The Weeknd has another hit album on his hands with Starboy. His last album, Beauty Behind the Madness, was a huge success too, and now Starboy has debuted at #1 on Billboard for its first week of sales. What’s interesting about The Weeknd – real name Abel Tesfaye – is that he really doesn’t go a traditional route to promote his music. As in, he’s not doing tons of magazine interviews or music-industry press. He only did a handful of interviews for Beauty, and this Guardian interview is one of the few extensive sit-downs I’ve read with Abel so far. You can read the full Guardian piece here – a Guardian journalist traveled to Rotterdam to spend hours in Abel’s hotel room, listening to him talk sh-t about drugs, hair and music. Some highlights:

Being able to wear hats again after cutting off his dreads: “I think I felt a single tear come down my cheek.”

His height (he’s 5’7”): “Thinking about putting lifts in my sneakers… Guess I’ve been hanging out with too many supermodels.”

Whether he thinks his lyrics are misogynistic or callous: “Oh, for sure… The mind of a 19-year-old is very different from the mind of a 26-year-old. You grow. You get into better relationships. You experience more, meet more people, better people. But when you’re in a dark hole, at an earlier point in your life – you write about the mindset you’re in at that moment. I don’t think I’d ever apologise for music I make, no. But there are regrets in my life, of course. And you write about it.”

Whether he ever thought about going into therapy: “No. Definitely not. I think that’s more when you’re privileged, you know? Going to a therapist is not something you do when you’re growing up as a street kid in Toronto.” He wriggles in his seat. “Sorry, bro.”

His drug use: “When I had nothing to do but make music, it was very heavy. Drugs were a crutch for me. There were songs on my first record that were seven minutes long, rambling – whatever thoughts I was having when I was under the influence at the time. I can’t see myself doing that now…I’ll be completely honest with you. The past couple of albums, I do get back to that… Even on this new album. You have writer’s block. And sometimes you’re like, I can’t do this sober.” He recalls how, back in February, he decided to call off a summer tour in Europe to write the new record. “I cancelled it and something happened to my inspiration. I guess it was the weight on my shoulders. I’d cancelled a tour – a lot of money. I had these ideas, but I couldn’t put them on wax. If you were a psychologist, you’d probably tell me there was stress in my life, taking away from my work.” So what happened? “I had to get that little jump.” In the studio, out came the weed, the Hennessy, probably a few more things. “And the ball started rolling. And then I didn’t need it any more.” I ask if there’s a dark version of all of this, a version where at some point he’s not able not to turn to drugs. “Right now, I feel in control,” Tesfaye answers, frankly. “Where it takes me after, I don’t know.”

[From The Guardian]

I know The Weeknd has been accused of sexism or misogynoir, but from what I can tell… his lyrics are no better or worse than most of the younger male musical acts – the musical acts that aren’t trying to be straight-up pop music. Part of The Weeknd’s appeal is that while this album and the last album were billed as straight pop music, he’s still got that dirty edge he had when he was just making music for himself. I don’t know. I also take his point that how he felt about women when he was 19 isn’t the same as how he feels about them at 26. As for the drug stuff… I hope he keeps his eye on that. That’s another thing that should shift as a person gets older, where you don’t need drugs or alcohol to sleep/create/take the edge off. But it sounds like he still needs it. Ugh.

Photos courtesy of WENN.

These are photos of Jennifer Garner arriving at church on Sunday separate from her likely no-longer-estranged husband, Ben Affleck, and their kids, who were there first. In the photos where her hair is dry, she’s leaving church with her daughters. Judging by Garner’s wet hair, she may have hit the gym or had a personal training session just prior to church and couldn’t be bothered (or didn’t have the time) to dry it. We’ve seen Jen out with wet hair before, it’s not new. It does seem a little bizarre to go to church with wet hair, but that’s her prerogative and it’s becoming more common to see people do this. I saw a college-aged woman out at a very nice restaurant the other night with wet hair. My girl Kaiser does this sometimes, as she lets her hair air dry and doesn’t own a dryer. (I think her hair is so healthy and thick due to genetics not just air drying, but that’s my jealousy speaking.)

