Mailbag for December 1, 2023

Leaning into the Oscars, hoop-jumping women, attention-craving Leto, our seven deadly sins, and an update on the Squawking Chicken

Photos: Glasshouse Images/ Snap/ United Artists/Fantasy Films/Kobal/ Matteo Prandoni/ BFA.com/ Richard Young/Shutterstock

Dear Squawkers,

I have been running LaineyGossip and The Squawk all week. With Lainey trapped in another dimension on vacation, I was left in charge. The fox is in the henhouse! Since I became deputy editor of LaineyGossip in whatever year that was—you know how Nick Miller said he didn’t think he could read, he just memorized a lot of words? Well, I don’t think I can tell time, I think I just know what numbers are—I usually run things on Fridays, so this was my first time being knee-deep in it all week, and what a week it was, with premieres, award shows, other things, too. Everyone keeps insisting on going places and doing things! It’s the end of the year, everyone stop moving for five seconds and let us rest! But seriously, it’s been really fun this week squawking with everyone.

One piece of news that slipped through the cracks, though, is that the Oscars will begin one hour earlier for the 2024 telecast, beginning at 7 PM Eastern, 4 PM Pacific. Finally! I have only been saying this for years! People complain about how long the show is, in part because for some people, especially Eastern and Central time zone people, it doesn’t end until like, eleven o’clock. That’s too late! For actual years I have been saying just to start the telecast earlier, so that no matter how long the show is, it ends at a reasonable time.

This is how the Super Bowl operates, typically kicking off before 7 PM Eastern, and no one complains about the length of the Super Bowl, even though it is fucking long. But it ends at reasonable hour, usually around 10 or 10:30 Eastern, which is not an unreasonable hour. For some people—like me—that’s still early, and for others, it’s a special night to justify staying up an extra hour or two.

The Oscars will follow the Super Bowl in another way, too, by broadcasting an episode of Abbott Elementary after the telecast. Whichever network is broadcasting the game uses the post-game slot to promote their most popular show, and now ABC will follow suit by giving Quinta Brunson and the Abbott crew the post-show spot.

I love this. I have only said forever that the answer to “what’s wrong with the Oscars” is just to lean into what the Oscars are—an over-the-top glamorous celebration of cinema, and the Academy should lean into that and give the people who genuinely love the Oscars more of that, instead of constantly trying to whittle away at the ceremony to appease people who don’t actually care about the Oscars at all. Here’s hoping this is a sign that the Academy finally gets it and will make the Oscars more and not less. Now, onto the mailbag.

Question from Myra: I'd love to hear Lainey and Sarah's thoughts on the career trajectory of young Hollywood women. There have been some prominent jumps for men from "teenage series" to serious films, from Elordi, Melton, and Rob Pattinson before that. Whereas Simone Ashley, Ayo Edebiri, even Sydney Sweeney seems to have more hoops to jump through before they get offered a serious film. Are the standards different for men and women?

Sarah’s answer:

Just yes, in general, the standards are different between men and women. But I’ve actually been thinking about this lately because of Jenna Ortega. I saw Finestkind at TIFF and did not care for it. It’s a Boston fish heist movie, mediocre in a lot of ways, and Ortega is miscast as a streetwise Southie tough girl (the kind Blake Lively played in The Town). It struck me, though, that part of Ortega’s issue in that film is that she doesn’t know how to turn an underwritten, thankless girlfriend role into a meal…because she hasn’t had to. I’m not saying things are perfect, but they’re a little bit better than they used to be, and Jenna Ortega might be spared the “thankless girlfriend” phase of her career.

Jenna Ortega attends Harper's Bazaar Women of the Year Awards at Claridge's, London on November 7, 2023 (Photo: Richard Young/ Shutterstock)

Sydney Sweeney has been on a steady rise the last several years, going from prestige project to prestige project—The Handmaid’s Tale to Euphoria to The White Lotus to Reality. Sydney Sweeney has pretty much only done serious work, Anyone But You is the anomaly! Also, Ayo Edebiri is a comedian. The Bear allows people to see her in a different, more dramatic light, but that’s not necessarily the career path she’s even pursuing.

The thing that remains harder for women than men in the industry, though, is getting the big role that garners you a spotlight. Things are only just better than they were 20 years ago, and though there are more lead roles for women now, men still get WAY more shiny parts going their way. There are just more opportunities for dudes to headline a movie and break out.

Question from Lexi: Still bummed we didn’t get Sarah and Lainey’s hot take on Jared Leto climbing the Empire State Building 😂

Sarah’s answer:

You’re killing me, smalls. We almost didn’t have to talk about Jared Leto! In case you missed it, Jared Leto climbed the Empire State Building to promote 30 Seconds to Mars’s 2024 world tour. I mean, sure. Tom Cruise dangled off the Burj Khalifa like a decade ago, but okay, Jared. We see you.

