WTW76: Debunking the Deranged Blake Lively Hatestorm
Hey folks, big announcement!!! Our podcast, Gavel Gavel, is now available to the public! No longer is it only available on Patreon! This series on GG, we'll be covering the Blake Lively/Justin Baldoni legal battle. It is so fascinating for a million reasons. But this is a unique and standalone WTW episode, don't worry! The Blake Lively hatestorm that happened (Lydia will catch you up if you're not familiar) was absolute nonsense. It requires a debunk, just as any anti-woke scare story does. And debunk it, we shall! If you enjoy our work, please consider leaving a 5-star review! You can always email questions, comments, and leads tolydia@seriouspod.com. Please pretty please consider becoming a patron at patreon.com/wherethereswoke!
What's so scary about the woke mob, how often you just don't see them coming.
Anywhere you see diversity, equity, and inclusion, you see Marxism and you see woke principles being pushed.
Wokeness is a virus more dangerous than any pandemic hands down.
The woke monster is here and it's coming for everything, everything, everything, everything, everything.
Instead of go-go boots, the seductress green M&M will now wear sneakers.
Hello and welcome to Where There's Woke.
This is episode 76. I'm Thomas Smith.
That over there is Lydia Smith.
How are you doing?
Hello, hello.
I am doing okay.
How are you?
- Couldn't be better. - Oh boy.
That's funny because I'm mid-mental breakdown.
It's an inside joke.
Don't worry about it.
I'm in a padded room right now.
Yeah.
Me too.
Someday I'll explain.
Yeah.
Different kind of padded room.
One of us is in an asylum.
The other is doing like a wacky tacky adventure.
Like you're having fun.
Yeah, like Velcro walls.
I'm like throwing myself on them.
Trampoline room or something.
So, big announcement.
Here's what's happening currently.
We have gone live with Gavel Gavel.
Finally, on the public feed.
It's out for everybody, for the people we've wanted to for a long time.
And the way we're doing that is by going live with our new series, with our new subject.
And that is the Blake Lively and Justin Baldoni Legal...
Drama.
It's going to be so fascinating.
Hop on over to Gavel Gavel at some point if you want to hear that and the basics on that.
So this month for Where There's Woke, we're doing a little bit of crossover, but don't worry.
If you don't want to listen to Gavel Gavel, no problem.
It's all going to be standalone.
Don't worry, because it's completely relevant to Where There's Woke.
It's like...
We've discovered over the course of looking into this, it's the same exact dynamics and people that go into these anti-woke controversies.
And it's really, I've reflected on it so much.
I'm literally, the reason I'm in an asylum right now is I'm overwhelmed with the thoughts of how many ways there are parallels here.
I don't know what to do about it, but I feel like our job has been to try to identify it and to try to debunk.
And I love a good debunk.
And this is a debunk, specifically having to do with the Blake Lively-Baldoni stuff.
So it's a debunk, and it's also highlighting just some of the same dynamics that lead us to the hell that we're currently in, where, gosh, for example, just to bring this up randomly, I just sent you at a time when Trump is shutting down the whole government and ruining everything and gutting science funding everywhere, just across.
We're just literally ruining fucking everything.
You know, gutting every single, like, environmental protection, like, scientific things, for the point I'm making.
At this time, the fucking manosphere science dinguses.
Yeah, intellectual dark web.
Yeah, those people.
Richard Dawkins.
Who was on the list?
Peter Boghossian.
Peter Boghossian.
Lawrence Krauss.
Stephen Pinker.
Those fucking buffoons.
Right now, in this moment.
In the year of not our Lord, in the year of the hell that we're in, 2025, when we're not going to be left with a fucking government and science funding, vaccines!
We have an anti-vaxxer in charge of all of that shit.
And at that time, because of the anti-woke stuff, because of the very stuff that we're trying to debunk, right now, they're releasing a book called The War on Science.
39 renowned scientists and scholars speak out about current threats to free speech, open inquiry, and the scientific process.
It's so crazy.
Right now.
And how much of them are Trump stuff, do you think?
How many of the chapters, how many of the, you know...
Like, table of contents.
I have it right here.
Yeah, you would hope it's all of them because, like, that's actually the war on science and, like, the anti-woke people won.
Like, why are we still talking about this?
You won.
Yeah, you ready for this?
Section 1, free speech, victimhood, and ideology.
So, no, not there.
Section 2, ideological corruption of academic disciplines.
And that's going to be in a different direction than maybe you might think.
Cancel culture, section three.
Section four, impact of diversity, equity, and inclusion bureaucracies on scholarship and academia and beyond.
Why are they bothering writing that?
Like, that's gone, too.
It's gone.
Yeah, it's gone.
You're writing a book about why the left ruined a thing that the right has now burned down.
Like, there's...
Elon Musk has a smoking-like torch that he just is putting out because he burned down the entire building.
And it's rubble, and he's standing on top of it, peeing on it.
And then Richard Dawkins and Lawrence Krauss are like, so the real problem here is the left.
You know, it's like, it's so worthless.
It's so fucking worthless.
And it's this same misdirection.
I mean, so much of what we are working on, broadly speaking, is this misdirection.
It's the prioritization of culture war, hot button things that are made up, mostly, pretty much mostly made up, and inevitably involve voices that want to challenge the dominant.
Hegemonic class kind of thing.
That's always what it is.
It's trans people.
It's people of color.
It's women.
Any voice, and more, by the way, gay people.
It's so many.
Just go down the list.
Basically, any non-Christian, white, male, conservative, cis person, basically.
As long as they don't agree with those people.
If they agree with the team, then that's great.
You can use their voice in order to stomp on...
As a token.
Yeah, exactly.
You can use them as a token, whether it's a black person or a woman who wants to fight against other feminists.
Happy to use them to stomp all over people.
But it's all one fucking Marvel Universe.
And I just want to talk about how many different ways this bullshit thing...
From the Blake Lively controversy that, don't worry, we'll give you enough facts to go on so you don't have to listen to, you don't have to know anything about it, you don't have to listen to Gabby Gabby if you don't want to, but you should.
So after this break, we're going to get into it.
