Best Picture vs. Worst Reality
the curtains continue to rise and the missiles continue to fall
Mōrena my angel babies!!!! My bestie/ housemate/ employee
said the FUNNIEST thing to me this weekend. We were in the car on the way to get burgers for dinner, and she goes:“You’ve been like a sim levelling up your skills today.”
I started pissing myself and asked her to elaborate.
“You went from reading, to putting stickers all over your Switch, to watching Dumbo, to having a pot of coffee with all of us, to playing your new little Tamagotchi game, to writing a newsletter, and then you disappeared for like three hours and we heard you playing your guitar - you were literally a sim working on all your skills!!!!”
I continued laughing and sent myself a note on Slack to tell you all about it:
I love weekends like that. Where I have nothing planned so I have time to do all my cute little hobbies and I can let the day pick me up and carry me through it like a leaf in the wind.
The next day was full on: we went to the Newtown Festival which was UNREAL (just a festival with musical acts throughout the streets and the most LUCE-CODED stalls you’ve ever seen.) Abby and I ended the weekend by being mermaids at the beach and making our way through All Fours (our book club pick.)
I hope your weekend was cute, whether you were upskilling, relaxing, or being a 365 party person.
I love you!!!!
Trump and Vance going at Zelenskyy was one of the most disgraceful things I’ve ever seen
Over the weekend, Trump, Vance, and Zelenskyy (Ukranian President) met for what was supposed to be a prelude to the signing of a new minerals deal, but ended up being one of the grossest things I’ve ever seen.
Trump and Vance literally acted like high school bullies, speaking over Zelenskyy, saying stupid and insensitive shit (like ‘where is your suit’ - uh, this man is literally navigating a war) and gassing each other up over how nasty they could be.
If you don’t know what I’m talking about, watch these two clips:
Needless to say, perhaps, is that a deal didn’t get signed - apparently Zelenskyy was told to leave before that happened.
Here’s a transcript for you to be disgusted by:
Zelenskyy: What kind of diplomacy, JD, are you are asking about? What do you mean?
Vance: I’m talking about the kind of diplomacy that’s going to end the destruction of your country.
Zelenskyy: Yes, but if you …
Vance: Mr President, with respect, I think it’s disrespectful for you to come to the Oval Office and try to litigate this in front of the American media. Right now, you guys are going around and forcing conscripts to the frontlines because you have manpower problems. You should be thanking the president.
Zelenskyy: Have you ever been to Ukraine to see the problems we have?
Vance: I’ve actually watched and seen the stories, and I know what happens is you bring people on a propaganda tour, Mr President.
Do you disagree that you’ve had problems with bringing people in your military, and do you think that it’s respectful to come to the Oval Office of the United States of America and attack the administration that is trying to prevent the destruction of your country?
Zelenskyy: First of all, during the war, everybody has problems, even you. You have nice solutions and don’t feel [it] now, but you will feel it in the future.
Trump: You don’t know that. Don’t tell us what we’re going to feel. We’re trying to solve a problem. Don’t tell us what we’re going to feel.
Zelenskyy: I am not telling you, I am answering …
Vance: That’s exactly what you’re doing …
Trump, raising his voice: You’re in no position to dictate what we’re going to feel. We’re going to feel very good and very strong.
Zelenskyy tries to speak.
Trump: You right now are not in a very good position. You’ve allowed yourself to be in a very bad position. You don’t have the cards right now. With us, you start having the cards.
You’re gambling with lives of millions of people, you’re gambling with world war three and what you’re doing is very disrespectful to this country.
Vance: Have you said thank you once?
Zelenskyy: A lot of times.
Vance: No, in this meeting, this entire meeting? Offer some words of appreciation for the United States of America and the president who’s trying to save your country.
Zelenskyy: Yes, you think that if you will speak very loudly about the war …
Trump: He’s not speaking loud. Your country is in big trouble. No, no, you’ve done a lot of talking. Your country is in big trouble.
Zelenskyy: I know, I know.
Trump: You’re not winning this. You have a damn good chance of coming out OK, because of us.
Zelenskyy: We are staying strong from the very beginning of the war, we have been alone, and we are saying, I said, thanks.
Trump, speaking over Zelenskyy: You haven’t been alone … We gave you military equipment. Your men are brave, but they had our military. If you didn’t have our military equipment, this war would have been over in two weeks.
Zelenskyy: I heard it from Putin in three days.
Trump: It’s going to be a very hard thing to do business like this.
Vance: Just say thank you.
Zelenskyy: I said it a lot of times.
Vance: Accept that there are disagreements and let’s go litigate those disagreements rather than trying to fight it in the American media, when you’re wrong. We know that you’re wrong.
Trump: You’re buried there. Your people are dying. You’re running low on soldiers. No, listen … And then you tell us, ‘I don’t want a ceasefire. I don’t want a ceasefire. I want to go and I want this.’
Trump: You’re not acting at all thankful. And that’s not a nice thing. I’ll be honest, that’s not a nice thing.
Trump: All right, I think we’ve seen enough. What do you think? Great television. I will say that.
