Last night, Beyonce’s Beyonce-themed, all-about-Beyonce, directed by Beyonce documentary Life Is But A Dream premiered on HBO. I didn’t watch it, so please don’t expect me to talk about it, but feel free to discuss it. The header image is apparently an outtake image from the documentary, and it’s the first time we’ve seen Blue Ivy Carter’s full-on face in a year (although we have had glimpses of her head to varying degrees in the past year). Everyone is making a big deal about how Blue Ivy looks so much like Jay-Z… but…? I mean, I can see a resemblance to Jay. But I also think she looks like Beyonce too. She’s got an interesting blend of both parents, and maybe I’m not seeing what everyone else is seeing. Maybe she got Jay-Z’s eyes? Blue Ivy is more than 13 months old at this point – to me she looks older than that.
In case you’re like me and you haven’t watched the documentary, various sites have recaps so I’m sure you’ll catch up. One of my favorite details that’s come out is that Beyonce claims to have gained 57 pounds during her pregnancy. For real? No she didn’t.
I’m also including some images from Beyonce’s appearance as the cover girl for The Gentlewoman’s Spring/Summer issue. It’s a UK publication, and I kind of like the subdued black-and-white images. I prefer them to Beyonce’s Terry Richardson photo shoot, you know? I don’t even know if she’s wearing makeup!
Photos courtesy of Instagram and Beyonce’s Tumblr.
Here are some photos from the NYC premiere of Beyonce’s HBO documentary, “Beyonce: Life Is But A Dream”. That’s the documentary that was made from Beyonce’s extensive personal videos and archives and stuff, because as we know after her GQ interview, Beyonce pays for a videographer to follow her around EVERY DAY OF HER LIFE to document everything she does. And then those videos go into her amazing Beyonce archives. And those archives were culled and pulled together for the documentary. I don’t have HBO, so I won’t be watching the documentary when it airs, which is fine because I’m not sure I can handle that much Beyonce. Tell me how it was!
As for the premiere… old-school Beyonce showed up. Remember old-school Beyonce? The Beyonce who used to come to all of the big awards shows and she seemed to only wear Elie Saab and Versace and her gowns were always cut the same way and it got kind of boring? Well, that’s happening again! Beyonce wore this sparkly Elie Saab gown which seems like something we’ve seen on her many times before (although not lately). It’s okay. I’m not crazy about her wig/weave though.
Also: I feel weird saying this, but does Beyonce’s booty look deflated to anyone else, especially compared to how full-on badonkadonk it was at the Grammys? New Bey conspiracy theory: Bey was wearing Pippa Middleton-style butt enhancers at the Grammys?
Guess who else was there? THE OPRAH!! The Oprah and The Beyonce are tight.
Bonus photos: Solange forgot her pants (and she looks kind of righteous) and Doutzen Kroes wore some bad booties.
As we previewed in the Grammys Open Post on Sunday, Beyonce is the March cover girl for Vogue’s “Power Issue”. Many were expecting Michelle Obama to be the cover girl for the second time, but alas, we got Beyonce. I have to admit, the slideshow is gorgeous. Bey was photographed by Patrick Demarchelier, who these days is better than Mario Testino. You can read Bey’s full Vogue article (“The Queen B”) here, and here are some highlights:
Bey on performing live: “I’m still completely nervous. I still feel pressure.”
On Blue Ivy: “She’s my road dog. She’s my homey, my best friend.”
Pregnancy: “I felt very maternal around eight months,” she remembers. “And I thought I couldn’t become any more until I saw the baby. . . . But it happened during my labor because I had a very strong connection with my child. I felt like when I was having contractions, I envisioned my child pushing through a very heavy door. And I imagined this tiny infant doing all the work, so I couldn’t think about my own pain. . . . We were talking. I know it sounds crazy, but I felt a communication.”
Giving birth: “My family and my closest people were there when I gave birth,” she says. “Everything that scared me just was not present in that room. So for me to really let go and really appreciate every contraction . . . it was the best day of my life.”
