Dejana

There's no way to know, but I don’t think Peggy was the only secretary Joan ever sent along to that OB/GYN for birth control, or it was an unusual step. Even if a new secretary was pretty and fashionable, it doesn't mean she'd know a lot about reliable birth control or would automatically obtain it for herself. The Pill was pretty new in 1960 and not all doctors would have prescribed it to unmarried women. Who knows, Joan might have been making appointments for many of the staff around the time Peggy started working. I think Miss Blankenship was working for Sterling Cooper before Joan was even born! She was probably not giving Ida any directives about her personal life.

Joan would send the newbie secretaries off for a gynecological exam on their first day of the job and arranged for them to be put on hormonal birth control. Sure, she wasn't physically forcing The Pill down their throats and in her own way, she was looking out for them and the firm, but that's crossing a line or ten. I wasn't around in 1960, but I don't think that was anywhere close to standard job practice even back then.

You know LeBron's accommodations are far more luxurious, but still... Here's the "Motel 6" room in question:

Zendaya and John David Washington have started and wrapped a whole movie during quarantine: More here about all the Covid safety protocols on set. I wonder how many other secret movies have been filming since the pandemic began, especially with big stars. I guess we're going to be getting a lot of movies with small casts and limited sets for the foreseeable future.

I didn't watch Person of Interest, and only saw promos during football or print ads that featured Michael Emerson and Jim Caviezel. I knew Taraji was on the show but figured she had a smaller role than them. Taraji made it clear she was not pleased about being left out of the show's promotional materials. When the show was going off the air, showrunners Greg Plageman and Jonah Nolan were doing finale press and mentioned CBS pressure to center the initial show publicity around the two white guys: Since Taraji's career had really blown up by then, you have to wonder how much of that was CYA from the old show that let her go. On the other hand, it's not like CBS primetime, especially back then, was this bastion of progressivism overall, so it's entirely believable the network wouldn't want a black woman to shine too much.

I saw it on top of the Netflix charts and wondered what in the world it was. Glossy, Stockholm Syndrome porn, it seems... 365 Days is adapted from the first book in a trilogy of Polish novels. They haven't officially been translated but English versions can be found on Wattpad, which sounds about right.

Here's what Cinemark is doing: * These theaters will all be selling concessions and presumably allowing people to consume them, so I didn't understand the outcry about the mask policies. You'll have people with their masks off the entire time because they'll be eating/drinking, or saying they are because they don't want to wear a mask, and how well will the policy be enforced once the lights go down? I'd only consider a drive-in or outdoor showing right now.

It also came up on the show that Olivia (allegedly) had bad breath. I looked up Ben and Jojo's heights: the internet says he's 6'4" and she's just under 5'4".

Since the scheduled new movies from the big studios have been delayed or sent to VOD, many of the open theaters are playing older titles, along with the movies that were playing in March and a few of the new VOD movies. The top-grossing theaters at the moment are all drive-ins, though the numbers aren't all being officially released by the studios. That is weird about Sam's Rotten Tomatoes profile not mentioning Outlander. I've never used the site that way, just looked up different movie titles, so maybe the RT bio is not a priority for his team and he's not in control of what it says. Ford v Ferrari premiered on HBO last Saturday and I really enjoyed Caitriona's role/performance.

I think that when Gabaldon originally wrote Voyager, she had Frank in mind as a cheater. Now, with many more books and years behind her and Frank fans in the fold, she's teasing some sort of retcon: "He wasn't cheating-he was off being a government spy investigating time travelers!" Or something to tie into the larger story, I'll bet.

I read the books first, but as the books went on, it was easier to see Gabaldon's heavy hand in how she painted the "obstacles" to Jamie and Claire. Her writing makes it so that Jamie has to be coerced or cajoled into sex with anyone besides Claire. When he marries another woman, it's under pressure from his sister and false pretenses (he never would have married Laoghaire if he'd known her full role in the trial). Frank seemingly cheats with a string of (younger) women and is a racist, too! A lot of white people born circa 1902* were, granted, but it seemed more like Diana wanted Frank to be really unlikable right before he died, all the better to make Claire more sympathetic and justified for spending years emotionally checked out of a marriage she chose to continue. I think Frank's plan with the gravestone is beyond convoluted but withholding the knowledge that Jamie survived Culloden? The wrong choice but one many men in his shoes would make, if he thought she'd leave forever and take the child with her. The story would be boring if everyone did the right thing. Book Roger reminded me in some ways of "Meathead" from All in the Family: a progressive with some chauvinistic tendencies. The modern book characters generally acted like people born in 1918 or the 1940s, even if they did unconventional things sometimes, while the show wants to smooth them out so they're "relatable" to contemporary viewers. That approach runs into problems when the story says Roger has lingering hangups about Bree being raped, or the modern characters interact with enslaved people and slaveholders without personally doing much to eradicate the institution on a societal level. That would not have been an expectation from a 1990s romantic sci-fi/fantasy novel but the show is being made in a different time. I wonder if people who see the show first go into the books expecting the characters to be more enlightened and are disappointed when that's not the case. *The books allude to a sizable age difference between Frank and Claire, and they married when she was 18. The show completely omitted this dynamic, or any sign that Claire/Frank might have been wrong for each other, even without the time travel.

