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- [00:17]
Jessica Defino
Hello, and welcome to the Review of Mess, a podcast dedicated to discussing the highs and lows of pop culture every month. I'm Jessica Defino. I write the newsletter, the Review of Beauty.
- [00:26]
Emily Kirkpatrick
And I'm Emily Kirkpatrick. I write the weekly newsletter, I Heart Mess, where I round up bad celebrity fashion. And lately, it's really just kind of been a Blake Lively hate train, as it should be. Yeah, I guess I'm in the zeitgeist. I have my own reasons. But we get to the.
- [00:42]
Jessica Defino
We will get into that.
- [00:45]
Emily Kirkpatrick
I was thinking about our podcast this month because we talked about foot fetish and celebrities last time, and since we talked about it, Asin Rae put out her new music video for Diet Pepsi, and it is just chock full of fetish content in a way that I find is, like, really interesting and surprising. Of course, I do think it should be behind a paywall. Right.
- [01:03]
Jessica Defino
I mean, is it surprising to you? You've been, like, telling celebrities to do this forever.
- [01:08]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Yeah. And, I mean, I'm glad that she's listening to me and that she's following through, you know, off the promise of her sense editorial where she was smoking cigarettes with her feet, and now in the new music video, she's just kind of putting them in her boyfriend's face as he drives and he's licking whipped cream off of them. And I don't know, I just was really struck by it because there's a lot of, like, kind of niche fetish content in that music video, including some stuff with, like, compression tights, which I've covered pretty extensively in my newsletter as well. That seems, like, so out of place. But then I was also thinking about it, and I'm like, I guess if you don't know that that stuff is, like, courting a specific fetish market, it might not even register to you as, like, particularly sexual or, like. But for the communities that it does speak to, it's like, kind of an incredible PR tool because, like, you're definitely going to get clipped and proliferated around all these fetish sites and all these porn sites without doing anything explicitly pornographic. And it all points back to your music video.
- [02:06]
Jessica Defino
Yeah, it's kind of a genius way to inflate views from people who might not love the music, because, to be honest, I've heard the song many times now, and I can't remember it.
- [02:17]
Emily Kirkpatrick
I love it.
- [02:18]
Jessica Defino
I think I. I probably would love it, too, if I could only remember it. For some reason, it's just not clicking yet.
- [02:24]
Emily Kirkpatrick
I get it. It's completely like Generic, like Lana Del Rey put through an AI machine. But I. It's. I don't know. I just. I like her. I find her. She is my Camila Cabello.
- [02:35]
Jessica Defino
You know what? And I have to respect that. I have to respect that.
- [02:38]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Exactly. You've got to understand where I'm coming from with that. But, yeah, I just thought it was a very, you know, because it's already like, this career where, you know, pop stars are expected to do really, like, overtly sexual stuff in music videos for attention. Right. Like, I mean, going back to Madonna, you kind of see that trope played out over and over again. And here she is doing that, but in a coded way where it's like, it comes off as she's not doing anything, but then low key. She is doing, like, the most overtly sexual things for these fetish groups. I just think it's compelling.
- [03:08]
Jessica Defino
It is compelling. I think, like, it also kind of speaks to the pornification of skin care. That's kind of happening right now, too. Like, I mean, these have been popular ingredients for a while, but I'm seeing a big resurgence of, like, talk about semen and sperm in skincare agent nature. I don't know how you say them.
- [03:28]
Emily Kirkpatrick
The original facial serum.
- [03:29]
Jessica Defino
Yeah, they jism. Oh. I remember reading an article on, like, Vice Paul, back in the day where it was like, a woman tried using her boyfriend's semen as a moisturizer for, like, a week.
- [03:42]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Classic rage bait content. That's a good one. It's an old standard of years ago.
- [03:47]
Jessica Defino
And now, you know, it's more refined. We're taking amino acids from sperm and putting them into supplements and serums. Yeah. Kim Kardashian got the salmon sperm facial that now everyone.
- [04:00]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Oh, yeah.
- [04:01]
Jessica Defino
Is writing about. There's also, a couple of years ago, people were using lube on their face to get, like, the glass skin look. Yeah. And somebody mentioned this in the comments of a newsletter recently. Do Skin talks about all the time, how their moisturizer doesn't splooge.
- [04:17]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Like, I don't like that word.
- [04:19]
Jessica Defino
I hate that word. But apparently it's something a lot of moisturizer tubes do is splooge. And you want to reduce. Reduce the splooge.
- [04:27]
Emily Kirkpatrick
I hear what they're saying. Like, I agree. A lot of moisturizer tubes do sploosh. I don't want to call it that, but that. I guess that is technically the correct word for what it's. What it's doing into my hand. Unsettling. That's interesting. I feel like that Also touches on a conversation we have a lot here, which is just kind of about like taking things that are kind of like basic human biology or basic human functions and then like distancing ourselves from them. But. But in order to like sell it the natural back to ourselves.
- [04:55]
Jessica Defino
Exactly.
- [04:55]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Where it's like we put this weird, I don't know, scientific middleman wearing like, it's not sperm, it's the essence of sperm that's been put through a lab and so now it's safe to put on your face. And now you need this.
- [05:07]
Jessica Defino
You could say that about like literally almost any skin care ingredient right now. Like collagen, hyaluronic acid, epidermal growth factor, peptides, ceramides. All of that is like, oh, we actually just have that. You don't need to buy it, but.
- [05:22]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Right. You make that.
- [05:23]
Jessica Defino
Actually, should we get into it? You know what I'm talking about? Yeah.
- [05:28]
Emily Kirkpatrick
The drama of my life currently. The drama that I ranted about at length in my newsletter already but like tried to restrain myself. I certainly texted a storm to you.
- [05:36]
Jessica Defino
And I loved it.
- [05:37]
Emily Kirkpatrick
About my feelings. No, and I, and I really appreciate your feedback. Basically. I had an incident with a magazine this week that I've. I've never. I've been a professional writer for at least 12 years now, full time professional writing for everyone. And this is. This experience is literally never happened to me. And I just wanted to share it with everyone on the pod because, you know, I'm. I'm a very experienced writer. I'm very far along in my career and if this happens to me, then I imagine that's happening to young writers and less experienced writers all the time. And I just wanted to put it out there to make it clear that like, this is not acceptable behavior. This is not how anyone's work should be treated. It's not the dynamic that you should have with a publication ever or someone editing you ever. So I just wanted to make clear that it's not normal. So basically I got commissioned by the Face, which for those don't know is a big British indie magazine. They used to be like very big in the 80s and 90s. Kate Moss on the COVID was kind of like their most famous. I remember that, I would think. Yeah. And so they've relaunched in the past few years and they wanted me to work with them in the past. And honestly the rate was. Was wildly too low. And so I turned it down at the time and I. It's just funny looking back because at the time when I turned that down, I Thought that I was like, really setting a standard for myself. And I was like, I do not accept work under the. And it's like, only to be put back in a place with them where I again, had to like, assert my boundaries.
- [07:11]
Jessica Defino
Right.
- [07:11]
Emily Kirkpatrick
And assert, like, how. What is professional and like, what is the correct way to treat people? Which is just fucking crazy to me anyway.
- [07:18]
Jessica Defino
Yeah. I mean, it also makes sense that a publication that's really lowballing its writers probably doesn't have the highest regard for their work, is not like we respect them in other ways.
- [07:27]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Yeah. And I should have taken the first red flag as what it was and learned my lesson there, but I did not because I'm a generous and kind individual. They circled back to me earlier this month, um, and they asked me to write a piece. Basically the working title was Kind of Fashion's Flirtation with the Alt Right. And so obviously, like a very serious topic about, you know, neo Nazis. And very interesting question, honestly, because it was about fashion co opting a lot of the aesthetics of the alt right, whether that be guns or MAGA hats or kind of like pulling garments from overtly racist history. I'm thinking about this one collection inspired by Gone with the Wind. Right. Like, and like, kind of romanticizing the antebellum. Right. And romanticizing the white women of that era. So it's a lot of stuff like that very serious topic. These people are just edgelords who want attention. You know, ultimately, as all people who are kind of like, I think cosplaying Nazism on the Internet tend to be ultimately just attention seekers. Anyway, I got commissioned to write this piece. It was their idea pitched to me. I wrote the story and then my editor who commissioned the piece went on vacation and I was passed off to another editor at the Face, who I turned in my piece on a Wednesday. He read it on Monday and left a series of comments that, I don't know, just reading through them, I could tell that he fundamentally didn't understand the point of the article. Like, the points I was trying to make, kind of like the thrust of it. A lot of kind of just common, common sense stuff about American politics or phrases that I think are very commonplace in America. You know, I'm talking about, like, triggered. Right.
- [09:14]
Jessica Defino
Well, and I read some of these notes too.
- [09:18]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Please.
- [09:19]
Jessica Defino
Like, the one that really blew my mind was when he was questioning, like, whether you could include a certain celebrity who identifies as liberal in this piece for, like, using the aesthetics of the alt right, which is the point. And I was like, that's the point of the piece is like, does it matter if you don't have these politics if you are still adopting the aesthetics and like promoting the values visually.
- [09:47]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Right. And like dog whistling essentially to a.
- [09:50]
Jessica Defino
Demographic to completely like not get that. I can see how the piece got out of control. Like that's just, that's the question of the piece.
- [09:58]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Yeah, that was the moment for me also that was kind of the tipping point where I was like, oh, like he might not understand fundamentally what I'm. What I'm getting at. And then I think his final comment on the piece as well about Dasha from Red Scare, you know, I was making a point that a lot of these people are doing this for attention. It is a very good PR stunt. Like it gets you a lot of anger, obviously, but anger is still clicks, it still views, it still listens. Right. And then you become this kind of like alternative figure of like counterculture, whatever, when really you're just promoting neo Nazi ideas. Anyway. So Dasha was one of my examples of that. And you was saying like, oh well, like is this a good example to use that she wants attention when she gets so much attention? And I'm like, right, because she gets working. Right. The strategy. It's almost like her strategy is working.
- [10:48]
Jessica Defino
It's almost like I'm completely right about this.
- [10:51]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Yeah, so it was a lot of that with him. But yeah, the first round of comments was very. Those types of comments, right? Like kind of fact based, I would say a lot of times. Way too literal, I would say. And no real, no grammatical edits, no structural edits. And the paragraphs were not changed around, the sentences were not shifted. You know, it was really just like kind of broad comments like that. So I thought, okay, you know, that's a little odd but you know, everybody edits different. Maybe he likes exactly the way I said everything in this piece. I mean it was to the point that I even had another friend who is not a writer read through the piece to be like, is this sound like, am I going to embarrass myself if this gets published? Whatever. And as I'm doing this, he's rushing me through the edits. Like I get, I get his final comments. I would say Monday afternoon. And he wanted me to get the edits back the same day, which I like. I don't know, I have a life, right.
- [11:46]
Jessica Defino
It's not like you're writing for like New York Times print. Like this is an online publication that.
- [11:51]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Right. Or that this was even something pre discussed that like the edits would need to be in by this date to publish on this date. My entire conversation with them the whole way down the road was like, when do you think you can get this drafted? Like, when do you think this would be ready by? Blah, blah. You know, like, it was clear to me that there was no hard timeline.
- [12:06]
Jessica Defino
It's also not a topic that you want to rush through. Like, I would be very slow and deliberate with what I'm saying about neo Nazis on the Internet. Yes. And you would hope that an editor would also kind of feel that way.
- [12:17]
Emily Kirkpatrick
And especially in America, and especially in the lead up to an election and just like, knowing how fast and loose neo Nazis play with, like, death threats online. Like, I'm a very online person, you know, again, which again, is why I had my friend read through it for, like, the soundness of the argument, because I was like, I don't want to be caught in something, you know, because this guy didn't do a close enough read that. Like, I can't stand by or whatever. Anyway, so I was rushed, very much rushed through the edits. And the next morning, I mean, even after I told him, like, you know, I've done as many updates as I can on Monday, you know, I'll finish up the last five comments tomorrow when I have a chance. Tomorrow. I was, I was interviewed by two different publications that morning.
- [12:58]
Jessica Defino
Okay, Bragging, a little bit of flex.
- [13:00]
Emily Kirkpatrick
A little bit of brag, a little bit of flex. What can I say? But meanwhile, he's editing. He's like, emailing me over and over and over, being like, are they done yet? Are they done yet? Are they done yet? And I'm like, no, they're not like, they're going to be done when I say they're done. Like, I am also a professional. It was just an undermining of my professionality right off the bat, where I'm like, I am a. I'm a real writer. Like, I'm not going to ghost you on these edits. I'm not going to do what I say. I'm not going to. You know what I mean? Like, I'm going to follow through. And I did follow through, and I had my edits done within the hour. So that was all fine and good. And I was told that they need to be done because it need to be published on Wednesday. I wake up on Wednesday, it's not published. So I say, oh, I guess it didn't have to be published today. And I. It didn't have to be rushed through like this. And then I Receive an email back from him, and he's like, okay, this is all ready to go for Thursday. Just want you to, like, look over the changes that have been made and sign off on it before it goes live. And I think, okay, I start reading through it. I didn't write a word of this. I didn't write a word of this essay. It's completely different. I mean, I cannot express to you how different it is. Like, paragraphs massively moved around, every sentence rearranged somehow. Just words I would never use. Phrases I would never use. The entire tone of the piece is very light, very jocular, in my opinion, for a topic that I was treating very seriously and, you know, heavy as you should have. Yeah. And I just told them, you know, I can't put my name on this. I didn't write it. I wasn't a part of this editing experience. And I just want to make it clear to people who maybe don't understand a typical editing experience everywhere. Everywhere I've ever written for, even if something I wrote was massively rewritten by my editor, every change they make is made as a suggestion in Google Docs. And I go through and I approve every single change. And I'm talking down to commas, like apostrophe.
- [14:43]
Jessica Defino
Yeah, spaces.