How motherhood has changed her: “I feel like I have something that has grounded me so much more,” she says. “Family has always been important. I’ve always had my mother and my father and my husband. But it’s just. . . .” She pauses. “Life is so much more than. . . It’s not defined by any of this.”
Gwyneth Paltrow chimes in: Beyoncé’s close friend Gwyneth Paltrow relates a story of going to visit her in the recording studio and encountering mother with daughter. “Blue was sleeping in her arms, across her body, and B was listening back to what she had been working on,” Paltrow says. “I thought, This is how you do it. You do what you love with who you love included.”
Firing her father as her business manager: “My father taught me so much about being a businesswoman,” she says. “And I’m understanding him a lot now. . . . A lot of the crazy things he did were necessary.”
Making her HBO documentary: “This movie has healed me in so many ways,” she says. “It makes me want to cry. I’m sorry,” she says, her eyes welling. “I’m very passionate about it, and it just feels good.”
On the rumor she used a surrogate: “That was very odd. Who even thinks that? Like, who would make that up. . . . You can’t take it too seriously.”
More kids? “When I was younger, there were moments where I said, ‘I’m not going to have children,’ ” Beyoncé says. “And then moments when I wanted four. And now I definitely want another, but I don’t know when.”
There’s a lot more, but you should just go read the full Vogue story. Beyonce doesn’t seem crazy or anything – and I don’t believe she really is “crazy”. I think she’s somewhat OCD and she’s definitely a control-freak, but throughout the interview, it felt like she’s in a different place these days. She seems calm, and she approaches her career (and everything) with a lot of contemplation and dedication. Oh, she also admits that she reads stories about herself online, but she never reads the comments! So… HEY BEY!
Yay! I love it when women wear sleek pantsuits or jumpsuits to awards shows. Wearing pants is always acceptable in my book! Beyonce appeared at last night’s Grammys, and it was as if she was saying to the world, “I will allow this one night to not just be about me.” Like, she made the conscious choice not to dominate the Grammys. And we should be thankful. Beyonce wore this Osman Yousefzada jumpsuit which looks great on her, and hugs her every curve. Her booty really is amazing. Like… I have no words. Her booty is a work of art. I liked low-key Beyonce so much!
Ashanti is still a thing? Debatable. She wore this Tony Ward Couture which is… not bad. I don’t hate it at all.
Kelly Rowland in Georges Chakra – ugh! Kelly is better than this. We don’t need to see shadowy biscuit. But I will say this – her body is killer! Hate the dress though.
Is it just me or does Solange look amazing in this Ralph & Russo Couture gown? Great color, great body, great hair. One of my favorite looks ever from Solange.
Ah, Beyonce. I’m disappointed! But I’m disappointed because the rumor mill was working overtime last week, with multiple sources claiming that FLOTUS Michelle Obama had scored her second Vogue cover, the March “Power Issue”. Considering Anna Wintour is so tight with the Obamas (Wintour was one of Obama’s top bundlers/fundraisers), I really was expecting to see a cover full of first lady bangs. But instead I get Beyonce! Just as well. If I had a Vogue cover full of bangs, I wouldn’t know what to say about it.
So Beyonce covers the March “Power Issue” it seems. I guess it’s not completely 100% – this wasn’t leaked by Vogue or anything, and God knows, it could be Photoshopped, although I don’t think it is. I think Bey is just continuing on her path of total world and media domination. Allegedly, Beyonce will be at tonight’s Grammys. Remember when everybody thought she would be at last year’s Grammys too? She and Jay-Z released Blue Ivy’s first photos and everybody was expecting them to show up but they never came. Probably because Bey knew she’d be losing big-time to Adele. Speaking of, Adele is going to be there too, allegedly. You know Beyonce and Adele are sort of close, right? Adele has said that they’ve met several times and she (Adele) loves Bey.
