True Detective Season 2 premieres on HBO on June 21 right after the current season of Game Of Thrones comes to an end. Even though that’s still 7 weeks away and they’re still shooting the final episodes, Colin Farrell just gave an interview to The Sunday Times. Early promotion?

He talks about…      

Scarlett Johansson covers this week’s issue of Parade. The cover is a bit whack and I sort of find of amusing that an “artiste” like ScarJo has to go “downmarket” to Parade. But that’s what happens when you’re shilling a massive comic-book movie which needs to make more than a billion dollars. And while ScarJo doesn’t need to give up any juicy gossip for Parade, she still managed to throw in some interesting tidbits about her current marriage (to Romain Dauriac) and her former marriage (to Ryan Reynolds). Some highlights from Parade:

Where she lives: “I live a little bit of everywhere. My husband and I and the baby are a little bit nomadic at the moment.”

An allusion to her marriage to Ryan Reynolds: “Acting is a very strange world to be co-existing in. It’s very volatile. There’s always going to be the more successful person. It’s related to rejection. Because actors, if they’re not having success, connect it directly to unpopularity—to the fact that nobody wants them. It’s not necessarily true. I’m constantly rejected.

Marriage is hard: “It takes a lot of work. It takes a man who’s not only confident in the love that you have for one another, but confident in what he has going on in his own career. He has to be in a field that’s completely different from yours. My husband’s also involved in art. What’s important to him is the recognition that he gets from his job, and that has nothing to do with my job.”

Her current husband: “We like to go out and go dancing. Other times, we like to sit at home and eat Thai food and watch House Hunters International for four hours. And we’re interested in each other’s worlds. He’s interested in my weird, alien entertainment world. It fascinates him because it’s so different than what he knows. And I like to go to art openings with him and talk about art and emerging artists with him. That’s his passion.”

Her relationship with Chris Evans: “I’ve known Chris since I was 17, when we did The Perfect Score. This is our fifth movie together. We’re like Bogart and Bacall.”

She doesn’t want her daughter in the spotlight: “It’s hard. On the one hand, you don’t want to isolate your kids, but you don’t want to make your kids feel like freaks: There’s this fascination with famous kids, like they’re celebrity spawn.”

Parenting rules: “I think you just have to encourage your kids to be who they are, be themselves and not live in the shadow of your accomplishments.”

[From Parade]

I feel her on House Hunters International. I can turn it off when it’s a regular House Hunters marathon but when it’s a marathon of the HH International? It gets really difficult. Especially if there are families moving to cool cities and they actually have money to spend on good real estate.

As for the stuff about being married to an actor… her comments are begging to be parsed, right? “It’s very volatile. There’s always going to be the more successful person.” Meaning… Ryan had issues with Scarlett’s success while they were married? She was becoming one of the most in-demand actresses and winning Tony Awards for her stage turns while Ryan was… working on Green Lantern. This is also begging to be parsed: Marriage “takes a man who’s not only confident in the love that you have for one another, but confident in what he has going on in his own career.” Do I spy some very pointed shade? Hm.

Photos courtesy of Parade, WENN.

Mad Men Season 7 Episode 11 recap

Yes, we’ve done it before. We’ve seen this go down – the passion and ticking clock and the corralling of clients. I got just as excited this time as I did back then. I wanted to see the excitement and adrenaline start to flow like it did years ago when they s…      

Blake Lively has a decent new interview with the Los Angeles Times. Blake has been enjoying the past week of wall-to-wall press, probably because it’s her first film press tour since 2012. She’s been doing a major (and bizarre) fashion show in New York, but I kind of think the fashion show has just been to deflect from the fact that, oh right, Blake is kind of boring in interviews. She doesn’t have a lot to say in general. So why pick up on this LAT interview? Well, she actually had her baby with her in the interview – she was breastfeeding and she asked the LAT reporter not to describe it in the article (which the reporter does not). Blake also tells some lies about how she announced her pregnancy, because I guess she thinks we’re stupid. Some highlights:

Blake didn’t want to tell people she was pregnant? Lively hoped to conceal her pregnancy until she gave birth but shared the news at seven months because she found out that paparazzi had taken pictures of her (and her growing stomach) on vacation with Reynolds.