- [14:45]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Because that is how you confirm. That is how you feel as a writer, that you are engaged in the edit process and the rewrite process. Like, without that, you aren't a participant. It isn't your work anymore. You know? And I was just thinking. Yeah, the whole thing also just made me feel crazy because it also puts you in this position of feeling like a diva to push back. Like, you know what I mean? Where you're like, oh, I'm the one making trouble. I'm the one upsetting everybody. Like, this is clearly how they run things. And, like, I'm, you know, especially as.
- [15:16]
Jessica Defino
A freelancer, I feel like sometimes, like, you can get in your own head of, like. Like, who am I to push back? Like, maybe, like, they're the editor, they're at the publication. Maybe I should just let them kind of. Whatever. But I think for you specifically, too, like, you have such a distinct voice and you have an audience that's not attached to an outside publication like, that will recognize your voice. So it's just, like, bad for you even, like, as a business person, to allow something that you didn't write and doesn't sound like you to, like, go out under your byline.
- [15:48]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Most definitely. And if anyone read this, they would immediately know that this is not Me, this is not how I speak. And yeah, yeah, I started thinking, like, oh, you know, maybe I was too heavy. You know, maybe I was too dark on the subject matter. Something or too serious. And I was thinking like, even that, like, I'm a professional writer. Like you say, could we make this a little lighter? You know, could we make this a little voice here? Could we make this a little more comedic? And I go in and I do it, you know, like, at no point was that ever said to me. And, yeah, I just got. And so I said I couldn't put my name on the final piece, and I even got pushed back on that. And they ended up putting his version of my essay in the same doc as my original version. And they wanted me to highlight the parts that I felt particularly uncomfortable with or that I wanted re included. And I, you know, I got back to them and I was just like, yeah, so it's the. It's the whole thing. It's kind of the whole essay that I didn't write. Part. Like, I don't really see, you know, highlighting parts or changing certain words or adding certain arguments back in would correct this. Like, it's so far gone at this point. And, yeah, at every turn, it was kind of made to seem like, well, we offered you this opportunity to, like, you know, find a middle ground and to meet us here and blah, blah, blah. And like, that is just straight up not how this process works. It just isn't. And it was very, very frustrating. But I will say the editor in chief of the magazine called me. He was on vacation throughout this whole debacle, and he's a reader of my newsletter, apparently, and was very upset to hear what had happened and was very apologetic. And that's good. Yeah, you know, he completely agreed with me. He completely understood where I was coming from. And he, you know, and I agree with him, too, that I think this is just like a string of miscommunications that, like, got progressively more out of hand until it was, like, unsalvageable. But I also don't think that should ever be happening. I don't think. I would hope that this person isn't editing other people's writing in this way and that they think that that's, like, is acceptable editing.
- [17:44]
Jessica Defino
No, that's definitely not. It's not any way that I've been edited before. If I have, I've done the same thing. Like, I've definitely asked in the past for my name to be removed from certain articles, and they've said yes. So there's there's some writing out there that's just like, not mine.
- [17:59]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Yeah, I forgot to mention that. I guess that's the other thing is I told them, you know, you can publish this under a staff by line if you have to publish this for some reason. And they refused. They said my name had to be on it if it was to be published. And so I had to take a kill fee, which is basically just like half your rate to not publish the story. Which I've literally never in my life even utter the words kill feet. Like this is never. I've never been put in a position like that. And so, yeah, I had to kill it. And no one will ever get to read my thoughts on fashion's alt right flirtation.
- [18:31]
Jessica Defino
Well, can you publish it elsewhere?
- [18:33]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Yeah, I guess I could. I guess I could. Honestly, I've just. I needed to step away from the whole. The whole experience was like so aggravating that I couldn't even go back to look at it to think if I wanted to even publish it or share it somewhere else.
- [18:47]
Jessica Defino
I mean, I think if you get back into the groove, it's a great piece and I think the subject is like, really interesting. Like, I do think these are questions that especially ahead of the election in the US we should be thinking about. And I loved your take. I think everyone.
- [19:03]
Emily Kirkpatrick
I agree. Thank you. It also made me wonder, you know, if a magazine that works with celebrities is even the right place to publish something like that. Because a lot of it I felt like, oh, I feel like my harshness or my critique is being toned down because eventually they want to interview these people, they want to feature these people and they don't want to like rock the boat or upset them. Even though these are the very same people who are participating in like Neo Nazi dog.
- [19:29]
Jessica Defino
Right. They have to preserve the relationship. Which is just something that, like, I'm sure both of us have come up against time and time again in writing for mainstream publications is like, oh, endlessly.
- [19:39]
Emily Kirkpatrick
And it's so frustrating.
- [19:41]
Jessica Defino
Yeah.
- [19:41]
Emily Kirkpatrick
And it's always so annoying. You just cannot say the truth. You cannot say what you actually mean because one day you might need something from this random ass celebrity. Even if they're behaving awfully in the moment. It's crazy. It's an impossible situation. I don't. Yeah. If. I mean, that's. People talk all the time about how like media has turned into these like fluff pieces and this nothingness in this drivel. And it's like. Right. Because they're so beholden to these famous people to like sell publications, to share links to their store. You know, it's just like you simply cannot do good journalism. You cannot do good media under the circumstances.
- [20:14]
Jessica Defino
I totally agree.
- [20:16]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Free us from the tyranny of celebrity.
- [20:19]
Jessica Defino
I had, I mean, not a similar experience, but sort of in the same vein. I was interviewed for a story by a freelance reporter who was writing for like a major publication. I think they're still like talking to the publication, so I won't say. But I was interviewed for a story about the morning shed trend, which I guess is kind of like old now. It's probably been happening for a couple of months. But the morning shed, basically, for those who don't know, on like Instagram and TikTok, these are videos of kind of like waking up in the morning and taking off all of the cosmetic products that you put on the night before to sleep in. So it's not like moisturizers and serums and stuff. It's like overnight sheet masks covering your whole face. Wrinkle patches for your forehead, wrinkle patches for your cleavage under eye masks, lip masks or lip taping, jaw straps. These like, they look like something from like wrestling that you like hang over your ears.
- [21:22]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Yeah, it's very like post op plastic surgery aesthetic to me. It gives me big, actually. Death becomes her vibes. Do you remember there's a scene where Madeleine Ashton is like fully wrapped up, like mummified, and her maid has to come wake her up and she has to like delay her. It just reminds me so much. It's such a weird, I don't know, weird mannequin vibe.
- [21:42]
Jessica Defino
Yes, definitely, definitely like post op care vibes. And basically the idea is that like you put all this on at night, you sleep in it and then you wake up and you take it all off and you look great and. Okay. So some of the rhetoric that's used in these videos is like being high maintenance to be low maintenance or like going to bed ugly to wake up beautiful. And so yeah, the idea is to like to be high maintenance or ugly when nobody, like theoretically nobody in your real world is looking at you.
- [22:16]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Well, that's why I always wonder what these girls. Well, one, my first question is always like, how are you sleeping actually? Then like when you can't roll, when you can't move, like when everything is, I don't know, plastered you, I wouldn't be able to fall asleep like that. There's too much going on. And then two, I'm always like, do you have a partner right do they, like, want to kiss you before they go to. I don't know, do they want to?
- [22:37]
Jessica Defino
Yeah. That makes me like, question, like, what or who are we doing this for? For?
- [22:41]
Emily Kirkpatrick
And does it ever stop? Also, like, is this just the routine for the rest of your life? Is mummifying yourself to be to go to sleep ugly and wake up beautiful?
- [22:50]
Jessica Defino
I like, you can make the argument like, oh, I mean, I don't care if my partner sees it because I'm doing it for me. But it's like, you're not. You're doing it for. So you don't look like that throughout the rest of your day when you're going out and about and going about your life.
- [23:05]
Emily Kirkpatrick
You're doing that to be perceived. Right. Like you're doing that for others enjoyment. Because it's not like you're waking up and then staring at yourself in a mirror for the next 12 hours before you go to sleep again. You know what I mean? Like, that is a beauty that you're cultivating for others to perceive you as beautiful. And you're like, well, I can do it at nighttime because they won't see me doing it.
- [23:25]
Jessica Defino
And beautiful in an effortless way.
- [23:27]
Emily Kirkpatrick
And then it looks effortless. Yes, it looks natural. It looks effortless.
- [23:30]
Jessica Defino
And that's the thing that, like, really bothers me about it is like the phrasing be high maintenance. To be low maintenance is absurd. Like, there is only high maintenance. Like, if you're doing this at any point, this is a high maintenance routine. Not like casting moral judgment on being high maintenance. But like, you can't absolutely say that you're later low maintenance. Like, it's just high maintenance.
- [23:55]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Yeah, it's a very interesting idea. Right? Like the labor stops as soon as I remove these products. It's like, no, you put the labor in, thus making it the high maintenance. The whole look is high maintenance. Low maintenance would not be doing any of this at all. It'd be going to sleep ugly to wake up ugly. You know what I mean?
- [24:11]
Jessica Defino
Which is what I do. But.
- [24:13]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Oh, a classic. That's an old classic in this house.
- [24:17]
Jessica Defino
Putting an effort to look effortless is like, there is only effort. That's effort full.
- [24:22]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Yes. There is no such thing as effortless. There is no such thing as low maintenance. Yes, you're doing the labor right.
- [24:28]
Jessica Defino
The amount of work you're putting in is high, even if it looks low later. And I mean, basically my thought on this trend is like, I just kind of think it's sad a way to fill even, like Our precious sleeping hours, when we should be, like, blissfully unaware of, like, the otherwise unrelenting pressures of beauty culture with more aesthetic labor. And it's just like, okay, now there's not a single moment of our lives that has not been commodified for the project of becoming as beautiful as. As possible.
- [24:58]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Yeah, I think capitalism is just getting a little craftier, you know, like, it's kind of maxed out our days and what it can sell to us while we're awake. So it's like, hey, what if we start making a ton of sleep products? What if we. What if we packaged really high maintenance stuff as really low maintenance stuff and made you feel, like, lazy if you weren't doing all these things right? Because it is so low maintenance. You know, they're not asking you to blow out your hair and curl it. They're just asking you, just asking you.
- [25:23]
Jessica Defino
To dedicate your dream space to this impossible pursuit.
- [25:28]
Emily Kirkpatrick
But it also just makes sense. I don't know. I feel like we live in a culture of, like, maximizing everything and every second and hustle and grind and whatever. So of course it's now coming for the sleep space. Like, even then, you can't have a respite from all of this. Like, you have to be laboring in your dreams to be more beautiful. Because that is, like, our ultimate mission as women.
- [25:48]
Jessica Defino
I mean, I think that's a concept worth critiquing. I was researching morning shed stuff, and I found one particularly unhinged article on glamour that was called we need to leave the morning shed alone. And it was kind of arguing that critiquing the morning shed is. Is misogynistic because we're shaming women's behavior.
- [26:10]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Feminism is supporting women in everything they do. And we all know that you cannot critique women or anything they do or you are a bad feminist. That's just a fact.
- [26:20]
Jessica Defino
I mean, personally, I just, I find that more misogynistic than. Than questioning some of women's beauty behaviors. Because, like, yeah, it's patronizing. And it's also, like, there are real consequences to beauty standards. Like, there are physical and psychological consequences, like, not to mention the environmental aspect of it. And so, like, to dismiss all of that under the guise of feminism, I think, is. Is to do.
- [26:46]
Emily Kirkpatrick
It's classic misogyny, honestly. Like, our industries are already, like, diminutive because they're women's interests, right? And they're, like, things women care about. It's like, yeah, as you said, like, like, incredibly important. Like, setting beauty standards, like, setting These impossible standards that women are holding themselves to killing themselves over sometimes, you know, environmental impact, business impact, like some of the biggest business industries in the world. But like to say they don't matter. We need to just leave it alone. Because women like it, right? And they're having fun. They're enjoying this. They like doing all of this. It's for themselves.
- [27:19]
Jessica Defino
Boggles the mind that, like, that kind of stuff is still being published.
- [27:23]
Emily Kirkpatrick
But you're also talking about a magazine that makes its entire revenue off selling women these same ideas. So of course they're like, leave it alone. Don't look at what we're doing over here either.
- [27:34]
Jessica Defino
That's totally fine.
- [27:35]
Emily Kirkpatrick
That's mean. Everything's good. We like this.
- [27:39]
Jessica Defino
Oh, gosh. Yeah. So we'll see. I hope the story eventually comes out, but I think it'll be pretty dated.
- [27:46]
Emily Kirkpatrick
My dream. I have to say, I from a I heart mess perspective. I'm obsessed with the aesthetics of the morning shed and like, how insane they look. And I would like to start seeing that taken into the streets.
- [28:00]
Jessica Defino
I feel like it will be. I mean, we definitely are seeing that a little bit with under eye patches. Like, those are.
- [28:06]
Emily Kirkpatrick
You're right. Patches and pimple patches. You're right.
- [28:08]
Jessica Defino
Those are like, out on the street, go about your day. Show off that you're putting an effort into your appearance. Like, there's no shame in the labor anymore. So I could definitely see this. I could see people walking around in those chin straps.
- [28:22]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Me too. And I feel like we're headed there because the whole rhetoric is, you know, like, protecting yourself against the elements. Like, you know, anti aging, like blocking the sun and stuff. And I feel like you could work people up into a frenzy enough where they're like, okay, like, I will wear a full face mask outside with a. With a chin jock strap thing.
- [28:39]
Jessica Defino
And this is actually reminding me of a story that I pitched out a while ago and it did not get any bites on it, but about the transition from selfies to shelfies and now entering the age of. I need to come up with a better word for it, maybe. But the self shelfie, where the self is the shelf. We've like identified so much with the products on our shelves that we are becoming the shelves in which to display them. I was thinking of the eye patches, the pimple patches, but also, like, Rhode launched the pocket blush, which is like, meant to be carried around in your pocket.
- [29:15]
Emily Kirkpatrick
And Dr. Loretta or even their iPhone cases with the lip gloss that you can pop into it. Totally.
