By Kate E. Stephenson
This week I return to one of my favorite Kate Trivia subject—Kate Winslet. Miss Hat Trick herself is still making waves in the media, but not for her serious acting abilities. There is something sensational about the personal lives of our revered celebrities. And even bonafied talents such as Winslet often fall prey to the microscope effect—everyone minding your business on the microscopic level.
Now it’s rare that I present celebrity news as trivia, and this installment is not an exception. Rather I would like to offer the conversation about morality and mores that Kate Winslets third marriage and corresponding third child has started.
Emma Young posted an opinion piece in the Sydney Morning Herald on June 10th entitled “‘Calamity Kate’ talk highlights double standards” responding to a piece released by Judith Woods in the Telegraph on June 6th. This piece is what got my attention and pulled me into pondering modern morality. Here’s a little snippet:
Have you heard Kate Winslet is a whore? …
While every single sentence of the article “Three babies by three fathers – will it be third time lucky for Calamity Kate Winslet?” is hateful, some stand out more than others. “Three children by three different fathers doesn’t look good on anyone,” wrote Woods. “To paraphrase Lady Bracknell: to have children by two men may be regarded as misfortune, to have children by three looks like carelessness.”
Right. Clearly. If Lady Bracknell’s on your side you can’t go wrong in a debate about 21st century morality, can you?
Now to get the full gist of Emma Young’s ire, you have to read Judith Woods’ original Telegraph article, a portion of which reads:
Kate Winslet is pregnant again, and I blame Leonardo DiCaprio.
No, he’s not the father (this time…), but remember that scene in Titanic where his character, Jack, is about to slip off into the icy Atlantic and bids Rose adieu by reassuring her she will live and go on to have lots of babies? Well, he missed one crucial detail; the dang dying fool only forgot to specify that they weren’t supposed to be by different fathers. …
Falling in love and marrying and having a baby and breaking up and then doing it again (and possibly again?) stretches credulity, undermines your credibility, and the fallout for the little human beings you’ve brought into the world is too awful to contemplate.
There has been quite a lot of buzz about Judith Woods’ “Three babies by three fathers – will it be third time lucky for Calamity Kate Winslet?” It seems that she has struck a dissonant cord with many people who are wondering what century she’s living in. So the actress known for the rarely-achieved Hat Trick of Achievements (winning three of the four big awards: an Oscar, Emmy and Grammy) seems to like her experiences in threes—three awards, three husbands, three kids. Is there anything really wrong with having symmetry in your life? And since when is it a crime to have a child with your husband?
Emma Young points out a double standard for women being employed here perhaps unwittingly by Woods. But at a deeper level, do such standards, double or otherwise, serve a creditable purpose? Is it necessary really to scrutinize every part of other people’s lives or make anyone stand up to the impossible standards of normalcy or moral decency? What do those terms even mean?
Perhaps the greatest story explored in cinema, literature and art in general is the human journey to selfhood. All the great stories are about people figuring out who they are in the world, and none of the classics are simple or clean. So why do we expect our (or other people’s) real lives to be. Celebrities—even super talented ones—are people too. Aren’t they? Life’s hard. When do we say it’s ok to give ourselves a break?
Congratulations to Kate Winslet! Cheers to your pregnancy and to fighting for your own happiness!
Trivia runs on Kate-book.com every Monday at 10:30am. It is written by the insanely knowledgeable Kate E. Stephenson. Read much more about Kate here, and click here to follow her on Twitter.