Ugh, don’t even get me started on Hiram Lodge. Veronica’s entire personality has been reduced to pining after Archie or worrying about her father’s shady dealings. In fact, all of the girls of colour on Riverdale are not living up to their potential. The Pussycats, Melody, Josie and Valerie were glorified props in the finale, taking a backseat to Archie’s mediocre, buzzkill song. Valerie walks in on Archie making out with Veronica and does NOTHING. Sure, she broke up with Archie but as my friend Denise pointed out, the writers wrote that scene like Valerie didn’t have a pulse. Angelica Jade Bastien wrote a must-read piece for Vulture called “[Why Do Teen Dramas Like Riverdale Keep Sidelining Black Female Characters?](” that breaks down just how underused Josie and the Pussycats have been this season. Riverdale will be a lot more interesting if the best storylines don’t just go to straight white guys who look good in white tank tops. [Please think I'm cool 📸@austindaniels_ @tynandaniels @beaujamesstudio]( A post shared by Cole Sprouse (@colesprouse) on Jan 1, 2016 at 9:52pm PST What? Lainey and Duana have a segment in their podcast called “Do we need to care about…” I would argue that even if you aren’t watching this weird, wonderful, confusing, sometimes infuriating show, you need to start caring about Cole Sprouse. I guarantee that he’s hanging in more than a few teen girls’ and boys’ high school lockers. I would even go so far as to ask: is Cole Sprouse this generation’s Luke Perry? Are we fighting? My final appeal to pull you all down to my level is this: [Let's split up gang. Daphnes comin with me. 📸 @paulinashafir]( A post shared by Cole Sprouse (@colesprouse) on Jan 23, 2016 at 7:09pm PST I’m disgusting. I know. But don’t pretend you aren’t spending your Monday admiring Cole Sprouse’s photography skills and trying not to accidentally double tap any photos from 2015. Attached - Cole Sprouse and the cast of Riverdale at PaleyLive last month. [Click here for the rest of the photos.]( Posted at 3:00 PM [Angelina Jolie’s Mother’s Day dinner]( [Angelina Jolie and son Pax have Mother's Day dinner in West Hollywood, May 14, 2017]( Here’s [Angelina Jolie]( last night after Mother’s Day dinner with Pax. Not sure where the other five children were. But this has always been a mystery to me, we’ve been talking about it for years – when you have so many kids, how is it decided who gets to do what and go where? Presumably she spent the day with Maddox, Zahara, Shiloh, Vivienne, Knox, and Pax. But when and how was it negotiated that Pax would get the evening? I feel like I’d rather know the answer to that question than what happened on the plane. Anyway, Pax took his ma to Beauty & Essex, one of the new big deal hotspots from the TAO Group. Beauty & Essex is part of a huge complex that also includes more dining options and a nightclub and other entertainment venues. The grand opening [happened in March]( and the goal is for the entire space to be a nightlife destination. [Click here]( to see photos from inside Beauty & Essex. Note all those guitars hung up on the walls. I’ve never understood why adults enjoy eating among instruments, certainly now that Planet Hollywood and Hard Rock Café have had their moments. In my experience, places that have guitars on the wall aren’t known for good food. I am not interested in sacrificing flavour for guitars on the wall. For Pax, though, who is 13 years old, I suppose there would be a certain appeal. Is this for kids and Disney tourists then? [Click here for the rest of the photos.]( Posted at 2:22 PM [JT for Mother’s Day…and the dance-off]( [Justin Timberlake and Jessica Biel out in NYC, May 11, 2017]( One of the all-time best stories in gossip history is the dance-off that happened between [Britney Spears]( and [Justin Timberlake]( after they broke up. This was pre-TMZ. There were never any pictures. But while there’s never been any actual verification that it went down like that, the idea that their breakup was so ugly they had to settle it on the dance floor was just so f-cking good, we all wanted to believe it. It’s become a gossip legend. To be fair though, it’s not like they didn’t enjoy the fact that we wanted to believe it either. I mean, after all these years, JT could have definitively killed it. But you know why he didn’t. JT has been trading on Britney from the beginning. She made him. Which is why he’s never clarified. Unfortunately [Jenna Dewan]( has. Jenna is currently promoting World Of Dance. During an interview on Watch What Happens Live, she’s asked by a caller about the infamous dance-off. This is textbook Andy Cohen trickery – get an audience member to ask what we all want to know. And then jump off from there. So Jenna’s saying it never happened, “not that I saw”. There’s your hope then. Maybe it DID happen and Jenna just wasn’t there? That’s the version we all want to hang on to, non? In other JT news, here’s his Mother’s Day dedication to Jessica Biel: [I marvel at you. It's so hard to put into words EVERYTHING a Mother does. And, you do it with such grace. Thank you for giving me the greatest gift and continuing to show him what it means to be a good person in the world. You make me realize how much my own Mother has done for me. #HappyMothersDay to you, my love. And, to my wonderful Mother and all the Moms all over the world: Y'all really DO RUN THIS... I bow down to you. --JT]( A post shared by Justin Timberlake (@justintimberlake) on May 14, 2017 at 4:31pm PDT You know what makes me crazy? It makes me crazy that so many people out there, women in particular, read that message like it was sweet. Like that’s what they would have wanted to hear. Is it? Is it really? Do you really want a compliment that always ties your wonderfulness back to how it affects HIM? He could have just stopped at “grace”. But because he’s Justin Timberlake, and Justin Timberlake always has to make it about Justin Timberlake, Justin Timberlake is highlighting Jessica Biel’s grace by describing it relation to HIS life – “giving ME the greatest gift”, “making ME” appreciate my own mother. It’s like he’s genetically incapable of writing a message for someone that’s just about them. This is not just an accident; this is a chronic pattern. And it tells you exactly, EXACTLY, who the f-ck he is: Justin Timberlake, as if you could forget. Attached - More shots of JT with Jessica Biel last week and Jenna Dewan promoting World Of Dance in New York. [Click here for the rest of the photos.]