- [29:21]
Jessica Defino
Well, that was one thing. An editor said to me, they were like, well, how would the iPhone case tie into this trend? Like, that's not a part of your body. And I was like, have you not heard?
- [29:30]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Is it not. It's in my hand at all times.
- [29:32]
Jessica Defino
That's a huge thing, I think is like, the. The study of the phone as a. As a prosthetic, as, like, an extension of the body.
- [29:40]
Emily Kirkpatrick
An extension of hand. For sure.
- [29:42]
Jessica Defino
Yeah. I have to massage this idea, but I do think it's happening.
- [29:45]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Like, you aren't holding your phone up in front of your face. Like, it's either in your hand all the time or it's, like, in front of your face. Like, it is very much an advertisement. It's a billboard opportunity.
- [29:54]
Jessica Defino
The same as, like, clothes, I guess.
- [29:56]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Yeah, but yeah, for sure.
- [29:58]
Jessica Defino
I don't know. It would kind of be like carrying around a bottle of, like, Downy Wrinkle release on your clothes and something for, like, this.
- [30:04]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Which celebrities do. Like, we're not even talking about something that's fictional. Like, look at all the honey bunches of oats spawn con that I keep putting in the newslet letter. Like, it's celebrities literally walking around with, like, weird fake tote bags. Weirdly fake. Filled with cereal in these really, like, artificial, contrived circumstances where you're like, no one. Grocery shops like that. Like, literally no one. It's always so weird. Anyway, so, yes, people are already doing this. It's just not, you know, exclusively with beauty products.
- [30:33]
Jessica Defino
Should we talk about demure?
- [30:35]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Very demure, very mindful, very cutesy. You know, let's talk about it. This was crazy to me, just because I've never seen. I've never seen a meme cycled through at this rate. I've never. It seemed like I just saw Jules's. So Jules lebron posted the original video where this comes from. And I had just seen her TikTok, and I feel like the very next day I started seeing brands using it, and then it just, like, amped up from there. And I consider myself usually, like, on. On it. You know, I see a meme early.
- [31:09]
Jessica Defino
So I saw brands talking about demure before I realized where it was from or what had happened, where it was coming from.
- [31:16]
Emily Kirkpatrick
That's even sicker.
- [31:17]
Jessica Defino
Very quick, very quickly.
- [31:20]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Yeah, I don't know. I just think that we're not going to be able to have memes for much longer. We're gonna have to find a new format or a new. I don't know. They're a little. Brands are getting a little too TikTok savvy. They're getting a little too familiar with the lingo of Gen Z on the Internet. I think in a pretty. In a way that grosses me out. I don't know how other people feel about it, but it reminded me a lot of. Do you remember when brands on Twitter started getting personalities?
- [31:47]
Jessica Defino
Oh, yeah. Yes.
- [31:49]
Emily Kirkpatrick
This definitely paints me as old, but I just remember this turning point. I forget who was the first to have a personality. Maybe it was like Wendy's or something. But I just remember this turning point as all the brands started to realize that what interacted well and like what worked well for them on Twitter was something completely different than how they had marketed themselves in the past. And it was like having this unique voice, having this unique tone, and letting kind of the real person behind the social media account brand the voice of your brand and like, let it engage in drama and let it engage in trends and like, you know, back and forth with customers. And that was an entirely new idea. Before that, they were literally just like tweeting out like two Whoppers for five buck deal today.
- [32:32]
Jessica Defino
I feel like Duolingo is a good.
- [32:34]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Example of like, Duolingo is a great example. I mean, in the TikTok realm. Yeah, them, they also kind of pivoted in TikTok of like, brands having a voice that way and like actually participating in trends and being not just participating in trends, but Duolingo is very much.
- [32:48]
Jessica Defino
Like on the driver.
- [32:50]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Like they're. They're creating them. Yes, they're driving them and they're also creating them in tandem with other creators actively creating them instead of as like a response after the fact. Um, and so I think a lot of brands started following that Duolingo model and now they have themselves a bunch of like super plugged in Gen Z TikTok creators who are jumping on the trend so incredibly fast that you're barely seeing the original before you're seeing the meme ified version.
- [33:19]
Jessica Defino
And I think there's also a difference between, like having a personality as a brand and then just jumping on somebody else's personality to sell your brand. Most definitely is what is happening with Jules, like, that was a hit because of her.
- [33:32]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Yeah, I think that's mostly what's happening with brands. I think it's very, very. I mean, Duolingo is maybe an exception to that, but I think most brands are just using other beloved creators voice and formats and energy to like, to hopefully shed some of that onto their own brand. And I don't think it works. It doesn't work for me. I don't know about other people.
- [33:52]
Jessica Defino
I mean, Demir is a good example of this because I feel like the original video, Jules was talking about how she goes to work with sort of like, you know, subtle makeup on. She's like, I'm not doing a green crease. I'm not going all out. My lashes are demure. I'm very mindful.
- [34:09]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Yeah.
- [34:09]
Jessica Defino
What I thought was interesting about the video is like, Jules as a trans woman talking about having to be demure and mindful in certain settings. And obviously, like, she's having fun with it. But I think it also speaks to, like, some of the problems that trans women face in the workplace out in the world of having to adhere to a certain code of contact or certain aesthetic in order to get, like, basic human treatment or just a little bit of respect. And when I see brands taking that language and then marketing me, like, some examples of, like, demure products I've gotten pitched now are like, French manicures, a little pink dress, like an undetectable concealer, for sure. When you're promoting them mostly to, like, CIS women and reinforcing these ideals of femininity, like, it's going against sort of the message that I think was embedded in the original post. And it's like, you know, gender dysphoria and these, these standards that we hold, the trans community, too, are fueled by rigid beauty ideals that reinforce traditional gender norms. And it's been kind of like, wild to watch brands just grab onto demure and be like, oh, let's reinforce traditional femininity to everyone now. I don't know.
- [35:31]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Yeah, I agree. And also, like, the original joke to me that Jules was making is that, like, it's all fake. Like, it's all kind of these made up terms that we're applying to these different looks. And I don't know, I was thinking about too, because Bob the Drag queen did a video lip syncing to Very Demure with, like, the full face of drag on and was like, you see my cut crease, like, very demure. And I was like, right. Because it's like, I don't. It's a fiction. Like this idea of the demure woman, this cutesy woman.
- [36:00]
Jessica Defino
Well, that's why I love drag. It's like drag exists to highlight the fact that gender is a performance and it's not inherent.
- [36:08]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Exactly. And so Jules was being like, look at me performing it this way. But it's like the joke is you're also performing it when you do it this way. And I don't know, I think that's very interesting and compelling and it just kind of got lost in the sauce. And then of course, Jules, there's a big controversy. This other creator said that they invented demure and like Jules stole it from them. And we ended the TikTok community, ended up having to like trace back the word demure through culture. And it actually, it's a reference to Princess Nokia who is referencing Venus extravaganza in Paris is burning. Because demure is a huge word in ballroom culture. Oh, right. So actually it is part of this like trans legacy of like beauty and standards and the performance of femininity. And yeah, as you said, it's now being co opted by these brands to sell products back to CIS women. And very literally using the word demure to mean ladylike. Ladylike, Diminutive. Yeah. And I just think, I don't know, it's very interesting given the origins of the word and also given the time that we're at culturally, especially on TikTok with like Trad wives and stuff, who are these kind of like exemplary demure women, Right. Who are like selling us this dream of being demure, which is the joke Jules is making. Because it's a fiction, it's not a real thing. It is fully a crafted Persona that you're putting on and projecting into the world or on social media that has no real bearing in reality. Like the most demure woman on social media. You cannot be demure 100% of your life. You know, like there's no way to live as a human being being demure and cutesy and mindful 100% of the time. It's not a real person.
- [37:58]
Jessica Defino
Right.
- [37:59]
Emily Kirkpatrick
But we're being sold it like it's a real person, which is kind of fascinating.
- [38:03]
Jessica Defino
Yeah, I think you're right. Like, I see people being sick of demure already. So I wonder, like, are we going to keep seeing trends like this, like blow up in this way or our brands can learn the lesson?
- [38:14]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Well, and I think just in general, people really don't like brands co opting Internet culture, Internet slang. Like, I don't know, this is my thing. I always, my personal opinion is that celebrities and brands shouldn't be allowed to be on social media because I just don't think it's for them. To me, these are places where like we get to talk to each other one to one and we can like have inside jokes and like share stories, share jokes, memes, whatever, troll, whatever you want to do. But I don't know the second that, like, a corporation intervenes or a celebrity trying to sell you something, it's, like, disingenuous. And it's always just used as marketing. And it's like, these are people who can afford a commercial on television. They can buy a page in a magazine. Like, go do that. If you want to make jokes to me about demure and pay the original creator for it. You know what I mean? Like, license that from them. I don't think you should get to be on Twitter, like, clogging up my feed, making weird jokes about Demir that you don't even understand.
- [39:07]
Jessica Defino
Hard. Agree.
- [39:08]
Emily Kirkpatrick
And also, Jules is, like, struggling now to. I mean, it seems good. She made money from this to pay for her gender confirmation surgeries and all of that. And that makes me very happy. And she was able to quit her job because of it and let her friend move into her apartment with her and stuff. However, someone also trademarked it before she had a chance to. So she can't make merch off of this.
- [39:29]
Jessica Defino
That's so.
- [39:31]
Emily Kirkpatrick
It's so sinister. Yes. And she should.
- [39:35]
Jessica Defino
Do we know who trademarked it?
- [39:36]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Yeah. I forget the guy's name, though. I don't even feel like giving him attention for doing something shitty like that. But it's also. I don't. You know, it's all. I don't know. It's just about power and classism and stuff, too. Cause it's like, she can't. Jules can't afford a lawyer to even take a step like that on her behalf. And so, like, some opportunist saw, you know, saw the chance, seized it. I don't think you can even. Maybe lawyers in the chat can let us know, but I don't think that you can even trademark kind of a generic phrase like that.
- [40:08]
Jessica Defino
I don't think you could trademark a word like demure. I don't know.
- [40:12]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Right. I don't think. Yeah. I don't know. I'm not a leader. It feels too broad to me. But then again, I don't know. Paris Hilton trademarked. That's hot. So anything is possible, I suppose. But anyway, I just think it's very shitty. I think it's a very shitty meme cycle, and no one who should be getting the money or attention is getting it properly, in my opinion.
- [40:34]
Jessica Defino
Well, speaking of. Of obvious gender performance.
- [40:38]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Sure.
- [40:38]
Jessica Defino
We gotta talk about Dolly.
- [40:39]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Beauty would love to.
- [40:41]
Jessica Defino
Dolly Parton let us.
- [40:44]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Sadly, after a perfect career, Dolly Parton.
- [40:49]
Jessica Defino
Kind of ruined a career streak of not profiting off of beauty and released her own celebrity beauty Brand Dolly Beauty.
- [41:00]
Emily Kirkpatrick
No one is immune to the siren song of a. Their own celebrity beauty line, it seems.
- [41:06]
Jessica Defino
No. So I guess the lipstick line. It's four lipsticks. The line is called Heaven's Kiss, and all the colors are named after, like, Dolly Parton songs. And. Yeah, I'm upset because, like, I've always kind of been a champion of. Of Dolly's aesthetic, despite, you know, generally being, like, anti surgery procedures, stuff like that. But I have always loved that she's, like, very upfront about all the surgery she's getting.
- [41:31]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Yes.
- [41:31]
Jessica Defino
She doesn't mystify what she's doing in language of, like, empower or authenticity. Like, she's very upfront about the fact that, like, this is fake and it's fun.
- [41:40]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Yes. She has always been very vocal about, like, this is smoke and mirrors. Yes.
- [41:44]
Jessica Defino
Yes.
- [41:45]
Emily Kirkpatrick
And I love that is a facade that I put on to be an entertainer. And I. I also admire that she's. Her aesthetic is also just like my newsletter to a T. Yeah. I mean, everything I love.
- [41:56]
Jessica Defino
It's just hard not to love Dolly. And I mean, what I love about capitalizing about it. Yeah. Is that she hadn't capitalized on her look to sell it to other people. Like, it was very her, you know, and so, yeah, now we have Dolly Beauty. And I just. I don't know what to think. I also think. Thought it was very funny that she is promoting the brand with, like, the line she's using is, like, a little red lipstick never hurt anybody. Which is, like, okay, true in some senses. But I think it's funny because, like, pretty much all lipstick has a little bit of lead in it.
- [42:26]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Yeah. I was gonna say, except for those, like, chemicals and toxins that we put in lipstick to, like, make them.
- [42:32]
Jessica Defino
No safe amount of lead when it comes to consuming it or putting it on your body, which just a little helpful to, you know, it's. It's pretty much all lipstick out there. It's got some. Some little bit of lead in it. Even Dolly's.
- [42:46]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Yeah. It is disappointing, but, yeah, I just. It's feel like every celebrity we're just seeing, like. I don't know. I wrote about this in the newsletter as well, but just kind of a peak saturation of, like, celebrity product. It feels to me like no stone can be left unturned. Like, everything has to be marketed somehow and branded with their name, and they can't, you know, miss any check. Do you know anything about, like, when. When are we getting this lipstick? Do the proceeds go to anyone?
- [43:15]
Jessica Defino
I actually have no clue. I just saw Dolly beauty pop up and I think just blacked out a little bit.
- [43:21]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Sure.
- [43:22]
Jessica Defino
And haven't looked into any of the details. Just I'm in mourning.
- [43:25]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Right. You couldn't take too much in at once.
- [43:28]
Jessica Defino
But we can look that up and put in the show notes for anyone who wants to order. I won't support you, but. But I will give you the details.
