Mailbag for August 23, 2024
Taylor's explanation and the state of 'fandom', pap-calling celebrities, 'Good Ones'' award chances, crisis management politics, acting "prospects" who blew up, why not more social media, and an ask
Dear Squawkers,
Callback to last week’s mailbag and a question about Taylor Swift and Vienna and why she hadn’t yet, at that point, addressed the cancellation of her shows there. Following her recent shows at Wembley in London and the conclusion of the European leg of The Eras Tour, Taylor this week posted on socials and wrote a great explanation – not that she had to – about her concerns for her remaining concerts in Europe.
“Let me be very clear: I am not going to speak about something publicly if I think doing so might provoke those who would want to harm the fans who come to my shows. In cases like this one, ‘silence’ is actually showing restraint, and waiting to express yourself at a time when it’s right to. My priority was finishing our European tour safely, and it is with great relief that I can say we did that.”
It’s a reminder that even though we live in a time of rapid communication and oversharing and information exchange, and we think we know everything, there’s a lot going on behind the scenes that is not made public immediately, if ever. But not only do we think we know everything, the parasocial relationships that develop between celebrities and fans leads us to believe that we think we know THEM.
Taylor’s response to what happened in Vienna and this week’s thoughtful debate about Chappell Roan (including Stephanie’s piece on LG) in the daily chat here at The Squawk is a conversation about what the stars owe their fans and the audience. Some people, including Jacek, suggested that because celebrities profit so much from fan support with the money spent on albums and merch and concerts etc – and the life and privilege that affords them – taking a photo and being appreciative when recognised etc is not a huge ask. Others believe that celebrities are entitled to a certain amount of privacy and are within their rights to ask fans to respect their boundaries.
But then again, one star’s boundaries are not another star’s boundaries. And nuance is becoming extinct, so people are having a harder and harder time distinguishing between what one celebrity prefers to the next. Some stars might not mind being interrupted at dinner. Others very much mind being interrupted at dinner. I have friends who have interrupted celebrities over dinner, they see nothing wrong with it. I, on the other hand, find this mortifying.
A good example of this is what happened to Bad Bunny last year when he was in the Dominican Republic, followed by fans who got in his face with their phones, and he grabbed one and threw it into the water. Some people thought he did was so offside. His defenders insisted that it was rude of the fan to be shoving their phone up on him like that and deserved it.
This reminds me of part of an off-the-record conversation I had with a famous person once (I’ll protect their identity for obvious reasons so please know that there are zero clues to who they are in what you are about to read) who finds the phone thing to be dehumanising. “Are they really my fan if all they want is the photo? Or are they only interested in the photo so that they can post it on Instagram and brag about meeting me? What’s the difference between that so-called fan and the paparazzi? The paps get paid in cash to take pictures of me, and the fan gets paid in likes and follows.” They went on to say they’d rather have a short conversation than pose for a photo that takes a few seconds, if that. When I asked them if they actually had the time to have a conversation with everyone who’d want to take a photo with them, they exhaled in frustration because they knew that I was making a point about the economy of energy but at the same time they still felt so strongly that in most situations where they encounter people in the wild (not at a premiere or a festival or official event), in this age of social media, they don’t trust anymore that the moment between them and the fan is about anything more than clout.
At the time of that interview, I couldn’t decide where I stood on the issue, and I still can’t. But this was a discussion that was happening here in our community this week and since I heard the perspective of one person who is actually a celebrity, I thought I’d throw that in there.
Let’s get to the mailbag.
Question from Charlotte:
We were squawking last week about when celebrities call the paps on themselves--specifically mentioning JLo and Angelina. I was on the naive side that thinks mostly those two are followed around and don't call them on themselves. What's the deal? We all know Taylor [Swift] and Tom [Hiddleston] called them to their little beach announcement, but what about JLo riding her bike in the Hamptons? What about Angelina going shopping with her kids? Someone mentioned Angelina going to see Jonny Lee Miller post Pitt-Split - is there any way for us to know if that would have been a call? (Any other Squawkers have anything to add to this question?)
Lainey’s Answer:
Yes, celebrities call the paps on themselves. But also, yes, sometimes those same celebrities who have called the paps before are also followed around by the paps and don’t necessarily have to call the paps anymore.
