Vanity Fair on LinkedIn: A 95-year-old diamond heiress and a much younger genderfluid reality star… (2024)

Exclusive: ‘Rust’ director Joel Souza, who was wounded during the on-set shooting that killed cinematographer Halyna Hutchins, finally tells his devastating story about the fatal accident. “When I tell someone it ruined me, I don’t mean in the sense that people might generally think,” Souza tells VF in his first interview about the shooting. “I don’t mean that it put my career in ruins. I mean, internally, the person I was just went away. That stopped.”In the emotional interview, the director mourns Hutchins’s loss, unpacks his complicated relationship with Alec Baldwin, and discusses his reluctant return to finish the movie. Read the full conversation: https://lnkd.in/dR_HEyie

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Former Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer is chasing one of the few prizes money (alone) can’t buy: an NBA championship for his team, the Los Angeles Clippers, whose staggeringly expensive state-of-the-art arena opens Thursday.Ballmer oversees the completion of his stately pleasure dome in Inglewood and constructing a championship-caliber club to play in it. It’s a tall order, as the Clippers have never won a title in their half-century-plus existence. Despite emerging as a recurring playoff contender, they have yet to shake their rep as the little brother to the city’s most celebrated team. “It’s hard enough getting out of the Lakers’ shadow,” he admits. “We’re trying to establish an identity.” For VF’s September issue, Ballmer speaks to VF about the passion project, his “unmatched” devotion to the team’s success, and his relationship with Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates.Read the full interview: https://lnkd.in/eDuguKz7

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In the wake of the success of Netflix’s ‘Wednesday,’ Jenna Ortega was grappling with an identity crisis of sorts. “For a long time I was so scared and so thrown off by everything that happened,” she says of her overnight ascent. She had dodged the minefields of child stardom, but growing up a Disney star came with other stumbling blocks—namely, finding a sense of self. “So much of my life has been on set with other people telling you what to wear, what to do, what to say,” Ortega tells VF. “I realized that I had lived pretty much all of my life under this naive perspective that I never challenged or questioned things because I never felt like I needed to.” She likens shooting the hit series, and the reception that followed, to a door opening. “It was the first time that I felt like I actually had to ask myself what I wanted.” Read her full September cover interview: https://lnkd.in/enHuC7Zp

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Jenna Ortega got a crash course in online celebrity media in 2023 after she revealed she changed lines on the set of ‘Wednesday.’ In what became a notorious interview, Ortega shared that she became “almost unprofessional” at times while filming, changing lines that she felt weren’t authentic to the character. She recounted seemingly prickly exchanges with the show’s writers: “They would be like, ‘Wait, what happened to the scene?’ And I would have to go through and explain why I couldn’t do certain things.” Her comments came at a tender time for Hollywood writers, and the backlash she received was swift. “Everything that I said felt so magnified…. It felt almost dystopian to me,” she tells VF. “I felt like a caricature of myself.”In her September cover story, the actor reflects on her comments and teases what fans can expect in the hit series’s forthcoming season.Read the full interview: https://lnkd.in/enHuC7Zp

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Presenting our September cover star, Jenna Ortega.The 21-year-old actor found her big break as a Disney star, but her overnight ascent came with Netflix’s hit series ‘Wednesday’—now the streamer’s most viewed English-language series ever. “A majority of the last year and a half has felt very far from me,” Ortega tells Michelle Ruiz. She describes the experience almost like a sci-fi thriller: “very dissociative and alien and out-of-body. When people mention my name, it’s almost like my name has been taken from me. Now I just feel like I’m floating and…I’m up for interpretation.” Her star will only shoot further with the release of ‘Beetlejuice Beetlejuice,’ a sequel to the beloved 1988 film.In VF’s September cover story, the Emmy nominee discusses her “sacred” bond with Winona Ryder, her experience with child stardom, the public backlash to her script changes on the set of ‘Wednesday,’ and much more. Read the full interview: https://lnkd.in/enHuC7Zp

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It’s been four years since Meghan Markle and Prince Harry walked away from their royal roles, sparking an endless stream of media attention and second-guessing in the UK. This year, the biggest royal headlines—from historic health challenges for Kate Middleton and King Charles III to royal banquets and honor ceremonies—have been coming from Windsor Castle and Buckingham Palace. Meanwhile, the Duke and duch*ess of Sussex are carving out their own semi-royal, and very philanthropic path, thousands of miles from their former home. Despite the usual tabloid rumblings, the Duke and duch*ess of Sussex are having a pretty solid year, expanding both their charitable commitments and Netflix offerings. After four years of high and lows in America, it’s time for the question on everyone’s lips: Will they ever return to the fold?Learn how Meghan and Harry are building their entertainment and philanthropy legacy on VF's DYNASTY: https://lnkd.in/eFSTsnzi

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