As I’ve mentioned many times, I am the kind of person who puts makeup on, every day, without fail. I also either pull my hair back into a ponytail or blow it dry. I save time by only washing it every other day. Only twice in the past 15 years can I remember going out with wet hair and once was because the new spinning studio I tried didn’t have any hairdryers to use (they told me they were available before I took a shower!) and the other was when hairstylists at a new salon were trying to stealthily gossip about me, so I told them I didn’t want my hair done after all. I am all about doing my hair and makeup, it’s somewhat ritualistic at this point and I truly enjoy it. No judgment on women who don’t wear makeup or fuss with their hair! I admire that attitude and sometimes wish I could do this, I’m just too self conscious otherwise.

So what do these photos mean for Garner and Affleck’s relationship? We know he’s promoting Live by Night, which is out in limited release by the end of the year, and we know he’s gunning for more Oscar nominations. Along with that comes playing the family man, a role which often eludes him. Sometimes his professional life requires that he convincingly play that role, and that’s when his urges to self destruct aren’t quite as compelling, or he just gets better at hiding them. Garner has said she values family above all else and she continues to show that with her actions.

Thanks to The Daily Mail we know that the shoes Garner is wearing are Chloe brand and that they retail for $545. Just in case you have a lot of disposable income and are wondering where to get nondescript overpriced flats.

Photos credit: FameFlynet

Patton Oswalt is a stand up comedian who has also found his footing in both film and Television. Even though he had great turns on both VEEP and The Goldbergs (and his amazing, improvised Star Wars filibuster on Parks & Recreation), I will always think of him as Remy from Ratatouille. Patton was married to true crime writer Michelle McNamara and they were parents to seven-year old Alice. In April of this god-awful year, Michelle died suddenly in her sleep. Patton has been trying to deal with the loss ever since. In August, he wrote a touching essay on grief, which is well worth reading. He returned to standup, eventually being able to address his wife’s death in his comedy, something he told Stephen Colbert helped him cope. Another way he copes is by being a kick a—dad to little Alice. Patton wrote an essay for GQ discussing being a widowed father and how he plans to move forward. You can read the whole thing here. Below is an excerpt.

Five months and ten days ago, as I write this, I became a single father.

This is my first time being a single father. I’ve missed forms for school. I’ve forgotten to stock the fridge with food she likes. I’ve run out of socks for her. I’ve run out of socks for me. It sucked and it was a hassle every time, but the world kept turning. I said, “Whoops, my bad,” and fixed it and kept stumbling forward. Now I know where to buy the socks she likes. I asked two parents at her school to help me with forms and scheduling. I’m getting good at sniffing out weekend activities and scheduling playdates and navigating time and the city to get her and myself where we need to go every day. I work a creative job, but I live a practical life. If I can persuade a comedy club full of indifferent drunks to like me, I can have my daughter ready for soccer on a Saturday morning.

I’m going to keep going forward, looking stupid and clumsy and inexperienced at first, then eventually getting it, until the next jolt comes, and the next floor drops out from under me, until there are no more floors.

I don’t know what kind of single father you are, if you are one or ever will be one. If you’re widowed or divorced, adopter or elder sibling. If you’re feeling any fear or self-doubt, reassure yourself with the fact that I’m doing this. Me. Spend an hour with me sometime. I can’t drive stick. I can’t scramble an egg. I can’t ice-skate. But I’m doing this. Being a father. I’m in charge of another human being. So you can do this. I promise.

And to show you I’m on the up-and-up? I’ve also been lying to you. Because none of this is for you.

It is for Alice.

I’m moving forward—clumsily, stupidly, blindly—because of the kind of person Alice is. She’s got so much of Michelle in her. And Michelle was living her life moving forward. And she took me forward with her. Just like I know Alice will. So I’m going to keep moving forward. So I can be there with you if you need me, Alice.

Because I’ll need you.

