Culture Study Podcast - What Does J.Lo Actually Want？

00:00:00.620 I know I knew her before this, but my most vivid J-Lo imprint on my life is when a very 1.00

00:00:08.840 cool girl freshman year decided to have a butt measuring contest in the hallway.

00:00:14.220 And this was the year 2000. 1.00

00:00:17.260 So this is when Abercrombie jeans were supposed to stay up by hanging on those little hip

00:00:21.940 bones. 1.00

00:00:22.540 You weren't supposed to have a butt.

00:00:24.360 So whoever was going to have the biggest butt was going to lose.

00:00:27.280 And I lost.

00:00:29.140 And then like an angel on a float covered in fairy dust, J-Lo entered pop culture and having a butt and having curves.

00:00:42.040 And suddenly we could wear juicy sweatpants, which are elastic.

00:00:45.900 And I just remember her as a savior to body image.

00:00:50.980 You know, it's so funny because that's been so normalized like vis-a-vis the Kardashians.

00:00:55.420 But it was very disruptive at the time.

00:00:57.980 Extremely.

00:00:58.500 She made the Kardashians.

00:01:00.160 And now it's funny because with all of her, you know, all the work she has done, but she

00:01:04.800 sells a skincare line, but then she says it's olive oil.

00:01:07.100 And it's like, obviously not olive oil.

00:01:08.660 She's doing perhaps a disservice to all of our body images.

00:01:12.240 But in the year 2000, 2001, 2002, she was the first woman with curves that I knew of 0.99

00:01:19.480 as a teenager who was treated as just as hot as Kate Moss, the heroin chic.

00:01:28.500 This is the Culture Study Podcast, and I'm Anne Helen Peterson.

00:01:35.200 And I'm Chelsea DeMontes.

00:01:37.020 I am the author of the memoir, I Shouldn't Be Telling You This,

00:01:40.440 and I host the podcast, Glamorous Trash, where we read female celebrity memoirs.

00:01:45.940 It's so good. 0.97

00:01:47.380 I don't even like celebrity memoirs, except for one.

00:01:50.080 We can talk about this later.

00:01:51.920 Oh, I do need to know which one.

00:01:53.880 Two. I need both.

00:01:55.940 Well, I used to study classic Hollywood, like, in my academic career.

00:02:00.900 And a lot of those memoirs are total, just, like, so boring.

00:02:06.460 But Gloria Swanson wrote a memoir that was released at the end of her life, which is always good, right?

00:02:13.460 It's, like, kind of like Barbara.

00:02:15.760 And it was called Swanson on Swanson.

00:02:18.880 Yes, I've heard of this one.

00:02:20.260 I think it's, like, 700 pages.

00:02:23.040 Oh, Ann, I'm so sorry.

00:02:25.180 because you're now my podcast guest for that episode

00:02:28.220 and you've booked yourself whether you wanted to or not.

00:02:31.980 And most of the listenership is like,

00:02:34.240 who's Gloria Swanson?

00:02:35.540 And I'm like, let me tell you.

00:02:37.840 But people, some of the old ones that are good,

00:02:40.380 people need to know who they are.

00:02:42.060 I mean, even Lonnie Anderson,

00:02:43.460 who is what, the 70s or 80s,

00:02:45.120 people don't know who she is anymore.

00:02:46.460 But that memoir is so good.

00:02:47.960 Didn't you do one on Delta Burke?

00:02:50.140 I did.

00:02:51.240 So I actually covered Delta Burke's memoir.

00:02:53.960 It was one of the first episodes I did on my podcast in 2020 because I just love her

00:02:58.360 so much.

00:02:58.860 And then I just got to interview her about her memoir.

00:03:03.020 And it was like her first interview in 20 years.

00:03:05.540 What?

00:03:06.520 Yeah.

00:03:07.040 Isn't that wild? 1.00

00:03:08.060 Because she was so viciously mistreated by the press. 1.00

00:03:13.040 She was. 0.99

00:03:13.800 She said, you know, I don't think I need to do any interviews for you vile monsters.

00:03:19.220 and then when I hired PR for my book she said what do you want to do like you know what kind

00:03:25.740 of things do you want to do and I said I want to send a letter to Delta Burke and she was like okay

00:03:29.520 I don't think you know how PR works because we need to what are you talking about and I was like

00:03:34.520 just do you I feel like you know people can you get her a letter from me because she was the very

00:03:40.040 first celebrity memoir I ever read and then I sent her a letter and then she came on the podcast

00:03:44.100 And I mean, the old gems of books have so much tea in them.

00:03:49.660 It's unbelievable.

00:03:50.940 Like the people who went there in an era when, you know, authenticity wasn't as hot and cool

00:03:55.620 as it is now, they went there just out for blood.

00:03:59.960 I love it.

00:04:00.700 This is actually a great segue to talking about your memoir.

00:04:03.340 How did celebrity memoirs inform yours?

00:04:05.540 Because you're a celebrity, right?

00:04:07.120 Like, you know, so how do you think about it?

00:04:09.280 Absolutely not.

00:04:09.540 To everyone who just heard my name, they went, no, she's not. No, but they did heavily influence

00:04:16.840 me in part because celebrity memoirs have always been my favorite book genre. And that is what

00:04:22.580 happens when your nearest bookstore growing up is a Walmart. And so I also grew up in small towns

00:04:28.180 and Us Weekly people, celebrity memoirs, obviously, you know, I had a library card. I read a lot, but

00:04:34.100 I wanted to be in this industry. So I always wanted to know what these women who had succeeded 1.00

00:04:38.800 in this industry had to say. And on top of that, the good celebrity memoirs have been talking about 0.63

00:04:45.400 abortion and traumatic relationships and abuse and men trying to come on to you when you're at

00:04:52.500 work and how do you still get the role and all these things that like really were not okay to

00:04:57.860 talk about. And they've been in these books this whole time. And yet we've branded them as trash

00:05:03.100 literature. And so I genuinely love the books. Listen, some of them very bad. I still enjoy

00:05:09.760 reading them, but the good ones are good. And yeah, so I just have always loved the art of

00:05:14.640 memoir. And I don't think I would have gotten the chance to write my own memoir, which I've

00:05:19.880 always wanted to do, unless I started a podcast where I cover these memoirs, which, you know,

00:05:24.280 I started it in 2020. So I think we've covered at least 150 memoirs at this point. And that is

00:05:31.700 what really helped me build the community that led to someone emailing me saying, you should

00:05:36.340 write a book. And I said, yeah, I've always wanted to do that. Please, please, anything.

