One day after announcing their engagement, it seems Prince Harry and Meghan Markle have settled on a time and place for their royal nuptials. According to my source, they will tie the knot in May at St. George’s Chapel at Windsor Castle, about an hour outside London. “Her majesty the Queen has granted permission for the wedding to take place at the chapel,” Kensington Palace announced Tuesday in an official statement. (Prince William and Kate Middleton got married in London at Westminster Abbey.) Markle, a Protestant, will also become a British citizen and will be baptized and confirmed into the Church of England prior to their wedding.
The Royal Family will reportedly pay for the wedding and the reception. (And yes…the ceremony will be televised).
After the wedding, Meghan will become the fourth patron of The Royal Foundation, a charity set up in 2009 by the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge (a.k.a. Prince William and Kate Middleton) and Prince Harry.
Harry and Meghan’s first joint royal engagement will take place in the city of Nottingham on Friday, where they will greet members of the public and attend an event marking World AIDS Day.
Meanwhile, Meghan has apparently already broken one of the Queen’s dress codes when she did a photoshoot in bare legs. The Queen requires all female family members and guests to wear tights or leggings during Royal events. Kate Middleton wears nude hosiery.
The Grammy nominations came out yesterday and there are a couple of big headlines; for starters, there were quite a few snubs!
Ed Sheeran. Sheeran cleaned up at the Grammys in 2016 with Thinking Out Loud, which took home the trophies for song of the year and pop solo performance. With a hit single, “Shape of You,” that seemed ready to repeat Thinking Out Loud’s awards success, fans had every reason to expect Sheeran’s 2017 album Divide to also be Grammy bait, with experts predicting that the British singer would lead the pack of 2018 nominees. Add the fact that Divide is 2017’s second best-selling album, behind his pal Taylor Swift’s Reputation, and a Sheeran Grammys sweep almost seemed preordained. Take it as a sign of the times that Sheeran barely appears on the nominees list, getting snubbed for all the major awards, and only earning two nods in the pop categories.
Lady Gaga. Lady Gaga has previously been nominated many times in the pop categories, while failing to break through to a song or album of the year win. While her 2016 album Joanne pushed Gaga’s sound beyond the dance floor with songs like “Million Reasons,” the release wasn’t enough to earn her nominations in any of the main categories. Instead, Gaga will be competing with Sheeran in the same two pop categories, with “Million Reasons” facing off against “Shape of You” for best pop solo performance, and Joanne and Divide both nominated for best traditional pop album.
Katy Perry. Despite a string of nominations over the years, Katy Perry has never won a Grammy. Her 2017 release Witness earned mixed reviews with critics, and the Grammys felt similarly lukewarm about the album, leaving Perry off the nominees list entirely.
Kesha. Kesha’s comeback album, Rainbow, was hailed as a triumph when it arrived this summer, but that wasn’t enough to boost the singer into the main categories. Instead, she will compete for best pop solo performance and best traditional pop album alongside Sheeran and Gaga.
The Weeknd. The Weeknd won two Grammys in 2015 for best urban contemporary album and R&B performance, and despite the charts success of his 2017 release Starboy and its eponymous single, he only earned one nomination for urban contemporary album.
Miley Cyrus. Cyrus earned her first Grammy nomination in 2015 for Bangerz, but couldn’t replicate that success with 2017’s Younger Now. Even with Cyrus’ newly stripped-down sound, Younger Now failed to score any nominations.
Demi Lovato. Similarly, Lovato followed Confident’s nomination for best pop vocal album at the 2016 Grammys with a new album this year, Tell Me You Love Me, featuring the successful title single. Yet the Grammys just weren’t loving Lovato’s new music, leaving her off the nominees list.
One Direction. All five former members of the boy band landed in the top 40 on Billboard’s Hot 100 charts this year, with Harry Styles impressing critics with his self-titled debut album and Liam Payne and Niall Horan earning breakout hits with “Strip That Down” and “Slow Hands,” respectively. Unfortunately for Directioners, neither Styles, Payne, Horan or their fourth bandmate Louis Tomlinson earned Grammy nominations this year. Zayn Malik, who departed the band before their 2015 hiatus, earned one nomination for best song written for visual media with “I Don’t Wanna Live Forever, “his single with Taylor Swift for 50 Shades Darker.
