Iliza Shlesinger on ‘mom brain' and being a mother while hustling as a comedian
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Cosmopolitan
12 hours ago
- Cosmopolitan
Madelyn Cline and KJ Apa Cover Cosmopolitan for ‘The Map That Leads to You'
'Should I cut all my hair off?' Madelyn Cline asks, pulling her blond waves out of an updo. 'I was thinking of getting a pixie cut and—' KJ Apa cuts her off: 'No, no, no,' he says, incredulously. 'You're crazy right now—you've been working too long. When you work too long, you start thinking, Maybe I should dye my hair pink, or maybe just shave it all off! I love your hair. Don't chop it off.' It feels like I've crashed a private catch-up between friends versus what I'm actually doing, interviewing two costars on a press tour. The actors each rose to fame on the waves of teenage TV catnip; Madelyn on Netflix's hit Outer Banks,¹ KJ on the seven-season CW show Riverdale. And now their paths—and palpable chemistry—have converged in The Map That Leads to You, a Prime Video romantic drama by director Lasse Hallströn.² 1. Outer Banks season 4 debuted with a whopping 1.2 billion minutes watched, making it a huge success for Netflix. To no one's surprise, the show will return for season 5 in 2026. 2. The director behind What's Eating Gilbert Grape and nearly all of ABBA's music videos, fun fact. In the movie, Madelyn plays a straitlaced student named Heather who collides with KJ's spontaneous stranger Jack while on a Mamma Mia!–coded European sabbatical. 'It turns her girls' trip upside down in the best way possible,' explains Madelyn. 'They say opposites attract, and together Heather and Jack form one very complete Venn diagram.' In real life, Madelyn and KJ's bond is less 'opposites attract' and more 'two kids with race car brains hyped up on pixie sticks,' a pair of sprinting hares in a world of tortoises. In the beginning, they had only a passing familiarity with each other's work. KJ first caught an episode of Outer Banks while shooting The Map That Leads to You, and Madelyn watched season 1 of Riverdale while recovering from wisdom-tooth surgery (meaning, she remembers basically none of it). Yet the two have obviously now forged a deep, if chaotic, friendship full of playful fighting, flirting, and finishing each other's sentences. 'I always know that whenever KJ and I are going to be doing something together, it's going to be an absolute mess and a really good time,' Madelyn says. 'We're like Mr. and Mrs. Smith—if it was mixed with Dumb and Dumber.' Where does that leave our chances of staying on topic during this interview? Truthfully: doomed. KJ: I do now. So much crazy stuff happened while we were shooting. MC: Oh my god. KJ: We spoke to this dude who clued us in to how you have relationships with people in your current life that you potentially had relationships with in the past. MC: He told me that in a past life, we lived in Italy and I was your mom. KJ: Yeah! Wasn't it in the 1800s? MC: And then in another past life, we were brother and sister. KJ: Now we're just colleagues. MC: We got downgraded. KJ: I will say this: A good 60 percent of what he said has not happened. MC: True, but I think that's because we asked him for specifics. He did say that, for our mutual friend Alex Fine,³ this was his first lifetime on Earth and he's an alien. That I believe! KJ: We all believe that because, honestly, he doesn't have any logical sense. 3. A triple threat in his own right, having founded the wellness/fitness company Almost Home, acted in 1883 and American Primeval, and married singer Cassie, with whom he has three kids. KJ: With Madelyn, I felt like we'd known each other for a while. Everything was just easy. I wish it was like that working with most actresses. What can you say? Look at her, she's an absolute monkey beast. KJ: Basically, being a beast is all know what? I can't say it. It's just something you feel in someone. MC: If you know, you know. If a fellow beast is looking at you and says, 'I see you…you're one of us, you're a beast,' then you don't question it. KJ: I'd go to the dentist, honestly. I haven't been to the dentist in a long time. MC: Oh wait, I haven't either. We should make an appointment. KJ: I have a 3-year-old⁴ and any spare time I get, I'm doing my own shit. So honestly, I wouldn't go anywhere. I'd stay home and get all the things that I need to get done done. MC: That's some real dad shit. Daddy beast. If I had time off— KJ: I bet you would choose to work. MC: You're completely correct.⁵ If I had a month off and I could somehow make work happen, I would do that. Or I would stay home and sleep. I love sleep. I love being in my enclosure. I find it to be so much fun being nonverbal. 