00:05:41.460 What, you know, reading all of these memoirs and talking about them,

00:05:45.720 what interests you the most about the ways that celebrities learn to narrativize their own lives?

00:05:52.040 Well, I think it's definitely gendered, at least for me. And I wonder if you'll agree, 0.60

00:05:58.380 which is that women have never been able to tell their own story, especially the more famous they

00:06:04.980 get. And so our perception of these women have always been written by the male led media. And

00:06:10.420 especially if we're talking about, you know, JLo in the early 2000s, just this, the articles written

00:06:15.440 about her ass, it just unbelievable things said. And so when a woman decides to tell her own story, 0.90

00:06:21.900 to me it's incredibly healing and it's the way I want to do my trauma work like I want to fix my

00:06:30.660 body image by reading Jessica Simpson's memoir talking about how when we called her fat she was

00:06:35.820 a size four and then I want to look up those photos and now I've done 10 years of therapy

00:06:39.020 that's how I want to do it it's fun it's gossipy I'm going to learn about John Mayer showering in

00:06:43.640 her parents house like that's how I want to that's how I want to grow as a person personally

00:06:49.080 it's more fun and so I actually I'm not even a real fan of biography I really like memoir I want

00:06:55.680 to know your version of it right well and I also a very like previous lifetime I was approached to

00:07:03.480 potentially audition to ghost write one of the Jonas Brothers memoirs what does a ghost writing

00:07:10.680 audition look like oh it's more like okay so let's have a conversation about like how you would

00:07:17.040 approach this kind of thing I didn't talk like I didn't get past the point of like having a

00:07:21.460 conversation with the agent I see yes um but and I've never actually admitted this because you're

00:07:27.100 supposed to be so hush hush about it but I figure enough time it's a new era it's fine and that

00:07:33.580 process too is so fascinating to me that essentially you have someone who you tell a lot of stories to

00:07:39.040 and then that person has to figure out okay how do I turn that into a story right and the good

00:07:46.640 ghostwriters can make your book incredible and the bad ones will destroy you. Todd Gold, you know who

00:07:53.980 you are. I'm out for you. I need him to know we are enemies. He doesn't care about me. He wrote

00:07:59.500 Drew Barrymore's book when she was 14 and in rehab. And yeah, and it's so interesting too,

00:08:04.900 because haven't you felt like classically people have looked down on ghostwriters? They're like,

00:08:09.600 well, if you used a ghostwriter, it's not a real book. And all I can say about celebrity memoirs

00:08:14.040 is please use a ghostwriter and pick a good one because the people who don't, you know,

00:08:20.240 you can't just learn how to write a book the next day. It's hard stuff. And I love the ones

00:08:24.620 that use good ghostwriters. It makes the best stories. Okay. So back to JLo, I grew up in a

00:08:29.580 small town in Idaho and my primary mode of access to pop culture was through a subscription to

00:08:35.360 Entertainment Weekly. And so I like, I knew a lot about things that were happening without necessarily

00:08:43.300 like ever watching them so i knew a lot about selena before the movie came out yeah so that

00:08:50.420 was like that's one of my memories i was of that and of the song from the soundtrack dreaming of

00:08:55.940 you that was so big but j-lo didn't sing and selena sings it and then also to note i was

00:09:02.600 yes very important i also was not allowed to watch in living color the sketch show because

00:09:08.640 too risque yeah like basically everything on fox i think my mom thought was rude so like the simpsons

00:09:14.300 was rude married with children was rude listen she's not wrong they are rude so so i would sneak

00:09:20.500 shows on fox including in loving color and yesterday i was watching because i knew she 0.98

00:09:26.120 was a fly girl and i was like i saw her before i saw her like i knew her before i knew her which

00:09:32.320 is really interesting like that was my you know in living color is so much less polished than

00:09:39.480 SNL or than like any of the music videos that I was watching sneaking as well on MTV at that same

00:09:46.080 time oh yeah and it's an unpolished version of J-Lo and I think I love I love reading memoirs

00:09:53.680 for so many reasons but also you start to connect different tidbits from different books and Rosie

00:09:59.340 Perez, who was the, you know, the dance captain and boss of the Fly Girls, wrote an entire

00:10:06.080 section about J-Lo and what she was like.

00:10:08.960 And that was kind of J-Lo's like first big break.

00:10:11.320 And they almost fought each other in the street.

00:10:14.280 Yeah.

00:10:14.580 That was their beef.

00:10:15.740 Yeah.

00:10:17.040 So when we came up with the idea to do a J-Lo episode, I asked for host suggestions.

00:10:25.320 This is on Instagram.

00:10:26.100 I cannot tell you.

00:10:27.120 I think I received a hundred recommendations for you.

00:10:30.340 What?

00:10:30.700 I was wondering how I got here.

00:10:32.260 That's amazing.

00:10:33.500 Okay, thank you, everyone.

00:10:34.600 And I know that you've done,

00:10:35.880 like I was watching one of your TikToks the other day

00:10:37.760 where you're looking at the cups from the wedding.

00:10:41.440 So I know that there is some content,

00:10:43.060 but what makes you an aficionado of J-Lo?

00:10:46.940 Of Jennifer Lopez.

00:10:47.820 Well, I hate to ask this,

00:10:50.680 but have you read J-Lo's memoir?

00:10:52.560 And I'm going to use quotes when I say memoir.

00:10:54.920 I have not, but I know you have.