I cannot wait to do this debunk.
It's literally demons inside me trying to get out.
They're clawing at me because it's so infuriating.
Okay, so...
If you don't mind, can you try to give people just enough info to know where we are here?
And not an inch more, nothing more, not a drop more.
Oh my gosh, that's a lot of pressure.
Okay, so essentially this all revolves around a book that was turned into a movie last summer called It Ends With Us.
Blake Lively was cast as the main character opposite Justin Baldoni, who was also the director and the head of the studio that had optioned the book from Colleen Hoover the author.
So the movie comes out, and as it's coming out, there's this kind of eruption, almost, of anti-Blake Lively media.
And it seemingly comes out of nowhere.
Some people are really confused.
Most people are just mad.
Most people latch onto it.
They jump onto it.
Yeah, and they jump onto the way they're promoting the film since the film has to do with domestic violence.
They think Blake Lively should be like, I don't know.
Pretending she's a victim the whole time or coming out with a cast on her arm.
I don't know what they expect from her, but whatever she's doing is wrong.
Audrey from Little Shop of Horrors.
Yeah, it's like, however she's doing it is wrong.
And that starts this sort of avalanche.
It's a tornado, right?
What's the metaphor for the thing?
It's like the snowball rolling down the snowballing.
That's it.
It starts small and it just collects all these different misogynists and all these different haters.
And to the point where you get to the bottom and that snowball includes a lot of normal people.
Like that's what's so pernicious about it.
Like by the time you get to the bottom, there's so many people who I don't think would ever think they're sexist or piling on.
And they just see, oh, man, I don't like this person.
And here's why.
There's these couple little things and they are the worst and we all hate this person.
Yeah.
And one of the biggest pieces during that snowballing that went very viral, you had mentioned, you know, like to the point where you even saw it.
I saw it on Reddit.
I was so confused.
I saw it.
I was like, what is this?
What the fuck is this?
Okay.
And then I forgot because I have no frame of reference.
And this was back in August.
So I just was like, I don't know who this is.
I don't know Blake Lively at all.
Literally had never seen anything she was in.
And I just was like, what are we doing here?
Yeah, and so it is an interview of Blake Lively and Parker Posey while they were doing press tour for Cafe Society.
From 2016!
Back in 2016, summer of 2016, that Kirstie Flaw uploaded to YouTube.
Don't worry, you should not know who Kirstie Flaw is at all.
Yeah, she's an interviewer for celebrities.
She's just an incredibly minor interviewer, internet celebrity interviewer person that no one would have ever heard of.
And so she uploaded it from what we can tell.
This might be the first time it's ever been uploaded, and it's titled...
The Blake Lively Interview That Made Me Want to Quit My Job.
Yeah.
It has, as of recording, it has 6.8 million views.
6.8 million views.
Yeah.
34,000 comments.
It's crazy.
And they're universally negative.
Universally.
And it's not just like, no, that was a little...
Like, the proper reaction to me is like, this is nothing.
But like...
Maybe you think it's a little weird.
The proper reaction would be like, yeah, that's a little weird.
That's a little awkward.
The reactions are like as though she is Pol Pot or another genocidal dictator who just mutilated your family.
That's what the reactions are.
It's incredible.
It's not fake people.
That's the thing I want to make sure to get across.
We won't talk about that here.
There may be some artificial...
You know, stuff happening behind the scenes here.
But this is real people.
Like, people, I don't think it takes much.
Talk about that snowball.
It only takes a little bit if we're dealing with a woman or a person of color or whatever.
If we're dealing with someone who threatens the hierarchy, it only takes a little bit.
And then everyone wants to find a way to hate them.
And it's so easy with women.
Our society is so quick to hate a woman and find every reason that she's wrong.
Like, look at this comment from a female username, by the way.
With 66,000 likes.
This comment has 66,000 likes.
This is a classic high school bullying method.
Acting like you totally click with your bestie right in front of the third wheel to make them feel as excluded and ostracized and rejected as possible.
Stuff like that.
And it gets so vitriolic.
I'll never see Blake Lively the same way again.
Yeah, I saw that one too.
I can't wait.
For anyone who doesn't know what this is, I can't wait to play what it is.
Just for fun.
Like, I just want to set up.
Oh, the interviewer almost quit her job.
It's so bad.
It's actually scary.
This is 31,000 likes.
It's actually scary to observe two people who are so full of themselves.
Oh, geez.
And this is 34,000 likes.
I love how the interviewer never forgot this moment and patiently waited until it was the right time to drop this.
Blake Lively trying to act like a feminist while bullying a female interviewer who was being genuine slash kind is ironic and so hypocritical.
Yeah.
Okay, so let's play it.
We're going to play it for anyone who hasn't heard it.
We're going to play...
I mean, the part that earned her public execution is like the first three seconds.
So we can play that for starters.
And don't adjust that dial.
This is what it is.
Like, you're not going to fucking believe this.
Here we go.
First of all, congrats on your little bump.
Congrats on your little bump.
What about my bump?
That's Blake Lively laughing.
They are kind of bumps, aren't they?
No, not bumps.
The lovely lady lumps.
Check it out.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Do you like the movie?
I think it's a little bit of a, like, uncomfortable, like, I think she's expressing discomfort, possibly, but she does it, I think, the way women have to do, which is, even in a room full of three women, because it's going to be on, you know, on the internet or whatever, but, like, they have to do it in a very pleasant way.
It's on women to, like, completely de-escalate or, if that's the right word, like, to keep everything fine while they're Perhaps trying to voice some discomfort with something.
And can I chime in to say like...
No!
Shut up!
Not a safe space for me, I guess.
You can, but I'm cutting it.
But go ahead.
This was not like super early in Blake's pregnancy.
You know, it's not the middle of Blake's pregnancy.
It's towards the end.
And there's a lot of expectations on women for like how their bump is supposed to look throughout their pregnancy.
And so I kind of want to like, yeah, spin this on its head a little bit where it's like, congrats on your little bump.
She's eight months pregnant.
You know, she's far along in the pregnancy.
And for someone to call your belly small, that can also be offensive for women, too.
