Google “date night beauty” and you’ll get tips on bombshell hair, bedroom eyes, and why your date will love it. Sorry to all the potential Tinders matches here, but we believe in getting ready for no one but ourselves. That’s why we created the Date Prep Diaries, a personal look into the different pre-date rituals of women across America.
First up: Teddy Quinlivan, 24, single and a model in New York City and Paris
When it comes to beauty, my philosophy is that if you love yourself unapologetically, the right person will come to you. I don’t swipe on a magic mascara or lipstick and feel less insecure. It’s something I’ve had to work on internally for years and years. So when I go on a date, I try to look the most like my natural self.
I was so nervous I wasn’t going to live a normal life anymore when I came out as trans two years ago [especially when it came to dating]. But I’ve actually been pleasantly surprised. Not only has my life been normal, but I’ve been dating more and having more successful dates. It’s not like I tell anyone or announce that I’m trans before a date, because that’s not the most important thing about me. But if somebody is not attracted to me for something I have no control over, like my trans identity, there’s literally nothing I can do about it. This is who I am.
How often I go on dates varies. It really just depends on what mood I’m in. Sometimes I’ll be really busy and I don’t have time to go on any dates in a month, but other times I’ll be thirsty, and so I’ll go out on multiple dates in a week. I never go out to dinner with a boy [on a first date], especially if I’m meeting somebody from Tinder. A whole dinner can take an entire hour, and if I don’t find you attractive, then I’m just not going to devote that time to you. So my strategy is to be like, “Let’s go grab a drink.” Sometimes I don’t even want to do that, so I’ll suggest, “Let’s hang out at your place.” But I’m not really a Netflix and chill kind of girl, and I never want there to be an insinuation that it’ll lead to sex in any way, shape, or form. It’s never on the table from the get-go. It has to be earned.
The thing boys always compliment me on is my skin—they notice that. Plus, I like to feel dewy and fresh. So when I’m getting ready for a date, I usually start out by doing a face mask like Dr. Jart’s sheet masks or Sisley’s Black Rose one. Then, I exfoliate my lips with a MAC lip scrub, because I always want to have the most soft, kissable lips. After that, I moisturize with the Trish McEvoy Beauty Booster Serum, which I swear by, and Creme de la Mer.
As a passable transgender woman, I know a lot of other trans women feel more comfortable wearing more makeup. I do too in my daily life, but when I’m out on a date I don’t feel like I need to wear a lot. It’s very rare for me to find somebody I connect with, and when I do find that person, I don’t want something like my makeup overshadowing me. So I’ll usually keep my skin natural and add a little bit of La Prairie’s Cream Blush and a taupe eye with a little highlight in the corner. I always like to make my lashes look really full and thick with the Dior Pump n Show Mascara. And anything that draws attention to your lips is key, so I love the Fenty Gloss Bomb.
This Is Us finally returned tonight with Kevin on the hunt for a very much alive Nicky, his relationship with Zoe on shaky ground, and a tense election night for Randall and the rest of the Pearsons. And that’s just the beginning—caution: spoilers ahead.
In the episode, Zoe recruits her politician ex-boyfriend to help Kevin get answers on Nicky, but in the process reveals that she dumped this ex via email. This doesn’t sit well with Kevin, who questions her choices and whether she’d do the same to him. They split, but eventually reconcile at Randall’s election headquarters and decide to move in together (complete with Zoe’s own John Stamos key ring. Long story).
Meanwhile, Randall and Beth start off the episode at odds (with Randall mainly to blame). But Beth feels bad for trying to stop her husband’s dream and gets back on board with the campaign. Randall—who was way behind in the polls—discovers some damaging information on his opponent, Sol Brown, but decides to try to win the election on his own merit. And in the end, he does.
Throughout all of this drama, Kate and Toby bond over vintage action figures—and a Three Rivers Stadium replica—but otherwise things remain status quo. Now, though, the big question is what will happen when Kate and her brothers and Rebecca find out that their uncle Nicky is alive. Plus, what’s in store for Beth and Randall’s marriage now that he’s a big city councilman (with a two hour commute)?
So we asked executive producer and co-showrunner Isaac Aptaker to tell us what to expect next week. Oh, and he has some info on an easter egg you might have missed. Read on for more.
PHOTO: Ron Batzdorff/NBC
As soon as we heard Nicky was discharged from Walter Reed Medical Center, it was clear Jack had to have known he was alive. Turns out he did—so will we see them together post-Vietnam in the weeks and months to follow?
