My wife had an affair and the pain is killing me. I'm worried the sadness is going to take over... BEL MOONEY reveals the only possible solution
I've been floored by how upset I've felt in response to the recent headlines about the so-called ' Coldplay
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Times
19 hours ago
- Times
My 50 minutes with Sydney Sweeney, the pin-up dividing America
'I love real estate,' Sydney Sweeney said when we met in April, back when she was simply Hollywood's hottest bombshell and not the Republican Party's favourite pin-up. She owned a $6.2 million Bel Air mansion, a $3 million Tudor-style home in west Los Angeles, a compound in Florida Keys and a lake house in Idaho. And sports cars? Well, she bought so many she was running out of space to keep them: a 1969 Ford Bronco, a 1964 Ford Mustang, a 2024 Ford GT and a Range Rover. 'Each property has its own vibe,' said the 27-year-old actress, who rose to fame on the HBO shows Euphoria and The White Lotus. 'So it needs its own cars to go with the vibe.' But even as the words came out of her mouth she stopped herself, immediately worried about how she sounded. Her fame felt vertiginous. She shot a look at her (two) publicists. I suspect Sweeney knew all too well, even then, the consequences of saying anything that meant very much at all. For the past two weeks she has been the internet's favourite political talking point. The latest storm blew up when an advert for American Eagle denim, which featured the tagline 'Sydney Sweeney has great jeans', triggered wall-to-wall debate as to whether this was a dog whistle for racist eugenicists. Next came the revelation that Sweeney was a card-carrying Republican, registering in Florida in June last year. 'Now I love her ad,' a fellow blond Republican with a passion for real estate, President Trump, said last week. 'You'd be surprised at how many people are Republicans.' To some, Sweeney is an attractive symbol of white 1950s-style Americana; to others, a provocateur who is in it for the cash. But who is Sydney Sweeney really? And what makes her such a lightning rod for pop-political debate? Sweeney was early to our interview by an hour (unheard of) when I met her in a Hollywood photo studio. I was thrilled — until I realised it was a reflection of her keenness to leave rather than her enthusiasm to arrive. A petite 5ft 3in, she sat with her legs folded, fidgeting with little boxes of make-up and often talking to her publicists on the other side of the room. She pulled as far back from me as she could. I could feel the height of her fresh fame acutely, her words put so carefully one in front of the other that it sometimes felt she was doing everything she could to sound boring. 'Privacy [is] huge,' she said. 'You don't realise how much that means until you lose it. I see all the time, 'Oh, they sold themselves, they knew what they were signing up for'. But 18-year-old me had no idea what she was signing up for.' • Read the original interview: 'I have to prove myself as a young woman' When it came to photographers, she found it 'crazy' that they were allowed to take photos of her at home. When it came to headlines, 'none of it's real'. And when it came to making friends, 'I've always been guarded', she said. 'Definitely more so now. You let few people in who you trust.' In fact, she exhibited such discomfort about being there for the 50 minutes — in order to promote a new movie as well as a number of brands — that it verged on annoyance. I suspect this wariness came from past experience, because this is not the first time she has ended up making political news. In 2022, when guests at her mother's 60th birthday party at home in Idaho were pictured wearing red 'Make sixty great again' caps, in reference to Trump's election slogan, Sweeney's blue eyes and bouncing blonde hair made her a pin-up for the American right. Prior to that, her boobs have been described as the 'harbingers of the death of woke', symbols that the left's obsession with political correctness and 'body positivity' was over and that we were back to the days of ogling old-school va-va-voom. I asked what it was like for her body to be so politicised. 