The Met Gala Cometh
With Special Guest Lauren Sanchez. Plus: Rosemary Baby's getting a prequel and we wonder about Baby Reindeer.
Broads! An important PSA: The Met Gala is coming our way in less than a week, on Monday, May 6th. This year, the Costume Institute’s Spring Exhibition is “Sleeping Beauties: Reawakening Fashion,” and will include— inspiring its name — several very rare pieces from the Met’s permanent collection which are apparently “far too fragile to ever be worn again.” (As we’ve noted previously, the “ahem, Kim Kardashian” feels strongly implied there.)
Per Vogue:
This year’s 2024 Met Gala dress code is “The Garden of Time.” Inspired by J.G. Ballard's short story of the same title, written in 1962, it can be interpreted in a myriad of ways. Still, we'll likely see many floral and botanical looks grace the famed Met Gala red carpet.
In other words, as many people have also pointed out, this is fluid enough that people may be less likely to get dinged for whether they sufficiently interpret the theme, given that Anna says right there that they’ll have a wide berth.
J.G. Ballard is best known to me as the person who wrote the memoir Empire of the Sun, which Spielberg eventually adapted with Christian Bale in the starring role. (I loved this movie as a teen but have no idea how it’s held up.)1 Harper’s Bazaar kindly put together a precis about the piece in question, saying the “vivid, thought-provoking short story is often seen to act as a metaphor for the evolution of human history and the endless cycle of creation and destruction,” and theorizing that “we can expect to see plenty of floral motifs in this year's red-carpet looks,” but that “some guests may stray towards the darker end of the spectrum, embracing the sense of transience made evident in the theme, and in the book – from the inevitable doom of the aristocracy to the inability of money and beauty to halt death.”2 I hope we get more of that and less of people just scanning the invite and putting on a Princess Aurora costume or a Louis Vuitton runway look, but this also sounds like a story designed to give almost all invitees an existential crisis so… I have my doubts.
This year, the gala’s “hosts” are Jennifer Lopez, Zendaya, Bad Bunny, and Chris Hemsworth, and I am very interested in seeing what 75% of those people wear — no disrespect to Hems the Greater, who I am sure will look very handsome (and, who knows, could hugely surprise me by showing up with a giant flower on his head). I’m also, as ever, interested in what Rihanna is cooking up, although she’s out there trying to manage expectations right now: She told Extra that her look is “real simple,” “very simple,” and “very simple-ish... compared to everything I've ever done.” (She also said she’s actually showing up for dinner this time, and added, “Shout out to Anna Wintour,” which is extremely funny for some reason3.) As far as other potential guests go, it’s mostly just speculation at this point — although we know that Jeff Bezos and Lauren Sanchez will be there (see below), presumably because of their deep pockets — and Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce are rumored to be skipping, possibly because the Eras tour kicks off again in Paris on that Thursday, but maybe also because they just don’t feel like dealing4.
Whoever shows up, rest assured we will be watching! (And maybe lightly hoping that the whole endeavor is as humorously disastrous as it was last year, just because that’s entertaining.) You can see all the arrivals on Vogue.com, or on whichever of the magazine’s socials make it the easiest for your life — last year, I believe I watched everyone show up via Vogue’s YouTube channel because I could have that on my TV and still type on my laptop. Logistics! And speaking of logistics: This year, returning host La La Anthony and occasional compatriot Ashley Graham are joined by Gwendoline Christie (!!!!), as former sometimes-host Vanessa Hudgens is extremely pregnant. (This might be the only time in recorded history where the Hudge and Gwen Christie are up for the same gig.) Emma Chamberlain — always so much more charismatic to me in movement than in still photos — is also back as “Vogue’s special correspondent,” and I hope they don’t shove her into a corner again this year. (Derek Blasberg and Chloe Fineman, who did not do a good job last time, have seemingly not been invited to return in a professional capacity.) Guests are meant to start trickling in around 5:30 p.m. ET — and, as usual, we will be hosting an open thread here to discuss everything that everyone wears and/or gets into!
Live chats like this one are a perk of being a paid subscriber to Drinks With Broads, but they’re not the only perk — you also get an additional full length newsletter every Thursday (like last week’s dive into Christina Hendricks’s wedding), access to our complete archives, and all TV recaps. On that tip: Bridgerton recaps start in just a few short weeks! All this, plus the smug satisfaction that comes with supporting independent creators and the fun of yakking with your fellow Broads. Join us! It’s fun!