4. KJ shares his son with ex-girlfriend Clara Berry.5. Madelyn's filmography reflects her hustle: In addition to The Map That Leads to You, she was recently in I Know What You Did Last Summer and continues to lead Outer Banks. KJ: I want that to happen to me, honestly. It's lonely these days. MC: I think yes, but for me, it usually happens through work or mutuals. KJ: Honestly, cool things still happen to me in real life sometimes. I was flying back from Paris and the flight attendant gave me her number on a napkin. I loved that. MC: Did she really? KJ: Oh yeah, and I hung out with her. MC: You did? KJ: I did. I'm not going to tell you what we did. But also, I find that the grocery store is another great way to meet people.⁶ People aren't really on their phones much, so it's an easy way to have conversations. 6. Is KJ being 100 percent serious about all this? Maybe not. Did we still publish it verbatim just in case? 100 percent. KJ: Yeah. Honestly, for me too, I can just ask my son to go talk to a girl for me. I say, 'Go tell that girl I love her.' KJ: One time. My son is so unashamed. He'll just go do whatever I tell him to do. KJ: He's a beast. And he knows what he's doing, I'll say that. MC: He learned from the best. KJ: Not accurate. Because a lot of the time, he goes up to the wrong woman. MC: I don't have a son to do that with yet. KJ: I'm your son! MC: You have been. My son with an even tinier son. We're like a Russian doll set. KJ: I'm your freaky beast. MC: As soon as we get together, all of a sudden we start talking in code. MC: Yeah, it's funny. KJ operates solely on feeling. He leads with how something makes him feel, and if it doesn't make him feel a certain way, he's on to something else. KJ: I'd say that's accurate. By the way, that's why I'm sober now. MC: I know this because I'm your mom. MC: I can be spontaneous and instinctual, but I'm also a workaholic. KJ: I mean, you're on another planet most of the time, in a beautiful way. You're constantly teetering the line of somehow getting everything done at a very high standard, while making fun of everything at all times. Somehow everything becomes pink and fluffy and stupid.⁷ MC: Pink and fluffy and stupid…that is what my brain looks like. It's fluffy because there's a little bit of mold on it. It's a little rotted. There's a bit of brain rot going on. 7. For the record, KJ also describes Madelyn like this: 'She has such a lightness about her that makes coming to work so enjoyable, because you smile every time you look at her. I'm moody, but I can't not be in a good mood around her—it's infectious. It's really a blessing for me to be with people like her. It makes my job easier, it makes my life easier, and it makes my life more enjoyable.' MC: Let's say we're in a cartoon. And you know how in parts of a cartoon, they zoom into a person's brain and it's this physical space with little people inside? KJ has three of them, and they're all shooting BB guns at the walls. There's a thousand of these little BB guns just shooting around, pinging off the walls, and it's not stopping.⁸ KJ: Do I have ADHD? MC: Hmm, any more silly questions? KJ: Fuck off. Do you think I do? MC: KJ, we both do. KJ: I don't even know how we shot a movie together. And with Lasse! MC: I don't know how we finished any of our scenes. KJ: He was wandering around looking for seashells during filming. MC: One day, we did genuinely lose him. We couldn't find him for 30, 45 minutes. I think he was trying to get on the wrong train. He's wonderful. KJ: Really wonderful. I love him so much because although he's in his 70s, he still has all of his curiosity for life. I think that's why he cast us in the movie—he casts like-minded people.⁹ 8. Madelyn also has this to say about KJ: 'KJ is an open book. I really felt like we were a team on this one. He was my partner, and we were fully in it together.' 9. 'I think onscreen chemistry is really hard to replicate if it doesn't naturally exist,' Madelyn says about likeness and similarities. 