I can do it. I can do it. I can do it. Because of you, Alice.

[From GQ]

I encourage you to read the whole essay if you are any kind of parent at all. I am not a single parent and I, thank everything, am not a widow but I constantly feel like I “can’t do it” when it comes to parenting. No matter what has happened, if it went wrong, I am sure I was the cause and that I have irrevocably damaged my children as a result. Reading this made me feel a little better to know that others think they’ve failed in their parental role as well. In another part of his essay, Patton discussed the ways in which he and Michelle’s personality traits worked together to form a parenting machine. Again, he eloquently demonstrates how their relationship operated and it is both beautiful and tragic to understand how incomplete he feels currently.

I have not felt true grief yet. I’d love it if I never had to but I will, I know. I hope I remember to reread Patton’s essays when I do because he has put very complex emotions into relatable concepts. I know he’s working through a process by writing about it and addressing it in public and that he is doing so for himself but hopefully he also understands how much he is doing for others. In his Facebook essay, he says of all the people who offered him support, “They will show up for you, physically and emotionally, in ways which make you take careful note, and say to yourself, “Make sure to try to do that for someone else someday.”” I think, in many ways, he already has.

Embed from Getty Images

Photo credit: WENN and Fame/Flynet Photos and Getty Images

Tom Hardy covers the January issue of Esquire UK to promote his new “anti-Downton” miniseries, Taboo. That’s not me saying it’s “anti-Downton,” it’s Tom saying that. Taboo is set in 1814, and Tom stars as an adventurer who returns home to England to collect an inheritance, and shenanigans – dramatic shenanigans – ensue. As for this Esquire interview… because Taboo is his baby (he produced it and shepherded it for some-odd seven years), he’s chattier and nicer than ever before. He’s certainly nicer here than he ever was during the promotion for The Revenant almost one year ago exactly, when he was publicly called out by a journalist for being an unprofessional douche. You can read the full Esquire piece here. Some highlights:

He needs to get a new tattoo because he lost a bet: “I haven’t got it yet because it sucks.” Hardy had a wager with Leonardo DiCaprio, with whom he starred in last year’s The Revenant, a story of betrayal and vengeance among 19th-century fur trappers. DiCaprio predicted that Hardy would get an Oscar nomination for his supporting role as a feral frontiersman who leaves DiCaprio’s character for dead after the latter is mauled by a grizzly bear. Hardy bet a tattoo of the winner’s choosing that he wouldn’t. Hardy lost. Hardy recreates DiCaprio’s design on a Post-it note for me. “He wrote, in this really shitty handwriting: ‘Leo knows everything.’ Ha! I was like, ‘OK, I’ll get it done, but you have to write it properly.’”

He was an underachieving student: “From a very privileged position I was underachieving and my desperate parents were like, ‘F–king hell, we’ve got to find something for Tom to do.’… There were systematically, constantly, things that were put across my path where it was, ‘Tom, you need to wake up because there are more important things to do. And you keep on doing stuff that’s nonsense, and you of all people have been born with opportunities.’ So I had words with myself about the reality of wanking about when there’s such a lot to be getting on with.” He’s been sober since 2003, though the impulses are still there. In Canada, he told me about “Arthur”, the orangutan who is the metaphorical manifestation of his destructive urges, which he likens to Winston Churchill’s “black dog” of depression. Always present, never to be ignored.

The sleep deprivation that comes with a new baby: “If anyone else did that to you you’d have them up at the Hague for war crimes.”

Two years after The Revenant’s troubled production: “Because it’s a good two years away it feels… There are still echoes of exhaustion from it, but I think it’s a beautiful film. I want to watch it again now because I have got a really healthy distance. It’s always the way, when people say, ‘It was a really tough time in my life when I was in it,’ in hindsight it’s a very fond memory. At the time it was aarararaghgh” — he makes a noise like a fatally wounded buffalo — “never ending! The Forevernant. It went on forever and it was confusing. The Forever-and-evernant! It was never-ending, confusion, chaos, none of us were in any form of control, we were being controlled, you know? And that was frustrating and stressful.”