Meanwhile, the Oscars happened
What’s with US awards shows feeling like they’re in an alternate reality atm? On the one hand, we have the ‘leader of the free world’ being the worst person alive (and being voted in, no doubt, by quite a few of Hollywoods elite) and then we have awards shows that I’ve seen people allude to as feeling like ‘a timeline where Kamala won.’ Feels weird to watch from the outside, but then I guess I’m lucky to be doing just that. Watching from the outside, as the curtains continue to rise and the missiles continue to fall. Anyway, if you care, here are the Oscars results!
But first I need you to watch the opening of the show and this performance of Defying Gravity (Cynthia Erivo is fucking insane):
Best picture
WINNER: Anora
The Brutalist
A Complete Unknown
Conclave
Dune: Part Two
Emilia Pérez
I'm Still Here
Nickel Boys
The Substance
Wicked
Best actress
WINNER: Mikey Madison - Anora
Cynthia Erivo - Wicked
Karla Sofía Gascón - Emilia Pérez
Demi Moore - The Substance
Fernanda Torres - I'm Still Here
Best actor
WINNER: Adrien Brody - The Brutalist
Timothée Chalamet - A Complete Unknown
Colman Domingo - Sing Sing
Ralph Fiennes - Conclave
Sebastian Stan - The Apprentice
Best supporting actress
WINNER: Zoe Saldaña - Emilia Pérez
Monica Barbaro - A Complete Unknown
Ariana Grande - Wicked
Felicity Jones - The Brutalist
Isabella Rossellini - Conclave
Best supporting actor
WINNER: Kieran Culkin - A Real Pain (fuck yes I loved this film)
Yura Borisov - Anora
Edward Norton - A Complete Unknown
Guy Pearce - The Brutalist
Jeremy Strong - The Apprentice
Best director
WINNER: Sean Baker - Anora
Jacques Audiard - Emilia Pérez
Brady Corbet - The Brutalist
Coralie Fargeat - The Substance
James Mangold - A Complete Unknown
Best international feature
WINNER: I'm Still Here - Brazil
The Girl with the Needle - Denmark
Emilia Pérez - France
The Seed of the Sacred Fig - Germany
Flow - Latvia
Best animated feature
WINER: Flow
Inside Out 2
Memoir of a Snail
Wallace & Gromit: Vengeance Most Fowl
The Wild Robot
Best original screenplay
WINNER: Anora - Sean Baker
The Brutalist - Brady Corbet and Mona Fastvold
A Real Pain - Jesse Eisenberg
September 5 - Moritz Binder, Tim Fehlbaum, Alex David
The Substance - Coralie Fargeat
Best adapted screenplay
WINNER: Conclave - Peter Straughan
A Complete Unknown - Jay Cocks and James Mangold
Emilia Pérez - Jacques Audiard
Nickel Boys - RaMell Ross and Joslyn Barnes
Sing Sing - Clint Bentley and Greg Kwedar
Best original song
WINNER: El Mal - Emilia Pérez
Never Too Late - Elton John: Never Too Late
Mi Camino - Emilia Pérez
Like A Bird - Sing Sing
The Journey - The Six Triple Eight
Best original score
WINNER: The Brutalist
Conclave
Emilia Pérez
Wicked
The Wild Robot
Best documentary feature
WINNER: No Other Land
Black Box Diaries
Porcelain War
Soundtrack to a Coup d'Etat
Sugarcane
Best costume design
WINNER: Wicked
Nosferatu
A Complete Unknown
Conclave
Gladiator II
Best make-up and hairstyling
WINNER: The Substance
A Different Man
Emilia Pérez
Nosferatu
Wicked
Best production design
WINNER: Wicked
The Brutalist
Dune: Part Two
Nosferatu
Conclave
Best sound
WINNER: Dune: Part Two
A Complete Unknown
Emilia Pérez
Wicked
The Wild Robot
Best film editing
WINNER: Anora
The Brutalist
Conclave
Emilia Pérez
Wicked
Best cinematography
WINNER: The Brutalist
Dune: Part Two
Emilia Pérez
Maria
Nosferatu
Best visual effects
WINNER: Dune: Part Two
Alien: Romulus
Better Man
Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes
Wicked
Best live action short
WINNER: I'm Not a Robot
Anuja
The Last Ranger
A Lien
The Man Who Could Not Remain Silent
Best animated short
WINNER: In the Shadow of the Cypress
Beautiful Men
Magic Candies
Wander to Wonder
Yuck!
Best documentary short
WINNER: The Only Girl in the Orchestra
Death by Numbers
I Am Ready, Warden
Incident
Instruments of a Beating Heart
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(levity on a seriously demented situation) that picture of Zelenskyy & Trump kills me. Trump is braying like a flatulent donkey and Zelenskyy looks at the camera like, "is this real life?"
The way the Ukrainian president was treated was shocking and disrespectful.
Putin wants the old Soviet Union back (plus natural gas and a whole boat load of minerals). This has nothing to do with idealogy - it's a simple land grab balanced with geo-political gambling. He just had to wait for a dumb whale to come to the table.