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Gayle King Kept Her Cool in the Face of a Terrifying R. Kelly


Watching R. Kelly’s sit down with Gayle King on CBS This Morning was intense. Thanks to teasers and some photos King posted last night on her own Instagram, I knew going in that Kelly would, at some point, lose his temper. But seeing it all play out was more terrifying than I expected. I can only imagine how it must have felt for the women who have been brave enough to come forward and share their stories about alleged sexual abuse on his part, or for any other survivors for that matter.

Kelly, in his first interview since the airing of the Surviving R. Kelly documentary series on Lifetime, categorically denied all the allegations against him. “I’m very tired of all of the lies,” he said when King asked why he agreed to talk to her. “I’ve been hearing things, and you know, and seeing things on the blogs, and you know, you know, I’m just tired.” When she named the women who participated in the documentary, he replied, “They are lying on me,” a phrase he repeated multiple times.

According to Kelly, his accusers (and the world, it would seem) are conspiring against him and making up stories for their own gain. “All you have to do is push a button on your phone and say, ‘So and so did this to me, R. Kelly did this to me,’ and if you get any traction from that, if you’re able to write a book from that, if you’re able to get a reality show,” he says, “then any girl that I had a relationship in the past that it just didn’t work out, she can come and say the same exact thing.”

Sharing your deepest pain with the world in the name of justice has never, to my mind, seemed self-serving. And while it will be up to the courts to decide whether Kelly will face legal punishment this time around (he was previously acquitted on child pornography charges and is currently facing 10 new charges of sexual abuse), the evidence in the court of public opinion is damning.

Kelly, by talking to King, must have thought he would somehow be able to change that. When he eventually blew up in anger and frustration, I recoiled. Thoughts of the Brett Kavanaugh hearings also came to mind, another moment where we saw a man scream and rage and cry in order to try to make his point. Like the women of the Senate Judiciary Committee, King remained steadfast and tough in her questioning. Even what he was saying sounded familiar: “I didn’t do this stuff! This is not me! I’m fighting for my fucking life! Y’all killing me with this shit! I gave y’all 30 years of my fucking career!” He believes he has been “assassinated” and “buried alive.”

To me, he seemed unhinged.

Others on social media had similar reactions to his aggressive behavior.

There was also (much deserved) praise for the way King handled herself in the face of an angry, menacing man. I cannot say that I wouldn’t have gotten up from my chair and walked away. King said that she did not feel like she was in danger of being hit by Kelly, but I wasn’t so sure watching from the safety of my living room.

If Kelly’s interview proved anything to me, it is that he is a man who seems to hold a deep contempt for women. He put that publicly on display for the world today. And in the face of his anger, a woman remained steadfast—much like his accusers before her.

That’s what I’ll take away.





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I Chose Unassisted Home Birth Because Pregnant Black Women Are Dying at Terrifying Rates


On all fours in an inflatable pool in my living room, I could feel my baby’s head crowning. I reached down to touch him, stunned at the quiet instinctiveness my body seemed to possess. Before I could even think about what to do next, my body summoned one last great push, safely delivering my son into my husband’s waiting hands. We sat there in awe, just the three of us—no doctor, no midwife, no doula—soaking in what suddenly felt like the perfect birth.

My husband and I always knew we wanted a home birth. Aromatherapy, candlelight, and the comfort and safety of my own home always sounded far superior to a sterile hospital delivery room filled with strangers in scrubs. But what we didn’t initially plan was that we’d have a completely unassisted home birth, without a trained birthing professional like a doctor or midwife present to help coach us through the delivery of our first child.

From almost the moment I found out I was pregnant, I worried. Every mom-to-be worries—Will I have pregnancy complications? Will my child be healthy? Will I poop during labor?—but with my being a black woman in America, the realization quickly set in: Being pregnant meant putting my well-being, even my life, on the line in a way that white moms, statistically, don’t have to.

Shockingly, the United States is the most dangerous developed country in the world to have a baby. Women in the U.S. are three times more likely to die during childbirth than women in Canada. To put it in perspective, that’s a higher maternal mortality rate than in Kuwait and Kazakhstan. Immediately after birth, complications like postpartum hemorrhage can threaten a new mother’s life, and after leaving the hospital, many more women face health complications that can be life-threatening, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Some estimates say 60 percent of these deaths are preventable.

That’s enough to keep any pregnant woman up at night, but for black women, the stats are even more chilling. Black women in the United States are three to four times more likely to experience pregnancy-related death than white women. The prevailing theory as to why this gross inequity exists? Black women are often ignored and dismissed when it comes to health issues, including ones that can turn fatal.