00:10:57.120 so her memoir is one of the most frustrating books of all time because all you want is J-Lo

00:11:07.160 and she wrote it I think in 2014 and like I was just so excited for that book and it is

00:11:11.100 mostly photos could have been a slim magazine with the amount of story in it one of those like

00:11:17.660 people commemorative magazines right yes exactly yeah yeah and most I say on my podcast you cannot

00:11:26.160 escape your book. Some piece of you always ends up in the book, even when it's just promotional

00:11:30.700 materials. But if there's one person who comes close to not being in her book, it's J-Lo. She

00:11:35.500 really tries to not be in there. And so, you know, I've always loved her, always wanted to know about

00:11:42.120 her. Her book is a huge disappointment, but it's still one of the first episodes I covered because

00:11:46.140 I remember reading it backstage. And then I think I became a Jennifer Lopez expert sincerely when I

00:11:55.800 looked at photos of her wedding and began posting it. And this is because I got married myself and

00:12:03.800 it ruined my personality. And now my for you page has wedding stuff all over it still. It was two

00:12:08.320 years ago. And so I was kind of already, I'd been through the wedding game of making all those

00:12:12.940 decisions recently. Yeah. And her wedding photos come up and all I could think is this is the,

00:12:20.620 she's the queen of weddings. It's her fifth. She knows how to plan a wedding and she's put on the

00:12:25.720 dress for all of them. She's done it. She's done all of it. And she has this like, I'm cool. I'm

00:12:31.580 Jenny from the block of the Bronx, baggy pants, jaw roll duets. Like she's cool. Right. And then

00:12:36.700 her wedding to the absolute love of her life, Ben Affleck is one of the most basic and ugliest

00:12:45.360 things you've ever seen. And I couldn't wrap my head around it. I was like, how are these live

00:12:50.720 love signs there. How are Christmas tree garlands wrapped in pearls next to this Georgia foliage,

00:13:00.160 which is a totally different climate. And the wedding dress choice itself, it was like

00:13:04.660 dressing to be different versus dressing to be yourself. And then I found these cups that she

00:13:11.540 had at her wedding. And then those cups have ruined my life. And that's the TikTok you watched.

00:13:15.480 And I felt I entered a space where I understood her taste for the first time.

00:13:21.360 Yes.

00:13:22.180 And that has changed how I look at her in her career.

00:13:26.120 I think that the documentary does something similar.

00:13:30.720 And I think that it's like part of it is that she has aged into it and she has complete freedom.

00:13:36.000 Yeah.

00:13:36.240 So that's part of it.

00:13:36.980 But before we get too deep into this, I think we should start with the questions because this will give us an opportunity to talk about all of these things.

00:13:42.960 I love it.

00:13:43.600 I was somewhat surprised by how many of the questions we received were kind of dogging on her because I really like her.

00:13:51.260 Like, I really like her.

00:13:52.780 She's a likable celebrity. 0.97

00:13:55.140 Yeah, absolutely. 1.00

00:13:56.320 She's our rom-com queen. 0.99

00:13:57.640 You can't star in that many rom-coms without being wildly likable because that's what they require of rom-com leads. 1.00

00:14:04.340 The most likable woman on earth.

00:14:06.020 And, like, the whole narrative of what's happened with Ben Affleck.

00:14:09.020 Like, oh, my gosh.

00:14:10.100 Like, I was absolutely riveted.

00:14:13.600 But I think that since the documentary and the movie, which like no one has seen the movie, but the documentary, there's been a little bit of a shift. So let's get to the questions. This is this first one is from Stephanie.

00:14:27.020 It feels like a lot of recent criticism of J-Lo is rooted in sexism and classism, but also like people haven't been paying attention to who she is and what she's been doing for the past 30 years.

00:14:40.800 Why does being with Ben change the way that people look at her?

00:14:45.260 Okay, so I think we have to remember all of the discourse around the first iteration of Bennifer.

00:14:52.580 Like, what do you remember from that time in the early 2000s?

00:14:56.060 i remember he kissed her butt oh my god beautiful slow kiss

00:15:01.020 i remember that to me that reaction was actually a very racist and sexist reaction yeah of you know

00:15:12.700 he had been with gwyneth paltrow and to see him with j-lo kind of broke her mind i think the only

00:15:17.640 thing that made it make sense is a meme i saw which was imagine both of their most recent exes

00:15:22.100 dating, which would have been P. Diddy and Gwyneth Paltrow. And then you sort of are like,

00:15:26.220 okay, I see how this is odd to people. And I remember that they called off their wedding

00:15:30.600 three days, three days before they were to walk down the aisle, which means those doves were paid

00:15:36.940 for. That is some Julia Roberts and Kiefer Sutherland shit, which is knowledge for any

00:15:43.260 of the real ones who know all about like early nineties gossip like me. But there was just like

00:15:48.820 this overexposure right and when we talk about overexposure oftentimes like it's a way of saying

00:15:54.340 that like they're too much they're too trashy in some way like they coveted or sought attention

00:16:00.940 in a way that was unbecoming and i do think that there are often class connotations with 0.98

00:16:07.280 that understanding like she wanted fame too much yeah and she needed to recede from the spotlight 0.92

00:16:14.000 Right. And like and now it seems like that really was the cause of the demise of their relationship.

00:16:18.980 Like we kind of understood that at the time, but it wasn't, you know, fully acknowledged.

00:16:23.100 It's interesting because had she just shown up and been like, I'd like a job and I'd like to be an actress, people would have said, you're being too much.

00:16:32.120 You want too much. You're trying to be famous. You're a diva bitch. Get out of here.

00:16:35.720 Like that's no question. What's fascinating about JLo is that she really did want fame and does and currently can't let it go. 1.00

00:16:44.240 She's in a phase of life where she could just be with Ben, but she's got to make her movie about it.

00:16:49.840 And that's always been the thing about her, which is that, and Rosie Perez stated it,

00:16:54.340 everyone who's known her says she goes after what she wants and she won't let go and she'll push for it.

00:17:00.540 So I think people were reacting in an ignorant way and also picking up something a little true.

00:17:07.360 And, I mean, the word we have for that is that she is incredibly ambitious.

00:17:11.320 Yeah. 1.00

00:17:11.900 Worst thing a woman can be. 1.00

00:17:13.320 I think sometimes, you know, Beyonce is also incredibly ambitious. But there is a little bit of a difference in talent. And I like, I don't say that in a mean way, right? Like, I think that JLo is probably just as good of a dancer as Beyonce. 1.00

00:17:31.840 I think JLo is an incredible dancer. I mean, I would actually, I would put her dancing as her top, top talent.

00:17:38.400 Yes. Same. Melody, because she's a wee baby who was a child in 2000, she didn't know the way that J-Lo came to fame, right? Which was that she was a dancer first.

00:17:54.800 Yeah. And then gets cast in Selena and becomes more of a movie star and then becomes really a 0.99

00:18:05.020 singer. Right. Like it's not until 99. Right. Is the first album. Yeah. And it's really Tommy

00:18:11.640 Mottola trying to ruin Mariah Carey's life. That makes J-Lo's career. I mean, that's just.