'I mean, you can do what you can, but there's nothing quite like it.' KJ: I'm similar in that my relationship with my higher power is very strong,¹⁰ and I rely on it every day. I always turn back to, Okay, I'm not in control. Whatever's happening to me is happening to me for a reason bigger than I'll ever understand. In taking on this movie, I was coming out of a really, really dark point in my life, and the script was one of those scripts that kept following me around. I knew I had so much to learn from that character, especially where I was in my life in terms of control and acceptance at a time when I was like, 'I can't do this anymore. I have to put my hands up and ask God to help me.' I knew that this character could help me. That's just how God works in my life. I do think my character is more resilient than I am for sure. MC: I think you're a very resilient person. KJ: I appreciate it. I was nervous about this because I hadn't acted in a really long time and I hadn't worked since Riverdale. I was just coming out of a really difficult time, so I was like, Shit, do I still have it? But I did it. Something that I try to combat every day is this idea of self-worth. I think in our industry, as artists and as people who want to make a name for ourselves, a lot of self-worth is pulled from recognition of creation. You want to be recognized for what you've created, and you want people to see you. 10. KJ brought this part of his life to screen by playing a Christian singer/songwriter in 2020's I Still Believe, which recently hit Netflix. MC: That's actually something I was talking about the other day. Being an actor can be a bit of a mindfuck. People always say, 'Don't compare yourself to others' and 'Don't base your self-worth on things that you can't control.' But ultimately, we do base our self-worth on our work because that's our calling card, that's our paycheck. KJ: It's the currency of what we do. When I think about these things, it all comes down to the people you end up attracting in your life. Working on this movie and working with someone like Lasse, like Madelyn, it's a breath of fresh air to be like, Oh, I can put my ego away. There are certain people where your ego wants to jump out a little more and you feel like you have to be a little more defensive or protective, but there are certain people who make you feel at peace. I want to spend more time with people in my daily life who make me feel like that. KJ: You know what? That's why I love what I do, because I get to live it. I get to experience it through someone else and so it is my reality at some point. I'm not going to lie, I fell in love with Madelyn on this movie in many ways that, one, are part of my job, and two, happened because she's an amazing person. You lean into it because it's fucking fun, and it's life, and I like feeling great.¹¹ MC: Actually, this was a conversation KJ and I had pretty early on, about our own belief systems and how they tie into our characters. I want every project I do to be illuminating. It should feel like it's holding up a mirror to you, because then I get to learn and experience things outside of my life as Madelyn. Each filming experience is so wonderful and beautiful and holds its own memories. How lucky are we to be able to live these tiny little forevers? 11. Another reason KJ thrived in this role? His New Zealand accent: 'Playing Jack is the first time I'm using my natural accent, the first time in 10 years I've been able to live in the moment with another actor without feeling like I have a separation between me and the character with my voice, which is huge for me.' KJ: I know that no matter what happens, everything's going to be okay. If I believe that, then I'm not allowed to stress. I'm not allowed to worry. It actually takes such a load off me. That's what Jack taught me. MC: I have this thing where I love spontaneity, but sometimes I catch myself trying to control outcomes of a situation, outcomes of a feeling, or what I think I should be feeling. Heather taught me how to completely give permission. You know what I also learned on this project? MC: How to be a beast. MC: I highly recommend the friends-to-lovers pipeline. KJ: Don't be afraid to love somebody. If you love someone, fucking give it everything, just don't hold back. You live one time. You never know when that opportunity is going to happen again. MC: If you love someone, just say it. It shouldn't be this thing that is meant to be put into a case and opened up when you feel like it is the 'right' time. Love is something that just happens. It's nothing to be afraid of and you should express it. KJ: Life makes you practical and logical. Go back to your first instinct, man. It's to love. (Title Image) On Madelyn: Mugler blazer and pants, Tom Ford shirt, Hermès tie, Madelyn's own earring (worn throughout), Cartier ring. On KJ: Paul Smith blazer and pants, Carter Young shirt, Ray-Ban sunglasses, David Yurman jewelry. (Cover Image) On Madelyn: Khaite coat, t-shirt from The Society Archive, R13 shorts, Falke tights, Hermès boots, Bulgari necklace. On KJ: Loewe jacket and pants, t-shirt from The Society Archive, Frye boots, David Yurman jewelry. Styled by Brandon Tan. Hair by Ledora for R+Co. Makeup by Jennifer Tioseco for Revlon. Production by Deer Studio NYC. Shot on location at the TWA Hotel.