Angelina Jolie has in the past definitely arranged for photos. By now we’re probably all aware that those infamous shots of her and Brad Pitt playing with Maddox on the beach in Kenya happened because the photographer was tipped off. Paps back in the mid-2000s weren’t hanging around in Kenya hoping that two of the biggest movie stars on the planet would just show up. What’s interesting though is that, sure, while Angelina may have been the one who made the call, it’s not like Brad was in the dark about it. And yet when we’re talking about this couple’s practice of pap-calling, she’s the one who has to eat it, even though he was right there co-signing. It’s actually gross when you think about it because, frankly, it was a decision they both made together but she did the dirty work. Jennifer Weiner wrote an essay in the New York Times a few months ago that kinda relates to this issue about Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito’s “blame-the-wife defence”. The ironic twist she takes with the piece is hilarious.
Since Brange imploded, if there’s any pap-calling, they’re both doing it. Remember in the first couple of years after the split how we learned that sad and lonely Brad was healing himself through art and sculpting? Brad was papped at Thomas Houseago’s studio by an agency that conveniently was able to get most of the exclusives of him at that time. He hadn’t been seen with his kids since the breakup with Angelina – and still hasn’t! – but the paps were somehow so industrious they were able to find him out of the way, doing his art thing. Few people were calling him out on that shit but whenever Angelina was at the grocery store, the antis were pointing their fingers.
These days, especially in LA, the paps post up in Angelina’s neighbourhood, and they now know the vehicles, so they can follow to the pet store or the mall or wherever she’s doing with the kids. Most of the time, then, the pap shots that we see of her in LA especially are not set up. Most of the time. There are still occasions, though, when she might be out for dinner with someone and wants to ensure she’s seen. But I’d argue that she’s now way more subtle about it than he is.
You’ll recall, in early May, Brad and Ines de Ramon were papped on the beach in Malibu, a soft launch. The photos were taken from a distance, not super HQ, even a little blurry so as to suggest that they didn’t know they were being shot. But the photographer was Miles Diggs, aka Diggzy, a celebrity photographer who’s most well-known for shooting Rihanna and A$AP Rocky’s pregnancy announcement. Diggzy isn’t a stalk-pap and definitely not in this setting; he works when he’s called. So he had to have been called. And the deal was to make them LOOK like pap shots so that the MiniVan Majority wouldn’t put it together that Brad was calling the paps on himself, but he was totally calling the paps on himself! He just doesn’t get accused and hated on for it because we don’t want to think of him as anything less than cool as fuck and never too thirsty.
Related Question from JenC:
Do we care if celebs call the paps on themselves? I think if they are talking about it out of both sides of their mouth then yes— complaining and calling. But otherwise, I find it hard to care? It’s a form of messaging, dating back to before celebs were putting messages out on social media. It just strikes me as part of the game, and I don’t look at it disfavorably or as fake or tricky
Lainey’s Answer:
I appreciate this question from JenC and decided to break up my answer this way because she brings up a great point about whether or not we care. I’d expand her question here to – IF we care and WHEN we care.
If so many of the big stars do it, and obviously many of the medium stars too, WHY do we care, or do we selectively care? Brad Pitt has established such a strong image throughout his career, the ultimate “man’s man”, whatever the fuck that means, so popular in Hollywood and with the public, that we don’t want to think of him as desperado for attention, right?
The same applies to Jennifer Aniston, the third corner of the triangle that consumed – and maybe continues to consume – the gossip ecosystem for so long. Jennifer Aniston has also engaged in pap-calling. One of the most hilariously egregious examples of it was when she and Justin Theroux confirmed their engagement in 2012… in Santa Fe, New Mexico, the hotbed of paparazzi.
I can’t license those pictures for The Squawk so click here to see the full set. Like you could not have asked for a better shot of that ring. And that pose, the two of them standing face to face, her hands on his cheek, giving all of us a great look at that diamond, LOL forever. Let’s not pretend there was a pap hanging out in Sante Fe who happened to stumble upon Jennifer and Justin and get this perfect image of them smiling at each other and the ring on full display.
But these were not sold as portraits, they weren’t represented to the public through the media that acquired the photos as official engagement photos. The suggestion was that they just happened be photographed in New Mexico and ta da! They’re engaged! Jen is so beloved, however, and she’s complained so much in the past about paparazzi intrusion that the public is willing to not think too hard about how these pictures happened. And even if they do acknowledge that they had to have been taken by the paps, they don’t hold it against her the way they do with others.