00:18:17.140 Yeah. Tell me more about this. Tell me more about this. So you can read multiple sources. But like

00:18:22.760 I said, my favorite would be Mariah Carey's memoir, where she writes chapters about this.

00:18:27.980 And you know, Mariah Carey famously gives the quotes. I don't know her. That's how much she

00:18:32.060 hates J-Lo. And it's a tough female feud because it really is Tommy Mottola's fault. Yes. And now

00:18:39.540 these two women hate each other. But Mariah Carey divorces Tommy. She married him when she was 18. 1.00

00:18:43.980 He was 20 years her senior. It was a horrible existence. Yeah. She gets free. Like I even knew

00:18:48.280 that as a teen, right? Oh, yeah. So she finally gets free and he does what every powerful man

00:18:57.120 does when a woman divorces him. He says, let's find ways to ruin her. I have money. And he finds

00:19:04.540 the way he's going to do this is via J-Lo. And he steals songs that Mariah Carey was going to use

00:19:11.680 in glitter and gives them to J-Lo. When Mariah Carey is doing a duet with Ja Rule, he finds a

00:19:19.440 producer and says, get a Ja Rule duet with J-Lo and get it out before the Mariah Carey one.

00:19:25.720 And that was Ain't That Funny? I think it might have been I'm Real.

00:19:29.960 Oh, I'm Real. Yeah. And he is building J-Lo piece by piece as a machine to drive Mariah

00:19:40.120 Carey crazy and it works. And I think what's on the table is how much did JLo know? How much was

00:19:46.620 she a participant in this? And it doesn't seem to matter to Mariah because she'll just hate her 1.00

00:19:53.480 forever. And Tommy always told Mariah, you'll never survive without me. You'll never survive

00:19:57.100 without me. And then her first project, Glitter, totally bombs. So the thing that the abusive man 0.91

00:20:04.080 said to her came true. You can't do it without me. And then JLo rises as Mariah Carey has her

00:20:09.900 breakdown and jayla rises she rises and rises and rises and then we get like jiggly right that

00:20:17.640 that like essentially like that's a turning point in her start so overexposure breakup with ben

00:20:25.860 recedes and still has like you know is still in the public consciousness she marries mark antony

00:20:32.360 she has twins i think she was just kind of hanging out there as like oh we know who jaylo is until

00:20:38.900 somewhat recently and that has reignited some of these discourses around this like her original

00:20:46.780 rise to fame and like the idea that she doesn't sing right like well that one yeah so we have to

00:20:53.180 talk about the idea that she can't sing so yeah you know with the tide turning there are now

00:20:58.360 singers on tiktok saying i am the jenny from the block singer and singing it and you know

00:21:04.840 or Ashanti being on the tracks, the original tracks. And, you know, I, it's interesting

00:21:10.580 because I think five years ago I tweeted some joke. I wish I could remember it, but it's something

00:21:14.900 like, I love that JLo is a singer. Cause it means I'm a singer. We're all singers. And I

00:21:22.180 was run off the internet for a hot second. People were like, how dare you? And now the perception

00:21:31.280 is totally flipped and I think that became clear when she sang at the inauguration do you remember

00:21:38.000 this yeah yeah and but this is the this is key about J-Lo to know to know you can hear you you

00:21:47.060 know your own voice and you're gonna sing live at the inauguration and you cannot sing from sea to

00:21:55.880 so you're gonna lower the key of that note we're not gonna hit that note so you gotta lower the

00:22:04.980 key of that song you're not even gonna choose a different song that wasn't even the whole song

00:22:08.940 you were singing you were singing this land is your land just stick with that one and but this

00:22:14.420 dogged persistence she has that made her so successful in the beginning made her one of the

00:22:20.480 first few latina stars to break through and star in rom-coms is now i feel her undoing she's got

00:22:27.640 to do the therapy thing we all do where you realize that one quality you had as a kid that

00:22:31.420 helped you survive is now hurting you yes yes no and i think you see this in the documentary too

00:22:37.740 like she just she wants it so bad and you can tell that it's torturing her like she is it makes her

00:22:43.560 really unhappy yeah that she can't succeed with this movie right that she wants to do this i love

00:22:52.560 that you keep calling it a movie you know twitter called it a minute made lemonade and i've never

00:22:57.360 been able to get that out of my head i haven't seen it i have i've only seen clips from it you

00:23:02.740 haven't seen it no but the way that it i've seen clips from it i couldn't bring myself to watch it

00:23:08.120 because i knew from the way that she talked like all these characters who are playing like the

00:23:13.200 signs, right? Like all of the shots that they do of the weddings. I had a watch party for its

00:23:19.740 debut. The moment it was streaming a veil, I had 20 people in my living room. We drank a Lola and

00:23:24.660 we watched. What's your take on it? So I say this with love because I've done it. Now, the difference

00:23:33.900 between me and JLo is that mine's still private on Vimeo and hers was made for $20 million and

00:23:39.860 she did a docuseries of it but it's very your first film it's very your college collage and

00:23:47.560 i love in the documentary when ben is trying to stop her from making certain decisions but

00:23:54.220 it is such it is just a collage of ideas and she's also someone who will not she wants to

00:24:01.000 play in the realm of authenticity but also will not let herself be herself right right right like

00:24:06.020 there's no she doesn't know what the there there is she thinks that like having herself as a kid

00:24:11.380 is somehow like doing some real yeah like doing real work right yes yes but this goes back to the

00:24:18.120 taste thing with her that like where where i think j-lo breaks our brains because you know she's cool

00:24:25.400 she's artsy she's doing this film she's like running around with it but it's like the thesis

00:24:30.240 of the film is astrology is real and good and is the reason I've been divorced. The thesis

00:24:36.500 is I was with the wrong astrological sign. J-Lo is, her name, she's giving Trishlin at the Cherry

00:24:47.160 Wood Mall in Minnesota, picking out a fun pillow that says another day, another sleigh. That is

00:24:52.360 J-Lo. She is her bedazzled Starbucks cup, but we refuse to mesh the two together of her taste 1.00

00:24:59.780 and what we think she is right right she's not like you know like beyonce's like weaving together

00:25:06.440 all of these like his like beyonce has done the reading like beyonce has taken a graduate class

00:25:12.240 in like thinking through some of these ideas about like what is genre genre is unstable

00:25:17.480 what is country music what are all the roots of country music what symbolism and activism

00:25:23.940 Yeah.

