In 2022, actress Anne Hathaway discovered that she was the most hated person on the internet. And she also met a new term: she had been Woman’d, or what is the same, “womanized”, a situation in which, at a specific moment, everyone stops liking a woman at the same time. time and begins to be criticized, especially in the digital universe. A star, always feminine, fallen from grace overnight and hated on a loop in the hate generator that social networks are sometimes. The new “victim” of this phenomenon is another Hollywood actress, Blake Lively, in a smear campaign orchestrated in five attacks.
Shot 1: Comedy or drama?
It all started with the promotion of his latest film. close the circle, an adaptation of Colleen Hoover’s popular novel of the same name, in which Lively plays a woman named Lily Bloom, a florist who begins an abusive relationship with a man named Ryle Kincaid, played by Justin Baldoni (who also directs the movie). Beyond an airy disagreement between both actors, the differences between the marketing strategies of the protagonists have been somewhat disconcerting. Always separately, Lively and Baldoni have given very different interviews: while Baldoni took the opportunity to make visible the drama of sexist violence, Lively gave a cheerful touch to her statements, placing the film closer to the romantic comedy and encouraging “the girls” to put on their flower dresses (a recurring theme in the film) to go see it at the movies and take advantage of the moment to promote their personal businesses, such as a hair care line or a beverage brand, a frivolity that social networks do not they let pass. “This is the most insensitive thing I have ever seen in my life. This movie is about domestic violence. Why are they promoting it as if it were a Barbie movie?” wrote a user on X.
Asked on the red carpet about what it meant for her to give life to a woman in a situation of abuse, Lively did not take the opportunity to raise awareness on the subject but assured that the protagonist is much more than a victim or a survivor: “No experience can define you, you define yourself,” she said.
After the promotional tour it seems that the actress has received advice to address the issue of abuse, because shortly after the premiere she did publish several Stories on Instagram with useful information and support for victims of sexist violence.
Hit 2: “Have you seen my hair?”
The journalist from The New York Times Esther Zuckerman publish an interesting article about how the imagery in the film is inspired by the actress’s off-screen business, making the film a fascinating study in the uses of star power: “Blake Lively’s hair is like a character in itself.” same in the new romantic drama,” he writes. Her thick hair changes shape depending on what happens to Lily Bloom, the owner of a flower shop who falls in and out of love with an abusive neurosurgeon. “You could say that Blake Lively’s hair is a tool she uses to sell her performance, but her performance is also a tool she uses to sell her hair. Those who were impressed with her locks in Break the circle you can find out in your instagram that she recently launched a line of hair care products called Blake Brown.”
But in addition, in full promotion, an email was distributed to the media with the steps to learn how to prepare cocktails inspired by the film using Betty Buzz, Blake Lively’s drink brand. The problem is that the film portrays a woman who suffers abuse, so the cheerful recipe clashes with the seriousness of the film’s theme.
Strike 3: Miscellaneous blunders
At the beginning of the summer, Lively screwed up. The actress took advantage of the commotion about the failed Photoshop in those photos of Kate Middleton with which the British royal family tried to appear normal. The actress added to the general mockery by publishing a photo of herself with an evidently poor retouching in which she joked while promoting her brand of drinks. Shortly after, the Princess of Wales made her cancer diagnosis public. Lively herself posted a public apology on Instagram, saying she was “mortified.”
The spiral of hatred towards Blake Lively on social networks began to grow and from then until now has created parodies and memes criticizing the attitude of the actress in interviews promoting the film, accusing her of mean girl behaviorbasically being a shrew, or labeling her as a pick me girl, that woman who not only does things to please a man, but in the process has to discredit other women. “A woman pick me In an environment of conservative men, she fits the type of person who openly says that “women are badder than men,” as Janira Planes analyzed in S Fashion.
On the networks there are also those who spend time editing videos with small excerpts of Lively’s apparently rude attitudes in interviews or before her fans, ordering them to shut up at the foot of a red carpet to be able to respond better to the media or thanking them with very little grace for a bracelet of beads that a follower gives her: “It doesn’t match my look but then I’ll definitely wear it.” This naturalness of Lively is jarring in an ecosystem like Hollywood, where publicists train stars to also be public relations professionals, both in the media and in front of fans.
Shot 4: That interview
In 2016 Blake Lively was promoting Coffee Society. The first uncomfortable moment arose when she was asked about her relationship with Woody Allen: remember that at that time the director was still involved in the controversy over his stepdaughter Dylan Farrow’s accusation of rape when she was a child. Lively’s response was that she could only speak from her own experience and that in her opinion Allen made women feel empowered. Probably no response could have been adequate, but the words Lively chose were understood to be, at the very least, insensitive.
That promotion came with another unpleasant anecdote. Lively, who was pregnant with her second child with Ryan Reynolds, was starring in an interview with the Norwegian-born, Los Angeles-based reporter Kjesrti Flaa. The reporter began by congratulating the actress “on her tummy”, Lively became upset and adopted a somewhat defiant attitude towards the journalist, with a passive-aggressive tone when faced with questions and barely looking at the reporter.
The video had not been seen until now, when Flaa decided post it on Youtube under the sharp title of The interview with Blake Lively that made me want to quit my job. The avalanche of comments has been such that the reporter has been encouraged to publish a new video on the platform explaining the reasons why she has decided to publish the interview eight years after the encounter. Flaa tells how that experience made her feel insecure in subsequent interviews with celebrities, and provides an interesting perspective on, in her opinion, how Lively handled the moment. He gives the example of a case of bullying: What is always recommended as the first step is to apologize. However, he adds, in the case of the actress it seems that the strategy of her circle – her publicist, her public relations or her image consultants – is quite the opposite: silence, a couple of positive news leaked to the press to increase its popularity, and a turning of the page.
The reporter obviously says that perhaps starting an interview with a pregnancy congratulation by mentioning the interviewee’s belly is not the best resource, but she is right by focusing on how celebrities assess and face their reputation crises.
Strike 5: The slave controversy
In a short time, Lively has experienced such a change in public perception that it seems that there are many who delve into her past looking for more reasons to hate her. Her critics today remember the actress’s failed first step into the lifestyle business. In 2014 the actress launched an online store under the name Preservea space similar to Gwyneth Paltrow’s Goop but with a country feel. One of his first posts was titled The allure of Antebellum putting the name of this site in a certain light. The problem was that it romantically reconstructed the southern aesthetic before the Civil War, ignoring the fact that its outfits were anchored to the era of slavery. The website was open for only one year.
There is more. The actress said I do to Ryan Reynolds at a magnificent estate in South Carolina in 2012. The ceremony, completely secret, was held in front of only 35 guests. The bride wore a Marchesa dress and the groom wore a Burberry suit. What generated the controversy was another small (big) detail: the wedding was held at Boone Hall Plantation, one of the oldest operating plantations in the United States, which used black slaves for decades. Boone Hall Plantation was also featured in the famous 2004 film Noah’s Diary and today there are still slave cabins on the property with historical information. Actor Ryan Reynolds publicly apologized years later, saying that that choice is “something for which we will always be deeply and unconditionally sorry.” “What we saw at the time was a wedding venue on Pinterest. “What we saw next was a place built on a devastating tragedy.”
