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Hello Crush,
Thanks for being here.
We have a lot for you this week, including the thing that really has me rattled. Candace Bushnell is not getting laid. Even though she has those long sexy legs. Not to make it about me but what, exactly, does that mean for me.
There are many more things on our plate this week, so let’s jump right in.
In This Letter. + Dish’s Hot Thots. For Women Over 50, It’s Been A Big Week For Our Icons. By Dish Stanley A couple of pop culture developments this week have piled worry on top of worry. +Going to Be a Guest at Somebody’s Summer House? Pt. 2 Here's How to Be A Good One. Do a little research before you show up, have some ideas of things to potentially do on your own. +The Check, Please. Notable Observations on Dating & Friendship from Dinners with Friends. by Dish Stanley If you or your circumstances are tricky at all, go foreign. +Re-sharing our May DEVOUR Letter {things to watch, read, and listen to} Any new discoveries or updates? +Social Media I Loved This Week. +Our Song of the Week Everybody Laughs
Dish’s Hot Thots.
For Women Over 50, It’s Been A Big Week For Our Icons. By Dish Stanley
Is Every Blonde As Worried As I Am That Her Colorist Is Giving Her a ‘2024’ ‘Ashy’ Shade? Also, If Candace Bushnell Is Not Getting Laid, What Are My Chances?
On top of everything huge going on in the world, as well as the demands of caring for my elderly parents, pop culture developments this week have piled worry on top of worry.
First there was the kerfuffle over early publicity photos of CBK.
Early photos were released for the upcoming Ryan Murphy production about JFK Jr. and Carolyn Bessette Kennedy’s romance American Love Story. It’s not due to air until February 2026 (reportedly timed to release on Valentine’s Day (gag)) but reactions were fierce in the world made up of CBK’s fans — a Venn diagram where Kennedy/JFK Jr. adorers, devotees of Calvin Klein circa 1990’s (and its progeny, including The Row and its imitators) as well as natural blondes (and those who seek to look as if they are) overlap.
While casual observers, myself included, might have cringed a bit at seeing the photos of Sarah Pidgeon in her CBK character, her rabid fan world reacted with an uproar suggesting their goddess‘s character had been impugned. In actuality it was just that if you looked quickly and sideways she kinda resembled a Fox News Host.
In a Harper’s Bazaar article dedicated to the publicity photo tempest-in-a-teapot, Brooke Bob wrote that the CBK character was dressed like “A ‘Spirit Halloween’ version of Bessette‑Kennedy.” I’m not sure what that is, but it’s obviously really bad.
Further criticism piled on at a level of detail that felt as over accessorized as circa 80’s Madonna. Case in point: evidently reacting to the shot below, a Marie Claire article pointed out that Pidgeon’s Birkin Bag was “the wrong size,” and thus didn’t align “with her elusive ‘quiet luxury’ style.”
Here are side-by-side photos of Pidgeon (as CBK) with her Birkin and CBK, with the actual Birkin. I mean, okay, not the same size, true, but a fundamental misalignment of her ‘quiet luxury’ style? That’s a head scratcher. Anyway, Pidgeon’s is smaller than the actual, meaning arguably quieter.
Sarah Pidgeon holding a birkin meant to resemble CBK (left) and CBK holding her birkin. (What was she carrying around in there, anyway? Somebody’s head?)
My personal favorite of the many lines of critique by a mile, though, came from CBK’s hair colorist Brad Johns. He is now a glass artist but Vogue immediately reached out to get his reaction anyway: “Totally wrong … If you show that on TV and fashion people see it, they are going to think, why the fuck is she all ashed out with her hair only one color?”
Johns went further. “No one would believe that Carolyn in the ’90s would ever have that color from me. It’s too 2024.”
Page Six Style also got in on the action, reaching out to Johns for this quote: “It’s all white and burnt.” Pidgeon’s hair looks “ashy,” he said, which is the “opposite” of CBK’s signature buttery blonde, which he “meticulously crafted with contrast and warmth.”
While even casual observers like myself can see that Pidgeon’s overall look is a little off, I don’t actually see the hair color point. And the level of vitriol — the ‘why the fucks,’ the ‘no one is going to believe’s,’ — the assumption that the whole world shares their eagle eyes and state of intense agitation amuses.