So, to bring it around to Jennifer Lopez…
For sure she’s called the paps in her time. Is she calling them EVERY time? These days I’m not sure she has to because they all know where she lives. Yes, even in the Hamptons. I know there was some talk about what Whitney Port said on a podcast recently about JLo calling the paps but, like, summer in the Hamptons? You don’t think the paps are already there? First of all, one of the biggest parties of the summer is in the Hamptons – Michael Rubin’s Fourth of July party is pretty much a summer institution now. It’s a huge bash, so many major players show up, and so many of them live in the Hamptons during those months. The paps are stationed in the Hamptons. JLo didn’t have to call them, she just had to go out.
So in her case, it’s not an issue of calling the paps, but more an issue of NOT AVOIDING the paps. Let’s get specific, then, about JLo’s sin: she wants to be seen or, more generously, she doesn’t mind being seen. Which has been a consistent thing throughout her career, no matter what she’s going through. When she’s in love, she wants to be seen. When love ends, she wants to be seen. At this point she doesn’t have to deliberately call the paps to be the seen though. All she has to do is leave her house.
Question from Bentia:
I know it's a hair too early to start talking about Academy Award noms but after seeing Lily Collias in Good One I was hoping that she gets included in the mix. She's truly astonishing in this movie and the film as a whole is so attuned to a specific time in a young woman's life and how the fallout affects her going forward. It's Eighth Grade aged up, a little more resilient yet still realizing that people are going to surprise her in the worst ways along with the realization that she cannot control the actions of others, but she gets to choose how she responds and all of this with minimal dialogue. Collias's face tells you everything you need to know, for her to come out of nowhere with this performance seems to be tailored made for a Cinderella awards season, perhaps not winning but making the rounds. I say seems since the film appears to be in a smattering of theaters where it's only resonating so far with a small number of critics who have seen it. I don't want her positioned as the bad guy spoiler nom (we all know that story) so how can she factor in there if the film is so under the radar?
Sarah’s answer:
For anyone curious, Bentia is referring to India Donaldson’s film, Good One, which stars Lily Collias, James Le Gros, and Danny McCarthy. It premiered at Sundance and is now playing in 13 theaters. That’s right, 13. It’s not playing close to me, and I live in a top three market. It looks good, though, you can see the trailer here. I actually got invited to the LA premiere, but when I wrote to the publicist and said, Hey, I don’t live in LA, but could I get a screener? The answer was no. Even though the pandemic showed us how EASY it is to make films readily available via digital screeners, the answer is almost always “no”. (VERY occasionally someone makes a link available for review but let me stress very.) It’s frustrating when you actually WANT to support these smaller films and get stonewalled.
Anyway, to Bentia’s question about awards season, the answer is “duct tape and hope”. Good One is distributed by Metrograph Pictures, which is an indie outfit associated with New York’s Metrograph Theater, similar to Chicago’s own Music Box Films and Music Box Theater. The reality is that Metrograph won’t have the money to splash out for a big For Your Consideration campaign, so they’ll have to manage their resources and do what they can, which so far has meant sending the film to several film festivals, including Cannes, where it has picked up a couple awards (from the Champs-Élysées Film Festival and the Independent Film Festival of Boston. An award from the Melbourne International Film Festival is still pending). Later this year, they could court critics groups and get some more notice for the film that way (will not be surprised if they send me a screener in October that they previously denied me in August. Don’t want my review but DO want my vote. It’s not uncommon).
Beyond that, they could target indie-friendly groups like Gotham and the Independent Spirit Awards and hope to build some mainstream momentum, should they get nominated/awarded there.
Beyond THAT? Well that’s where we saw Andrea Riseborough get in trouble a couple years ago with To Leslie. That was a low budget indie with no money for campaigning, so the filmmakers and friends of Riseborough tried a “grass roots” campaign (quotes because it was really about a white actress being able to leverage her powerful white friends in the industry to her advantage, while Black actresses with more resources STILL couldn’t get Academy members to watch their movies) that ran afoul of the Academy’s “direct lobbying” rules. But small films without huge FYC budgets DO get screwed every year. Luke Gilford’s National Anthem is one of the best films I’ve seen this year so far, and I guarantee it will be nowhere on the trophy trail. The Academy doesn’t want members emailing each other about voting for specific films/people, but it will take NO steps to level the playing field between big and little films by doing anything about the money spent campaigning (not unlike real politics). So unless you have the budget, or you get REALLY lucky and your film hits with audiences and builds momentum from that, you’re pretty much SOL. A Gotham nomination would be a huge win for a film like Good One. Anything else is basically impossible. And THAT is a problem.