'It's fascinating to see how I play a character that gets judged and thrown around and talked about because of her body,' she said, referencing Cassie in the teen drama Euphoria, the high school's popular girl, whom she said people perceive as a 'one-note dumb blonde, pull-your-tits-out kind of girl'. She added: 'And instead of having a lesson to the viewer they kind of mimic and shadow the exact same thing.' Yet it's also true that she has taken enormous financial advantage of her body, as an ambassador for Miu Miu, Armani Beauty, haircare brand Kérastase and Hey Dude, a trainer-slash-loafer company with a whole line of 'patriotic'-themed shoes. In June, in collaboration with the men's toiletries company Dr Squatch, she released 5,000 bars of soap ($8) apparently made out of her bathwater. In most of these adverts, Sweeney plays up to being a hot chick. 'I wear overalls more than dresses,' she said in a recent advert for Hey Dude, cowboy hat on, eyes sultry, hair tousled. For American Eagle, she speaks in a blissed-out vocal fry, lying on her front, back arched. And it works: Sweeney is now considered potentially the hottest chick in the world. But at what point does profiting from your body for its sexuality — 'because everyone else is!' Sweeney told me — end up perpetuating the same objectification you are angry about in the first place? It is a question the supermodel Emily Ratajkowski wrestled with boldly in her 2021 book My Body, which I mentioned to Sweeney. 'Mmm-hmmm,' she said. 'I'll take the power back.' In what way? 'You'll have to wait and see.' The main thing I was struck by was how keen she was to make money, largely motivated by her own upbringing. Sweeney was born in rural Spokane, on the Washington-Idaho border, her mother a criminal defence lawyer, her father in hospitality. Her younger brother, Trent, is now in the US Air Force. At 13 years old, Sweeney persuaded her parents — with a five-point business plan — to move to Los Angeles so she could pursue acting. They struggled financially. When she was 16, the family sold their home in Washington and moved into a Holiday Inn in Burbank, outside LA. They later declared themselves bankrupt. 'We were sharing a one-bedroom hotel room — no kitchen, no balcony. A pull-out sofa bed, where my dad and brother slept, my mom and me in the bed,' Sweeney told me. 'We'd run around the different hallways and find stairwells and make friends with all the staff.' This is the experience that still drives her: 'I just knew that I'd never allow myself to fail.' She started acting in 2009 when she was 12 and has appeared in more than 30 films since. This year she will have starred in three, as well as running her company, Fifty Fifty Films, which produced the rom-com Anyone But You. It starred Sweeney herself and grossed $220 million worldwide. Many of her other movies have been so gritty or gruesome you forget entirely how she looks on a red carpet: Reality, in which she plays former US intelligence contractor, Reality Winner, being interrogated by the FBI; Immaculate, a horror movie about nuns in a convent; and Echo Valley, a dark crime thriller in which Sweeney plays a young women throttled by addiction. She is a brilliant, bold actress. 'I will always want to work harder, achieve more,' Sweeney told me. She works six or seven days a week, sleeps for four to six hours each night and had last taken a holiday the year before we met. 'I love to work. There's 24 hours in a day, obviously, but I make sure that there's 26 for me.' It reminded me of similar comments by famous women who are open about being motivated by money and famous for making lots of it. In 2022, Kim Kardashian said the best advice for women in business was to 'get your f***ing ass up and work … It seems like nobody wants to work these days.' She was accused of 'richsplaining'. Discussing her own success, the British influencer and Love Island star Molly-Mae Hague was described as 'Thatcher with a spray tan' after she said: 'We all have the same 24 hours a day as Beyoncé.' These Instagram-ready celebrities are the pretty faces of consumerism, the women who have amped up their beauty and taken it to market. It is a gleaming example of late-stage capitalism, the newest iteration of American-dream Republicanism. Amid the furore over Sweeney, the Texas senator Ted Cruz declared: 'The crazy left has come out against beautiful women.' Welcome to America, where it's increasingly hot to be on the right — and the right is increasingly hot.