And yet, I have to admit, it has me worried. As a consequence of all the hullabaloo I am newly obsessing over my highlights. Suddenly concerned that my colorist is giving me the overly “ashy” version of “2024” blonde and that I just don’t see that either. And what could be worse than having your blonde shade be so six months ago?
At any rate, Ryan Murphy felt that he had to defend himself and American Love Story. He did this by countering that the images were “work in progress” test shots. He clarified that “a team of experts and vintage pieces—including Bessette‑Kennedy’s own Prada boots, authentic bags, and a recreated Narciso Rodriguez wedding dress—will inform the wardrobe choices in the actual series.”
He did not though, as far as I can see, make any announcement about who he is going to hire to fix his lead character’s “ashy,” “too 2024” hair.
So there’s that. But what worries me even more is that the other icon (I use that term broadly) of our generation, Candace Bushnell, is not getting laid. This, it seems to me, is the real tragedy. The author (and star) of her famous New York Observer Sex and the City column (later made into the book and television series) published a piece this week in New York Magazine about dating and sex in her sixties.
Candace Bushnell
As a single 60-year old woman myself, no subject interests me more these days, frankly. (Although the fact that my golf handicap is soaring in the wrong direction is a close second.)
To summarize, for those who aren’t New York Magazine subscribers: The City is full of single wealthy women over 60 looking for a proper boyfriend or husband. (By ‘City’ she means to include all the glamorous hot spots where exorbitantly rich Manhattanite-types go, Aspen, Palm Beach, the Hamptons.) Their failed luck at finding a man is not for lack of trying. She recounts many illustrations of this, including a particularly elucidating example from three years ago involving ‘Eddie’ who, at 77, was 14 years older than she. Fixed up by a mutual friend, Eddie texted her to ask where she wanted to have dinner. She “suggested Y and Z, two well-known restaurants” near her. He responded by telling her they were going to X, a restaurant inconvenient to her (which he knew), but close to him. In a similar vein, at the restaurant he asked what she wanted to eat but before she could answer he told her what to order. When it came time to leave, she asked to be driven directly home but he drove her to his house to take a hit off a joint. Worse than that, the next day he pulled into her driveway uninvited to insist that she join him for a ride on his boat. She says no, she doesn’t want to go, he asks why not and she responds with this:
“Because I don’t want to have sex with you. I can tell you’re the kind of guy who needs to have sex because you feel entitled to have your needs fulfilled, and that’s great. But I am absolutely not the one to fulfill your needs. On the other hand, you’re a handsome, wealthy man with at least two flashy cars and a house with a great view. So I know there are plenty of other women out there who would love to fulfill your sexual needs, and you should go after one of those women.”
There are many further telling interactions between her (and her similarly situated friends) and the men they date. The tone throughout the piece veers from her insisting that she prefers not to date at all (because she is happily single) to wondering whether some part of her actually does want a man to maintaining that all old men are horny and just want to get their “wienie waxed.” There are a lot of characters, including menopausal women who don’t want sex, men with E.D., older men dating significantly younger women.
The bottom line, if it’s not clear from the summary, is that Candace Bushnell is not having any sex in the city.
My guess is that there will be a lot of reaction to the piece from SATC fans, AJLT hate-watchers, midlife dating guru’s and those, like me, in the dating pool themselves. I am cogitating over penning a more considered response to Bushnell’s article myself.
But in the meantime, my immediate thought was: what might this say about my own chances in the market? If Candace Bushnell isn’t getting any, then what are my hopes? Just off the cuff, take a look at those legs CRUSH Readers — they’re nine miles long, not to mention thin and toned, with none of the visible veining, dimples or stretch marks that so many of us near her age fret over. Plus, look at the toes. She’s obviously been religious about wearing yoga toes, something I had laughed at until I noticed the beginnings of a hammer toe last year.
And then there’s the many decades of experience that she’s had as a seductress, which I decidedly have not. I’m quite sure that she’s very experienced in this area not only because I read her column in the 90’s (which was a period during which I was also single living in New York), but also because I had confirming intel from a friend who lived down the hall from Bushnell then. My friend reported that Bushnell’s apartment was busy, as in “busy.” A lot of well-heeled, well-dressed men coming and going at all hours. A lot of, ummm, noise. “Wild,” she reported. My friend, an economist, eventually moved to a climate more conducive to the pursuit of her serious profession and far less conducive to wild sex parties. Boston. (I thought it an extreme overreaction myself.) But the memory of the carrying-ons is pretty concrete.