00:25:24.280 Right.

00:25:25.260 Like, I don't think that this means that J-Lo's a worse person.

00:25:29.820 She's just a different person.

00:25:31.980 It's taste. 0.98

00:25:34.260 It's taste.

00:25:35.700 If someone, you know, it really is her taste.

00:25:39.200 You can see it in the wedding decor.

00:25:41.340 You can see it in the Starbucks cup.

00:25:43.140 You can see it in her movie where, oh, you can see it in her 73 questions.

00:25:49.160 where I think they say

00:25:51.880 everything she says

00:25:53.660 is the thought you had

00:25:55.660 when you were 20

00:25:56.500 you know

00:25:57.460 and it does matter

00:25:58.880 so it's like

00:25:59.400 the other theme of the movie

00:26:00.820 is you can't love

00:26:02.320 anyone else

00:26:03.140 until you love yourself

00:26:04.420 great good message

00:26:05.980 but

00:26:06.240 we know

00:26:08.120 we know

00:26:09.020 I gave that advice

00:26:10.360 to people

00:26:10.820 when I was 20

00:26:11.700 right

00:26:12.040 and also like

00:26:13.100 that's like youth group advice

00:26:14.460 that's like what

00:26:15.260 this is

00:26:15.980 this is our level one

00:26:17.460 and she's

00:26:18.560 But she's giving it to us as her, you know, she's 50 years old and has finally done her own project fully by herself.

00:26:25.260 And this is what she has to pass on.

00:26:27.640 But she's like that with a lot of things where it's like she's got that first thought idea.

00:26:34.500 It's like the novel that she needed to write, but she didn't need to release it.

00:26:37.740 But she doesn't know how to do that.

00:26:39.060 Like she only knows how to perform in public, right?

00:26:41.740 It's not real.

00:26:43.420 It's not the novel she needs.

00:26:44.700 She still hasn't done it.

00:26:45.840 That movie talking about why she had so many relationships and then ends back up with Ben, it's because he was the right astrological sign and she fixed the heart factory by loving herself.

00:26:59.340 That's not it.

00:27:00.540 No, no, no, no.

00:27:01.560 That's not it.

00:27:02.940 That's not why you called up your wedding three days prior to Ben Affleck and within six months are married to Marc Anthony.

00:27:11.200 That can't be it.

00:27:15.840 Hey, it's Anne. I wanted to give you a heads up on some of the episodes we're working on

00:27:21.360 so you can submit your questions. Next week, we're recording with a guest host who wrote a

00:27:25.800 memoir about her former life as a trad wife. What do you want to ask her about that experience

00:27:30.940 and about the fascination with trad wives right now? Later this month, we'll be recording with 0.96

00:27:36.880 Nick Kwa about something kind of meta, the state of podcasting today. Whatever you want to know

00:27:42.140 about this weird and struggling industry, Nick can answer. We're also working on a show about

00:27:46.900 cooking that we're still kind of trying to figure out. It's something like, why does the internet

00:27:51.560 make finding something to cook feel overwhelming? But also, what does it mean that we can all find

00:27:57.000 and cook recipes from other cultures? And also, how does cooking tie you to your roots or not?

00:28:03.100 So something, something about the internet and cooking, we need your questions to help us figure

00:28:07.160 it out and as always if none of these shows inspire you tell us what you would like to hear

00:28:13.140 you can submit questions and show ideas in the same place it's at tinyurl.com slash culture

00:28:20.400 study pod thank you so much for being such a huge part of what makes this show so fun to make

00:28:26.860 and to listen to we literally cannot do it without you okay back to the show

00:28:31.720 Okay. So next question I think is about aging in public. And I think we have to talk about this.

00:28:38.860 So let's hear from Joanna. Why is J-Lo still doing the Anjanew thing? It is wild to me that

00:28:44.680 I, a fully fledged middle-aged woman, am all the way in my comfy pants and flat shoes era while

00:28:50.260 she, 10 years my senior, keeps trying to play the young babe. Is there any hope that she will give

00:28:56.200 us middle-aged people some real representation? It only kind of works. Genetics and plastics only 0.88

00:29:02.400 get you so far. What gives? Okay. I have complicated feelings about this because I've

00:29:09.500 watched and I've written about what has happened with Madonna, right? Like just the incredibly

00:29:15.880 exacting standards that we have that somehow you should not age. Yeah. But if you try to keep

00:29:21.860 yourself young you become monstrous right actually and i think that j-lo feels most herself

00:29:29.860 and again this is probably in part because she hasn't done some of that harder

00:29:34.420 interior work she feels most herself when she looks the way that she looks when she was 30

00:29:42.060 yeah this one's a hard one for me because i love it i love it yes i want to see i mean what does

00:29:49.960 She went 52, 53, and she's like –

00:29:52.600 She's almost 55.

00:29:54.040 Yeah.

00:29:54.300 All I wear are crop tops, stilettos.

00:29:56.460 I looked better than an AI version of me in the movie Hustlers by all that olive oil or whatever she uses.

00:30:05.140 And she's just going to be the hottest thing forever.

00:30:09.120 I actually think we've got some great other representation. 0.62

00:30:12.520 And I like – I love that J-Lo is delivering sex pot well into her 50s.

00:30:18.000 I love it.

00:30:18.740 I think it's fantastic.

00:30:19.960 There's that meme that says, here's what we thought of women when they were 50 years old in, I believe it's the 80s. 0.81

00:30:26.840 Right, it was like the Golden Girls.

00:30:28.580 Yeah, and then it's, and the other picture is J-Lo at 50.

00:30:31.540 And I think this is just a different type of representation for women.

00:30:34.620 I'm here for it.

00:30:35.660 Yeah, and you know, I always feel like there's these conversations about, or at least I hear them in like everyday life.

00:30:41.420 Like, oh, are these shorts like too short for me at my age, right?

00:30:46.180 Is this too young?

