Gwyneth Paltrow’s relationship with Brad Falchuk started as an affair when they were both married to other people. When she secured Brad as her jumpoff, only then did she and Chris Martin consciously uncouple. Post-conscious uncoupling, Brad and Gwyneth still took it relatively slowly – after all, he needed to secure a divorce from his wife as well, and the divorce process for both of them took a while (in California-divorce time). Brad and Gwyneth would go out and most people knew they were together, but it wasn’t some “they’re attached at the hip” deal. Then he proposed, and they got married last year in the Hamptons. And in all that time… they’ve never really moved in together, apparently. Brad still has his own place, and Gwyneth still has her own place (with her kids). She told the Sunday Times Style Magazine that they only spend four nights a week with each other:

She’s a wildly successful Hollywood actress and entrepreneur who is famous for her creative, and sometimes quirky, lifestyle choices. And Gwyneth Paltrow, 46, revealed that she still doesn’t live with husband Brad Falchuk in Los Angeles in order to keep ‘polarity’ in their newly married life. The founder of Goop, who was wed for the second time in September, admitted that Brad only stays with her for four nights a week, spending the rest of the time at his own house.

Speaking to the Sunday Times Style Magazine, the actress said the couple’s friends think their unorthodox set-up is ‘ideal’.

She said: ‘Oh, all my married friends that the way we live sounds ideal and we shouldn’t change a thing’.

The actress previously revealed she and the TV writer don’t live together yet because they are trying to navigate their blended family and be respectful of their children. But the Sliding Doors actress also admitted her intimacy teacher taught her ‘polarity’ to keep the relationship fresh.

[From The Daily Mail]

I’m such a loner, this is probably the only kind of marriage which would work for me – the kind of marriage where I could have my own private space and nights away from my partner. Everybody’s different and some married couples don’t need to or want to spend every waking moment together, or spend every night together by choice. I wonder if people would have a better reaction to this if it was someone other than Gwyneth, though. Because coming from her, it sounds less “everybody’s different, do what works for you” and more like “I’m so evolved and special and elitist that my intimacy teacher suggested that Polarity Is The Future, only peasants live together while married.”

Also: I find it curious that there are references to “we’re being respectful of our children” sprinkled in a lot of stories about Gwyneth and Brad. Gwyneth’s children (Moses and Apple) seem fine with Brad and they both seem to have great relationships with Chris. I wonder if… Brad’s kids have an issue with how everything went down between Brad and their mom? It sort of feels that way, doesn’t it?

Here’s a cute thing which went viral a few days ago. Gwyneth did not remember that she was in Spider-Man: Homecoming.

Gwyneth Paltrow genuinely did not know she was in “Spider-Man: Homecoming” so this adorable interaction from “The Chef Show” is easily my favorite thing on the internet today pic.twitter.com/lc3VlSs1Hp

— Jarett Wieselman (@JarettSays) June 7, 2019

Photos courtesy of Avalon Red and WENN.

SPOILERS for the Season 4 finale of Billions.

I only got into Billions this year, when Showtime aired a multi-season marathon and I got hopelessly addicted. The show started out as a look at the bro-culture of high-risk/high-reward capital hedge funds and the scratchy ethical and legal lines they cross all the time. Paul Giamatti is the prosecutor who spent three seasons trying to take down Bobby Axelrod, the mega-rich hedge funder played by Damian Lewis. Both characters were drowning in toxicity, and the show really needed a different energy, a “third heat,” if you will. The show found that third heat with Asia Kate Dillion, the nonbinary actor playing the non-binary Taylor Mason character, in the second season. Ever since Taylor was introduced, they have stolen every scene and become a huge fan-favorite.

