Pop Culture Mondays/2.10.20
Post Oscar edition
by Brooke Hammerling on Monday, February 10, 2020
Happy Post-Oscar Monday all you pop culture junkies! There was a lot that went on last night which we will get to — tbh I am still processing some of it because SOME of the show confused me, and some of it bored me and some of it moved me and some of it enraged me but I watched the whole thing. SO in case you didn’t see it or you tuned out after a while or you had loud people talking during your Oscar party so you missed it or you were on that STUPID HULU TIME DELAY and could not track what people were saying on the Twitter because you were several steps behind…I am here for you. We get it into it (and SO MUCH MORE) below.
For those new PCM subscribers….welcome! This is meant to be an escape from whatever stress or madness you have got going on and is not meant to add more — while we can cover some serious issues if they are big pop culture moments of the week, this is a Trump-free zone. SO if you want to dig deep into the memes going around of his bad make up (it’s bad) or all the controversy of Pelosi ripping up his speech, go for it. But I am staying in my blissful candy-filled bubble of PCM which is filled with Haribo gummi bears and warm, gooey chocolate chip cookies.
LADIES AND GENTLEMEN…ACTUALLY, JUST YOU GENTLEMEN….
OK…wow. There is a lot to unpack from last night’s Oscars I don’t know even where to begin. In my fantasy, I am sitting here furiously smoking long Vogue cigarettes while biting my nails to the quick and panicking over ALL the ground I need to cover here. Instead, I am sitting here drinking an Oatly latte whilst listening to The Daily podcast on scary AI spying tools that will basically destroy society.
BUT I digress.
SO, there has been a lot of controversy over the nominees this year and like EVERY year) being mostly men. This year in particular though, there were some incredible films directed by women who were ignored entirely. Think about it — how can a movie be nominated for BEST picture but not BEST director? Did the movie just MAGICALLY make itself? It’s absurd. And I don’t care what you say, Little Women is amazing and I don’t care if you are only secretly going to see Timotheé (Timo-tay) Chalamet, just go. But back to the ladies. There were a lot of statements last night about the lack of women which I have tried to break down below (though there were a lot more than I can actually highlight):
- Natalie Portman had the names of female directors who were snubbed, sewn into her cape.
- Steve Martin and Chris Rock made a vagina joke! Because that’s what women are…VAGINAS. PLEASE. Granted it was in the context of what was missing from the Oscars this year but no.
- The ACADEMY realllllly tried to make up for their mistake by having a LOT of other women talk about how great women are. And they also - FOR THE FIRST TIME EVER -had a female conductor. Wait, no scratch that. Sorry. She did not actually conduct the whole show — -JUST ONE PART. 2 minutes. And Eimear Noone, the Irish conductor, WAS badass and looked like she was wearing Tina Turner’s outfit from Beyond Thunderdome (WATCH THIS VIDEO) and I was there for it (because WE do IN FACT need another hero). But the Academy was super proud of themselves for the fact they allowed a woman to conduct those 2 minutes! 2020 guys. 20 freaking 20.
- A woman won for Best Original Score! Hildur Guðnadóttir (TRY TYPING THIS ONE!) became the FIRST EVER woman to win this category for her truly beautiful score for Joker. And her speech was perfect and I frankly think she should have given all the acceptance speeches (I am LOOKING RIGHT AT YOU JOAQUIN & RENÉE) but don’t take my word for it, check her out and her message for girls:
- Jane Fonda. I mean what did we do to deserve Jane Fonda?? Also, side note — if you are NOT WATCHING Grace & Frankie, you are missing a whole part of life and you are not a complete human being. Go and start watching it immediately, for it is pure joy. (And shout out to MARK CUBAN, PCM reader, for being on this season!) Anyway, Queen Jane gave the final award for BEST FILM and in her way decimated the Academy with one line: “FOR THE ACADEMY, these films were the most impactful…” PS: TRY finding an article on this. I DARE YOU. Every article is about Jane embracing her grey hair or all about her dress. 🙄
So a quick summary of the other stuff. PARASITE WON EVERYTHING and this is important because no foreign language film has ever won Best Picture. Also important, because the movie is amazing and funnily those who celebrate it also maybe miss the point that it’s KIND of about them??ANYHOW….
The director of Parasite, Bong Joon Ho (who was legitimately frustrated with all the wins because the dude wanted to just go get drunk) has been outspoken about urging Americans to watch foreign language movies. I think he will get his wish! Also, the Oscars changed the category historically known as BEST FOREIGN LANGUAGE film to BEST INTERNATIONAL FEATURE FILM because obviously this should be the case — which Parasite ALSO won for. While people expected Parasite to have a big night, the BIG SURPRISE was winning Best Film which people thought would go to 1917 or that movie about Hollywood. So yay!
And lastly, the music was weird. No one really knows why Eminem was there (and he looked like a cross between Moby & JT IN my opinion) and Elton was Elton, and Billie Eilish sang “Yesterday” for the IN MEMORIAM part but truthfully I was just focused on her nails the whole time. Sorry! (But she did give the meme of the night when the camera panned over her WTF look during the Maya Rudolph/Kristen Wiig bit — HOW DARE SHE.
And in Memoriam forgot a lot of people INCLUDING DYLAN MCCKAY WHICH IS BULLSHIT!!!