Questions about Justin Baldoni’s crisis management:
There were a few questions and comments in the various chats over the last week about Justin Baldoni working with the crisis management team that had previous experience with Johnny Depp and other problematic people and why that’s an issue. Like that’s what crisis PR is for, right? Getting a lawyer doesn’t mean guilt, it just smart to have representation.
Lainey’s Answer:
I’ve been waiting a week to talk about this because it relates to another really interesting inside baseball story that has nothing to do with the It Ends With Us drama but is super insightful about Hollywood fuckery.
But first, of course it’s not a problem to engage a crisis management team when there’s a public relations mess that might be looming. That’s not my issue with Justin Baldoni. It’s not that he’s hired crisis management, it’s specifically which crisis management team he hired. Did he have to go with THAT one?
Now let’s take a detour over to the fight over Billie Eilish and Finneas. Matthew Belloni at Puck had a great story last week about how Billie and Finneas changed representation recently. They used to be repped by Casey Wasserman’s agency but have moved over to WME and Ari Emmanuel. Ari Gold, the character on Entourage, is said to be based on Ari Emmanuel. Casey Wasserman is the head of the Los Angeles Olympic Committee. Ari and Casey are frenemies. Ari accused Casey of shit talking him all over town and allegedly screamed at him for being a backstabber.
Do you remember the post I wrote right after the Olympics. I was in withdrawal, and here’s how I started that piece:
“Today is the first day this month with no Olympics, and I am already in withdrawal! Which, of course, most benefits those corrupt assholes at the IOC; although, apparently, they’re in their anti-corruption era right now and it’ll be interesting to see whether or not any of that momentum carries forward to Los Angeles, where the Summer Games will be held in 2028…”
With that in mind, here’s what Matthew Belloni said in his report about Ari Emmanuel and Casey Wasserman:
“Still, despite the strained relationship, Ari and Casey are in business together in a major way. Endeavor’s On Location unit bid for, and won, the contract to host events and offer special ticket/experience packages for the Paris, Milan, and L.A. Olympics. (Per the terms of his deal to run LA28, Wasserman isn’t allowed to steer any Olympics business to his own company.) That On Location business is potentially major, and there’s a profit-sharing element—the more money the company makes on Olympics activities in Los Angeles, the more money that flows to Wasserman’s LA28, which is under intense pressure to turn a profit like the 1984 Olympics did in L.A.
The point: These guys kinda need each other, despite being competitors in the agency business. So to mend the rift, Emanuel, Shapiro, and Wasserman organized a sit-down in Paris during the Games. According to two sources, Casey apologized to Ari for the perception that he was trash-talking, and Ari apologized for the situation getting out of hand.”
Mid-way through the Olympics, though, the Daily Mail dropped a story about Casey alleging that he’s a “serial cheater” and many of his affairs have allegedly been with women who work for him. When that story broke, Ari and WME moved in hard on Billie and Finneas. And now the question is whether or not Casey can keep the remaining clients at his firm, like Chappell Roan and Kendrick Lamar.
So Casey needs crisis management. And that’s where we circle back to Justin Baldoni and It Ends With Us. Who did Casey bring on? NOT THE JOHNNY DEPP TEAM but Risa Heller. Risa Heller has also represented problematic people like Jeff Zucker and Anthony Weiner – as some of you have pointed out, unproblematic people don’t need crisis PR, and as some of you have also pointed out, hiring crisis PR doesn’t mean you’re guilty, it just means you’re in a crisis.
Here's the difference between Risa Heller, though, and the firm that Justin Baldoni brought on, Risa Heller does not have a reputation for smearing women to bring down a man. New York Magazine published a GREAT profile on Risa Heller last year - if you’re interested in marketing and comms and crisis management, it’s worth the read.
There are many crisis management teams working in Hollywood and adjacent. Because celebrities, politicians, and rich people often fuck up or find themselves in fucked up situations. When they do, they have choices. Nobody is side-eying that they need help, but in my opinion it’s fair to side-eye where they’re getting help from.
Question from Lexi:
Question for Lainey and/or Sarah: Similar to how sports scouts try to get in on the ground floor with “future prospects”, are there any actors, musicians, etc. that you are most pleased to have been an early fan of, who ended up “making it”? People who blew up in the way you thought they might?