Lauren Sanchez at the Met?!?
It’s not an exaggeration to say that Lauren Sanchez might be the… I hesitate to say “celebrity”… how about “person of particular renown”? Okay: Lauren Sanchez might be the person of particular renown who has MOST overestimated the world’s interest in her, and LEAST backed up those assumptions with mighty chicness — or even just a display of moderately good clothes. Like, what even was this? And all those boobs at a state dinner seem like perhaps she misunderstood what was on the menu.
People piggybacked on a scoop from the ever-delightful Amy Odell to report that Anna Wintour is personally helping Sanchez with her dress for Monday’s Met Gala. I am only really linking to People’s version to yell at their fact-checkers: It’s Amy Odell. Not O’Dell. No apostrophe. No capital D. You are professionals; if you’re turning her scoop into a story for clicks, at least get her name right. Anyway: Amy’s source says that Anna Wintour is well aware that Sanchez has “poor taste” and that she’ll be intervening to make this a success. I can only imagine how this has gone.
LAUREN SANCHEZ: So I was thinking, what if we go with TIME and I dress as if I am on the cover of Time…
ANNA WINTOUR: No.
LS: There’s also GARDEN. So flowers. I could dress as a woman’s most favorite flower, THE VAGINA…
AW: No.
LS: Slow march of death… what about Sexy Grim Reaper?
AW: No.
LS: Maybe just sheer—
AW: No.
LS: Or what about—
AW: No.
LS: How—
AW: No.
LS: …
AW: No.
It’s easy to understand why Sanchez would sign off on Anna telling her what to do here: She herself has yet to establish any legitimacy in the fashion world, or really in pop culture in general, and she did also deservedly spawn a lot of jokes with how out-of-place that state dinner ensemble was. Amy Odell likened this union to Anna eventually giving Kim Kardashian the seal of approval she desperately craved, but Kim was — like it or not — at least a big, active player in the entertainment industry. Like, with her whole body and face. She was/is a brand, and at the time Kanye was also considered an asset (the little we knew), and you can understand the calculus that led Anna to decide playing ball with them made Vogue seem more contemporary. Sanchez doesn’t provide that, and isn’t near Kim’s level of being public figure. So what’s in it for Anna here? This is not the first time she has bent over backwards for Sanchez, the first being an egregious and unintentionally hilarious photo spread in Vogue (I’ve decided our coverage of that is why we seemingly got booted from Vogue’s distribution list). Is this all just about access to, or appeasing, Jeff Bezos? That’s a simplistic explanation, but I can’t think of a complicated one that makes any more sense. Maybe Anna just likes Sanchez, but that doesn’t ring true to me for some reason. Perhaps A-Dubs is eight steps ahead of us in this chess game and hopes Bezos, already the owner of the Washington Post, might want to fatten up his media portfolio should Conde fold, or try to force Vogue to go digital, or any number of other doom scenarios.
Or, and I decided this is it, Anna Wintour is simply a modern-day Henry Higgins, and when the night goes off without a hitch, she will return to her penthouse with bestie Bradley Cooper and Gigi Hadid and Roger Federer, and crow, “I do believe she did it, she did it, she did it, I said that she would do it and INDEED SHE DID,” while Tom Brady peeks through a window. Somehow, even despite May weather, sad snowflakes will flutter down onto his nose as his breath slowly fogs up the glass. “Let the time go by!!! I don’t care if I,” he whispers, “can be here on the street where you live.” Slowly, he traces a 12 in the window condensation before clearing it away.
Yep, nailed it.
— Heather
What About Bridget Jones in College? Come On, That’s Actually a Good Idea
I sat down at my desk today prepared to write an enraged screed about how we don’t need this prequel to Rosemary’s Baby because the movie is perfect and not every universe needs expanding — and then I read the description of the project and actually think it sounds pretty good. Phew! (Although good luck figuring out who can play a younger Ruth Gordon.) (Actually, if I were in charge of this project, I’d be making a deal with the devil myself to try to get Mia Farrow to do it, and if I were Mia Farrow’s agent, I’d advise against it.)