So, will Beyonce be able to achieve complete Grammy domination if people like Rihanna, Adele, Taylor Swift and The Black Keys are around? Oooh, I had forgotten about The Black Keys. They’re my favorite!!! Anyway, this is your Open Post to discuss all things Grammys. We’ll have lots of coverage tomorrow, in addition to lots of BAFTA coverage too.
Cover courtesy of Vogue, additional photos courtesy of Beyonce’s Tumblr.
By now I’m sure you’ve heard about Beyonce’s latest gift to her public – her publicist sent an email to Buzzfeed demanding/requesting that they take down several unflattering photos of Beyonce as she performed at the Half-time show. It wasn’t a standard “take-down notice” which every blog gets at some point when the origin of a photo is up for grabs – this was just an attempt from Team Beyonce to control what copyrighted Getty images were used in stories about Beyonce, and she had no rights over the images. All of the photos Beyonce wanted pulled are ones where she’s making “RAWR! COME AT ME!!” faces. You can see the pics here.
But that’s not the only controversy about Beyonce these days. Apparently, PETA is all up on Bey because for Bey’s two major public appearances in 2013, she’s worn animal skins.
Beyoncé is in trouble with PETA. Again. The animal rights group is angry at Bey for shaking and shimmying in a Rubin Singer leather bodysuit, made of python, paneled iguana and leather.
“We would take a bet that if Beyoncé watched our video exposés, she’d probably not want to be seen again in anything made of snakes, lizards, rabbits or other animals who died painfully. Today’s fashions are trending toward humane vegan options, and Beyoncé’s Super Bowl outfit missed the mark on that score.”
PETA was also furious with the singer after she wore a three-quarter-length Christian Dior mink coat to sing at the inauguration.
The group adds that the “game was great” however, and expressed love for Baltimore Ravens linebacker Terrell Suggs, who just joined PETA in protesting the fur industry by starring in their new “Ink, Not Mink” campaign.
Did you know her Half-time bodysuit was made out of python and iguana? That just seems completely random, especially since it just reads on camera like plain old leather. Why go so fancy (iguana?!) when it just looks like regular leather? As for Beyonce wearing mink at the Inauguration – yeah. She did that. Most people didn’t notice because she took off her mink coat for photos and she “performed” (lip synced) without the coat, in just the Pucci gown.
Shhh… are the Bey-stans gone? I hope so. They went a little bit crazy defending their girl’s Halftime performance on Sunday night. While I didn’t think Beyonce embarrassed herself or anything (far from it), I also thought there were some hilarious elements, like Beyonce practically shoving Michelle and Kelly off the stage and how Bey made sure their mics were turned down. It was Classic Beyonce in every sense – she didn’t bring anything new or groundbreaking to the show, but I do appreciate that she put in a lot of work for it.
One of the most startling things that I noticed as I first watched the show was that Beyonce’s bootiliciousness seemed… subdued. Sure, Beyonce still has curves and she’s always had a really great athletic-strong-fit-curvy figure, but at the Half-time show she seemed particularly slender for her. Well, Bey’s stylist told Entertainment Tonight that Bey was working so hard, she kept losing weight:
One of the most anticipated events at yesterday’s Super Bowl was Beyonce’s performance during the halftime show and ET spoke exclusively to the superstar’s costume designer about her her rigorous rehearsals and how much work went into her outfits.
“When a performer is working so vigorously, they’re shrinking constantly, and so she was losing weight every day,” fashion designer Rubin Singer told ET. “So we had to keep taking it in and taking it in and taking it in and doing tweaks and changes.”
Singer said he was based in New Orleans all last week preparing for Beyonce’s Super Bowl performance and that a team of 14 people put about 200 man hours into producing and tweaking the costumes.
“When you have the dress rehearsals and you actually get to see the footage the next day, or that night, and you see all the little nuances that you need to change,” he said.
In addition to Beyonce’s costumes, Singer also created the outfits for former Destiny’s Child band member Michelle Williams as well as the jackets for the show’s 120 backup dancers.