- [43:35]
Emily Kirkpatrick
I will give you the information. I will not give you my approval. I also just wanted to share. I went to Dollywood recently. I'm wearing my Dollywood T shirt right now actually. And my friend told me a little anecdote that has really is so delightful to me and is very validating to me. I guess I'll start with my friend has been living at her parents house this summer in Asheville, North Carolina. And I went down there to visit her and we decided that on the 4th of July we're going to go to Dollywood, which I highly recommend. It's a great Americana location to ironically celebrate your country in the most patriotic environment humanly possible. Which is Dollywood. Anyway, part of Dollywood, there's a museum that's just dedicated to all of Dolly's possessions. Her guitars, her outfits and her wigs. Most notably to me walking around that. Well, for one, the proportions of her body is one of the craziest things I've ever seen in my life. I didn't really understand. I got, you know, like, I knew I knew, but I didn't know. And it really puts Kim Kardashian to shame in kind of a crazy way. Like, she's just so tiny, she's so petite and her boobs are so big. And all of this clothing absolutely has to be custom made for her. Anyway, I was looking at the wigs and I was telling my friend that like, I guess I just never thought about it. But I didn't realize that Dolly's always been wearing a wig her entire career.
- [45:03]
Jessica Defino
I feel like I recently read that.
- [45:05]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Yeah, that is not her hair. Because they're basically in the, in the museum. They're showing you clips of her like performing in the 60s and 70s and stuff. And then like next to it is the wig that she was wearing in the clip. So I was like, okay, so she. I've literally never seen her real hair because in my mind I guess I was thinking like, of course they had bouffants and stuff back then. And then as she got older, her hair probably got thinner and so she's just like wearing the wigs as like to Keep the brand. No. Like a unified brand through all of time. But no, the unified brand is always wearing a wig. And so I was telling my friend when we were in there, I was like, I bet you so much money that if Dolly is not wearing one of these, like, rhinestones, spangled jumpsuits and this wig, nobody would know who she is.
- [45:49]
Jessica Defino
Yes. And I think that's part of what I have loved about, like, the way she presents herself.
- [45:53]
Emily Kirkpatrick
It's drag.
- [45:54]
Jessica Defino
And her Persona in general. Yeah. Is that it's. I think it's, like, big and showy and fake for a reason. So that she can keep things about her life just for her.
- [46:06]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Yes.
- [46:06]
Jessica Defino
Because I feel like I have read somewhere. I'll try to find the article where she mentions, like, not really getting recognized when she's not in her full look.
- [46:15]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Makes sense.
- [46:16]
Jessica Defino
So no one's seen her real hair. No one, like, really knows what her husband looks like. Like, she. It can be incognito when she wants to. And I kind of, you know, really respect that way of, like, using beauty in order to preserve your authenticity. Like, behind the veil.
- [46:31]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Totally. And I was thinking about her a lot because of all this new Chapel Roan stuff where she, you know, she's talking about the project versus her as a person and, like, drawing that line. And I'm like, actually, like, a lot of great creators through all of time have drawn that line. I mean, look at Beyonce.
- [46:44]
Jessica Defino
Right?
- [46:44]
Emily Kirkpatrick
There's a Beyonce on stage that you can consume, and there's a Beyonce private life that none of us can consume, you know, and is not available to us anyway. So I bring this up because. Because my friend who lives in North Carolina works at the food pantry in her town, and she texted me one day after I came home from visiting her, and she said, dolly came to the food pantry today to drop off books. And she sent me a picture of the sign in sheet with just the name Dolly signed audit. And she said, unrecognizable. Whoa. Nobody knew it was her. Nobody knew she was there.
- [47:18]
Jessica Defino
Wow.
- [47:19]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Yeah. Because she. No wig, no outfit, just her real. Probably brown hair, probably gray, probably white at this point. Yeah.
- [47:27]
Jessica Defino
Who knows?
- [47:28]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Just a grandma dropping off some books.
- [47:31]
Jessica Defino
That's very sweet.
- [47:32]
Emily Kirkpatrick
At the food pantry. Yes. Because that was another part of the museum is they were showing, like, the 20 million books or something that she's donated over the course of her lifetime. And it's just. Yeah. Unblue. And the counter's going up every second that you stand there. Yeah. She's incredibly well.
- [47:48]
Jessica Defino
I hope These lipstick proceeds are going to libraries.
- [47:51]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Right. That's why I asked, because I assume that she's doing this for something altruistic. I don't know what it is, but just knowing how her business model typically operates, I would hope so. Anyway. I was very charmed by her being able to go to a food pantry undetected and just kind of live her life out and about in Tennessee.
- [48:10]
Jessica Defino
Yeah, I like that.
- [48:11]
Emily Kirkpatrick
For doing her thing undisturbed. I think that's beautiful. I think that's the dream type of fame if you have to be a famous person.
- [48:18]
Jessica Defino
Oh, yeah, 100%. Speaking of fame monsters, should we.
- [48:25]
Emily Kirkpatrick
The less ideal version of fame, should.
- [48:28]
Jessica Defino
We pivot into Blake?
- [48:29]
Emily Kirkpatrick
I guess we have to talk about the news story of the whole month, if not the whole year, is the great Blake Lash of 2024.
- [48:38]
Jessica Defino
Did you coin that term?
- [48:39]
Emily Kirkpatrick
I don't know. I don't know. I certainly said. I certainly named one of my newsletters that, but I don't know if I invented it. I don't. So I don't. I don't think anyone's using it either, except me, so I think it's yours. Okay, fantastic. I coined that the Blake Lash of 2024. I just think it's very interesting that she's getting the full Jennifer Lopez treatment.
- [49:00]
Jessica Defino
Yeah. Yeah. Blake Lively is definitely having a public downfall a la JLo.
- [49:05]
Emily Kirkpatrick
She's having a moment, and as with JLo, I just always think these are funny because it's like, if you are paying attention at all, if you're paying attention at all to these celebrities, like, you would already know this stuff. Stuff. Also, why does everyone think celebrities are, like, inherently nice? It's also my question.
- [49:22]
Jessica Defino
Right, Right.
- [49:23]
Emily Kirkpatrick
You can like them, and they can still be, like, a bitch, you know?
- [49:26]
Jessica Defino
Well, this is my theory, and we can get into, like, a lot of the. The backlash stuff that she's experiencing. But the beauty portion of this is that at the same time as she's kind of stuck in this media storm of people not really liking her anymore, she has released Blake Brown Beauty, her hair care line.
- [49:44]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Perfect timing.
- [49:45]
Jessica Defino
And is promoting it sort of alongside her.
- [49:48]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Her movie, her domestic violence movie, and just a perfect moment of brand synergy.
- [49:54]
Jessica Defino
Who's on her team? Like, who is this?
- [49:57]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Ryan Reynolds.
- [49:58]
Jessica Defino
Ryan Reynolds.
- [49:59]
Emily Kirkpatrick
100%.
- [50:00]
Jessica Defino
It all makes perfect sense.
- [50:01]
Emily Kirkpatrick
I see the heavy hand of Ryan Reynolds and absolutely everything going on here down to, like, the comments Blake is making and the jokes that are not landing are so him.
- [50:09]
Jessica Defino
The jokes feel very deadpool.
- [50:12]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Yes. She has spent way Too much time locked away in Connecticut with her husband that she thinks this is like a normal way that people communicate in like a normal form of comedy and not like hyper specific to how her husband jokes around with the press.
- [50:24]
Jessica Defino
I think that's an excellent observation.
- [50:26]
Emily Kirkpatrick
It's not helping her.
- [50:27]
Jessica Defino
No. Well, maybe we should get into more of that before I might go into my Blake Brown beauty.
- [50:33]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Sure. I don't even know where to begin with. It ends with us stuff. Like it just seems like a bottomless pit of bad decision making. I mean, I guess I'll start with the clothes because I'm like the clothes person.
- [50:45]
Jessica Defino
Right.
- [50:46]
Emily Kirkpatrick
But the whole they're bad. The fashion press tour is very tough. It's been very tough and strenuous on me specifically having to cover it all. And it's been very hideous. But again, anyone who's been paying any attention knows that she's a bad dresser.
- [51:03]
Jessica Defino
Yes. And she's. I've known this for very proudly self styled. She does not work with a stylist. She puts together all of her own outfits and she.
- [51:11]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Oh my God, don't even get me started on self styling. Self styling. I've said the this 50 million times in my newsletter. But self styling is a fiction. Any celebrity who says they are self styled, that is a lie. It's literally impossible in their real day to day life. Sure. Absolutely. For a press tour with this many brands of this magnitude, you're not self styling because. I'm sorry, former fashion assistant stepping in. But the way. Maybe people don't know how this operates, but when a celebrity wants to wear something from a brand, you have to email the brand with the looks that you have selected off the Runway that you would like to request. And then they have to go through their own internal, you know, do we like the celebrity enough to dress them? Are these pieces available on the state, Blah, blah, blah. You go back and forth with them about confirming the samples. Then somebody has to pick up the samples and they have to be brought to Blake Lively's home. And then someone has to remove the samples, document them so they don't get lost. Right. Because they have to be returned exactly as is in completion to the brand when you're done with with it. That's a whole documentation system that has to happen. And then someone has to steam them, someone has to hang them on a rack, someone has to put them in color coded order. And then Blake waltzes in, makes whatever insane selection she's going to make. And that's what she's calling self Styling, and then the assistant does the return, they do the packing. There's just. It's such an elaborate, like, administrative process, honestly, that I know that Blake isn't doing because she literally doesn't have the time to do it.
- [52:44]
Jessica Defino
No, I. Like, when I was assisting, I didn't have the time to do it. And assisting was my only job.
- [52:48]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Yes, exactly. Me neither.
- [52:50]
Jessica Defino
So much effort.
- [52:51]
Emily Kirkpatrick
I watched my peers just drown under emails and just like, weep at the amount of correspondence they had to do every day just to make, like a dress materialize in the office. I just think it's so that, to me, is already, like, indicative of her personality. If you're willing to, like, obfuscate all the people involved in getting you dressed to take credit for it, we already have a problem. And there is a team of people working for you to make this happen anyway. So self styled is ridiculous to me. But yeah, I mean, the ultimate outfits are also bad. Like, do you really want credit for dressing badly? Like, you're welcome to it. I guess you're putting together combinations of things that are very ugly and also all floral themed. And I'm ready for this thematic press tour dressing to end.
- [53:37]
Jessica Defino
It doesn't work for everybody.
- [53:39]
Emily Kirkpatrick
No. And it's just not interesting. I think if Barbie proved anything, it's like, it's like real dull by the end.
- [53:47]
Jessica Defino
And everyone's like, especially when the theme is floral. Like, okay, yeah, that's. That's a little.
- [53:53]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Right. Like, at least Barbie, it's like you're referencing these, you know, Barbie I have my own problems with. But at least you're referencing these, like, archival doll costumes that are real and they're all very different. Right. They all don't, like, look when your theme is florals because you play a florist named Lily Blossom Bloom or whatever in a movie. It's like that to me is not a reason to be dressing like that. And again, that was another part of the rollout of this film. It's like, why are we talking about floral? This is a film about domestic violence.
- [54:22]
Jessica Defino
Right, Right.
- [54:23]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Why are we talking about florals? And she even in the marketing, she says, get your girlfriends, wear your florals and head to the theater. And it's like, excuse me for a devastating look. Yeah. To weep. To weep over domestic violence. Yeah. It's just so baffling to me. And this light hearted and. Yeah. And then she's also obsessed with all of her own clothing that she, like, put in the film because it's not just bad street styling for the press. Tour. She also weirdly self styled in the movie. And I'm like, where's the costume department?
- [54:56]
Jessica Defino
And it's very distracting. And also. Okay, I'm gonna admit something that I'm not proud of, but last summer I read it ends with us.
- [55:06]
Emily Kirkpatrick
You're so brave.
- [55:07]
Jessica Defino
And it starts with us. I just needed to see what the hype was about.
- [55:11]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Yeah, I don't know anything about it.
- [55:12]
Jessica Defino
I'm familiar with the book. And when I first started seeing these, like, paparazzi shots of them filming the movie start trickling out, like, a year ago or whenever, I was so confused because it is not part of, like, Lily Blossom Bloom's character to, like, dress strange, like, to have, like, a distinctive style. There's no commentary about, like, oh, she was wearing this wild floral vest with cargo pants. Like, style is not part of the book. It is not part of the character. So Blake just decided to do this unfairly, I think, to Lily Blossom Bloom, who's already dealing with so much. Now we're gonna put her in these horrible little outfits too.
- [55:54]
Emily Kirkpatrick
I agree. It's very distracting and odd. And obviously, fashion was not part of the books that, again, are about a domestic violence relationship. So I can see how they maybe didn't stress the florals and her quirky appearance, but Blake made that a real big central part of the film, which also, again, makes me wonder what the wardrobe department thought and, like, how they felt that was impacting their job and their vision for the film. But then also, she's incorporating her own pieces of clothing into the movie. So there's a scene where she wears a $3200 pair of Saint Laurent boots. And, like, explain that to me, like, how is this florist wearing mesh crystal Saint Laurent new season boots? And then, of course, she had to bring up that she brought a bunch of Ryan Reynolds old shirts that she was wearing. And Gigi Hadid got a good plug in there for her failing cashmere line. Guest in residence. There are some sweaters, apparently, that she borrowed straight from Gigi's closet because they weren't even in production anymore. And that's kind of how besties they are. So isn't that exciting?
- [57:01]
Jessica Defino
It does feel kind of like insulting to the art of costume design for film.
- [57:06]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Very much so. Very much so. And as we'll get into kind of the onset drama, it's like, I don't want to side with a man in this, especially a man who's hired Johnny Depp's former PR team.
- [57:18]
Jessica Defino
Yikes.
- [57:19]
Emily Kirkpatrick
However, I can see how Perhaps Blake was stepping on some toes on set, just given by her wardrobe alone. I also thought the talking point of the wardrobe in this movie was very interesting when juxtaposed with this newly released interview from 2016 where she is so deeply offended to be asked about her costumes in a Woody Allen film.
- [57:43]
Jessica Defino
Right. I saw that clip. So it's an interviewer asks, like, what it was like to wear the costumes of.