Which is what he wants! Jared Leto wants to be cool so badly, he’s the most uncool. Which is too bad, because in the 1990s, he was actually cool. He’s ruined it, though, with his many shenanigans. I genuinely don’t like giving the guy the attention he so clearly craves.

Question from Charlotte: In the getting to know you vein - most and least prominent sins? (i.e., I am high in sloth, pride, and gluttony, and low in vanity, lust, and wrath, leaving envy for the middle.) I feel like Lainey may have no impulse toward sloth at all, but maybe high in vanity?

Lainey’s Answer:

The short answer is that I am going to hell. The only sin I’m low on is sloth. I am driven, I am a hard worker, I am pretty active, I don’t like to waste time. Everything else though? It’s off the charts.

I am too proud. I have a huge ego. I wouldn’t say it’s outwardly out of control but on the inside, I’m a pride monster. I am also a food monster. Not sure if you follow me on Instagram but much of my content from this trip has basically just been food. I order everything I can order. When I’m at dinner with a friend, we get enough for four people, not just two. So, for sure, I am gluttonous. I love more – more everything, more food, more clothes, more shoes, more more more more more.

Lust? Girl, I’m perimenopausal and I’ve never been hornier. I also think about sex all the time because I read so many horny books and watch so many Chinese and Korean drama series which go hard on the foreplay because they string you out on their longing and only, in the end, give you two minutes of skinship in the last episode.

Envy might be a weaker one for me in the sense that I don’t really live my life coveting what other people have. But I’m not immune to it, LOL. Being in Hong Kong the last couple of weeks and hanging out with people who live the high life here has made me pretty envious, especially since the shopping is just so fucking good.

Vanity and wrath, though, these are probably my two guiding sins. I think we’ve established that I’m a vain bitch and, again, I’ve been in Asia for a month so you can imagine all the notes I’ve been taking on what skin treatments I have gotten and will be getting so I can keep my current face for the next 50 years.

The wrath part of it is… I mean if you could only hear my inner thoughts. I am angry all the time. I am ready to throw down any time. Last week I told off a woman who was crowding my ma on the shuttle bus. My tone and my eyes were pure venom – she was terrified of me, and it felt good. So good that I wanted to follow her and keep yelling at her. When I’m not thinking about how to take care of my skin and what outfits will look good and what will make me look prettier, my thoughts are consumed by revenge. And it’s not necessarily big revenge. Most of the time, actually, it’s the small petty sh-t. Like if someone parks like an asshole on our street, I spend the next hour plotting revenge on how to f-ck them up. Or if I’m texting or on the phone with a friend and they’re telling me about how someone wronged them, all my energy will be spent on how to mess up that person’s life. A few years ago, my friend Melissa Grelo and I were standing outside in winter waiting for an Uber and some dude tried to cut in and get in the car and then was a total dick to her when she told him, politely, that it was her ride. You have never seen someone go from zero to red so quicky, I turned into the Hulk, raged at him not to talk to her like that, and pulled out my phone and took his picture. He slunk away, and up to that part of the story, I probably hadn’t committed a sin, but the rage stayed with me to the point where I spent the next couple of hours trying to think up a way to post his photo online and haunt him forever.

One night during the pandemic, Duana, Sasha, and I were talking shit in our friend Lara’s backyard about which one of us would win a fight. I’m the shortest of all of us but all of them said it would be me… because I am vicious. I will go for the eyes, I will get dirty, even if it takes me years, I will get my revenge.

Anyway, I should stop now because I’ve probably scared you. But since you wanted to know, Charlotte, it sounds like you’ll be in heaven, and I will be burning in the darkest parts of a place called torture.

Sarah’s answer:

I’m lazy as fuck. I hate going places and doing things. So, sloth, I guess. But I also don’t believe in the seven deadly sins, as a concept, because they were probably written to discourage people from acting like profligate Roman citizens. I judge myself more along the lines of the pirate code—am I being fair, am I ready to fight when needed and help when necessary, am I putting out the candles every night at eight o’clock.

Question from Anna Dobben: This might be too late of a mailbag request! Sarah has said a couple of times that this is a competitive year for film awards, which is always fun. What was the most competitive year in recent memory, and what was the least?