00:30:47.280 and what like where what makes you feel good and I think we've gotten to that point when it comes to

00:30:55.000 body image in a lot of other ways at least like you know collectively like that is how we we've

00:31:01.840 agreed that we can talk that way but also I think we're still stuck in some funky age stuff in terms

00:31:06.940 of absolutely but I mean why is why are they wearing a crop top when they're over the age of

00:31:11.560 50 and you know what everyone stay in touch because you'll see me in a bikini at 71 and I

00:31:17.340 I mean I I and I plan to do it I think you know Dolly Parton just wore the Dallas Cowboys cheerleader

00:31:23.720 uniform which is a full midriff and she had a full Spanx bodysuit on underneath which I respect

00:31:28.920 and I think it's interesting who we let be sexy for how long yeah and I it's just like you said 0.99

00:31:40.800 if J-Lo looked an inch different, she'd be punished by so many people economically, 0.77

00:31:47.020 career-wise, the roles she gets. She's doing what everyone wants, which is to look like you're 28.

00:31:54.520 However, my favorite part of the documentary is when Ben is like, why are you writing your,

00:32:01.900 why are you saying your age is 28? Yes, it's the best part. And it's so wild because she cast her

00:32:09.220 real group of friends as real 28 year olds but then she's sitting with them being like right guys

00:32:15.340 like this is the friend group and it's like wait this was not the correct decision why why

00:32:22.820 uh yeah no i think she's that's where she's living right like that is where

00:32:28.580 that is where she feels comfortable and like i hope that she doesn't i don't know enough about 1.00

00:32:35.420 like her the way that she regimes her body like obviously she works out all the time i i know that 1.00

00:32:40.040 she does that and she puts that all over her instagram but i hope she's not like i hope she 1.00

00:32:44.680 still eats things right like i hope she well i mean you know they called her fat and heavy set

00:32:51.180 when she was auditioning to be a fly girl those words are written in rosie's book is something i 0.99

00:32:55.220 think keenan said about her and their whole thing was you have to lose weight and that happened to

00:33:00.200 when she's what 18 19 20 as the the barrier between are you gonna make it in life or not

00:33:05.820 you know she's she's a product of that yep and i don't think she's eating and i love that wish

00:33:11.300 beautiful i mean like there and there's grace that we can offer to people who have were so

00:33:16.940 firmly ensconced and are so firmly ensconced in that understanding of like self-value it's hard

00:33:23.380 but yeah it is really hard stuff like you said there are a lot of other examples of people

00:33:28.540 who have chosen different ways to age.

00:33:32.040 And I think like not everyone has to take the same avenue. 0.98

00:33:35.620 Yeah, I think that diversity to women's aging

00:33:38.260 is actually better for us than, I don't know,

00:33:42.120 a homogenized version. 1.00

00:33:43.200 And don't forget, she's got a bedazzled Starbucks cup

00:33:46.720 with the Starbucks logo, also bedazzled.

00:33:50.620 So she's delivering some,

00:33:53.160 I would call that a staunchly 51-year-old take on coffee.

00:33:58.540 how old is bradley cooper hold on let's let's i'm gonna google this age bradley cooper is 49

00:34:06.360 so he is not that much younger than j-lo yeah and no one's like why is bradley cooper going to hang

00:34:14.140 out at taylor swift concerts and and dating is it gigi hadid or bella hadid gg gg he is wearing

00:34:24.300 giant beanies oversized blazers and sweatpants that sweep the floor because baggy is in for

00:34:31.520 ginsy with his young girlfriend like cruise in new york and everyone's like what a funny thing

00:34:36.600 to wear versus like stop i just googled too channing tatum is 44 and people aren't like

00:34:46.560 you know what you should stop trying to be so cut like yeah so freaking out

00:34:50.540 okay next question this I need some help with because I haven't seen all of the things that

00:34:58.100 are referenced in this so uh this is acknowledging that J-Lo does not make her image on her own

00:35:03.760 no celebrity makes their image on their own it's also like an image is the collection of things

00:35:08.340 that people say about the celebrity so let's hear the question from Anna which Melody is going to

00:35:14.880 read. How did an A-list celebrity and her team lose such control of the narrative? The TikTok

00:35:21.300 misinformation and also legitimate ribbing seems like it's permanently altered her public image.

00:35:27.200 To me, JLo is a great famous person, but it seems like great swaths of the celebrity watching

00:35:32.060 population now really dislike her. Okay, I want to start first with us talking about the first part

00:35:38.740 in which I agree so much, which is that she is a great famous person. What makes her such a great

00:35:44.820 famous person. I do think it goes back to that likability, which is fascinating because she

00:35:52.840 didn't have it at the beginning of her career. She actually was quite vicious and it's a learned

00:35:58.260 likability. And it's also one that means she needs to stop trying to do these documentaries where you 1.00

00:36:03.600 have to be authentic because you need to learn how to be unlikable in those places and she won't let

00:36:08.760 it go. I also think it's because her talent is being her image and her personality and her

00:36:16.980 persona. She's a great performer. You don't go, oh, what a great singer. What a great actress.

00:36:21.600 What a great performer. And her fashion is always giving. And that's important. The Versace dress, 0.54

00:36:28.400 she's always delivering looks. When she's getting groceries, she's got to look on. That's a lot of

00:36:33.480 work yeah that's what i think what do you think yeah i think she also she has charisma like she

00:36:40.040 does i just think you can't argue with that um and that's something that can't be taught

00:36:44.160 it can be amplified but it can't it's either there or it's not i think of her like laughing

00:36:49.980 like she always she seems like she's having a good time being a celebrity right this has always been

00:36:56.120 the thing about her and the contrast between her and ben is that like j-lo's like i love being a

00:37:03.060 celebrity. And Ben has never liked being a celebrity. Yeah. And, you know, in every documentary

00:37:10.060 she does, she says, no one will ever know what I think or how I feel. That's who I am. Right.