- [57:49]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Yeah, so that clip is bizarre, but also very fascinating. Like, I don't know, like an ephemera from that specific time in media and culture and, like, how celebrities thought they could act and, like, treat the press. Anyway, so basically, it's this interview that this woman who does these kind of press junket movie interviews with celebrities and puts them on YouTube, she re released, and she called it the interview that made me want to quit my career. And I think an important piece of context for it is Blake had just announced her pregnancy, her second pregnancy, publicly. She was about six months along at the time. And so it was a big news story of the day. And so when she comes in for the interview, the woman says, oh, congratulations on your little bump. And Blake replies, congratulations on your little bump. So rude about that tone. Yes. And we come to find out that it's even ruder than we thought it was because the interviewer is infertile.
- [58:54]
Jessica Defino
Yeah.
- [58:56]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Yeah. So she's not just calling her fat, she's also reminding her of a painful truth.
- [59:01]
Jessica Defino
Right, right. I guess she was trying to make a point of, like, don't comment on women's bodies.
- [59:06]
Emily Kirkpatrick
That's absolutely what she was trying to do. But she had just announced her own pregnancy publicly. But also, I guess why I say it's a piece of ephemera from 2016 is because that was the time when. I don't know if you remember this, but it was like the big red carpet movement of AskHerMore.
- [59:22]
Jessica Defino
Yes.
- [59:22]
Emily Kirkpatrick
And so that is a hundred percent. Why? Why? So this woman goes on to ask them about the costumes of Cafe Society because it is a film set, I believe, in the 1920s or 30s.
- [59:32]
Jessica Defino
Right. The costumes are a huge part of it.
- [59:34]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Yeah. They're historical. Like, they are very different from what you would wear today. So it's a perfectly legitimate question to ask. But the reason why Blake has such, like, a snide comeback like that is because it was at a time when a lot of celebrities were like, quote, unquote, clapping back like that against the press, like, how dare you only care about my outfits and my clothes, my manicam and what I Don't know if you remember the manicure cameras that used to be on the red carpet.
- [59:58]
Jessica Defino
Oh, yeah.
- [59:59]
Emily Kirkpatrick
But, yeah, so it's kind of just, I don't know, it was a big thing. It always reminds me of, like, Chrissy Teigen, you know, being a bully on Twitter and being like, well, I'm just, like, standing up for myself. And it's like, actually, you're. Yeah.
- [60:11]
Jessica Defino
Right. So I think in that interview, what did she say? She was like, oh, I wonder if you'd ask a man that question. Or she didn't even address the interviewer. She turns to Parker Posey.
- [60:21]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Yes. And they both wonder if this person.
- [60:23]
Jessica Defino
Would ask a man that question.
- [60:24]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Yes. And then you hear the interviewer say, I would. I would, in fact. And then the two actresses go on to prove exactly her point of why she asked the question to begin with. Because they talk at length about the men's costumes in the film.
- [60:37]
Jessica Defino
Right.
- [60:38]
Emily Kirkpatrick
And it's like, yeah, that's why she's asking you. That's what we're doing here. It was just such a weird, A weird attitude and a weird entitled attitude. And I, I, I think I said this on substack notes, but I just don't, I don't understand celebrities who are so off the bat hostile to media people. Like, we aren't all just trying to do our job. Like, we aren't all trying to, like, make something. You know, this is the same as me talking about interviewing Kendall last time we were on the podcast is like, we have to work together to create a piece of content that, like, I can put my name on and that promotes whatever weird bullshit thing you want me to promote. And that's why we're talking to begin with. So you need to just, like, meet me in the middle ground.
- [61:16]
Jessica Defino
Yeah.
- [61:17]
Emily Kirkpatrick
You know, pretend offer up fake anecdotes. I don't care. Like, we, I am not getting paid.
- [61:23]
Jessica Defino
This is like a mutually. Supposed to be a mutually beneficial experience.
- [61:27]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Yes.
- [61:27]
Jessica Defino
But mostly benefits you.
- [61:29]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Yes. You're the multimillionaire in this dynamic. I'm getting paid 20 bucks an hour.
- [61:33]
Jessica Defino
I think that's interesting too, in the context of her hair care, which we'll get to later, but I read an article about it and I'm trying to remember the exact number, so don't quote me on this, but I think they estimated that just in, like, media impressions alone. When she launched Blake Brown Beauty, it generated something like $16 million worth of ad placements just from the media placement. So it's like, Yep. Journalists really are you know, paying your.
- [62:02]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Bills, like, and making nothing but.
- [62:05]
Jessica Defino
Yeah, so it's like the media and journalists have generated a lot of, of publicity for her brand that she's now promoting.
- [62:14]
Emily Kirkpatrick
And they don't see a dime of that, by the way. Like, they don't see any of that money. Even when you're talking about this has always driven me insane. But even when you're talking about affiliate revenue that the magazine is making, the writer does not get any of that affiliate revenue, not a cent. So they are not only helping you promote your product, they're helping their employer make thousands, if not millions of dollars. And. And they're still getting paid $20 an hour to do it. It's just crazy. And then they get the brunt of you being, you know, in a bad mood that day.
- [62:45]
Jessica Defino
I. Yes, and I was just gonna say, like, I can see anybody having like a bad day and snipping for sure. But it seems like what we're seeing with Blake is like a lot more examples of, of behavior like this kind of coming out at the same time. So it seems more like a consistent thing that people are noticing about.
- [63:04]
Emily Kirkpatrick
I agree. And I think I would be a lot more sympathetic if it was kind of a one off instance or she hadn't announced her pregnancy or whatever. But we're seeing video after video come out of her having a very similar attitude, especially with people from the press. I mean, another one came out for this press cycle where, you know, that's the thing too. It's like the interviewer admittedly didn't word the question great. Or in like a super clear way. But also, like, you are a professional celebrity for over a decade. Like, you are media trained. Like, you do know the right way to reply and the right way to, like, engage. But when I, when I was talking about Ryan Reynolds sense of humor earlier, specifically, what I was thinking about was this reporter asking Blake and her co star, you know, if viewers, you know, went through similar experiences basically as what is depicted in the film. Like, he said, like, how could they broach that subject with you? How could they approach you, you know, like, what would you tell them? And she gives this very flippant response of like, oh, should I like, share my location? Oh, should I give them my cell phone number? Should I tell them where I am, where I live? Blah, blah, blah. It's like, that is so clearly not what he's asking. Like, it's not an invasive no.
- [64:13]
Jessica Defino
And it also would have been a perfect opportunity to shout out like a nonprofit that works with survivors of domestic violence and say, you know what? I actually don't have much to share on this subject, but I've loved no more throughout the filming of this movie. And I would like direct people there for resources like that is so simple and helpful.
- [64:35]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Yes. To me, immediately I'm like, this is Media Training 101. You say, wow, I can't imagine what they've been through. I can't imagine how horrible that experience must have been. I would point them in the direction of some resources such as X, Y and Z that could help them out. You're getting. You're plugging, you know, good resources that are helpful to people. You're. You're recognizing the topic of the film for once in an interview instead of pretending it's like a rom com. Like, it's just an easy layup to me. I just don't understand how it could have gone so awry. It just seems so straightforward and simple and even you can hear the host, like, humoring her, like, trying to play along with it, like, make it light again.
- [65:17]
Jessica Defino
What about your Social Security?
- [65:18]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Exactly. You can hear him playing along, trying to make it not weird. But it is so weird.
- [65:23]
Jessica Defino
Weird. Yeah. I think even without any of the. The discourse about what's happening between Blake Lively and the director Justin Baldoni, which there's a lot of speculation on either side. I think even without that part of the drama, people would still be kind of like, put off by the way that she's off putting promoting this movie and kind of skirting the deep issues that the movie tries to engage with. With for sure.
- [65:51]
Emily Kirkpatrick
We didn't even talk about the cocktail party for Betty Buzz for her canned alcohol.
- [65:58]
Jessica Defino
What. Okay, what happened at this cocktail party?
- [66:00]
Emily Kirkpatrick
You know, just plug in the cocktail brand. She named a bunch of the. The cocktails at the party after characters in the film. And again, it's just like, why are we involving. I don't know. It's. It's rom com sales techniques applied to, like, a really dark subject matter that often involves alcohol abuse. You know, it's just like, it's right. Look, it's not the right tone. And I just don't understand how so many people involved could be so off in the tone.
- [66:29]
Jessica Defino
It feels very insensitive.
- [66:31]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Yeah. But then, I don't know, some people were pointing out that the. The author herself is kind of tone deaf in, like, a weird way about these topics. So maybe it's like calls coming from inside the house. I don't know.
- [66:42]
Jessica Defino
Yeah, no, that's a good. That's A good point, because she also.
- [66:46]
Emily Kirkpatrick
She tried to launch some brand off of the back of one of her books. It was. It ends with us coloring book. It's the official. It ends with us coloring book. Yeah. January of last year, she was gonna launch this coloring book. I don't know. And for children.
- [67:04]
Jessica Defino
Lily Bloom's bruises.
- [67:06]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Yeah, it literally seems like it's so weird. And then she immediately. There's a lot of backlash. And people were like, you literally can't do that. That's so bad. And she apologized inside, like, oh, like, I didn't think it through or something.
- [67:18]
Jessica Defino
Like, all considering that now this whole.
- [67:20]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Right. Doesn't it kind of change seems a.
- [67:22]
Jessica Defino
Little bit more bizarre because it's like, you know. You know, that. That people didn't respond to, like.
- [67:30]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Right.
- [67:30]
Jessica Defino
Trying to capitalize on this particular pattern.
- [67:33]
Emily Kirkpatrick
But to me, it makes it make all sense, because I'm like, oh, she has, like, bad critical thinking skills to begin with about the nature of this book and the subject matter. So, of course, this whole rollout has, like, been bungled in such, like, a weird way because, like, she thought it would be normal to release a coloring book about a domestic violence story. I don't even know how you translate. Translate any. Not the idea already of translating any novel into coloring book. Like, any serious book into a coloring book is already, like, a weird leap to me, let alone this one. But, yeah, I've heard that there's quite a bit of interesting and problematic things within her. I've never read a Colleen Hoover novel, so I can't speak to it.
- [68:11]
Jessica Defino
But, yeah, I mean, having read two, I will say there's. I mean, the writing is just not good. It's very, like, juvenile. I mean, a big plot point in It Ends with us is that Lily keeps a journal. She addresses the journal as Ellen DeGeneres.
- [68:33]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Yes. I recently learned this.
- [68:34]
Jessica Defino
So she speaks to Ellen DeGeneres.
- [68:36]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Very troubling to me.
- [68:38]
Jessica Defino
And the book is filled with references to Finding Nemo.
- [68:42]
Emily Kirkpatrick
She named her daughter's middle name or something like that.
- [68:45]
Jessica Defino
Her daughter's middle name is Dory. Even in, like, the wedding vows in the second book, like, the wedding vows are quotes from Finding Nemo. It's like, it's. It's. I mean, it's not even silly. It's, like, concerning to me. It's like, yeah, very, like, infantilized way of.
- [69:04]
Emily Kirkpatrick
It's also such a funny way to, like, date your book. Like, you. That's setting it in such a specific time and place in a really funny way. And Also, just considering every, like, the fallout of Ellen DeGeneres since that book must have been published. Like, it's just a very funny trope to have now about a fully, like, canceled person who we found out is, like, not nice. I have not seen the movie. I wonder if Ellen is.
- [69:29]
Jessica Defino
I do want to see involved in any way. I can't imagine that she could be this.
- [69:33]
Emily Kirkpatrick
They surely had to get out.
- [69:35]
Jessica Defino
But it was a huge part of the books.
- [69:38]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Very interesting.
- [69:39]
Jessica Defino
What I think is interesting is despite all of this, despite everyone kind of going, you know, anti Blake and calling her out, rightfully, for just not treating the subject of the movie with, like, the gravitas.
- [69:52]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Yeah.
- [69:52]
Jessica Defino
Gravitas it deserves is her hair care line. Her new hair care line. Blake Brown Beauty is doing really well, apparently.
- [70:01]
Emily Kirkpatrick
I think that's incredible.
- [70:03]
Jessica Defino
Yeah. So I read a really great article on it from Rachel Strugatz for Puff, and she has, like, some really good insights there, I guess. One investor told Rachel, Blake knows what her girl wants, and it's not conventionally chic.
- [70:19]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Okay.
- [70:19]
Jessica Defino
So it's like, I agree with that. She knows that her audience and her fans are not looking for that sort of, like, chic, elevated, or even just like, nice looking kind of aesthetic, which I think explains the horrendous packaging.
- [70:35]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Yeah.
- [70:36]
Jessica Defino
Like Brown Beauty.
- [70:37]
Emily Kirkpatrick
That's also so validating because one of the interviews that I was bragging about doing before, we were talking about, like, bad celebrity fashion, but specifically pegged to, like, this Blake Lively, Blake Lash, or, you know, Taylor Swift and the way her fashions have been received. And one of the arguments I was making is like, well, they're courting their demographic. Like, they're not trying to look good to all of us. They're trying to look good to the people who like them, who think that they're cool. Which, you know, is not conventionally good looking, I guess, conventionally chic. So this is very validating to me.
- [71:12]
Jessica Defino
The other thing from that Puck article was that a source close to Target told Puck that the brand had over a million dollars in sales in the first week.
- [71:23]
Emily Kirkpatrick
That's nuts.
- [71:24]
Jessica Defino
Which is impressive considering all the products are like, 20 bucks or under.
- [71:27]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Yeah. Yeah.
- [71:28]
Jessica Defino
And then Rachel also quoted the Los Angeles podcaster Kirby Johnson, who's also a fashion journalist. And Kirby was saying that a lot of Los Angeles listeners were reaching out to her, saying that they, like, ran to Target right away to get the products, and that was something that she hadn't heard about Fenty's Hair Care or Sacred. So it does seem like that despite all of this, the beauty brand is pretty successful, at least initially. And I just, like, it makes me feel like her core customer or her fan is not somebody who's, like, participating in the backlash anyway. Like, like you said, they've probably been paying attention. They know that this is kind of her vibe. This is kind of her tone.