So, last night was the Season 4 finale. This season was… not the best. It was too much about Giamatti’s character Chuck Rhoades and his shenanigans, and I guess we were supposed to believe that in the end, Chuck and his father would end up in jail for all of their bullsh-t. Turns out, it was all a complicated and utterly improbable scam which – spoiler – was a complicated set-up to get the current holder of Chuck’s old job, US Attorney for the Southern District of New York. Chuck also managed to get the current Attorney General. As I said, improbable. It actually pissed me off how many ridiculous flashbacks there were to show, Usual Suspects-style, all of the complicated double-dealing and added scenes.

The story with Bobby is that he was willing to knowingly sabotage his relationship with Rebecca just because he was so pissed at her “betrayal” by… working out a business deal with Taylor. So he utterly destroyed his girlfriend, all to get revenge on Taylor and manipulate Taylor into nearly a billion dollars in losses, so Taylor would eventually come back to work for him.

But the big story is that after Bobby helped finance Chuck’s AG campaign, Chuck is no longer on his side. Chuck ended up fake-arresting Taylor Mason and then he asked them to help him (Chuck) get Bobby. Taylor is like “what is even going on” but they kept it together. This whole thing was a giant set-up for Season 5, where Chuck and Bobby are going to war with each other again, and Chuck thinks his “inside nonbinary/man” is Taylor Mason. Meanwhile, Taylor realized that Chuck and Bobby are going to destroy each other. So Taylor is back at Axe Cap with their team and Taylor is sort of working undercover for Chuck but really Taylor is going to try to bring both Chuck and Bobby down?

This was a bonkers finale and basically, this is the reason why I didn’t watch the premiere of Big Little Lies 2. Should I keep watching Billions? This season was such a disappointment, but I’m curious about how the show completely shifted everyone’s loyalties to reboot the show for the next season. I don’t know. I probably will watch. For Taylor.

PS… I didn’t even talk about Wendy because I’m still f–king mad at her. I can’t believe she still gets to keep her medical license after that profoundly unethical sh-t she pulled.

Photos courtesy of Billions/Showtime.

As we saw this weekend, the Duchess of Sussex put her maternity leave on pause for a few hours to honor the Queen’s fake birthday at Trooping the Colour. It was the first time Meghan has been out and about since Private Archie’s baby-debut a little more than a month ago. It was notable, to some people, because Meghan did not make any public appearances whatsoever during Donald Trump’s state visit to the UK just days earlier. Her maternity leave was well-established, and royal women (like Kate!) often make “exceptions” to their leave for Trooping the Colour. But trust that some royal commentators are trying to turn this into a thing. Nevermind the fact that the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge did the bare f–king minimum for Trump’s state visit too – they only attended the banquet and they did not pose with him or give him a photo-op at all. All of the younger royals chose to shun Trump in their own ways to varying degrees (as they should), so why is Meghan the only one getting these “why didn’t she do THIS?!” screeds? Oh, right. From Tom Sykes’ Daily Beast column:

The Cambridges’ putting duty first? While William and Kate appear to have accepted they must do their duty, put country before their own personal feeling (by, for example, attending the state dinner held in President Trump’s honor), Harry and Meghan are making it very clear that they will be led first and foremost by ethical considerations…Harry did make a rather grudging appearance at a private lunch for Trump and his family, somewhat against expectations, and William and Kate did as little as possible with Trump, and denied him a personal photo-op, but it is a handy enough summary of the bigger picture. Harry gets to choose, William doesn’t.

What the Sussexes will choose for themselves: But what will Harry and Meghan choose for themselves? The overarching plan, according to royal sources, is that once Charles accedes to the throne, Harry and Meghan will do far more of the overseas trips, a fact which explains their role as youth ambassadors to the Commonwealth, the loose federation of nations which once called the Queen head of state (and those that still do). There will be a fair bit of shaking hands with dignitaries, of course, but Harry and Meghan will always be more attuned to the needs of the children or people they are helping than the bigwigs. They are said to see for themselves a role as international humanitarians and awareness-raisers in the Angelina Jolie mold. As this week showed, they intend to be guided by moral, rather than political, imperatives.

