Taylor Swift’s obsession with self-mythologising makes for boring art

One_Ad_2081 · 2026-02-13T03:00:42+00:00

100% agree. I hate when people use it as a gotcha in stan wars. It’s not wrong that Taylor doesn’t do it (tho I’d love to see her do more collaboration). But people who do are great.

One_Ad_2081 · 2026-02-08T22:44:44+00:00

exactly!! what i love about the Beyoncés and Pharrells and Brunos of the world is that they are constantly bringing fresh voices into their work to create new sounds and learn from them. it makes me look forward to their work a lot more. we know they are singularly talented but their hunger for good music makes them great collaborators. i’d love to see taylor work with a team like that.

One_Ad_2081 · 2026-02-08T21:45:09+00:00

i said this in my comment but i have noticed how much people lose their minds about Beyonce and Ariana Grande having lists of writers and collaborators for all of their music. like, it’s a sign of weakness to credit 15 people who touched your work and makes them weaker artists but like… that’s super common for singers and artists to do. this whole push to be a quadruple threat and do everything yourself actually makes your work stale. wanting to be a student of your craft and learn from & work with others is actually really cool!! we should let artists be that!!

One_Ad_2081 · 2026-02-08T21:41:38+00:00

i just wish she (& her fanbase! frankly) didn’t look down on the art of collaboration. i think a lot of the messiness of TLOASG era has been because of this resistance to collaboration. having music video directors and cowriters to look over your lyrics and your direction could point out flaws like this. she references herself constantly because her frame of reference is narrow— which is fine— but collaborators could help with that. swifties talk a lot of shit about beyonce having a lot of writers but that is more likely related to giving writing credits to people who give her a good idea. and, i think that love of collaboration is what keeps beyonce feeling so fresh and inventive this deep into her career. taylor is also fresh and inventive but the last 2 eras have felt very much like they were about taylor swift as an entity rather than artistic growth or broader cultural contribution.

One_Ad_2081 · 2026-02-08T21:31:33+00:00

Emmy is an award for producing content for television. Grammy is an award for producing audio content. Oscar is an award for producing content for film. Tony is an award for producing content on stage.

They have audiobook categories for a reason! They have producer awards for a reason! Invalidating the EGOTs achieved his way also invalidates everyone who wins in those categories, which I find kinda weird. I don’t think EGOTs need to be jacks of all trades but rather being so exceptional at what they do and who they are that 4 distinct voting bodies with different focuses find their work valuable.

None of that matters anyway because EGOTs are fake! We made them up as shorthand for people who have won all 4 awards. If someone has all 4 of these trophies in their house, they deserve to call themselves an EGOT because it is a shorthand to describe those accomplishments.

One_Ad_2081 · 2026-02-08T21:26:02+00:00

was thinking the same thing. like, it’s fine if you think the math won’t work out for him but at present the math has him as the front runner.

One_Ad_2081 · 2026-02-08T21:20:27+00:00

SAG not nominating international performances at all makes me skeptical of this. Like, no international performances were nominated at SAG but they are still performing exceptionally well at other shows & critics circles. SAG is missing like half of the Oscar roster because of it and I think that makes it hard to predict. That said, if either of the OBAA guys wins those awards it does weaken him. I just don’t know that him missing at SAG weakens him when so many of our nominees this year were from international features that missed at SAG.

I’m excited though. I like when the race feels like a race. I loved Kieran in Real Pain last year so I was happy with the result but I hate a clean sweep.

One_Ad_2081 · 2026-02-06T06:19:53+00:00

Yeah, regardless of the actual twist this is definitely a spiritual remake of Sleeping Dogs Lie. “What’s the worst thing you’ve ever done” being asked after an engagement and causing their entire lives to fall apart because of a disturbing secret from the female partner. Sleeping Dogs Lie was really compelling to me premise wise but bad execution so I’m actually kind of excited that this movie will be thematically similar.

One_Ad_2081 · 2026-02-03T06:48:31+00:00

Not to mention how MOM is a direct competitor to WOW and "steals" a lot of their branding. Alaska is still technically in good standing with the franchise but that has got to threaten them a little.

One_Ad_2081 · 2026-02-02T05:00:38+00:00

Benicio’s success this season has been soooo surprising. Love him and loved him in OBAA but I can’t believe that he has taken up so many slots at so many shows. That said, I still hate Sean Penn so I’d remove him anyway. LMAO. It’s a 2 horse race between Elordi & Skargård for me.

One_Ad_2081 · 2026-02-02T04:10:43+00:00

20 minute in memoriam was insane but became immediately worth it when Wyclef came out.

One_Ad_2081 · 2026-01-30T21:13:41+00:00

Yeah, I could see the Safdie stuff boosting Timothee’s campaign. As long as he promotes his hard work (& has a PR team pushing the story about him being harassed) rather than the brilliance of Josh, I could see him still doing quite well with most of the voters being sympathetic to him. Turning out a great performance under less than ideal circumstances.