But I suspect you can understand why my knee jerk reaction to this news was negative — and I assume everyone else’s will be, too. How many reboots, prequels, and sequels does one generation have to live through? If we’ve stretched all the way back to intellectual property dating from 1968, where is it going to stop? Are we gonna get The Sound of Music 2: A Drink With Jam and Bread where we watch the Von Trapps opening their Vermont B&B, ideally somehow next door to the one on Newhart, so we can cover that base, too? Is Max going to launch a series based on Rear Window called Rear Windows wherein Jimmy Stewart has opened a detective agency where he investigates — with the help of his incredibly well-dressed girlfriend and his wise-cracking housekeeper — all kinds of nosy neighbor shenanigans? (Spoiler: They’re all murders!) Are we gonna get The Absolutely True Story of Lina Lamont?
…and does it totally undercut my rant if I now confess that I would probably watch every single one of these, and now that I’ve thought of them, I think they’re good ideas?! It does. My God! I am part of the problem! This is how this keeps happening!
— Jessica
TV Crank Needs Your Advice
Everyone is going bananas for based-on-a-true-story Baby Reindeer on Netflix, but my husband and I watched the first two episodes, and… I am really struggling to enjoy it. I know more or less where it’s going, thanks to it being all over the Internet (and the real-life stalker threatening to sue), but I don’t respond to this lead character or actor at ALL, and I found the characterization of the female lead to be… reductive? (Though the actress IS very good.) I rarely quit a show, especially on a short run, because I know these things warm up; Severance, for example, and Succession, both took a few installments to reel me in, but I would have missed out on SO much if I hadn’t stayed the course and I’m thrilled I didn’t bail. So what I’m asking is: Did any of you watch Baby Reindeer with a similar reaction, and find that it paid off to stick with it? Or should I set the wee critter free?
— Heather
Bridgerton Season Three Recap Plan
As noted above, we’re adding the newest Bridgerton season to our recap rotation. The first four episodes come out Thursday, May 16, and then the last four on Thursday, June 13 — but, my thought is not to binge them and try and stuff each drop into two massive recaps. Obviously, YOU should watch them at whatever speed you desire, but for discussion purposes, I’m thinking we do it one per week for eight weeks — you know, EXACTLY as they did with new TV shows in Regency times. It’s risky, I guess, because we’ll be talking as if many of you have not already seen what’s coming, but it also seems potentially both more satisfying and more doable? All hail the glories of teasing it out! Bring back the weekly watercooler! Hopefully the episodes themselves will bear out this approach, and I won’t have to circle back and be like, “Just kidding, nothing happened.”
The plan right now is to send these recaps out to paid subscribers on Mondays beginning May 20, which gives us one recap a week without a pause. I can’t tell if people like getting recaps over a weekend, as occasionally happened with The Traitors, but that’s also not always possible, given… you know, weekends.
Bridgerton lovers, let me know if this scheme works for you. And non-Bridgerton lovers, come join us anyway! It’s a Shonda joint, so it’s likely to be a good time.
— Heather
Last Call
— You will likely be relieved to hear that Law Roach was joking when he said he was going to explore how he could interpret “porn and hardcore sex” on the red carpet. And if you aren’t, Zendaya surely was! — J
— Fans of over-the-top weddings will definitely want to see this. Via People — which has STORMED back into the weddings market after losing so much ground to Vogue lately: “Bilt Rewards CEO Ankur Jain married former WWE wrestler and creator of KNOCKOUT Erika Hammond in Egypt over the weekend, treating guests to a four-day celebration that culminated in a ceremony and reception at the base of the Great Pyramids of Giza.” The first several career-related adjectives there read a bit like they were picked out of a hat to me but whatever: This wedding was WILDLY EXPENSIVE and I need more pics. — J
— Related to the above, this year’s Met Gala is sponsored by TikTok — an app I refuse to get, because I feel too old to learn a new app and don’t need the time-suck. This feels lightly “how do you do, fellow kids” to me, but also the US government and TikTok are in a fight, which makes this partnership a bit of a head scratcher at this moment in time. — J
— One of the dudes on America’s most fraught TV production, Yellowstone, told ET that it’s going to have “the best series finale in history,” which seems like a tall order, especially considering how many people involved in it are currently suing each other. — J
He also wrote Crash, which was adapted into arguably the modern era’s most-hated Best Picture winner.
I’m sorry that sentence read like something from the Zagat Guide.
I can only imagine the gently exasperated “please don’t stop COMING, just stop coming LATE” phone calls Anna has made. —H
I am very annoyed that I am potentially wrong about this being their red-carpet debut!!! — H
It's the most wonderful time of the year... the weeks of the Met gala sliding into Cannes are my favorites of the fashion calendar!
Love the Bridgerton plan! Yay for pacing out episodes!