Welcome, friends, to the first in what I hope will be a recurring column in which I investigate whether recent celebrity news is real or a PR stunt. Now, you might be asking yourself what gives me the right to judge the intimate details of a complete stranger’s life and decide for myself if their most recent headline-making dalliance is real or something cooked up by their publicist? Well, I have been recapping The Bachelor for the last five seasons and seeing as how that show is a modern-day Ringling Brothers Circus that specializes in creating Kris Jenner-worthy storylines for the sake of our Monday night entertainment, I’d say that’s all the certification I need. Mmkay?
Moving on. Today I thought we’d focus on a headline that is dominating entertainment news feeds as well as five of my personal group chats. I’m, of course, talking about the selfie seen ‘round the world of Kristin Cavallari and her ex-Laguna Beach lover Stephen Colletti. Last night Kristin shared a selfie on Instagram of her SITTING ON HER EX’S LAP for the entire world to see with the caption “2004 or 2020?!” Subtle, Kristin, veeery subtle.
As you’ll recall, in March, Kristin and Jay Cutler announced that they were getting a divorce after 10 years of marriage. Soon after their very chill, very “we love co-parenting” divorce Instagram announcement, headlines started popping up accusing Jay of some alleged “misconduct.” There were cheating rumors, rumors that Jay was holding the family’s bank account hostage so Kristin couldn’t find another house to live in, and other wild accusations. In May they finally reached a joint custody agreement and have been laying relatively low ever since.
Which brings us to Tuesday night and the Instagram that launched 1,000 ships speculations. Are Kristin and Stephen back together? How long have they been talking? Will she plan a vacation to Cabo for old time’s sake and, more importantly, will Stephen get drunk and call Kristin a slut for dancing on the bar?
Ah, young love! So cute! So healthy!
These are the questions that keep me up at night. But is this for real or is this a mere PR stunt? Well, let’s take a look at the evidence.
From the outside (and probably all sides, tbh) this looks very much like a PR stunt. As we’ve mentioned, Kristin’s marriage is over. For those of you who watched Very Cavallari (guilty), you know that her marriage was arguably the most interesting thing about the show. What we used to love about Kristin during her Laguna Beach era (her mean girl antics, outrageous love triangles, and ability to make choppy bobs look chic) have been completely abandoned on Very Cavallari in favor of interviews about her pilates schedule, b-roll of her pretending to cook family meals, and modeling microscopic jewelry for her Instagram followers. Jay carries the show with his bare minimum personality while Kristin maintains the stage presence of a Cobb salad.
Speaking of Very Cavallari, in May Kristin announced that we wouldn’t be getting another season of the hit E! show and was instead focusing on this “new chapter” in her life. Booooo. I’m assuming this next chapter is going to focus on growing her jewelry “empire” which consists of mid-level expensive midi rings and layering necklaces. Let’s be honest here folks, the girl could really use a PR boost.
And she’s not the only one whose publicist is probably thirsty for more media coverage. According to Stephen Colletti’s IMDb page, his last television appearance was on a show called Everyone Is Doing Great about washed-up heartthrob actors “struggling to reclaim their previous level of success and relevance”, and the pilot appears to have been filmed in his basement during quarantine. Brb just going to copy and paste that entire entry to share with Merriam Webster in case they’re looking for a sentence to illustrate the definition of “rock bottom.”
Now, I can already hear some of you coming for me in the comments section with “bUt WhAt iF tHeY’rE jUsT fRiEnDs??” and, yes, they could just be friends! In fact, sources tell TMZ that the two have remained “good friends” since their break-up many eons ago, and that’s why they were seen together Tuesday night. Good friends that in the last 16 years have never posted or spoken about each other unless they’re in the midst of promoting their latest book or a trailer for the upcoming season of their show.
Final verdict: this is 100% a PR stunt. This wasn’t a nostalgic get-together with old friends or—and I hate to break my eighth grade heart—an epic Laguna Beach romantic reunion. If anything, it was a casual dinner and drinks situation that maybeee ended in a hookup on Stephen’s futon couch that triples as a bed and dining room table (IDK, I just feel like he has one of those), and Stephen pretending they’ll “totally do this again sometime” as he responds to a random’s DM on Instagram. Good luck, kids! Ever happiness to you both!
Images: @kristincavallari /Instagram (3); SheKnows.com (1); Giphy (1)
While we were all mixing our quarantinis, cleaning our apartments, or just generally lazing about this rainy Sunday, Kristin Cavallari took to Instagram to announce that she and Jay Cutler are getting a divorce. To be perfectly clear, I haven’t thought about Kristin Cavallari since approximately 2009, but I still didn’t see this one coming. I’ve honestly been waiting for more celebrities to announce divorces once the effects of being quarantined together started kicking in, but I still wouldn’t have predicted that Kristin Cavallari and Jay Cutler would be the first ones to bite the dust. They have been together for 10 years and have three children together, Camden, 7, Jaxon, 5, and Saylor, 4.
In an Instagram post that depicts the now-exes with their backs to the camera, Kristin wrote, “With great sadness, after 10 years together we have come to a loving conclusion to get a divorce.” She added, “This is just the situation of two people growing apart,” and if you ask me, the whole announcement smacks of “conscious uncoupling.” Still, it’s better than a Notes App screenshot.
News of Kristin Cavallari and Jay Cutler’s divorce comes just a few weeks after the couple returned to Nashville after being “stuck” in the Bahamas on vacation with Kristin’s friend and hairstylist, Justin Anderson. On March 15, the group traveled to the Bahamas (despite there being a confirmed case of coronavirus in the Bahamas that same day). In the days that followed, they would complain about being “stuck” on the island despite there being no travel restrictions at the time; later, on March 24, they would remain on the island even after the U.S. Embassy urged travelers to return home. After catching some flak online for remaining on vacation while almost everyone around the world was staying home in an effort to flatten the curve, they all returned home on April 6.
In light of recent events, this trip to the Bahamas is raising even more eyebrows. Was it a last-ditch attempt to save their marriage? Were they trying to escape more than the reality of coronavirus? Or was being stuck on an island together the straw that broke the camel’s back? God knows I’ve returned from a family vacation wanting a hell of a lot more than a legal separation. With Kristin asking “everyone to respect our privacy”, we’ll probably never know. But I’m predicting that this won’t be the first seemingly solid celebrity marriage to crumble under quarantine, and we’re going to be seeing a lot more of this verbiage the longer we’re stuck inside.
Images: Timothy Hiatt/Getty Images; kristincavallari / Instagram