I literally cannot write another word about this show so for more info check out:
THE INDEPENDENT SPIRIT AWARDS AKA BEST PERSONALITY AWARD SHOW:
There has been a lot of Adam Sandler talk recently. His weird movie with Jennifer Aniston on Netflix, Murder Mystery, was the most popular movie on Netflix in 2019. And then he starred in the really incredible and stressful Uncut Gems but was snubbed by the ACADEMY in what seemingly everyone was in an uproar about. And truthfully, an accurate assessment as he was AMAZING. BUT he won the BEST MALE LEAD Award at the Independent Spirit Awards (celebrating independent film vs big studio productions). And Sandler gave truly the most hilarious, touching, gracious ADAM SANDLER-y speech ever. Basically the exact opposite of Joaquin Phoenix’s.
Check it out immediately:
BREAKING MY RULE HERE:
OK so every once in a while, something from the political world will bubble up to transcend politics or party and just be purely a cultural moment. AKA Wine Cave. So here we are, AMY KLOBUCHAR! The Senator from Minnesota, and Presidential candidate, who is now surging in popularity, was caught in the crosshairs of angry old white dudes at the most recent Democratic debate held in New Hampshire. This picture needs ZERO context. It doesn’t matter what they are even talking about — also I have no idea and don’t want to dive down that rabbit hole. But there are some moments caught on camera that become iconic and this is one of them. Twitter erupted. I think I had my most successful retweet ever — thank you to the goddess Monica Lewinsky for the retweet — but it was everywhere because every woman was able to relate. From our earliest of memories I think we can all relate but most especially as women in the workplace (or any college course I took that had more men and a male professor where I just stopped even trying to engage and doodled for the rest of class). This picture really is everything and it’s helping Amy’s popularity because it might be the most authentic thing yet to come out of this race.
More on Amy:
STAND UP FOR GAYLE PLEASE:
So, you might have heard there is a whole beef going on with Snoop Dogg and Oprah BFF Gayle King. So let me break this down for you. Media have been trying to figure out how to deal with the part of Kobe’s history which is not awesome — the part where he was accused of rape and settled in civil court and Kobe apologized and admitted fault back in 2005 (the case was from 2003). And it’s tricky as he unquestionably from that point on was a devoted and loving father and husband and the epitome of hard work and graciousness. But it was a part of his history and no one quite knew (or knows)how to handle it.
Do we erase these things from history because that person is beloved? Do we wait a bit longer especially because there are children involved? I actually don’t know the answer tbh. But here’s what happened with Gayle. She was interviewing retired WNBA star Lisa Leslie, who was friends with Kobe, and asked her whether the rape case made Kobe’s legacy complicated for her, which Lisa said it did not. Apparently it was a very long interview where they covered lots of ground but CBS honchos/producers (obviously) decided to make this small part of the interview the tantalizing tease to get people to tune in. Making it seem like Gayle was focusing the interview on this and trying to get this WNBA great to say something controversial about Kobe.
It was NOT well received. Gayle herself was shocked and PISSED off at CBS for doing that with her interview and she claims she was blindsided — which I believe. But then it went to another level and Snoop posted a video that is so shocking I have no idea why people are not CANCELLING Snoop. People are entitled to have their own opinions and feelings, and Snoop started OK making an argument that was his and entirely ok, but then it goes SIDEWAYS. He calls her names (“bitch” being the main one) and then seemingly threatens her, which he denies is a threat…but THERE IS VIDEO. Watch it for yourself but it’s shocking. And yet the media for the most part and thought leaders have remained silent. ALSO truly shocking. She is now getting death threats and according to OPRAH, Gayle is “not doing well”. WHO WOULD BE? WHERE IS MARTHA STEWART calling out her bff Snoop? SO LET’S ALL rally around her and let her know we don’t accept what Snoop said from ANYONE. This isn’t about whether or not asking about this piece of Kobe history is right (again, it’s complicated) but by attacking in this way is just…NOT ok.
NOT SUITABLE FOR WORK OR FOR KIDS -
VAGINA VAGINA VAGINA:
I can honestly say I have never said or read the word “vagina” more in my entire life. NO ONE is having a better year than THE WORD VAGINA. Is this GP’s fault? (FYI new readers, I cannot type Gwyneth easily as I am super dyslexic so I refer to her as GP.) Her vagina candle was a HIT (I have my very own now thanks to Cindy Gallop and it smells divine tbh). Here is GP standing in front of a FLOWER vagina. But this week we got a lot of other people’s vaginas to consider.
Apparently, Harvey Weinstein has a vagina. (I would say this is a MINUS for vaginas everywhere.) But, for those of you who read the news from the testimony of one of Harvey’s many accusers this week, we all made that face we make if we are sucking on a 🍋 . Am I wrong? No. Apparently, the accuser felt compassion initially for Harvey after seeing his…um…private area which she explains IN detail looked like a vagina. I really can’t write more so read all about it here:
AND to continue the vagina theme, we have Erykah Badu. YES GIRL you are riding this wave and while I am not entirely sure this is what anyone asked for, we support you. I think? Anyway, Erykah announced this week that she is launching an online store and one of her items is an incense that smells like…well you guessed it obviously. So here we are.
And making it’s 2ND APPEARANCE in PCM, I present you with “My Vag” by Awkafina before she was famous. If you have not watched it before, I am sorry because this will be a song you might break into during a meeting or on a conference call and SORRY NOT SORRY. But it needs to be celebrated:
Until next week Pop Culture Junkies….
PS: A lot was on the cutting room floor today, AGAIN. For some of the stories I was into but didn’t cover, check them out here:
The Best TikTok of the week:
Mazel to Sheryl Sandberg:
State Farm is Cancelled (you should use Lemonade Insurance anyway!):
Harvey’s lawyer is a Comic-book Villain:
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