I follow People Magazine on Twitter and today they had a story about Chuck Wicks in their timeline. I smiled to myself, thinking of the never-ending debates about "celebrity" when it comes to DWTS. He was a "singer" then, but everyone knows he was only cast because he and Julianne Hough were a couple at the time. ABC tapped into the Bachelor franchise for a "star" in its very first season, so that's nothing new, but I do find it a little odd that they're picking Kaitlyn now.

New time slot: https://people.com/tv/abc-reveals-the-bachelorette-now-airing-on-tuesdays-this-fall/

Rob Mills confirmed that Clare’s season will film before they get to Matt, so she's not being shoved aside for anyone. Rob also says they've received a record number of applications for Matt's season. https://onairwithryan.iheart.com/featured/ryan-seacrest/content/2020-06-17-abc-exec-rob-mills-reveals-how-bachelor-will-film-clarifies-clare-rumors/

The first season of DWTS had Trista as a contestant. The show is well past its peak and is likely to go with whoever will agree to do it. * Rob Mills was on Ryan Seacrest's show and confirmed that Clare was told about Matt being named Bachelor before it was announced to the public. He also confirmed Clare’s season will film before Matt's: There's more stuff about the plans for the season at the link.

I don't know, I can see the whole Cameo drama happening organically as a generational clash. Clare started in the franchise before the contestants were mostly there to build up a brand. Matt had his own fanbase before even being on the show. If not for the Rona, they would've been filming and none of this would have happened. It seemed like the active Bachelor Nation-type fans sided with Matt over Clare. I was kind of looking forward to seeing them interact on her season. Would the conflict be addressed, or would TPTB want them to pretend it never happened? How well could they have faked "thinking about starting to fall in love" with each other? Guess we'll never know.

The trailer for You Should Have Left, for anyone who hasn't seen it: When Julia Roberts was in her early 20s, she was making Steel Magnolias and Pretty Woman. Will Smith and Tom Cruise got to play grown men in star vehicles before they were 30. Now the most lucrative movie roles for actors are in franchises where they could be 30 and still playing a teenager/college kid. The timeframe of adulthood has been pushed back culturally, so 61 becomes "middle aged" to Hollywood. More people than ever are starting families later in life. I don't necessarily need an explanation about why characters have children who "seem" too old or too young for them, when it doesn't really matter to the plot of the movie. Still, a movie about a couple in a creepy house with their young child could work just as easily with the couple both being in their mid-30s or mid-40s. Even mid-20s, and have them as a religious couple who married young. It doesn't require a tremendous age gap and it's not like the world was crying out for this particular onscreen pairing, or that the story is so fresh and compelling. If it turns out the twist is that it's a resentful grown-up child from the Kevin Bacon character's prior marriage messing with them, at least there would be a point to it all.

Amanda seems the right age to play the mom of a young child and it's Kevin who's probably too old for his role. I looked around online and saw a plot description of a "middle aged writer" but 61 is stretching it at this point.

I agree Matt was only cast on Clare's season (before Covid-19 and all the protests) to be the next Bachelor, but it's not something TPTB can quite openly state. He was Tyler's hot BFF with a social media following and a cool job before they were sure about which Bachelorette they'd cast. TPTB were actually planning to be diverse for a change, but the way it's unfolded makes it look like they entirely buckled to public pressure. Then, they announce a black Bachelor and get slammed for not simultaneously unveiling their ten-point diversity initiative as well. Of course, if they'd cast differently years ago, the show wouldn't be facing such negative PR over these issues now. Heh, sucks for them. One bit of speculation I've seen about Mike Johnson being passed over this time is that picking him now would make it easier for fans/media to say Peter as Bachelor was a mistake. Considering that the show was just trying to sell him and Kelley as a win for the franchise less than a week ago, I think it will be a few years before TPTB are willing to say he was a bad lead--not a bad person, but not cut out for the top role. I used to not really care about the franchise having black leads because honestly I think this show is an exceedingly bizarre way to find love, and it's not always flattering to its participants. Did I really need or want "my people" to be a serious part of this hot mess? But other dating/marriage reality shows can be diverse, not just in terms of race but body types, age and even attractiveness, so why not The Bachelor shows, too? Maybe some diversity in front of and behind the camera would make the show less repetitive. It might help ratings, to have different ideas, and appeal to a broader audience.

The requirement that a movie had to be number one on 5 percent of the ballots to get into Best Picture, kept out movies that people would feel comfortable putting in a Top 10 list, but not as a #1. Things like Straight Outta Compton and Crazy Rich Asians probably would have made a Top 10 Best Picture race. You get animation and more blockbusters that weren't necessarily released with Oscar hopes, but were well liked and reviewed. Smaller movies with passionate support also made the race in those two years it was a Top 10.

Maybe they didn't like what they saw from him in Paradise?

Where did you see that Clare's season won't be filming until next March? Reality Steve said he's heard production will start again in July, but that didn't seem final. The networks are starved for new content because of the shutdowns. I think The Bachelor/Bachelorette will just end up airing at different times of year than normal for a while.

The pressure worked because TPTB announced Matt James as the next Bachelor this morning. That was obviously the plan, even before Covid-19, but now Matt and Clare don't have to go through the motions of pretending he might get the Final Rose. There's no word that Clare’s season isn't happening, but in her shoes, I'd be a little nervous... If it does go forward, already having the next lead in place might actually weed out more of the Wrong Reasons guys. So, this might end up working out for everyone.