Sarah’s answer:

Well, 1999 leaps to mind as a crazy competitive year—the year Shakespeare in Love, Elizabeth, The Thin Red Line, and Saving Private Ryan went head-to-head. But really, the most competitive years? A couple standout: 1976, the Oscars honoring 1975. The year of Jaws, Barry Lyndon, Nashville, One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest—the Best Picture winner that year—and Dog Day Afternoon. Legit every film in that lineup is a classic. Every nominated director is a legend: Milos Forman, Robert Altman, Federico Fellini, Stanley Kubrick, Sidney Lumet. Never mind the actors nominated, including Pacino, Nicholson, Matthau, Isabelle Adjani, Ann-Margaret, Carol Kane, Louise Fletcher, Glenda Jackson, George Burns, Lily Tomlin, Burgess Meredith, Brad Dourif, among others, an all-timer lineup. That’s probably the single toughest year, both to get nominated—Spielberg didn’t even make the cut for JAWS!—and to pull off the win.

Jack Nicholson in ‘One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest’ (Photo: United Artists/Fantasy Films/Kobal/Shutterstock)

And 1993, the year of The Piano, Remains of the Day, The Fugitive, In the Name of the Father, and Schindler’s List. Again, all classics. All involving the best of the best talent, in front of and behind the camera. The year Tom Hanks beat Daniel Day-Lewis for Best Actor, the year Spielberg won his first directing Oscar, and Jurassic Park and Schindler’s List ate everyone’s lunch in the below-the-line categories. Spielberg’s year.

As for least competitive, it’s not so much that I remember an “easy” year the way the competitive years stand out, but for the last several years, the actor races haven’t been nearly competitive as the ladies’ categories. This is the first year in recent memory where the dude categories genuinely feel up for grabs.  

Lily Tomlin on-set of the Film, 'Nashville', Paramount Pictures, 1975 (Photo: Glasshouse Images/Shutterstock)

Question from Josephine: Question for Lainey, if it's not too personal: how is your mom doing with POEMS and how is your dad doing as her main caretaker?

Lainey’s Answer:

Thanks for asking. My ma had second round of chemo and stem cell in March 2022 to treat multiple myeloma, which is a condition of POEMS, and so far it has not returned but that’s only a matter of time. Chemo and stem cell are not cures, there is no cure, so we’re hoping for five years, at which point she’ll have to be on medication since they won’t do any more stem cell after a certain age.

It’s now been almost 15 years since her POEMS diagnosis. POEMS is the reason she has a disability since it attacks the nerves and severely affected her lower body mobility. That puts a lot of pressure on her but also my dad because she’s not independent. Which is why it’s such a big deal that they were able to come to Hong Kong. And that’s why it was such a big deal for Jacek and I to be able to come here with them for what might be their last trip home. Of course, we hope that they can come back to Hong Kong in the future, but her health is always a concern, and sudden hospitalisations are a constant reality.

So there are the physical struggles of living with chronic illness and caregiving for someone with a chronic illness, but there are also mental health challenges. My parents have been through so much trauma, both before and after the onset of her various diseases. They have a hard time forgiving each other. They have a hard time loving each other. She resents him for all kinds of past issues and he, well, he has to live with a person who is often difficult and unreasonable because of how sick she is, both physically and mentally. So, to be honest, it’s not always a happy situation. And that unhappiness rebounds off of them and onto those who orbit them.

I share all of this because we don’t talk enough about our aging population and the obstacles they face. We also don’t talk enough about caregivers, a rapidly growing demographic that is not being served by industry and government and community. Many of you reading this are caregivers, or you will be caregivers. This is either your present or your future. And right now, our institutions are not adequately prepared to deal with what’s coming.

For Jacek and me, we are fortunate that all four of our parents are still with us. But I know I don’t have to spell it out. Over the next few years, that will change – and our lives will change. We will likely have to take on more responsibility taking care of the parents who remain, one by one. That will shift how we manage our priorities. Maybe it will even affect our own marriage. We have had pretty sobering conversations about how we can prepare ourselves, financially and emotionally, for what’s on the way. And we are doing what we can now to strengthen ourselves, in all aspects, so that we might weather what will probably be the toughest period of our lives.

This is also why we took this trip to Japan and Hong Kong this year. Because we really don’t know if we’ll be able to do something like this for next few years. I mean, we hope so…but we also aren’t counting on it either. So on that note, I’d like to thank Sarah and Emily and the writers at LaineyGossip who’ve been holding it down for us while we have travelled. I’ve been able to put in limited work hours during this holiday knowing that Sarah, especially, has it covered. THANK YOU SO MUCH, Sarah! And thank you, gossips and squawkers, for continuing to support our work at LaineyGossip and here at The Squawk. I’ll be back to regular gossip schedule on Monday.

And on that note, have a great weekend everyone!

Squawk on,

Sarah and Lainey