Daily Mail
20 hours ago
- Daily Mail
My wife had an affair and the pain is killing me. I'm worried the sadness is going to take over... BEL MOONEY reveals the only possible solution
Dear Bel, I've been floored by how upset I've felt in response to the recent headlines about the so-called ' Coldplay
Daily Mail
a day ago
- Daily Mail
The 'utterly mortified' Princesses: Sordid revelations about Prince Andrew forces Eugenie and Beatrice to 'keep a distance' from their father - as insiders fear what may happen next
Princesses Beatrice and Eugenie are used to reading lurid headlines about their parents – particularly when it comes to their father, the Duke of York. Affairs, sex scandals, bribery, abuse of power; no daughters should have to confront the sordid allegations that have dogged their family over the years. Such was the infamy of Andrew and his then wife, the former Sarah Ferguson, that throughout their childhood, newspapers were banned both at home and, by an agreement with their head teacher, at school. That is not, sadly, the case today. This week, Beatrice, who turned 37 yesterday, and Eugenie, 35, have endured five agonising days of revelations about first their father, then their mother, in an explosive new book by historian Andrew Lownie, Entitled: The Rise And Fall Of The House Of York, serialised in the Daily Mail. The exclusive extracts detailed the Prince's close friendship with disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein and his mysterious financial dealings with foreign billionaires, as well as making claims about his 'bullying' of palace staff, vulgar sense of humour and brazen sex life. The focus then moved to his ex-wife, detailing Fergie's allegedly hedonistic spending on staff, parties and holidays, an aversion to paying her spiralling debts and her desperate pursuit of high-profile men – including John F Kennedy Jnr and the golfer Tiger Woods. With the nation gripped by one shocking anecdote after another, one can only imagine the humiliation felt by the two Princesses. A source close to the family told the Mail this week that Beatrice and Eugenie are 'utterly mortified' by Lownie's book, especially its claims about their father. Although they'd been braced for its release, the reality – and the global furore it has stirred up – has been worse than they feared. 'They're keeping a distance from [their] dad,' the source reveals. 'The extent to how much the relationship can recover will depend on what further revelations, if any, emerge.' With the book not out in full until next week, there may well be more to come. Ingrid Seward, Sarah Ferguson's biographer and editor-in-chief of Majesty magazine, says Beatrice – something of a 'Daddy's girl' – will be finding the fallout especially hard. 'She has always been close to her father,' she explains. They will both be finding this very difficult – it's a horrid time. 'But I'm not surprised they haven't come out and said anything in his defence. For his girls to show their solidarity publicly wouldn't benefit them in any way.' Both York girls and their mother have remained steadfastly silent for most of the past decade, ever since allegations were first made about Andrew's links to Epstein in 2015. In an Instagram post this week, eagle-eyed followers spotted Fergie's choice of shoes: a pair of black loafers with the words 'Never Complain, Never Explain' – a favourite motto of the late Queen – embroidered on the front. It's a mantra her daughters, too, seem to favour when it comes to their father. Not only do they have serious careers to pursue – Eugenie in art, Beatrice in tech – but both hold several charitable positions, not to mention having young children whom they will be eager to protect. Beatrice has attended several engagements lately, and was spotted at the Lionesses' victory parade in London, alongside husband Edoardo Mapelli Mozzi, stepson Wolfie, eight, and their daughters, Sienna, three, and Athena, seven months. Meanwhile Eugenie, who lives in Portugal with husband Jack Brooksbank and their two children, August, four, and Ernest, two, has been busy entertaining A-list friends – namely singer Robbie Williams and his wife, Ayda Field – at her multimillion-pound villa. But family friends say their silence isn't just the sensible choice. Rather, it belies years of hurt and heartache the sisters had worked hard to overcome. Andrew was, throughout much of their childhood, an absent father. 'He was away a lot – either as a serving naval officer or on royal duties – so they rarely saw him,' a source tells the Mail. He has, it seems, adopted a similarly 'hands off' approach to grandfatherly duties. 'He gets hardly any practice,' the source says. 'These days, the girls are rare visitors to Royal Lodge [the £30 million Windsor estate where they grew up, and where Andrew lives on a royal lease, together with Fergie when she's in the UK]. 'They spend most of their time raising families, pursuing careers and trying to be normal. Andrew isn't completely ostracised, but arrangements to see Sarah usually take place elsewhere, and the girls seem keener that the King and other senior royals are part of their lives.' On social media, where Eugenie boasts 1.8 million followers, the last reference to her father dates back to June 2020, when she wished her 'Papa' a happy Father's Day. In an album of pictures entitled 'Family', Andrew features just once, in a photograph from 2018. By contrast, Fergie is pictured countless times – on Mothering Sunday, International Women's Day and on her birthday. In a recent podcast appearance, co-hosted by Prince Harry's ex-girlfriend, Cressida Bonas, the girls described themselves and their mother as a 'tripod'. 