Meghan has displeased palace insiders: Meghan’s steadfast refusal to participate in the Trump circus was generally greeted by the public as an appropriate response to Trump’s bizarre insults of her and his history of misogyny and racism. It has, however, provoked a few tuts of disapproval amongst old-school palace insiders. She is an American and she is a senior member of the royal family, therefore it was perceived by her critics as rather odd that she was not on hand to greet another American. The fact that she took no part at all in the activities was well flagged to the visitors, and one can’t help wonder whether Trump’s decision to insult her in his interview with The Sun and in his Piers Morgan interview was a retaliatory strike when he realized that she would not be meeting with him and his family.

Meghan is determined to do the right thing: But what Meghan’s refusal to meet with Trump this week shows is that she is determined to do what she sees as the right thing even if that is at the expense of the expected thing. That is a game-changing statement of intent for a new entrant into the royal firm. She stood up to what was probably considerable pressure and simply refused to use her position as Harry’s wife to exult a man with whose values and beliefs she profoundly disagrees.

Meghan’s maternity leave: The official argument presented by the Palace for her week-long no-show was that Meghan is on maternity leave, but everybody knows this is just a convenient fig leaf… If Meghan is well enough and strong enough to honor the Queen on her birthday, logic suggests that she would have been strong enough and well enough to honor the president of the United States, and very few people would expect that she would have missed every single engagement with the president had she been named Hillary.

Harry follows Meghan’s path: Meghan seems unwilling to adopt such a craven stance, and Harry’s startlingly brief appearance on camera as the Trumps were led around an exhibition of Americana from the royal collection by Her Majesty, was also revealing. While he might be prepared to partially go along with the royal virtue of putting-up-with-it, Meghan’s principled stance is clearly rubbing off on her husband.

[From The Daily Beast]

All of this breast-beating because a woman who recently gave birth didn’t want to do a photo-op with a racist piece of sh-t who REPEATEDLY called her “nasty.” Can we not? I mean, sure, it IS notable that Meghan ghosted the Trump clowns, but I thought it was more notable that “future king and future queen” William and Kate didn’t do a photo-op with Trump. At all. There’s a movement to embiggen Will and Kate as the model of everything appropriate and regal and smart, but at the end of the day, they did the bare minimum and they didn’t even have the excuse of “we just welcomed a baby one month ago.” As I said last week, I didn’t have a problem with any of it either – I think it’s funny that Will & Kate denied Trump a photo-op, just as I think it’s great that Harry purposefully ignored Ivanka and Meghan just stayed home. These royal courtiers who are mad about Meghan and only Meghan need to get a grip. “Why wasn’t she there to be an object of Trump’s derision?!?” Because STFU.

Photos courtesy of WENN, Backgrid and Avalon Red.

This is like something from a Saturday Night Live skit. The thing is, when I first read the headline “Kylie Jenner throws a Handmaid’s Tale-themed party,” I truly normalized it to the point where I was like “there’s some justification here, like the proceeds to the party go towards Planned Parenthood or something.” But no. This was not a fundraiser party to draw awareness to how reproductive rights are under attack. This was a birthday party in which a handful of vapid, illiterate rich girls thought it would be funny to dress up as fictional “handmaids” and put the whole thing on social media. I told you, it’s like an SNL skit.

Kylie Jenner is receiving harsh criticism after she and Sofia Richie dressed up in costumes from The Handmaid’s Tale for a themed party over the weekend. Jenner, 21, took to her Instagram Stories on Saturday to share a snap of herself and Richie (who is dating her sister, Kourtney Kardashian’s ex, Scott Disick) wearing red outfits for a bash at her Calabasas, California, home.

The event was in honor of Jenner’s pal, Anastasia “Stassie” Karanikolaou’s, birthday; the reality star decked out her abode to look like Gilead, the fictional setting of the popular Hulu series, and served cocktails with names like “praise be vodka,” and “under his eyes tequila.”