Sarah’s answer:
Emma Stone leaps to mind. I met her while she was making House Bunny, she was adorable, and I’ve been rooting for her ever since. And while I wouldn’t say I’m a fan of Chris Pratt, I DID call his exploding fame that came after Guardians of the Galaxy, and it’s always nice to be right. Another one is Anna Kendrick, she sticks out in Twilight, but it was Camp and Rocket Science that showed everything she could be, which panned out. Also, I believe I predicted Glen Powell, no? And more recently, Lewis Pullman? Get on the Lewis Pullman train now, I am telling you! (We’re going to look back at Top Gun: Maverick as one of those films that randomly cast a generation of huge stars.)
Right now, I’m loving watching Jenna Ortega blow up (so cute! I want to put her in my pocket!). I know she was a kid actor and has years of work underpinning her “overnight” success, but from 2020’s The Babysitter: Killer Queen to now has been amazing to see. Also, Juno Temple, who is like Jenna’s opposite—I thought Juno would break out LONG before Ted Lasso finally got her there (I’ve been on her case since this 2009 Irish movie called Cracks). Another one I’m watching is Jaeden Martell, from Knives Out, IT, and Mr. Harrigan’s Phone. He was in Jeff Nichols’ 2016 film Midnight Special, a great kid performance, he’s unforgettable. He went through some unfortunate family bullshit but seems to have come out the other side thriving, and I am rooting for him to transition successfully into grown-up roles.
And Taylor Russell, I’m not convinced she wants it, but she could be a huge star, SHOULD be, unless she makes conscious choices for herself that lead elsewhere. Oh, and speaking of Top Gun: Maverick. Monica Barbaro, keep an eye on her. I think she’d already be a bigger star, except she sat out most of the Maverick press tour in 2022 to make the Netflix action series FUBAR (it sucks, but SHE is great). But I think she could end up with a very impressive career.
Question from Vera Cardoso:
Hey LaineyGossip team! First time question for the mailbag (English is not my first language...). You mention (and we're glad that you do, so that we can support) the struggles of maintaining site traffic, that social media is taking a big chunk of attention and numbers. I know that the focus of the site is to bring more depth, more analysis and I'm glad for it. However, why are you not leveraging social media's numbers to bring more traffic to the site? Or even to try and counter programme and educate through videos on the responsibility we all have with gossip? thank you!
Lainey’s Answer:
We’re not seeing that social media is driving traffic back to websites. Social media, supposedly, is short form content. Celebrity stories run a quick whatever minute or less because, supposedly, users have short attention spans. And LaineyGossip is not for the short attention-spanned. We are wordy! We analyse! We are writers and we write for readers. That’s not what social media is. So that’s the disconnect we have to figure out how to bridge if we want to somehow find a way to produce social media content that complements LaineyGossip.
But also, and here’s where it gets really unsexy, there’s the actual presentation of the content, as in photos and videos. Most social media content creators are ripping off photos. If there’s a TikTok about a set of pap shots of, say, Timothée Chalamet and Kylie Jenner, that’s generating tens or hundreds of thousands of views? Chances are that TikToker ripped those photos off of a website that legitimately paid for them. So they’re taking shit for free and creating content off of it and we wouldn’t be able to get away with that. And while most agencies extend some social media rights for photos used to promote web posts for which you’ve properly licensed photos, a different arrangement (and licensing cost structure) is required if you plan to make standalone content for another platform using legitimately licensed photos. We don’t have the resources nor the time for that, particularly when monetizing that content is not straight forward. And we can’t violate our agreements either. A screen shot of another site’s post featuring an exclusive, or Instagram embed of a hot pap photo could constitute a violation.
Does it frustrate me sometimes that we lose out for actually following the fucking rules? All the time. ALL THE TIME. Probably once a month Jacek and I will have a testy exchange about me wanting to embed a social media post with an exclusive from one of our agencies. He’ll be like, “No, we can’t, we’re going to get an invoice, it’s not worth it, just link”. And I’ll be like, it’s not fair! Look at this website, look at this TikTok, look at this IG account, they’re doing it, why can’t we!? But he’s right, there are eyes on us, and we can’t afford it. You will note, the bigger outlets also don’t embed anymore when social media accounts use images or footage that they know they can’t cheat out with the licence.
