My rising opinion of Thimotthee Chalamat; Girl Dinner; and more

[a few weeks ago]

Here's a new segment wherein I report mainly on the instagram reels I've been seeing lately. some things may be over explained to accommodate for those readers who are less attuned to the modern day internet. 

I've been spending a pretty embarrassing amount of time watching instagram reels lately (can you believe it? you're friend who hasn't worked in months and is holed up in her parents house as winter slowly descends, taking with it every last bit of sunlight, warmth, and hope, is spending a lot of time watching inane little videos??), but finally I stumbled upon something halfway good: Timmothee Chalamet's promotional tour of his new Bob Dylan video. Everyyyyyone is trying a little too hard to turn their movie promotions into good "content" (barf) these days. For me it goes back to Barbie, which seemed to have started this character dressing thing (is it called method dressing?), where for the whole promo tour actors dress in the style of their characters. It was cool at first, maybe just because it's hard to go wrong with Margot Robbie x Barbie. Also the aesthetics were a huge part of that movie to begin with, so I guess it made sense. And then you had Zendaya dressing in tennis whites for her tennis movie (see my review here), and then Zendaya dressing all metallic for Dune (because it's about....robots? idk, haven't seen it), and then also Zendaya probably doing it a third time because she's everywhere. This new fad  dovetailed nicely with the Eras tour culture of dressing up for a concert, which then seems to have evolved into dressing up for movie premieres. But after more than a year of all this, for me, it's stale. I think it was already getting played out, but Wicked was really the nail in the coffin for me. If I have to see one more picture of influencers and their besties in pink and green, or one more video of Ariana Grande and Cynthia Erivo making so little sense with their hyperrrr emotionality that even they reflect on clips of themselves to say, "yeah idk what was going on there," I'm going to lose it. Or maybe just finally get off instagram. which honestly.... would be good for me. With all this in mind, I was delighted to come across a clip of Elle Fanning and Timmothee Chalamet doing a segment for Vogue where they were being....silly. And....normal. And....not in character. It felt like they'd been doing press for so long they were going a little insane, I imagine the same way it feels when you've been at work or studying for wayyy too long and you start just getting silly with your friends and everything is funny to you even if it doesn't make any sense. It was a whole new side of Timothee. (To be fair, I don't really follow him so idk this for sure, but I've never seen him like this.) The clip was funny enough I searched up the original 10 minute video they did with Vogue and I wasn't disappointed. Nothing revolutionary, but enjoyable. There's something so funny to me about him being so delightfully unhinged, talking about things totally unrelated to Bob Dylan, even going on ESPN College Game Day to talk football (surprisingly adept at this) and then ending every segment very seriously but quickly to say, "but look I actually worked really hard on this film and you should go see it." Idk, I'm into it and I encourage you also to look for clips from this press tour. 

Also, I've been seeing a lot of videos of Padma Lakshmi (of Top Chef, duh) where her gen Z daughter tries to explain things like brat summer and girl dinner to her, and I like that. She originally didn't like the girl dinner trend because she thought it implied girls can't cook, so she showed herself making a fancy plate of leftovers to counteract that idea ?? a little confusing if I'm being honest. but it reminded me that the real gift of being 27 and single is that every day can be girl dinner for me. No protein? No problem. Pasta every night! Candy or ice cream pie for dinner.....? yes please. A week straight of trying to make better and better risotto with less and less ingredients to work with? Also yes. there are no rules. there is no one else to please. and there is nothing that can diminish the pleasure and delight that is derived from such freedom. [editors note: these are all real examples from my recent life, and I actually have been sort of famished from my lack of real sustenance BUT that is my choice and my problem alone !!!] 

Other media I've been consuming lately and would love to discuss includes the following: The Bear-- just finished it. loved it. don't know why I put off watching it for so long. very chef's table coded. might write more about it later--, The Neapolitan Novels--aka My Brilliant Friend and subsequent novels. also loved. can't wait to watch the hbo show adaptation. made me think about so much. also might write more about this later--, Facebook Marketplace-- if there's a couch for sale within 30 miles of me, I know about it (I know that's a pretty small radius but who wants to drive that far for anything really?)--, NYT games-- I am determined to get better at Spelling Bee!! one day I will not just be typing random letter combinations to see if they are words I just don't know, and one day I will achieve "genius"!--, the Ikea website--the only thing worse than wandering aimlessly through and Ikea store just may be aimlessly perusing the Ikea website, but it's gotta be done. I guess it doesn't necessarily gotta be done, but if you want be to sure you're getting the best deals on things and not missing anything included in their winter sale and also have time to be on there all the time, it might as well be done. 

If you have other suggestions of media I might consume before I have responsibilities again, lmk!

*also check out the updated collage archives to see this year's work in (to the best of my memory) totality