However, not everyone was impressed by the pals appearing to glamorize a show which highlights serious issues like women’s rights violations. “I honestly believe Kylie Jenner did NOT understand The Handmaids Tale if she’s throwing a themed party about it,” wrote one Twitter user. “But why is Kylie Jenner having a Handmaid’s Tale party… she does realize it’s about rape & oppression… right?” questioned another.

[From ET Online]

I found this video (below) where Kylie tells a friend that they’re going to watch the first episode, which… maybe Kylie and her friends are truly watching A Handmaid’s Tale and this themed birthday party coincided with the premiere of Season 3? I mean, anything is possible. But I genuinely think that Kylie and her friends were like “cool handmaid’s tale cloaks, great theme for a cocktail party!” Wrong moment, chicas.

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Kylie throwing a themed birthday party for @stassiebaby and the premiere of @handmaidsonhulu who watched the show? I watched most of it it’s so good

A post shared by Kylie Jenner News (@kyliesnapchat) on Jun 8, 2019 at 6:04pm PDT

Photos courtesy of Backgrid, Kylie’s social media.

We took two weeks off: Minutes 0 to 3:45
We took two weeks off, for Memorial Day and because I was visiting my parents in Florida. I mention that I just found a tick on my back and am on antibiotics. Chandra has been watching tennis and we think sports have a lot in common with celebrity gossip. You can listen below!

Trump and his treasonous kids visit the UK: Minutes 3:45 to 9
Trump was met with huge protests, which he lied about as usual. Some of the royals, particularly Harry, William and Kate, pointedly avoided being photographed with the Trumps, which was smart. Chandra didn’t want to cover Ivanka’s fashions but she did it reluctantly. I think Tiffany is pregnant and mention seeing photos of her on a boat.

Rose Hanbury came to the state banquet: Minutes 9 to 14
Kate’s rural rival, Rose Hanbury, came to the state dinner looking remarkably similar to Kate. Chandra thinks she’s a better dresser than Kate and I say it doesn’t take much. Rose walked into the banquet with a gossip columnist, Sarah Vine from the Daily Mail. Chandra found out that Rose and Sarah walked in together before the procession, meaning that it seemed very deliberate and not assigned.

Camilla was drinking and Trump called Meghan nasty: Minutes 14 to 17
Camilla loves her wine and was seen with a glass during her meeting with the Trumps at the American Embassy. We find that relatable. Trump called Meghan nasty twice, once to The Sun, then he denied it and gave an interview to Piers Morgan repeating that. He only has one adjective for smart women who make valid arguments against him.

Jennifer Lawrence looks different: Minutes 17 to 23
Jennifer Lawrence has been doing promotion for X-Men: Dark Phoenix. She looks much different. There’s speculation that she had work done, but it’s hard to tell what it was. (Here’s a link to a Jimmy Kimmel interview I mentioned.) Some people say it’s veneers, Botox, fillers and/or a nose job or chin implant. Her face looks sharper now. It could be injectables. (I mention this story from Bethenny Frankel but I thought her nose was different, it’s her jaw.) We agree that she didn’t need anything done. Famous people rarely own up to plastic surgery, except for Real Housewives and Cardi B.

Meryl Streep doesn’t believe in toxic masculinity: Minutes 23 to 27:30
Meryl Streep made some clueless “not all men” statements when asked about toxic masculinity while promoting season two of Big Little Lies, a show where she plays the mother of an abuser. Chandra says she needs a publicist to tell her what to say and I say she’s just up her own ass and wouldn’t listen to one anyway.

Serena Williams get blamed for a conference room change: Minutes 27:30 to 31
Serena Williams was told to move to a bigger press conference room by French Open organizers, pushing out Dominic Thiem. It wasn’t her fault but she was blamed for it. We talk about people policing Serena’s behavior, calling her a diva and then denying that’s racist. Chandra mentions how Wimbledon is coming up and is worried that the British press will try to use Meghan and Serena’s friendship to portray them both negatively. She also remembers how cute Meghan’s reaction was when Serena lost at Wimbledon last year.