00:37:14.440 So it's true. And I think for most of our years with celebrities, perhaps until this one,

00:37:21.360 that is the way to crush being a celebrity. Don't lose your shit on paparazzi. Don't say the wrong

00:37:25.920 thing. Don't show that you're bored at the very boring awards show that Ben is showing on his

00:37:30.940 face. I think this year is a turn of, of wanting authenticity and having access to it on TikTok and

00:37:39.900 all these places where what's made her so great isn't working anymore. Yeah. Can we talk a little

00:37:45.360 bit about this? What's happening on TikTok? Because first of all, I don't think that the

00:37:50.260 conversations that happen on TikTok are actually things that the vast majority of the celebrity

00:37:55.420 consuming public actually knows in any way I would say that the vast majority of America especially

00:38:01.780 over the age of 30 still thinks of JLo kind of the same way that they did yeah five years ago

00:38:08.620 if you're on TikTok she's she ain't I don't think she's coming back on TikTok that doesn't mean that

00:38:15.320 she can't come back in other spaces and I still think she's a people magazine favorite and she

00:38:19.340 just ran. Yes. But yes, TikTok has her number in a few ways and in a few ways that I think are 1.00

00:38:25.540 unfair, too. There's a bunch of videos that I wouldn't quite give credence to that have become

00:38:30.660 quite viral. Like what? Can you give me an example? So the ones where I'm like, yes,

00:38:37.200 this is real. They're they're pulling her 73 questions where the guy's like, so what's your

00:38:41.680 order at the bodega? And he puts a little thing on it. He's like, oh, right. And she gives her

00:38:47.560 bodega order. And then every one, why was that question in the 73 questions? I feel it's just

00:38:52.360 so clear that her team asked for it. That guy's not asking that question to Nicole Kidman when

00:38:56.480 he does her 73 questions. And then her order makes no sense. It's like ham and cheese on a roll

00:39:01.120 with a small bag of chips and an orange drink. And everyone is on TikTok being like, what the

00:39:06.000 everyone from the Bronx is like, we don't know what an orange drink is. But she's like, if you

00:39:09.540 know, you know. And they're like, we don't. What is this? So it feels like an orange Julius.

00:39:13.540 like what is it supposed to be if it was an orange julius i'm like yeah let's go to the mall

00:39:18.860 let's get an orange julius but i think like people she she specifically looks at the camera and says

00:39:24.040 if you know you know so she's she's trying to be like right everyone in the bronx on the block

00:39:29.760 where i lived where i was jenny and all of tiktok went no yeah um so things like that i'm like yeah

00:39:36.280 you know they got under the hood there there's other videos where it's like she doesn't tip well

00:39:41.400 she won't look you in the eyes. And she, you know, her, her ensemble, that's not what it's 0.80

00:39:47.420 called. Her entourage. Entourage. Her entourage is like very rude at restaurants. And that's where

00:39:55.280 I sort of have a sliding scale because the amount of times I've heard of a celebrity who doesn't

00:40:00.820 allow other people to look them in the eyes is too many for all of them to be true. Right.

00:40:04.740 Right. I just don't, you know, or it was like some, you know, some member being like, hey,

00:40:09.460 don't look at jello she walks by i'm sure that's true i'm sure they were rude at that restaurant

00:40:12.960 but i just think those things have more of a personalized take on them than uh an entire like

00:40:19.220 we can say this is fact did she try to make a tiktok herself no or just excerpts from the like

00:40:28.220 the questions and that sort of thing no no yeah it was just people pulling the 73 questions

00:40:32.880 themselves pulling clips of it that the other big thing is that there was this woman who made a

00:40:37.400 bunch of JLo videos and JLo's team sued for copyrights because it's the way to get these

00:40:43.560 videos that are going quite viral about her, way to get them taken down. And so this woman is like

00:40:49.480 very upset she's lost her accounts. There's so many copyright notices and her team has gone

00:40:53.880 through and made them all. And this woman later dies. And TikTok was like, JLo killed her. Now, 0.53

00:41:03.740 obviously I don't that's not true yeah but so that's where it's like I think TikTok is like

00:41:09.500 really gone right too far however you know this woman did make these videos about her and talk

00:41:15.380 about her and like really sadly has passed away I think that what this suggests to me is that

00:41:20.660 there's something about JLo's personality that is not quite amenable to the way that

00:41:26.960 tiktok handles celebrity to me j-lo is such a young gen x millennial celebrity who looks like

00:41:34.600 a gen z skin wise see and that's right and so like that makes her vulnerable yes to this critique in

00:41:43.320 a way that like i'm trying to think of a contemporary like i mean reese witherspoon

00:41:48.800 i've seen some of her stuff like on reels and stuff like that but she's not trying to be like

00:41:53.100 she has kids who are that age who are gen z-ers and so she there's less of that like reese had

00:41:59.760 put out a movie and a docuseries this i think the same thing she would get arrested yeah yeah yeah

00:42:04.640 for sure yeah and and i do think uh you know it's like it's weird that one of her first songs is

00:42:10.720 called i'm real because jayla refuses to be real and tiktok is about authenticity right can we talk

00:42:18.080 about the how did her team lose the narrative? Yeah. Okay. Yes, please. Because so this is what

00:42:24.580 this was what blew my mind when I was reading her book. She talks about her manager, Benny,

00:42:28.860 and everyone will talk about Benny as like, that's the first person you're going to hear from. And

00:42:32.740 he's like this real brutish force in the industry. Benny Medina, his true real life story is how

00:42:40.680 the Fresh Prince of Bel-Air became a show. So that's his life story that then gets pitched to

00:42:46.900 become the fresh prince of bel-air and he's been on the team the whole time and has had this very

00:42:54.780 specific narrow way of looking at the industry that really worked back then and he's still

00:42:59.680 trying to play it now and it doesn't work anymore and no one in her they're all so insulated they've

00:43:06.800 all been doing the same thing for so long they they really need a bold intern who's ready to

00:43:11.720 get fired to speak up and say something right because what isn't it her agent who's in the

00:43:17.980 documentary who also has been with her forever right yeah and a producer um yeah yeah and like

00:43:25.120 her wardrobe everything everyone has been with and i that loyalty i understand it right it's like

00:43:30.540 these people get me they probably don't say no to me as often how can you they're all on the payroll

00:43:37.960 and oh this is what's so important oh I'm so glad I didn't forget to say this she lost her best

00:43:44.280 friend she and Leah Remini had a quiet friend breakup she does not have her female best friend

00:43:51.280 to stand there and say don't do that what the fuck is this not that this this they're not friends

00:43:56.100 anymore she wasn't at the wedding to Ben and yet her photo is the one that Leah Remini's photo is

00:44:02.460 the one that leaked her and Ben being together so you can see this time span when they stop being

00:44:07.620 friends and i think leah wasn't on the payroll leah was her friend and i don't think she has

00:44:13.020 enough of those people anymore yeah i mean we say this about like you know ceos like whatever like

00:44:18.820 you need someone who is going to say real shit to you and say like maybe maybe no about how did you

00:44:27.940 say 20 million dollars i think we could take a tax credit on that if we put it in the trash 0.57