Like commenting on a body at all that's pregnant, it's just unnecessary.
She could have said...
Hey, congrats on your pregnancy.
I'm sure you're really excited.
Like, if she wanted to even have that conversation.
And I have a feeling everyone should play that in their minds.
Do you think she would say, congratulations on your pregnancy?
Like, it clearly is about the calling attention to her stomach in an interview.
Yeah, yeah.
Yeah, exactly.
It's not about, like, fuck this person for congratulating me.
Like, that's not what it's about.
And it's not like she's standing up or, like, it showed her walking in where you can see it.
Like, she's literally sitting down where, like, if you're just...
Watching the interview, I don't think your eyes are necessarily going to focus in on that.
Like, it's something that drew attention to something that honestly didn't even need to be talked about at all, but then done so in a way that I don't think was super sensitive, especially coming from another woman.
And again, I want to note for people not able to see this currently.
I want to play this whole thing, but it's audio.
It's just not going to work, unfortunately.
It sucks because so many of the points I want to make are based on that, but we'll see what I can do.
Well, we'll link the video.
Not that you necessarily want to keep racking up Kiersey Floss.
I know.
You count, but, you know.
Whatever.
Blake Lively is smiling nicely the whole time.
And at the end of that little exchange, when Parker Posey is the other woman there, she asks, you know, did you like the movie or whatever?
Blake Lively kindly is looking over toward Kirstie.
She's redirecting back to Kirstie in that moment.
It was a comment that there was definitely something behind it, as we talked about.
There's definitely some discomfort there.
Yeah, it obviously bugged her.
That is the thing.
I'm in disbelief.
Like, if you take an objective view of this, that is fucking nothing.
It's absolutely nothing.
And so, as some of the comments said, to kind of make that make sense, then the rest of it, they talk about how, oh, they just ignored the interviewer.
They iced her out.
They're mean girls.
Mean girl behavior.
As you just saw.
Parker Posey posed a question back.
You're a Woody Allen fan?
I love most of his movies, and this one was so, like, visually amazing.
Yeah, it's gorgeous.
Did you guys love wearing those kind of clothes that you...
Yeah.
And I'm going to warn you, viewer discretion advised, you're about to hear the next thing, the next war crime that earned Blake Lively a public execution.
Yeah.
And, you know, working in digital...
Everyone wants to talk about the clothes, but I wonder if they would ask the men about the clothes.
I would.
I love Jesse's suits.
That's what I'm saying.
His wardrobe was beautiful.
Corey's wardrobe was, of course, those high-waisted pants.
He's so great.
I would wish men wore high-waisted pants like that still.
That little hiccup you heard was in the original video.
That wasn't like me.
And maybe you can't, I don't, who knows if you'll be able to hear it by the time this gets, like, crunched to MP3 and then on your player you're listening at 5x speed.
But there's a little hiccup there.
And it brings me to a later point I was going to make, which is this is deceptively edited.
But we'll get to that in a moment.
Because right now what's happening is they're talking to each other.
And I think that Parker Posey picked up on a little bit of that discomfort, maybe.
Although I'm not even sure.
Because when you watch other interviews, they're talking to each other.
And they start talking to each other.
So what she said was, everyone wants to talk about the clothing, but I wonder if they would ask the men about the clothes.
Which is what Hitler did and why we bombed them.
It's something that gets brought up on places like the red carpet all the time, right?
Women are always asked, what are you wearing?
What are you wearing?
And men aren't, and they're asked about their work.
Yeah.
This is a common, common thing that actors have been speaking out about.
And so for that to be your first question in the interview, especially when it's like like you're trying to set it up, you know, it's a beautiful, gorgeous movie to look at.
Did you like wearing those costumes instead of saying the costume design was especially remarkable?
Yeah.
How was it kind of like living in that period?
That's a great point.
It's like, did you like wearing the clothes?
It's a bad question.
It is.
It is a horrible question.
And I'm not even good of an interviewer.
No.
Well, actually, that's a good time to talk about something I wanted to talk about.
As someone who is an interviewer myself, the worst thing in an interview, the worst fucking thing, and I've had this happen only a couple of times, and it's the worst.
And I've had it happen marginally a few times, but I get through it and then edit to make it not sound like shit.
The worst thing you can do in an interview is not talk.
Yeah.
Like if I'm an interviewer and like, so what did you think?
How long have you been making movies?
If I ask whatever the question is and they go, about a year or whatever, you know, and they just stop.
That makes you want to quit your job.
Like I've had ones where people won't talk.
That's the worst feeling because like as an interviewer.
You want some time to think of your next question a little bit or make sure you have, you know, like, and if someone gives one word answers, you likely have a few questions prepped.
You likely have a few.
If you're better than me, I can't prep like fucking anything.
I just, I really, I'm going to reveal myself.
I've rarely prepped anything.
I try to have like a question ready.
Like five minutes before we start.
That's as best as I can do.
You're a very genuine person.
Yeah, I make up for it, but I'm genuinely interested in people.
But it's hard because sometimes if you're caught off guard and maybe the first question doesn't go well, if they give a quick answer, you're like, fuck, I'm not ready.
It's so hard.
The worst thing for an interview is that.
Now, keep in mind, I don't want to get too elitist here, but I'm doing a different kind of interviewing.
I'm doing a type of interviewing where what I say matters a little bit more.
Like an Ezra Klein type, I try to do that.
I'm not saying I'm anywhere near as good as he is.
When I'm doing interviews, I'm usually also trying to communicate thoughts, maybe get their...
I want to hear what they think about maybe the way I'm framing things.
But I'm a little bit a part of it.
I'm not trying to just be like...
Totally to the side.
It's a conversation more than an interview usually.
And that's how I do it.
If people don't like it, whatever, they don't like it.
But that's what I'm doing.
When you're doing a fucking celebrity bullshit interview, sorry again to be a little superior here, you're not part of the fucking interview.
Nobody cares about you.
Like, nobody is there to hear Kirstie Flaw talk.
The point.
Is to get the celebrity to talk.
And to sell the movie.
Yeah.
You just want to get them talking.
You want to have a video of them talking.