She didn’t think ‘Gossip Girl’ was about the quality of the content. “If it was about the content, they wouldn’t hand us our script pages minutes before shooting. You’re part of this machine — this pop culture phenomenon — but as an actor, the quality of your work is definitely compromised because of that. When I finished the last season, I didn’t feel good at it anymore. I didn’t feel stimulated. It had become muscle memory, but not good muscle memory — like bad-habit muscle memory.”

The bad reviews of her lifestyle site, Preserve: “You feel like you’re in high school and being bullied,” Lively says of the negative reviews. James, who was bouncing on her lap, gurgled. “Excuse me! She has a lot to say on the subject. She hates bullying.”

She’s sticking with Preserve: “I’m a lot better at this than I am at acting. I always feel like I’m faking it when I’m acting. I do the best I can do to tell the story in the best way, but I always feel really lucky when I get a job. I feel confident when I’m cooking or decorating. It’s something I control beginning, middle and end. That ownership feels good.”

She wants more kids: “It’s addictive…Having a baby is just living in the constant unexpected. You never know when you’re gonna get crapped on or when you’re gonna get a big smile or when that smile immediately turns into hysterics. It might be like living with a drug addict. But you have a baby and you think, ‘I can’t imagine ever not having a baby,’ because they grow up so quickly. I’d be an 80-year-old woman with a baby if I could.”

[From The LAT]

Oh, so much here to parse. First of all… while the paparazzi might have gotten photos of Blake’s pregnant belly, let’s be real, she used her pregnancy announcement to shill the launch of Preserve. She literally posted the first “bump photo” on Preserve as part of the launch of the site. And yes, she’s “better” at Preserve-ing than she is at acting, although that’s setting the bar pretty low. And no, what we said about Preserve wasn’t “bullying.” We were utterly justified in mocking the crappy functionality of the site AND the cheesy, offensive writing. Anyone remember her stupid “Allure of Antebellum” post? Because it was so quaint and lovely in the American South when black folks were slaves, right? SO ALLURING.

And why is Blake criticizing Gossip Girl so much these days? Chica, that’s the show that made you famous. Stop biting the hand that fed you and made you a household name.

Photos courtesy of Fame/Flynet.

Game of Thrones Season 5, Episode 3 recap

At the beginning of Game of Thrones there were a lot of characters spread across a vast land, all with different motivations. Now, five seasons into the story, there are still a lot of characters and the land is even vaster, but the motivations have n…      

The Brian Williams scandal fully broke in February. That was when Williams went on air on the NBC Nightly News to give a weird half-apology for “mis-remembering” a story about how he came under fire in Iraq in 2003. Except that he never came under fire, and he told like 11 different versions/lies about that one incident. Williams was quickly suspended without pay for six months while NBC underwent an internal audit of Williams’ actions, words, stories and lies. We got a taste of what the internal audit was uncovering a few weeks ago, when Vanity Fair published a fascinating and bitchy piece about the dysfunction within NBC News and the executive mishandling of Williams and crisis in general.

So, what’s new? The NYT published a gossipy, insidery piece this weekend all about the audit/investigation into Williams. Apparently, they’ve already found “a half-dozen instances” in which Williams outright lied or “misremembered” certain stories.

An NBC News internal investigation into Brian Williams has examined a half-dozen instances in which he is thought to have fabricated, misrepresented or embellished his accounts, two people with inside knowledge of the investigation said.

The investigation includes at least one episode that was previously unreported, these people said, involving statements by Mr. Williams about events from Tahrir Square in Cairo during the Arab Spring. The investigation, conducted by at least five NBC journalists, was commissioned early this year. The inquiry is being led by Richard Esposito, the senior executive producer for investigations, for the news division.

The two people with knowledge of the investigation, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe internal discussions, said the episodes under review included details of the incident in Iraq in 2003; statements Mr. Williams made about a missile attack while he was traveling in another helicopter over northern Israel in 2006; and the circumstances under which he received a fragment of a helicopter that crashed during the mission to kill Osama bin Laden in 2011.