'We are each other's biggest fans and … we turn up for each other,' they said. Their father didn't get a mention. Their public indifference must be a blow to Andrew, who spent much of their childhoods fighting for his daughters, non-working royals, to earn places on the royal rota. He defended their HRH titles and is said to have been furious when their official police protection was axed in 2011. Over the years, Andrew lavished them with gifts, expensive schooling and extravagant family holidays. Some of the former, it now emerges, came from dubious sources. For Beatrice's 21st birthday in 2009, for example, she received a £18,000 diamond necklace from a Libyan businessman who had allegedly boasted he could 'influence' Prince Andrew to support certain commercial projects. In 2013, with his financial backing (and approval from Charles and his mother, the late Queen), the sisters attended a series of trade events in Germany to prove their mettle as assets to The Firm. They ended up making headlines – not for their ambassadorial prowess, but for unintentionally running a red light. A bemused official from the British embassy commented: 'This is making us a laughing stock. Better if they b****r off and marry millionaires.' It was a tricky time for the girls, then in their early 20s, whose love of holidays and partying had led to the labels 'spoiled royals' and 'throne idle'. As Beatrice and Eugenie grew up, however, a transformation took place. 'The girls lost their loyalty to Andrew and his pompous approach to being royal,' a family friend says. 'They'd been brought up to believe their breeding set them in a class apart. Their change of view was gradual, but was no doubt helped by having been out in the real world at non-Oxbridge universities [Beatrice at Goldsmith's in London; Eugenie at Newcastle].' Another associate says: 'Considering what they've been through, they're remarkably well-adjusted.' 'They are far more courteous and respectful towards staff than their father has ever been.' Nevertheless, when Andrew's name was linked to Epstein's in the 2015 sex trafficking case brought by Virginia Giuffre, his daughters initially sided with him. Epstein, after all, had been in their lives since they were children. Sources say they knew him as 'Jeffrey'; the kind American who gave them thoughtful presents and occasional gifts of money. But after Andrew's Newsnight interview with Emily Maitlis in November 2019, things took a turn for the worse. Beatrice was more involved in the ill-fated enterprise than Eugenie or their mother: the 2024 dramatisation, Scoop, depicts her attending a BBC meeting at her father's side. To this day, a royal insider says, Beatrice is angry with her father for not apologising on air – and regrets letting him go ahead with it. Eugenie was also deeply affected by the whole distasteful episode. In 2017, she had co-founded the Anti-Slavery Collective, a charity which campaigns against sex trafficking and modern slavery – a mission that could not be more at odds with the heinous crimes of which Epstein and his associates were accused. Her move to Portugal in 2022 – the same year Andrew settled out of court with Giuffre for an undisclosed sum – seemed impeccably timed. Eugenie's life in Europe today is undeniably lavish: she and Jack live in an exclusive golf complex, where he works in marketing, and where villas cost upwards of £3.6 million. For trips back to the UK, she and Jack have retained Ivy Cottage, their former home in the grounds of Kensington Palace. Beatrice and her family also have an enviable existence, purchasing a £3.5 million Cotswold mansion, with swimming pool, tennis court and 'party barn', in 2021. The sisters – not wholly immune to paternal influence, nor their mother's love of the high life – have a taste for the finer things. Sources say both employ Norland nannies, whose salaries can be £64,000 a year, and their social calendars are a whirlwind of prestigious events: Royal Ascot, Wimbledon, Chelsea Flower Show, gallery openings and garden parties. There are more serious issues on their minds these days, too. Fergie, who underwent a mastectomy in 2023, was diagnosed with a malignant melanoma last year, and her daughters have supported their mother through treatment. Both have thrown themselves into charity work: Eugenie for the Scoliosis Association UK, a spinal condition which led to her having connective surgery aged 12; and Beatrice for Borne, a charity supporting research into prematurity, after her second daughter was born premature. As for their relationship with their father, thanks to Fergie's efforts to keep her family unit intact, relations had started to thaw. The sisters had begun to spend alternate weekends at Royal Lodge – where both have permanent quarters – with their young families. But now family unity is once again under threat. So can the Yorks recover from this latest rift – or has their father's infamy become too much to bear? Motherhood, says Ingrid Seward, has made the princesses far more inclined to forgive – even if they can't forget. 'As mothers themselves, they value their family links more than ever,' she says. 'They've been through a lot together and they won't just abandon their father. Their lack of public support doesn't mean they don't love and care for him very much. Both girls have that Ferguson spirit,' Ingrid adds.'Fergie is quite remarkable – the way she rises through these dreadful scandals, which would squash most people, unscathed and still smiling. 'If they've inherited anything from their mother, it's that.'