That's what you care about.
Nobody fucking tunes into E! News, whatever bullshit.
I can't even come up with the examples.
Nobody goes to the red carpet video to hear the interviewer and what they're going to say.
They're usually doing everything they can to get the celebrity to talk.
They just want to like...
I don't care about this stuff, but that is what it is.
It's silly.
There might be perhaps like different contexts where that's not true.
Like maybe some more in-depth interviews.
I don't know.
I think there are some like people who have gone like viral for how they approach red carpet that have like a real skill at it where they are kind of well-known and they have like other projects and stuff and people are excited to go talk to them.
But for the most part, you're 100% right.
Kirstie Flaw is not that.
We'll just say that.
There may be others who are.
She's not.
And the red carpet too, often when it comes to those, or if it's like the people, what is it?
It's the red carpet before the award shows or whatever.
Like you're trying to talk to a million celebrities.
Like you get like five seconds with each of them.
You're not going to waste that five seconds.
And that's kind of what this is because this is a press tour where they're in the same setting for multiple interviews.
This is not Kirstie Flaw's living room.
This is where they are.
This is where Parker Posey and Blake Lively are.
And they switch out the interviewers.
You get a little bit of time with them.
You shouldn't waste that time being the person who talks.
I say all this because the biggest thing people are criticizing is, oh, Parker Posey and Blake Lively just talking to each other.
Mean girl behavior.
They're not even interacting.
And here's the other thing that, again, is a little uncomfortable to say.
Having been someone...
Who was at events or, like, God-awful movies, live shows or something where, like, people want to talk to you.
Like me and Heath, for example.
We'll talk to each other because a lot of these interactions can be uncomfortable.
A lot of them are great.
Totally great.
A lot of them can be a little uncomfortable.
Someone comes up.
They're awkward.
They say weird stuff.
You know, like, they're just, okay, this is a little awkward.
And you have your friend there who's there the whole time.
the interviewer passing through like Kiersey Fla here, but your friend's there the whole time.
You interact with that friend.
It's a little bit of a comfort in an awkward moment, you know?
Yeah.
And they don't owe anything personally to this interviewer.
They're there to do a job, which is promote the film, but they're not friends with her.
They're not like, she's not even like a professional relationship, really.
It's like a very quick thing.
There's going to be multiple of these.
And when you're someone who has to talk to and do these painful interviews all day.
It must get pretty fucking tiresome.
And I know it's your job.
But, like, we also have to recognize people are humans, too.
Like, I just think the level of judgment...
It's one thing, if you want to say this was a little awkward, fine.
I think it was nothing.
I think it was barely...
I think it was almost nothing.
Like, completely nothing.
If you want to say it was a little awkward, sure.
But does it warrant this?
Does it warrant all the hyperbole about it?
Like, it's insane.
And there's so much more to it.
Because there's also, when I look through here, I won't play the whole thing.
So the deceptive editing thing I was talking about, Kirstie Flaw has edited this herself.
I am positive of this.
It's her own company.
It's her own video.
Either her or whoever.
Like, someone with her did it, is the point.
And they keep cutting back to Kirstie.
They cut back to Kirstie, who's like, one time she's about to say something.
But otherwise, she's just sitting there.
She thinks she's getting, you know, maybe needs to ask a question.
But then that effect it has and is very intentional is look at them, gabbering away, not even letting her get a word in.
A couple things wrong with that.
For one, that's because of the editing.
We shouldn't even see her.
There's another video that I'll play probably a little of where it's some dude doing the interview who, by the way, is much more of a popular channel.
It's called like Joe Blow Movie Network.
So it's like a more this YouTube network.
I don't know it.
But it's bigger than Kirstie Floss.
So it's like a bigger interviewer.
And he is not shown at all.
He's shown when he asks a question and no other times.
And the other times, you just film the celebrities because they're the fucking actresses.
They're who you're there for.
You're not there to see an interviewer that you don't know.
That's just not it.
It's edited to make it look like, and we can't know this for sure, but every time it cuts away, there's a real chance.
I think there's a real chance that Blake Lively is actually looking at her and she cut away deceptively.
Because there's no other reason to cut to her.
A, it's either to just show her maybe trying to say something, or to cut when Blake Lively might have been looking at her.
Even still, Blake Lively does look at her several times.
They go back and forth.
And here's another thing.
If you're interviewing someone, There can be a time where, as an interviewer, you want the flow of the conversation.
You want things to flow.
You don't want dead air, especially on something like this with a time limit.
So it's not even a bad thing if my interview subjects, subject or subjects, are talking.
There's perhaps what seems like a brief pause.
And so I'm like, oh, got to ask a question.
And then they keep going.
There's nothing wrong with that.
That's fine.
You're trying to keep the flow.
And sometimes, I have this happen every fucking day of my job, where I'm like, oh, I think they're coming to a stop in their thing, so I need to have a question ready, and I start to say, and so, oh, they weren't done.
And I'm like, oh, by all means, I want them to, because the goal with your next question is to get them to talk more.
Yeah.
So that's fine.
It's not for you to be heard.
Yes.
Yeah.
We're not talking about some fucking power hitter interviewer trying to take on, you know, Frost Nixon or something.
Like, we're not doing that.
It's fucking celebrity interview about a movie.
You just want them to talk about a movie.
That's your goal.
And when you look at this, she asks several questions and she talks.
A decent amount.
Let's play.
The reason I'm playing this is to compare it to another video where people said, oh, she can be nice to a man.
And they're trying to catch her on this hypocrisy.
She can be nice to a man.
So Kirstie Flaw asked that.
So we covered the little bump.
We covered the first question, which is terrible.
Thank you.
Thank you.
You like the movie?
Are you a Woody Allen fan?
I love most of his movies, and this one was so, like, visually amazing.
Yeah, it's gorgeous.
Did you guys love wearing those kind of clothes?
As we covered, bad question.
And, you know, working in digital...
Everyone wants to talk about the clothes, but I wonder if they would ask the men about the clothes.
She says, I would.
I would.
So that's her getting another word in for just for what it's worth.
Yeah, kind of defensively, too.