Isaac Aptaker: Yes, next week’s episode is such a huge episode of the show. It’s a do not miss. We’re going to give all the answers people have been waiting for—about what happened to Jack and Nicky, who knew what, what went down in Vietnam. It’s an incredibly packed episode that will answer everything people are wondering about that story.
Is the entire episode just Jack and Nicky next week, or will we see other characters?
IA: There’s a present day storyline, too. We’re going to learn what happened to Nicky across all of our timelines, including him in the present day.
I was looking at the postcard Nicky sent Jack. When he wrote “last one,” that must infer it’s his last attempt at reaching out, correct?
IA: Yeah, that’s certainly what I would think. [Kevin] has this handful of artifacts of Jack’s that survived the fire, so that’s just one piece of their correspondence. That’s not the whole story, but we will dive into exactly “last one” of how many, “last one” of what, all of that, next week.
How much thought went into that particular postcard that Nicky sent Jack? If you look closely, the image on the front is described on the back as “Young brothers fishing the rivers of Pennsylvania.”
IA: Yeah, that was not an accident at all. [Laughs] We had all of these postcards to see what [the right one] would look like. They were brilliantly designed by our props department. Everything had to be [authentic to the time] period and have little hints about their story but not too on the nose. They were all very carefully designed and selected.
The postcard is also dated 1992, so…
IA: That’s when our big three are in their adorable 12-year-old period.
So if Jack died in January 1998, could we maybe see Jack and Nicky in scenes between 1992-1998?
IA: Totally possible. Totally possible.
I think that means yes.
IA: [Laughs]
Last year viewers first saw Jack and teenage Randall in Washington D.C. Tonight, we saw more of their dialogue there. Had you shot all of that at the same time last year, or did you have to go back and film the part where Jack tells Randall it’s too sad for him to look at Nicky’s name on the war memorial?
IA: We shot part of it [last year] because we had to plan for Nicky back then, so we knew we had that piece of it. Part of it we were able to recreate with some very clever green screens and angles to fill in the rest. But we knew the part of the war memorial back then.
That’s just frightening how much you guys have planned out that far in advance.
IA: Well, we have a really big writers room with so many things on the wall. We’re always putting in these little easter eggs that we know we can go back to.
Let’s talk about Randall and the election. As soon as he got the call with the results, I knew he won based on the look of disbelief that washed over him. But before he told Beth, I wondered if he would say “I won” or “We won.” He says, “I won,” but was that even a conversation in the writers room?
IA: That’s really interesting. I can’t remember a particular conversation about that, but I love that you brought that up. He’s been trying so hard to include Beth in this and for her to find her place in his campaign, but also as her own person in this marriage. When someone wins a job like that, the whole family’s life is going to change. It’s not like he’s the president, but he’s going to be a public figure in a big way. He’s going to be working hard from home, and their whole lives are about to change. What I love about that scene is the look on both of their faces. Neither one was entirely expecting this, and they are having a million thoughts at once. What does this mean for their marriage? What does this mean for their three children? What does this mean for their finances? He got what he wanted in one sense, but also this huge bomb has just been dropped on this home that’s had a pretty rocky year.
And he has this two hour commute between his district and his home.
IA: Right. The logistical problems alone of this new job are just tremendous.
PHOTO: Ron Batzdorff/NBC
Randall will obviously change as he takes on this new role, but will he change for the better or the worse?
IA: I think the immediate storyline we’ll be tackling—because it’s a bit of a slow burn—is once you’re in this position, you’re not actually sworn into office for a little while. There’s a period of time when you’re assembling your staff and applying for committees and such before you begin your work as a city councilman. So the immediate stories are that he won, he wasn’t really expecting that, and what does that mean for him and his family? There are much more family-focused and marriage-focused stories coming. He’s beginning this new job as his wife is at this total crossroads in her life and coming to terms with what she wants as a career woman outside of being a mom and now a political wife. The immediate stories coming up are everything’s changing; how do we continue to be amazing parents to these three amazing daughters who are also going through [things]? Deja wants to see her biological mom, Tess has just come out. Everyone in this family, except for stable, wonderful Annie, is sort of in crisis and in flux, and how do we maintain that amazing family unit that we love when everyone’s in crisis?
By the way, it was such a Randall thing to do when Randall ordered Ellen DeGeneres’ mom’s book on her daughter’s coming out. How much more will we see in the coming weeks and months of Tess’s journey now that she’s opened up to her parents?