What did Mark Rylance say to him when Rylance won the Oscar? “I think he said, ‘F–king amateur.’ Hur hur! Or, ‘This is how it’s done.’ Hur! I can’t remember. But it was just amazing to be there.”

On attending the Oscars: “I don’t think I ever expected to be welcomed to one of those events. I always felt like a bit of a naughty boy, and I always thought part of me would be like, ‘Nah’. And then actually I was like, ‘Oh yeah! I’ll have a sniff of that.’ Obviously there’s that pull and we were both jetlagged and nervous, but f–k me, if you’re going to leave home and do anything we really ought to do this. I’ve got a photo of us in our outfits underneath the 88th Academy Awards logo, and that’s a piece of history, isn’t it? That’s mum and dad in their heyday. They were there. Wicked.” [When a reporter approached Hardy while he waited outside the Dolby Theater, he explained, with perfect Enlightened Dad poise, that he was waiting for Charlotte to finish breast-pumping in the bathroom.]

[From Esquire UK]

There were so many stories about how Alejandro González Iñárritu and Tom were butting heads throughout the production of The Revenant. Now that we’re a year removed from Leonardo DiCaprio’s exhausting Oscar campaign and everything else, I have to say that I feel very Team Nobody in that situation. Do I think Tom probably acted like a pissy baby? Sure. Do I also think Inarritu put his actors through hell for no real reason? Yes. As for Tom’s newfound engagement with journalists… I do hope he learned something positive from that crap last year, but I’m not holding my breath.

Photos courtesy of Esquire UK.

Do you remember when The Mummy was an Indiana Jones-ish action-adventure about a smart librarian outwitting a mummy? You know, back when Brendon Fraser looked like this and didn’t have weird freaky hands? Remember Rachel Weisz and how cute and spunky she was, and how she was a total nerd who look…

Michelle Williams covers the new issue of Porter Magazine to promote her supporting role in Manchester By the Sea. Most critics believe that Michelle is going to make all of the Best Supporting Actress shortlists, even if those same critics believe that Viola Davis has an actual lock on this year’s Supporting Actress Oscar. But still, Michelle’s going to promote the film and do some Oscar campaigning, even if Viola is a sure thing. And how does Michelle consistently campaign for her Oscar nominations? Yeah. She talks about Heath Ledger. Some highlights from Porter:

Her dating life post-Heath Ledger: “Talk about a learning process. I think, God, what would I say about it? I feel really sensitive about it and certainly did not expect to still be dating at 36 with an 11-year-old. This is not what I imagined. I’m like a cat, I’m a very domestic creature. I just want to stay home and take care of people. But I’m also happy with myself and just because I might have a desire to be with someone…that won’t lead me to marry the wrong person.”

Advice from her BFF Busy Phillips: “My friend Busy and her husband Marc [Silverstein] said, ‘Michelle, you’re in like a blackout zone, everybody is now partnered up and you have to wait for people to start getting divorced.’ Oh my f–king God. Are you kidding me? I’m just sitting around and waiting for marriages to crumble? Oh wow! No!”

Seeing Matilda grow up without a father: “In all honesty, for pretty much everything else, I feel like I’m a believer in not fighting circumstances, accepting where you are and where you’ve been. In pretty much all senses but one, I would be able to go totally down that line of thinking were it not for Matilda not having her dad. You know, that’s just something that doesn’t…I mean, it just won’t ever be right.”

[From Porter via E! News]

I’ve complained about this over the years, because every time Michelle gives an interview about her personal life, she acts like she hasn’t been in any serious relationships since Heath died. And that’s just not the case. She’s had a series of relationships, several of which I would consider “serious,” in that the boyfriends seem to spend time with her daughter, and Michelle and the guy have moved in together (or come close to it) and they’ve been together for a year or two. In this interview, she speaks as if she’s still being set up on terrible blind dates, when the reality is that she’s reportedly been with Jonathan Safran Foer all year? And what’s funny about that if Foer and Williams allegedly got together once his marriage crumbled! So… yeah. Ha. Her friends are sort of right.