Even Serena Williams isn’t immune to the deadly bias. The day after giving birth, she was having trouble breathing. With a history of pulmonary embolism, she notified her care team right away, telling them she needed a CT scan. But Williams’ request was initially downplayed; nurses thought her pain medication might be making her confused, she told Vogue. Her persistence is what ultimately saved her life. When she finally did get the scan, it revealed blood clots had indeed settled in her lungs.

Not all black women are as lucky. Kira Johnson, a 39-year-old woman in Los Angeles, died just hours after giving birth to her second child. After a routine C-section, Johnson began complaining of excruciating abdominal pain and started losing color, her husband told People. He noticed blood in her catheter, but it was hours before her health care professionals took any action, he said. Another surgery revealed Johnson had massive internal bleeding. She died from the complications.

This racial bias weighed heavily on my mind—with stories like Johnson’s and Williams’ happening more often than I could stomach, how could I feel safe having a hospital birth? My husband’s own grandmother died while pregnant in the hospital. She was just 35.



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Kate McKinnon Playing a Hybrid Pennywise-Kellyanne Conway Is Legit Terrifying


Few could strike more fear into the hearts of Americans than Donald Trump, Kellyanne Conway, and Pennywise from Stephen King’s It (in theaters now!). So when Saturday Night Live premiered its latest digital short, which incorporates all three into one sketch, chills were had.

The short opens with Alex Moffat as Anderson Cooper leaving the CNN offices late one night. He accidentally drops some papers he’s carrying and chases them as they float way and into a nearby sewer, which is where he encounters Kate McKinnon‘s Conway-Pennywise hybrid, hereafter known as “Kellywise.”

“Hello, Coopy,” says Kellywise, her crazy smile smiling from underground. “It’s me, Kellyanne Conway. But you can call me Kellywise. Kellywise the dancing clown.” When “Cooper” asks what she did to her makeup, which is white with red lips and—are they red tears streaming down her face?—she deadpans, “I toned it down.”

What Kellywise wants more than anything is for “Cooper” to put her on TV. “I’ll give you a quote,” she promises in her frightening clown voice. “I’ll give you a crazy, crazy quote.” Then she does this creepy ghost-like flicker before offering up this example: “OK, so, Puerto Rico actually was worse before Hurricane Maria. And the hurricane actually did blow some buildings back together. And I don’t know why Elizabeth Warren won’t tweet about that.”

Pennywise follows that up with another soundbite: “OK, so, Secretary Tillerson did not call the president a moron. They were sharing a sundae, and the president asked if he wanted more sprinkles, and the secretary says, ‘More on.'”

You know, just some Conway Classics, a.k.a. “alternative facts.”

That’s when Kenan Thompson, playing a police officer, intervenes. He warns “Cooper” against talking to Kellywise. Even Rachel Maddow has fallen prey to her darkness, Thompson says—which is when Cecily Strong-as-Maddow makes her appearance in the sewer next to Kellywise. “You’ll float too, Anderson,” she promises him.

Not giving up, Kellywise tries every trick in the book to convince “Cooper” to have her on his show, including threatening him with his two greatest fears (Trump winning a second term as president and a headline that says “Anderson Cooper Fat Now”). In the end, it’s McKinnon-as-Kellywise-as-Hillary-Clinton (got that?) who finally gets him.

Watch the full thing below—if you dare:

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Related Stories:
–‘SNL’ Launched Its Own Savage Investigation Into Kellyanne Conway’s Whereabouts
–The Way ‘Saturday Night Live’ Transformed Kate McKinnon Into Hillary Clinton Is Fascinating
–Kate McKinnon’s Dos and Don’ts



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The Trailer for Maisie Williams' New 'X-Men: The New Mutants' Movie Is Terrifying


PHOTO: 20th Century Fox/YouTube

There has been no shortage of X-Men movies since filmgoers were first introduced to Professor X and company in 2000. Marvel fans have seen the good (X-Men, X-Men: First Class), the bad (X-Men: The Last Stand), and the so sad it might ruin not just all Wolverine movies, but all Hugh Jackson movies for you (Logan). And now, mutant fans are finally getting a horror movie.

On Friday (the 13th, no less) the trailer dropped for X-Men: The New Mutants—a look at what happens when mutant teens aren’t sent to a magical prep school full of small classes and only the occasional government raid, and instead are locked in some kind of haunted house. The film stars Stranger Things’ Charlie Heaton as Sam Guthrie (Mutant code name: Cannonball) and Game of Thrones’ Maisie Williams as Rahne Sinclair a.k.a. Wolfsbane. (I know it’s traditional to pick a new name that highlights your abilities, but Rahne Sinclair is already a pretty cool name.)

With the film, Williams is joining her GoT co-star and real-life bestie, Sophie Turner, in the X-Men universe. Turner played young Jean Grey in last year’s X-Men Apocalypse and will star in X-Men: Dark Phoenix, out next November.

If the star power of X-Men: The New Mutants hasn’t sold you (the film also features Split‘s Anya Taylor-Joy and 13 Reasons Why’s Henry Zaga), the man behind the camera might. Josh Boone, who directs the new film and penned the screenplay, also directed classic teen weepie The Fault in Our Stars.

X-Men: The New Mutants will be released on April 13. Watch the trailer below, if you dare:

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Related: Maisie Williams Explains Why the ‘Game of Thrones’ Cast Are Scared of Getting Drunk in Public



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'American Horror Story: Cult' Is a Terrifying, Completely Cathartic Look at Trump-Era America


PHOTO: Copyright 2017, FX Networks. All rights reserved.

When people find out I’m interested in horror, the first question is usually, “Why?” Depending on who’s asking and how much time we have, I may give a surface-level answer (“Jump scares are fun!”), a semi-autobiographical answer (“I’ve always been interested in the creepy and macabre.”), or the real, let’s-get-into-this answer: because it’s cathartic to confront what scares you, which is why horror tends to reflect present-day society’s biggest fears. It’s why movies like The Purge: Election Year and Get Out have been so successful in Trump’s America. It’s also why American Horror Story: Cult, which premiered last night, is so fascinating.

From the start, the episode felt like a 2016-2017 time capsule that’s been dumped open far too soon. It opens with a montage of election highlights (or lowlights, depending on how you voted): Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton announcing their presidential campaigns, Trump’s rallies, the riots, talking heads on Fox News discussing “the emails,” even Trump declaring, “I could stand in the middle of Fifth Avenue and shoot somebody, and I wouldn’t lose voters.” By the time a title card informs us it’s election night, a feeling of dread (well, again, depending how you voted) has set in.

Then the show cuts between two very different election nights taking place in a small Michigan town. At the comfortable, upper-middle class home of life partners Ally and Ivy (played by Sarah Paulson and Allison Pill, respectively), a group of diverse friends pace the room and nervously say things like, “I won’t believe anything until I hear Rachel Maddow say it. She’s the only one I trust!” Contrast that with Kai Anderson (Evan Peters), a 20-something, greasy white dude sitting alone in a drab basement. When Trump is announced as our next President, Kai cheers, humps the TV, and yells, “The revolution has begun!”; Ally wails as if she’s physically being harmed. Meanwhile, upstairs at Kai’s, Winter Anderson (Billie Lourd) watches the news on her laptop and calls her friend to ask, “Why did CNN not give us a trigger warning!?”

It’s a cutting satirical take on progressives and the alt-right alike—Hillary voters may be emotional snowflakes, but Trump supporters are angry losers living in their mom’s basement—that might immediately turn off people who aren’t willing to look in the mirror too long. But this is American Horror Story—and a Ryan Murphy production at that—which means you’ll never have to sit too long in a moment before it’s on to the next atrocity. This time, it’s a scene in which Kai, still reveling in the glory of Trump’s win, throws a bag of Cheetos in a blender and smears the orange goop onto his face as he whispers, “it’s gonna be huuuuggeee” into the mirror. It’s campy, disgusting, and grotesque—but, hey, this show has never been described as “subtle.”

And that’s just what happens before the opening credits. The rest of the episode continues to capitalize on the fears of both the left and the right, with Ally and Kai serving as tropes of their respective parties. Post election night, Ally’s coulrophobia (fear of clowns) and trypophobia (fear of tiny holes) have flared up. Even the most basic places are no longer safe: A trip to the grocery store starts off ominously when a MAGA hat-wearing cashier declares, “We finally got a real leader in Washington.” That alone would trigger Ally, but then a group of people in clown masks wielding knives and metal music start terrorizing her. Ally defends herself by throwing bottles of Rosé (yes, really) until she makes it to her Prius, where she breaks down. Later, back at home, she’s told by the cops it was just a hallucination. Was it really? Or is she being gaslighted? We don’t know yet—but if this season really is an allegory for our current politics, I think we all know what the answer will be.

Kai, meanwhile, may seem more confident than Ally on the surface, but his actions reflect the insecurities and fears that are currently driving many Trump supporters, like the moment when he picks a fight with Mexican workers, telling them, “You wetbacks aren’t welcome here no more.” Most revealing, though, is a speech he gives at a city council meeting that ends with this line: “There’s nothing more dangerous in this world than a humiliated man.” It’s chilling—all he’s missing is a tiki torch.

By the episode’s end, I started to wonder: Is there anything both sides can agree is universally scary? North Korea making good on its threats? Trump’s Twitter feed? Clowns? Maybe clowns—but then again, given Trump’s orange hue, exaggerated facial expressions, and funny hair…maybe not. Maybe that’s what we’re supposed to discover by the season finale.

All I know is this: We’re in for a wild, fucked-up ride. And I’m ready for it.

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'What Happened to Monday?' Is a Terrifying Mix of 'The Hunger Games' and 'Divergent'


PHOTO: ©Netflix/Courtesy Everett Collection / Everett Collection

Warning: Major film spoilers ahead.

Noomi Rapace plays seven characters in Netflix’s new film, What Happened to Monday, but that’s not even the wildest part about this project. Nope, that honor goes to the Child Allocation Bureau, a government branch responsible for making sure families have onlyone child in their households. The goal of this entity is to “fix” the world’s overpopulation issue, which has reached critical mass in 2073, the year this film takes place. And what happens to the excess siblings, you ask? They’re killed—but the families don’t know that.

This is a dystopian movie, if you couldn’t tell, and it’s a good one. It’s also a movie about survival and determination and sisterhood—seven sisters, specifically. All played by Rapace.

If you’re scratching your head, here’s some background info: A genetic mutation causes a woman to give birth to seven children, which is bad because of the Child Allocation Bureau I mentioned earlier. If the government finds out about her children, six of them will be taken away. So after she dies in the hospital, her father (Willem Dafoe) takes the kids into hiding. He names each child after a day of the week—and when they get older he lets them go out once a week. Monday can leave the house Monday, Tuesday on Tuesday—you get the idea.

But here’s the catch: When the sisters are outside, they have to fool the world into thinking they’re one person named Karen Settman. They have to wear a wig and walk the same and talk the same. If they don’t, the government might realize more than one person is living in their house—and I already told you what happens in that case.

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PHOTO: ©Netflix/Courtesy Everett Collection / Everett Collection

At the head of this totalitarian regime is Nicolette Cayman, played brilliantly (and terrifyingly) by Glenn Close. When she gets wind of the seven siblings, a manhunt ensues for all of them but one. Those are the rules, after all.

You can probably guess what happens next: lots of fighting, blood, and yes, death. (Sorry, but not all the sisters make it to the end of the film.) These scenes are exciting and adrenaline-pumping, sure, but they’re something even more important: empowering—especially for women. The seven sisters outsmart their techno-savvy government by working together—using their strengths to stay one step ahead of the violent dudes hot on their tails.

In one particularly chilling scene, three men with scary guns lure five of the sisters out of hiding. The dudes laugh at the sisters and make some disparaging comments about them. Right as you think it’s all over, though, one of the physically astute sisters takes a shot at the head lunkhead, and a full-out brawl begins, ending in the death of all the men hired to kill them. Granted, this isn’t a fully victorious moment—one of the sisters, unfortunately, also dies—but it establishes the tone of the film. On some level, this movie shows what good can happen when women join forces.

It also shows what happens when they’re adversaries. This entire blood bath began in the first place because one of the sisters—I won’t tell you which—made a seedy deal with the government. She quite literally betrayed her sisters, and the result was carnage. Lots of it. The message isn’t exactly subtle—but it’s powerful.

And the film’s references to The Hunger Games, Divergent, and Orphan Black aren’t subtle either. Nicolette Cayman is eerily similar to Jeanine Matthews, the dictator who had a bone to pick with Tris in Divergent; the sisters’ fighting style has distinct Katniss Everdeen shades; and, as I mentioned earlier, Rapace takes on seven. different. roles. That’s Tatiana Maslany AF.

What Happened to Monday still has its own identity, though. For one, it’s scary. Like, genuinely scary. (The Hunger Games and Divergent are great, but they won’t keep you up at night.) But it’s that theme of sisterhood that really sets Monday apart from its peers. Katniss and Tris are great female protagonists, but they’re the only ones in their respective stories. Their narratives are inextricably linked to the male characters. In What Happened to Monday, the males take a backseat to the badassery of Karen Settman. Times seven. Whoever said there’s power in numbers was absolutely right.

What Happened to Monday is streaming on Netflix right now. Go watch!



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