LOL, “tweaking”. I understand about how hard she was working and how that contributed to her weight loss – and quite honestly, her body looked amazing during the show! I’m not a Bey-stan or anything, but I would love to have her figure. She looked strong and fit. But I did laugh at the whole “a team of 14 people put about 200 man hours into producing and tweaking the costumes… for the show’s 120 backup dancers.” There were 120 backup dancers? LOL. Why does Beyonce need that many dancers when it’s going to be ALL ABOUT BEYONCE all the time, forever? I seriously didn’t pay any attention to the “backup dancers” at all – I was too busy paying attention to Bey whipping her weave around in the wind machine.
Photos courtesy of Beyonce’s Tumblr, Jay’s Instagram.
So we finally got to see the much-hyped and much-analyzed Half-time show where, YES, Destiny’s Child reunited. For about two minutes before Beyonce and her wind machine kicked Michelle and Kelly off the stage. It was ridiculous! I mean, it was enjoyable because Beyonce and DC have had a lot of hits and it was fun to see which songs got picked, etc. It was also interesting because I’m pretty sure Beyonce’s booty caused a 34-minute black-out in the Superdome, right? Just after the Half-time show and just as the second half was about to begin, the lights went out. Maybe because of Beyonce’s show? Maybe because of The Booty? Anyway, here’s the video (I’m including two videos, just in case) – we’ll discuss it below.
Just a few things:
*I actually liked Beyonce’s costume, and Michelle and Kelly’s complimentary costumes. Yes, they were a little bit “dominatrix lite” but I didn’t feel like lady bits were assaulting me, you know? The costumes were sexy without anything hanging out.
*Beyonce sang live! And we know this because the vocals weren’t perfect. But how in the world is her voice totally okay to sing live with a smoke machine and a wind machine but it’s not okay at the inauguration?
*I can’t wait to see how Beyonce “homage’d” with this performance. You know it’s coming! She can’t give a major performance without “copying” (“homage-ing”) some lesser-known mortal.
*Last thing – Beyonce had to make it all about Beyonce (!!) by announcing her new tour – the Mrs. Carter Show. This commercial was so… ridiculous.
For the first time since way before the inauguration, Beyonce took questions from members of the press yesterday – it was a press conference in NOLA for her Halftime performance. I don’t know if Beyonce was forced to do the press conference by the NFL, or if it was her idea to do a big media event or whatever. I guess… props to her for doing it, and props to her for having the balls to not put any limits on what people asked. Of course, this is how she began her press conference:
I want to see the RECEIPTS!! No, she was singing live. Right?!? But seriously, she just did that to distract us from her admission that she did in fact lip sync the National Anthem at the inauguration.
Beyonce proved the critics wrong at a press conference for the Super Bowl. As the singer walked on stage, she asked the audience to please stand. She then kicked off the press conference with a show-stopping, live performance of the national anthem.
“I am a perfectionist and one thing about me, I practice until my feet bleed, and I did not have time to rehearse with the orchestra. It was a live television show and a very, very important emotional show for me. One of my proudest moments,” Beyonce said when asked what happened at the inauguration.
“Due to the weather, due to the delay, due to no proper sound check, I did not feel comfortable taking a risk. It was about the president and the inauguration and I wanted to make him and my country proud. So I decided to sing along with my pre-recorded track, which is very common in the music industry, and I’m very proud of my performance,” she said.
The 31-year-old singer also guaranteed that she will be singing live during Sunday’s Super Bowl halftime show.
“I will absolutely be singing live. I am well rehearsed and I will absolutely be singing live,” Beyonce said. “This is what I was born to do. What I’m born for. I love haters. No shame. No hate.”
After reporters were told to move onto another topic, Beyonce said she was honored and humbled to have the opportunity to perform at the Super Bowl, especially in New Orleans, since her family is from Louisiana. As for her setlist, she said it was difficult to choose which songs to perform, adding, “trying to condense a career into 12 minutes is not easy.”