Photos courtesy of Ryan McGinley/Porter Magazine.

Tom Hardy stars in and produces a new series called Taboo. See the new teasers for the show below. Taboo premieres on BBC and FX in January. So Tom is doing some promotion with a new cover feature in UK Esquire. The major headline coming out of this article is that he owes Leonardo DiCaprio a tat…

As we discussed on Sunday, Kanye West is living separately from Kim Kardashian following his release from UCLA’s psychiatric ward. My assumption is that Kim and the kids are living in the family home, and that Kanye is either staying in a rental, or he’s staying in some other property that he owns, like his old bachelor pad (which I don’t think he ever sold). There’s been a lot of gossip about the Kimye marriage and whether Kim is trying to do some kind of tough-love situation, or whether Kim has been leaking stories to advance a storyline which will have her filing for divorce. E! News – home to the Kardashians’ reality shows – claims that divorce is not on the table. I guess.

Kanye West has the support and love from wife Kim Kardashian as he continues his recovery following a more than weeklong hospitalization for exhaustion. The rapper was released from UCLA Medical Center Wednesday and has since then been treated as an outpatient and spent time with his family.

Kanye “will remain getting outpatient treatment till he is fully recovered,” a source told E! News exclusively. “Kim wants him to continue getting therapy even after all of this. He has support from so many people.”

“Kim is doing okay despite reports,” the source continued. “She has many things on her plate so being overwhelmed is expected. She wants to get Kanye back on his feet. She is not leaving him. She loves him.”

Another source told E! News, “Kim will of course always stay by Kanye’s side and support him and help him through it all.”

[From E! News]

Some people believe all or some of this is being faked, or that certain stories are being used o further some agenda. Personally, after years of covering the Kardashians, I feel like I have a good handle on which stories are being used as reality-show storylines and which stories are actual tragedies and bad moments that are unfolding in real time. I don’t think this is a reality show storyline. I think Kim has been over the reality show sh-t since the Paris robbery, and now that Kanye is struggling in a huge way, she’s really just trying to keep her head above water. While Kris Jenner might be pushing certain angles – I would not put it past Lucifer’s Homegirl – I’m choosing to take most of this stuff at face value. Kim loves Kanye, but she’s tired. She’ll always support him but she wants him to be an equal partner to her. They’re not splitting up, they’re just working through a really rough time.

Photos courtesy of Fame/Flynet.

Jon Stewart is currently promoting The Daily Show (The Book): An Oral History, which is why he’s been giving interviews in the wake of the election. Jon is more than a year past the end of his Daily Show hosting job, and… it shows. Personally, I think he’s sort of lost his edge, his anger, his desire to call out bulls—t as he sees it. Maybe it’s his age, or maybe he’s just tired of all the yelling, but Jon has been doing a lot of normalizing the past few weeks. In his first interview post-election, Jon tried to claim that Trump voters weren’t racist, and that many of them were just, like, concerned about their health insurance. Which rang hollow, and I said so. It makes me sick to listen to all of this paternalistic white guys try to patronizingly tell the rest of us not to worry, that we’ll all be fine, that we’re still “great,” when there are violent racists and homophobes and misogynists targeting the people who are not cisgendered, white, heterosexual men. So, that’s where we are. A few days ago, Jon participated in a talk with the New York Times and he doubled-down on this idea that Trump voters are racists, and more. You can read THR’s full coverage here. Some highlights:

Satirists don’t have any real power: “I think of one of the lessons of this book and what we’re talking about is to put satire and culture in its proper place — that controlling a culture is not the same as power. And that while we were all passing around really remarkably eviscerating videos of the Tea Party ? that we had all made great fun of ? [they were] sitting off a highway at a Friendly’s taking over a local school board. And the lesson there is, as much as I love what we did and I liked it, there is a self-satisfaction there that is unwarranted, unearned and not useful.”