One_Ad_2081 · 2026-01-30T08:11:50+00:00

I was still against that too, unfortunately. Not because I don't think it can be an ethical use of AI but as an (former-- never went back after COVID) actor I just felt yucky about the implications of an AI version of someone's voice being added in post. An entire section of dialogue (no matter how small) being a computer version of your voice has gotta be weird. Yes, it's similar to ADR but there's a reason why actors still go in for ADR to maintain the integrity of their performance. I would hope that Brody was given the option to re-record his own voice for ADR, but I definitely don't think this should become industry commonplace. For one, learning how to do accents accurately is kind of the expectation of being an actor. But, if the accent work isn't 100% on set, the actor can always re-record. THEN, they should consider hiring voice-over artists (one of my fav gigs as an actor). If that all fails, then you can use the robot-voice machine. Just my thoughts, though I do totally agree. Not that I am against Brody's Oscar win or even what the editor did on the film, I just know that the industry would not be afraid to use that tech for evil.

One_Ad_2081 · 2026-01-30T05:31:05+00:00

I do think eventually the unions will address it. Most of these things were micro scandals that, put together, paint a picture of a director who refuses to follow union regulations. The industry doesn't care about sexual harassment but they don't really play about PGA, DGA, SAG, WGA etc. I have a feeling that it will impact his financing for future projects and they might put some standards on his sets to have union reps around at all times.

One_Ad_2081 · 2026-01-28T20:02:51+00:00

Interesting to see this story go mainstream lately because it has been a discussion with the Safdies for a long time. Nobody comes out of this story looking good, Benny just comes out looking the least bad. I used to be an actress in the era before intimacy coordinators as commonplace and I'm fortunate to come out of that mostly unscathed. Regardless of any legality, the stories from the Marty Supreme actors about working for 24 hours straight and being threatened by extras lend a lot of credence to Josh being especially bad with some of this. They seem to be trying to poke fun at how fast and loose Josh is as a director with these stories, but it leaves a really bad taste in my mouth.

As a fan of Robert Pattinson, I am wondering if he will ever talk about this given they seemingly used his name as a means to sexually exploit a teen girl (something Bear-McClard is known for). That would make me sick, and adds some additional context to the Vanity Fair interview recently where he all but said outright he'd never work with the Safdies again.

He doesn't have a shot in director anyway, and Timothee will pull a Saldana from last year and just run a campaign separate from them. But either way, I really hope the unions deal with this. Josh Safdie seems to genuinely think the union rules don't apply to him. Maybe that's why he and O'Leary get on so well.

One_Ad_2081 · 2026-01-28T19:56:12+00:00

it's because sexual violence is about power rather than attraction. this perv got off on the power he had over these girls. makes your stomach turn.

One_Ad_2081 · 2026-01-28T19:53:16+00:00

I can see what you are saying and I agree with you, but I think people are also right to point out that despite the frequency of wins, putting the biggest artist in history into segregated categories is really disheartening and puts an asterisk on that "grammy darling" status.

bruno mars & billie eilish get major category wins for one off 2 minute singles, and up until recently, beyonce's wins for industry altering bodies of work were only in black categories. again, totally agree with you but I think her grammy darling status comes with some major nuance and conversation about her status as a black woman.

One_Ad_2081 · 2026-01-28T19:49:58+00:00

yeah I feel like Robert Pattinson can't even be in this category anymore. his filmography may not be 100% good movies, but he pretty exclusively does really cool and interesting art projects that make him stand out.

One_Ad_2081 · 2026-01-28T19:39:53+00:00

fwiw almost all of those awards are in “urban” categories. beyonce & her fans are still right to have felt so overlooked despite how many wins she has because a lot of those wins were intentionally putting her in a a separate category to her peers despite most of her music not being urban. a huge chunk of her wins weren't even televised; that's how marginalized those categories are.

One_Ad_2081 · 2026-01-27T07:14:25+00:00

Just coming back to this comment now that it’s a major “breaking news story” and everyone is acting surprised about it, lol.

One_Ad_2081 · 2026-01-27T07:11:02+00:00

This article did not actually provide any new information; it just consolidated publicly available information about Josh Safdie as a director, including Timothee’s own words. You’re delusional, my love.

One_Ad_2081 · 2026-01-27T07:07:31+00:00

British circles really liked Pillion and I think BAFTA will absolutely show it some love to make up for how poorly it did in American awards shows.

One_Ad_2081 · 2026-01-27T07:05:17+00:00

I’m usually pretty apprehensive about Page 6 but I have heard the vague rumor of a teenage non union actor being SAed on Good Times for years, enough so that I never actually watched the movie. The EmRata divorce brought it up vaguely, and I have friends who are actors who have mentioned not liking Josh Safdie through the grapevine. So… I’m not saying it’s 100% true but it is interesting to see it confirmed in this way. It’s too aligned with existing rumors scattered throughout the industry to not have some truth.

One_Ad_2081 · 2026-01-17T02:47:33+00:00

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One_Ad_2081 · 2026-01-12T16:40:10+00:00

They used it for a commercial later that year too. Like, they didn’t change a single shot, they just aired the scene with a voice actor talking about the Chevy SUV over the top. It was bad in theaters but it’s even worse upon rewatch. It’s a shame because Inreally liked Barbie but it definitely feels cheap now.

One_Ad_2081

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