But the other concern for us is time. Sarah and I and our writers are already spending hours and hours a week writing. I’m currently on my third hour of writing this mailbag; it’s Thursday night, I wrote and edited the site today and I was filming a guest spot on a TV show – I won’t have any juice left by the time I finish my part of the mailbag and send it over to Sarah to create a reel or a TikTok. Emily and Jacek also have full days managing the site on the backend. Could we hire a social media manager to do this for us? I mean I’d love to, and hopefully we can build to that eventually. But we need to secure our bag before we expand. SHAMELESS APPEAL COMING UP, DON’T SAY I DIDN’T WARN YOU…
The one-year anniversary of The Squawk is coming up. And as I told you a few weeks ago, this is a critical time for The Squawk as we’ve been told by other Substack publishers that annual renewals are really important. So… please… if you’re enjoying this community, please consider an annual renewal. We would be SO grateful!
Note from Jacek: We also know it’s tight out there. So if you signed up last year with an annual payment or a founding member annual payment and you don’t know if you can do it this year, go monthly! We rely heavily on The Squawk to help cover expenses incurred maintaining LaineyGossip.com and The Squawk, so even if you can’t do an annual one-time payment, a monthly subscription still goes a long way for us.
And of course if you’re on a free subscription and enjoy these weekly newsletters, we’d love to have you jump over to paid. You’ll get access to the subscriber-only newsletters, award show live chats, and gain the ability to comment in our Squawk chat threads and post comments like those below this post. The discussions are so lively and respectful and we’re so grateful for all those who take part.
Keep squawking and keep gossiping!
Lainey and Sarah
Let me say first: I am renewing my Squawk subscription! There is no question about that.
I meant to send this in to the Mailbox, and will post this with no expectation of it being answered. BUT just in case:
The site has covered Ryan Reynolds’ evolution from behind the scenes dick to current mastermind of intelligent promotion and overall sincere (apparently) decency, even kindness. I genuinely like him. So how does that happen while Blake, his wife and, presumably, witness to internal conversations and strategy, handle the IEWO rollout and gossip firestorm so badly? How did he change into the thoughtful celebrity of today while she is rude to journalists, minimizes domestic violence, and decides to launch a hair care line at the same time as her movie? Are their teams totally separate? Obviously we are not privy to the inner workings of their relationship, but one of the reasons I fell for my husband is how smart and perceptive he is.
I was thinking of how she could have launched Blake Brown by announcing that all proceeds for the next six months or year would go to shelters for people escaping DV situations, for example. That could have engendered good will, done something positive, and also started building in a client base for her products. I am not a mega fan of Blake’s but this whole thing has definitely changed my view of her.
I can see calling the paps ahead of time if you want to control a narrative and get ahead of a breaking story that could get unruly. It made sense for Angelina to summon photogs to Namibia to get those first grainy beach shots, even if it seems like a ridiculous effort on the part of the paps. I know Rihanna has done this in regards to her kids, and that makes sense to me - may as well direct the story as best you can if you know you and your family are going to be hunted down with cameras, anyway.
I always feel a little bad for celebs when I see them out and about, just plodding around and running simple errands. I saw Goldie Hawn in NYC a few years ago, and I felt myself involuntarily do that thing where your eyes get big and zoom in for another quick look. I didn't bug her, and tried to actively direct my attention away from her, but I know she clocked my recognition because she kept glancing in my direction. She was just a grandma buying shit at FAO Schwartz's that day, so I left her alone to do that.
My younger brother is involved in a very specialized artistic field, and he spotted THE MOST famous person in that field unloading his car a year or so ago - it's the kind of situation where this famous dude could breeze past a lot of people, but if you're into the kind of art he makes, you'd be able to pinpoint him in a crowd immediately (and everyone knows this guy's very distinctive name, even if they haven't listened to a minute of his output). I begged my brother to leave that person alone if he ever saw him out and about again, and I hope to hell he does. I think my brother, like so many other people, was like "but I'm his BIGGEST fan," when in actuality, he's just another rando who happens to love a person he doesn't know very much. That can be hard for a lot of people to accept - that the celeb is never going to appreciate a stranger bounding up to him on a sidewalk and professing their love, because who doesn't want praise and adoration? We don't get it, and we never will, because none of us have been the recipient of that much unrelenting parasocial attention. Cate Blanchett doesn't give a fuck about me, and she never will, and that's the way the universe should operate.
I don't think I'd enjoy being famous, honestly. I'd despise the notoriety, and being tapped on the shoulder everywhere I go for a picture, or to deliver a tired catchphrase, etc. I get how these folks have chosen careers that plant them in a spotlight, and many of them are handsomely paid for that choice, but I'm on the side that says they should have the right to pump gas or get coffee or sit in first class without being whispered at or harassed. Unless they're signing Playbills after a performance or something, I think they deserve to be left alone.