- [72:12]
Emily Kirkpatrick
And it's not, like, why they like or dislike her like, that her personality does not really have anything to do with, like, their fandom.
- [72:17]
Jessica Defino
If anything, they, like, relate to her being kind of, like, annoying and messy. Like, that's kind of more relatable than Beyonce or Rihanna.
- [72:25]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Yeah. Yeah. And it's interesting. Like I said, I feel like we're in this time of, like, peak celebrity products, so it is interesting that her product is able to cut through the noise like that, especially against someone like Ariana or Beyonce who have these massive beauty brands already established. Like, it just. Honestly, what it makes me think of is, like, it's just she is dining out on Serena Vander woods and for the rest of her life because it's the same reason that people thought that she's a really good dresser. Right. It's like, Serena Vander wasn't on tv, had great costumes, and really, like, defined an era. And similarly, like, one of the touchstones of Serena as a character was she had great hair.
- [73:04]
Jessica Defino
Yes.
- [73:04]
Emily Kirkpatrick
And so I think people are just like, right, she has great hair. It's like, no, I don't think that's the reality. I think that's the character that we've all conflated her with. And so I can see how that would lead to really good product sales. And if anything, I think it's testament to, like, celebrities need to hone in on the thing that they're known for or celebrated for, and, you know, market off of that versus trying to scattershot.
- [73:27]
Jessica Defino
Even if it makes no sense to market that way. As in the case of Blake Lively. Like, her big marketing push for the hair care line is saying she doesn't use conditioner. She says she hasn't used conditioner in 20 years. She only uses shampoo and then a hair mask. No, but.
- [73:44]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Which I reject.
- [73:45]
Jessica Defino
Which is. But the thing is, that's shampoo and conditioner by another name.
- [73:51]
Emily Kirkpatrick
This reminds me, I get in fights with straight men all the time because they're obsessed with two in one shampoo conditioner, and it is always my duty to be the one to break it to them that that doesn't exist. That's not a real thing. It's just conditioner that's what you're using. It's just conditioner. Because as my high school chemistry teacher taught me, the shampoo lifts up the hair follicle to clean it. The conditioner smooths the hair follicle back down. Down. You cannot have one product both lifting and smoothing simultaneously. It just doesn't. So it doesn't make sense. It doesn't. It isn't real.
- [74:22]
Jessica Defino
It's just not real. And neither is the hair mask. I asked a cosmetic chemist that I'm friends with, like, okay, what is the difference, like, on a chemical level between these hair masks and a conditioner? And he basically said, like, nothing, really. A hair mask will have often just, like, more fatty acids. And he. And he said it was to make. Make it feel greasier. It's like, heavier. Like, it's working harder.
- [74:48]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Yeah.
- [74:48]
Jessica Defino
But it's just more fatty acids. I actually. I thought I was going to write about the hair care line, so I. I went to Target. I bought. I bought one.
- [74:58]
Emily Kirkpatrick
You were one of the millions.
- [75:00]
Jessica Defino
I was one of the millions contributing to Blake Lively success. I didn't end up writing about it, but I did not have a good experience. I mean, you know, user experience varies. But the mask was just, like, really heavy and really scented. So after I washed it out, it's like my curls were just completely limp. My hair just looked very blah all day. And I was, like, assaulted by the smell. It was so strong. I gave it away.
- [75:31]
Emily Kirkpatrick
I feel like it's so heavy, too, because you're making up for not using conditioner. You know what I mean? Like, it's rolling two products into one.
- [75:38]
Jessica Defino
So it's like double heavy if you used a regular conditioner.
- [75:42]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Yeah. The scent thing is interesting. I don't know. I feel like. I'm sure that's the gateway into her launching her own perfume. You know what I mean?
- [75:52]
Jessica Defino
It could be. Although I can't imagine anyone layering a perfume and this hair care.
- [75:59]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Well, you haven't met the Blake stands.
- [76:00]
Jessica Defino
Yet, which has huge.
- [76:02]
Emily Kirkpatrick
You don't know what they want.
- [76:04]
Jessica Defino
It's so much. And it's like, honestly, it's so heavy that it's like, I think a little rude to other people. You know, people. A lot of people get headaches from these scents.
- [76:12]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Yeah, that's true.
- [76:14]
Jessica Defino
I don't know. I don't love walking around in a cloud of someone else's fragrance, and I didn't want to be that person.
- [76:20]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Yeah. I also thought it was interesting, this line about not using conditioner. Well, one, because it Seems like, again, kind of playing off that, like, cool, effortless girl. Like, I don't put in any. Right. I don't use all the products. I just use some of them in there. I make all of. Of them. But. And then also just like, the rollout campaign, like, as even in the ads promoting this product and throughout this press tour, her hair has looked very dry, in my opinion. And so I think it's really funny to brag about not using conditioner, where it's like, babe, I think we could use some in this situation. Like, I don't know, you're not putting your best hair foot forward to try and sell me hair products. I don't know. I just think it's interesting.
- [77:00]
Jessica Defino
That's very funny. Yeah, I saw a Reddit thread on that, too that was like, does anybody else seeing that her hair looks very fried right now? Like, especially some of these images for the hair care line.
- [77:11]
Emily Kirkpatrick
That was especially. Like, it's one thing on a press tour, you know, whatever. You can't control every day, every situation. But in the images promoting the product, I'm like, these are Photoshopped. Like, this is a fully controlled environment with professional hairstylists. Right. Like, you could lie to us in this circumstance, actually, and, like, make us.
- [77:29]
Jessica Defino
Believe maybe this could be part of the relatability. Like, a lot of people have fried hair.
- [77:35]
Emily Kirkpatrick
They do, they do.
- [77:36]
Jessica Defino
Maybe they're like, wow, I see myself in this ad, and I'm going to use Blake Brown Beauty.
- [77:40]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Yeah. I just don't necessarily want to buy my beauty products from the other people with fried hair like mine. You know, I want to trust the.
- [77:46]
Jessica Defino
Experts, want to aim for more.
- [77:48]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Yeah. Also, I just wanted to add my favorite, my personal favorite part about this whole press tour rollout has been the moment where Blake, like, like, unprompted, just announced that her husband is a scab.
- [78:03]
Jessica Defino
Oh, my God. I can't believe we forgot to mention.
- [78:06]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Nobody asked. Like, nobody was digging for this information. And just. She just fully offered up the fact that he, like, crossed a picket line. And basically, for those who don't know, he apparently, according to Blake, rewrote a whole scene in the movie that's like, kind of the crucial scene. Like, it's a. Again, I haven't seen this movie. I haven't read this book. But, like, it's a kissing scene. It's like the first kiss between her and. Okay, Ryle. Ryle, I'm sorry. My brain refuses to retain his name. For some reason.
- [78:34]
Jessica Defino
He gets all riled up.
- [78:36]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Yeah, it's Not a real name. I think that's what my problem is. But, yeah, so apparently Ryan Reynolds completely rewrote that and he would have had to do that rewrite during the writers strike. And People magazine recently reached out to the screenwriter Chrissy hall, who's responsible for the screenplay, and she had no idea. Idea that he had rewritten that scene. She thought that it was. She thought she saw it and she thought that they must have improvised that on the spot.
- [79:05]
Jessica Defino
Okay. Very interesting, though, for people to go out to the screen.
- [79:09]
Emily Kirkpatrick
I know. And shady. Yeah. I was like, blake and Ruben must.
- [79:13]
Jessica Defino
Be on the outs in the industry too, because that feels like something people wouldn't normally do.
- [79:18]
Emily Kirkpatrick
I know. This is how I felt when People magazine started reporting on Ben Affleck and Jennifer Lopez's divorce before anything had been confirmed. I'm like, damn, people. Like, people is usually like, so butt kissy with people like that. It's so like, that's how you know it's real.
- [79:35]
Jessica Defino
That adds another layer to this, for sure.
- [79:37]
Emily Kirkpatrick
I know. I thought it was really interesting, and I don't know why you would go around bragging about that and telling People, yeah, that your husband's a scab. Anyway, that was my favorite part, and I think it's a highly overlooked part of this whole debacle.
- [79:50]
Jessica Defino
I agree. I agree. Well, now that we've talked about a huge celebrity backlash, should we talk about some niche drama?
- [80:00]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Oh, yeah. Some niche substack only drama that nobody knows or cares about.
- [80:05]
Jessica Defino
I mean, well, it took. There's an article kind of took over our. Our humble platform Substack a couple weeks ago. For those who don't know, because why would you. Substack is the platform that hosts my newsletter, Emily's Newsletter, this podcast, and you can consume the content that it hosts on the substack app. Most people who read the newsletter and listen to the podcast don't. I think like 97% of my readers or something are reading from email. So, yeah, that's just kind of a little bit of backstory. There is a substack app. The substack app has its own, like, notes, which is sort of like the substacks version of tweets.
- [80:49]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Do people know that substack and Twitter are, like, in a feud with each other and you can't promote one or the other platform? It's the bane of my existence as a user of both and a person who likes to embed tweets. You literally can't embed tweets on Substack. They got in A fight with Elon. I don't even remember what the fight was about, but they got in a fight with him. So if you post a substack link on Twitter, it just deads your tweet. Like, literally no one sees it. It doesn't show it to anybody. It's really crazy. Crazy. And then if you try and embed a tweet in substack, it doesn't work. So substack, like, invented their own Twitter, basically called Notes. And it's just a place where other substack writers can, like, talk with each other, share bad memes and fight with.
- [81:29]
Jessica Defino
Each other and promote their content. Like, within the app, I'm using it for drama. Clearly within the app, there's also, like little charts ranking, you know, the top posts in fashion and beauty today, the top posts in business today or culture, which I think is where a lot of this. This niche drama that we're about to get to.
- [81:48]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Yes. Because apparently this is the most read substack newsletter of all time.
- [81:53]
Jessica Defino
Wow.
- [81:54]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Which is crazy to me because I. I mean, maybe we should just say what it is.
- [81:57]
Jessica Defino
Yeah, you do the backstory.
- [81:59]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Emily Sundberg writes this huge business newsletter called Feed Me, which I love.
- [82:03]
Jessica Defino
I love feeding. Yeah, I think it's great every day.
- [82:05]
Emily Kirkpatrick
I do too. I think it's really great. And she's. She's very good at just kind of succinctly putting together trends and things that are happening. And she asks interesting questions from. Interesting, I think. But she was on vacation recently, so she had time to write kind of a more long form essay. And it's called the Machine in the Garden. Yeah, it's just kind of about substack and the nature of writing and being a writer on Substack and what happens when you monetize your writing and monetize content and the whole goal is kind of making money. What becomes of the writing itself? And man, it really pissed people off.
- [82:39]
Jessica Defino
Well, because she kind of of insinuated that what happens is you get kind of lazy, low quality content, bad writing, and then people who are just sort of like following tropes in order to get likes, get clicks, get readers, get subscribers without, you know, really putting a lot of effort into. Into their newsletters. So. Yeah.
- [83:03]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Yeah. But basically this essay started because she said that while she was on vacation, she was reading the newsletters of people that she subscribes to, to. And then she started reading the newsletters from people that the people she subscribes to recommend. And she said to her they were basically all pretty Indistinguishable and had no specific personality or unique tone that she could identify with the writer, which kind of. I mean, maybe I should start off by saying that I don't think this is an issue that matters. And so this whole essay to me didn't mean a whole lot. I'm not triggered by it. I think think it's, you know, has some interesting points, but ultimately I think is kind of irrelevant and just kind of the nature of being on the Internet and using, you know, open source platforms where anybody can post and create content. But also that kind of lost me right off the bat because I'm like, you don't read these people your self, Admittedly, this is the first time you've ever encountered them. Who are you to say that they don't have a unique personality or like, have a tone that you just don't recognize because you've never read their content before?
- [84:05]
Jessica Defino
That's true. That's true. I will say that I kind of had a different initial reaction to it because I feel like a lot of people took this as, you know, a successful substacker, like punching down, which I guess you could see it that way too. But like, Emily also writes about media and business. She writes about plenty of other platforms. She writes about, you know, the packages, the cut put out all the time. So. So I saw it less as like a personal attack on certain people or certain writers and more like as someone who writes about media, her musings about what she's seeing in the general media.
- [84:43]
Emily Kirkpatrick
It's a media landscape.
- [84:44]
Jessica Defino
Yeah. So it like, makes sense for her to like be thinking about this and writing about this as part of like the general media landscape.
- [84:54]
Emily Kirkpatrick
I think. And I think you can even see that. I pulled a quote from the piece where she says, I'm noticing this platform has become a really good way for women to monetize their diary entries, lists, random thoughts and easy to write roundups of what I've been doing do really well on the site. Substack is making everyone into writers the same way Instagram made everyone into photographers. And it's like, I don't know, I both see her point, but also like, yeah, that's, I don't know, that's what happens on these social. I don't know any website with social components, especially monetizable social components. And like, and again, you can say that really well. Like, I use Instagram, I post photos. Do I think I'm a photographer? Hell no.
- [85:38]
Jessica Defino
Yeah. I thought that comparison was like off for sure.
- [85:42]
Emily Kirkpatrick
But Like, I get what she means is just kind of like it opens up this bigger trend to like, I don't know, it makes a medium more accessible to people and it also makes people realize that a medium could, could be potentially lucrative, I guess.
- [85:58]
Jessica Defino
I mean, I think. Okay, so my part of my take is I think she was obviously probably looking at a lot of like fashion, beauty and lifestyle.
- [86:05]
Emily Kirkpatrick
I think you can tell that very much in the example she gives. Yeah.