( Posted at 1:48 PM [Charlie Hunnam is White Aladdin in King Arthur: Legend of the Sword]( [Charlie Hunnam appears on TBS's Conan, May 12, 2017]( [Guy Ritchie](’s King Arthur: Legend of the Sword was supposed to be the first in a six-film franchise. But in a classic “the gods punish hubris” result, King Arthur fell on its sword with a [$14.7 million opening weekend](. This isn’t just a bomb, this is, “Sorry your movie tanked AND you lost your job” territory. (And it’s probably worse in reality: Warner Brothers is reporting a $175 million budget but there’s no way in hell that’s honest and we’re not even talking marketing costs.) It got a B+ CinemaScore, which is not great (on the CinemaScore curve, Bs are more like Cs), and will probably cause a completely redundant second-week crash. So much for six films. We’re all going to pretend we didn’t even see this one. Which is bad, by the way, King Arthur is a bad movie. The movie opens with Mordred (Rob Knighton, Anti-Social) attacking Camelot because magicians should rule humans which has nothing to do with anything and will later have to be linked to the main action in a very dumb and convoluted way. In what should have been the actual opening of the movie, Uther Pendragon (Eric Bana, renewing his protection against the crone’s curse by appearing in yet another sh*t blockbuster) fights his brother ([Jude Law]( in a silly hat) for the throne. Honestly, I didn’t quite catch Jude Law’s name in this, but it sounds like Verdigris? Anyway, Uther and Vatican fight and he sacrifices his wife so that a demon will show up (??) and kill Uther and his wife and baby Arthur is sent down river like Moses. Also none of the women have names. Arthur grows up in a “Londinium” brothel and he’s basically White Aladdin and also is [Charlie Hunnam]( who cannot carry a movie. (Sorry, Lainey, but between this and Pacific Rim it doesn’t look good.) We learn that Arthur is a good person because he forces some Vikings who raped a prostitute to pay her a year’s wages which makes total sense and Arthur is a GOOD PERSON and there is nothing gross or wrong about this plot point AT ALL, MOVE ON. The brothel gets raided because every five minutes of King Arthur must involve PUNCHING and through the raid we learn the Vikings were VIPs of King Verdugo and Arthur is now in trouble and he ends up on a prison ship where he hears about the sword in the stone. He couldn’t just overhear some gossip in the town square while doing something low-key nice like paying for fruit after a kid steals it, oh no, we have to have Viking rape and prison ships because King Arthur is a testosterone nightmare. Then Arthur is forced to try pulling the sword from the stone, which he does, but he faints because he’s like, so powerful he’s overwhelmed by his own manly energy. He ends up in King Vestibule’s dungeon and instead of lying to Arthur and being like, “Hey man, this means you’re my right-hand good dude, come join my army,” Valhalla tells Arthur exactly who he is, as if that won’t inspire Arthur in the slightest. So then “The Mage” shows up—the closest a woman gets to having a name in this movie is a noun—and there’s an execution break-out scene except [Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves]( did this a thousand times better and all they had was Mullet Hawkeye. Also The Mage (Astrid Berges-Frisbey, for the record) is an acolyte of Merlin because they were saving Merlin for the sequel, which is hilarious. At this point, King Arthur gets way overcomplicated as Arthur learns that really, King Veranda was responsible for Mordred attacking humanity, and Arthur has his training montage and gets his sh*t together to go fight Vaseline and his silly hat. Which he does, and he wins, even though Ventricle sacrificed his daughter to become a demon (???). And then he builds a round table, and we all laugh because they thought there were getting FIVE SEQUELS. Guy Ritchie can direct the sh*t out of a movie, we know this. And even a not-great movie from him, like Man from U.N.C.L.E., has its charms, mostly deriving from Ritchie’s visual style and action chops. But King Arthur is almost visually incoherent, the action is so over-edited, and the story—in part scripted by Ritchie—is so insanely complicated that even though it’s a relatively lean two hours, it feels like your typical bloated disaster blockbuster. And there’s nothing especially clever here, either, which again, even U.N.C.L.E. offers plenty of fun touches. But King Arthur is the sort of the movie where you know Arthur is the rightful king because [he hasn’t got sh*t all over him]( and that’s as clever as it gets. If you are at all tempted to watch King Arthur: Legend of the Sword, just watch A Knight’s Tale instead. Attached - Charlie Hunnam promoting King Arthur on Conan last week. [Click here for the rest of the photos.]( Posted at 1:17 PM [Privacy Policy]( - [Unsubscribe](