User Questions: 31 to 35
We talk about our new writer, Quimby, and why we hired her. She sent this story in with her application! I want to thank everyone who sent in applications. I could not respond to them all and feel bad about that. We answer Gabby’s question about celebrity names we still can’t spell.

Comments of the Week: Minutes 35 to 39
My comments of the week are a little older as I looked during our time off, they’re from cannibel on the Demi Moore magic mirror post and from Sayrah on the story about Trump’s staff covering up the name of the USS McCain. Chandra’s is from Pose83 on the Camilla MVP post.

We’re on all major platforms including Google Play Music, Spotify, iTunes, Stitcher, YouTube, Castbox and Google Podcasts. You can leave a comment or email us at info-at-celebitchy.com. You can also leave a text or voicemail at 434-218-3219. Thanks for listening!

Here’s the episode on YouTube!

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A post shared by Celebitchy (@celebitchyofficial) on Jun 4, 2019 at 9:17am PDT

At this point in the program, I don’t think many people genuinely believe that there’s some deeply held beef between the Duchess of Cambridge and Duchess of Sussex. Do I think Kate and Meghan are BFFs? No, I don’t. But I think they see each other as coworkers, and while there might have been some growing pains and difficulties early on, they buried the hatchet by Christmas and they have been the ones doing the heavy lifting to ensure that the two couples “get along” for the sake of the family. I believe the beef was always between the brothers, and Meghan and Kate got “blamed” for it, because it’s sexier to have a duchess-war.

Anyway, I was just reminded of this when I went through all of the photos from this year’s Trooping the Colour. It’s true that the Sussexes and Cambridges stood apart on the balcony, but Harry, Kate and Meghan all rode in the same carriage (with Camilla), and for what it’s worth, the photos of Kate and Meghan interacting were kind of lovely. Kate and Meghan smiling genuinely at each other, Meghan on the balcony looking down at George and Charlotte affectionately (and Kate beaming too). I’ll buy that William and Harry are still beefing – especially given the “let’s exile the Sussexes to Africa” story was not even two months ago – but the duchess-beef isn’t a thing anymore, if it ever was.

Now, do I believe that this is the end of minor passive-aggressive social media moves and event-scheduling drama? Of course not. But that’s fun stuff. And as we’ve seen over the past year and a half, Meghan has done what no one else could do: she got William and Kate to work consistently and be truly KEEN. The competition is good for both couples.

Also: some “body language expert” is trying to sell a story about how Kate and Meghan were showing a lot of “tension” with each other. That’s why I wrote this story, my take on the “Kate and Meghan are still DEEPLY BEEFING” idea. If anything, Kate has never looked more comfortable in her position, and she seemed genuinely happy to be in the carriage with Meg. Now I kind of hope they both go to Wimbledon this year to see some matches.

Photos courtesy of Avalon Red, Backgrid, WENN.

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At the very same time that Brad Pitt’s team were trying to make it sound like Angelina Jolie is still in love with Brad and that’s why SHE is holding up the divorce, Angelina was en route to Colombia for a UNHCR trip. Jolie has held a position with the United Nations High Commission on Refugees since 2001. She’s currently the special envoy for the UNHCR, and she’s been particularly focused on Venezuelan refugees lately. She was in Peru last fall to visit some refugee camps full of Venezuelan men, women and children, and she arrived in Colombia late last week to visit more camps, full of thousands of Venezuelan refugees.

Hollywood star Angelina Jolie on Saturday urged the international community to provide more support to three South American countries with the most migrants from crisis-hit Venezuela, saying 20,000 Venezuelan children are at risk of being without basic citizenship rights.

Jolie spoke in Colombia as a special envoy for the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). She is on a two-day trip to meet Venezuelan migrants there and met with Colombian President Ivan Duque in Cartagena.