IA: I love that scene, too, but at first I was like, “This is too broad, you can’t just make up books.” Our writer Laura Kenar was like, “No, no, look!” She pulled up the Amazon page and was like, “Ellen’s mom really wrote this book.” I was like, “That’s amazing, we’ll keep it in the script!” As far as Tess’s coming out storyline, that’s a slower burn, sort of like a bigger picture through the whole series. It’s not like next week we’re going to be jumping into a dating story for Tess, but it’s something that we’re going to see play out over the course of the rest of the series as Tess struggles when to tell her sisters and her friends at school. Of course, we’ll also see what comes of her romantic relationships in the future storyline as we get to know more about adult Tess. It’s now part of the fabric of our show.
Creator Dan Fogelman recently teased that the cast gathered for a rare table read for episode 15 and that it’s “so intense that our cast called for it. These guys are not messing around right now.” Explain what that means.
IA: I think it was Sterling K. Brown who rallied the troops [to get everyone together for the table read]. Bekah Brunstetter, who is one of our writers and also a very established playwright, wrote this script. I don’t want to tell you too much about it, but it’s very contained and sort of all our characters in one space in almost real time. It’s almost an extended version of that season two, episode 11 rehab family scene we did last year. We just started shooting it today. When Sterling first read the script he was so excited that he said, “Guys, we have to read this through together so we can all hear it out loud before we start.” We hadn’t done that since the fifth episode of season one since it’s so impossible with our production schedule to get everyone in the same place at the same time. But we made it happen and hearing that group of actors perform this incredible script that Bekah wrote was just so exciting. It’s a special one. The episode takes place in the present, and it’s all of our adult siblings and Miguel and Rebecca. It’s a bunch of amazing actors thrown into a situation, and they’re just going to act their faces off.
Dan said it’s an intense episode, but is it shocking as well?
IA: I’d say it’s all of that. It’s also really funny! Jon Huertas (Miguel) was so funny at the table read. He would tell a joke and it would be a minute of laughter before someone could tell their next line.
Finally, let’s talk about Kate. Will we see her give birth this season?
IA: That I cannot answer without giving too much away, but our show progresses pretty much in real time. So if you look when she got pregnant, there’s a good chance that will happen over the course of our year. We try to stick to a normal schedule aside from little [time] jumps here and there.
In 2018 it feels like the world is at last prepared for Janelle Monáe. Ten years ago her EP, Metropolis: The Chase Suite, arrived as if from another continent, even planet. The layered, literary R&B album referenced classic space operas like Star Trek and the works of David Bowie and Prince. It seemed to foretell a world where black girls could imagine themselves without limits. I first heard about Monáe around then, from a much cooler coworker. I remember listening to “Many Moons,” the single that merited her first Grammy nomination, as my colleague and I traded visions of black self-determination.
It was 2008, before the social media heyday, when mass portraits of black identities were still controlled by a narrow-minded media complex. But Monáe kept working her own grooves anyway. Next came The Arch-Android in 2010, which broke the Billboard top 20 with tracks so infectious even Michelle Obama put them on her workout playlist.
PHOTO: Danielle Levitt in Los Angeles. Stylist: Sean Knight; hair: Vernon François; makeup: Jessica Smalls; manicure: Sreynin Peng; set design: Carl Hopgood; production: Emily O’Meara. Calvin Klein 205W39 NYC gown, hat. Alison Lou
Calvin Klein 205W39NYC gown, $1,900, hat, $390, calvinklein.com. Alison Lou hoops, $125, alisonlou.com.
It didn’t occur to me then to wonder where in the world Monáe had come from. But as I reached out to interview her this fall, it all of a sudden seemed essential to know. Every superhero has an origin story.
This is hers: Monáe, 33, was born in Kansas City, Kansas, the product of a black working-class neighborhood called Quindaro. The area was a settlement for Native Americans and, during the Civil War, a haven for abolitionists and black people who escaped enslavement. Her grandmother still owns the house Monáe played in as a child. When she visits, the stories she was raised on flood back to her. Her grandparents, Monáe tells me, passed down the tales from their ancestors about watching slaves escape during Bleeding Kansas, a series of violent clashes in the lead-up to the Civil War. “You can still see some of the ruins there,” she says. “Just knowing that I come from a place where people were trying to be free and fighting for their survival, it makes me feel like I have a lot of people to make proud. I don’t want their work and their blood and their sweat and their tears and their sacrifices to go in vain.”
It’s because of her parents (mother, a janitor; stepfather, a post office worker) that Monáe started to wear a black-and-white tux to public appearances, she says. The outfit was her uniform, an homage to the uniforms that blue-collar workers have worn for decades.
“I’ve always taken issue with people trying to place an image on what a young girl could be,” says Monáe. “I was going to decide that for myself.”