To make up for lost time, I was going to sign up for Shan Boodrum’s MasterClass on The Art of Sex Appeal but hadn’t gotten around to it yet. I don’t know if I should bother because Bushnell’s article suggests there’s little hope.
But before I give up entirely, I have to wonder. It’s clear from her article that, as a writer, she is keenly observant. She sees all the behaviors that would scream ‘red flag’ to anyone with a fraction of her dating resume, but sallies forth with the offenders anyway. (Remember that after asking where Bushnell wanted to go to dinner, ‘Eddie’ not only ignored her response but suggested some place inconvenient to her and close to him, a red flag that would have had me politely backing out of a first date.) It all makes me question whether she is actually dating in order to ‘find a match,’ or at the very least to genuinely enjoy an evening of good company. My theory is that she is dating primarily to get material for her stories. In which case, she’s nailing it.
I hope that she writes more. As depressing a picture as it paints of the dating landscape for women in our sixties, it is far more entertaining than its television version, And Just Like That.
I do think that points to me continuing to throw myself out there, self-doubt and all. I’ll be carving out time for the Sex Appeal Master Class this week end.
Going to Be a Guest at Somebody’s Summer House? Here’s How to Be A Good One.
A Guest Guide from Your Fellow CRUSH Readers Who Host Frequently.
In last week’s Letter we shared the gifts that CRUSH Readers who host a lot appreciate from summer guests (or don’t). Diane provided a perfect example of both with this entry:
"We have a dog centric household and you get greeted at the threshold by Polo & Scout. The best housewarming gift was a doormat that says ‘we hope you like dogs’. The worst was when someone brought kerchiefs for the dogs and insisted on putting them on. It was painful not to be rude and explain that we are not an ‘animals in clothes’ house."
I’d also like to point out that Southern Living published a guide on what their readers’ suggest that guests bring their hosts (other than a bottle of wine). Southern Living is a media outlet that I’d guess would nail this particular topic, for obvious reasons, but I have only this to say: there is nothing original there, and nothing we didn’t offer up, only better. CRUSH Readers, you’re so much cooler, not to mention more helpful. Thank you.
This week we are back with the courtesies our CRUSH hosts appreciate from their guests.
Entertain themselves when it is “off time.”
Do a little research before you show up, have some ideas of things to potentially do on your own. I love it when somebody takes off for a few hours on their own to check out something. Obviously check in with me first and say, “while I’m here I wanted to X, Y, Z and if it’s not something you want to see yet another time, when might be a good window for that?” That lets me know they’ll be off my hands and we can figure out together when.- Annie
"I strongly suggest to my guests to rent a car and to go sightseeing without me. And, rule No 1, they have to fix their own breakfast!" - Cornelia
Actively engage socially with the guests or family members also there.
"This seems obvious but it’s not! Don’t think you’re getting a one-on-one, or couples’ week end with me and my husband unless that was specified going in. We often have a full house. Engage with whomever is there. It takes pressure off me so I can get some things done. If you’re not the only guest it’s so helpful for you to not assume that you’re going to spend significant one-on-one time with me, but rather that it is about being part of the whole household.
Be aware of what’s happening in the household. Be in a good mood! Understand that when you’re a guest you’re expected to show up, come down for cocktails even if you don’t drink, etc." - James
Specific ways to chip in:
"Load the dishwasher and strip the beds." - Diane
"Offer to help with household chores and/or shopping." - Cornelia
Figure out what’s needed and how to contribute:
"I think people forget that you’re not a hotel. That even though you might have help with cleaning, there is so much work in hosting. Although we’ve received some fabulous gifts, most often the best gift is not a ‘thing,’ it‘s being a thoughtful, easy, considerate and helpful guest. Just notice. Contribute. Just be an additional set of hands. If there is a down moment, ask whether you should do a grocery run for anything. Say that you passed a gorgeous farm stand you’d like to go to and ask if there is something there you might pick up for the house. Say you noticed a wonderful local homemade ice cream place - should you go get a gallon for dessert?" - Hope
We also asked our hosts what items they always bring when staying at someone else’s home:
"I always try for the thing they needed but didn’t know they needed — Dreamy coffee beans or Everyday Oil." - Diane
"My own snacks that I can eat whenever I’m hungry without bothering the host."