- [86:08]
Jessica Defino
In this, you know, critique. And she's framing her argument around that. And I think like, obviously these topics, as we were saying before, are often disregarded as like female interest and therefore frivolous and therefore not to be taken seriously. So I do think there's like a legitimate conversation to be had there about like pinpointing these particular types of newsletters. At the same time, I do think there's like a plethora of bad writing in the world. Of course, I don't think it's inherent or exclusive to substack. And I think a lot of what is happening on substack in terms of like listicles and low lift pieces and like short little essays that aren't really thought out or whatever is kind of like a direct result of the type of content the mainstream media puts out in order to market, especially in terms of fashion and beauty. So like I was thinking of, you know, when I was a beauty editor full time, like the site I was working for had to put out dozens and dozens and dozens of stories a day in order to be relevant, to get advertiser, click through, et cetera. Yeah. And we would have a couple of hours to put each of these together, which leads to like very quick, shitty, not thought out content. Content that doesn't have a strong point of view or even fact checking or like anything beyond like, this happened on the Internet today or like I tried a lipstick. Here's what I thought. And I think this has a downstream effect of like, if this is what's on offer, if this is what's being considered good in terms of being published on like vogue.com or glamour or whatever, then people got used to this standard of writing as like what they expect respectable writing is and what readers want. I also saw a lot of comments because I think in the piece Emily had sort of in not so many words said like, this content isn't valuable and yet people are paying for it.
- [88:02]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Yeah.
- [88:03]
Jessica Defino
So I saw a lot of responses that were like, well, if someone's paying for it, why do you care? Like, if someone's paying for it, it is valuable.
- [88:10]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Yeah.
- [88:10]
Jessica Defino
And I actually, I think that's a little ridiculous. Like especially we're, you know, we're talking about the beauty industry on this podcast. Like the beauty industry is technically valuable. It's worth hundreds and billions of dollars. But like that doesn't mean all the standards we're buying into are good. Right. Like people buy bad quality plastic shit on Amazon all day, every day. That doesn't mean it's valuable.
- [88:32]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Yeah.
- [88:33]
Jessica Defino
So I, I do think it's important to keep in mind that like, like we are conditioned to want and like certain things, often through like inundation.
- [88:41]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Definitely.
- [88:42]
Jessica Defino
But those things aren't necessarily beneficial to us. And I don't think just because like the audience wants quick content and shoppable lists that that's like a net good for sure.
- [88:52]
Emily Kirkpatrick
But I also, I agree with you. But I also, then I'm like, well, is it their fault that this is what we've been conditioned to like and this is what people like? Because even when you're talking about that type of content at like major media publications I've worked at, it's like, yeah. And another reason we do that content, it's clicks like people.
- [89:09]
Jessica Defino
Yeah, no, it works.
- [89:10]
Emily Kirkpatrick
And buy like crazy off of it. And I'm not saying that's a good thing. It's definitely like a bad thing for the state of media at large, you know, and not making into one giant mall. But it does work. So I can understand why people fall into that trap. And also, I don't know, at a certain point it's like, is it our job to police bad writing or bad content? Or you know, like no, again, I guess I'm circling back to like, I think this is a non problem. Like I just think that these people exist on every platform and this is always what's done. Like whenever you get capitalism involved with any, anything, any medium, any platform, you know, like, yeah, people default. Default to like the easiest way to make money, the easiest way to get attention and virality and whatever. I don't know. Also maybe I'm just thinking also like I do a monthly shopping email and I don't do it because I want to do it or I think it's like, you know, easy or whatever. Literally my readers demanded it of me.
- [90:10]
Jessica Defino
Yeah.
- [90:10]
Emily Kirkpatrick
And I was leaving money on the table by not linking to whatever. I just remember this one time I mentioned this pair of shoes that was in an ad and I'm like, oh, I own these shoes and they're actually really comfortable. I sold so many pairs of that shoes. And I didn't make a die off of it.
- [90:24]
Jessica Defino
Yeah.
- [90:25]
Emily Kirkpatrick
And so my. My readers were like, you should be affiliate. Like, you should get. You, like, you. I bought that because you recommended it. And I was like, okay, yeah, I guess I'll. If that's what you guys want, I'll make that. I don't know.
- [90:36]
Jessica Defino
Yeah. And I think, like, a newsletter's also kind of a fine place to do that, especially if your readers are demanding it and wanting it of you.
- [90:46]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Yeah.
- [90:49]
Jessica Defino
For me, I'm also just, like, in general, I think a personal newsletter is kind of a. A really perfect place to play with not having to do those types of things, which, I mean, you do. I do. A lot of people do. And also a lot of people don't, I think, because they're just, like, conditioned of, like, this is the type of content that is successful. So I. Yeah, I think, think I would love to see, like, more inventiveness in general in the newsletters, but I don't think it's bad if your readers are like, hey, can you link me to what you like?
- [91:24]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Totally. And a lot of these people are also coming from other platforms where they are big influencers from selling products like this. So this is what their audience wants from them. I don't know. I just think just let people write bad stuff. Let them do whatever, you know, I just don't think it's.
- [91:40]
Jessica Defino
My counterpoint is just like, I kind of see this as having sort of a beauty culture angle where it's like, I think we're, you know, I call it, like, living in the aesthetic realm. So it's like the aesthetic of the thing is more important to us than doing the thing. Like, the aesthetic of being a writer is more important than, like, dedicating yourself to the craft of writing and developing a unique, unique voice and great content. Like, an unrelated example of this is, like, the fake tan. The aesthetic of the tan is more important to us than living the type of life that would lead to us just, like, getting a tan. And I see some connection here with the figure of the literary it girl. I think it's very compelling to adopt the pose of writing and the aesthetic of being a writer rather than the tough work of, like, dedicating yourself to the craft.
- [92:37]
Emily Kirkpatrick
I get that. But also, then, like, what? Again? It just feels like we're policing the media. It's like, who is a writer? What is a writer? I think if you put words on a page, you're a writer.
- [92:47]
Jessica Defino
Yeah. And anyone is. And I just Also think there's, like, a difference between, like, being a writer and, like, being a good writer. Like, I struggle. I don't know about you, but, like, I still struggle to, like, call myself a writer because 100% I am an expert in the beauty space and writing is my medium. But, like, I feel so weird calling myself a writer because, like, I don't feel like my writing is there yet. I don't know.
- [93:12]
Emily Kirkpatrick
See, but I used to feel this way all the time. And I think. I think we need to get over it, because I have. I know, but I mean, I just mean, like, I wouldn't call myself a writer for so fucking long because what I was doing was blogging and I thought it was so, like, nothing frivolous, you know what I mean? I wasn't a real writer. I wasn't, like, writing books or whatever. And so I wouldn't call myself a writer, but what was I doing every day? I was waking up writing five articles a day for Vanity Fair. Like, is that not a writer?
- [93:41]
Jessica Defino
No, that's. I mean, that is a writer.
- [93:43]
Emily Kirkpatrick
But I mean, that's kind of. We're getting into this weird, I don't know, this nitpicky thing of, like, is it real? Is it good enough? I think the problem is I was really struck by this line that she has that where social media is encroaching on what was once a respectably literate walled garden. And I was like, who do you think is in that respectably literate walled garden that we're protecting so hard? Like, is it Stephen King? Is it John Grisham? You know, is it James Patterson? Like, are they in the respectively literate walled garden? Like, where does the line of you discerning who's a real writer and who's not, where do you draw it? I don't know.
- [94:17]
Jessica Defino
I think you're right. Like, I don't think it should be anyone's, like, job to police, like, who gets to call themselves a writer at all. I think there is some value in writers, especially new writers, reflecting on that for themselves.
- [94:31]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Definitely.
- [94:32]
Jessica Defino
And pushing themselves to create something that isn't, like, easy or isn't shopping links or do those things in the meantime and have, you know, other goals for yourself as well. I think, like, there's value in self reflection there. I don't think anyone should be telling anyone else, like, you're not a writer or you don't count. But I think some of the questions posed are good questions to be asking ourselves. I mean, I agree. One part that stuck out to me. She mentions in the article, like there was an article on airmail a while ago about young authors who were getting six figure book advances and then delivering bad books. And editors were really frustrated because the books needed to be edited a lot and then they flopped. And you know, I feel like that's part of like the posing as a writer, like the aesthetic of like, I want to be a writer. And I feel that way because I did it myself, like probably 20, 19, 2020. Like writing a book was a big goal of mine. I just wanted a book deal and I like, I did it, I got it, I signed the book deal. And then I was like confronted with the task of writing a book and realized I was not ready to write a book. I was ready to be regarded as someone who had written a book. I just like, hadn't ironed out my beliefs and figured out what I wanted to say in that format yet. And I mean, there were a lot of other factors there, but I did, I put the book deal on hold. And I don't know, I'm proud of that self reflection and really grateful that I'm not one of those writers who handed in a shitty draft because I very easily could have been. And I think questions like, am I writing? Is this just kind of like I want the glory of being a writer or a writer with a book deal and is there more that I could be doing in terms of my craft and my work rather than chasing XYZ goals? So that's kind of what I took away from it.
- [96:26]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Yeah, no, I think that's extremely real thing and something that everyone has to grapple with is, you know, are you in it for kind of the trappings of what and the idea of what it is versus like the reality of what it is.
- [96:37]
Jessica Defino
The funny thing too is like, what are the trappings of being a writer?
- [96:40]
Emily Kirkpatrick
We like, we're horribly paid, our editors.
- [96:43]
Jessica Defino
Don'T respect us, as you heard at the top of the podcast.
- [96:46]
Emily Kirkpatrick
I know, but it is just kind of, it's one of those benchmarks. I don't know, I've had to do a lot of this, this, this work with myself, I think just even transitioning from being like a blogger at these like really big prestigious titles, you know, to being just a new, just a newsletter writer, just a freelance writer, you know, because it used to be, I don't know. And there's something I definitely got out of the shorthand of being able to go to a party and be like, oh, like I'm a writer at People magazine. Oh, I'm a writer at Vanity Fair. People know what that means, and they respond to you a certain way because of it. When you're like, oh, I'm a writer. I send out a little newsletter every week. It's about fashion. They're like, ooh, yikes. Okay, buddy. And it's like, you do just kind of have to find the value in it for yourself, which for me is like, getting to be authentically myself, getting to write the things I'm interested in and the exact voice and tone that I want to write it in. But again, I wouldn't even be able to do that if I didn't have a platform like substack, where I could write badly for so long. As I transitioned out of kind of my fake blogging voice into my real voice voice that took, like, a year, you know, to even figure out what I sounded like. And if I didn't have a platform like this where I could do it and fail at it, you know, I maybe never would have done it. Especially one that's monetizable like this, where people can actually give me money to value because they value my voice and my perspective. Like, I don't know. It's not an easy thing. It's. And it takes a lot of practice. And I. I don't know. I sympathize with all the people struggling and, like, doing it poorly.
- [98:17]
Jessica Defino
Yeah.
- [98:17]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Or not trying to do it at all. I get why, like, it's easier to just not.
- [98:21]
Jessica Defino
Yeah. I also think it's, like, it doesn't have to be, nor is it ever, like, a linear thing. Like, I feel like I put out some really great work early in the newsletter, and I've put out some real clunkers.
- [98:33]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Absolutely. Since I feel that every week.
- [98:35]
Jessica Defino
Written anything in a while. So it's like, obviously, it's not just this journey of just 100% have to be the best every time and always best yourself. Like, I put out crap content all the time.
- [98:46]
Emily Kirkpatrick
I'm sure every time I have, like, a banger newsletter, I'm like, I don't know why. I'm not sure why that one's hitting with everybody. In my last, like, five. We're not.
- [98:55]
Jessica Defino
I think there's something to be said for, like, for you and for a lot of people, just, like, a really unique, like, point of view where even if you're not putting out, like, what you think of as, like, your greatest writing, like, your thoughts are valuable no matter how you, like, formulate them and put them out there. Their End.
- [99:16]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Yeah, and to me that was like also the message that was kind of hidden at the core of Emily's newsletter. And maybe like what. Why it didn't like incite so much feeling and trigger in me is she is just kind of saying like, what's valuable is your authenticity. What's valuable is whatever's like true to you, not what's like viral on the website that day and trying to like game the system and play into the algorithm and be the type of like writer or influencer. Whatever you think people want want is like a no win game. And the more you just kind of drill down on like what you're excited about and what you're passionate about, even if that's a list of five, you know, things you bought this week. I also don't like the opposition that you can't write about five things you like this week in a way that is voicey and personal and oh yeah, authentic writing. You know what I mean? Like, there is no limit if you have a perspective and a voice. There is no limit to what it can be applied to. In an interesting way, in my opinion, in.
- [100:08]
Jessica Defino
I agree.
- [100:09]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Honestly, the part that rubbed me the wrong way more than Emily's essay was Kyle Chaka's statement.
- [100:15]
Jessica Defino
What? What did he say?
- [100:17]
Emily Kirkpatrick
He's from the New Yorker and he was saying that basically, like people in subset, it leads to this urge of trying to monetize everything, even very casual stuff. Like they'll put like, you know, here's five places I went this week behind a paywall. And I was like, and yes, okay. And like, yeah, is it not, Is that not valuable? Is their labor? Is their perspective? Is their time not valuable to you? I don't know what to tell you. It's not for you. Then like, keep it moving. Mute them.
- [100:46]
Jessica Defino
I think people are lumping together these separate conversations. Like there's a conversation to be had about like the media sort of. I don't even know the format of the monetized newsletter.
- [100:58]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Yeah, like the gamifying of SEO for the media.
- [101:01]
Jessica Defino
And then I think there's also a really valuable, non judgy, interesting conversation to be had here about like, what is an effective strategy for monetizing your newsletter? Is that five places I went this week?
- [101:14]
Emily Kirkpatrick
For sure.
- [101:14]
Jessica Defino
Because to that I would say, no, you're probably not going to get that many new subscribers. That's not the interesting clicking headline that people are maybe going to convert with. But like, should somebody who has an audience and a newsletter and something to say be able to monetize that? Like, of course, course.