Her plans after the Super Bowl? “I’m going to enjoy my daughter,” Beyonce laughed. “I’ve missed her, I’m working so hard and I keep saying, ‘Mommy will be done Sunday at nine o’clock!’”
Beyonce also said that she “might” have an announcement at the end of her performance — she hinted that it would have to do with a tour. In addition, she refused to confirm a Destiny’s Child reunion onstage.
So, her story is that she managed to prerecord the track AND that she didn’t have time to rehearse or have a sound check? Tell me, professional musicians, is that really how it works? And how is it that Kelly Clarkson managed to kill her song live while Beyonce had to rely on her pre-record? As for the “surprise” – SURPRISE, she’s seven months pregnant RIGHT NOW.
As for “This is what I was born to do. What I’m born for. I love haters. No shame. No hate.” That sounds like a tattoo. I’m surprised she didn’t whip out a shank and cut her eyes at the crowd, saying, “I LIVE for some motherf—ing haters getting all up in my bidness. Pre-record that, bitches.”
Beyonce keeps posting photos and videos to her Tumblr, in case you care. She’s also revamped the photo array so now the photos are divided up by “My Work” and “My Life”. All of the new Super Bowl preview pics are in “My Work”, and I’m including some of the new pics here. Today Beyonce is also doing a press conference in support of her Halftime gig, in which she will have to answer questions from what I suspect will be a mix of sports, entertainment and hard-news journalists. She might even have to answer questions about lip syncing the National Anthem! Anyway, Us Weekly has another preview from Beyonce’s HBO documentary – Beyonce opening up about her miscarriage two years ago.
She’s now the ecstatic mother to daughter Blue Ivy Carter, nearly 13 months, but Beyonce dealt with the ultimate maternal anguish before that famous pregnancy: A miscarriage. Last year, the 31-year-old singer’s husband Jay-Z briefly referenced the tragedy in “Glory,” the rap track recorded within days of Blue’s Jan. 7 birth, but Beyonce hasn’t ever discussed the loss.
In a surprising moment of candor, she opens up for the first time about the incident and its aftermath in Life Is But a Dream, her new documentary debuting on HBO in February. “About two years ago, I was pregnant for the first time,” the Grammy winner says in one scene. “And I heard the heartbeat, which was the most beautiful music I ever heard in my life.”
She and Jay-Z (they wed in April 2008) were naturally overjoyed about their baby-to-be. “I picked out names,” Beyonce recalls. “I envisioned what my child would look like . . . I was feeling very maternal.”
But something went wrong in the early stages, the “Love on Top” singer reveals. “I flew back to New York to get my check up — and no heartbeat,” she says. “Literally the week before I went to the doctor, everything was fine, but there was no heartbeat.”
The superstar (who will perform at the Super Bowl Half Time show this Sunday, Feb. 3) dealt with the heartache the best way she knew how: Through music.
“I went into the studio and wrote the saddest song I’ve ever written in my life,” she says, although she doesn’t name the track. “And it was actually the first song I wrote for my album. And it was the best form of therapy for me, because it was the saddest thing I’ve ever been through.”
All of which made her successful pregnancy with Blue Ivy all the more exciting and joyful. “Being pregnant was very much like falling in love,” she muse. “You are so open. You are so overjoyed. There’s no words that can express having a baby growing inside of you, so of course you want to scream it out and tell everyone.”
After months of understandable secrecy, she finally did “tell everyone” — in one of the most Tweeted moments in history! — by revealing her bump on the red carpet at MTV Video Music Awards in L.A. Aug. 28, 2011. Later on in the evening, she rubbed her growing belly at the tail end of a lively rendition of “Love on Top.”
With all of the Pillow Baby Conspiracies, I actually didn’t doubt the fact that Beyonce had suffered a miscarriage a few years ago. I think that actually happened, because I genuinely can’t see Beyonce and Jay-Z making something like that up. The idea that Beyonce was having problems conceiving and/or carrying to term was actually one of the reasons WHY there was such a proliferation of conspiracies. That and, you know, her bump collapsed.
