Content Consumed: Lea Michele, “We Cry Together”, and Rings of Power
Hello! It’s Thursday and it’s finally the start of a new month. I’m ready to start anew. Are you?
In today’s Content Consumed…
🎭 Need to know: Can Lea Michele read?
🎼 Kendrick and Taylour’s “We Cry Together” film
🌴 The Sex Lives of Cannibals, my comfort book
⚡️ Our era of “Blockbuster TV”
So is Lea Michele literate or not?
It’s a meme that has consumed the Internet for years now, that Lea Michele, star of Glee and soon Broadway’s Funny Girl, is illiterate.
It’s not that people thought Lea has a learning disorder. Or that the world’s just sexist, which Lea thinks is the reason for these rumors (untrue, her being a woman has nothing to do with it and we’d make this joke about a man). Theorists believe that because she was a child star, she’s simply never found the time to learn how to read or write and she just pays people to do it for her.
The evidence is there, albeit shaky and exaggerated, and hilarious fodder for meme-ery.
And here’s the problem: Lea still won’t deny that she can’t read. She knows the rumors exist! And she told the New York Times today:
I went to Glee every single day; I knew my lines every single day. And then there’s a rumor online that I can’t read or write?
She knew her lines, yes… but did she read them? Or did her assistant?
Editor’s note: I’m sure Lea Michele can read. Probably. I just think this is very silly, funny, and rather harmless Internet banter.
“We Cry Together”, the short film
Thank you, Kendrick Lamar and Taylour Paige, for sharing your talents with the world. Lamar just posted the short film for his Mr. Morale & the Big Steppers album hit “We Cry Together”. Like the lyrics of the song, the film is intense, honest, emotional, and heated.
Now, can we get a show of hands? Who thinks Taylour Paige is the most underrated performer in Hollywood right now? Everyone?! Okay, hands down now.
Paige proves herself again in this one-take film with live vocals from her collaboration with Lamar, where she spits jabs at Lamar’s character and storms around the house (a set), trying to leave for work mid-argument before giving into Lamar’s insults and pleas with raunchy make-up sex at the end.
It’s a unique song and unique video with its narrative structure, and certainly worth the watch. Catch it here.
My comfort book: The Sex Lives of Cannibals
Hey—don’t judge a book by its title. This memoir follows J. Marten Troost as he and his girlfriend navigate life in Tarawa, Kiribati in the South Pacific for two years. And it is the funniest book I’ve ever read. Every single page of The Sex Lives of Cannibals—and I’m on my 12th, maybe 13th read of it by now—has a line to giggle at.
This could easily be seen through a mightier-than-thou lens of life in a foreign country and its native people, but that’s not it. Troost perfectly balances the hilarity of the I-Kiribati’s lifestyle with the ridiculousness of his own as an I-Matang (the I-Kiribati term for white people). What he learns to appreciate, and what he learns to hate, is told through hysterical anecdotes.
The lagoon everyone shits in. The I-Kiribati’s favorite song, played on repeat at all hours of the day: “La Macarena”. The time-honored custom of stealing from each other. The five weeks without alcohol, when the entire island shut down (deemed The Great Beer Crisis). Just… read it.
This is the age of “Blockbuster TV”
How do we measure eras, especially in media?
In this millennium, Prestige TV came first: auteurs and antiheroes, think pieces, niche content made into events. Next, Peak TV: a ton of content, on all the platforms, fighting for ratings and viewership, knocking off Prestige TV’s biggest hits. Now, Blockbuster TV. Streaming services are restructuring and it’s all about the money, money, money.
More money is being invested in television than ever before. Examples include spinoffs of existing cinematic franchises, like Marvel and “Star Wars” on Disney Plus, and modernized historical pieces like “Bridgerton” on Netflix. What will get the Internet talking? is what studio execs ask.
Here’s the biggest experiment yet, says one NYT columnist: the near-simultaneous kickoffs of House of the Dragon and The Rings of Power. Both come from mega-franchises (Game of Thrones and Lord of the Rings) and both have had hundreds of millions of dollars thrown at their production.
Could these two series elevate fantasy into the cultural territory occupied by superhero movies? Game of Thrones almost did it—is this the final touch?
And that’s it for today, folks! Thanks so much for reading. You’re best. Really.
Lots of love,
Casey
Interested in more long-form pieces? Check out my extended Medium columns:
