This is a preview of the pop culture newsletter The Daily Beast’s Obsessed, written by editor Kevin Fallon. To get the full newsletter in your inbox each week, Sign up for it here.
This week:
Lights out in Memphis
We talk a lot about the MTV generation but ignore the VH1 generation.
We are a generation of geriatric (general) millennials whose parents thought MTV was “too rude.” We are the ones who still play The Corrs’”Breathless” on the loop. Who can recreate every moment of Céline Dion’s”that’s the way it is” music video. Who thinks life is wonderful, as long as Rob Thomas is still making music.
That is the VH1 generation associated with Lisa Marie Presley’s music career.
It is heartbreaking that Presley, the king’s daughter, died this week afterward Suspected cardiac arrest. As an entertainment writer and editor, my mind goes in so many different directions: Her dad! Michael Jackson! Nicolas Cage! Just try to be her own entity!
I remember when she released her single, “Turn off the light” in 2003. It must have taken a major record label to put it on the VH1 part of my morning ritual “sweep a Pop Tart before driving to school”.
i know it is the age of babies, but there’s something about the song’s success that doesn’t seem to have been “gifted” to her that way. It captures our fascination with her father, and an understanding of her background and expected celebrity status, no matter your talent or ambition.
Watching music videos is a strange experience. She looks great number of like her father, and her vocal style is gruff and gruff like his — but also her own unique feature. Throughout the song, she thinks about her legacy. “Someone turned off the lights in Memphis,” she sings, recounting her family history directly. “That’s where my family was buried and died,” another wrote. When the song ends, she sings, “Bastard from Memphis.”
It all just feels so… cool. A lot of times, when the children of rock stars dip their toes into performance, music or otherwise, it’s frustrating. But there is an art to what Lisa Marie is doing. A point. And, it is good.
Elvis Presley with his wife Priscilla Beaulieu Presley and 4-day-old daughter Lisa Marie Presley on February 5, 1968 in Memphis, Tennessee.
Michael Ochs/Getty Archives
I think one of the reasons this death hit so hard is that there was a generation of Elvis idols. And then he had a daughter? Those fans may have already his family? But in “Lights Out,” Lisa Marie tells what it feels like to be that person. It’s a bit like Prince Harry and Preventive: find out what it feels like to be inside the palace, or the walls of Graceland.
The great thing about Lisa Marie is that she left her mark. She has to say what she needs to get out, in this case, through song. And she is in charge of her own journey, as everyone should: “I guess I fell on my own.”
Perfect acceptance speech
This is a newsletter about what I’m obsessed with, so it would be a mistake not to mention it Jennifer Coolidge‘S Golden Globe stated. I’m not exaggerating when I say I’ve probably watched it 100 times. It went viral, so it’s on my Twitter feed, Instagram Stories, and group text messages. I watch it every time I come across it. It brings me such joy.
Jennifer Coolidge accepts the award for Best Supporting Actress in a Television Series or Limited Series or anthology for “The White Lotus”.
Rich Polk / Getty
I consider myself an expert in award speeches, having spent years in the sleepless hours from 1am to 3am rereading every Oscar, Golden Globe speech over and over. , Tony Award and SAG Award on YouTube. Coolidge for White Lotus Perfect. So funny. She does a great job when she tells stories, and in her stories is her thanks.
It also made me realize my new goal in life: having someone talk about me on national television with the same emotion Jennifer Coolidge did about Mike White.
The best “Beast” show of all time
I worked at The Daily Beast for a number of years which I won’t share, as that might make you spot my age. (I’m 26, always and forever.) But with certainty and inherited knowledge, I’d say there’s never been a TV series that caught my attention like “Beasty” (as it does). we mean in-house) than this.
Storm Danielsex-porn actor accused of having an affair with former US president Donald Trump and compare my penis to a mushroom, in storage a reality dating competition for older gay men, called For the love of DILF. Welcome to 2023.
I cry.
There are two types of people: those who don’t know that pop star Sara Bareilles wrote the soundtrack for the Broadway musical Waitress, and who deeply loved a song on that show, “She used to Be Mine,” so much that they considered it another human emotion, like sadness or regret. I watched the videos, no exaggeration, at least 50 people singing this song. But to see Bareilles himself perform it with Brandi Carlile? Come back now. I need to run to Costco to buy a pallet of Kleenex boxes.
What to watch this week:
velvet: As if they were going to make Velma gay from Scooby-Doo and I wouldn’t watch right away? (Now on HBO Max)
Maid: M. Night Shyamalan stands here. Sorry not sorry. (Available on Apple TV+)
Our last: This program is going to be huge. Start watching. (Sunday on HBO)
What to skip this week:
A man named Otto: Even Tom Hanks couldn’t save a movie as bad as this. (Currently showing in theaters)