When Monáe released Dirty Computer in April 2018, she seemed to want to break out of even her self-imposed strictures. Her latest work is a new beginning, showing us the fullest vision of Monáe to date. She describes the single “Pynk” as “a brash celebration of creation, self-love, sexuality, and pussy power.” And in its music video Monáe flaunts pubic hair and showcases a parade of voluminous pants shaped like vaginas. “I knew that I wanted to embrace all of me,” she says. “The good, the bad, the complicated, the humble, the cocky, the many dimensions of who I was.” In December, audiences will see her in Welcome to Marwen, her first feature role since Hidden Figures in 2016. The movie is as distinctive as its leads—a combination live-action and animated film about an artist named Mark Hogancamp (Steve Carrell) who tries to recover from a brutal attack by creating a miniature World War II town. Monáe stars as his physical therapist and friend. In other words, the healer.
“I’ve always taken issue with people trying to place an image on what a young girl could be. Early on I told my parents that I was going to decide that for myself.”
Monáe was raised in the Baptist church, a place that both fostered her love of music and emphasized, in her view, that she was different from some of her fellow worshippers. “I grew up with 12 aunts that I was very close to and that loved and cared about me,” she remembers. But with their affection came a host of opinions that they didn’t hesitate to make known. “They would say, ‘Oh, no skirts above the knees,’ or, ‘You can’t wear pants,’” Monae recalls. “I would…come in and just want to express myself. You had to deal with the looks and the community saying, ‘When you come in here, you need to look this way.’ I’ve always taken issue with people trying to place an image on what a young girl could be. Early on I told my parents that I was going to decide that for myself.”
The church may have sometimes stifled her, but it was also where Monáe learned the power of activism. She went door-to-door to feed the poor. She walked around the most dangerous parts of her neighborhood, “praying with people that people [would] put down their guns.” It felt good, she says, like, “This is what I’m supposed to be doing.” Monáe has carried that commitment to activism into adulthood. She has been an outspoken and frequent supporter of the Women’s March. At the 2018 Grammys she gave one of the most powerful speeches about Time’s Up; it was an extension of her own work with Fem the Future, which she launched in 2016 to empower female music executives, filmmakers, and sound engineers. The organization is her response to her own frustrations about opportunities for women in the business. That zeal for justice will continue to permeate her artistic work; her videos in particular create worlds of both oppression and rebellion. These fictional worlds, she says, “allow us to see where we could be headed. If we don’t right our wrongs, this could be our future.”
At this moment, even as the country seems bitterly polarized, she’s focused on a path forward. “We are going to have to figure out how to protect each other better than we have been,” she says. “We have to prioritize that, do a better job of looking after each other. I think we get an F in that. We’re going to have to stop getting lost in our own individualism because we are a [community]. We literally rely on each other to survive.”
“We are going to have to figure out how to protect each other better than we have been,” Monáe says. “We have to do a better job of looking after each other.”
Helmut Lang coat. Celine top. See by Chloé pants, $345. Stetson hat, $115. Alison Lou hoops,$125. Louise Olsen silver rings, $220, $230. JaneD’Arensbourg ring, $132.
And how do we do that? For Monáe—an exceptional talent but one hell-bent on collective deliverance—the best chance we have at freedom comes to us as it did to her as a child: through stories. “Having real vulnerable moments allows us to see each other in each other,” she says. “Once we can reach a level of empathy, maybe we can like each other more. Maybe we can love each other more.”
It’s a kindness Monáe has tried to extend inward over the past year in particular. Her various identities have rallied her: “I’m a part of the LGBTQIA community. I’m a black woman. My parents are working class,” she says. None of us, she adds, has “our shit together,” so why not just own it, whatever we are?
“We can pull down the fake wallpaper, break the mirror that has been lying to us and making [us] believe that we need to be perfect,” she says. “We don’t need to be perfect to be respected.”
Kaitlyn Greenidge is the author of We Love You, Charlie Freeman.
Hair: Vernon Francois at The Visionaries Agency; makeup: Jessica Smalls at The Wall Group; prop stylist: Carl Hopgood at Celestine Agency; manicure: Sreynin Peng; production: JN Production.
If it’s been a while since you’ve had a cathartic cry, then you’re in luck: season three of This Is Us premieres on NBC next month. Still too far away for you? Get this: The network will be airing a primetime special on September 18 to celebrate everything we know and love about the show.