Yeah, they talk about the beautiful costumes.
Of the men, and they hope that the men are asked about them, which seems pretty legitimate to me.
Whatever.
Blake looks at her several times.
And then we get to...
Yeah, it was amazing to look at.
And then to see it...
And then you notice in LA, like, everybody's in cream colors and all the men are wearing, like, white and cream.
And then you get to New York and it's a little bit more browns and moodier.
And Susie really told such a story alongside Vittorio because it is a lot brighter and sunnier in LA. And New York has just a steaminess to it.
They have cut to Kirstie a hundred fucking times.
This is her doing this.
In order to try to make a bullshit fucking fake point.
Because if you take out the cuts over to Kirstie's face doing nothing, what you have is a fine interview about the fucking movie.
She's like, yeah, in LA, they've got the warmer tone, whatever the fuck she said.
That's fine.
That's what you're going for.
You're trying to get the person to talk about the movie.
It's great.
Now we get to another question here.
You know, the whole Hollywood glam, it's so glamorous and everything.
Can you relate to the things they were saying about Hollywood?
It's so easy to get seduced by the fame and the money and the glamour.
Oh, you see it all the time.
That was one of my favorite things about the movie, where the subtle turns to...
Now, again, they're talking mostly to each other.
Blake does this actually a lot, though.
I think she likes...
Again, she has a personal relationship with one of these people.
Yeah.
So she's talking to that person.
But she's also looking over from time to time.
And we don't know how many times she's looking over because this is deceptively edited.
We don't know for sure.
Oftentimes you're such a greater fan of them as a person than you are.
She's looking at her there.
She's looking at her again.
She's bringing her in.
That's always nice and refreshing when you see that.
We've gone over to Kirstie for no reason.
Okay, now she has another question.
What do you feel like is the biggest misconception?
Now, what question is that?
Like three or four?
I've lost track.
I want to say third.
This is now her third question.
Yeah, I guess she had the comment, the I would.
Well, no, the I would or whatever.
Yeah, I would.
Oh, I'm counting the bump.
Oh, I wasn't counting the bump.
Yeah, that's the first question.
It's not a question.
Well, I'm saying prompts for, it's her talking to prompt the other, you know, the celebrities.
Then yes, then this is four.
Yeah, at least.
And so then we get this one.
Do you feel like, what do you feel like is the biggest misconceptions about fame and Hollywood in general?
I think the idea that people think that they know you, I think, because of how intrusive media is these days.
Interesting point.
People care so much more about your personal life than they do your work.
And if you aren't open with your personal life, then they just make it up for you and share it for you.
So I think the biggest misconception I see often is people feeling like...
By the way, she's perfectly...
She's smiling and addressing that toward Kiersey in a way that's like...
I mean, she might be kind of making a point there, but not really.
I mean, that might be...
Tangentially related to the discomfort earlier, but not really because she's talking about making up your life for you.
Yeah, I think this is what they deal with all the time.
Anyone trying to say that this is specifically in response to Kiersey Flaw is not being realistic.
This is why tabloids exist because people like to make up what they think a celebrity's life is all about.
For the love of God, Perez Hilton got his start with upskirt stuff.
It's awful.
Yeah.
It's an awful thing to deal with.
I mean, and like even now, despite Blake sharing this, like that this is something that is a real struggle for people who work in the industry, even now, like you see it on Reddit, people saying like, I bet that her marriage with Ryan Reynolds is not doing well.
And I've heard that they're separated and et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.
The theories are insane.
Literally crazy.
Literally crazy.
Yeah.
It makes no fucking sense.
So we got that question.
She's still going on here.
They know someone that they don't.
The disappointing thing is when you...
This answer, she's fully engaged with Kirstie and talking toward her.
Yeah.
Fully engaged.
And I think that people don't watch the whole video probably, even though it's all four minutes.
So, you know, I understand why that's so hard to do.
Because they know what the media has created of someone.
She looks objectively warm and inviting.
And the disappointing thing is when you meet the people, they're always so much more awesome than they're portrayed to be.
I mean, that's normally my experience.
And even people that are portrayed to be really great people, they're just a lot more complicated and interesting and nuanced and caring and thoughtful.
And that's always nice, you know, to see that your idea of someone isn't always who they actually are.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Wait.
What was that cut?
Yeah, that was a cut.
That was absolutely a cut where they probably said something nice.
Like, I bet you anything.
Because that sounded like it cut out some content to me.
I mean, I could be wrong because her cuts are terrible because she probably edited in those.
But it almost sounded like they cut out something that might have been a nice pleasantry at the end of the thing to me.
Right.
Because otherwise it doesn't really make any sense that it ended there.
Yeah, almost like maybe it was something that Kirstie Flaw said, like, I really enjoyed this conversation with you guys or something like that.
Like, wanted to cut that out.
Boy, I wish we had the unedited thing.
Hey, release the unedited thing, Kirstie.
If it's what you're talking about, release the unedited thing.
So, what did we get up to?
Four, at least?
Questions?
Yeah, four or five.
Now I want to play the interview that is, oh, why is she nicer to the male interviewer and mean to the female?
Wow, she can make eye contact with this interviewer.
Go figure.
She's nicer talking to the man.
Interesting when you know someone's not a girl's girl.
And again, this is an interview for a channel that is far more something than the other one.
And yet...
Let's count how much this guy talks.
What are some of the fun things that come with shooting a movie that takes place during this, you know, the golden age of Hollywood?
Music.
The music was amazing.
Getting to see, we were exposed to musicians, New Yorkers who play, specialize in 1930s jazz music.
Yeah, this performer cabaret and cat who's incredible and she performs here in New York.
She's the one singing in the movie for a few scenes.
And we got to sit there and watch these live performances of them while we were dressed in these incredible vintage couture gowns and jewelry.
We're going to have to play this whole fucking one.
There's an excitement to...
To that, because it wasn't faked, you know?
You have people that are actually there performing live, and there was a time...
They have not shown him yet.
I've never seen this before on a film, where...
I want to emphasize, same setting, so this is the same day, could have been before, could have been after, we don't know.
Same day, same length of time.