Yahoo
19 hours ago
- Yahoo
Taylor Lautner Reveals If He's Team Conrad or Jeremiah & 'Twilight' Is The Reason for His Answer
Taylor Lautner Reveals If He's Team Conrad or Jeremiah & 'Twilight' Is The Reason for His Answer originally appeared on Parade. Actor Taylor Lautner, who famously played one of Bella Swan's (Kristen Stewart) romantic interests, Jacob Black, in the Twilight film franchise, is sharing his thoughts about another famous love triangle. While speaking to People magazine in August 2025, Lautner shared that he and his wife, Taylor Dome, watch the Prime series, The Summer I Turned Pretty, which premiered in 2022. The series follows Belly Conklin (Lola Tung) who's had romances with two brothers, Conrad (Christopher Briney) and Jeremiah Fisher (Gavin Casalegno), at different times. In the show's current third season, Belly is engaged to Jeremiah. However, she seems to still have feelings for Conrad, whom she dated for a few months about five years prior. Lautner referenced that fans of the series are divided into two camps, Team Conrad or Team Jeremiah, which is similar to how Twilight fans reacted to Bella's relationship with Jacob and her eventual husband, Edward Cullen (Robert Pattinson). Lautner said he wants Belly to end up with Jeremiah because he thinks the character is similar to Jacob. 'My wife watches that show religiously. I would be lying if I said I didn't ... I've been watching this current season with her, so it's been a fun thing. I don't think she's super excited about watching the show with me like she is with her friends, but I get it. I get it," said Lautner to People magazine. 'I feel like because of my roots, I have to be Team Jer. But that's just because I feel like I have to. I feel like [Jeremiah] resonates a lot with Jacob. I know that'll irritate a lot, a lot of fans.' Lautner then shared he thinks his wife wants Conrad and Belly to end up together. 'I think my wife may be on the other team, and that makes sense because she was Team Edward as well,' said Lautner. During a July 2025 interview on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon, alongside Casalegno and Briney, Tong discussed the fans' response to Belly's love life. She said fans will often tell her if they are on Team Conrad or Team Jeremiah. She also clarified that she is "Team Belly, always." "I'm all for her following her heart and what she needs to do in the moment," said Tong during the interview. Taylor Lautner Reveals If He's Team Conrad or Jeremiah & 'Twilight' Is The Reason for His Answer first appeared on Parade on Aug 16, 2025 This story was originally reported by Parade on Aug 16, 2025, where it first appeared. Solve the daily Crossword
Forbes
21 hours ago
- Forbes
‘Betty La Fea' S2: Ana María Orozco, Jorge Enrique Abello Talk What To Expect
Betty la Fea: La Historia Continúa — Prime Video's global smash series, the sequel based on the hit late 1990s Colombian telenovela — returns for its highly anticipated second season, upping the stakes for its leading protagonists. The story picks up with Betty (Ana María Orozco) facing difficult choices about herself, her family and the future of Ecomoda — where she has returned as president. She makes another life-changing decision regarding Armando (Jorge Enrique Abello), who she admits is the love of her life, and continues her efforts to reconnect and build a stronger relationship with her daughter Mila (Juanita Molina), who is herself recovering from a romantic disappointment and betrayal. For Orozco and Abello, the revival is both joyful and challenging, as they ensure the show remains true to the essence of the story that audiences remember and love. "We're very pleased to return with this story that needed new chapters for fans around the world," says Abello. A Record-Breaking Return The return resulted in a record-shattering first season, with the largest global viewership for a Latin American title in Prime Video history and the most‑watched series or movie of all time on Prime Video in Colombia. The success was driven by nostalgia, curiosity around what happened to the beloved characters, and most of the original actors reprising their roles, with on-set chemistry and camaraderie enriched by time. "Reuniting with Jorge and the entire cast is a joy," says Orozco. "They're all wonderful actors. We have a lot of fun