Per Deadline, the special, titled The Paley Center Salutes This Is Us, will be an hour long and will “usher in the new season with clips, interviews with the stars and creators,” as well as present a “behind-the-scenes look at how the series comes together each week.” You can also expect to see most of the show’s stars—including Milo Ventimiglia, Mandy Moore, Sterling K. Brown, Justin Hartley, and Chrissy Metz—talking about their experiences on the show in never-before-seen interviews.
PHOTO: NBC
“Upon its 2016 premiere, This Is Us captured the hearts of viewers and immediately took its place as one of television’s most beloved dramas,” the Paley Center’s president and CEO said in a statement. “We are proud to once again partner with our friends at NBC for this very special look at the trials and triumphs of the Pearson family before the series returns for its highly anticipated third season.”
PHOTO: NBC
Besides the September 25 premiere date for This Is Us‘s third season, NBC has been remaining coy about what to expect when the next chapter of the Peasons’ lives begins. The big things we do know, however, are the following: It’s going to be the most “ambitious” season yet, the Vietnam War is going to be an integral part of many character developments, Kevin and Zoe’s relationship will be a central story, and the aftermath of Jack’s death will be fully explored.
Rihanna—the singer—is back. The multi-hyphenate seems to have grown weary of singlehandedly disrupting entire industries according to her whims, and now appears to be hard at work on some new music. The news comes courtesy of her very own Instagram Stories, where she posted one picture, one video, and one Boomerang showing her in front of the mic. It looks like she isn’t holding back, either: In the posts, she’s traded in her Met Gala-destroying looks for a T-shirt and white-rimmed sunglasses. She also captioned the Boomerang, “Vamp: when breakfast becomes dinner.” She remained otherwise wordless, supposing correctly that the visuals alone would cause the Internet to implode.
It’s unclear whether Rihanna has returned to the studio for a mere late-summer hit or a full album, but she previously gave fans a sneak peek at her musical projects in the works. For her June cover of British Vogue, she revealed that she plans to make a reggae album, with a possible collaborator in record producer Supa Dups. Then, in July, Rolling Stone reported, based on conversations with multiple unnamed sources, that she apparently has two albums on the cutting board: One “devoted to exploring [her] Caribbean roots,” and another that’s “pop-oriented.” Rolling Stone also reported that two unnamed sources have “confirmed” Supa Dups’s involvement, and that Rihanna has gotten a “large number of demos” from top dancehall and reggae producers and singers, including, reportedly, the duo R. City, Stephen “Di Genius” McGregor, Linton “TJ Records” White, Ricky Blaze, Tyshane “Beam” Thompson, Kranium, and Chronixx.
PHOTO: badgalriri/Instagram Stories
PHOTO: badgalriri/Instagram Stories
“[Rihanna’s team] have, no lie, 500 records for this project [from] different producers and writers,” one anonymous dancehall producer told Rolling Stone. “They’re only choosing 10 records. They’ve been having writing camps and trying to keep them quiet for almost a year and a half now. I’ve been flying to Miami, flying to L.A., cutting records nonstop for this project.”
“Every artist, every producer, every songwriter in Jamaica or of Jamaican descent has been working on [Rihanna’s album] and has little snippets of publishing or production credits on it,” another anonymous source added.
It’s hard for Rihanna to make a wrong move. In fact, just writing that feels out of bounds—if Rihanna chose to do something, she must have her reasons. Leg stubble? She’s revolutionizing beauty. That said, her latest look is stirring up some strong feelings. On the cover of British Vogue‘s September issue, Rihanna, ever a beauty visionary, is wearing the tiniest, most over-the-top pencil thin brows to be seen on a celebrity in what feels like forever, and Twitter is distressed.
As Rihanna’s Instagram caption explains, the look was created in collaboration with Isamaya Ffrench who’s a celebrity makeup artist known for pushing the boundaries of makeup in a very avant-garde, Alexander McQueen-ish way. Ffrench used Fenty, because of course, although the exact products aren’t listed (if Fenty drops a 1-millimeter brow pencil next the Internet would surely implode). As is, her brows look like they plausibly could’ve been the work of Flyliner, Fenty’s newly-launched liquid liner.
The images Vogue came up with are beautiful, but the Internet’s reactions were immediate and hardline: No, please, Rihanna, NO. Don’t lure us back to the early aughts skinny brow trend, we didn’t go all-in on Boy Brow and microblading for this. We’ve bought brow serums and hundreds of products to escape the horrors that these brows did. Don’t let a new generation suffer.
There are divisions. Some people say, just because Rihanna wore it on set doesn’t mean we’re seeing the start of an actual real-life trend. They have a point; insane brow styles pop up on Instagram all the time, and we haven’t seen those make the jump.