Also, Blake Lively, happy to talk about the costume as it serves a purpose.
She's okay talking to the man about clothes!
Idiot!
No, because she's presenting it in the realm of the setting of the entire experience.
Yeah, and he asked what is fun or interesting about shooting a period piece like that or whatever, you know?
Yeah, yeah.
And she brings it up as one of the things.
Yeah.
And here's the other thing.
Yeah, he didn't ask about it.
No.
He didn't ask about it.
It's categorically a different thing.
And again, that's all to defend, in quotes, What she did in the other interview, which is just say, I wonder if they asked the men about the clothes.
Right.
That's it.
That's it.
That's all she said.
It's nothing.
Anyway, we're almost a minute in.
They have not panned back to the dude a single time yet.
I just lost my ring.
In my hair.
It's alarming when you're finding.
Oh, there's toast.
No, but, you know, I remember when Kat went to perform with the band, we had a break because they turned around.
You know, it wasn't on us anymore.
It was on them.
And they said, okay, you go back to your trailer.
You guys have about 30 minutes.
But I didn't want to go back.
I wanted to secretly watch the performance.
But I didn't know if it was allowed because it was my first day.
And, you know, they weren't pulling up chairs for us.
It wasn't a true concert.
We were still making a movie.
We're the sound booth, and there was a tiny little monitor.
It was this big on our sound guy's cart.
And I thought, okay, I'll move.
Maybe I can sneak over to that monitor.
And I just see this monitor, and I round the corner, and I see Parker, and I see Jesse, and I see Paul, and I see Jeannie, everyone.
Everybody's sitting around fighting over this little monitor because everybody was so excited to be able to see these performers do what they do best.
Everybody was so happy and honored to be there and be doing good work, stimulating work, and it was neat that nobody was going back to their trailer.
Everybody was just...
Proud to be there.
There's so much artistry.
Yeah.
They're talking to each other.
It's his first time working in digital and the set design.
Still have not shown the dude a single time.
Susie Benzinger, the costume designer.
We're halfway through.
So we would go into the club.
Because this is how you would do an actual fucking interview like this.
You're trying to get the beautiful celebrities to talk about the movie.
Yeah.
They have not shown him a single time.
We're two minutes in.
I'm going to keep going.
What's the club called?
Oh, they changed it.
It was late.
They're just talking to each other.
How dare they?
I think so, yeah.
They didn't even look at him when he said, I think so.
I can't remember.
They changed it.
There we go.
We finally went to the dude and we're getting a question.
He's noticing it slowing down a little bit.
Question two.
They changed it.
Do you think that's how it was back in the day, though, that the actors would kind of just always hang out and it was just maybe a different atmosphere than it is nowadays?
I don't know.
It's kind of a terrible question, to be honest with you.
But that's dope.
Now we're painting back to them.
I think in the 90s, yeah, it was like that too.
You know, people would hang out because there weren't trailers to go to.
I fantasized that there was more camaraderie and more movies cast based on chemistry and not how much money your last film made.
So that's what I love about Woody Allen's movies is that he gets to create, you know.
These ensembles in exactly the way that he wants to and put these characters together.
Blake is looking at her the entire time.
She's looking at who's talking.
Wise and witty and charming.
Romantic.
It's very romantic.
Did you cry at the end?
Were you sad?
Are you moved by it?
They still haven't shown him again.
They have not shown him.
But they showed him the once.
You know when you're in a movie?
Oh, I kept, yeah, I left.
It's hard to separate yourself from it.
And real quick.
Not fun.
Not my idea of fun.
Did you cry?
I did not.
Are you going to cry at the end of this interview?
Maybe.
But only because I'm sad to leave.
We've made every single person cry so far.
Really?
He wants you to comfort him.
Favorite Woody Allen movie, not counting this one.
Manhattan Murder Mystery.
Oh, I love that one.
Oh, that's really good.
Crimes and misdemeanors.
That's it.
End of celebrity interview.
There we go.
Same length of time.
He did get three questions in.
Okay.
They only showed him when he was asking the questions for as quick as possible because that's what you do in this exact interview.
Totally fine.
That's the interview.
That's the function that they're doing.
That's it.
That's crazy.
Yeah.
Because I hadn't watched that video.
I was waiting for you to present it.
Here.
That's crazy.
Yeah.
The idea that, like, she'll treat the man different.
No.
This is because this interviewer knew what the job was and did the job.
And it wasn't, I mean, it honestly wasn't that great.
To present the Kirstie Flaw one is the interview that made her want to quit her job.
It's insane.
It's insane.
And then I need to play just a touch of the other interview that you on Gavel Gavel played for me as the next thing that everyone said was the worst.
Right.
So this is the other thing that she did that was part of why she needed to be...
I'm going to jump into this, and Blake, I'm going to start with you.
Most of us, if we're lucky enough to run into a celebrity in public, we only have a few moments to maybe speak with you guys.
But for people who see this movie, who relate to the topics of this movie on a deeply personal level, they're really going to want to talk to you.
This movie is going to affect people, and they're going to want to tell you about their lives.
So if someone understands the themes of this movie comes across you in public and they want to really talk to you, what's the best way for them to be able to talk to you about this?
How would you recommend they go about it?
Like asking for like my address or my phone number or like my location share.
I could just location share you and then we could I'm just social security number.
I'm a Virgo, so I'm like, are we talking logistics?
Are we talking emotionally?
Yeah, what's been beautiful about this movie is that, like, unfortunately, we all know at least...
So, I don't want to repeat too much because we go into this and gavel gavel, but what's happening there is this guy's asking an insane question.
Hey, if a stranger wants to come up and accost you about their deepest, darkest, emotional things, how should a million strangers a day do that?
It's like, that's an insane question.
To ask a woman, how should people come up to you and talk to you about this?
By the way, so this was modern day.
This was about It Ends With Us.
This wasn't 2016. So I want to play this because I realized something, and this is probably, maybe this is obvious too.
You and to any woman.
So forgive if this is obvious.
But it occurred to me that everything people are mad at Blake at are when she is expressing discomfort.
That's it.
It just kind of blew my mind.