Four million Venezuelan refugees and migrants have fled economic and humanitarian crisis in their homeland. More than a million are living in Colombia, where the government and aid agencies have scrambled to provide housing, food and healthcare to an ever-growing influx of migrants arriving in already-poor and violent border regions. The parents of Venezuelan children born abroad often struggle to register their baby’s birth, either because they do not have access to an ever-shrinking number of Venezuelan consulates or because they do not have migration papers.

“The president and I spoke of the risk of statelessness for more than 20,000 Venezuelan children, his commitment to always helping children,” Academy Award-winner Jolie, 44, said at a press conference.

[From Reuters]

Four million Venezuelan refugees have fled the brutal dictatorship of Nicolás Maduro, and they’ve fled wherever they could – Peru, Colombia, Mexico, and some have even made it to the US. It seriously doesn’t get better for them in Trump’s America either – the children are put into baby-sized cages and worse. This whole thing is a nightmare. I wonder if Angelina ever feels so hopeless with this work.

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Photos courtesy of Getty.

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Mike Schur has had a thriving career. He was a producer and writer (and actor) on The Office. He co-created Parks and Recreation, Brooklyn Nine-Nine, and he’s the creator of The Good Place (and those are only a handful of hs credits). If you were near an internet connection on Friday night, you probably heard that The Good Place is ending after its fourth season. Schur made the announcement at its For Your Consideration Emmy panel, and posted a message on Twitter. While the announcement might have come as a surprise to fans, wasn’t a surprise to the cast and crew, which Schur explained in this thoughtful interview with The Hollywood Reporter, in which he devotes a lot of time to discussing ethics, unsurprisingly.

The Good Place is part of philosophical wave of shows that explore what it means to be human. What kind of message do you hope to send in general with the show?
I hope one of the takeaways is that ethics is a really important discipline. Ethics and living an ethical life or trying to live an ethical life is incredibly important to me and I hope it’s important to other people. … I hope the main lesson of the show, in terms of ethics, is that the important thing is that you try and you’re aware that ethics matter and are factoring them in to your decision making at all times as best you can…

And there’s a downside — if you think about it too much, you become Chidi and you don’t do anything. So putting a filter on your life that when you have to make decisions, you do a quick check at the end with your ethical compass and say, “What am I doing? Why am I doing it? And could I be doing something better?” It’s not that hard. This show is taking a very simple and obvious position that it’s better to live that way than to not live that way. That’s one of the main messages of the show. The other one comes from that book, What We Owe to Each Other, the actual philosophy of that book is complicated and it involves a lot of hard to untangle social theory stuff. It basically says if you’re setting up a society, you should do it through a system where everyone has a vote and anybody can veto anybody else’s idea… But the larger sense of that book, to me, is that we owe things to each other. That you start from a position of owing things to other people and that your life should be led with that in mind all the time. That this is not an everyman or -woman for him or herself situation. That we have obligations to each other and it’s up to us to take care of each other; and that no one can really live a full and happy life without the support of other people. So, it’s incumbent upon each person to provide that help, love and support for other people to the best of his or her ability.

[From The Hollywood Reporter]

Schur said that he planned that the show would probably be four seasons, and initially talked to the writers about it so that they could write with that in mind. He told the actors while they were wrapping up Season 3 so that they could plan their careers and lives, which was thoughtful of him and I’m sure they appreciated it. I watched the first season of The Good Place sporadically while I was writing my dissertation, and then, like most TV-watching, it fell by the wayside, but I’ve occasionally read spoilers. This interview makes me want to bump it up in my queue. Schur really seems to care about the quality and integrity of the show; he knew that it wasn’t an idea that could sustain itself over 10 (or more) years, and so has never had any interest in pushing it that far. And, he genuinely seems to care about the cast and crew, too. (Though Schur doesn’t specifically mention the crew, I’m assuming he didn’t keep them in the dark.)