- Annie
"Snacks that don’t require refrigeration. I mean snacks that I keep in my room because often you’re not eating on your own timeframe and I want to be able to blunt any cravings without imposing on the host. One of the most annoying things guests can do when dinner is planned for 2-3 hours later is say “I’m starving.” So annoying. That means that on top of organizing / managing the main meals I now have to come up with some snacks off the cuff. So I always have wrapped protein bars or nuts in my bag. Wrapped! Not chocolate — in case they have dogs." - James
"A good book." - Cornelia, Annie
See our Part 1, on how / what to gift here.
The Check, Please. Notable Observations on Dating & Friendship from Dinners with Friends. by Dish Stanley
Whenever I go out with a group these days I ask them to share tips or stories about how to check people out for dating and friendship at this stage. I’ve begun to compile a list of their trenchant and humorous observations.
"If you or your circumstances are tricky at all, go foreign."
From a divorced woman in her late 50’s with a complicated family situation. “Foreigners living in America tend to be more flexible …”
"Make a point of going some place early on where they have to put in their coffee order…"
“An order that is longer than four words signals very high maintenance.”
"How they cook bacon or scramble eggs can tell you how much patience they have.“
“The right way to cook both takes time,” so it’s just one more clue. From a 60-something guy who knows how to do both.
"If you ask them their favorite movie and they say ‘When Harry Met Sally‘ or ‘The Godfather‘ or ‘The Shawshank Redemption‘ they are going to be predictable."
“That may or may not be a good thing! It’s likely a good thing in some areas and not in others … you get to decide.” From a woman who says her husband of over thirty years answered that question with A Clockwork Orange.
"It’s a good idea to ask them something that signals what they find sexy (unrelated to you) so you know what you’re working with on a deeper level.“
“For instance, ask them which actor/actress they find sexiest (there’s a big difference between someone saying Goldie Hawn or Meryl Streep or Meg Ryan, etc. If they say Jessica Rabbit, get out now.”
To see our full list of Red Flags go here
Re-sharing our May DEVOUR Letter {things to watch, read, and listen to}
In our periodic DEVOUR column CRUSH Readers share all the things that they think you should eat up. My friends keep telling me that they’re stockpiling for the summer, so we’re giving you these recommendations again. And also asking you — any new discoveries or updates? We’ve gotten a few already, so we’re going to publish a new comprehensive list soon and we’d love to include yours.
Watch. From Harry. Daughters of the Cult (Hulu) - aka The Mormon Manson. My beloved and I like cult documentaries generally. (We aspire to be cult leaders but lack the people skills.) This series is mind blowing, even for the genre. W...T...F!!! The usual family values: sex, murder, end-of-times fanaticism, faith, hope, mind-control, polygamy, organized-crime, forgiveness, compassion, smuggling, redemption, togetherness, dumpster-diving…
Do. From Wendy. The 10 Must-See Paintings at the Frick Collection. I loved your Roam piece on Manhattan’s Upper East Side, Dish. After going to the Frick, though (thank you!), I came across this article about the 10 paintings to find when going through the museum. I have to say, even though the Frick is not a large, overwhelming museum like the Met or the Louvre, it would be really nice to go in with a plan. I think I’ll go back and use this one. (This is from Airmail and behind a paywall but you can put your email in for a free read, I think.)
Read. From Ken. The Highest Calling: Conversations on the American Presidency by David Rubenstein. In this book, Rubinstein has interviewed a number of relevant sources like historians, journalists, and living presidents, to ask them probing questions about our country’s past presidents and life in the oval office. I found it very interesting because it sheds a lot of light on the presidency as an office, as well as individual presidents, and it is not academic in tone. It is conversational and fun and enlightening.
For the full DEVOUR Letter from May continue reading here.
Social Media I Loved This Week
Song of the Week
Everybody Laughs by David Byrne
David Byrne, the Talking Heads genius, is coming out with a new album in September and has announced that he is touring this summer. He dropped the first single of the album — a simple, straightforward track that’s about how we’re all human. About what connects us. At least that’s what I think it’s about, but take a listen. I’d love to hear what you think.
You know you can always write me, right? And it gets right to me. I love to hear from you. Dish@PrimeCrush.com.
XO,
Dish
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The Crush Letter is a weekly newsletter from Dish Stanley curating articles & intelligence on everything love & connection - friendship, romance, self-love, sex. If you’d like to take a look at some of our best stories go to Read Us. Want the Dish?