He doesn’t believe the mainstream media outlets “caused” Trump’s win: “Trump didn’t happen because CNN sucks. CNN just sucks. He happened because that’s the push and pull of this nation at all times. It’s a push and pull between nativism and a more inclusive multi-cultural approach. It’s a country that writes in its founding document all men are created equal but only white men who own property can vote. That’s the earliest contradiction, and we’ve been fighting that battle ever since.”

Trump voters are not racists: “Not everybody that voted for Trump is a racist. I don’t give a f— what any of you say to me. You can yell it at me, you can tweet it at me. They’re not all racists. Or they’re not giving tacit support to a racist system. We all give tacit support to exploitative systems as long as they don’t affect us that badly.” He pointed to the many people who own iPhones as an example of his point. “Guess how those are made, guess who makes them? … It’s not different, we all do that. All of our sh-t stinks and getting beyond that takes incredible work. This has to stop. This idea that we’re all … that our team is perfect and the other team is demons. And this is not like a Kumbaya, let’s all get along. Let’s f—ing fight, but let’s fight with precision and integrity, and not with just demonization. And I’ll say this, I know a lot of first responders. I spent a lot of time in that community. A sh-t load of them voted for Trump. The same people that voted for Trump ran into burning buildings and saved whoever the f— they could no matter what color they were, no matter what religion and they would do it again tomorrow. So, if you want to sit and tell me that those people are giving tacit approval to an exploitative system ? I say, ‘OK, and would you put your life on the line for people who aren’t like you? Because they did.’”

There will still be an America even after Trump: “We’re still the same country. Obama didn’t change and fix everything, and Trump can’t ruin everything. If we’re that vulnerable to one guy… That guy? That’s how we’re going out? This incredible experiment in liberty and democracy that we fought and died for is going to go out with that guy? That can’t be how this story ends.”

[From The Hollywood Reporter]

I’m just so tired of this. Do I believe that every Trump voter is some rabid, white-hood-wearing racist douchebag? Of course not. But I believe every person who voted for Donald Trump did so despite the fact that he was endorsed by the Ku Klux Klan. Every Trump voter supported him despite what he said about women and what he himself admitted to doing to women. Every Trump voter should have known what he said about Mexicans, about Muslims, about the handicapped and more. And if those Trump supporters are first responders or veterans, I thank them for their service and bravery… and I still think they’re awful for supporting a racist, misogynist con man. The answer isn’t to shrug and say, “well, every system is exploitative.” Not when you’re looking fascism in the bloated orange face.

Photos courtesy of WENN.

Mom-to-be Camilla Luddington radiated the red carpet at 102.7 KIIS FM’s 2016 Jingle Ball at the Staples Center in Los Angeles, Calif. on Friday (December 2).

The Grey’s Anatomy star, 32, looked radiant in a print mini maternity dress paired with a black leather jacket draped over her shoulders.

The first-time mom-to-be posted a photo from the event.

“#jingleball2016 last night to worship Britney Spears hair @dereksyuen makeup @kiranasrat second trimester baby bump: ME! ,” she Instagrammed the image.

The following day, she attended the 6th Annual Santa’s Secret Workshop in West Hollywood, Calif., benefiting L.A. Family Housing.

“Got to attend #ssw2016 today- donating for a good cause and browsed baby product heaven #firsttimemom #babyontheway,” she captioned an image from the festive event.

Last month, the actress debuted her baby bump on Instagram.

And in October, Luddington announced her first pregnancy on social media.

The Californication alum is expecting her first child with beau, Thirteen Reasons Why actor Matthew Alan.

#jingleball2016 last night to worship Britney Spears hair @dereksyuen makeup @kiranasrat second trimester baby bump: ME!

A photo posted by Camilla Luddington (@camillaluddington) on Dec 3, 2016 at 8:38am PST

Got to attend #ssw2016 today- donating for a good cause and browsed baby product heaven #firsttimemom #babyontheway A photo posted by Camilla Luddington (@camillaluddington) on Dec 3, 2016 at 5:21pm PST

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