Arts

Written by Tim Teeman and Kevin Fallon

Well, Tim, Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie got married Saturday in France. It was not a drill. It was not an OK! Magazine fever dream. The two most famous people in the world are now the most famous husband and wife in the world, laughing in the face of that little singer and her rapper husband who did that little thing on MTV over the weekend and that prince and princess parading around that little baby George. Just one kid, Will and Kate? Try six.

One would imagine the halls of Us Weekly resemble some sort of chaos tornado, with gossip and fashion reporters teetering on stilettos darting about and screaming “THEY DID IT! THEY GOT MARRIED!” And when some lowly intern asks, “Who?” they are pointed to the bronze busts of Jolie and Pitt and sit permanently on the conference room mantle and then subsequently fired for their stupidity. Even TMZ’s headline announcing the news ends with the word “…Finally!,” as if the nuptials of two actors was some right guaranteed to all of us that for some reason has been withheld. I love the pairing of two incredibly famous and incredibly attractive people as much as the next person who has devoted himself to writing about incredibly famous and incredibly attractive as a profession, but are we overreacting just a bit?

Tim: Hang on. Weren’t they supposed to be getting married when all gay people were freed from their chains of living sinfully in sin? Didn’t one of them say: We’ll only get married when our gay brethren can. Gay people are only free to marry in 19 states. Did Brad and Angelina get bored of waiting for federal marriage equality and think: “OK gay people, we love you, but this is totes ridiculous.” I mean fair enough. I basically hope the ceremony was like Mr. and Mrs. Smith, with her swinging in on a rope and him smashing some flower displays over a baddie’s head, and then she gets to the altar, fixes him with a smoky glare, and says, “I’m ready.” He karate-chops a final stray assassin, then they exchange vows.

Kevin: Sadly, the ceremony sounded like it was less sexual assassin-themed and more “absolutely perfect and heart-meltingly gorgeous and tear-jerkingly adorable” themed. It took place in Chateau Miraval, France. Jolie was walked down the aisle by her oldest sons. Zahara and Vivenne tossed rose petals as they walked. Shiloh and Knox were ring bearers. I’m getting misty eyed just mentioning this. I’m not really a wedding crier, per se, as someone who cries just thinking about weddings. The ceremony truly did sound beautiful, and I’m duly impressed and even find it admirable that they did it without nary a member of the press finding out. (Though I suspect that Harvey Levin or Giuliana Rancic would’ve delivered the blood of slaughtered virgins in order to get the scoop on the nuptials.) In the age of Kim and Kanye, there’s something refreshing about its secrecy.

Tim: Now I’m imagining that intern at US Weekly, amid the shrieking orders, miserably having to unearth the “five things you need to know about Chateau Miraval.” Kevin, I can hear it in your tip-tapping: you’re softening. You’re weakening. You’re Googling “Jolie Wedding Dress.” You didn’t care, and now—welcome, come in, pour a glass of prosecco—you’re totally in the glare of what the bouquets comprised of, and the specific wedding duty breakdowns of the Many Children of This Handsome Union. Gotta say, love the reaction of their various family members, as reported by the Daily Mail: well-practiced variations of “whatever.”

But Kevin, we know the wedding is not about Brad and Angelina, it is—in tabloid/tattle-mag shorthand, all about Poor Jen, The Perpetually Suffering Aniston. Still not married. Still no kids. And on the day this all happens, she’s appearing on Jimmy Kimmel with her other female Friends. Life on perpetual freeze-frame. So, how soon will this story be turned into Poor Jen?

Kevin: Yikes. Is it too optimistic to hope that it doesn’t? Can misogynistic and baseless tabloid narratives go out of style? If so, I’m more than ready for the Sad Unwed Jen Greek tragedy to go the way of Juicy tracksuits. Jen has a fiancé. He’s hot as hell. He’s got a fancy-sounding name. (Justin Theroux, oo la la.) He’s joyously .GIF-able when he goes jogging in sweatpants, if you know what I mean. Jen is doing just fine! Isn’t there something a little anti-feminist about the assumption that a girl is unhappy because her ex now has a new wife? Do you know how many people in the world have exes who are now married? It’s pretty much every single person.

I will, however, cede that it’s a little thunder-stealing that this wedding news came on the same day as Jen’s big Friends reunion, the kind of viral moment that would take over the celebrity news cycle on any other day but the day Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie go and get married. It’s would be like Beyoncé and Jay Z announcing they’re getting a divorce the same day Kelly Rowland has her baby. Can a girl have her moment?

Tim: Of course it’s sexist nonsense, and of course all the celebrity magazines—staffed/edited by women—are already going down that route. Why they do it who knows, but the Tragic Jen narrative has never run out of steam, even with the presence of the .GIF-able Mr Theroux (he’s like a pretty punk doll isn’t he?). Anyway, the gossip magazines are already imagining the fringes at dawn confrontation when Jen and Ange come face to face at George Clooney’s wedding. The coolest fuck-you-sexist-media thing Jennifer Aniston should do today is release a .GIF or YouTube video, vodka bottle empty beside her, cake smeared over face, empty pill bottles around her, headlines of Brad and Ange marriage scrunched up, and just slurring: “I’m fine about it” over and over again.

Kevin: This is actually a delicious opportunity for Aniston. She’s full-throttle on a press tour right now for her new movie Life of Crime, which comes out on Friday. The Elmore Leonard movie is solid evidence that Aniston is capable of more than slight rom-coms, raunch comedies, and willowy romantic dramas, and she’s going to want to keep promoting it because she’s really quite good in it. It would be impossible to do press for the film and skirt questions about the Jolie-Pitt nuptials. So rather than just ignore the flawlessly attractive pair of elephants in the room or recite some bogus PR bullshit that respectfully wishes them well, it would do aces for her career to address this in a fun way. In fact, she should just do exactly what you said. Tim Teeman, PR Manager for the Stars (or at Least Jennifer Aniston), For Hire!

Tim: Always free for Jen. I can even recommend she doesn’t do short sketches on her friends’ farewell shows, like she did with Chelsea Handler the other night. Tried hard. Not side-splitting. But I love her. When my hair gets long enough I kid myself I can mimic the glorious tumbling fringe of “the Rachel” sometimes. Yes, boys can do it too: no shame! Her problem is when can she and Justin T get married now, in the foreseeable future, without it all seeming a bit “Hello, us too”? I think we need more pictures of them being generally hot, her rolling her eyes when asked about the wedding, and being super-funny about the “poor Jen” narrative. And then we need the double-date photo to end all double-date photos. Yes, I speak of Jen-Justin-Brad-Ange emerging from Nobu, giggling, and then—just for the paps outside—swapping partners and then kissing the hell out of them. The media meltdown would be delicious.