It is not clear precisely which parts of Mr. Williams’s reporting from Tahrir Square have been scrutinized by NBC or what the network’s investigation shows. But discrepancies are evident in accounts given by Mr. Williams in February 2011.

In an appearance that month with Jon Stewart on “The Daily Show,” Mr. Williams described his reporting from the square. Speaking of clashes between protesters seeking the overthrow of the Egyptian government, and a pro-government group on horses and camels, he said he had “actually made eye contact with the man on the lead horse.” Mr. Stewart then referred to reports that the pro-government group had used whips. “Yeah,” Mr. Williams replied, “he went around the corner after I saw him, they pulled out whips and started beating human beings on the way.”

The NBC News report on the clash between the protesters that day did not show Mr. Williams in Tahrir Square during the protest. Subsequent reports said that Mr. Williams was reporting “from a balcony overlooking Tahrir Square,” rather than from inside the square itself, a description that matches footage that was broadcast, and that he repeated in an interview with The New York Times last year.

[From The NY Times]

As we hear more stories about Williams’ many lies, a pattern has emerged: the lies are always included to make Williams look more heroic, to make it seem like he was in more danger, that he is always in the thick of it… rather than reporting from a balcony overlooking the real action. The NYT’s sources also say that the investigators are getting information and direction from NBC News employees, many of whom have apparently known about Williams’ penchant for lies and falsehoods all along. I’ve got to wonder… did Williams piss off a lot of NBC underlings? Because the knives are out for him. And yes, he’ll be fired by the end of the year. He’ll probably be fired in the next few months, actually.

Photos courtesy of WENN.

Dear Gossips,

I keep calling it the Mary Lindo. That’s the Lindo Wing at St Mary’s Hospital in London where Princess Catherine will give birth to Big G’s sibling. And where press and royal TwiHards have been gathered for days. It could be any time now. Which is why I was happy to get out of t…      

Jay-Z launched his music-streaming service, Tidal, less than a month ago. The launch was epic in its craziness and obliviousness of how pretentious everyone looked. Like, Jay-Z, Madonna, Kanye West, Jack White and many more signed some kind of Tidal Manifesto and stood proud of their accomplishment of charging more money for basically the same (if not a substandard) music-streaming product. Well, in the past few weeks, everything has gone to hell. No one likes Tidal, the app isn’t popular at all, Jay-Z is getting terrible press and even Jay’s BFF Kanye has distanced himself from Tidal (Kanye deleted his pro-Tidal tweets).

So what did Jay-Z do? Something he rarely does: he tried to explain himself. He went on a “stream of consciousness” Twitter rant. I’m not going to embed all of the tweets (there are so many), so if you want to see them all, go here. He kept using the hashtag #TidalFacts throughout, but here’s the bulk of Jay-Z’s defense, compiled into two paragraphs:

“Tidal is doing just fine. We have over 770,000 subs. We have been in business less than one month. The iTunes Store wasn’t built in a day. It took Spotify 9 years to be successful… We are here for the long haul. Please give us a chance to grow & get better. There are many big companies that are spending millions on a smear campaign. We are not anti-anyone, we are pro-artist & fan. We made Tidal for fans. We have more than just music. We have video, exclusive concerts, tickets for events early, live sports!…

“Tidal is where artists can give their fans more without the middlemen. Indie artists who want to work directly w/ us keep 100% of their music. “If you don’t want the CEOs all in the videos” haa. Tidal pays 75% royalty rate to ALL artists, writers and producers – not just the founding members on stage. Rich getting richer? Equity values… YouTube $390 billion. Apple $760 billion. Spotify $8 billion. Tidal $60 million. My cousin just moved to Nigeria to discover new talent. Tidal is a global company. We have Tidal X – it supports artists by giving them a platform to connect with their most loyal fans. Tidal is for all. Our actions will speak louder than words. We made Tidal to bring people the best experiences… and to help artists give that to their fans over and over again… We are human (even Daft Punk ha). We aren’t perfect – but we are determined.