The second headline circulating is that Rock and Pop are taking a backseat to Rap and R&B. Jay-Z has more nominations than anyone with eight. Kendrick Lamar is next with seven . . . followed by Bruno Mars with six, and Childish Gambino, Khalid, producer No I.D., and SZA, all with five apiece.
This year, Childish Gambino’s surprise nomination, alongside Jay-Z, Bruno Mars, and Kendrick Lamar means that there are FOUR urban, R&B, or hip-hop Album of the Year nominees for the first time ever.
This year’s awards include albums released from October of last year, up through September of this year.
So that means the latest albums by Lady Gaga, Metallica, and The Weeknd all qualified, even though they came out at the end of last year . . . while Taylor, and others like Pink, Maroon 5, and Sam Smith will have to wait until next year.
CBS will air “The 60th Annual Grammy Awards” live on January 28th.
Kris Jenner has now told her version of how Jennifer Lawrence ended up naked in her closet. Kris was on Steve Harvey TV last night and she told the story of how she and Jennifer became friends. Somebody from Jennifer’s team called Kris up and asked if she would surprise Jennifer on her birthday and give her a birthday cake. She did and that was the start of something beautiful. From that day on they became texting buddies, one thing led to another and they ended up hanging out. Kris invited Jennifer over for dinner, they got into some cocktails and they were having so much fun, they ended up in Kris’ closet trying stuff on and that’s that!
According to my source, George and Amal Clooney are planning to renew their vows. I guess it has always bugged George that so many friends could not make their wedding in Italy, so they are going for round 2! Apparently, George is feeling a lot more sociable since he eased up on his work duties, and he’d love to organize a fancy wedding in either New York City or L.A.
In an attempt to get Kim Kardashian to stop wearing fur, Pamela Anderson has sent Kim a faux fur coat that she designed herself as a holiday gift. “As we all ponder New Year’s resolutions, won’t you consider making a meaningful one to stop wearing fur? You’d be setting a trendy, compassionate example,” she wrote in an accompanying letter. “Kim, I know your young fans would admire you and your brand even more if you dropped fur.” Pamela, who is an outspoken animal rights activist and honorary director for PETA, went on to note, “Gucci announced that it would stop using real fur because it’s ‘outdated’ — joining Giorgio Armani, Ralph Lauren, BCBG Max Azria, Calvin Klein, and other stylish brands that have shed fur.” She went on to wish Kim and her family a “wonderful holiday.”
James Cameron says Kate Winslet demanded to do all “her own water work” in ‘Avatar 2′. James has let it out that Winslet has already done a “couple of days of rehearsals” and confirmed she will be playing one of the Sea People in the upcoming Avatar film. According to James’ current schedule, the next chapter will be released in 2020, followed by the other three in 2021, 2024 and 2025.
The Weeknd has taken another step toward getting over ex-girlfriend Selena Gomez by deleting any trace of Selena from his Instagram account. Yep, he’s gotten rid of all of them, including the one he posted in April of Selena clutching his face and tenderly giving him a kiss on the cheek. While Selena has already rekindled the flame with Justin Bieber, she still has a handful of pics of her and The Weeknd on her profile–including their first red carpet appearance at the Met Gala in May.
Everyone thinks Jennifer Lawrence is that down-to-Earth girl next door you could just sit down next to and have a beer with. But if you ever run into her in public, that might not be the woman you encounter.
In an interview she said, “Once I enter a public place, I become incredibly rude. I turn into a huge a-hole. That’s the only way of defending myself.”
“[They’ll be] like, ‘Can I have a selfie?’ And I’m like, ‘No!’ You know what sometimes I do? I go, ‘It’s my day off.’ Like, if it’s Sunday, I’m like, ‘It’s Sunday, I’m not working today.'”