00:44:32.080 maybe the fact that no studio wants to make your movie is a sign right like oh i think that's the

00:44:38.680 most painful thing because you know whatever people ask me for advice my number one piece

00:44:43.360 of advice is make your own work no one knows what they're doing make your own work you have to prove

00:44:46.960 it to them and then j-lo took 20 million dollars and in the docuseries says what if it's great

00:44:51.160 what if everyone's wrong and it's great and then it and then she kind of was the thesis of like

00:44:56.560 yeah sometimes when you make your own work it doesn't go well and that's an important lesson

00:44:59.920 too yes i still love her though i still love her i do too this is the thing is i love her so much

00:45:06.780 and she's such a good celebrity and she do you get her newsletter of course i do of course i do and

00:45:14.040 hello if you are listening person who makes j-lo's newsletter you cannot put pictures in

00:45:20.780 the newsletter and make them an inch by an inch no make them bigger my friend i don't know who's

00:45:25.900 making you do this and also whoever's designing her merch they gotta be fired did you see the

00:45:32.020 merch this is me now it was a forest green hoodie and it was this is me now was printed on the back

00:45:40.440 but on the shoulder then on the back and then on the shoulder which means anytime someone moved

00:45:46.260 their arms it would be like hissism it was what's going on you guys oh and on her her whole motif

00:45:55.620 was subway stops you gotta get a better artist in there that's not you now that also well i you

00:46:02.380 know going back to the fact that she's kind of basic even like the the title of the documentary

00:46:08.340 is the greatest love story never told like also you still never told it come on yeah i know you

00:46:17.440 got back together with ben in the pandemic after a 20-year separation how who called who and how

00:46:25.600 how does jennifer garner feel watching an entire movie be made about how you and ben were destiny

00:46:30.700 which means the previous 20 years of your lives were tangents three kids three how does mark

00:46:35.940 antony feel i you know i'm not so concerned with him i know and i and i really like jennifer garner

00:46:43.680 a lot um and so i i do think she probably is like huh interesting i mean uh if my if my husband and

00:46:52.520 divorced and he ended up with someone he even went on one date with before me i would drive my

00:47:00.920 car into their house i i feel like well you already knew her what what what i felt kind of

00:47:10.060 dirty wishing in the documentary for so much more ben like he was my favorite part yeah and i think

00:47:17.100 it's because he is so bad at being a celebrity that the things that he says was when you're bad

00:47:22.980 at being a celebrity you can either be super boring right and just like so banal or you can

00:47:28.920 inadvertently say things and make faces that like give away the truth right so like every time that

00:47:34.900 like ben is sucking on a cigarette and just like miserable with his duncan's iced coffee like i'm

00:47:40.980 like oh right like he is he is so compelling and likable in that documentary and also

00:47:47.980 the scenes with them together i i am not and i am so fine if if one day i realize i'm so wrong

00:47:56.660 about this but like i'm not here for the like he hates being with j-lo and she makes him miserable

00:48:01.660 i mean oh no that man was on raya okay yeah he was he was out and about it's not like there was

00:48:08.560 no one for Ben to choose and I think they really do love each other and I do too I think he is the

00:48:15.400 only person in her life saying like don't well I don't know that script still went to they still

00:48:21.760 filmed it I don't know he razzes her like he's the only person who can like effectively razz her

00:48:28.460 and Jane Fonda yeah and I was just going to say and Jane Fonda maybe like if she had a couple more 0.51

00:48:34.540 Jane's in her life. I truly think we can turn the ship around. And I still think we can.

00:48:40.800 Yeah. Maybe a couple more decades. But I look forward to the documentary when she's in her

00:48:45.760 70s. J-Lo is eternal for me. And I, you know, it's so funny. In the 73 questions, they say,

00:48:53.680 what would the title of your memoir be? And instead of saying, I already wrote one and it's

00:48:58.360 horrible. She said, dance again and again and again. She just gave a new title like she didn't

00:49:03.740 already memoir. And it does make me think there is a memoir coming. And if she gets the right

00:49:10.260 ghostwriter, Anne, I think it could be beautiful. Dance again and again and again. Well, you got

00:49:16.600 to change the title. That's your first job. Thank you so much. If people want to find more

00:49:24.460 of you on the internet, where can they find you? Go listen to my podcast, Glamorous Trash with

00:49:29.940 Chelsea Devontes. We have, yeah, we've got like 120, 150 episodes on there just ready for the

00:49:36.280 taking. And also I'm on Instagram at Chelsea Devontes. And the way I started my podcast was

00:49:42.580 book clubbing the books in my Instagram stories. So if that's your thing, come be a part of the

00:49:46.940 digital book club. And you know, my book is everywhere. I did the audio book too. So go

00:49:51.760 get my longest podcast yet. I hope everyone goes out and gets your memoir. It is going to be the

00:49:57.220 memoir I mean like if you've read this many celebrity memoirs like I can't imagine a better

00:50:01.560 training to write your own memoir so thank you thank you and you know for everyone listening

00:50:06.140 it is half a comedy gal memoir it's half funny and it's half absolutely harrowing trauma whatever

00:50:11.840 the opposite of J-Lo's memoir is where it's mostly pictures I did the opposite of that

00:50:16.360 um so if that's your thing go get it amazing thank you again thank you Anne so if you were

00:50:23.540 paid subscriber, right now you'd be getting the Ask Anne Anything segment. This week I'm answering

00:50:28.560 two questions. One about how to handle it when you become the default person to plan all the baby

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00:50:45.780 you can learn from the AAA segment, including how to create a low-key skincare routine, how to make

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00:52:27.160 Melody, how'd we do? So good. But also I just started Googling and like today there are rumors

00:52:33.900 going around that ben and jen are splitting no but it's a anonymous source and the the sources

00:52:41.080 are weird like it's not in people magazine what do you think of that melody yeah oh i mean if it's

00:52:45.380 not in people it's not real yeah yeah or tmz and people is my understanding yeah yeah tmz is real

00:52:52.700 i agree but allegedly he's moved out of their marital abode i don't want it to be true i don't

00:53:00.120 want it to be true oh my gosh what the the note we're gonna have to put on that if it if it comes

00:53:05.720 to be true and then me saying look i'll be wrong but i don't like that he's not happy with her

Culture Study Podcast - July 10, 2024

What Does J.Lo Actually Want？

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