Maybe that's obvious, but it kind of blew my mind.
Oh, yeah.
The kind of people that would so quickly hate a woman and be mad at her and just go off on her are the kind of people that really don't react well if a woman expresses any of her boundaries, expresses the slightest discomfort.
And she's also doing it in a humorous way, too.
Like, I think there are some people who just don't understand that humor.
There's like a little bit of like sarcasm there.
And if you think about her relationship with Ryan Reynolds and the way that they engage in social media and stuff like these responses track to who she presents herself.
And most importantly, that's her being kind.
That's her trying to express some discomfort.
In a way that's jovial.
Rather than next question.
What she didn't say for Kirstie Flaw was, how dare you ask me about my fucking bump you asked?
She didn't do that.
She doesn't get to do that.
Women can't do that.
So what she does is she makes a little joke.
And then the second one is, I wonder if they ask the men about the clothes.
The least offensive possible way I can imagine to make the point.
I wonder if they ask the men about the club.
It's a perfectly valid point.
Absolutely a valid point.
I can't think of a less offensive way to make that point.
So, is she not allowed to make that point?
Is that just not a thing you can do without being a complete...
B word, C word, every single word that they call women.
I think also, since we covered this particular interview on Gavel Gavel, I found out that Blake Lively actually had a stalker at one point.
Oh, yeah.
And it's understandable that this is a clear boundary for her.
She has four children and she has expressly called out paparazzi for trying to get pictures of her kids and, like, how inappropriate that is.
Again, had that stalker situation, had to pursue a restraining order.
Like, this is a serious thing for...
Especially female celebrities, especially ones that have children.
Like, it is ruthless out there.
And so I think it's perfectly understandable for her from a humorous perspective.
Especially, you know, like, she doesn't owe that to anybody, but she's going to do it because that's coming from a place of, like, yeah, yeah, exactly.
This is her job.
Well, and just the patriarchy.
Women are not allowed to express their discomfort.
Deflect and kind of help transform the question into what he should have asked, which is, if there are women out there who see this and this resonates with them in this way, do you have recommendations for where they can reach out for help?
That's the question.
Not about, like, if someone sees you on the street and comes up to you, how can you help?
That is such an insane question.
I cannot get over.
How insane that question is.
People are going to want to talk to you about their abuse.
What are you talking about, dude?
That is a terrible question.
The only reaction to this should be, wow, what a dumb, weird question to ask.
That is bizarre.
You're going to ask a woman who's had a start.
And you're right.
you're right.
I came across that when I was doing the court record search.
I saw that she had a stalker, then it got resolved via the courts, hopefully, to ask a woman who's had a stalker and had to deal with it with the legal system and has four kids.
Hey, what's the best way for them to talk to you about this deeply?
Because it's just not, I know I already said it, but I guess these people don't realize that it's a many to one fucking database relationship here.
Like, you can't function in the world if on this massive scale, Something that's popular with hundreds of millions of people potentially want to all talk to you about it as their deepest, darkest thing about abuse.
You can't do that.
It's not sustainable.
No one could do that.
Not even a therapist could fucking handle that.
It's an insane question.
And what she did, as you point out, is try to signal, that's a fun, insane question, with humor.
This one was a little awkward.
I think the transition to the humor was a little bit of a gulf.
Yeah, she'd need to workshop that joke.
She's on the spot.
She's probably exhausted from doing this very shit all day.
But if Ryan Reynolds said those exact same words, if he said that, do you think the delivery from a man would be like, oh, he's joking.
It's clear he's joking.
Brings me to the next section, which, dear God, maybe this is another part because we've already gone on long.
So maybe this is part two.
But before that, now we need to talk.
I got to play this video of how Kirstie Flaw talks about that interview.
After this interview went viral, obviously, because that was her goal and deceptively editing it and posting it and it's a pile on.
Now, Kirstie Flaw wants to talk about why it went viral.
And this video is the real reason why my Blake Lively interview.
This has been a really crazy week for me.
This has just about a million views.
And I felt like I had to actually say something about it.
This is my dog, Oscar.
Yes.
Yes, he keeps me sane.
So, after I posted the interview with Blake Wiley that a lot of people have been watching, I got so many questions from people asking why I decided to post that interview now eight years later and the reason for that is that I got contacted by another reporter who told me a story that was a little similar to this one that he had experienced and then we started talking about comparing notes about this and then I just felt like you
know what it's not okay to behave like that and I think it needs to be called out.
And so that's the reason why I did that now so much later.
And also because it took me a while, to be honest with you, it took me a while to actually get over it.
Oh, sure.
It affected me for a while because it made me nervous when I was interviewing other people after that.
And I blamed myself for it for a long time because I felt like I did or said something wrong.
And that's the reason.
Okay.
First of all, okay, that's an interesting point where she said a reporter, you know, contacted her.
Again, let me point out, this was August 10th when she posted that video.
And flaw is cited in the New York Times article that...
You're going to gobble, gobble, man.
Okay, but I want to say, I just want to say that she is really trying to distance herself with her comments on how she's engaging with the Blake Lively stuff.
But every single day...
She's posting a video about Blake Lively or Ryan Reynolds.
Literally every day.
It's literally every single day.
It did not used to be like that.
And man, at one point I looked at it and it was like 41 videos over the last month, over the last like 30 days or something.
And 40 of them are about Blake, Ryan, and Al Doney.
I have this ritual when I'm, because I stay up really late to work.
I'm just a night owl.
And she seems to release her videos late at night.
And so as I'm late at night, maybe about to go to bed, I can just refresh her.
I'm like, oh, there's the next Blake Lively video.
Every single day, without exaggeration.
And I also think it's interesting, too, because, like, the timing of releasing this eight-year-old interview, a couple months after that, in October, she released a bad interview she had with Anne Hathaway.
from when she was doing the Les Miserables press circuit.
And Kirstie Flaw had asked Hathaway to sing her response to a question.
And Anne Hathaway says, well, I won't be doing that, but you're more than welcome to sing.
Oh, another polite way of rejecting a super stupid fucking question.
So stupid.