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Photos credit: NBC and Getty

Tom Cruise is a Scientologist wingnut who never sees his youngest child because his “church” doesn’t allow it. But today, I actually had a pang of sympathy for him. Tom Cruise is mostly just minding his own f–king business these days. So imagine you’re Tom Cruise, just minding your own business, and one day Justin Bieber tweets this:

I wanna challenge Tom Cruise to fight in the octagon. Tom if you dont take this fight your scared and you will never live it down. Who is willing to put on the fight? @danawhite ?

— Justin Bieber (@justinbieber) June 10, 2019

Tom Cruise is 56 years old and by the looks of things, still in pretty good shape. Justin Bieber is 25 years old and maybe 100 lbs soaking wet. Can we not? Can we not live in a world where rando pop stars are like “I CHALLENGE TOM CRUISE TO A FIGHT!” And this: “Tom if you dont take this fight your scared and you will never live it down.” Toxic bro, toxic masculinity, just toxic. Stepping up to a man who is older than his father and then basically calling Tom a p-ssy ahead of time? Are we really doing this?

Speaking of toxic, Conor McGregor responded, bizarrely.

If Tom Cruise is man enough to accept this challenge,
McGregor Sports and Entertainment will host the bout.
Does Cruise have the sprouts to fight, like he does in the movies?
Stay tuned to find out! https://t.co/TxsH9KUyFg

— Conor McGregor (@TheNotoriousMMA) June 10, 2019

So here we are. In the year 2019, I actually have a pang of sympathy for Tom Cruise. And seriously, how badly is Justin Bieber’s rehabilitation going?

Photos courtesy of Backgrid, WENN.

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Gina Rodriguez and Penn Badgley were on Variety’s Actors on Actors show, which you can see here on YouTube. It’s quite long so I’m not embedding it. While I still think that Gina is an incredible actress, my opinion of her changed after some comments she made earlier this year about women of color. Her brand of feminism does not extend to women outside her range of experiences, I’ll say that. Gina is up her own butt, and although a lot of famous actresses are like that it’s not an adequate excuse. (She talks around those issues at around 15:30 to 20. I’m not getting into all that. She absolutely has not changed.)

They talked about Gina’s show, Jane the Virgin, ending and how Penn could relate, because he was on Gossip Girl. He also discussed his role on You, and how different it was to be on Netflix now after the show started on Lifetime. (If you haven’t seen You yet, watch it! He plays a psycho, it’s amazing.) Gina is Gina, but Penn is fascinating to me. He’s clearly thought a lot about these issues. So has Gina, insomuch as they affect her. I’m quoting Penn here, obviously.

On the tagline for You, ‘how far are you willing to go for love’ and how that is inaccurate
To me it’s about ‘how far are we willing to go to forgive an evil white man…’ The cultural norms that we’re still all indoctrinated by that incline us to forgive a certain kind of person who looks like myself…

Now that we’re more conscious of representation… I’m not interested the way I used to be in being likable.

Gina: What’s up with your crazy eyes?
Isn’t that acting? You’re asking me how I make my facial expressions. I don’t find it difficult to access what people define as creepiness or even rage.

On people thirst-tweeting him about his character Joe
I had this measured response, ‘let’s check ourselves a little.’ I was really pleased and surprised to see how much that elevated the conversation around it and encouraged people to have a deeper viewing of the show.

His acronym for fame
It’s f’ing awful man, extremely

Gina: it’s that bizarre space between blessing and burden
Like dancing on a razor’s edge.

Gina: The thing about fame is you just can’t believe the shit that you’re given
Yeah it’s like a constant test of the ego. When you falter it’s very public. You just have no idea what you’re signing up for.

[From Variety video via US Magazine]

Penn revealed that he had an equivalency degree because he stopped school to work, which was surprising to me. He’s so smart and sounds quite educated, which of course doesn’t depend on formal education. As opposed to Gina he really came across as trying to understand the world beyond his own experiences. His thoughts on fame kind of explain his career. He wasn’t chasing that, he was trying to hone his craft and learn how he fit into the world. This makes me want a second season of You already. It’s been announced but there’s no release date yet.

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photos credit: Getty