[From Jay-Z’s Twitter]

Two things. One, it sounds like Jay is genuinely worried that he made a terrible investment and that the whole thing is blowing up in his face and he won’t be able to sell Tidal for a tidy profit. Two, I like the idea of Tidal more now that he’s explained his mission statement this way, rather than with the awkward, bonkers, celebrity-filled stage in which they all had to sign the Tidal Manifesto or whatever.

Oh, and is there a “smear campaign” against Tidal? I don’t really think there is. I think people were genuinely put off by the launch, but a lot of people still gave Tidal a chance and the sad fact is that people just dislike the app/service.

View image | gettyimages.com

Photos courtesy of Getty, WENN.

Bruce Jenner’s 20/20 interview justifiably took over social media and news and gossip sites this past weekend. It was one of the most-watched programs of the year (17 million people tuned in), and will likely go down as one of those cultural-milestone moments that people will cite for years to come when we speak of trans-acceptance and tolerance. I’ve been impressed by how the reactions to Bruce – from his family and from random internet people – have been largely positive and accepting. The few prominent people who have said negative things have been slapped down HARD. People like… Kris Humphries.

As you might remember, Kris Humphries was married to Kim Kardashian for a few months back in 2012. I always thought that Kim married Kris just because she was turning 30 and she just wanted to get married to someone, anyone and Kris was the first guy to ask her. It was not a love match and Kris always seemed like a loser (sorry to anyone who thought he would bring down the Kardashians, but he was just a douche who wanted to make Kim “pay” for divorcing him). Anyway, just hours after Bruce Jenner’s interview, Humphries tweeted: “Man, I’m glad I got out when I did. #Gottadoyou.” The reaction must have been immediate and unpleasant, because Kris later tweeted an apology and clarification:

Are you buying it? I am not. I think Kris’s intent was pretty clear in the first tweet. He thought he’d grab a few headlines by tweeting some shade at his ex-wife’s family and he’s such an idiot that he thought people would be on his side. But I’ll give him this: at least he recognized that he was acting like a dumbass and offered support to Bruce.

Photos courtesy of WENN.

Last week, I discussed the rumors that Tyga was cheating with his ex, Blac Chyna, behind Kylie Jenner’s back. This gossip was based on screencaps that Blac Chyna posted. I pointed out how easily these images could have been faked. Kylie believes that’s the case. She tweeted, “I didn’t know u could change the font size on tweets now. #fake.” I’m sure the images created some doubt in Kylie’s mind. She’s a teenager, and teens are dramatic. Now there’s a new image ^^^ which was Instagrammed by The Shade Room (before they deleted it). But TMZ says this image is completely real. You can see a prominent new tattoo on Tyga’s left inner elbow area. The tat reads “Kylie.” The idea is that Tyga inked himself to prove his devotion to Kylie.

I’m not a tattoo expert and can’t tell whether the image is faked. Tyga did post this selfie that shows a bit of the alleged tattoo. His (now-deleted) caption read, “Everything happens for a reason, things go wrong so you can appreciate them when they’re right, and sometimes good things fall apart so better things can fall together.”

A photo posted by Tyga / T-Raww (@kinggoldchains) on Apr 24, 2015 at 11:14am PDT

So … tattoo or not? I can’t figure out whether Tyga would be dumb enough to confirm his statutory rape of Kylie with a tattoo. He’s already gross enough (at age 25) to date a 17-year-old. He’s clueless enough to talk about how it doesn’t matter what the world thinks,” but is he stupid enough to get a tattoo with her name? I guess we’ll know the truth if he decides to wear long sleeves until she turns 18.

More Kylie news. She’s now surpassed 21 million followers on Instagram. No wonder the #KylieJennerLipChallenge happened. Meanwhile, a crazed Kylie fan delivered a stack of pizzas and a proposal on last night’s episode of KUWTK. Creepy.

Photos courtesy of ShadeRoomInc on Instagram, Tyga on Instagram, Fame/Flynet & WENN