- [101:32]
Emily Kirkpatrick
And monetize whatever the hell they want. Yeah, I don't know.
- [101:36]
Jessica Defino
Me either. Should we go to the mess of the month?
- [101:39]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Yeah, we can go. The mess of the month. I'm getting too worked up.
- [101:42]
Jessica Defino
I know. I think we need a breather and we just need to talk about some. Some light hearted mess.
- [101:47]
Emily Kirkpatrick
I'm going to start with my mess of the month and it is Tom Cruise's new PR lady at Scientology headquarters. Whoever this diva is, she is working so hard for this crazy man all year long. Is it just me? Have you noticed him, like, more.
- [102:03]
Jessica Defino
I've noticed him pop up more and more, always with that, you know, a big bright smile.
- [102:10]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Oh, yeah, and just like that classic Tom smile.
- [102:13]
Jessica Defino
He's just so watchable.
- [102:15]
Emily Kirkpatrick
That twinkle in his eye that flopped to his bob.
- [102:18]
Jessica Defino
Even though, you know, he's a weird and maybe bad man. He's very watchable.
- [102:24]
Emily Kirkpatrick
I get it. He's. He's. It's hard, hard. When Hollywood invests so much in like a star, it's hard to ever kind of like divest. It's hard to kind of take it back. But they just. I don't know. He is an occult and I just think that we need to all be reminded of that periodically because we treat him like he's. He's normal and not in a cult, even though he's like in a really crazy, murderous, allegedly murderous religious culture group. Anyway, I'm loving his new PR lady because she's really been working overtime to gloss over all of that and she's doing a spectacular job and people are eating it up. Let me just start with his relationship news cycles that he has been in like five relationships this year with absolutely no evidence to support him actually being in any of those relationships. It started out with this Russian oligarch and like Instagram influencer Alcina Kyrova. She's just getting out of a divorce with another. With a very rich Russian, Oliver.
- [103:30]
Jessica Defino
Oh, interesting.
- [103:32]
Emily Kirkpatrick
So, yeah, it seems like just a perfect PR opportunity for both of them to rebrand. But yeah, they were reportedly spotted together at all these parties and. And yet literally never photographed in the same room together. And then, then they broke up ultimately, according to the tabloids, because Tom proposed and his feelings were too intense and she wasn't ready. She wasn't ready. And so after his intense feelings. Yeah, a little harsh. After his intense feelings broke up his relationship with her, then there was all these news stories that Irina Shayk, the Victoria's Secret supermodel, was interested in getting together with him. And as I said at the time, like, that is a match made in PR heaven. I don't know. His team immediately. Yes. And his team immediately was like, no, like, he's flattered but not interested. I was like, why is he not interested in a supermodel half his age who also, I mean, famously dated some men who he might have some things in common with?
- [104:34]
Jessica Defino
Right, right.
- [104:35]
Emily Kirkpatrick
I was going to say, yeah, I feel like that would be a perfect match. But yeah, his, his sources. In other words, this Scientology PR lady got back to the Daily Mail and was like, he's flattered, but that's not going to happen. And then she started putting out this story about how he. He wants a relationship with Angelina Jolie because he thinks that she is his perfect match and he wants to take their relationship out of the friend zone by working on a movie together, which I think is so funny.
- [105:02]
Jessica Defino
Zone into the coworker zone.
- [105:04]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Exactly. From. From friend to co worker to romantic partner. As we all know, the classic trajectory of celebrity relationships.
- [105:12]
Jessica Defino
It's worked with Angelina before, but it has.
- [105:15]
Emily Kirkpatrick
I think she's learned her lesson, perhaps from Brad Pitt for forever, but I thought that was pretty incredible and incredibly insane because that's actually really laying bare Tom Cruise's entire relationship PR strategy, which he is literally always linked in the press to his like 20 year old model co star in like every Mission Impossible movie. And I just think it's so funny that they like tried to Mission Impossible Angelina Jolie and there's just.
- [105:41]
Jessica Defino
No, he can't do Mission Impossible.
- [105:44]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Tom Cruise cannot handle that. That woman, you know what I mean? Like, she is too much woman for him. I don't know why he would even suggest this. Like, it's just so improbable. It's crazy. And then finally they tried to link him to Chris Martin's protege, Victoria Canal, who's just a singer and. But I guess they forgot to tell her that they were going to do this because she, like, immediately, as soon as the stories came out, wrote on Instagram that it was literally bonkers and they just met for the first time. And that's where this photograph of them together came from. Oh, my gosh.
- [106:14]
Jessica Defino
I love.
- [106:15]
Emily Kirkpatrick
They were like in a green room together. Yeah, I think it's so, so funny. So anyway, she's been doing all this relationship press cycle and then he's at the Olympics, obviously, which is another weird role for us to give him that. I don't understand why we're like having him represent America at the Olympics. But he was like, Lady Gaga gave him this big, dramatic hug in front of everyone that was highly photographed. And I was like, all right, Lady Gaga. Like, have we not learned from the R. Kelly of it all? Like, maybe just look a little bit into the background of the gentleman you're associating with. And then he's, like, watching gymnastics. And I saw all these, like, fawning tweets that were just like, can you imagine if Tom Cruise was watching you at the. It's like, no. I kind of be focused on, like, winning a gold medal.
- [106:58]
Jessica Defino
Yeah. There'd be other things on my mind.
- [107:01]
Emily Kirkpatrick
I wouldn't be thinking about the Scientologist freak in the stands, like, trying to convert me into his cult. I'd be a little focused on my sport. It was very weird, very glowing. And then, of course, in the closing ceremony, he jumped off the roof, which there are also reports they, like, didn't want him to do that, but it was, like, really dangerous. And they, like, didn't finalize the safety protocol or anything. And he's like, I'm gonna do it anyway, you know?
- [107:22]
Jessica Defino
Sounds like Tom.
- [107:23]
Emily Kirkpatrick
It sounds very Tom. He's obsessed with doing his own stunts because he's obsessed with proving his manly manliness to everyone. So, yeah, he jumped from the roof, and then he grabbed the Olympic flag and then rode off with it on his motorcycle through the streets of Paris as he's bringing it home to la. The home of Scientology. Yeah. And then finally, I just. This week, I think, what set it off for me anew this week, because, like, well, earlier this year, they had all these headlines about how he sends Dakota Fanning shoes every year on her birthday because they were co stars. I can't remember what movie right now. But anyway, he sends her shoes on her birthday every year, and there's this big, like, happy story about, like, wow, what a great guy. Isn't that so cute? And meanwhile, I'm thinking, like, this man hasn't seen his actual daughter in 18 years. Her entire life. And then. And then this week, we get all these headlines that are. Are like, basically, like, isn't Tom such a great guy? Like, he's going to pay for Surrey Cruise's, like, full college tuition.
- [108:20]
Jessica Defino
Just like, dads who don't have millions of dollars do that sometimes, too.
- [108:23]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Right. That already. And then you look into the story for five seconds, and you discover it's literally stipulated as part of the divorce agreement with him and Katie Holmes, that he would pay for all of Surrey's schooling and college. That's so cool. So it's like. Yeah. So he's literally just doing what the.
- [108:39]
Jessica Defino
Law has required, that it's coming out now.
- [108:41]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Yes.
- [108:42]
Jessica Defino
As, like, a puff piece.
- [108:43]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Yeah, now. It's amazing. Now he's such a generous and great guy, paying for his daughter's schooling, but before it was just, you know, part of his divorce contract. Anyway, so congratulations to Tom Cruise's new PR lady. You're doing fantastic work. It is all complete bullshit and messy. Yes. But you're. You're doing it to the best of your ability, and I applaud you.
- [109:03]
Jessica Defino
My rest of the month is all of the food franchises that are launching beauty products.
- [109:08]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Yes.
- [109:09]
Jessica Defino
We've got Chipotle by Wonder Skin, a lip gloss. We've got an Auntie Anne's perfume called need that smells like pretzels.
- [109:19]
Emily Kirkpatrick
I just go to the train station if I wanted that.
- [109:22]
Jessica Defino
Exactly. We've got Hellman's Mayonnaise, who. I don't understand this. Partnered with the Titans quarterback, Will. Will Levi.
- [109:32]
Emily Kirkpatrick
I could not have sent this press release to you any faster. It hit my inbox in under a second. I was, like, forwarded to Jess because I can't make heads or tails of what's going on in this email. Oh, my God.
- [109:43]
Jessica Defino
The notes listed tart, lemon, mayonnaise, Accord.
- [109:47]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Nope.
- [109:48]
Jessica Defino
Coffee undertones, musk and vanilla. And. And Hellman's is saying that this has sold out multiple times. Can it be true?
- [109:56]
Emily Kirkpatrick
I feel like they're playing fast and loose with those notes. Like, what do you mean, musk and vanilla? What does that have to do with mayonnaise? Is that the Titans quarterback aspect?
- [110:05]
Jessica Defino
I want mayo and coffee together. I don't want vanilla with any of it.
- [110:09]
Emily Kirkpatrick
You're just. You're losing the plot in the middle of there. Coffee, musk, and vanilla. What are we talking about? We're talking about mayonnaise. Like, get back to the basics.
- [110:17]
Jessica Defino
Wild.
- [110:18]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Like, why not just say, like, egg spoiled, milk heart, lemon. Like, that's. I'm like, okay, a little dill, maybe. I would accept.
- [110:26]
Jessica Defino
Sure.
- [110:26]
Emily Kirkpatrick
It's just so weird.
- [110:27]
Jessica Defino
Yeah. Something fresh and green in there, please. I'm like, I'm wondering if the food collabs have anything to do with the rise of Ozempic. Like, there have been a lot of business reports about brands like, the food industry kind of scrambling and anticipating, like, huge changes in consumer behavior as semaglutide becomes more popular. And it feels like, okay, these brands, like, aren't associated with, like, health in any way. Are they trying to endear themselves to Like a beauty conscious customer.
- [110:58]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Well, it does make sense to me if you can't eat it, that you maybe you want to smell it.
- [111:01]
Jessica Defino
You want to smell it. Yeah.
- [111:03]
Emily Kirkpatrick
You know, it also seems to me like an extension of, you know, I think brands. I don't even remember when this started, but I feel like food brands especially learned that when they do kind of, like, crazy off the wall collaborations, like, it gets them a lot of attention. I'm thinking specifically about this time that I went to a Hot Cheetos Runway show. Did you ever get invited to that?
- [111:26]
Jessica Defino
I didn't, and I'm jealous.
- [111:28]
Emily Kirkpatrick
It was kind of incredible and awful. During fashion week, they staged this whole, like, Flamin Hot Cheetos beauty fashion activ. So you would go there and you could get like a Flamin Hot Cheetos manicure. You could get some sort of, like, hairdo inspired by Flamin Hot Cheetos. And then they had, like, real Cheetos that were all so stale. It was crazy. And then, like, weird swag. I used to have a great scrunchie that had just Flamin'hot Cheetos all over it. But anyway, and it got a lot of news. It got a lot of attention. And so I think that for brands, it's also kind of stuff like that. Like, what kind of weird synergy can we make with the most nonsensical product? I think that it's also very like, goop. This smells like my vagina candle. You know what I mean? Like, just kind of like, as extreme as possible to like, get attention and.
- [112:15]
Jessica Defino
Yeah, it also just feels like old to me, though.
- [112:18]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Yeah, it feels dated.
- [112:20]
Jessica Defino
I mean, over the past couple years, we. There were Velveeta by Nails, Inc.
- [112:25]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Yes, that is what I was thinking of recently.
- [112:27]
Jessica Defino
There was Elf and Dunkin Donuts collaboration. There was Sally Hansen and Sour Patch Kids. Applebee's had a lip gloss. Like, there's a lot.
- [112:36]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Do you remember Velveeta's lip ring that they made?
- [112:39]
Jessica Defino
No.
- [112:40]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Oh, my God. I don't know if they actually produced this or if they were just giving it to celebrities to, like, troll, but I remember a couple celebrities did spawn con for that Velveeta campaign, and they had, like, a little clip on.
- [112:53]
Jessica Defino
Oh, wait. It looked like a noodle.
- [112:56]
Emily Kirkpatrick
No, it looked like cheese dribbling out of their mouth a little bit. Bit. A noodle is actually like a way better.
- [113:01]
Jessica Defino
That would be so much better.
- [113:02]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Now that you say that, I'm like, yeah. Why? Was nothing noodle shaped? No, it was like a little dribble of, like, silver gold cheese coming out of their mouth. It was very weird.
- [113:10]
Jessica Defino
I don't like that.
- [113:11]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Really takes us right back up top to like the whole semen conversation, but.
- [113:15]
Jessica Defino
Right. Yep. A little splooge.
- [113:18]
Emily Kirkpatrick
A little splooge out of the corner of your mouth to promote some Velveeta.
- [113:22]
Jessica Defino
Oh, my God.
- [113:23]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Synergy.
- [113:23]
Jessica Defino
I think. On that note, we gotta be done.
- [113:26]
Emily Kirkpatrick
We've done all we can do today. Just a tight two hours of sploosh talk.
- [113:35]
Jessica Defino
Well, we're gonna try something new as we end the pod and encourage you, if only if you're gonna give us five stars to, like, only if you're very, very nice and review the podcast on Apple Podcasts or anywhere.
- [113:50]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Wherever you want to do it.
- [113:52]
Jessica Defino
Wherever you want to do it, but.
- [113:53]
Emily Kirkpatrick
Only if you want to say nice things and be supportive. Otherwise, please don't.
- [113:56]
Jessica Defino
Yeah, just. Just stay quiet.
- [113:58]
Emily Kirkpatrick
I don't know how you would have even made it to the end of these. This two hour conversation.
- [114:02]
Jessica Defino
I know. If you're here, I'm proud of you. I'm grateful to you.
- [114:05]
Emily Kirkpatrick
I trust you to be kind to us.
- [114:09]
Jessica Defino
All right, I'll see you next month.
- [114:11]
Emily Kirkpatrick
All right, bye.