And so she posted it about how Anne Hathaway, so rude, etc., etc.
And then Anne Hathaway apparently reached out and apologized.
That's insane.
Why didn't she post that video in August?
Why was it the Blake Lively video in August?
I don't know.
Just...
Some things I'm thinking about.
So here's what's funny.
I just asked Lydia, like, oh, maybe we should watch that Anne Hathaway interview.
And then I scrolled back and I said, oh, wait a minute.
She named it my worst interview idea ever.
So, okay, so maybe she's a little self-aware on that one.
And then...
And then I was like, hmm, can you change titles to YouTube videos?
And so I went in way back to October when she originally posted this, and it is actually titled, This Might Be My Worst Interview Ever.
But because Anne Hathaway apologized, now it's fine.
And it wasn't her worst interview.
So that's very interesting.
And just to note, before she posted that Blake Lively thing, her videos got no views.
I shouldn't say no.
They got a couple thousand views.
And she had a few from Norway, like about Norwegian something that I guess got some views.
Maybe that struck a chord in Norway.
But for the most part, her videos...
Had a couple thousand views.
She got some good celebrity ones, so some of those will get like, you know, tens of thousands.
Yeah.
But especially going into that Blake Lively clip, she was getting not very many at all.
And now she posts, I'm not exaggerating, every single day a video about Blake Lively.
And now she has sponsors and now she has ads and, you know.
And fine.
That's fine.
But it's not some organic thing that's happening.
Why I waited so long and I actually hadn't read up about all the other controversy that was going on with Lake Lily and the new movie.
It ends with us.
So it was kind of a coincidence, I have to say, that this ended up being posted.
I also have to say thank you to everyone who contacted me and sent me beautiful messages.
I'm so touched by it.
You have no idea how much it means to me that you've been reaching out to me, sending me messages on Instagram and commenting on YouTube.
I think there's like over 10,000 comments on that video, which is kind of crazy to me.
And a lot of people are calling out the behavior of these two women.
I think now I understand why it has gone viral like it has.
I think it's not only because of Blake Lively.
Let's hear her expert thesis on why this has gone viral.
It has gone viral like it has.
I think it's not only because of Blake Lively, but I think it's because a lot of people could kind of resonate with this situation.
Especially, I've been contacted by a lot of women, and I feel like...
A lot of people have experienced something.
Exactly like this, but a bit similar to it.
Like, experience that mean girl energy from someone.
You felt left out or bullied.
Most of the time this happens when we're younger.
Do you think you were in the movie?
Kirstie, do you think you were in the movie?
We had four minutes together.
Four-minute interviews!
And a million people get these four-minute interview slots.
And they go through and do a zillion of them.
And it's your job.
It's your fucking job.
You're not there to be a friend.
You're a plumber.
You're less involved than a plumber.
It's four minutes.
You're there to do an interview for four minutes and you're there to get a celebrity to talk for four minutes.
That's it.
And, like, all the language they're using around bullying, I think she, let's see if she goes more on this.
But, as you can see from this video, it does happen when you're grown-ups, too.
I think it's quite interesting, you know, thinking about it now, how most parents would tell their children, you know, if they're getting bullied or if they're bullying someone, it's always like, you go and say sorry to that boy or to that girl right now.
And in this situation...
The opposite happened.
No one came out and apologized.
And they probably told her, don't come out, don't react, don't do anything.
We'll take care of this for you.
We'll just say that it's the journalist's fault and that you were offended by her.
And then we'll just plant some other good, positive stories.
What is that?
And I think that's the problem.
In Hollywood and in other places that people don't own up to their mistakes because they're afraid that it's going to backfire.
Or that it's going to make them look bad.
And I think it's time to change that.
And I hope this video that I posted could help people own up to their mistakes.
And I think, you know, if Blake Lively would have come up out in front of this, things would have been very different.
I wonder why Anne Hathaway apologized for the thing that wasn't her fault.
God damn.
Like an extortionist.
This is absurd.
This is the most, and here's what drives me nuts, the obvious hypocrisy.
I just want everyone to imagine.
I just wish we could get one of these assholes in a fucking strap to a chair.
I just want to ask them and give them truth serum.
Hey, imagine it was, I don't know, on the set of, it ends with us.
And Blake Lively said, this made me want to quit my job.
I had such a hard time.
I blame myself for the longest time.
Now I'm coming to terms with the abuse that I've suffered.
I, Blake Lively.
I'm an abuse victim.
What happened was I said, congrats on your little bump, and someone said, congrats on your little bump, while still smiling at me.
Do you think you'd have any fucking sympathy for Blake Lively?
Obviously not.
It's not even worth asking.
And it's this dynamic we see so often, where these people, they are amoral.
The only thing they want to accomplish is the shutting down of women expressing their discomfort and or anything else.
They want to shut down the threat.
To their dominance in the hierarchy.
And the way they do that is by taking on fake victim status to try to point out that the left is fake victim.
Like, honestly, honestly, this reminds me of when white women would tell lies about black men.
I mean, honestly, I think it's that same dynamic where, like, Kirstie Flaw's pain, quote-unquote pain, is magnified times a thousand.
Oh, this poor woman.
This poor woman who had to do a four-minute interview.
And felt like...
It didn't go well.
It did go well.
It went fine.
It actually went 100% fine.
That's the thing.
It's nothing.
She's such a victim.
And they magnify her victimhood.
You know it's bullshit because on the other side, the other person is complaining about sexual harassment.
They're like, yeah, shut up.
Yeah.
Like, they don't care about the victimhood, really.
They don't care about the women, really.
They don't care about Kirstie Flaw.
They care about...
It suits their purpose.
Of shutting down any threat to their dominance.
It's so infuriating.
Yeah, that's a great point.
All right, well, I didn't get through half my thoughts, but next time on Where There's Woke, we have to go through the difference of what happens to women in this situation and what happens to men.
It is jaw-dropping and eye-opening.
So we'll do that next time.
I'm realizing this is going to be me like mansplaining a bunch of feminism stuff I've been thinking about, but it's just because I've been obsessed with it and it's all I
So please feel free to give me your thoughts or anything like that.