working, and we bring out the best in each other. Everyone contributes so much and the magic truly happens on set." Both stars now serve as associate producers and describe their role as guiding the spirit of the show — making sure the show's direction stays aligned with Betty's true essence, while big decisions remain a broader team effort. Streaming Format, Timeless Appeal The sequel's streaming-first format gives the 21st century series momentum without straying far from its origins. Abello contrasts the original telenovela pacing with the new version's episode length. "We always did 30-minute episodes where nothing and a lot of things happened, because the arcs would take 20 or 30 episodes to unfold so there could be real transformations within the narrative…. Now we have the same time but with greater punch." Orozco agrees. "Everything is tighter, more to the point…there are things you won't see but are told another way." Strategic flashbacks help old audiences remember and new ones catch up with history that provides context to the current story. Female empowerment anchors the narrative, reframing beauty, success and staying true to oneself. Orozco frames Betty's most visible transformation from Season 1 — abandoning a polished image to return to her original appearance — as a deeply personal reckoning. "The glasses and the look symbolize going back to her essence, back to herself," Orozco explains. "She's wondering whether the polished path she took was faithful to who she is, or a response to external pressures and a search for social approval from Armando's world. She's at a point in life where certain events trigger a crisis where those questions surface." But she isn't the only one doing some introspection as Armando's world crumbles under the weight of poor life decisions. "I don't know if Armando has fully evolved," admits Abello. "Armando is a product of a society where the discourse completely changed for men — where everything you've done from the past until now is wrong, so you have to reinvent yourself... He's trying to learn a language of norms he never grew up with, one his upbringing didn't prepare him for, which leads to mistakes and a real sense that he doesn't know where he belongs." Those internal questions intersect with the show's larger themes. The series continues to address female empowerment and the tension between change and continuity. Even as beauty standards and workplace culture have evolved over time, some negative attitudes persist. There are still characters who call Betty ugly, reflecting real-world resistance to change. At the end of the first season, Mila discovered she was used to bring down Ecomoda — her own family's company — by a vengeful member of Marcela's (Natalia Ramírez) family. She also found Betty's younger‑self diary detailing the painful past with Armando before his change of heart and her mother's forgiveness. Furious yet newly empathetic, Mila — strong, sometimes snobby, once dismissive of her mother — now understands Betty more and is determined to help her be happy again, away from her father, who is now on her blacklist. Betty, torn between her daughter's expectations and her enduring love for Armando, wants to reconcile her family and find a way to save Ecomoda from bankruptcy, a takeover, and legal consequences tied to Armando's failed investments during the pandemic. Armando, meanwhile, struggles with his own reinvention, burdened by his father's shadow and a need to prove he can be better for his family and everyone who depends on the company. "I feel we've done a great, conscientious job, with a lot of love, and we've had fun—and that will surely come through," Orozco says of the new season, which she hopes gets picked up for a third installment. The series is produced by RCN Estudios and written by Marta Betoldi (Ciega a Citas), César Betancur (Rigo), Valeria Gómez (Manes), and Luis Carlos Ávila (La Reina del Flow), and directed by Mauricio Cruz Fortunato (Manes). Season 2 is executive produced by Yalile Giordanelli (Ana de Nadie), Alexander Marín, VP of Distribution at RCN Estudios, and Juan Pablo Posada (Manes), RCN Estudios production VP. Betty la Fea: La Historia Continúa premieres today, August 15, exclusively on Prime Video in over 240 countries and territories. The new season has 10 episodes, with two released each week.
